Early the next morning, Linde woke up as usual, looked at Nameria beside him, and gently moved his hand away from her.
"Who is it!" Although Linde's movement was slight, it still woke Nameria.
At first, Nameria, who was used to sleeping alone, thought something had happened and instinctively swung her hand at Linde, but when her hand was caught by Linde, and she clearly saw who the person next to her was, and felt all the unusual sensations on her body, she immediately realized what had happened. Her cheeks turned crimson, and she buried her head under the pillow.
Linde kissed Nameria and said, "You sleep a little longer, I'll go to the stable to see that little guy."
"No, I'll go with you!" Nameria shook her head and sat up.
Linde did not refuse either. The two got out of bed. Nameria shook the bell by the bed, and the maid came in to help them dress. Linde and Nameria also put on the weapons placed by the bed.
Although in Tengshi Town, they often didn't wear armor, they always carried weapons. After all, in such an environment, who knew when a fatal attack might occur.
When the two left the castle, they encountered many knights and officials under their command. They all showed ambiguous smiles when they saw Linde and Nameria, and only restrained themselves when they saw the displeasure on Linde and Nameria's faces.
When the two arrived at the stable, Rossos was standing at the entrance of the stable with several of his subordinates, whispering something.
"What's wrong?" Linde walked over and asked.
Rossos saw Linde and immediately praised him sincerely, "My Lord, is that little fellow in the stable your new stable boy? He's truly remarkable."
Hearing Rossos's words, Linde and Nameria looked into the stable at the same time.
Brienne, with many bruises on her face, was standing on a horse stool, washing Black Wind's fur, and Black Wind was standing still, not attacking her. It seemed that a lot had happened last night.
"That's enough," Linde walked into the stable and said to Brienne.
Upon hearing this, Brienne looked at Linde, but did not stop washing Black Wind's back, stubbornly brushing every piece of fur clean.
During Brienne's brushing, Black Wind seemed very impatient, snorting at Brienne from time to time, but did not attack Brienne again, only walking a few steps away when Brienne tried to lean on him.
Although Linde didn't know how Brienne did it, he could tell that Black Wind didn't dislike Brienne's approach.
After completely brushing Black Wind's fur, Brienne jumped off the horse stool, walked tiredly in front of Linde, and said, "I have brushed your horse, My Lord."
Linde said sternly, "From today onwards, Black Wind will be under your care. You also need to polish my armor. In addition, every day you will study with Scholar Yves, and in the evening, I will train you in swordsmanship. My training is very strict. If you don't meet my requirements, I will continue to train you. Do you understand, Brienne?"
"Yes, My Lord," Brienne replied loudly.
"Very good, now you can rest, everything starts tomorrow." Linde turned to Rossos and said, "Rossos, now take Brienne to the fortress, arrange her next to my room, and prepare a few sets of suitable clothes, leather armor, and weapons for her."
"Yes, My Lord," Rossos nodded, waved to Brienne, and said, "Come here, little one."
"My name is Brienne, My Lord," Brienne walked in front of Rossos and said.
"Alright, Brienne," Rossos smiled and led Brienne out of the stable and towards the fortress.
For the next four days, Linde stayed in Nameria's room. After that, he led his team to the east side of Rose Road to clear out bandits, Savage Tribes, and mountain villages there. Brienne was also brought along by Linde.
This time, the request was unusually smooth. They encountered no resistance along the way. The targets they encountered either surrendered directly or moved to the Red Mountains or the depths of Kingswood in advance before Linde arrived, avoiding Linde's military might.
Linde was also somewhat surprised by this situation. He did not know that the clearing operations in the area west of Rose Road had a far greater impact than he had estimated.
Leading just over a thousand men, they swept across a large area west of Rose Road. Each subjugated mountain village had thousands of people, a dozen bandit groups were easily cleared out, and the unruly Savage Tribes surrendered without a fight. A total of tens of thousands of people were incorporated into Tengshi Town. The deterrent effect of such astonishing military achievements, let alone some bandits and mountain dwellers, even the regular garrison armies of various lords would probably be filled with fear.
