Chapter 23: The Crimson Sunset, The Dragon Gods' Echo
The campaign against R'hllor, the Lord of Light, was a masterpiece of insidious infiltration and overwhelming, targeted force. For years, Sōsuke Aizen's agents – the ever-adaptable Faceless Men and his arcane Sentinel constructs – had woven a web of doubt, discord, and decay within the Red God's earthly dominion. Key priests had been turned, discredited, or silently eliminated. Sacred flames in remote temples had "mysteriously" sputtered and died, prophecies had soured into falsehoods, and whispers of a greater, more ancient power had begun to circulate among the disillusioned. The time for the final, decisive blow had arrived.
Aizen chose Volantis, the proudest and oldest of Valyria's daughters, and the site of R'hllor's most magnificent temple, as the stage for his overt challenge. He did not arrive as a creeping shadow this time. He arrived as a divine judgment.
On a night when the Volantene sky was clear and starry, a new, terrible star seemed to be born above the city. It was Ignis Primus, the colossal magma dragon, teleported from the Obsidian Spire by a feat of Kido-Valyrian spatial manipulation Aizen had perfected. The dragon's scales, like cooling lava veined with incandescent gold, shimmered with an internal furnace that outshone any mundane fire. Its roar, a sound that resonated with the planet's molten heart, was a proclamation of primordial power that sent shivers of primal terror through every living soul in Volantis.
Simultaneously, Argent, coordinating with the Faceless Men already embedded within the city, unleashed a series of perfectly timed diversions. Explosions rocked the wharves, phantom attackers were "sighted" near the Black Walls, and reports of slave uprisings in the outer districts drew the attention of the Tiger Cloaks and the city's garrison. The stage was being set.
Then, Aizen descended. He did not arrive on dragonback this time, initially. He materialized directly before the Great Temple of R'hllor, a figure wreathed in an aura that was neither pure light nor absolute darkness, but a terrifying fusion of both. His form was that of a divine being, ethereal yet undeniably real, his eyes holding the cold light of distant nebulae. Kyōka Suigetsu was a subtle shimmer around him, ensuring that while his power was felt, his true, anathema-inducing nature was veiled just enough to prevent mass insanity, instead inspiring awe and profound dread. Vhagarion, his original emerald-streaked behemoth, landed with a ground-shattering impact on the plaza before the temple, a clear line drawn against any interference. A squadron of Aizen's elite juvenile dragons, now fully mature and fearsome, circled overhead, their roars a challenging chorus to Ignis Primus's deeper thunder.
The High Priest of R'hllor in Volantis, Benerro, a man renowned for his fiery oratory and potent command of flame, emerged onto the temple steps, flanked by dozens of heavily armed temple guards and fanatical Red Priests, their hands already blazing with conjured fire.
"Abomination! Spawn of the Great Other!" Benerro thundered, his voice amplified by his god's power, though a tremor of fear was evident even to the distant onlookers. "You dare defile this sacred place with your unholy presence? R'hllor's light will consume you!"
Aizen merely smiled, a chillingly serene expression. "Your 'Lord of Light,' priest, is but a flickering candle before a cosmic inferno. Its time is at an end. I have come to collect what is due."
The battle for the Volantene Temple was short, brutal, and utterly one-sided in its pivotal moments. The Red Priests unleashed torrents of sacred flame, but Ignis Primus, under Aizen's silent command, simply inhaled them. The colossal magma dragon drank R'hllor's fire as if it were a refreshing draught, its golden veins blazing brighter, its incandescent eyes mocking the priests' efforts. When it exhaled, it was not with R'hllor's orange-red flame, but with a torrent of pure, white-hot primordial fire that vaporized stone and sent priests screaming as their own god's element turned against them, supercharged and refined.
Aizen himself moved through the ensuing chaos like a phantom, yet with the irresistible force of a divine judgment. Kido spells of immense power, disguised as manifestations of shadow and cold light – direct counters to R'hllor's imagery – erupted around him. He shattered wards with a gesture, unraveled fire elementals with a thought, and used Kyōka Suigetsu to turn squads of temple guards against each other, their minds filled with illusions of their comrades being demonic entities.
