Summary
CD Projekt Red has revealedThe Witcher 4protagonist will be none other than Ciri, also known asCirilla of Cintra, and fans couldn’t be more hyped about this. The worthy heir to Geral of Rivia’s monster hunter business has been showcased in a spectacular trailer that reveals how she has aged and mastered the tools of her trade.
If fans are ready to know more about the heroine of this story, here are some facts about Ciri that not many people know about and everyone should know before playingThe Witcher 4. From the origins of her bloodline to one of the most devastating events her powers have unleashed in the world ofThe Witcher.
13She Is The Heir Of Three Great Bloodlines
A Link To The Past Of The Elven Race And The First Mages
Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon was born as the fruit of the love between the Urcheon of Erlenwald (also known as Emyr Var Emrheis) and Princess Pavetta of Cintra. Theirs was a doomed love story, never meant to be, but their unfortunate meeting was bound by the Law of Surprise, a powerful geis that is said to bind the fates of two people. So, when the cursed heir to the Imperial Throne of Nilfgaard met Pavetta, it was pure fate that made them meet. They thought they were in love, but it was a powerful ancient magic that drew them together.
On the other hand, Cirilla’s mother’s bloodlineties her to two characters fromThe Witcherlorethat are known for their exploits, and infamous at the same time. One is Lara Dorren Aep Shiadhal, an ancient and powerful elven sorceress who led her people away from the broken Elven world after the Conjunction of the Spheres. Lara fell in love with the human mage Cregennan of Lod, and together they sired Riannon, one of the first half-elven children.
Riannon had powerful magic that was nearly uncontrollable, and she ended up being adopted by the queen of Redania after her parents were murdered. Thus, these powerful magic users' bloodlines also transmitted the “curse” of their lineage up to Cirilla’s nearest ancestor, Falka, also known as The Bloody. That’s what makes Ciri’s ancestry quite the talk among heraldric experts, and a target for magicians both elven and human alike.
12Her Powers Are Not Limited To Magic
She Is A Powerful Medium As Well
Since Cirilla not only inherited her aptitude for Elven Magic but also a lot of the tools of the Witcher’s trade, she is quite powerful. But there are also a couple of things that make her particularly special: she has the power to see beyond past, present, and future, a gift that seems to have been sparked somewhere around Ciri’s elven lineage (and probably related to Ithlinne). Like her ancestor Lara Dorren, she is also a space-time mage, or “Navigator,” a power she used to evade her persecutors for nearly a decade.
Cirilla is also gifted with Telepathic abilities, which seem to be more attuned with animals than humanoids, this is why she was able to speak with “Horsey” (a.k.a. Ihuarraquax) a unicorn that saved her life more than once and guided her back to her world. Perhaps, she will be able towield these powers inThe Witcher 4.
11She Used To Have An Unicorn As A Friend
Though Bound By Fate, They Lived In Different Worlds
When Cirilla fled Vilgefortz’s clutches using her newly awakened powers, she teleported to the Desert of Korath, located southeast of the Northern Kingdoms, in the easternmost part of Nilfgaard. Here she nearly met her demise due to exhaustion, dehydration, and famine, but thanks to a unicorn whelp named Ihuarraquax, who she rescued from a giant Antlion monster, she managed to find water, food, and solace in a travel companion.
Together, they carried on their journey through the desert, though Ciri’s powers were lost by a powerful mind block she imposed on herself by rejecting Falka’s latent bloodline, which nearly drove her mad and caused her to end the world. Both Cirilla and Ihuarraquax parted ways when the little one was able to find his pack, but he would return later as an adult (since the time in their dimension works differently than in Ciri’s) to aid her again when she needed him most.
10Ciri Is Canonically The Heiress To Half Of The World
Her Title Is So Long That It’s Impossible To Fit In A Headline
As the heiress of Cintra’s throneand Nilfgaard’s Empire, Ciri is the rightful ruler of most of the Northern Realms and the Empire, since she is also related to the Redanian (by mother’s side) royal family, and to several other of the kingdoms by right of marriage and ancestry. Through her Grandmother’s second marriage, she is also a rightful heir to the Skellige Islands and part of Cidaris and Verden by right of conquest.
Her full title is “Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon, Empress of Nilfgaard, Queen of Cintra, Heiress to Inis Ard Skellig and Inis An Skellig, Princess of Brugge, Duchess of Sodden, Lady of Metinna, Ebbing and Gemmera, Suzerain of Attre, Nazair, Vicovaro and Abb Yarra.” That’s a lot of names.
9Her Birth Was Part Of The Greatest Conspiracy In The Witcher World
The Black Sun Was An Excuse To Justify Heinous Crimes
Ages ago, using schemes and the excuse of a prophecy about a solar eclipse, mages all around the Northern Realms (and beyond) banded together in a tremendously well-devised conspiracy to track down Ancient Elven ancestry in the heirs of the Kingdom’s most notorious kings and queens, and to conduct the most horrendous experiments, getting away with some of the heinous acts that would spark a generation-spanning war. So, the wizards managed to convince the kings and queens that some of their heirs born during the eclipse would be cursed forever and should be imprisoned in towers as far from society as possible.