Therefore, in just one month, Linde had already completed the bandit suppression mission that he had prepared to take several months to complete. Seven mountain villages and two Savage Tribes were incorporated, and eleven bandit groups were cleared out. In a way, Duke Mace's bandit suppression mission was considered complete, and now it was only a matter of time before Linde received his reward.
If it were before, perhaps some people would play tricks to snatch Linde's credit, after all, Linde was just a knight without any backing, but now even the most greedy person would not dare to have such thoughts, because Linde not only had Velas Tyrell, the heir of Highgarden, standing behind him, but also the Seven Gods Church as his backer.
In the eyes of the Seven Gods Church, especially the Archbishop of Starry Sept, the more brilliant Linde's achievements, the more he could solidify his identity as the Chosen One of the Warrior, which was also very beneficial to the faith of the Seven Gods Church.
After Linde returned to Tengshi Town, he did not change any habits, nor did he send anyone to Highgarden to inform them of the bandit suppression situation. Instead, he continued to train soldiers in Tengshi Town. When he had time, he would go to the Blackwater River Fortress, which was being built on the Blackwater River, to check the progress of the project, or train Brienne and Daisy's combat abilities.
Originally, Linde only trained Brienne alone, but Daisy, upon seeing this, also expressed a desire to be trained by Linde. Linde did not refuse; for him, one more person would not cause any trouble.
Brienne had obviously undergone very rigorous sword training, and Linde could not find anything in her swordsmanship that needed to be changed. The only thing that could be trained was her movement when performing swordsmanship.
So Linde slightly improved the movement steps of the Peace Envoy with some attack techniques, handed them to Brienne, and then had Balin, Rosso, and Rossos act as sparring partners, taking turns to fight Brienne to increase her practical combat ability.
As for Daisy herself, Linde didn't need to teach her swordsmanship or other combat techniques separately. The House Mormont's own combat techniques were already excellent, ranking among the top in all of Westeros. Just think about Old Bear Jeor Mormont, Great Bear Jorah Mormont, and now Daisy Mormont—which one isn't a highly skilled warrior?
After Linde's analysis, Daisy only had two weaknesses: one was combat experience against strong enemies, and the other was combat experience when surrounded by multiple people.
Thus, White Deer Wenda and Nameria naturally became Daisy's sparring partners, while Linde observed from the side, pointing out problems that arose during her fights, gradually improving her combat skills.
In this way, more than half a month passed. One morning, Linde had Brienne prepare the armor and put the saddle on Black Wind. He planned to tour the area around Tengshi Town with Nameria and some men, and incidentally resolve some minor conflicts in the relocated villages.
"This time, only bring the Third and Fourth Cavalry Regiments. Everyone else stays in town," Linde said, putting on his armor, to his gathered subordinates.
"Yes, My Lord," Balin and Rosso immediately responded.
Nameria then ordered a knight from the garrison, "Ser Quinn, you also bring a hundred men and follow me."
"Yes, Earl," the knight nodded in response.
"What about me?" Brienne handed the broad-bladed hand-and-a-half sword to Linde and asked.
"You come too," Linde said, looking at the eager Brienne.
"Yes, My Lord," Brienne took a deep breath to suppress her excitement and replied.
Unfortunately, Brienne rejoiced a bit too soon. Just as they were ready to depart, Scholar Yves rushed over and handed two letters to Nameria and Linde respectively.
Nameria and Linde looked at each other, then simultaneously broke the wax seals on the letters and read their contents.
"Balon Greyjoy has declared himself king, the Iron Islands have rebelled!" Nameria exclaimed after reading, and the others around also looked surprised.
Linde, on the other hand, remained calm, as this had long been within his expectations, and he had already prepared himself mentally.
What truly surprised him was the battle report of the Iron Islands rebellion. In Linde's memory, after the Iron Islands rebellion, they only attacked Lannisport in the Westerlands, burned all Lannister ships docked at the port, and destroyed the Lannister fleet. It took more than a decade for the Lannister fleet to be rebuilt.
