"Although this is our first attack, we cannot back down easily." The tall, thin man had rust-colored hair, pale skin, and cold, dead eyes, and his chosen weapon was a Dothraki arakh.
"Charge!" The Wolf Pack Company and Purplebeard's Brigand Knights clashed in a melee. Seeing that things had gone wrong, some of the fleeing slaves had already scattered into the night.
The mercenaries fought with brutal directness, immediately plunging into a bloody brawl. Purplebeard's men unexpectedly possessed decent armor, which explained where they had found the courage to charge.
"Follow me!" the Handsome Man shouted, then brandished his longsword and engaged Purplebeard as the battlefield descended into chaos.
One member of the Wolf Pack Company was pinned to the earth by a bandit knight's longspear, while Long Spear's horse lashed out with its hind legs to shatter an enemy's spine.
The Wolf Pack Company was smaller in number, but far fiercer and better equipped; Purplebeard's men were more numerous, yet significantly looser in formation. A reckless bandit knight charged straight at Gendry, only for Gendry's warhammer to sweep across and strike him squarely in the chest. It punched through leather armor, hide, muscle, and lungs, killing him instantly. Watching the bandit knight's blood slowly cool, Gendry pulled his warhammer free from the corpse. Without missing a beat, he launched a new attack.
A bandit infantryman thrust a spear toward Gendry's chest, but Gendry swung his warhammer and batted the spear aside, forcing the man to leap backward. Yet Morningstar, the Wolf Pack drillmaster, promptly wheeled his mount around and trampled the bandit knight beneath his horse's hooves.
Another throwing spear came whistling at Gendry from the right, embedding itself in his wooden shield with a dull thud. Gendry relentlessly pursued the thrower. With the enemy holding his shield high, Gendry circled him on horseback, bringing his mace down in a relentless rain of blows that sent oak splinters flying. While greenwood and iron shields made fine defenses, ordinary oak shields fell far short.
"Crash!" Gendry's mace whipped up a vortex of death, smashing away half the bandit knight's cheek in an explosion of blood, brains, and bone fragments as the man slumped limply to the ground.
"Watch out!" Gendry saw Morningstar and cried out in anxious alarm. For some reason, Morningstar had leaped from his warhorse-perhaps his mount had been wounded by a spear and bucked him off, which was perilously dangerous. Morningstar stood amidst the melee, brandishing his spiked mace in the thick of the fight. A master of martial arts, he had already sent several souls to their graves beneath his blows.
"Watch and learn, boy!" Morningstar roared with laughter, though his smile abruptly faded as a bandit knight caught him with a crossbow bolt.
"Die!" A tall, lean bandit knight emerged right behind Morningstar, wielding a vicious, deep-curved blade as he engaged him in combat. The man wielding the arakh struck with blistering speed and ferocity, pressing Morningstar hard, but the dagger proved even deadlier. Finding an opening, the rust-haired man thrust his dagger straight up through the joint between Morningstar's arm defense and breastplate, right into his armpit. Blood spurted out-the inevitable fate of a mercenary.
"I am sorry for the trouble!" Morningstar wore a faint, wan smile before he too collapsed onto the ground and closed his eyes.
"No!" Caught up in his own desperate fight, Gendry could not save Morningstar.
Seeing Morningstar fall to the earth, Gendry seemed to transform into a storm. He raised his warhammer and unleashed a frantic assault, fueled by the raging fires of battle.
Gendry swung his mace, a surge of violent strength seemingly welling up from deep within his body. He directly batted two Brigand Knights to the ground before charging straight toward the rust-haired Brigand Knight.
"Little boy, are you eager to die as well?" The rust-haired bandit pulled out his dagger and wiped the blood from it with a delicate piece of white silk. Two mortal enemies stood face-to-face amidst the chaos.
"Come on!" Gendry leaped down from his horse. Without wasting words, he swung his mace directly; Morningstar had been his comrade, his drillmaster.
"I wouldn't mind opening your heart again!" The rust-haired knight raised his long, curved blade. It was a weapon favored by the Dothraki, ideal for slashing, capable of inflicting deep and long wounds on enemies from horseback, and especially effective against unarmored foes.
