"If you yourself are a demon god, why bother offering sacrifices to evil deities?" Kweixi looked at the Dragon Queen meaningfully.
Dany immediately understood what she was implying and said thoughtfully, "Blackfyre is almost a demigod now. Lately, I've also come to understand more about the divine path. Divine roles cannot be casually promised.
Most deities who accept sacrifices have a dark nature, including R'hllor, who is claimed to be the 'Lord of Light.' I don't want Blackfyre to become an evil dragon god."
Ever since she accidentally connected to the Seven Gods' faith pool, Dany had been trying nearly every day to re-enter her dragon-spirit state and communicate with believers praying to the Seven.
However, she was no longer as reckless as that first time, casually calling out their names.
Instead, she maintained a lofty, dignified demeanor—observing the believers, listening to their prayers.
At this point, she saw herself clearly as a "god-in-training."
Dany wasn't uneducated; she understood the importance of studying when ignorant.
Previously, she knew nothing of the divine path, so she naturally began researching everything related to gods.
When dealing with believers, a deity must be reserved, must remain aloof, must embody divine majesty. If a believer sees a careless, lazy deity, their faith will shatter.
In other words, a deity is like a celebrity—they must maintain their image. Only then will their believers become obsessive fans who shower them with rockets.
If fans finally get to meet their idol and see them picking their nose like "Princess Qiao Biluo," of course they'll stop idolizing them.
Through days of personal testing and study, Dany was now confident she understood most of the secrets of divinity.
God = IdolBeliever = FanFaith power = Fan economyDivine power = Total money contributed by fansGod responding to prayers = Idol interacting with fans
Church = Fan clubChurch name = Fan club's name
High Septon = Head fan who organizes fan activities
Believer's prayer = Fan supportChurch recruiting followers = Fans recruiting new membersChurch militia = Online "comment control" squadsReligious enemies (like Stannis to the Faith of the Seven) = Malicious hatersReligious war = Brawls between rival fanbases
Most importantly:
Divine role = Persona crafted jointly by fans and the managing agency for the idol
In modern Earth, personas are mostly for attracting fans and otherwise useless.
But in this fantasy world with real gods, a divine role (persona) grants the "god" specific faith-based skills.
Blackfyre's persona at the moment was problematic—he was the Grand Protector of Light.
The Grand Protector, in relation to the Seven Gods, was like Wang Chao, Ma Han, and Zhang Long to Judge Bao in his temple.
It was essentially the "Red Stick Enforcer" of the Faith of the Seven.
Even though Blackfyre could freely tap into the entire faith power of the Seven, the divine role granted him only two abilities—fire breath and bite.
Yes, Dany had tested it. After absorbing faith power, the dragon's internal magic fused with the faith power to form divine power (demigod-level power), enhancing his dragon flame.
First, the temperature increased.
With divine power, Blackfyre could nearly replicate what Balerion could do as a mature dragon—melt steel with his fire.
Second, the duration of the flame nearly doubled.
Finally, the color of the flame changed from smoky, sulfur-reeking blood-red to a radiant golden-red glow.
Strangely, the sulfurous stench disappeared entirely.
Blackfyre now truly had some divine presence to him.
Simply put, the High Sparrow and the Seven's clerics gave Blackfyre the persona of a "fire-breathing, bite-capable divine guardian dragon," and thus he received that divine role.
And with that divine role, the divine power reinforced Blackfyre's abilities to breathe fire and bite.
If he stopped drawing on faith power, his combat abilities would instantly drop to their original state: blood-red flames, billowing black smoke, and a choking sulfur smell.
In the end, power doesn't come from nothing. Faith power is a form of supernatural energy, and it is by using this energy that gods surpass mortals.
Take Melisandre, for example. She had been a demigod for a long time, but possessed no faith power. On the contrary, she had to offer faith to R'hllor.
Therefore, she was a demigod in name only.
Or consider the Undying Ones of the House of the Undying.
In the age when magical tides surged, male warlocks had true power. They were renowned throughout Qarth, feared and revered, with faith power flowing like a river.
Thus, the Undying Ones were immensely powerful. They could imprison fragments of time and create a knockoff divine realm (the Hall of Immortality).
But in the last days of magic, the warlocks lost their powers. The people of Qarth came to see the Undying as frauds, and their Hall of Immortality became mockingly known as the "Hall of Dust."
Without faith, the Undying lost their divine power—and were tragically roasted alive by little Blackfyre at just four months old.
Blackfyre had luck on his side. He suddenly became the sole inheritor of the "Seven Gods system," gaining access to the belief pool that the Faith of the Seven had accumulated over millennia.
Because of that, Dany didn't want Blackfyre's persona to collapse.
Blackfyre inherited the Seven's immense legacy because the Seven's believers gave him the persona of the Grand Protector of Light.
If Blackfyre accepted blood sacrifices and became an evil god…
That would be a persona collapse on the scale of Edison Chen's scandal—or Madara Uchiha, for that matter.
Coming from the modern world, Dany was like the agent of "Idol Trainee Blackfyre" and would never allow his excellent persona to be ruined.
The Grand Protector role wasn't perfect, but it was far better than the persona of a "glutton."
Yes, in this world, a god known as a "glutton" eats human flesh, drinks blood, and absorbs human souls—in other words, an evil god fueled by blood sacrifice.
—
Afternoon, after lunch.
Top floor, first level of the Great Pyramid, Queen's study.
Kweixi put down the scroll in her hand and shook her head. "No, without blood sacrifice, Valyrian steel cannot be reforged. According to this blood sorcery incantation, I'm one hundred percent sure—the blood sacrifice not only summons the power of the Black Goat, it is also a necessary part of the reforging process."
