Valyria

Biodata

Feature	Details
Name	Valyria (瓦雷利亚)
Type	Ruined homeland of the Valyrian Freehold; later the site of Viserys III’s New Valyria 40 42 48
Location	Valyrian Peninsula, west of Slaver’s Bay 32 49
Historical Rulers	The dragonlords of the Valyrian Freehold 24 40
Current Allegiance	House Targaryen under Viserys III 42 48
Settlement Center	Satheryn Castle, also called Obsidian Castle 36 43 48
Population	Nearly 2,000 inhabitants after three years of settlement growth 48
Status	Recovering from the Doom’s magical contamination; partially resettled and defended by Targaryen forces 41 48

Geography and Landmarks

• Uneven destruction: Ancient records indicate that the Fourteen Flames devastated the peninsula’s central region most severely. Some coastal islands, fjords, and outlying structures survived with less damage 32.
• Sea approach: Before its recovery, Valyria was surrounded by the Smoking Sea’s dense fog and destructive magical turbulence. Temporary calm passages made entry possible, though still dangerous 33.
• Interior terrain: Viserys’s expedition crosses black-rock mountains, a molten-lava lake, and a poisonous swamp while traveling deeper into the peninsula 37.

Landmark	Description and Significance
Fourteen Flames	Fourteen volcanic mountains seen erupting during Viserys’s vision of the Doom; their eruption devastated central Valyria 24 32.
Smoking Sea	A surrounding maritime hazard created by the Doom’s magical contamination. Its gray-yellow fog disperses during New Valyria’s first three years 33 40 48.
Bleeding Peninsula	The peninsula whose southern tip contains the Kiss of Astapor landing site 31 32.
Kiss of Astapor	A fjord bordered by towering black cliffs, recorded as House Satheryn’s private harbor. It becomes the arrival point for Viserys’s relocation fleet 32 48.
Gate of Sighs	Two black basalt pillars marking the expedition’s approach to Valyria; still standing when the later settlement fleet arrives 33 48.
Bloodweeping River	A river leading toward a landing near the Obsidian Plains. The expedition encounters ruined carvings and a lake occupied by Stone Men along this route 33 34.
Obsidian Plains	The expedition’s first campsite, abandoned after attacks by Ash Crabs and Stone Men 34.
Satheryn Castle / Obsidian Castle	An angular obsidian fortress on a mountainside platform, bearing a triple-spiral sigil. Its defensible position, nearby fresh water, and surviving structure make it New Valyria’s initial base 34 48.
Boiling Oil Lake	A lake of molten lava inhabited by fire lizards; its name does not refer to actual oil 37.
Hall of a Thousand Pillars	Former headquarters of the Mages’ Guild. Marion believes its underground vaults may remain intact 42.
House Valaerys’s Castle	A surviving stronghold of a prominent dragonlord house, containing a major cache of Valyrian steel equipment 42.
Star Court and Furnace Canyon	Additional ruins identified on Marion’s map as potential exploration sites, with warnings of mutated creatures and other dangers 42.
Dragonlord Road	A new blackstone road paved between the docks and Satheryn Castle using recovered Valyrian construction techniques and Blackflame’s fire 48.

History

Origins of the Freehold

According to King Ghidorah, the early Valyrians were shepherds who exploited the peninsula’s unusually active magical energy. Through forbidden knowledge, mass sacrifice, and experiments combining fire lizards, bloodworms, and Ghidorah’s released energy, they created dragons. These controllable magical war beasts enabled them to establish the Valyrian Freehold 40.

The dragonlords continued pursuing greater power, deepening their ties with organizations such as the House of the Undying. Their increasingly ambitious experiments threatened the interests of the Maiden of Light, who had become R’hllor and could no longer intervene directly 40.

The Doom

R’hllor indirectly encouraged leading dragonlords to seek supposed divine power in the peninsula’s depths. More than a dozen dragonlords entered on their strongest dragons and awakened the wounded King Ghidorah. She defeated them, but the battle aggravated her injuries and caused her foreign energy to leak uncontrollably 40.

That energy reacted with Valyria’s existing magic, warping the magnetic field, contaminating land and sea, and producing mutated creatures and fields that disrupted life and thought. Ghidorah identifies this chain reaction as the source of the Smoking Sea and the ruins’ continuing supernatural hazards 40.

