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"Send word to the overseers. Kill the deserters. Do not let them crash into the main force. Stop them quickly!"
Beric still remembered clearly how to lead men in battle. The moment he saw the many routed soldiers of the vanguard, he immediately gave his herald the order.
But by the time his order passed from the center to the overseers, and the overseers reached the front, they could no longer stop the rout of tens of thousands.
Peasant uprisings had always been like this. When the wind was with them and plunder was easy, every man seemed brave beyond compare. Once the situation turned bad, the first thing they did was run.
Beside Beric, Thoros and Moqorro watched their own men collapse. Their faces were anxious, but they had no solution.
Unless every soldier was a fanatic of the Lord of Light, faith alone could not stop a rout.
They also could not understand it. Their enormous army had advanced in triumph all the way here and should have taken the entire Riverlands with ease. Now their main force had not even begun to fight, yet somehow such a massive collapse had already appeared.
"Thoros, send out the Fiery Hand. Do not let the deserters affect our core troops. Then have the cavalry on both wings circle the area and wait. Once we tie down the enemy cavalry, they attack.
"We continue this battle."
Looking at the large numbers of enemy cavalry behind the routed men, Beric quickly weighed the gains and losses and spoke to Thoros.
The Brotherhood's core troops had expanded rapidly to around fifteen thousand. Because warhorses were hard to find, however, only four thousand were cavalry. The remaining eleven thousand were infantry.
Aside from the original members of the Brotherhood, all fifteen thousand were devout followers of the Lord of Light selected from among the others. Their cohesion was very high.
If Beric chose to retreat now, he was confident he could keep them in formation and withdraw in good order.
Then why, faced with such a great rout, was he unwilling to retreat and instead chose to fight on?
Because of the allied army's astonishing number of cavalry.
From the way those cavalry did not pursue the deserters desperately but slowly drove them into the main formation, Beric could tell that the enemy commander knew exactly what he was doing.
That commander would also understand that a refugee army of two or three hundred thousand could not pose a real threat to the riverlords.
The only true threat was Beric's own core force, the troops leading the uprising.
So once Beric's core troops began an orderly retreat, the enemy cavalry could immediately separate from the rest and would surely try to wipe them out.
Escaping a cavalry pursuit while leading infantry was never easy.
And at that point, many other routed soldiers would be disturbing morale. Even if the core troops were devout, an orderly retreat might still become a true rout.
"The Fiery Hand? Beric, are we using them from the start?"
Thoros did not have sharp battlefield judgment. Hearing Beric, he asked in surprise.
"Yes. Their purpose is to matter at a critical moment. Only they can ensure the center is not smashed apart.
"Send them out now."
Beric nodded heavily, then answered Thoros in a rapid voice.
Seeing Beric's firm expression, Thoros did not hesitate any longer. He dismounted at once and walked quickly toward the rear of the center.
Soon, roughly two hundred members of the Fiery Hand wearing fine armor and carrying longswords hurried to the front of the central formation.
"Remember. Your task is to kill every enemy blocking the front. My lord's light will shine upon you.
"The night is dark and full of terrors.
"Move."
After the two hundred members of the Fiery Hand lined up before the center, Thoros looked at the front ranks that had completely collapsed and shouted the order.
"The night is dark and full of terrors!"
The Fiery Hand prayed in unison. Then they solemnly took wooden tubes of potion from their clothes, pulled the stoppers free, and drank them in one swallow.
Heavy heartbeats sounded.
As the potion took effect, every member of the Fiery Hand suddenly swelled by a full size, warping the armor on their bodies.
At the same time, red veins crawled across their eyes. Their exposed skin turned pale as a corpse's, and thick veins bulged and twisted across it. The sight was terrifying.
After drinking the potion, most of the Fiery Hand stood quietly in place, breathing harshly. A few shook their heads or slapped themselves from time to time.
"In the name of the Lord of Light, charge!"
