The dragon screeched joyfully over Hardhome, opened its mouth to reveal sharp teeth, and occasionally unleashed Dracarys upon the ground and the sea.
The dragon despised the scent of ice and death, determined to eradicate evil completely. It wreaked havoc, turning the surroundings into a scorching inferno.
A stretch of the plains by the sea at Hardhome had become an ocean of fire; the various bright flames dispersed some of the white mist, causing those wights and White Walkers to melt into water.
On the wildling refugee ships, the dragon group watched the distant white mist vigilantly. Only the area where the dragon group was located could be cleared, while in the distance, the endless white mist remained, filled with death and cold.
"Hardhome belongs to me, Rhaegar Targaryen! White Walkers, I know you are still hiding within the mist! If the servants of the god of cold wish to come, they will only find death!"
Rhaegar, piloting the dragon, shouted loudly toward the mist in the distance. There was no blood on him, but he still exuded a murderous aura, shining like a bright silver flame.
Not all the White Walkers had appeared; there must still be more in the mist, those pale shadows watching from here with blue eyes.
After shouting, Rhaegar steered the dragon back to the ship. Knowing when to stop, he felt that the Ice Dragon might also be related to the god of cold; White Walkers were one thing, but an Ice Dragon could be even more terrifying.
The coalition forces on the ships were also startled; there were actually White Walkers inside the white mist. The faces of the soldiers—whether they were Night's Watch, wildlings, Northern lords, or knights from the south—were filled with fear and panic.
The arrival of the white mist was unusual; how could these dead things be endless? The army of wights could be defeated, but the White Walkers in the white mist were truly invincible. They asked themselves, and realized that ordinary knights were simply no match for the White Walkers they had just seen.
The human coalition ships began to retreat; everything that had happened felt like a nightmare. There were dead things in the forests and in the ocean, along with that eerie white mist and the White Walkers appearing within it.
Everyone looked at Rhaegar with a mix of fear and admiration, as if he were a god walking among men. With the Dragonrider and the dragon, they were invincible in this world.
The wights were like zombies, and the crowd felt they could still be dealt with. But the White Walkers—their terrifying swordsmanship, the stench of magic, and their ability to summon white mist like shadows—exceeded the limits of human imagination.
Yet, the Dragonrider had acted alone, and everything remained calm and effortless. His cruel sword dance was a testament to his precise mastery of skill and power, and his high level of self-confidence.
Rhaegar landed on the ship and stood at the bow. He was weighing methods to defeat the White Walkers: "I still need a full set of Valyrian steel armor. Even the Valyrian steel sword should only be considered suspected dragonsteel, right?"
"However, Valyrian steel is incredibly sharp and is also a powerful weapon against White Walkers, because the ice-swords are hard to break. Then, what is the true dragonsteel, the ultimate weapon against White Walkers? Could it be a sword made of dragonglass, embedded with the runes of the First Men?"
If the time came, he could organize a Valyrian assault team to charge into the distance and wipe out the Night King. Valyrian weapons, obsidian blades—a true special forces unit.
"Some say the world will end in fire, some say the world will end in ice. Which element do you think will destroy the world?"
Rhaegar asked the people on the ship, his gaze sweeping over them: the brothers of the Night's Watch, the Northern lords, the King-Beyond-the-Wall, as well as the silver dragon brought by Barristan and the knights of House Whent.
Everyone stammered, unable to speak. This was metaphysics; rough men like Jon Umber and Mance Rayder wouldn't know the first thing about it. Even Ser Barristan only had a vague understanding of such things.
"I know, Dragon King! The world will end in ice. Fire was extinguished in Valyria, but it has been rekindled within you. And ice still lingers in the Land of Always Winter; the god of cold wants to destroy this world!"
"And you are the savior, the messiah, the silver flame that saves this world, the messenger who brings light!" said Mother Mole excitedly, a short and small wildling leader, a forest witch.
Fire was the Valyrian Dragonlords, who once ruled with an iron fist. And ice was the god of cold, summoning the tide of the dead, the wights and White Walkers.
"Savior!" "Savior!" "Bringer of Light!" the wildlings, Night's Watch, Northern lords, and southern knights on the ship all shouted.
Without the Dragon King and the fire, the outcome of this war might have been uncertain. With the final appearance of the White Walkers, everyone might have been trapped and died in the white mist. The Dragon King represented fire, and fire was the enemy of ice.
"You speak well, the world will end in ice!" Rhaegar looked at Mother Mole; saving her wasn't in vain. This prophetic public opinion was still public opinion, and everyone believed in this sort of thing. An army needs faith; that's how it is in the Middle Ages.
Mother Mole and her wildlings were hungry and tired, so Mance Rayder had someone take them down to rest.
"The White Walkers can speak! The bones are servants of the god of cold, a brand new species!" The ship continued on its way back, heading toward Farwinter. Rhaegar said to the crowd.
"Although I couldn't hear it very clearly, they definitely have an ancient language! The White Walker spoke to me before it shattered."
Everyone on the ship felt a chill run down their spines at the thought of those terrifying shadows in the white mist. Before, they thought it was a bold guess, but now it seemed clear that the White Walkers were indeed a different species—not just humanoid, but more importantly, intelligent.
"Then the Night King didn't do it with a corpse, but with a cold woman!" a wildling made a crude joke, breaking the silence. "After all, White Walkers have feelings, they're much better than wights."
"I'd rather do as the Vale men do and screw a goat than screw a zombie!" a Northern lord retorted, unwilling to be outdone.
They all knew the terrifying stories of the Night King, who fell in love with a woman "with skin as pale as the moon, eyes like blue stars... and skin as cold as ice," and was eventually defeated by his brother, the King in the North, and the King-Beyond-the-Wall, Joramun.