His true target was the petrified weirwood heart-tree hidden deep within the temple's foundations, the anchor Argent had identified. With Vhagarion blasting open a direct path through the temple's structure, Aizen reached the ancient, blackened tree. It pulsed with a furious, fiery energy, the concentrated essence of R'hllor's Volantene power.
"A co-opted vessel," Aizen observed, touching the charred bark. "You drew power from the earth, R'hllor, and cloaked it in the guise of fire and light. A clever deception, for mortals."
He did not seek to destroy the tree outright. Instead, he placed his hand upon it, and the Hōgyoku, his divine core, began to drain it. The fiery energy within the weirwood, the very spiritual lifeblood of R'hllor in this city, poured into Aizen in a visible torrent of crimson and gold light. Ignis Primus, sensing this, landed heavily beside the temple's gaping maw, adding its own power to the process, drawing upon the released geothermal energies the tree had once commanded. The tree began to crumble, its stolen fire returning to a far greater, more encompassing master.
The High Priest Benerro, witnessing his temple's sanctum violated and its sacred heart extinguished, let out a cry of despair that was cut short as Argent, moving with the silent speed of a Faceless Man, delivered the "gift" of a swift, merciful end.
With the Volantene anchor severed, a shockwave of spiritual dissonance rippled through R'hllor's global network. Aizen, already anticipating this, had his Sentinels and Faceless Men strike simultaneously at other identified nexuses across Essos. Sacred flames in Myr and Lys flickered and died. Prophetic visions granted to Red Priests in Pentos turned into horrifying nightmares or utter, terrifying silence. The Red God's power was being systematically dismantled.
Now, Aizen turned to the core. Projecting his consciousness onto the metaphysical plane, guided by the dying tendrils of R'hllor's energy, he sought out the central egregore itself. He found it not in a specific location, but as a vast, amorphous realm of sentient fire, light, and shadow, a tempestuous sea of collective belief, sacrifice, and raw elemental force, held together by a pseudo-sentience born of millennia of worship.
The R'hllor entity reacted to his intrusion with a storm of divine fury – visions of blazing judgment, waves of soul-searing heat, armies of fiery angels and shadowy demons. But Aizen, now a god in his own right, waded through these manifestations with contemptuous ease. Kyōka Suigetsu was his shield and his sword in this psychic battleground. He showed the R'hllor entity illusions of its "Great Other" achieving ultimate victory, of its sacred flames being snuffed out by an eternal, cold darkness, thereby creating fissures of despair within its collective consciousness. He then presented his own divine essence as a "truer light," a more "perfect fire," a more "absolute order," offering the constituent energies and soul-fragments within the R'hllor gestalt a path to a higher, more stable existence through assimilation into him.
The struggle was immense, a battle of wills fought on a plane beyond mortal comprehension. But Aizen's singular, Hōgyoku-fused will, sharpened by eons of ambition and refined by the consumption of countless souls and one other "god," was far superior to the diffuse, emotionally driven consciousness of R'hllor. Slowly, inexorably, he unraveled the Red God, absorbing its vast reserves of fire-aspected spiritual energy, its understanding of light and shadow manipulation, its priests' ability to see (often flawed) futures in flames, and even the echoes of its followers' fervent belief.
When it was finally over, an eerie calm descended upon the metaphysical realm where R'hllor had once blazed. Aizen felt a profound surge of new power, a warmth that was not just destructive fire, but the very essence of radiance, of revelation, of the searing truth. He could now command flames that could purify or utterly annihilate, peer into the tapestry of fate with far greater clarity (though he knew true omniscience was a fool's trap, preferring instead to shape destiny), and even project an aura of divine inspiration or terrifying judgment that would make R'hllor's former priests seem like charlatans.