At Thoros's roar, the members of the Fiery Hand, whose eyes still held awareness, rushed forward.
In the blink of an eye, they collided with the deserters of the broken front ranks. The longswords in their hands chopped down with brutal force, cutting large numbers of fleeing men in half.
A few members of the Fiery Hand simply abandoned their swords and used their swollen, powerful bodies to smash forward. Any deserter blocking their path was hit and sent flying in a spray of blood.
The men behind saw the terrible deaths ahead and immediately fled toward both sides to avoid the Fiery Hand. Yet someone was always unable to get out of the way and collided head-on with the men in the center.
The Fiery Hand carved a road against the flow through countless deserters. The soldiers of the central force behind them, faces pale, stepped onto that road of blood and bodies and advanced.
"Impressive. They truly deserve the name Fiery Hand. Brother Beric, afterward, could you give me some of that potion to bring back to Volantis?
"Of course, the temple in Volantis will pay you well."
Seeing the Fiery Hand cut men down with terrifying ease, Moqorro sighed in admiration, then turned to Beric and asked.
"Brother Moqorro, you know these potions are not easy to prepare. Otherwise, there would not be only two hundred members of the Fiery Hand. We can speak of this later."
Beric's face remained grim as he answered Moqorro casually.
These newly formed members of the Fiery Hand were Qyburn's so-called new breakthrough.
During this period, Qyburn had studied the potion that had once driven Beric into a mutual-destruction frenzy and developed this new version.
Its effect was not as powerful as the old potion, but the Fiery Hand could keep their minds clear, and after the effect faded, they would only fall into weakness. With rest, they would recover.
At least, that was what Qyburn had said.
Beric watched the deserters killed by the Fiery Hand, and his expression grew uglier. Although the order had been necessary for the larger situation, guilt still filled him.
If there were no nobles, these commoners would never have suffered such calamities.
After losing so many memories, Beric had grown increasingly obsessed. At this moment, his determination to overthrow noble rule became even firmer.
At last, as more and more deserters avoided the brutal members of the Fiery Hand in advance, the road of blood and flesh opened at the end.
But the Fiery Hand had barely emerged when Brynden, who had long since noticed this group moving against the rout, led three thousand heavy cavalry at full charge toward them.
The instant the two sides collided, all two hundred members of the Fiery Hand sprayed blood and were thrown into the air.
But the warhorses in the first rank that struck them fared little better. The violent impact passed through their barding and slammed into their chests and bellies, making them scream.
These excellent warhorses were already carrying a heavy burden. After suffering such injuries, they rushed forward a short distance before collapsing limply with their northern riders still on their backs.
"Split left and right!"
Seeing the first rank of heavy cavalry and the enemy both suffer, while some of his own heavy riders behind them had no time to change direction and were tripped, Brynden roared at once.
The northern heavy cavalry behind him split into two groups, bypassed the fallen horses and men, and continued charging toward the enemy center.
Just as the two main forces were about to collide, the weapons in the hands of the enemy infantry suddenly burst into flame.
The broad, swaying orange-red firelight startled the northern heavy cavalry's horses, which had never seen such a thing.
Under the momentum of a charge that could no longer be stopped, the two separated groups of heavy cavalry still crashed hard into the infantry formation of the uprising center and caused heavy casualties.
But after rushing into the enemy formation, the horses of the northern heavy cavalry went completely out of control. Some panicked and fled wildly. Some reared back in terror, throwing the northern riders from their backs.
In short, the northern heavy cavalry's charge was broken.
As had been said before, on a battlefield, the moment heavy cavalry stopped was the moment they died.
Large numbers of uprising soldiers surrounded the two groups of heavy cavalry. Whenever they found a chance, they pulled northern riders from their horses and cut them down with flaming swords.
If this continued, Brynden's fewer than three thousand heavy cavalry would be wiped out.
Fortunately, they were not fighting alone.
