"Your Majesty has fulfilled her oath," the spearwife said hesitantly. "But you are the Dragon Queen, feared across the world. Your every move shapes the course of the future. Someone like Margo is not worthy of your promise."
Dany liked hearing that—especially from an honest, simple-minded free woman.
"Margo may not deserve the Dragon Queen's concern," Dany replied, "but he was worthy of the vow made by a Khaleesi who had fallen on hard times.
Four years ago, I was not the person I am now.
Back then, I had no dragons, only a few dozen horselords at my command, while he was a bloodrider commanding thousands of screamers."
Morona was stunned.
Wasn't that true?
From today's perspective, it did seem petty for a Dragon Queen to swear to kill a single bloodrider.
But at the time, for a frail, sickly woman with a dark future ahead, to swear death upon a general who commanded tens of thousands—what courage, what grandeur, what confidence that took.
Four years later, though their power and status were now worlds apart, the Queen still kept her word. Because "a Targaryen's word is as unshakable as a mountain," she risked being misunderstood as small-minded or petty, yet still crossed thousands of miles to fulfill her vow. Such spirit—
Realizing this, Morona looked at Dany with growing admiration.
Indeed, when her story made sense, Dany's whispers were truly powerful.
"Your Majesty, I understand now. The matter of sending ravens last night to search for Bloodrider Margo—I'll keep it to myself and never speak of it."
Dany nodded in satisfaction. "I went to the Dothraki Sea last night mainly because of the blood plague information you provided.
I was concerned about the outbreak there, so I flew over personally to investigate. Unexpectedly, I encountered Khal Tep Kao.
He offended me, so I killed him and took his khalasar."
"I see," Morona said, nodding. She was a woman in her fifties who had once led her own tribe—no fool.
Once everyone's "testimonies" aligned, Dany immediately began assigning epidemic prevention tasks.
After the greyscale epidemic, Slaver's Bay had already developed a mature and systematic quarantine system.
Meereen and Yunkai completely shut down maritime trade. Apart from their own military and cargo vessels, no foreign ships were allowed to enter.
Astapor, however, had made special accommodations for certain "VIP" clients. Between the docks and the main city, Dany had built a "false bottle city." A real bottle city should be shaped like an inscribed circle, but hers was an exscribed one—built outside instead of within.
In this small trading city, goods were allowed to move freely, but strict limits were placed on interactions between merchants and residents. Business still thrived under such control.
Now, Dany decided to close even that small outer city.
Beyond disease control, Dany also moved her royal court from Astapor to Meereen.
Old Aemon, the mages' council, and her ministers all flew there on wyverns.
No one knew when the war would end, but over the next two months, Meereen would see continuous battles of all scales, culminating in the final great war within three months.
Five days later, the skinchangers finally completed their investigation into the blood plague outbreak in Volantis.
The source remained unclear, but nearly one-third of the mercenary companies were infected.
However, the massive collapse Dany hoped for never came. The mercenaries had lived through countless blood plagues before.
Like some nations accustomed to frequent flu epidemics, they treated similar symptoms as common colds.
Even with people dying daily, they lived on—happy and carefree. The people of the east might find that incomprehensible, but those mercenaries were simply used to it.
Many of the renowned mercenary groups had decades or even centuries of history.
Some, like the Second Sons, had existed for thousands of years.
Even if the Dragon Queen annihilated them, new mercenaries would scramble to rebuild the company immediately.
These veteran companies fought every month, every year. They'd endured more plagues than Dany had caught colds in her life.
If they collapsed every time a plague hit, their companies wouldn't have lasted a few years, let alone centuries.
Thus, the Volantene coalition—composed mostly of mercenary bands—remained calm. Drawing on millennia of experience, they isolated the sick, contained the outbreak zones, and continued to march and fight as usual.
The horselords, however, panicked.
In the Red Waste, when they had encountered Whitecloud City, "everyone knew" it was haunted—a cursed city of the dead, not to be entered.
Clearly, their way of dealing with a plague was the same—avoid it entirely.
They fled far, far away.
The seven or eight khalasars that had gathered around Volantis scattered like startled birds in the forest, fleeing northward into the Dothraki Sea.
This deeply disappointed Dany. Her original plan had been for the horselords to live off the coalition's supplies—to eat their food, drink their water, and drain their resources.
When they reached Meereen, she would strike their camps, challenge the khals to single combat, seize control of the khalasars, and lead a hundred thousand screamers to smash through the coalition's center.
After weeks of effort driving the northern hordes toward Volantis, one unexpected plague had scattered them all. Damn it!
As Dany cursed, the coalition forces were cursing even louder—and feeling even more miserable.
Outside Volantis, at the foot of the mountains, inside a cave converted into a secret chamber—
An eight-candle chandelier lit a thirty-square-meter stone room. At its center stood an oval stone table surrounded by four or five people.
At the head of the table sat a young girl of breathtaking beauty.
Her long hair shimmered silver-gold. She wore a white priest's robe trimmed with gold. Her small face and large blue eyes gave her a sweet, innocent appearance.
Yet the aura of authority she radiated made everyone else lower their gaze, respectful and slightly fearful, not daring to harbor a single impure thought.
A middle-aged man with a narrow, triangular face spoke."High Priestess Jenny, Khal Bono refuses to return. He fears being taken by the 'Pale Mare' and insists on going to Mother's Mountain in Vaes Dothrak to pray."
Hmm, Dany's guess was right — after Benny's death, Jennie personally took charge.
Now, she was here.
The man with the triangular face was Sibelio, one of the three Triarchs of Volantis. A member of the Tiger Party, he was well-versed in the art of large-scale warfare—though he had never actually fought in one. He had, however, read a mountain of military classics passed down through generations.