The physical world reflected this divine shift. Across Essos and Westeros, the sacred flames of R'hllor either died completely, leaving behind cold ash and bewildered acolytes, or they flickered with a new, strange light, their prophetic visions now subtly influenced by Aizen's will, guiding their interpretations towards his own ends. Many Red Priests lost their powers entirely, their faith shattered. Some, the most adaptable or ambitious, found their abilities subtly altered, now drawing upon a new, unnamed divine source that offered even greater, if more demanding, power – these became Aizen's unwitting (or, in a few rare cases, secretly converted) agents. The religion of the Lord of Light was broken, its heart devoured, its remnants left to either fade into obscurity or be subtly repurposed by the god who had consumed its essence.
Aizen returned to the Obsidian Spire, the divine energies of R'hllor settling within him, a new facet added to his ever-expanding godhood. He spent a period in deep contemplation, integrating this new power, understanding its nuances, and observing the ripples of his actions across the world. The chaos and confusion within the R'hllor faith provided a fresh wave of ambient spiritual distress, a delicate dessert after the main course.
His divine appetite, however, was insatiable. The consumption of two "gods" – the Many-Faced God of Death and R'hllor the Lord of Light – had only sharpened his hunger, broadened his perspective on the myriad forms divinity could take in this world. His gaze now turned inwards, or rather, downwards, towards the very foundations of his rebirth in this realm: Valyria.
He had risen from its ashes, a dragonlord reborn. He had harnessed its Doom. He had plundered its ruins. But one final aspect of its legacy remained untouched, unconsumed: its original gods. The deities worshipped by the Valyrian Freehold in its prime, the beings whose names had been given to its mightiest dragons, the powers that had supposedly overseen its unparalleled mastery of fire, blood, and sorcery.
Who were Balerion, Meraxes, and Vhagar the gods? Were they mere personifications, as some maesters believed? Or were they true entities, ancient powers tied to the Fourteen Flames, their essences perhaps lingering, dormant or fragmented, within the ruins of their fallen empire, within the very bedrock of the Smoking Sea?
Aizen delved into the deepest, most forbidden Valyrian texts he had salvaged – scrolls bound in dragonhide, tablets of obsidian etched with glyphs that radiated ancient power. He sought out mentions of the Valyrian pantheon, their creation myths, their sacred rituals, their spiritual domains. The information was fragmented, often contradictory, veiled in allegory and the arrogance of a people who believed themselves gods.
Yet, patterns emerged. The Valyrian gods were not depicted as anthropomorphic beings dwelling on a celestial mountain. They were intrinsically linked to the Fourteen Flames: gods of the molten heart, goddesses of the shadow-smoke, deities of the gemstone veins and the dragon's fire. They were chthonic, elemental, primal. Their worship involved offerings of fire, blood, and sometimes, it was whispered, soul-essence.
Aizen's divine senses, now attuned to the subtlest spiritual vibrations, began to scan his own domain – the Obsidian Spire, the Smoking Sea, the very geothermal vents that powered his fortress. He felt… echoes. Faint, incredibly ancient signatures of immense power, slumbering deep within the earth, or perhaps bound to specific, unplundered ruins of colossal Valyrian temples that had been swallowed by the Doom. These were not active consciousnesses like R'hllor or the Many-Faced God had been before their consumption. These felt more like dormant seeds of divinity, or fractured god-shards, waiting for a catalyst, or a sufficiently powerful will, to awaken or reclaim them.
The allure was irresistible. To consume these forgotten Valyrian deities would be more than just another acquisition of power. It would be the ultimate act of inheritance, of superseding the very divine forces that had shaped his Valyrian rebirth. It would grant him access to the deepest, most primal secrets of Valyrian magic, of dragon creation, perhaps even the true, metaphysical cause of the Doom itself. It would complete his mastery over the legacy of fire and blood.
"The children have forgotten their parents," Aizen mused, a predatory gleam in his cosmic eyes. "It is time for a new god to remind this world of the true meaning of Valyrian power – by devouring its very source."
His next hunt had begun. The search for the lost gods of Old Valyria, the slumbering titans beneath the ashes, would be a journey into the very heart of the cataclysm that had birthed his current existence. And the Hōgyoku, his divine soul, resonated with a profound, almost familial anticipation. This was not just a feast; it was a reclamation.