"You had better stop discussing these terrifying things; his name is a taboo now!" said Mance Rayder, the King-Beyond-the-Wall.
This name remained a taboo. After the Night King died, people discovered he had offered sacrifices to the White Walkers, so all records of the Night King were destroyed, and his name became forbidden.
"We have fire and the dragon, what is there to fear!" said the warrior from Last Hearth. When the dragon shone, the white mist would quiet down significantly.
"Everyone, the White Walkers in the white mist are terrifying. Do not try to imitate me when you fight them! Try to stay at a distance and attack, firing dragonglass arrows!"
Rhaegar said to the other soldiers. Those who imitate him will die; those who oppose him will live. Rhaegar had cheats—runes, magic, and numerous Valyrian weapons. If other soldiers went up, it would be essentially throwing their lives away.
It was unnecessary to make people risk their lives for just those few gold dragons a month. The silver dragon army was raised by his own hand and were his trusted confidants. As for the other armies, they were his future subjects, and there was no need to cause unnecessary losses to his soldiers.
"As you command, Prince!" The others nodded one after another. Jokes were jokes, but they had seen the scene—the White Walkers' swift and elegant swordsmanship, dangerous and lethal.
More importantly, there was the magic. The White Walkers' armor changed color, and their longswords were incredibly sharp, able to clash with Valyrian steel swords for a moment. Even a reckless man like Jon knew fear at this moment.
Many Northern lords were reckless, but being reckless didn't mean throwing one's life away. Now they were not fighting men, but strange and ghostly monsters. There was no honor to speak of on the battlefield; dead was dead.
"We must reorganize our forces!" Rhaegar watched Hardhome fade further and further from his sight. Hardhome had a high gray cliff, with flames burning in hundreds of caves within it.
The cold wind blew, the white mist surged, and the wights were perhaps still quietly circling. "Farewell, Hardhome!"
"Do you mean to mobilize the armies of the Seven Kingdoms?" Ser Barristan asked.
"To be precise, just mobilize them, not send them out yet! It's too cold here; the royal escort soldiers from the Reach and Dorne might not be able to withstand this cold. So, mobilize the strength of the Seven Kingdoms, whether it's men or supplies, anything works!"
Rhaegar said. "Fear is the enemy of war. If the coalition marches, at least these soldiers need to see the death of the White Walkers and wights; that way, the soldiers won't be caught off guard!"
Ser Barristan nodded. A proper army should not be narrow-minded or rash. This was the only way to be responsible for the soldiers. "First, let the soldiers train at Harrenhal, then march north to Farwinter!"
"Inventory the soldiers, food, and armor and equipment!" Rhaegar thought to himself. This was an even grander plan; this time, it was to save the world, not for profit. It was a matter for House Targaryen, so naturally, it was upright and honorable, which would allow for better control of the Seven Kingdoms.
"The equipment needs to be upgraded. Try to use long-range bows, catapults, and scorpion crossbows; do not engage in close-quarters combat! If close-quarters combat is necessary, use heavy plate armor, fully armored heavy cavalry; ordinary armor won't work! Wights are easy to deal with, but White Walkers are much harder to handle!"
"You must make special preparations for these things! Close-quarters combat is too dangerous!" Rhaegar discussed with Barristan, the Northern lords, the King-Beyond-the-Wall, the high-ranking members of the Night's Watch, and others.
To deal with this tide of wights and White Walkers, there was no need for chivalry; it was all about suppressing fire, covering everything with fire arrows and obsidian arrows. If they were forced into close combat, they would need to be fully armed.
Barristan and the others nodded. They had seen the terrifying tide of wights, and the soldiers' ordinary weapons simply wouldn't work; relying on long-range suppressing fire was the safest option. After all, how many people in the world could get a set of Valyrian steel armor?
Wights were rampant Beyond the Wall, and another reason was that the wildlings Beyond the Wall and the Night's Watch simply had no good equipment.
"How much do you know about what happened at Hardhome?" Rhaegar asked, looking at the high-ranking members of the Night's Watch and the King-Beyond-the-Wall. Aside from the tide of White Walkers and wights, Hardhome had a sense of being cursed.
"That place is a cursed place!" Mance Rayder said, "It could have been the only town for the Free Folk; Hardhome's location was too good, a deep-water harbor. But on a certain night more than three hundred years before Aegon's landing, Hardhome was struck by a mysterious disaster, the entire settlement was burned down, and all the residents died."
"Some say cannibals from Skagos attacked the area, and others say it was the work of slave traders from across the Narrow Sea."
"The Night's Watch once went there too!" said a high-ranking member of the Night's Watch. "It was the power of fire, the scent of fire. The destruction of Hardhome back then. A ship we sent to investigate—the investigators said they couldn't find any survivors in the settlement, and chilling screams came from the caves in the cliffs overlooking it."
"The merchant ship said the bay of Hardhome was filled with floating corpses, and a large amount of charred bones and branches remained in the ruins of the settlement. It is said that the flames formed after Hardhome was burned were so bright and scorching that the Night's Watch on the Wall said it seemed as if the sun had risen from the north, and ash fell like rain on the Haunted Forest and the Shivering Sea for half a year."
Three hundred years, so now it's more than six hundred years? Rhaegar thought this date was very peculiar; it shouldn't be far from the time of the Doom of Valyria. So, what power organized the destruction of Hardhome? This place wasn't particularly far from Braavos either.
What was certain was that this destruction was related to fire, which then caused the destruction of Hardhome, the total annihilation of the wildling town, and the death of the wildlings.
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