[Chapter Size: 3600 Words.]
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Third Person POV
Arctic, 298 AC.
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Quickly, in the midst of the chaos between creatures and their soldiers mounted on the enormous cavalry stabbing enemies with their spears, Jon took his steps while some of the dead passed by the cavalry around him, continuing to massacre anyone who had come close to the king.
Still, many creatures managed to slip past them and advanced toward Jon, who moved, cutting the creatures down with Blackfyre. While he slaughtered a group of undead without difficulty, he turned toward a one-armed man with a sword in the other hand, half skeletal and half covered in rotten flesh, charging at him.
With a movement so fast it made the air whistle, he cut him down before he could make any move, striking his rib. The blade was so quick and sharp that it sliced through his bones as if he were cutting cheese, leaving the creature split into two halves that fell lifeless on either side of Jon.
Right after that, a giant spider came running toward him, pushing an Arctican horse, knocking it over, and nothing seemed to stand between it and the king.
Certainly, ice spiders of that size were not something any normal man could fight, but Jon remained firm and calm. He had already faced these horse-sized spiders alone.
They were the same spiders they cultivated in Arctica to produce textiles, which he managed to tame only because of the warg bond he formed with them when he brought them into the kingdom. The living ones—perhaps the only ones in the world at this moment—were sheltered along with all the birds and other animals that could not fight in this war, all kept in the bunkers beneath Arctica, built even before the city was raised.
And when the spider leapt at Jon, the enormous shadow passed by his side at the same moment. Ghost easily collided with the spider, with a body three times larger, and bit it with his teeth, using a Valyrian steel prosthesis over his natural teeth, piercing the spider as it roared, unable to escape the wolf, who was far larger than it. The moment the Valyrian steel penetrated its skin, it was already dying, falling lifeless the next moment as the giant wolf howled in his easy victory, protecting his master.
Jon nodded, satisfied with his companion protecting him, while he headed toward the dragon behind them, which was moving farther and farther away as it walked across the ground. His dragons were not only precious and connected to his blood as companions/family; thinking as a king, they were also resources he simply could not abandon for anything.
When he moved away from that chaos following the dragon, he analyzed the battlefield, while the soldiers were stopping the dead and the archers in the lines of their own army turned their bows to that side and began shooting directly at the creatures still falling from the wall. Any other dead that appeared there was immediately massacred by countless arrows. They were maintaining control.
Jon looked on, satisfied, and continued cutting down all the dead that passed and advanced toward him, with Ghost also biting any creature that came near, while more dragons began to emerge from the sky, diving into that area and breathing fire upon the new groups approaching the undead, but without getting too close to the mist as the first dragon had done and nearly been killed because of it.
"Retreat!" Jon shouted. "We're retreating!"
With that, they moved back to let the lateral armies continue fighting, while they returned to the main group, with Ducken taking command after Jon left his post.
Jon went straight to the dragon after mounting Ghost again. The dragon had stopped in a corner, still roaring in pain.
Jon ignored Lancelot and the others, keeping them at a distance from the dragon as he approached it himself. Jon walked up to him, the dragon growling softly in pain.
"Hey, hey, it's all right. We'll deal with this," Jon said in High Valyrian, approaching his neck while the dragon watched him. He was a yellowish gray in color, with only two hind legs and arms with wings, typical of a natural Targaryen dragon.
Jon remembered that Bran had given this dragon its name during their children's games — Honeyhoney. He waited for the dragon to calm down while he inspected the damaged wing. There was blood, and it wasn't just a cut that would bring a dragon crashing to the ground, but rather the ice that had formed around the wound — a particularly irritating ability of the White Walkers and their weapons.
It was even dangerous to bring dragons into the mist to try to fight the true enemies, because if a dragon fell inside it, outside the walls, it would be killed without a shadow of a doubt, with no chance for Arctica to rescue it.
Either way, Jon began healing him, taking out some potions and applying them over the wound before placing his palm over it, which began to glow in a green hue as he activated his magical abilities.
