"Seven Gods bless me, help me slay the wights!"
Richard swelled from 1.9 meters to 2.2 meters tall. Including the golden bull helm atop his head, he was nearly 2.5 meters, like a smaller giant.
He could instinctively feel that he possessed a giant's strength. His muscles bulged, and his entire body seemed filled with nothing but power.
It was as if he had gulped down a year's supply of aphrodisiacs in one breath. He felt the ultimate pressure, the ultimate swelling.
At this moment, he had absolute confidence that the sword in his hand could break through any defense: a knight's iron armor, a shieldman's oak shield, the Night King's icy armor.
"Mighty Heavenly Dragon, kill, kill, kill!"
He lowered his body and charged forward violently. The divine power of a warrior activated the red sword in his hand, igniting it in a ring of golden-red flames.
"With a hiss," he rushed in.
He advanced rapidly, but halfway through, his steps became increasingly difficult.
He suddenly recalled the night when he was thirteen and became a man with a maid.
"Mighty Heavenly Dragon, Pineapple Eight Meters Red!"
The faint golden light armor covering his body was drained of divine power and instantly dimmed and vanished, yet the full-force strike proved remarkably effective.
The three-foot blade sank halfway in.
"Awooooooo—" The Night King trembled like chaff in a sieve. Its mouth remained tightly shut, not daring to open, and it could only emit a soul-shaking wail from deep within its chest.
Jon, who was pressing down on the Night King's head and stabbing at its eyes and ears with Dark Sister, heard his uncle's anguished cry. Looking at Richard, who advanced with a savage grin and unstoppable valor, he unexpectedly felt a trace of pity.
"Uncle, Uncle Benjen, open your eyes. Dispel the ice crystal armor and let me help you find release," he pleaded softly.
"Weng—" At that moment, the sky suddenly darkened. The battle between sunlight and darkness, which had churned together like a pot of porridge, ended. The sun vanished completely, and darkness, like a coffin lid, sealed the last remaining crack.
Daenerys was multitasking, operating on two fronts at once.
At that same moment, within the faith space of the Seven Gods, her split soul swallowed the Lady of Light's destiny.
"You dare covet the Song of Light and initiate a struggle of laws. Between us, it will be life or death, with no room for reconciliation.
"I will no longer concern myself with the Long Night or the God of Cold. From now on, all my power will be used to hunt you down," the Lord of Light declared coldly.
And He meant it.
He withdrew.
Once again, at a critical moment, just as Richard twisted his blade and was about to thrust deeper, step by step, the Lord of Light faltered and fled.
"Be careful! The God of Cold is descending from the astral realm. I can't hold him back anymore!" Bran's shrill warning echoed in Daenerys and Jon's sea of consciousness.
He had been resisting the will of the God of Cold's descent together with the Lord of Light all this time.
"Mother God…" The Night King called out in a low voice.
It summoned a phantom of ice, darkness, and death.
In an instant, every brazier and torch in Winterfell was extinguished.
The counterfeit red sword was stuck at the core and could not advance another inch. The pockmarked knight roared in frustration.
In truth, within the domain where fire was forbidden, ordinary flames could no longer be ignited. Now even wildfire had gone out.
Winterfell felt as though it had fallen into a jelly of darkness and cold, like orange segments suspended within orange gelatin.
Would a torch be extinguished if dropped into water?
It was the same principle.
Only dragonfire still burned fiercely. Yet the "umbrella mushroom" formed by the dragonfire of the three dragons could no longer be maintained and scattered into chaos.
"Rumble—" The ground trembled. Winterfell boiled as, from all directions, a million wights swarmed toward the walls.
The twenty-ton wildfire wall burning outside the gates went out. The wights surged forward, and the knights immediately raised their shields high, forming a shield wall centered on the Night King.
Winterfell had six sides to its walls. Without wildfire bombs to clear the field, the wights could pile up slopes of corpses against the walls from any angle. Only dragonglass weapons could inflict damage.
The true Great Battle of Winterfell had begun.
"Skree—" Little White leapt up, flying within the walls to avoid possible White Walkers hidden among the wights. Twisting its long neck outward, it swept the battlefield with a pillar of dragonfire along the outside of the walls.
Great Black landed heavily atop the tower above the gates, crushing bricks and tiles beneath its feet. Its dragonfire fell directly upon the shield wall more than a dozen meters away.
With one hand raised to the sky, Daenerys met the surging dragonfire. Like a jet of water striking a reef, it splashed and scattered, spilling over the wights outside the shield wall.
Just as Winterfell barely managed to stabilize the situation again, Bran's warning returned. "Be careful! The God of Cold has altered the heavens!"
The snowstorm over Winterfell, and even across half the North, temporarily ceased. All the cold and ice gathered above the Night King's head, merging into massive hailstones that fell from the sky.
In the area near the gates alone, the hailstones were as thick as fists, as long as forearms, with spear-like tips.
It was as if the God of Cold lay upon the clouds, smashing the ground with iron fists. A terrifying Meteor Fist from the heavens, each hailstone a punch.
"Great Black!" Daenerys shouted.
"Skree—"
At the critical moment, Great Black opened its mouth atop the wall and spat out a vividly red fireball that seemed pixelated.
"Pop—" The pixelated fireball flew above Daenerys's head and instantly expanded into a bright red mirror surface thirty meters in diameter.
It perfectly covered the shield formation formed by several hundred knights below.
And one hundred meters ahead, another identical mirror surface opened, appearing slow yet actually swift.
"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—" The hailstones, like spears falling from the sky, plunged at high speed into the mirror surface without creating even a ripple, vanishing completely.
