True Insight, Final Battle with Mero

Before the duel, Syrio gave Viserys a special lesson.

In the vast waters north of Braavos, a crab boat lay across the sea.

At the westernmost edge of the Shivering Sea, from Skagos Island and the Great Cliff to the Sarn River delta, lay the most fertile fishing grounds in the Known World.

These fishing grounds were largely managed by Braavos, but deep-sea crabbers rarely came to such coastal waters. Their hunt was more dangerous.

On the gray-green sea, Viserys Targaryen crowded onto the bow with Captain Lingo and Syrio, the former Sealord's chief swordsman. Seawater splashed across their faces, salty and bitter.

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They had drifted aboard the ship for several days now. It felt like a way to experience life, and a kind of journey as well.

Viserys now understood why so many people loved the sea. Before this vast realm, everyone was their own king, filled with the feeling of rushing toward freedom.

Wild winds and towering waves swept in together. Though their crab boat was not small, compared to the boundless sea, it was no more than an insect.

Gray-green waves followed one after another, driving the ship to sway from side to side.

They said the most terrifying waves could rise higher than city walls and swallow any vessel. Viserys did not think that was merely a legend.

"Hold on tight!" the sailors at the helm shouted.

"It really is terrifying." Viserys felt the immense power created by storm and sea, as if they could command the wind and rain.

"This is nothing," the sailors said proudly. "The storms of the White Waste are far worse than this."

For the toughest and most seasoned sailors, storms near the coast were already a common sight.

Some waves were as large as houses, truly frightening.

Viserys watched the raging sea. The waves moved with the wind, roaring and howling, carrying the scent of currents and tides.

"You're lucky," Lingo said. "There's a storm now, but it isn't a big one. The sea is a cruel bitch, but we have no choice. Sailors make their living from ships."

Viserys rose to his feet and felt the might of the sea.

"Have you ever seen anything strange at sea?" Viserys asked curiously. If they reached the far north, would they see sea monsters and Wights?

"We haven't," Lingo answered. "Perhaps we never truly reached the far north. But there are legends of such things at sea. The most terrifying things are Ice Mist, Ice Dragons, and sea monsters. If the Ice Mist is blue, it drifts across the water and freezes every ship it touches. When night falls, the ghosts of the drowned crawl out of the water and drag the living into the abyss of the sea. Or there are merfolk more wicked than those in the south, pale-skinned with black-scaled tails, who pull sailors to their deaths."

In all those legends, cold and evil were the common theme.

Viserys did not mention the White Walkers. It seemed that north of the Shivering Sea, Braavos might one day face a disaster of Wights as well.

But those were distant plans. For now, he still had to face Titan's Bastard.

"There are still a few days before the final battle. Plestan will surely find some famous swordsmen to spar with Titan's Bastard," Syrio said. "But I will teach you another method."

Viserys had already understood that the techniques Syrio taught were about tranquility of mind and the movements of nature.

Compared to noisy sparring, this method required more skill and tempered one's character more deeply.

"Watch the waves. Watch the sea, Viserys," Syrio said. "Water is the source of Water Dancing."

"The scenery... water." Viserys looked at the sky and sea around him. He had been busy amid war and chaos, with the sounds of blades everywhere. He truly had little chance to observe the scenery like this.

Viserys watched layer upon layer of waves roll across the sea, like different forces piling atop one another.

My sword should be like those waves, each layer rising higher than the last, flowing without end, Viserys thought as he watched the magnificent swells.

Ordinary swordsmen found it difficult to reach such a state, but Viserys's attributes were high and balanced. He could do it.

The sea unleashed its power freely, the ship rose and fell with it, and the sailors felt out the strength of the waves.

Beneath the vast sky and sea, the sailing ship floated like a dragonfly on the water, its oars rising and falling in perfect rhythm.

"True Insight means perceiving everything—not only people, but the environment as well," Syrio said. "There is little more I can teach you. This is what you must learn."

Viserys nodded. "Insight. True Insight."

It meant broadening the scope of his attention, not stopping at his opponent but observing everything around him.

Viserys felt that if the Water Dancers' Way of Insight truly reached its pinnacle, it seemed capable of countering the Faceless Men.

The Faceless Men blurred their own faces through a miraculous kind of magic, while the highest realm of Water Dancers was perception.

Hardness and softness, lightness and heaviness, speed and slowness—these were the basic operations of warriors, while Insight stood above all such forces.

"I don't really understand the principles you're talking about," Lingo said. "The only thing I understand is that practice makes perfect. Only after spending a long time at sea can sailors hear the sea's voice, hear the wind's movements, and know where the richest fishing grounds lie."

"All arts are the same," Syrio agreed with Lingo.

Still as a shadow, swift as a snake—the truths of Water Dancing became clearer in Viserys's heart. He felt that he might soon touch the bottleneck of Water Dancing.

"What did you see?" Syrio asked.

"The wind blows, the waves move, and the swells pile together, each wave higher than the last," Viserys said. "My sword strikes should be the same."

"You have learned enough," Syrio said with certainty. "It is time to return, Captain."

"Very well." Lingo passed down the order, and the ship formally set course back to Braavos.

The crab boat cut through the sea, while the mist faded away layer by layer.

The sails billowed like purple wings, marked with symbols of rum and great crabs.

Viserys turned and saw a row of rocky ridges rising sharply from the sea, their steep slopes covered in soldier pines and black spruces.

A gap lay directly ahead, where the Titan of Braavos stood with light shining from its eyes and long green hair streaming in the wind.

Viserys looked ahead at the Titan of Braavos. Its legs stood on either side of the gap, each foot planted upon a mountain.

Its broad shoulders loomed above the jagged peaks. Those legs were built from solid stone, the same black granite as the sea reefs beneath its feet.

The Titan wore a green bronze war skirt around its waist, with a bronze breastplate and a half-helm of crowned bronze. Its flowing hair was dyed green rope, while its eyes were two caves with great fires burning within.

One hand rested on the ridge to the left, its bronze fingers gripping a massive boulder. The other reached toward the sky, clutching the hilt of a broken sword.

Viserys watched the ships passing back and forth. The Titan was frighteningly enormous.

"The Titan is the symbol of Braavos. I hope you achieve victory just as Braavos has," Syrio said.

"Warrior, grant me strength," Viserys said.

"You must win, exiled prince."

"Crush those Plestan lapdogs!" the sailors cheered.

The sailors truly hated House Prestayn to the bone.

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