It was a bit strange to think about it at that moment, as he watched the wound close. His abilities were limited to healing, raising all kinds of vegetation from the ground, controlling animals, and genetically altering both animals and plants. He could not genetically change a human, but he could strengthen them with potions he himself created — just as he had done with his family, the royal guards, and others who had earned it.
Still, it was bizarre that he could even create a great variety within existing species, as he had already done with Caraxes, his eagle and first bond.
He had transformed a small eagle into a giant eagle, which was now among the other birds, because Caraxes would not be very useful in this war — just as any other bird would be easily shot down by the undead birds.
Just like Caraxes, he had also altered his partner, and soon they gave birth to new eagles, which Jon also genetically modified so they would not grow as large as their parents, since he needed them smaller to serve as his main birds in his journeys and battles, acting as his eyes in the sky — but they were also useless in this war, where the enemy dominated the skies, and the only ones who could stop them were the dragons, capable of spewing fire ahead and even over their own bodies, burning any creature that dared approach in an attempt to kill them.
It wasn't only the birds Jon had changed. He had also modified many animals. He altered more birds, wanting to allow people with warg powers to fly on them as well. He enhanced many of the horses that entered Arctic, making them stronger and faster, and even modified their reproduction, creating far more horses than mares normally could. Jon even used his powers to create a species of deer as mounts, transforming them into magical animals with antlers glowing with blue particles.
Not to mention his yellowish horse, Panis, which he had taken from Icehill when he left the farm and traveled north at eight namedays — it had been his first real experiment. He had turned a skinny nag into a warhorse faster than any other on the battlefield, strong and steady. He had also increased its longevity, so much so that, ten years later, the horse had never stopped being used without ever seeming worn out.
Just as he had done with many animals, granting more vitality, strength, and speed, it was no wonder his main wolf looked like a giant feral beast from ancient legends. Anyone who saw him — even the Dothraki, who had declared it when they saw the creature — would consider him monstrous. Jon's gaze couldn't help but seek out the Dothraki on the battlefield as well. They rode swiftly, rising and falling with their horses, while shooting arrows at the dead. Even some Arcticans were doing the same, because since Jon had brought the Dothraki from Essos, he had asked them to teach the kingdom's soldiers to fight that way. Even Jon had taken interest and trained in that style of combat, hitting targets perfectly without falling from his horse.
Returning to thoughts of his powers, the abilities mentioned so far were tied to the Old Gods, and the little fire magic he had had become almost useless. Wind magic was no longer useful, and fire magic only served to light flames — except when it was powerful enough when he was in Valyria or in the presence of the Red God, but beyond that, it wasn't very effective, though useful to light a fire effortlessly.
His magical abilities, except for Warg control, were useless in battle. He relied only on his sword.
Jon finished healing the dragon and gave its wing a slap. "Return to the city, rest with your brothers, and come back when you're better," Jon murmured, mentally sending the command to the dragon, which let out a purr before taking flight, already able to fly again. Jon ignored the strong wind caused by its wings and returned to his men.
He observed the battlefield: on all sides, men attacking and shouting orders, while volleys of arrows continued to be fired. The sound of the storm, the drums, and the chaos of war were all his ears could catch, while his eyes saw his soldiers struggling to destroy every enemy. All of them had a crystal hanging at their waist so that the darkness — even with the shining Tree — wouldn't be a hindrance, for not even the tree's glow could illuminate everything, especially in the middle of chaos surrounded by blue-eyed monsters.
Arctica had never stopped producing crystals from the trees Jon had created, even after relocating the entire city. Every day they were replenished and charged under the little sunlight — at least three for each soldier — to replace them in case one ran out, since they couldn't fully recharge with only three hours of light. Still, each soldier had the right to his own crystals.
His men — Dothraki, Northerners, Free Folk tribes, and even some Solist soldiers — remained firm in their defenses. Jon mounted Ghost and turned to Lancelot.
"Let's go back to command," Jon said, while his royal guard nodded. They returned to the main group in the north, continuing to fight more and more hordes of dead that climbed over twenty-five-meter walls, piling corpses over corpses.
The rest of the night held nothing worth noting, only the massacre of any undead within the walls. It was only at the beginning of dawn that the attacks began to weaken, but the men never stopped, following orders while those in command shouted, their voices growing hoarser after an entire night full of battles.