"To give a simple comparison," she continued, "the people of Qohor use coal fire and sacrifice to the Black Goat to smelt fine steel from iron ore. When you were smelting basic steel in Slaver's Bay, you didn't use blood sacrifice, but you still needed coal fire."
Charcoal fire is essential for forging steel.
The Valyrians were already well-versed in blood magic, and when they invented the technique for forging Valyrian steel, blood became a necessary component."
The scroll in Quaeshi's hand had been given to her by Dany. It contained the "Valyrian Steel Smelting Spell," written by the blacksmith Butto.
The Shadowbinder first confirmed the authenticity of the spell.
Originally, Dany had intended to use the spell herself to try re-forging a Valyrian steel sword.
But the forging process required a blood sacrifice of a black goat.
She had even drawn up a plan: melt down the Valyrian steel statue, repel the first wave of the allied forces, then raid the Temple of the Black Goat in Qohor and feed the evil god's goat to Little White.
Now, how could she offer a blood sacrifice to that god?
The verification of the spell had never been carried out, so it still wasn't certain whether the blacksmith had been telling the truth.
"Can it be improved?" Dany asked.
"Of course," Quaeshi nodded without hesitation.
"Do you know about Dragonsteel?" she asked.
"It seems to appear in the legends of the Long Night, where Dragonsteel was a weapon used against the White Walkers," Dany mused.
"Eight thousand years ago, when the Valyrians were still herding sheep in some forgotten mountain village, the world already had a kind of magical steel similar to Valyrian steel—namely, Dragonsteel," said Quaeshi.
"I'm skeptical about that," Dany shook her head. "Maybe Dragonsteel could kill White Walkers. Maybe it did share the same anti-magic properties as Valyrian steel.
But it certainly wasn't as 'immortal' as Valyrian steel, or we wouldn't have so few—if any—Dragonsteel weapons left today."
Given her status and position, if Dany herself had never seen a Dragonsteel weapon, then most likely, they no longer existed in the world.
They had decayed.
"Perhaps," Quaeshi didn't argue. Instead, she emphasized, "Dragonsteel and Valyrian steel have similar properties, but their forging methods differ. This proves that different forging techniques can produce the same quality of steel.
So maybe you can also find a way to smelt Valyrian steel without a blood sacrifice."
"Me?" Dany was taken aback. "I was counting on you!"
"I can help you modify the spell—change the sacrifice from a black goat to 'Black Diamond.' That's your black dragon's real name, isn't it?"
"Uh… now that I think about it, 'Black Diamond' does sound a bit… tacky," Dany said awkwardly.
Quaeshi didn't respond to that and continued, "The Black Goat is known as the 'God of Death,' whose divine power doesn't align well with that of a blacksmith.
Your black dragon is the opposite. The fire-aligned magical energy of a dragon is practically made for forging."
Dany pondered, "Perhaps when the Valyrians forged Valyrian steel, they sacrificed Balerion."
"Shall I make the change or not? I'm busy—I still have to prepare medicine for the Wildfire General," Quaeshi said.
"He's still drinking medicine? Didn't you see? He's completely unconscious and passed out from exhaustion," Dany said, eyes wide.
"I know what I'm doing. He won't die. Maybe, after enough purging, he'll get used to it," Quaeshi said flatly, with no trace of emotion in her voice.
Dany scratched the back of her head and sighed, "Teach me the principles behind modifying a blood sacrifice spell. I'll do it myself."
"It's very complicated," Quaeshi replied, clearly reluctant.
"I'm smart, and I have time to learn."
In essence, the Valyrian steel reforging spell had three parts: First, summon the dark deity known as the Black Goat to obtain high-level divine energy; second, perform magic to harness that energy; third, use Valyrian blacksmithing techniques to blood-forge the steel.
Dany now needed to revise two of those parts. Replacing the Black Goat with Blacky was the simplest. As for removing the blood-forging, or substituting it with animal blood—this was necessary to preserve Blacky's image as a "sacred dragon."
In the days that followed, Quaeshi and Bu Tian continued refining the dragon-essence soup.
Every day, Blacky had to eat loads of roast beef infused with all kinds of strange magical herbs.
Tyrion, meanwhile, would wake up to drink medicine, which would send him to the toilet. He'd pass out from the purging, then wake up and repeat the cycle.
The light in the dwarf's eyes began to fade, and he grew thinner by the day.
Visibly so—Tyrion was wasting away, reduced to a skeletal version of himself.
Because of this, Fenny even took a leave from the performing troupe.
Every day she stayed by his bedside, feeding him medicine, wiping him down, and changing his clothes. She had almost become Lady Hill.
The side effects were harsh, but at least the cure for greyscale was finally developed, and the Dragon Queen could breathe a sigh of relief.
After announcing the good news to the people of Slaver's Bay, she turned all her attention to a matter of great importance to Blacky's future—The Descent of the Seven Gods.
To help Blacky become a god, she first had to transform him from a temporary enforcer of the Seven into a permanent member.
Yes, if one day the High Sparrow turned against Dany, or if Blacky's image was destroyed—
If the statue of Blacky was smashed and his followers stopped praying to him, then Blacky would be "dismissed."
But no matter what, the Mother wouldn't be dismissed. The Father wouldn't be dismissed. The Maiden wouldn't be dismissed.
The Seven Gods would never be dismissed.
So, if Blacky could inherit the centuries of faith the Seven had accumulated, could he not also inherit their roles and divine personas?
This wasn't just a fantasy.
(End of Chapter)
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