"Crack, crack—boom, boom!" A completely indiscriminate attack. Beneath the pink mirror, the helmeted and armored knights looked around in confusion, while the surrounding wights had their skulls smashed and bodies shattered by the hailstones.
Jaime looked up in shock. Above the dense army of wights' heads, he saw them walking upon the ground while being pulverized by hailstones that had passed "from his side."
"What is this?" he muttered dazedly.
"A spatial gate. It's a spatial gate opened by the dragon," the Great Bear exclaimed excitedly.
"Don't delay. Quickly, carry the Night King into the city!" Daenerys ordered loudly.
"Its back is stuck to the ice crystals on the ground. We can't lift it." Barristan and the others tried hoisting its head, pulling its legs, grabbing its arms. After much struggling, they were horrified to discover that the Night King's back seemed embedded in a block of cement, utterly immovable.
A sharp glint flashed in Dany's eyes as she said coldly, "Since it refuses to get up, we'll bury it where it lies."
"Bury it?" Jaime was startled, then suddenly understood. "Right. We can pile stones over it and crush it to death."
"Where would we find the time or chance to haul giant stones over here?" Barristan said helplessly.
"If I weren't afraid of freezing my balls off, I'd piss straight into its mouth. Each of us take a turn and freeze it in our own filth," the Hound cursed.
Not a bad idea. If there were time, it might actually work.
Dany thought to herself.
"We can use materials on the spot," she said to Jon.
"What do you mean?" Jon asked uncertainly.
"Leave! Get out of this tower!" Drogon roared loudly at the people inside the tower beneath him.
The garrison soldiers were bewildered and did not move.
"Skree—!"
"Skree—!"
Viserion and Rhaegal wheeled around, and dragonfire poured down like a waterfall, igniting the three-story tower above the city gate.
The burning tower snapped everyone awake. Though they did not understand what was happening, they fled the tower immediately under the threat of the flames.
Seeing the knights looking over in confusion, Dany merely said calmly, "Prepare to retreat."
Before she finished speaking, the pale red spatial gate above their heads rippled a few times. With a buzzing slash, the gates wandering a hundred meters ahead vanished. In the next instant, another spatial gate suddenly appeared at the junction of the tower and the city wall beneath Drogon's feet.
Where there is an entrance to a spatial gate, there is an exit. In the higher-dimensional world, a spatial gate is a single entity with its entrance and exit connected. But in the three-dimensional material world, it appears to have two doors, with the entrance and exit separated.
Now Drogon kept the entrance unchanged, shifting the exit from outside the city to beneath the tower.
Like a chainsaw cutting through wood, the pale red mirror-like surface laboriously sliced into the massive stone wall.
It stopped after cutting halfway through. The remaining half of the wall still held together, and the tower did not fall into the spatial gate.
From the outside, the spatial gate cutting stone looked as effortless as a sword slicing flesh. But Dany knew that cutting solid matter with a spatial gate was extremely difficult.
The difficulty lay mainly in the consumption of soul power.
Drogon was using brute force to drive the Gate God's space-time talent. He had no comprehension or technique whatsoever.
Last time in Qohor, his spatial gate had even been blocked by the black tower's undying stone.
Crackling sounds erupted from within the stone tower as it began to sway precariously, like firecrackers exploding one after another.
The hail had not stopped. It passed through the spatial gate and smashed into the stone tower.
"I need two warriors to stay here and hold the Night King down at the point of mutual destruction," Dany shouted.
Watching dust and bricks fall from above their heads, everyone more or less guessed what was about to happen.
Old Jon was the most eager to take responsibility. He raised his hand first, his expression solemn. "Your Majesty, I am willing to drag the Night King down with me."
"Let me do it instead. I've lived long enough. Going to heaven with the honor of ending the Night King wouldn't be a bad way to go," Barristan said, eager to volunteer.
"I'm not afraid of death. Khaleesi, let me," Qhorin said immediately.
"Do you think my resolve to defend Westeros is less than that of a Dothraki? Your Majesty, just tell me what to do," the Hound shouted.
Jaime, the Great Bear, Darkstar, and the others also declared their willingness to walk the glorious path.
Even Little Crab, when Dany's gaze swept over him, reluctantly stated that he was willing to die for his queen.
His father and elder brother were both wyvern riders and were not here.
Little Crab certainly did not want to die. But with everyone around him thumping their chests and clamoring for a noble sacrifice, if he said nothing, he would stand out far too much.
What he did not know was the Dragon Queen's habit.
If Ser Alliser had been here, he would rather have lost face than raise his hand to volunteer.
Because the Dragon Queen most liked pulling her own people into the suicide squad, calling it leading by example and absolute fairness.
"Ser Celtigar, your ancestors and your descendants will be proud of you," the Dragon Queen said with a sigh.
"Ser Richard, may the Mother bless you."
Little Crab's eyes widened. His soul seemed to freeze solid, and the queen's voice sounded as though it came from beyond the heavens.
I've been chosen?
Why me? I'm a Celtigar, one of your own!
And I still dream of becoming Prince Consort. I'm not married. I don't even have descendants!
His mind went blank. He did not even know what to curse.
"Your Majesty, thank you for granting me this honor. I guarantee I will complete the mission!"
The pockmarked knight was different. He was delighted and thrilled.
"Dragon Queen, King Stannis is dead. I wish to follow his brave example and perish together with the Night King. Please grant me this opportunity," the short and stout Ser Song said fervently.
"Don't try to steal it from me," the pockmarked knight glared angrily at his companion.
"Richard, we've known each other for years. Just help me this once and let me have the honor," Ser Song pleaded.
"No. I can yield in other matters, but the glory of perishing with the Night King is not something I can give up."
Watching the two argue, Little Crab's face was full of conflict.
(End of Chapter)
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