Ice and Fire: Conquering the World Starting from the Wall

For Stannis, today wasn't the worst day of his life, after all, he had experienced battles far more brutal than this.

And today's outcome, strictly speaking, cannot even be considered a failure.

Stannis's losses were very limited, mostly caused by the fire-breathing beast; the damage inflicted by the wildlings on his army was negligible.

However, during the subsequent retreat, countless savages relentlessly harassed the rearguard, forcing him to send out cavalry to drive them away.

However, with a demonic dragon circling in the sky, the riders dared not gather too closely or pursue too deeply. So they went back and forth, wasting each other's time and energy until the sun went down.

They were forced to rest in an abandoned village inhabited by savages.

In Stannis's eyes, this place hardly qualifies as a village.

It consists of only four single-room buildings made of stone without mortar plaster, surrounding an empty sheep pen and a well, three of which have already collapsed.

The only intact building had a sod roof and windows covered with tattered furs. It had been simply cleaned by the servants and was being used as a temporary palace for the king.

The savages who built this house probably never imagined that one day this dilapidated house would host a noble king from the south, a real king.

Above the house stood a tall, deformed weir tree with dark red leaves and pale branches.

This was the largest heart tree Stannis had ever seen in his life, with a trunk nearly eight feet in diameter and lush foliage that covered the entire village.

But what's truly unsettling isn't the size of the tree, but the face on it... especially the mouth, which isn't a simple horizontal cut, but a jagged hole, big enough to swallow a sheep.

The cavity was filled with ashes, indicating that someone had burned something inside.

What a knight found in the ashes was not the animal bones he had previously guessed, but a human skull.

"An evil priest."

The king heard some of his followers, who had converted to the King of Light, discussing this.

Perhaps in their view, only burning a living person is a sign of piety towards the Lord of Light, and the one in the tree hole was obviously already dead before being burned, because only half of its head remained.

Sir Richard Hope kept nagging in the King's ear, trying to persuade Stannis to continue the attack.

He thought the dragon was too small and afraid of arrows, so it was not a threat at all.

If they launch a few more charges, the savages will completely collapse.

The Wall will then have a true liberator, and the entire North will be grateful to King Stannis and pledge their loyalty to him.

Sir Richard was lean and had short, dark hair. He had a resolute gaze and his face was covered with pockmarks and old scars.

His loyalty was beyond question, but Stannis's face was still etched with exhaustion because the vast majority of the others had expressed their opposition.

They included Sir Nabert Grandson, Sir Benethorne Scars, Sir Somber Dalton, Sir Lambert Whitewater, Sir Peggy Frade, and Earl Swett.

"The warhorses were frightened, and the soldiers were talking amongst themselves."

Sir Dalton spoke with a tense expression.

"Lady Melisandre claimed that His Majesty the King was the reincarnation of Azor Ahai and would awaken the dragon in the stone, but the soldiers saw a dragon fighting for the wildlings."

"By the Seven Gods, now even the wildlings have dragons, except for that little Targaryen girl."

Are dragons some kind of turnip that grows in fields? Can just anyone own one?

Dalton's complaint voiced the common doubt in everyone's heart, so much so that no one cared about his disrespect for Allah Rahro and his prayer to the Seven Gods instead.

A dozen or so buzzing voices immediately rose from the simple stone room. Before this, no one had ever imagined that they would encounter a dragon attack on the battlefield.

The last time they heard news of dragons was from across the Narrow Sea, about the last Targaryen girl.

She is said to have a three-headed dragon, a reference to Aegon the Conqueror from hundreds of years ago, but no one has ever actually seen one, and most people just laugh it off as a story.

The crowd was noisy, and Sir Peggy Frad even absurdly suggested that the Dragon Queen might have conquered the frontier before them.

Count Swett refuted his argument, suggesting that a decision be made after Lady Melisandre had received the Lord of Light's will from the flames.

Everyone agreed.

Meanwhile, the Scarlet Witch, draped in a simple robe, stared at the rekindled fire in the weirwood tree hollow, trying to get guidance from the King of Light.

Nothing is more suitable for listening to divine pronouncements than the flames produced by burning weirwood.

Many people witnessed the dragon breathing fire. The guardian knights around the Scarlet Witch were all killed or wounded in the dragon's flames, while Lady Melisandre only lost her clothes and was otherwise unharmed.

In their eyes, this was tantamount to a miracle, a testament to the power of the King of Light.

Otherwise, almost everyone would question her authority because the dragon appeared in the opposing camp.

After a long while, Melisandre left the weirwood tree and slowly walked into the stone hut.

Besides the king, the room was crowded with nobles and knights who followed her, all looking at her with expectant eyes, wanting to hear God's guidance.

"I need to speak with His Majesty the King alone."

Melisandre said.

The crowd murmured their discontent, but intimidated by the king's majesty and their faith in the King of Light, they squeezed through the narrow doorway one by one.

When only the king and the priestess remained in the room, Stannis finally could no longer contain his irritation.

"Madam," he said through gritted teeth, "has the Lord of Light sent down a divine decree?"

Stannis was born with broad shoulders, strong limbs, and skin as hard as iron from long-term exposure to the scorching sun.

Although he was not yet thirty-five years old, he had only a row of thin black hair on his head, which resembled the shadow of a crown around his ears. His beard was trimmed short and neat, covering his square jaw and the hollows of his cheekbones.

He has lost at least ten pounds since he set sail from Dragonstone.

Melisandre sat gracefully on the low bed made of mud and straw, which seemed to be covered not with dirty straw, but with some kind of fine silk.

She was only wearing a gray-blue knight's cloak, with nothing underneath, but she didn't feel cold at all.

"I warned long ago that this is land corrupted by ancient alien gods, and my connection with the Lord of Light has become extremely weak."

Melisandre shook her head as she spoke.

"In the flames I saw only darkness, dotted with stars, and nothing else."

Stannis pressed his clenched fist against his jaw.

"This is a necessary military option, madam."

If they don't outflank the savages and launch a surprise attack from behind, the Wall will be completely taken over by Mance Red and that so-called "Star Child".

Once they have fortified their defenses, defeating them would require tens of thousands of soldiers, and at least a fifth of them would die.

"You should first win the support of the North."

Melisandre stood by her convictions.

"If we don't produce some respectable victories, how can we win the hearts and minds of those barbarians?!"

Their tempers were as foul and stubborn as rocks in a latrine; if they had known a little more flexibility, the Starks wouldn't have lost two generations of dukes and an heir in King's Landing.

The king looked distressed.

He believed that witches only knew how to interpret fire and were completely ignorant of politics.