This, of course, is revealed in Renfri’s tale to Geralt of Rivia, but there are lots of clues spread by Sapkowski throughoutThe Witchersaga about The Black Sun Prophecy being bogus and an excuse for mages to experiment on forbidden magic like the one that created the Witchers. How does this relate to Ciri, then? Well, at some point throughout the years, some mages managed to convince Emhyr to give away Pavetta for experimentation, in exchange for that they would spare Cirilla and grant him the opportunity to rule the Empire. So, yes, Emhyr sold her one true love and endangered his daughter at the same time, a foolish act that would doom the world.
8She Is The Human Who Is Most Suited To Become A Witcher
Her Bloodline Makes Her A Preferred Test Subject For Mages And Witchers
Since her birth is the product of the ages of meticulously planned “selective breeding,“orchestrated by mages to create a powerful Source(font of magic incarnated in a person) she is also biologically suited to become a Witcher and survive the terrible Trial of the Herbs.
It is possible that she is the most perfect candidate to be subjected to the changes without altering her biology radically, making her a Witcher and possibly allowing her to pass down her mutations to future generations. Unlike other Witchers and mutants, she could avoid becoming sterile during the process which leads to a lot of possible ramifications forThe Witchersaga. An excuse for more sequels perhaps? Time will tell.
7Ciri Used To Be Part Of A Criminal Gang Named The Rats
She And Her Crew Terrorized The Region Of Geso For Years
After the Tor Lara incident and crossing the Korath desert, Cirilla of Cintra was heartbroken. Her powers were gone, and as she was a fugitive of both the Empire and chased by Wizards all across the continent, what better than to join a gang of thieves and murderers under the moniker of Falka? Ciri explored her worst nature while she was part of the Rats of Geso, a bunch of war orphans who banded together to lash out at the society that had shunned them.
During her time as a bandolier, Ciri suffered a lot and grew into a teenager while going through an ordeal. She managed to somehow retain some sanity and humanity, despite the gang being forced to rob, murder, and worse to survive. During that time, Cirilla also got her famous Heart-shaped tattoo and fell in love for the first time, only to lose it all once again when Leo Bonhardt, the most notorious bounty hunter murdered her whole crew in front of her eyes.
6Her Power Was Foretold To Bring The End Of The World
Yet Another Prophecy Bound To Her Lineage
A recurrent topic inThe Witcherlore has always been the Ithline prophecy, whichalongside the Black Sun prophecywere the two determining factors in the development of the meta-narrative of the series. Ithiline prophesized the end of the world in an age of war and chaos where the wolf and the axe would cull the weak and only the strong would survive. But most importantly, she predicted the birth of a powerful sorcerer (or sorceress) that would tap into the power of Fire (forbidden for all magic users) to remake the world.
According to one of the parts in Ithlinne’s soothsaying, the world would be restored after being burned to ashes: “It will be reborn of Elder Blood, of Hen Ichaer, of the seed that has been sown. A seed which will not sprout but burst into flame.” This was most definitely talking about Ciri’s tap into the source of Fire in the desert and the events that were sparked after that.
5She Was Trained By Some Of The Best Swordmasters
Though Vesemir Was Her Most Important Teacher
Ciri’s instruction as a sword user started young when Geralt saw the need to teach her how to protect herself in the worst-case scenario, but it was later revealed that Calanthe had secretly been training her as well. Calanthe was a jealous and doting grandmother, and after the loss of Pavetta to the “shipwreck” who also allegedly killed Dunny (Emhyr) she became notoriously more fierce about her grandaughter’s education.
So she taught her a lot, a crash course on how to rule and direct an army. Though Ciri was too young to consider all this as important, she retained some of the teachings of the best swordmasters, one of them being Eist Tuirseach, king of Skellige. She would later be taught about swordplay by Vesemir, Lambert, Eskel, and Cohen. They drill-trained her to hone her sword skillsto the limits of human capacityand turned her into a killing machine.
4Ciri Lived In The Ancient Elven Realm For A While
A Doomed Visit To The Upper Realms
During her odyssey through time and space, Cirilla was captured by the Aen Aelle, the ancient elves who lived in a realm separated from the world ofThe Witcher. There, she was paired with Auberon Muicetarch, also known as “The AIling King,” in the hopes of restoring the lineage of Lara Dorren and the Elven’s time-space magic to their rightful owners.
Needless to say, this ended in failure, as neither Auberon nor Cirilla (which was being practically used as a breeding mare) were attracted to each other. During her stay with the elves, Cirilla discovers that the Aen Aella were always enslaving “lesser races,” both humans like herself and Aen Sidhe who they captured and experimented with. This ended with Eredin Bréacc Glas (also known as Sparrowhawk and the Witch Hunt Leader) murdering Auberon and hunting Cirilla down to resume what the former king could not do. Cirilla escaped through a portal to realms unknown, evading the Wild Hunt for a while.
