Daylight pierced the darkness once more, illuminating the earth.
Commander Luke's eyes were bloodshot as he forced himself to order the entire army into formation. Everyone was exhausted, their armor never having left their bodies.
Last night, the Northern Army had suddenly advanced in force, the sound of horse hooves shaking the ground and pressing right up to the camp.
The entire army was on alert, but the expected night raid never came; only the rumbling of hooves receded into the darkness.
The Bloodsworn heavy cavalry could not catch them in time.
Having suffered from an ambush before, Commander Luke did not dare to be careless.
He ordered the entire army to remain vigilant and doubled the sentries, enduring a tense and sleepless night.
At this moment, before the morning mist had dissipated, the Northern Army opposite them unexpectedly marched out of their fortifications again, drawing up their lines beside the bloody riverbank from yesterday.
The two sides faced each other in a silent standoff.
Between them lay the mountains of corpses and seas of blood left from yesterday, appearing even more hideous in the morning light.
Only the sound of metal scraping and suppressed breathing carried through the cold wind. Everyone knew that today would be another slaughterhouse filled with lives.
No one knew if they would be the next to fall.
In that suffocating silence, a strange sound suddenly came from the horizon, like cloth being torn by the sharpest blade, or like rolling thunder grinding against the dome of the sky.
Then, a soul-shaking dragon roar that seemed to come from ancient times crashed down from high above!
Everyone, whether Northern Soldiers or the Targaryen army, looked up in horror.
On the horizon, a pale golden shadow was cutting through the air at an incredible speed.
At first it was like a bird, but in the blink of an eye, it blotted out the sun!
The massive pale golden body was covered in thick scales; three hideous heads swayed slightly, and six cold vertical pupils looked down upon the ant-like crowd below.
As its wings unfurled, a shadow enveloped most of the riverbank, making even the rising sun pale in comparison.
The terrifying pressure was like a physical tsunami, making it hard for people to breathe.
Wylis Manderly's face turned pale instantly, but he reacted quickly, roaring hoarsely, "Forward! Charge in! Mix with the enemy! Fast!"
Under the officers' commands, the vanguard of the Northern Army woke up as if from a dream and charged frantically toward the nearest Targaryen formation.
However, it was too late.
"BOOM—!!!"
Like a falling star hitting the earth.
The sun-blotting pale golden dragon crashed down at the edge of the riverbank. The earth shook violently, and the shockwave sent the frontline Soldiers—both Northerners and Targaryen Soldiers—flying like fallen leaves.
Dust and smoke billowed into the sky.
Amidst the chaos of falling men and horses, the armies of both sides were thrown together, their formations in complete disarray.
But at this moment, no one cared about fighting. Everyone scrambled to their feet, looking up in sheer terror at the creature right before them, a terrifying being straight out of myth.
Even the Bloodsworn and Ash Company Soldiers, who had seen dragons several times, felt a shudder in the depths of their souls.
This was simply not a power that should exist in this world.
Aegon Targaryen stood steadily behind the central dragon head.
In black armor and a red cloak, his silver hair fluttered slightly in the currents of air stirred by the dragon's majesty. He looked calmly over the jumbled, terrified crowd below.
He gently patted Ghidorah's pale golden scales; that hideous dragon head submissively lowered itself even further, its long neck forming a staircase to the ground.
Aegon descended slowly and composedly, stepping over the dragon scales toward the ground.
At that moment, time seemed to freeze.
All eyes were fixed on the figure stepping down from the dragon.
Was he man or god?
Aegon stood firm before the lines, his gaze sweeping over the bedraggled, mixed Soldiers before finally landing on the panic-stricken faces of the Northerners.
"I give you a chance." His voice was not loud, yet it strangely pierced the silence of the battlefield, reaching everyone's ears clearly.
"Kneel and surrender."
"Or, die."
As the words fell, Commander Luke, being the closest, was the first to react. Using all his strength, he shouted hoarsely, "His Highness asks—yield, or not?!"
"Yield, or not?!!!"
Nearly ten thousand Bloodsworn and Ash Company Soldiers echoed him, roaring in unison. The sound waves were like a tsunami, making eardrums ache and completely crushing the last bit of hope in the hearts of the Northern Soldiers.