Smalljon's force, which had been circling on the left and waiting for the heavy cavalry to break the enemy, was tied down by the four thousand uprising cavalry Beric had sent.
On the right, however, Edd's force, after helping Lord Tytos clear the remaining enemies, had already come up. Behind them, Lord Tytos's infantry, now reduced to more than six thousand, was slowly pressing forward as well.
"Brothers, charge!"
Edd's eyes swept quickly across the battlefield. When he saw Brynden's force trapped by a mass of enemy infantry, he pointed his longsword toward Brynden and led four thousand light cavalry into a charge.
The two groups of northern heavy cavalry had not gone far into the enemy formation before being surrounded. After Edd's force charged in, they joined Brynden's heavy cavalry with relative ease.
This time, there was no sudden broad blaze of flame. The well-trained horses of Edd's force were not startled.
But animals naturally feared fire. Their horses still recoiled from the enemy infantry waving flaming swords.
"Lord Brynden, the horses fear their burning swords. We cannot fight this battle like this. Let us withdraw to Harrenhal first."
After Edd used his light cavalry to break the enemy infantry around them and helped Brynden's heavy cavalry steady their horses, he shouted the suggestion to Brynden.
Brynden was not a stubborn man who refused good advice. He nodded readily.
"Sound the retreat. Then take two thousand riders and help Smalljon break free. I will take the rest and rescue that other group of heavy cavalry."
The moment the retreat horn sounded, Lord Tytos's force reacted first.
They were farther away to begin with, and their infantry formation, exhausted from the fighting, moved slowly. Hearing the order, they immediately turned and began withdrawing toward Harrenhal.
Edd led two thousand light cavalry around from the main battlefield to the left flank and struck the enemy cavalry from behind. Smalljon cooperated from the front, and together they forced the uprising cavalry back.
On the main battlefield, after shaking off the surrounding enemy infantry, Brynden led more than a thousand heavy cavalry and two thousand light cavalry to rescue the other thousand-plus heavy riders trapped by dense infantry.
Before they could get close, nearly a hundred flaming arrows suddenly appeared and shot straight toward them.
More than a dozen heavy riders at the front were hit directly. This time, the heavy armor they were so proud of did not block the fatal attack.
The flaming arrows burned deep holes straight through their armor, and the flames around the shafts spread over their bodies like living things.
One flaming arrow brushed Brynden's left forearm. Sharp pain rushed into his mind. Before he could even scream, the flame on his forearm began spreading.
Seeing the state of the heavy riders ahead, Brynden did not hesitate. Suppressing the pain, he used the longsword in his right hand to cut off his own left forearm at the elbow.
"Ah!"
After a short scream, Brynden threw away his sword. Using his right hand and his teeth, he tore a strip from the lining of his clothes and bound his left arm roughly to stop the bleeding.
He looked once at the heavy cavalry still surrounded and helplessly gave the order.
"All forces retreat!"
Cavalry had a natural advantage against infantry. As long as they were not surrounded like the remaining thousand-plus heavy riders, they could come and go as they pleased.
Moqorro, who at some point had hidden among the infantry, watched the enemy commander flee and could only shake his head helplessly.
As the northern cavalry and infantry withdrew, the uprising soldiers swallowed the remaining thousand-plus northern heavy cavalry.
This battle, which could barely be counted as a victory for the Brotherhood uprising army, ended there.
After the battle, aside from the thirteen thousand core troops that remained, the Brotherhood gathered fewer than thirty thousand of the routed soldiers.
The other nearly two hundred thousand soldiers who had fled were unwilling to return. Some feared punishment for fleeing before battle. Some believed they could never defeat the noble lords' cavalry. Others had thoughts of their own.
These two hundred thousand soldiers, transformed from refugees, fled from the crossroads in all directions. Some went north. Some went toward the Vale. Some returned to Maidenpool. Some went south back into the crownlands.
In the Reach, at Highgarden's refugee encampment.