When the last dead one fell, Jon sighed atop Ghost. He had taken command of those thirty thousand men fighting in the north once again for the last few hours. His throat didn't bother him, even after shouting so many orders.
The giants were a bit tired and now needed to rest, being replaced by a new group, just like all the guards. Eighty thousand men marched back to their shelters, while another seventy thousand who had fought that night returned to the battlefield to guard Arctica that morning. As the sun began to rise, the leaves of the great tree lost their glow.
The crystals were placed in an area of the city to absorb sunlight, and the damaged armor and weapons would be given to the kingdom's blacksmiths to work on for the rest of the day. The men who had fought would sleep and spend time with their families in the shelters.
Jon gave his final orders for them to begin returning, but he continued looking at the field filled with corpses and couldn't shake a sense of discomfort.
"Ducken, I want you to come with me. Val, you too," Jon said. Val had been at Jon's side the entire night. She had removed her helmet and was adjusting her hair, completely soaked with sweat after fighting nonstop.
Some of the dead always managed to slip past the giants' shield wall, and that was when the army stepped in, slaughtering the creatures. Even so, since the army was armored, it was very difficult for them to be killed. Val, though exhausted, was perfectly fine.
As Jon had ordered, he moved past the giants who were beginning to withdraw, while staring at the mountain of corpses before him.
"My king, is something wrong?" Lancelot asked, always closer to the king than anyone else. He didn't need to be ordered to follow him, as he moved like a shadow at the king's side.
Jon analyzed the fallen bodies, narrowing his eyes.
"They're pretending. There are undead here!" he shouted, at the exact moment when a giant woman rose with a roar from the pile of corpses, appearing and charging at the king. Anyone else would have been startled, but she wasn't fast enough. Jon struck forward with Blackfyre, driving his Valyrian steel blade directly into her head before she could touch him.
"Quick! There are dead ones pretending to be fallen!" Jon shouted again as the people around him grew alarmed, and soon the entire army heard his voice, returning to their positions while other creatures began rising one after another from that field of bodies.
"Cavalry, advance! Formation!" Ducken shouted immediately as mounted men began to trot across the field and the rest of the soldiers prepared.
Soon, more than a thousand dead had risen in that northern field, advancing toward the troops from all directions. Other sides also seemed equally agitated.
There was no time to call the archers, who had already begun storing their weapons, but the cavalry trotted together with the dwarves who were closest, quickly advancing with a group of thousands of them, using their hammers to strike any creature running toward the king's group.
The initial chaos once again turned into a highly disciplined battle. The Arcticans, along with the cavalry, massacred any dead who advanced with their spears, while corpses accumulated, making it difficult even to walk across the terrain.
Jon didn't have much time to breathe. When the final dead one fell, they finally stopped. Jon stood in the middle of that chaos with a group of dwarves who had quickly joined the fight with their hammers, and Lancelot came right afterward, checking that the king was well — and he had no injuries.
"These bastards… they're developing new strategies," Jon murmured, and he could see that the other battlefields had faced the same situation — they just hadn't been as quick as he and the others in the north and had suffered some losses. He had been lucky to feel that something was wrong when he looked over the field full of corpses. The dead had never done this before: pretending to be dead to attack. And they probably wouldn't have moved until the right moment if he hadn't noticed it earlier. The loss could have been far greater when no one expected such an attack...
"This only proves they're intelligent, my king," the dwarf beside him commented after hearing Jon. He nodded and turned to Ducken.
"We must maintain vigilance after battles from now on. The dragons can burn the bodies here, but I can't risk bringing them too close to the wall. There's probably a White Walker prepared with another spear, like what happened with the dragon tonight," Jon analyzed, and Ducken nodded.
"We can pour oil. The walls won't be damaged," Ducken suggested.
Jon nodded. "All right. The dragons will burn all the bodies here. And pour oil on the bodies that fell from arrows in front of the wall." He gave the official order.
Jon studied the field like a sea infested with corpses. Every day they had to gather the bodies, throw them into a large pit, and burn them. Now, with the dead pretending, they would need another method: burning the field itself.