Wylis Manderly's face was ashen, his throat dry.
He looked at the silver-haired figure standing before the dragon and the sun-blotting pale golden beast. A wave of unprecedented despair gripped his heart.
But the loyalty of a House Manderly in his chest, the oath of a Northern vassal, struggled to burn like a final ember.
He took a sharp breath and, summoning all the courage of his life, roared out toward the silent and fearful Northern formation and that god-like figure:
"No—"
The word "yield" had not yet left his mouth.
Ghidorah's three heads slowly opened their massive maws.
Golden light condensed deep within their throats—not fire, but a more brilliant, more violent energy containing destruction.
Time was stretched thin at that moment.
Everyone who saw that golden light, whether Northern Soldiers or Targaryen Soldiers caught in the front lines, felt their hearts stop and their blood freeze.
Some were literally scared out of their wits, collapsing into the mud as they lost control of their bowels. Most people's minds went blank, leaving only the most primitive fear of absolute destruction.
They saw that the direction the golden light was about to erupt... seemed to be toward them?!
Does His Highness intend to take us out as well...?
This thought terrified many of the frontline Targaryen Soldiers.
However, three golden beams of light swept past just a few meters above the heads of the crowd at a speed faster than the eye could track!
The searing air currents almost ignited their hair, and the terrifying hum of energy instantly deafened everyone. The whole world was left with a buzzing roar that felt like it would crack their skulls.
The beams did not hit the crowd.
They landed behind the crowd, on the surging waters of the Green Fork.
"RUMBLE—!!!"
A roar millions of times more violent than thunder arrived late.
The earth rose and fell violently like waves, tearing apart.
A blinding gold-white flash swallowed everything.
No one knew how much time had passed; perhaps it was just an instant, perhaps a long century.
When the survivors' vision barely recovered, when they struggled to crawl up from the ground and turned their heads blankly to look behind them...
The Green Fork... was gone.
In the originally wide riverbed, three massive, bottomless charred chasms had appeared.
They had cut the river straight across.
River water poured frantically into the breaks from both ends, yet it could not fill those hideous abysses.
The soil and rock at the edges of the chasms were melted, showing a strange glass-like luster and steaming with pungent white smoke.
The entire section of the riverbed was completely severed, evaporated, and reshaped.
The flow had stopped.
Silence.
A silence more absolute than before the dragon's roar.
Only the roar of river water pouring into the chasms, sounding like it came from the depths of hell, and the uncontrollable chattering of teeth from over ten thousand people remained.
Aegon still stood where he was, as if that world-changing strike had nothing to do with him.
He spoke again, his voice indifferent without a hint of warmth, yet more piercing than any roar:
"One last chance."
"Yield."
"Or,"
"Not."
This time, without waiting for Wylis or any officer to give an order.
Clang! A longsword fell to the ground.
Thud! A Northern Soldier's knees buckled, and he knelt in the muddy blood, bowing his head deeply.
Like falling dominoes, the sound of metal hitting the ground, knees striking the earth, and suppressed weeping and pleas for mercy merged into a wave.
Rank upon rank of Northern Soldiers threw down their weapons and knelt. Terror of the myth and submission to absolute power overwhelmed everything.
They were just farmers, blacksmiths, and hunters who had been conscripted; at this moment, they only wanted to live.
Wylis Manderly stood alone, looking at his subordinates kneeling all over the ground, at the three abysses tearing through the earth, and at the indifferent figure beneath the sun-blotting shadow of the dragon.
He opened his mouth but could not make a sound.
The sword in his hand felt as heavy as a thousand pounds.
No one knew who shouted first, but it was an Ash Company officer from the Targaryen camp, his voice distorted with excitement and awe:
"Victory to His Highness!!!"
The next moment, nearly ten thousand Targaryen Soldiers—whether from the Bloodsworn, Ash Company, or those vanguards who had just come to their senses—all raised their weapons and used all their strength to let out a world-shaking, fanatical roar toward the silver-haired figure in black armor standing beneath the dragon:
"Victory to His Highness!!!"
"Victory!!!"
"Victory—!!!"
The waves of sound rolled up into the clouds, completely drowning out the roar of the Green Fork's severed flow and the final will of the Northern Army to resist.
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