The king on the Great Wall

Page 154

Chapter 430 A Choice in Difficulty

The Night King chose the Grand Canyon as the main direction of attack. In addition to needing enough troops to destroy the remaining weirwood forests on both sides of the canyon to open the gap for the penetration of cold magic power, there is another additional consideration: the Long Night Fort is the midpoint of the east and west coasts. The west end of the Great Wall is nearer.

To launch a raid from the Grand Canyon to the Nightfort, you only need to pass through eight strongholds along the way, and only half of them—the four strongholds of Canyon Watch, Shadow Tower, Sentinel Tower, and Stone Gate Village—are garrisoned.The remaining four buildings were only for the residents of the newly granted land to live in because there were no steps leading to the top of the Great Wall, and no defensive walls were built. When the alarm sounded, all personnel immediately moved to the nearest garrison stronghold.

Although the army of ghouls was slow to move, they won't need to rest.Overnight, they broke through the defense line of the Grand Canyon, the canyon watch, the shadow tower, and the sentry tower... This fierce offensive like a broken bamboo simply ignored the "Defense Plan" carefully planned by the Night Watchman Command, and ignored all those who had control of the situation. The living people were so shocked that their hands and feet were cold and their scalps were numb.

However, the Night King wasn't satisfied yet.

……

On the surface, the army of dead men led by him completely gained the upper hand in this final duel of ice and fire, but secretly, he felt that he was losing the war.

For humans, it is a disastrous defeat to lose defense lines and strongholds as soon as the battle starts under the condition of careful preparation, but for the Night King, none of the previous series of battles can be regarded as a "victory".

The judging of victory or defeat is not the gain or loss of strongholds and lines of defense, but whether the tactical and strategic goals have been achieved.

What Hanshen wants is not these hard, cold and useless fortresses, but to establish a victory before the magic dragon returns!The Great Wall is thousands of kilometers away from King's Landing, but this is only a matter of ten hours for a flying dragon. Even if we are optimistic, two to three days is the limit of the dragon's absence from the battlefield... According to the original plan of the Night King It is conceived that after capturing the Shadow Tower, the army will quickly capture the complete or almost complete climbing ladder, occupy the top of the ice wall, and then attack up and down, simultaneously advancing to the middle of the Great Wall, taking the Nightfort before dawn, destroying and closing the weave within the Great Wall of magic.

After relieving the priests of the cold gods from being unable to recover their magic power and being suppressed by spells, they quickly headed south, and before the three dragons returned to the battlefield, they destroyed all the resistance forces of the land grant and the northern border... so that those flying lizards could not spray. The finished Dragon Flame could no longer stop the army's pace.

And actually?

The living are preparing far more for this battle than the Night King predicted.

It took more than an hour for the army to capture the Grand Canyon and lost more than 1 ghouls—this was when the line of defense failed to play a full role, and it took another [-] years for subsequent preparations such as pulling out the canyon watch and cutting down trees to pave the road. For two or three hours, things were normal so far, but everything that followed deviated from the script.

***

After launching the attack on the Great Wall, the army consumed nearly [-] ghouls in the first stage of the Shadow Tower, and it took more than an hour... However, after paying such a heavy price far beyond the plan, the plan to seize the ladder failed. accomplish!

The defeat in the first battle may be a coincidence, and the army turned non-stop to the next stop that should have been bypassed - the "Sentinel Building".The fortress has blocked the gate after receiving the report from the survivors of the Shadow Tower, but the Night King adjusted his tactics slightly and decisively used magic to assist the battle after the battle, successfully reducing the strength and time consumption of troops. It can be seen that the defenders The ladder was destroyed the moment the wall was breached!

After these two consecutive battles, the number of puppets killed by the night watchman was far from keeping up with the consumption, and the number of troops fighting less and less was only a small problem that was expected. What really made the Night King feel desperate was that he realized: Destroying the ladder made him hopeless to seize it. It was not a personal decision of a night watchman commander who had a whim, but an established plan that the enemy had already planned!

To make matters worse, the two leading priests of the Eastern Route Army, which was supposed to serve as a backup and was deliberately separated to deal with this desperate situation, suddenly lost contact in just a few seconds and were completely wiped out.

That kind of mysterious weapon that can instantly kill the priests of the cold god is widely equipped by human defenders. God knows how many there are!

……

Turning the third fortress into a piece of scorched earth and leaving behind him, the Night King solemnly led the army to continue on their way. When they arrived at the last stronghold of the Great Wall defenders before the Night Fort, "Shimenzhai", the sky Start to shine.

The lightning surprise attack, the bankruptcy of the plan to win overnight is already a certainty, and now the Night King is facing a difficult choice: to attack this human fortress that is also heavily defended, and try his luck to pin his hopes in this fortress Will the defenders forget to destroy the staircase...or just bypass it and storm the Nightfort with only ground forces?

The former plan was rejected first, because gambling by chance did not conform to the cautious thinking mode and style of the servants of the cold god.

