The Witcher’s new trailer teases a big, bloody season 3 finale

The first half — or volume, as Netflix calls it — of The Witcher’s third season started streaming in June, and it was clearly setting up this kind of large-scale conflict for Cavill to go out on. Here’s the official synopsis for the season’s conclusion, which will consist of three episodes:

As monarchs, mages, and beasts of the Continent compete to capture her, Geralt takes Ciri into hiding, determined to protect his newly-reunited family against those who threaten to destroy it. Entrusted with Ciri’s magical training, Yennefer leads them to the protected fortress of Aretuza, where they hope to uncover more about the girl’s untapped powers; instead, they discover they’ve landed in a battlefield of political corruption, dark magic, and treachery. They must fight back, put everything on the line — or risk losing each other forever.

In addition to the trailer, Netflix also shared a handful of new images from the upcoming episodes:

According to the show’s producers, the idea of splitting up the season was inspired in part by Stranger Things 4 as well as a desire to have a cliffhanger that viewers had time to discuss.

“In a streaming world, cliffhangers don’t really exist because you’re hitting play [right after an episode ends],” executive producer Steve Gaub told The Verge. “You don’t get that satisfaction of the anticipation and discussion and chatting online. So we wanted to give that to the fans, and the story was there for us to do it.”