A melodious clanging of steel rang out-the dance of death. Gendry wore a helm and black scale armor, while his rust-haired opponent wore chainmail without a helm. Gendry had his Great Bull Helm, though his neck and face currently lacked armor protection.
"You have earned the right to know my name! Little boy, the gladiator of Meereen, the undefeated Rusty Khalas." Khalas moved with breathtaking, terrifying speed. His arakh hissed through the air, its blade-light resembling a torrential downpour as he sought to cut Gendry down by hacking at his throat or head.
Gendry maintained a cool defense, using his mace and oak shield to block every single strike. As steel crashed against steel, Gendry felt as though he possessed boundless strength that brought forth fury and a tempest. Neither the Meereenese nor Purplebeard likely possessed the wealth to hire a master from the Meereenese fighting pits.
"A bandit is still a bandit! Coward!" Khalas cursed, for the situation on the battlefield was shifting rapidly. The Handsome Man's men fought with frantic abandon, while Purplebeard's forces grew increasingly panicked and struggled to parry the blows. Khalas himself found the situation deeply vexing, the raw wildness of his opponent's strength shocking him amid the ring of colliding steel.
"Ha!" Khalas's curved blade struck Gendry's black scale armor. Gendry felt his blood surge, but the blade failed to pierce his Black Scale Plate Armor. Gendry's counterattack arrived in a flash, smashing directly into Khalas's face and leaving a gaping hole in his cheek. As bright red blood gushed forth, Khalas let out a wail of agony.
"Coward! Coward in iron armor!" Khalas wore no helmet; Khalas had only chainmail. This was Gendry's opportunity.
"Crash!" Gendry's warhammer felt like the arrival of the Storm God, the sheer force of the impact straining Khalas to his limits.
Roaring, Khalas launched a counterattack, his curved blade sweeping high and low as he tried to carve out a path to survival.
Gendry blocked only the blows aimed at his head; when Khalas hacked at his arm, it had no effect at all. This, after all, was no Valyrian steel.
"Die!" The grueling battle raged on until Gendry's warhammer hammered heavily onto Khalas's chest, shattering his torso. Khalas collapsed to the ground, drawing his final breath.
Chapter 22: Chaos and Ascent (Seeking Readership)
Blood stained the earth. The warhammer in Gendry's grip was already mired in gore, and the air reeked of blood and wails. Black scale armor, warhammer, oak shield-Gendry's cobalt-blue eyes burned with fire.
"Fall back!" Seeing "Rusty" fall to the ground and the Meereenese gladiator reduced to a corpse, Purplebeard felt his heart fracture. Rusty had been the backbone of these bandit mercenaries-savage and powerful, yet he had died in such a wretched state.
The bandit mercenaries abandoned their comrades' corpses and scattered in a panic, leaving only the scent of blood lingering in the air as Purplebeard escaped death by the skin of his teeth under the desperate cover of his remaining men.
Purplebeard glanced back to see the ferocious warrior who had beaten the Meereenese man to death with a hammer. He stood beside the corpse of the Meereenese fighter like a god of death bringing forth a storm.
"Where on earth did the Wolf Pack find such a skilled fighter?" Purplebeard wondered inwardly. He knew this battle had been a crushing defeat, and he would need more and better fighters.
"Strip these bandit mercenaries of anything useful-weapons, armor, supplies, and money! Don't waste the horses that survived, and burn all these corpses afterward!" The Wolf Pack comrades set about clearing the battlefield, unearthing the bodies of their fallen brothers from the pile of dead. Of the ten knights, three had died. As for Purplebeard's bandit mercenaries, their losses were several times greater.
Gendry walked over to Morningstar's side, finally feeling a dull ache in his elbows. Wielding a warhammer required both strength and technique, and the Meereenese fighter had been immensely fierce. The gladiator's thrust beneath the drillmaster's armpit had been fatal. Plate armor was not infallible; vulnerable points at the joints still offered openings for a piercing strike.
Gendry looked down at Morningstar's pale face as Long Spear and the Handsome Man approached him.
"Morningstar is dead, boy!" Long Spear patted Gendry on the shoulder. "You did well. Those who avenge their comrades are fortunate."
"I killed the enemy, but I couldn't save him!" Gendry murmured solemnly. Parting ways was always cruel.
Long Spear thought for a moment and remained silent. Although Gendry had fought like a raging giant on the battlefield, he was, after all, still a boy in years.