Most refugees in the encampment had hidden inside their tents. At first, the excuse of catching spies had steadied them, but after the grey plague began to erupt, even the slowest people realized something was wrong.
Anyone whose body showed grey-black scales was taken away and never returned.
The refugees suffered. Robb and the soldiers suffered with them.
The early grey plague patients were relatively easy to control, because those who erupted at that stage were mostly the people Rick, the first infected man, had directly contacted.
But afterward, the number of infected people began multiplying explosively. These were the many second-wave infections spread by those Rick had infected.
Nearly two thousand infected people appeared every day, along with even more close contacts. The soldiers managing the isolation zones were nearly overwhelmed.
Fortunately, because disinfecting supplies had been prepared ahead of time, isolation areas had been set up, and other containment measures were already in place, the grey plague outbreak was barely brought under control.
On Highgarden's northern wall, Robb sat in a solid wooden rocking chair, basking in the warm sun. Margaery, radiant as ever, peeled grapes with her fair fingers and fed the moist flesh into his mouth.
Since the grey plague began, Robb had worried that delays in passing messages might create holes in the epidemic response, so he had simply moved to live near the northern wall.
Margaery, bound to him by more than politics, moved with him. During this period, Robb's daily life was mostly handled by Margaery, and their days together were rather pleasant.
Over these days, he had drawn from nine thousand infected people... nine thousand blood pact points. Yet Bloodwind's Magic attribute still remained fixed at ninety-nine.
At this rate, it seemed to be aiming for more than ten thousand blood pact points.
Footsteps sounded.
While Robb ate grapes and considered the situation, Margaery's second brother, Ser Garlan, climbed onto the wall and walked quickly toward them.
"Your Grace, a raven letter for you."
As soon as he came forward, Garlan bowed respectfully and offered the letter with both hands.
"Thank you, Ser Garlan. Is it from the Riverlands?"
Ever since Robb learned of the refugee rebellion in the Riverlands, he had transferred the northern cavalry from Lannisport to Riverrun. Even so, he had remained uneasy about this matter that had not existed in his previous life.
"No. From Winterfell."
"Winterfell?"
Hearing Garlan's answer, Robb sat up abruptly in surprise and reached for the letter.
His mother Catelyn knew it was not easy for him to lead armies away from home. Unless it was something serious, she would not write to him.
As for how they knew he was at Highgarden, that was because of Sam. The head of a northern intelligence network with enormous funds was not eating his meals for nothing.
Robb unfolded the letter. In brief words, it explained Winterfell's general situation.
All members of House Stark in Winterfell were basically well. The new wall enclosing the winter town had been completed.
With the food and money plundered earlier, Catelyn had recruited another three thousand new soldiers for training. If Robb needed them, they could march south at any time.
The key issue in this letter was that Jon had sent a raven from Castle Black to Winterfell asking for aid. According to him, at least a hundred thousand wildlings were about to attack the Wall.
At the end of the letter, Catelyn said she doubted Jon's report and reminded Robb not to be distracted by the matter.
If Robb had not specifically instructed them before his second march south to report any news from the Wall to him, Catelyn might not have sent this raven at all.
The King-Beyond-the-Wall, Mance Rayder, was attacking the Wall.
Seeing that nothing had happened to his own family, Robb relaxed. He rubbed his chin and considered how to handle the matter.
He certainly could not personally go and help Jon now. The only choice was to have Captain Jory and Owin, who remained in Winterfell, lead the three thousand new soldiers to Castle Black in support.
If nothing unexpected happened, with that many reinforcements, Castle Black should be completely secure. After all, in his previous life, Jon and the others had held it with roughly a hundred men of the Night's Watch.
Once Robb made his decision, he had the servants beside him bring paper and pen. He wrote down his thoughts, handed them to Garlan, and told him to copy the letter several times and send ravens.
After that, he could no longer return to his earlier lazy posture.