According to the original plan of the allied army, four forces from the east, west, south, and north were to attack Meereen from land.
The northern front consisted of the horselords from the Dothraki Sea, the western front was the main allied force marching along the Valyrian Road, and the eastern front comprised the Jade Sea mercenaries and slavers coming from the upper reaches of the Rhoyne.
The southern front was meant to travel along the "Ancient Silk Road," the old route through the Red Waste that connected Qarth, White Cloud City, and Meereen.
Later, because the Red Waste was far too hot and lacking in water, the southern campaign was abandoned. Only the western, northern, and eastern forces remained.
Sibelio served as commander of the western front, the War God Grazdan of Yunkai led the eastern front, and the northern front was made up of horselords, led by Khal Pono — the same Pono who had taken half of Drogo's twenty thousand screamers.
Yes, that Pono.
Khal Pono had been one of Drogo's most capable bloodriders. Of Drogo's forty thousand screamers, twenty thousand had followed Pono after his death.
It was as if fate had smiled upon him, lifting him from the dust to soar once more.
After four years of effort, Pono had nearly recreated Drogo's former glory. With thirty-five thousand screamers under his command, he was now the mightiest khal in the Dothraki Sea.
More importantly, Khal Pono bore a blood feud against the Dragon Queen.Though Dany replaced Rhaego with Jango, she spared no effort to ensure Jango's safety.
Before Drogo's death, she had quietly arranged for five hundred elite guards to escort the false Rhaego away from the camp.
Her plan had almost succeeded. Jhako and the others never imagined such a scheme and failed to notice her movements.
But Pono was cunning. Even before Drogo's death, he had secretly begun absorbing the khalasars of other leaders. While others waited for Drogo to die before making their move, Pono was already consolidating power — and closely watching the newborn "stallion who mounts the world."
It was he who blocked the path of Qohollo and Drogo's five hundred guards.
He did not kill Qohollo or the Khal's son. Instead, he crippled the five hundred guards and let other khals finish off the boy who would have been Drogo's heir.
Pono was powerful. Pono had a blood feud with the Dragon Queen. And Pono had been chosen by the allies as commander of the northern army.
Now, that northern commander had fled.
"High Priestess Jennie, Khal Pono has betrayed us. Can't you give him a little punishment?" asked a bald, short, and fat man.
The fat man had a plum-sized pink growth on the tip of his nose. Known as the "King of the Long Nose," he was a prince from the Isle of Elephants and the commander of the five thousand war elephants in the allied army.
"It's pointless," said the Ragged Prince, shaking his head. "Your Highness may not know this, but the horselords are proud and stubborn. They do not fear death, so they cannot be threatened.
It would be better to send him a gift to shame him, then persuade him with kind words — make him understand the true purpose of this war."
"The horselords can feel shame?" the Long-Nosed King asked incredulously.
"When the horselords give their word, they usually keep it. They're more reliable than mercenaries.
If they accept a gift, make a promise, and complete a task, they feel honored. They'll even braid a new bell into their hair and boast of it to others," explained the Ragged Prince, leader of the mercenaries.
The Long-Nosed King rubbed the fleshy growth on his nose and sighed bitterly. "But we don't have time to wait for the horselords to change their minds. We must strike soon!
Forget the hundred thousand cattle and horses — just my five thousand elephants consume supplies at a terrifying rate. It's a miracle we still have the whole world sending us provisions."
"Alas, even if we want to move fast, we can't," Sibelio muttered, his triangular face drooping into a square. "Tolos has been sacked, New Ghis has fallen, the Dragon Queen strikes everywhere, and the allies are struggling with every step. Now there's even a blood plague."
"What about Meereen? Did we manage to launch our plague corpses into the city?" asked the Long-Nosed King.
"We sent four waves," Sibelio said dejectedly. "All failed. Before they even reached Slaver's Bay, they were intercepted by dragons. Five wyverns were killed, and three others were captured."
"Not even once? That's absurd!" the Long-Nosed King exclaimed.
"There must be spies among us. Maybe we should form a disciplinary force to root out traitors," said Sibelio, hesitation flickering across his sharp face.
The Ragged Prince frowned and said coldly, "When Tolos fell, we already rooted out a batch of traitors in Mantarys. Jack Halle, the deputy commander of the Spear Corps, was fed to the dragons. Every mercenary company trembled with fear afterward.
Then, when New Ghis fell, they said there were more traitors. The high command of the Alliance gathered to hunt spies, and Prince Trig of Lys and Qarth's Xaro accused each other, causing chaos and panic.
Now you want to do it again in Volon Therys? How many traitors do you think there are?If they didn't truly hate the Dragon Queen, who would travel thousands of miles to Slaver's Bay to suffer like this?"
"If there are no spies, then why do we keep failing? That makes no sense!" Sibelio insisted.
The Ragged Prince thought for a moment. "Could it be supernatural power? Princess Jennie mentioned that Dragonstone has rebuilt its magic network."
Everyone turned to Jennie, who until now had remained silent.
Jennie's delicate brows furrowed, and a faint confusion appeared on her moonlit face. "The magic network can transmit information, but it can't eavesdrop—"
"Who!"Suddenly, the young priestess's expression changed sharply. She snapped her head toward a crack in the stone wall, her gaze fierce enough to cut through the air.
(Note: The danger of the blood plague hasn't been exaggerated, but it truly didn't cause the allied army to collapse. In the original story, the army landed at Astapor — practically a plague city — and still marched rapidly.
From Astapor to Meereen is about 800 to 900 kilometers, and soldiers kept falling ill along the way, yet the army held strong.
Perhaps foreigners really do have a psychological advantage against "mild" epidemics.
Also, a small correction: the previous chapter title was misplaced. It should belong to this one. My mistake, apologies.)
(End of chapter)
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