However, this time the Iron Islands rebellion caused even greater destruction. Not only were Lannisport and the Lannister fleet destroyed, but Fairy City was also completely occupied. All of House Faman, the lords of Fairy City, were killed by the Ironborn, except for one Janie Faman who survived in Casterly Rock.
In addition, Shear Rock City and Warwick were also breached and plundered by the Ironborn. The lord families of these two places managed to escape through secret passages in their castles in time, suffering no major harm, but they also lost their ability to resist and are now all taking refuge in Branded City.
Not only were the Westerlands attacked by the Iron Islands, but even Sea Frontier City in the Riverlands was besieged by a large number of Ironborn.
Originally, Sea Frontier City's strength was sufficient to deal with these Ironborn. Even if they couldn't repel the Ironborn, they could prevent Sea Frontier City from being breached. However, the problem was that the Lord of Sea Frontier City fell ill during the extreme cold disaster a while ago, and after such a long time, his illness had not completely healed, recurring repeatedly.
When the Ironborn besieged Sea Frontier City, it was exactly when he was ill. Confused by his illness, he was unable to command Sea Frontier City's garrison to resist the Ironborn's attack, and his son, Patrick Mallister, could only barely hold the city walls, so he had no choice but to seek help from the Iron Throne.
It can be seen that at this moment, the Iron Islands are the sole dominant power on the west coast of Westeros, able to attack wherever they wish.
These two letters, in addition to describing the current situation, also mentioned that King Robert had issued a conscription order to all lords of the Seven Kingdoms, commanding them to immediately organize armies and gather in King's Landing.
These two letters were also orders from House Tyrell to Linde and Nameria, commanding them to organize armies and proceed directly to King's Landing.
"How many people should we bring?" Nameria handed the letter in her hand to her subordinate, then asked Linde.
Linde thought for a moment and said, "I will definitely take everyone. As for you, just bring a thousand people."
After making the decision, everyone went to arrange their personnel. Although Linde said he would take everyone, in reality, he did not take Rossos and White Deer Wenda's two teams, but left them to guard Tengshi Town.
As they prepared their forces to depart for King's Landing, Velas's raven also delivered a letter, primarily outlining some support plans for Highgarden.
Linde and Nameria were to go to King's Landing as vanguards, while the others would arrive ten days later.
However, this time House Tyrell was not planning to lead the troops themselves, but instead had Randyll Tarly in charge. Additionally, the supporting lords included House Rowan, House Crane, House Fossoway of Fruitwine Hall, House Hightower, and House Redwyne. Among them, House Hightower and House Redwyne would provide naval support to the Westerlands in the form of a fleet, while the people from other families would gather at Highgarden before being uniformly dispatched to King's Landing.
Among the dispatched support team were also some acquaintances of Linde, such as Joel Flower from House Crane, and Matus Rowan, whom he had met several times in Golden Tree City.
In addition, Velas specifically mentioned in the letter that Dorne would not respond to the Iron Throne's conscription and would not send a single soldier to save the Westerlands. Clearly, for Dorne, the suffering of the Westerlands was what they most wished to see.
At the end of the letter, Velas also reminded Linde not to waste manpower on this matter, just to put on a show. He also explicitly told Linde that after this rebellion was quelled, Highgarden would publicly acknowledge that his bandit suppression mission was completed and would issue his reward. At that time, he would need to bring people to Highgarden to accept the enfeoffment.
Upon reading this, Linde felt something was amiss, because Velas explicitly used the word "enfeoffment." If it were merely to reward him with an exclave and make him a landed knight, there would be no need for the word "enfeoffment." This term is only used when a commoner becomes a noble.
"Could it be that they are not only giving me land, but also enfeoffing me with a title?" Linde suddenly had a bold guess, and the more he thought about it, the more he felt that this possibility was very high.
It was precisely because of this conjecture that Linde remained extremely excited until the team departed, which made Nameria very confused.
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