If the North is frozen earth with biting cold winds, and The Riverlands are a marshy land of crisscrossing waters, then The Reach is a boundless green wilderness.
Green grass covers every inch of land, and white wildflowers dot the landscape like stars.
A breeze brushes by, causing waves of grass to rise and fall.
A carriage, entirely white and pulled by two Andal horses with hair like snow, travels along the road in this green wilderness, surrounded by a group of House Tyrell guards in bright armor.
Margaery Tyrell lowers the curtain in her hand.
Compared to the complex royal court and bustling streets of King's Landing, she truly prefers The Reach.
But the mission of her house does not allow her to linger here and enjoy this tranquility for long.
She leans against the soft velvet cushions, her thoughts returning to the scene a few days ago when she had just returned to Highgarden to persuade her father and grandmother.
She explained the situation in King's Landing in detail to her father, Lord Mace Tyrell, and her grandmother, Lady Olenna. She confessed that the dragon possessed by Aegon Targaryen was not comparable to ordinary dragons.
She had seen those three dragons with her own eyes and felt the shadows that blotted out the sky.
She told her father and grandmother that the dragon was closer to a god.
And Aegon's determination to implement a new order was unstoppable.
She told her father that Highgarden now only had two paths to take.
Either commit fully to Aegon's command—given the strength of House Tyrell and its influence in The Reach, if they submitted voluntarily, they might secure a good position in the new order and retain their titles and lands.
Or remain stubborn... and face certain death.
She produced detailed battle reports collected in King's Landing and had even spoken personally with Soldiers who had participated in the campaign in The Riverlands.
In a very short time, Aegon had successively defeated the combined forces of the lords of The Riverlands and House Stark of the North.
These words seemed to have some effect.
Lady Olenna's shrewd eyes flickered, and she even leaned slightly toward her plan.
But her father, Lord Mace, remained adamantly opposed.
He refused to abandon his position as High Lord of The Reach and was unwilling to have his title as the supreme liege lord of The Reach become a hollow name.
In his view, sitting upon The Reach, he could easily assemble a massive army.
To abandon all this and go to King's Landing to fawn over that young man was something he was absolutely unwilling to do.
The situation reached a stalemate.
In the end, with the strong support of her grandmother Olenna, her father's wishes were barely suppressed, though not entirely convinced.
They discussed a compromise: Margaery would act as an envoy for Highgarden, visiting the castles of the various great vassals of The Reach one by one to persuade them.
A final decision would then be made based on the stance of each great house.
Therefore, Margaery appeared in this carriage at this moment.
On this journey, she was heading to the Redwyne family on The Arbor.
That was the family Lady Olenna came from.
She had now entered the southernmost part of The Reach; after traveling a bit further and switching to a ship at the Port, she would be able to reach The Arbor.
A disturbance outside the window interrupted her thoughts.
The Reach truly lived up to its reputation as the most densely populated place in the Seven Kingdoms.
In this boundless wilderness, one could encounter a village every short distance.
At this moment, they were approaching a village, and the noisy clamor was drifting over with the wind from there.
Margaery frowned slightly and lifted a corner of the carriage curtain to look out.
She saw that in an open space in the nearby village, a person with all his hair shaved off, a deep seven-pointed star carved into his forehead with a knife, and wearing tattered septon robes, was standing on a slightly raised earthen platform.
He was speaking with great passion, waving his arms, and loudly proclaiming something.
As the wind shifted, broken words drifted over:
"...That Aegon Targaryen! He is unworthy of the dragon lord bloodline! He has defiled the name of Targaryen! He has brought foreign armies to invade our homeland!"
"I saw it with my own eyes in King's Landing! He destroyed the Great Sept of Baelor! He set up foreign pagan gods! He is a heretic! He is a devil!"
Driven by the septon's agitation, the villagers, who had originally just been curious onlookers, began to grow agitated.
Some shook their fists in anger, some showed fear on their faces, and some echoed loudly.
It was as if Aegon had not destroyed a cathedral in King's Landing thousands of miles away, but their own homes.
Even more so, the septon began to vividly describe the "tragic state" of King's Landing—septons of the Seven were hanged, and believers were driven away.
The rumors became more and more outrageous.
In the blink of an eye, Aegon Targaryen had turned into an ogre king in the mouths of these people, as if he were not a descendant of the dragon lords returning from across the Narrow Sea, but a devil crawled out of the seven hells.
Margaery lowered the carriage curtain, her expression somewhat solemn.
She turned to her brother, Ser Garlan Tyrell, who was riding alongside the carriage, and said: "Brother, let us continue on; there is no need to stop here."
Garlan nodded and waved for the guard to continue moving forward.
The coachman whipped the horses again, and the team continued south along the road.
The wheels rolled on, gradually leaving the clamor behind.
But the worry in Margaery's heart was as persistent as the rumors growing ever more fierce.
When she returned to The Reach from King's Landing, she noticed that those believers of the Seven who had fled King's Landing had not gone elsewhere, but had flocked to The Reach in large numbers.
These people brought chaos and, at the same time, spread what Aegon had done in King's Landing, exaggerated and distorted, vigorously slandering Aegon's image.
The rumors grew more and more fierce, causing the people of The Reach, who were originally neutral and waiting, to begin to develop resistance toward Targaryen.
Not only that, the influx of a large number of refugees also caused considerable chaos in The Reach.
On her way back to Highgarden, she had encountered situations where people took the opportunity to stir up trouble.
From the mouth of a young nobleman, she learned of an even more worrying trend:
As the rumors of those believers of the Seven spread, not only were the views of the common people being led astray, but many noble lords also began to resist Targaryen more and more.
Originally, the new policies implemented by Aegon, especially The Crownlands garrison system and the trend of centralization, had already shaken the foundations of these noble lords.
It was just that the new policy had not yet truly fallen upon them, so they were temporarily in a wait-and-see state.
But with the spread of rumors from those believers of the Seven, these lords who believed in the Seven also began to be hostile to Aegon on a religious level.
This was no longer a matter of interest, but a matter of faith. Matters of faith are often harder to reconcile than matters of interest.
Margaery withdrew her thoughts, her fingers gently rubbing her brow.
This could not go on.
She had to persuade the great lords as soon as possible and have her father lead The Reach to submit to Targaryen as soon as possible.
Although these slanders were currently still at the rumor level, she keenly felt the bad signs within them.
This was the southernmost part of The Reach, and those believers of the Seven who had fled from King's Landing had spread rumors all the way here, and now they had actually reached this point.
Then, the entire Reach was likely circulating these rumors.
She had to persuade the great lords as soon as possible to avoid further complications.
The carriage continued to drive south.
In the distance, the sea level was looming at the end of the horizon.
There was the direction of The Arbor, and it was also the first stop of her trip.
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