Viserys first witnesses the catastrophe in a dragon dream: erupting volcanoes surround dragonlords attacking a colossal three-headed beast. The vision prompts his decision to investigate Valyria for power and knowledge capable of restoring House Targaryen 24 25.

Failed Expeditions

Valyria acquired a reputation as a land of death. Jon Darry warns that explorers rarely returned and that survivors often became mad or died shortly afterward; his account reflects the region’s feared reputation rather than a verified survival rate 25.

Volantis repeatedly attempted to recover its ancestral legacy. Naharis Maro describes three expeditions that ended in burns, disappearances, or severe psychological trauma. Reports also identify an expedition led by Vaharis more than ten years earlier, comprising five ships, over 500 soldiers, 100 slaves, and 50 scholars and craftsmen 29 30.

Marisius, presented as a survivor, recounts glowing stones that sang inside explorers’ minds and transformed men into Stone Men when disturbed. His testimony also provides the first report of a living black dragon in the ruins. He is later exposed as an agent of the House of the Undying, leaving his guidance suspect 31 34.

Viserys’s Expedition

With Naharis’s sponsorship, Viserys studies ancient maps and expedition records, then commissions the Shadow Hunter, reinforced with lead and asbestos. Lead is a precaution against his suspected radiation or energy contamination, not a proven protection 32.

The expedition enters through a temporary calm passage in the Smoking Sea. A tentacled sea monster kills eighteen men and seriously injures twenty-three before fire drives it away. Further attacks on the Obsidian Plains force the survivors toward Satheryn Castle, where seven shadow creatures threaten them despite the fortress’s apparent protection from other monsters 33 34 35.

Viserys and Arthur defeat the shadows through coordinated mental attacks and strikes with Dawn. The castle yields weapons and magical records, but a living dragon’s appearance draws Viserys deeper inland. He leaves thirty-seven wounded or weakened people at the castle and continues with eighty-three fighters and the scholar Hallyne, suffering further losses at the lava lake and swamp 36 37.

Ghidorah’s Rebirth and Valyria’s Recovery

Viserys eventually meets King Ghidorah and learns the origins of the dragons and the Doom. Unable to recover in her existing form, Ghidorah compresses her life essence into a Primordial Egg. Viserys agrees to hatch it using the region’s remaining magic in exchange for her companionship and power 39 40.

Ghidorah hatches after one week. Her rebirth consumes much of Valyria’s corrupting energy, allowing the peninsula to begin recovering. Viserys initially predicts that the Smoking Sea will settle within three years and that the land will become habitable within five 40 41 42.

Hazards and Creatures

Environmental and Magical Hazards

• Connection-disrupting fields: Before Ghidorah’s rebirth, Viserys cannot reliably scout Valyria through animals. His skinchanger links become chaotic near the Smoking Sea and disappear inside Valyria 28 32.
• Heat and toxic conditions: Lava, sulfurous vapors, poison gas, and burning ground make travel dangerous independently of hostile creatures 25 37.
• Disorientation and illness: Expedition reports describe hallucinations, unexplained fires and leaks, sickness, and madness 32.
• Active ruins: Satheryn Castle retains a stable magical field, a lit glass candle, and lethal magical guardians long after the Doom 35 36.

Creature or Threat	Characteristics	Documented Response
Smoking Sea monster	An enormous, many-eyed creature with eight main arms and numerous smaller tentacles; capable of dragging a ship sideways 33.	Ordinary attacks are ineffective. Viserys and Arthur wound it, but fire ultimately drives it away 33.
Stone Men	Gray, hardened beings with eerie green eyes. They track the expedition, and their attacks can cause rapidly spreading petrification 31 34.	Soldiers target their joints. One infected warrior’s arm is amputated to stop the spread 34.
Ash Crabs	Fist-sized, dark-shelled creatures resembling crabs and cockroaches; their mouthparts can bite through leather 34.	Fire and bright light repel them; Viserys also disrupts them with skinchanging 34.
Shadow creatures	Seven regenerating beings created through blood and shadow magic, bound to obey a final killing command 35.	Dawn and Valyrian steel can cut them, but their bodies reform. Viserys’s mental attacks allow Arthur to destroy them; fire causes hesitation 35 36.
Fire lizards	Scarlet creatures that feed on subterranean fire and spit lava hot enough to melt steel 37.	The expedition skirts their lake but suffers two deaths during an ambush before driving them away 37.
Bloodworms and venomous spotted toads	Inhabitants of the poisonous swamp; bloodworms devour people trapped in its unstable mud 37.	The party uses a narrow route, but the terrain makes rescue difficult and causes further casualties 37.