And even though the danger had passed, they could still hear some of the dead growling in that place, since some who had pretended to be fallen were trapped due to the sheer number of corpses piled over them, unable to rise and only writhing in that area.
Jon organized the battlefield and left it, finding his cousin waiting. She looked tired and worn out as she watched a woman crying nearby over the corpse of another Arctican man.
There was an Arctican spear lodged in the chest of a soldier, even with eldenmetal. He had been struck down by the very spear of the kingdom — but Jon understood why it had happened — and the woman cried over his body, likely his lover.
Arya looked at Jon for a second as he also studied the woman, just as a man approached her and exchanged a few words.
"He fell in the early hours and turned into an undead a few hours later. He tried to kill one of our dwarves, catching him by surprise, but the armor protected him. A giant saw it and quickly drove a spear into him, killing the man. The woman crying over him is his wife. I had to send her away, because she simply didn't want to keep fighting anymore," Arya said, while Jon raised an eyebrow, seeing that the woman had already been there crying for hours.
It was a fairly common scene every day. After all, the night's battle had not come without losses. Sometimes they lost dozens of men, though it was always a very low number. However, the dead seemed infinite. They never stopped coming, making Jon wonder how they had cultivated so many creatures when they had already decimated a large portion of the undead army two moons ago.
"Jon, I lost many people this morning when the dead rose," Arya said with trembling eyes. She had lost more than forty people because she failed to notice the threat in time; only Jon in the north had begun to prepare.
"I know it must be difficult, Arya, but this is war. You did well. You didn't lose more than sixty people tonight and you killed thousands of undead," he said.
"It's still sixty people, Jon. You didn't lose even ten Arcticans from what I heard," she murmured. The north was the most pressured, yet even so Jon's losses were ridiculous.
"I have good men at my side. They help me with what I can't see. I wasn't always the one in command, Arya. Don't blame yourself for losing Arcticans. Just honor them in your memories. They gave their lives for Arctica tonight, so their families can see the sun when all this is over. They knew the danger of this war. Let's just stay firm until we win it," Jon said, already accustomed to the losses.
Arya nodded with some reluctance. Jon saw several bodies being carried off — dwarves and common men. No giant had been killed; they were the hardest to bring down. The dead simply couldn't defeat them, which was why they were always on the front line.
When the first giant had been killed more than a moon ago, it had taken more than a dozen giant spiders and dozens of other dead to finally bring him down — and even then they only managed to kill him because he was alone. It had been a command error that left him isolated, and that caused his death, something Jon corrected in the formations in the following weeks.
Jon had begun training in Arctica to fight against armies of men, and although it was quite effective against the dead, there were still some flaws because the enemy was different, since they had to deal with animals, murderous birds, and undead men who had no fear of advancing even if it meant their own destruction. They fought at night, without rest, while Jon always needed to replenish his strength and let his men rest.
For that reason there had been many changes in Arctica's formations. They had become a bit different from how they had started, and even when they weren't in battle, the armies trained to memorize all their positions to be more efficient against the dead.
Seeing Arya's silence at his comment, Jon continued. "Let's go home, Arya." He said at last, while Arya nodded and the general approached the king at that very moment.
"Your Majesty, I will stay," Ducken declared, and Jon turned back to him.
"Are you sure? You deserve some rest," Jon asked.
"No, my king. I need to hold this day. You will return tomorrow, correct? I can endure it with a few energy potions. I also intend to take a nap now in the morning. I don't think the dead will launch an attack while the sun shines in the sky," Ducken said, and Jon nodded. He returned to Val, who had fought at his side that night and was waiting for him so they could return to the castle together.
"All right. Let's go back," he said, before looking at Arya, who also nodded. Benjen was approaching as well, and Jon left the army organizing its withdrawal while the new soldiers would take position for the next twelve hours.
Another night had ended, as had the routine of two moons, with attacks sometimes small, other times on a large scale, with the dead always seeming to think of new tactics to destroy Arctica. But the kingdom was standing — and would continue to stand until the last of the dead fell.
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