As the Mandarin reads the imperial decree—any prince may woo Princess Turandot by answering three riddles, or be beheaded at moonrise—the fugitive Prince Calaf reunites in the crowd with his blind father Timur and the faithful slave girl Liù. When the young Prince of Persia is led to the scaffold and Turandot appears like a vision on the balcony to order his execution, Calaf is instantly spellbound and rushes to strike the bronze gong. Liù falls to her knees begging him to spare their lives ('Signore, ascolta!'); Calaf comforts her tenderly ('Non piangere, Liù') before striking the gong three times to summon his fate. Before the assembled mandarins, sages, and Emperor Altoum, Princess Turandot steps onto the marble staircase and explains why she executes her suitors ('In questa reggia'): thousands of years ago, her pure ancestress Princess Lou-Ling was dragged from this very palace and murdered by a foreign conqueror, and Turandot has sworn that no man shall ever possess her! She poses three riddles to Calaf: 1) The phantom reborn every night that dies at dawn (**Hope / La Speranza**); 2) The liquid that flares like flame when you dream of conquest (**Blood / Il Sangue**); 3) The ice that sets you on fire (**Turandot!**). When Calaf solves all three and Turandot begs her father not to hand her over like a slave, Calaf makes a chivalrous counter-offer: if she can discover his true name before dawn, he will gladly die at sunrise! Under pain of death for the entire city, Turandot has decreed that no one in Peking may sleep until the Unknown Prince's name is found. Alone in the palace garden, Calaf hears the heralds' cry ('Nessun dorma!') and sings of his certainty that at dawn his kiss will melt Turandot's icy heart ('All'alba vincerò!'). Suddenly guards drag in old Timur and Liù, who were seen speaking to Calaf in Act I. When Turandot herself demands to know how Liù can resist torture, Liù answers 'Love!' and sings her heartbreaking farewell ('Tu che di gel sei cinta'), predicting that Turandot too will love Calaf before snatching a soldier's dagger and plunging it into her own heart—the exact moment where Puccini's manuscript ended.