Recovered Knowledge and Treasures

Magic and Construction

• Satheryn records: Surviving scrolls describe blood and shadow magic, with stronger spells requiring increasingly cruel sacrifices. Murals depict volcanic eruptions, dragons, and blood-summoning rituals 36.
• Glass candle: A lit candle found in Satheryn Castle indicates continuing magical activity within the ruins 36.
• Recovered library: A preserved study contains magical knowledge, building techniques, and the complete method for forging Valyrian steel weapons 42.
• Dragonfire Stone-Shaping: Powdered volcanic rock acts as a binding agent while dragonfire melts and reshapes obsidian. The resulting blackstone is exceptionally durable and becomes a principal construction material for New Valyria 48.

Weapons and Other Finds

• Bloodshadow: A Valyrian steel sword bearing Satheryn’s triple-spiral sigil, named by Viserys and paired with Blackfyre 36.
• Satheryn armory: Valyrian steel longswords and spears are distributed among the expedition’s knights and soldiers 36.
• Half-collapsed palace: Contains twelve Valyrian steel longswords and four suits of armor 42.
• Bright-Roar: Found beside remains identified as Tommen Lannister II in a coastal castle ruin. Viserys claims the lost Lannister greatsword for House Targaryen 42.
• Additional valuables: Magical gems, gold, silver, jewels, enchanted ornaments, and possible ritual or experimental apparatus survive in the ruins 36 42.

The recorded cache in House Valaerys’s castle includes the following 42:

Equipment	Quantity
Valyrian steel longswords	48
Daggers	22
Battle-axes	15
Spears	8
Full suits of armor	7
Breastplates	12

New Valyria

Establishment and Development

Phase	Chapter	Development
Claim to the homeland	42	Viserys secures the surviving Naharis party’s allegiance and announces a new Valyrian Freehold rather than a government in exile.
Initial foothold	43	Fewer than 100 people remain at Satheryn Castle. Arthur receives command while the settlers clear and reinforce the site.
Supply network	43	Alliser takes thirty trusted warriors to Astapor aboard the Shadow Hunter to purchase grain, tools, seeds, livestock, and enslaved laborers under a trading-company cover.
Secret relocation	44 47	Braavos remains a public front while Viserys moves his family, followers, and nine Targaryen dragon eggs toward Valyria.
Construction program	48	Settlers build housing, warehouses, workshops, and defenses. Blackflame helps pave the Dragonlord Road and supports blackstone construction.
Three-year growth	48	Hundreds of stone houses and several outposts surround the castle; the population approaches 2,000, and the Smoking Sea disperses.
Preparation for expansion	49	With the final Braavosi evacuees arriving, Viserys selects Slaver’s Bay as the first target for acquiring wealth, labor, and an army.

Government and Defense

• Viserys III — Founder and ruler; uses the names “new Valyrian Freehold” and “New Valyrian Empire” for his rebuilding project 42 43.
• Arthur Dayne — Commands the initial settlement and later leads patrols against foreign landing parties 43 48.
• Marion — Organizes recovered architectural and agricultural documents and supplies the knowledge used in blackstone construction 43 48.
• Willem Darry — Maintains the Braavosi cover operation before arriving with the final evacuees; he and Jon Darry manage Valyria during Viserys’s Astapor mission 44 49.
• Blackflame — Guards the settlement, scouts ruins, transports recovered treasure, assists construction, and destroys hostile expeditions 42 48.
• King Ghidorah — Supports the settlement’s security and guides Blackflame indirectly while growing to thirty meters over three years 43 48.

Secrecy and Foreign Access

• Concealed foundation: Viserys orders his followers to avoid attracting Westerosi, Free City, and supernatural attention while their settlement remains weak 43.
• Braavosi misdirection: Trade continues in Braavos to preserve the impression that the Targaryens are still impoverished exiles confined there 44.
• Restricted landings: At least ten foreign expeditions attempt to approach Valyria during the settlement’s first three years. Blackflame destroys some at sea; Arthur’s patrols eliminate others after landing 48.
• Manufactured reputation: Viserys deliberately allows a few survivors to escape and spread stories of curses and monsters, delaying wider exploration 48.
• Loss of natural concealment: By the end of the three-year period, the Smoking Sea has dispersed enough for distant ridgelines and the Summer Sea horizon to be visible from Satheryn Castle 48.