"Look upon him one last time; new battles await us!" The Handsome Man looked at Gendry. "For a novice, you are the most remarkable I have ever seen, but every one of us must cross this threshold."
Alongside his other comrades, Gendry waited for the slaves to emerge from the estate, first loading their fallen brothers' bodies onto a flatbed cart before beginning to tally the bandit mercenary corpses. Maester Qyburn also emerged from the estate to bandage the mercenaries who had suffered minor wounds or bruises.
The Handsome Man left Gendry and continued to prowl the battlefield. He stripped away armor and gold dragons, but found nothing bearing words that might clearly trace the origin of these Brigand Knights.
"A hammer is truly vicious!" The Handsome Man looked down at the corpse of the Meereenese man, parting the gladiator's chainmail before offering praise. Gendry's tremendous, weighty blow a moment earlier had directly caved in the Meereenese man's chest, leaving a deep indentation over his heart and shattering his bones. As a blunt weapon, a hammer concentrated its striking surface into a single mass, delivering devastatingly fierce force.
"Yet we have brought trouble upon ourselves!" The Handsome Man analyzed the Meereenese man's features-rust-colored hair, a tall and agile frame. A Meereenese gladiator cost a king's ransom; where on earth had bandit mercenaries found the gold to hire him?
"A top-tier fighter among the Meereenese is worth a thousand pieces of gold. Clearly, whoever opposes Torello must also be a great lord among the Myrmen!" Long Spear murmured thoughtfully. "We should report this matter to the steward and send word back to Myr!"
"Indeed, fortunately our luck held! Warhammer Gendry finished him!" the Handsome Man said. "A unique weapon like the arakh remains difficult to deal with."
"Yet who could be behind the attack on the estate?" the Handsome Man wondered aloud. "There are far too many who fit the possibility. A rival merchant hoarding Fireweed, lords of other estates, or simply opponents of Torello. But I imagine the cost of hiring bandit mercenaries and Meereenese fighters was staggering. One can only conclude that the profits at stake were sufficient to drive them to it."
"No matter! Cart all these corpses back to the estate and let the steward dispatch the message!"
"This man's physique is marvelous!" Qyburn muttered softly, looking down at Rusty's corpse. "Though it would be even better if he were taller and stronger!"
"Now is not the time," Gendry replied, knowing Qyburn was still fixated on his "invincible warrior."
When the heap of corpses was laid out within the Firepowder Herb Estate, the atmosphere inside grew intensely heavy.
"Thirteen bandit mercenaries, and we lost three brothers of our own! As for the runaway slaves, they haven't been tallied yet."
"We've had thefts or raids on the Fireweed in the past, but never on this scale!" The estate steward turned pale as he gazed at the corpses before him.
"Send word of this to Torello! If these truly are the Torello's enemies within Myr and the Disputed Lands, they will strike from all sides."
Before the commotion at the Firepowder Herb Estate had even begun to settle, Gendry returned to his chamber.
Gendry stripped off his black scale armor-a task that, in Westeros, would normally fall to a squire.
"You are fortunate, Your Grace! Uninjured." Qyburn remarked. "Minor cuts mean nothing; what is most to be feared are deep, gaping wounds. Once infected, they prove fatal."
"A high-born lord who looks as wretched as I?" Gendry smiled faintly. For now, he remained a common mercenary, riding across battlefields on the strength of his courage and power.
"Heroes await the storm. In the days of old, Orys was merely a bastard of Dragonstone; by following Aegon the Conqueror, he elevated House Baratheon into the youngest great house of the Seven Kingdoms in a single bound. The Seven Grant you courage, strength, and bloodline-you must seize the opportunity!"
"Chaos may well be coming," Maester Qyburn continued, analyzing the situation. "Ordinary people cannot afford to employ a Meereenese gladiator; the only possibility is a wealthy merchant prince capable of matching wits with the estate's master. Our employer now stands on the precipice of danger."
"I never expected the Meereenese to show themselves," Gendry recalled. "They want to bring down Torello!"
"To my knowledge, the reason the Wolf Pack Company has continually served this Torello is because the daughter of one of the Wolf Pack's commanders married into the Torello's family. In truth, the Wolf Pack has already bound its fate to the Myrmen-they rise and fall together. If the estate's master is in peril, then so are we." Qyburn gestured toward himself and Gendry.