Since the wildlings had begun attacking the Wall, the Night King beyond the Wall was not far from it either. Robb had to speed up his unification of the Seven Kingdoms, or he would not be able to focus on the endless army of the dead.
Time passed quickly while Robb thought seriously. The sun gradually leaned west, and soon it was time for the daily harvest of blood pact points.
"Wait for me to return. Later, I will give you a small surprise."
As he kissed Margaery goodbye, Robb thought of trying something different with her that night. He winked at her, then turned and took Bloodwind, also fully protected, to the high-risk zone.
When he arrived, Crey, wrapped from head to foot as well, was already waiting there.
As soon as Robb came close, Crey reported, "Your Grace, there are only one thousand three hundred and forty-two infected people today. The outbreak has very clearly begun to decline."
"Mm. Crey, you have worked hard during this period. This epidemic response has also proved your ability.
"Good. Keep growing. One day, managing the Seven Kingdoms may not be beyond you."
Hearing Crey's hoarse voice from speaking too much, Robb nodded and gave him a meaningful hint.
Crey's whole body trembled. All his fatigue seemed to vanish.
He suppressed his excitement and answered as calmly as he could, "Thank you for your praise, Your Grace. Without your direction, I would not have known what to do."
"Ha ha. Then I will direct you more in the future."
Robb laughed and answered Crey. Then he sent a thought to Bloodwind, instructing him to carry out the daily harvest.
As the blood pact points continued increasing, the westering sun drew closer to the horizon.
The reason Robb chose dusk each day to harvest blood pact points and burn the infected bodies was simple.
By this time, the day's intake of infected people was mostly complete. And compared with burning bodies at night, when the flames would rise into the darkness, the glow was less conspicuous beneath the sunset.
As Bloodwind's work in the high-risk zone neared its end, Robb chatted with Crey about various things while adding blood pact points to Bloodwind's Magic attribute through the wooden fence. Suddenly, his heart tightened.
He turned sharply toward Bloodwind in the high-risk zone and discovered that Bloodwind's blood pact data had changed: Magic had jumped to one hundred points.
'Return, Bloodwind!'
Following that instinct, Robb sent the thought to Bloodwind and immediately moved toward the wooden fence beside the high-risk zone.
In truth, Bloodwind did not need Robb's command. The moment his Magic reached one hundred points, he had already begun running toward Robb. As he ran, he automatically released Control and returned to his enormous form, more than ten feet tall.
Bloodwind sprang lightly over the wooden fence and landed beside Robb. The instant man and wolf came into contact, cracks of ice crystal spread outward from them.
"Crey! Everyone! Get away from us!"
Seeing this, Robb immediately shouted to Crey, who did not know what was happening.
Crey always obeyed Robb's orders first and asked why afterward. The moment he heard Robb's shout, he turned and ran.
The cracks spread quickly into a circular field of ice crystals about thirty feet across. Then willow-leaf shards of ice suddenly thrust up from the ground.
The wooden fence, tents, infected bodies, and several prisoner soldiers who had not reacted in time were caught within the ice-crystal field. They were torn to pieces by countless shards, then assimilated into blocks of ice crystal and absorbed into it.
"Ah! What is that?"
Margaery, sitting in the wooden rocking chair on the northern wall, heard a guard cry out and immediately rose to look down.
Below, a huge ice-crystal lotus of astonishing beauty bloomed in the high-risk zone.
After it fully formed, it suddenly began closing inward like a touch-me-not plant, becoming a massive ice-crystal lotus bud.
"Hee. I did not expect His Grace to be so romantic."
Looking at the ice-crystal lotus bud below, like a work of art, Margaery thought this must be the small surprise. A sweet smile appeared on her lovely face as she murmured to herself.
"Your Grace..."
Crey, who had escaped being assimilated into ice crystal, sat dazed on the ground. Looking at the giant ice-crystal lotus bud before him, nearly thirty feet across and nearly thirty feet tall, he could not help murmuring,
"Please, nothing must happen to you."
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