The Dothraki revered strength and held life—both their own and others'—in contempt. With no other forms of entertainment, fighting and brawling were commonplace.
They would often draw blades and decide life or death over trivial matters.
"Do knights in Westeros have jousting tournaments?" Daenerys asked Jorah.
Jorah nodded. "We all wear armor, so even in group melees, deaths are rare. We could teach them the sword duels of knightly apprenticeships, having them don full leather armor and spar with blunted, unsharpened blades."
Such contests would never be as fair as real combat, as many Horse People relied on agility, their goal being a swift, fatal strike. Blunted swords and leather armor would demand greater strength and endurance.
But to prevent deaths, Daenerys had no choice but to accept Jorah's suggestion.
As evening fell, the newly painted black flag fluttered in the wind, and her *khalasar* began its slow march southward, using the sun and stars as guides.
Before leaving, Daenerys had her men dig through the cremation pyre to recover the melted gold.
"This is what Drogo left behind," she told the hesitant Horse People. "He took what he needed to the Land of the Night. The rest is our reward."
Drogo's Dragonbone Bow was also recovered.
The "Dragonbone" in the Dragonbone Bow was no mere metaphor; it was actual dragon bone.
Not to mention the dozens of dragon carcasses from the Targaryen dynasty, the ancient Valyrian civilization had only vanished 300 years prior. At its peak, the Freehold of Valyria could field a conquering army of 300 dragons.
Dragons, too, have a finite lifespan. After their death, they leave behind indelible Dragonbone, which is why so much of it has survived.
Dragonbone is rich in iron. The higher its iron content, the darker it becomes, eventually turning pitch black.
Ordinary flames could not harm them. Even young dragons could withstand the heat of burning firewood, let alone the bones of adult dragons.
Besides gold and Dragonbone, several Dothraki also discovered a pile of cracked stones in the ashes—dragon egg fossils.
When they pieced the fragments together, they miraculously restored three complete stone eggs!
"Dragons don't hatch from stone eggs!" The Dothraki exchanged bewildered glances before suddenly shouting in terror, "The Khaleesi gave birth to three dragons! The Dosh Khaleen's prophecy has been fulfilled—the Khaleesi has given birth to the horses that will ride the world!"
Disturbed by the Dothraki's cries, Daenerys was also horrified after examining the stone eggs.
"What kind of existence is a Dragon?" she wondered.
Regardless of how the Dragon had appeared, they had to leave. Gathering the charred remains from the cremation pyre, they buried them in a deep pit and the khalasar set out.
On the first night, Daenerys's khalasar only covered ten kilometers.
Five kilometers from their camp, they reached the stream where Khal Drogo's khalasar had drawn water. After four or five days of being trampled by over a hundred thousand people and hundreds of thousands of livestock, the once-babbling stream had been reduced to a layer of thick mud.
Daenerys altered their route, deciding to follow the wetlands.
After another five kilometers, they encountered a new shallow pool. Daenerys ordered the khalasar to halt; they would rest here for a day or two.
"We must slaughter all eighty-seven cattle and sheep," Daenerys told her people. "The deeper we go into the Purgatory Wasteland, the scarcer water and fodder will become. We can't let them compete with the horses for resources."
Since Daenerys had reorganized the khalasar, human resources were allocated more rationally, greatly improving efficiency.
The mutton was dried into jerky. The sheepskins, still covered in wool, were air-dried by the Horse People women and sewn into hooded cloaks.
The Purgatory Wasteland was scorching hot. The cloaks provided shade from the sun during the day, reducing water loss, and kept them warm at night.
The Dothraki were indeed a nomadic people, but even nomads couldn't guarantee everyone had a fur coat or cloak. Daenerys's original hundred or so Khas tribesmen had no shortage of clothing.
But now she had nearly two hundred more people, eight out of ten of whom were abandoned elders and children, many without even a spare Dothraki vest.
Daenerys had her own fur cloak.
When Daenerys first arrived at the Dothraki Sea with Drogo, he specifically hunted a White Lion for her. This male lion, taller than her small silver horse, had a terrifying head that formed a natural hood over her head, and its skin became a cloak that draped down her back.
On the third evening, the khalasar began moving again. This time, they traveled all night until the sun rose the next day before stopping.
Ten hours, about a hundred kilometers.
Now Daenerys faced a problem. Over ten scouts scoured a five-kilometer radius but found no clean water source.
Following the dry, skeletal riverbeds, they occasionally spotted stagnant, shallow pools of bitter water exposed to the scorching sun.
But these were death pools, undrinkable even by animals, filled with all manner of pathogens, mud, rotting animal carcasses, and even a strong sulfurous stench.
Daenerys grew increasingly curious about this world. How could such a vast plain—surrounded by mountains, bordered by the Great Grass Sea to the north, and the Summer Sea to the south—be such a desolate wasteland?
Even if it were a wasteland, where did the sulfur in the water come from?
This wasn't a hot spring.
Thinking of hot springs, a sudden idea struck Daenerys. She asked Ser Jorah, "I've heard that Ancient Valyria was built on fourteen volcanoes. Was the continent near the Summer Sea once like this Purgatory Wasteland?"
"What do you mean?" Jorah asked, puzzled.
"Could there be volcanoes hidden beneath the Red Waste we're in now? That's why the rivers evaporate and the pools smell of sulfur," she speculated.
What Daenerys really wanted to say was that both Ancient Valyria and the Red Waste shared a peculiar thin-crust geography, where the surface was too close to the underground magma layer.
"The sulfur smell comes from demons," the handmaiden Doreah interjected.