"Chaos brings slaughter, and the power struggles of the Myrmen are no less vicious than those in Westeros!"
"No, they are far more terrifying than Westeros.
During the bloody wars of Myr, two rival factions fought a series of assassinations, riots, poisonings, rapes, hangings, tortures, and naval battles for mastery of the city. The losing faction was driven entirely into exile. Following the Lysene Spring, Torello hosted a banquet to celebrate his election as First Magister, only to be poisoned to death alongside his wife, mistresses, daughters, siblings, and supporters." Maester Qyburn possessed a thorough understanding of the history of the Three Daughters.
"Yet chaos may also prove an opportunity! The Ninepenny Kings once seized the Disputed Lands and the Stepstones, and Tyrosh besides-the political landscape is never static. Should Myr descend into chaos, that just might be our opening."
"Were you just now thinking of tampering with that Meereenese corpse?" Gendry asked.
An embarrassed look crossed Qyburn's face before he nodded. "The dead are sometimes far more fearless than the living."
"That is too dangerous; you must carry it out in secret! Wait for the next time!"
Chapter 23: News of the Targaryen Siblings
Inside the Firepowder Herb Estate in the Disputed Lands, Gendry quietly wiped his warhammer. The dark mace was cold to the touch; though forged of refined steel, it still suffered wear and tear amidst the fires of war. Two new weapons now rested in Gendry's room: the Meereenese gladiator's arakh and the legacy mace of his fallen comrade, Morningstar. The arakh was forged half like a sword and half like a sickle-the favored weapon of the Dothraki.
Gendry yearned for a warhammer of Valyrian steel; nothing in this world cut sharper than a Valyrian steel sword.
[Bloodline: Blood of the Storm (Activated, Awakening 33%)]
Gendry noticed the enhancement of his bloodline. Combat-especially high-level combat-had fortified his Blood of the Storm, and Gendry felt his bodily strength and physical power continue to climb. Only between life and death, with the arrow nocked on the string, could the blood of the storm be properly stirred.
"I, too, was once so obsessed with my iron chain until I discovered the vastness of the world and the marvels of magic!" Qyburn said. "Westeros folk are like men locked in a dim room, yet bent on snuffing out the candlelight kindled by magic. Rather than bury one's head like a gray sheep turning a blind eye, one should seek the truth!"
"Master Qyburn, what you crave is truth! While I pursue a sense of security and a life of freedom." Gendry lowered his warhammer. He yearned for a secure and unburdened life-the sort of carefree happiness enjoyed only by highborn young lords.
Gendry's identity was far too awkward, placing him far too close to the whirlpool of power. House Baratheon was inherently unstable, and the fluctuations of power would inevitably pull Gendry into their wake. Rather than become a chess piece, it was better to become a player. Gendry was older than Joffrey, being in reality the king's eldest son, whereas Joffrey was the product of incest; even the existence of a bastard posed a threat. House Lannister, and perhaps even his own uncle, might pose a threat to him. Gendry knew the fate of his other bastard brothers and sisters; save for the noble bastard Edric, who remained safely tucked away in Storm's End, the others were bound to die the moment the vicious Cersei discovered them.
"The domestic relations of kings are occasionally just as wretched. Viserys I, the Unworthy, and the Mad King all presided over tangles of absolute chaos, and King Robert is no better. The king cares nothing for his children, while the queen is consumed by ambition-a recipe for self-destruction." Maester Qyburn muttered, well aware of the situation surrounding those legitimate children and feeling all the more that they resembled a powder keg.
Gendry was well aware of these monarchs, too; their jests were still bandied about King's Landing. Viserys had failed to properly handle the succession, triggering the Dance of the Dragons. The Unworthy had indulged his vices wildly, scattering seed everywhere and laying the groundwork for the Blackfyre Rebellion. As for the Mad King, true to his moniker, he was not only unhinged but deeply suspicious of his own wife and children.
"So prepare yourself, Master Qyburn! Whether my identity is exposed or not, House Lannister will be our formidable enemy!" Gendry faced his adversaries head-on. House Lannister was powerful and wealthy, and the population of the Westerlands was second only to The Reach; yet The Reach was fragmented, whereas under Tywin's iron fist, the Westerlands formed a unified whole, to the point that even the victorious Usurper Robert had ultimately chosen to ally himself through marriage with the lion.
"The situation is pressing and manpower is needed. It is a pity I cannot experiment upon that Meereenese gladiator! I feel he was ideally suited to become a tireless, invincible warrior!" Maester Qyburn still waxed nostalgic over the deceased "Rusty" gladiator. Any gladiator who could fight his way out of the pits of Meereen possessed extraordinary physical attributes.
"Just like the Kingsguard in King's Landing, you should have such guards by your side! An invincible warrior might even surpass the White Knights, for the White Knights are inevitably constrained by emotion." Qyburn mused.
"There will be opportunities! But not now!" Gendry checked Qyburn's regret. For the moment, they were merely mercenaries within a mercenary company; conducting such gruesome experiments within the Wolf Pack Company would inevitably get them swept out the door.
"Aside from engineering an invincible warrior, I am also deeply interested in substances crackling with magical elements. If we could acquire a dragon egg, it would be even better-Your Grace also possesses a touch of dragon blood, perhaps you could even hatch a dragon!" Qyburn said with soaring ambition. "Should you secure a dragon, even a hatchling, it will immensely aid your cause!"
"Dragons! There are already enough fools trying to awaken magic dragons, but such an undertaking is exceedingly difficult! Aside from ourselves, I imagine there is also a pair of exiled siblings who have never given it up!" Gendry knew the whereabouts of the three fossilized dragon eggs-they were in the possession of the fat magister in Pentos. Yet the conditions for hatching fossilized dragon eggs were numerous and harsh; he preferred to search for dragon eggs in other places, more vital dragon eggs that might hold a greater likelihood of hatching. Dragonstone, King's Landing, Summerhall.
"You speak of the Beggar King and his sister!" Qyburn thought for a moment. "Their dragon blood is indeed the most potent, but other houses mastering magic dragons is not without precedent. For instance, the Sea Snake's children-the Sea Snake himself could not ride a magic dragon, yet his children, and even his bastards, did so."
"In truth, we have other means of securing allies! Though it carries both advantages and drawbacks, it remains a shortcut nonetheless!"
"You speak of Daenerys?"
Qyburn nodded. "Indeed, Daenerys must be the most beautiful girl in the world! That girl possesses the blood of the dragon, the blood of the ancient gods of Valyria! Yet beauty is merely the most dazzling of her many virtues, alongside her hidden influence-you cannot truly believe that the supporters of the Dragonlords have all vanished like smoke. Think of Dorne, think of Crackclaw Point."
"Is the girl truly that beautiful? How can you be so certain?" Gendry asked. Given Qyburn's age and background, he likely had never even set eyes on Daenerys, yet he sounded like a devoted partisan of hers.
"The True Dragon families have always been renowned for inhuman beauty; I have never heard of House Targaryen producing an ugly creature. Moreover, while I have never laid eyes on this young girl, I have seen Prince Rhaegar." Qyburn shook his head, drifting into a memory. "Rhaegar was tall and handsome, with indigo eyes and silver hair. Those melancholy purple eyes—I guarantee they would make every maiden shriek! Prince Rhaegar's sister must undoubtedly be a peerless beauty."
Rhaegar's beauty was legendary throughout the world, remembered fondly even after so many years by Cersei, the Griffin, and others. Daenerys's beauty in the known world was equally peerless, unmatched by any.
"What you say is true, but we-" Gendry considered the insane plan, concluding it was worth a try. "We are enemies!"
Yet Qyburn shook his head. "Fortune and misfortune shift with circumstances; love and hatred change with interests. Once, Lord Orys was so loyal to House Targaryen that he even lost a hand to the Dornishmen; could Aegon the Conqueror ever have imagined that the one who overthrew the True Dragon throne would be the descendants of his own dearest friend? Everything changes, all the more so when both of you share a hatred for House Lannister and both require that iron chair."
"I must admit, you make a fine prompter, Master Qyburn!" Gendry smiled. He could not have it both ways; to ally with Daenerys for the restoration meant inevitably offending many people. Yet if he wished to touch that crown, he had to muster every ounce of his strength.
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