Though hiding in the tent, her face was flushed crimson, like a steamed prawn. Sweat trickled down her neck in rivulets, and her lithe figure was fully revealed beneath the thin silk robe.
"You saw a demon?" Daenerys scoffed.
"I... I think I've been possessed by a demon. I feel terrible all over," she wheezed, clutching her chest. "It's gnawing at my heart. Soon it'll devour my soul!"
The Lys girl's eyes were wide with terror, and her words were so earnest that Daenerys almost believed her.
"You have heatstroke!" she declared.
"What's heatstroke?" Eli asked, fanning herself.
Daenerys wasn't bothered by the heat; her handmaidens fanned her, freeing them from the need to attend to her.
"Your Highness, you mean heat exhaustion, don't you?" Jorah struggled to remove his vest, revealing a thick, bear-like patch of black hair on his chest.
"Something like that," Daenerys said. She offered her mare's milk skin to Doreah. "Stop drinking water. The minerals in your body..."
"Never mind. Drink my mare's milk."
"But this is your ration," Doreah said, her voice distant. She reached for the skin but recoiled as if shocked. "I can hold on. I can drink water."
Daenerys didn't argue. She simply shoved the skin into Doreah's hand.
Due to the scarcity of resources and an uncertain future, Daenerys had established a rationing system before they even set out.
Water could be drunk freely, as they had been following the riverbed and always found it.
Horsemeat could also be eaten freely. The tough, dried meat, hard enough to be used as a knife to cut wood, was so unpalatable that even with unlimited supply, people couldn't eat much.
The main items requiring limited rationing were mare's milk, salt, wine, and fruit.
Seeing the current situation, even water...
No, that wouldn't do!
They needed to ensure an ample supply of water; otherwise, even if they managed to cross the Purgatory Wasteland, more than half the people would die.
With this thought, she couldn't sit still. "I'll set up separate camps for men and women," she told her maid. "Everyone can be naked in their tents. Go and take off your clothes now."
"The tents are like ovens inside," Eli sighed. "Taking off our clothes won't help. Back on the plains, we froze even with two layers of sheepskin blankets on the ground. Now, the ground is burning our feet."
Daenerys teased, "You could scrape off the top layer of sand—"
At this, a sudden idea struck her, and she burst into laughter. "How could I have not thought of such a simple solution until now?"
"What method?" Jorah asked, curious.
Daenerys waved her hand. "Let's go outside and see."
As the tent flap was lifted, Daenerys's vision swam. The sun seemed to loom directly before her, its rays striking down in a blinding white column that plunged her into a world of dazzling light.
She rubbed her eyes, and when her vision finally cleared, she felt as though she had truly arrived in hell.
The radiant white light bounced off the flat red sandstone floor, reflecting back a red glow of equal intensity. The dense crimson light formed a sea of fire, making the people wandering this wasteland feel as though they were taking a stroll through purgatory.
*Oh my god, and the sulfurous stench lingering in the air...*
*It's true what they say: there are no wrong names, only wrong nicknames. This is the "Red Purgatory"!*
Quickly pulling on her White Lion hood, Daenerys surveyed her camp. The tents of each family stood silently, like dozens of mounds of earth piled up on the flat ground.
She approached the nearest one, intending to remind everyone to separate the men and women so they could shed their clothes to escape the heat.
As she approached the massive tent, pieced together from patches of cowhide, sheepskin, and horsehide, she heard a muffled panting sound.
A mixed-gender sound.
Daenerys's mouth dropped open in disbelief.
She crept closer and lifted a corner of the tent flap.
*I was wrong,* she thought. *The Horse People don't care about gender boundaries.*
*And they're not like Doreah; they seem incredibly resilient, tough as nails and ready for anything.*
Stepping back quietly, Daenerys didn't disturb the passionate Dothraki. She walked across the scorching gravel to the riverbed.
Fifty or so saddle-less, muscular horses stood scattered across the open plain, their ears drooping under the blazing sun. They chewed stubbornly on the tough, yellowish-brown demon grass that grew beneath the rocks and at the base of dead trees.
"Khaleesi, you've arrived?" A small old man suddenly appeared before Daenerys, as if materializing from nowhere.
"Avanti, can the horses regain their strength before nightfall?" Daenerys asked, a question she didn't believe herself.
This old man, Avanti, who tended the horses of the khalasar, was the "elder of many reigns" who had served twelve Khals. Daenerys was now the thirteenth.
*Ugh, that's a bit ominous!*
Avanti was short and thin, with a hunched back and a bald, graying head. He managed to tie a short braid at the back of his head, barely longer than his old man's dick. His reddish-brown face was deeply lined and wrinkled from years of sun exposure, making him look like a dried-out orange.
Only his eyes, now misshapen and no longer almond-shaped, still held a spark of life.
He opened his toothless mouth and flashed Daenerys a ingratiating, ugly smile.
"Khaleesi, with enough water and this land's unique demon grass, they can last at least half a month."
Daenerys breathed a sigh of relief. If her group didn't take any detours, they should be able to cross this desert in half a month.
"But these are all strong horses here," Avanti continued, his brow furrowing. "Except for the hundred or so ridden by the young men on sturdy mounts, the vast majority are old, skinny, sickly, lame, weak, and ill-tempered beasts.
Even in the Great Grass Sea, with its abundant fodder, they wouldn't last long."
"Everyone knows that kind of horse should have been slaughtered for meat long ago. That's what we fed our previous khalasar."
"I understand. There will be other arrangements made at the time," Daenerys said, her expression calm.
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(End of Chapter)