As for bypassing and going straight to the Long Nightfort?The east and west armies totaled 11 ghouls, and now they folded a little on one side and wiped out a team on the other. After all the way, there were only less than [-] left in a daze.The army of ghouls is not afraid of being pinched from both sides, but there is still the problem: the closer to the middle of the Great Wall, the more obvious the suppression of the cold god priests, and the slower the speed of recovering magic power. It will be so strong that no priest can release the fire extinguishing spell...

Only relying on the ghouls attacking with their flesh and blood, how many times would it take to be burned to death?After a fierce battle, if there are only a few troops left, even if they have recovered their full strength, can the priests of the cold god cope with the frenzied encirclement and suppression of the human armed forces that have reacted?

The opportunity was missed, and Kong held several meaningless victories, but the Night King felt that he had fallen into a dilemma-the Great Wall of Desperation, and it really made anyone who wanted to destroy it fall into desperation!

……

While thinking seriously, another priest at the side said a few words in an old saying, providing the Night King with a third way of thinking.

Now that the blitzkrieg plan to take down the Great Wall has gone bankrupt, it is better to admit defeat.There is at least one and a half days before the dragon returns to the battlefield. Although the magic of the Great Wall is strong, it has not covered the gifted land. The forces that might be used to counterattack are eliminated. After the army of ghouls has been re-strengthened, they can calmly go north and concentrate their efforts on dealing with the difficult Long Nightfort.

After thinking about it for a lifetime, the Night King immediately began to sense the dense places of human beings.After a while, he was pleasantly surprised to find that: not far to the southeast, there was a large group of dense life breath, the intensity of which was so high that at least five figures of living people could gather together to produce it.

Humans think that it is safer to keep warm in groups like this, but they don’t know that in the eyes of the priests of the cold god, such a dense group is much easier to deal with than those small but strong strongholds along the Great Wall, garrisoned by 2000 people, and the gains outweigh the losses if they are breached. , It's like fat meat delivered to your mouth!

-

Chapter 431

The first night of the thrilling battle is over.But for the greater part of Westeros, beyond the southern land grant of the Great Wall, who could neither see fire nor hear horns and explosions, it was just another morning in winter.The dense clouds blocked the sunlight, and the sunrise scenery was completely invisible. We could only see the eastern sky light up little by little. If it weren't for the crowing of roosters, most people might not even know the time.

Winterfell, which had been silent for more than ten hours, gradually recovered. Maester Luwin finished dressing and washing, and checked the crow's nest as usual before eating - he found several more ravens, one from White Harbor, two Only from Icefrost Harbor, and two from Castle Black and Queencrown.

They weren't there when I checked before going to bed late last night, and they probably arrived in the middle of the night or early in the morning.As the only city in the northern border, it is not surprising that Baigang has reported the situation... On the contrary, four birds came to the land today, which is a bit rare.Realizing that something was going on, Luwin suddenly woke up a little bit. With doubts and nervousness, he quickly removed the letters tied to the crows' feet, sent the birds to the cage and fed them some minced meat. Opened the letter from the land grant.

After a brief glance, the old scholar's expression changed drastically, and he hurriedly ran towards the main castle holding the letter.

A moment later, Robb Stark, who had just finished his breakfast, rushed out of the main castle, rang the bell on the school grounds and summoned all the retainers in the castle—the still drowsy Winterfell suddenly seemed to be stabbed by a needle Suddenly woke up...began to get busy.

The four doors were opened, countless retainers and guards swarmed out on horses in neat clothes, and the crow's nest also released ravens one after another like crazy, flying to all parts of the northern border.

The legendary enemy finally invaded, and in the northernmost frontier of the Seven Kingdoms, there is not only the first military port in the north that intends to use it to fight against the Iron Islands, but more importantly: the mother and younger sister of the Lord of Winterfell are still on the Great Wall Condolences to the frontline soldiers and civilians...

Whether public or private, emotional or rational, it is impossible for the northern border to sit on the sidelines at this moment. The order Robb sent was simple and direct: call all the troops and go north to support the Night Watchman.

***

On the afternoon when the Northern Territory began to assemble the army under the order of the Stark family, in the north of King's Landing, in the city of Rosby, where the three-headed dragon banner had already been hung, the two counselors of the Queen were both restlessly in the cold and gloomy hall. Waiting, holding on.

Daenerys left the gifted land yesterday afternoon and flew back to the south. After flying for more than one night, she arrived at Rosby City, the command post behind the siege of King's Landing, in the early morning. Due to the fatigue and exhaustion, she ate something and began to rest after landing.After learning the news, Varys immediately used the letter crow to inform Jon Connington, asking him to bring his "nephew" to see his aunt as soon as possible... With King's Landing already closed, crossing the Blackwater River does not take too much money After a lot of effort, Prince Aegon entered the castle under the escort of the cavalry half a day later because he had already made preparations, but the queen was still sleeping in the bedroom until then.Therefore, the two important ministers who had their own thoughts and didn't want to miss the first time the queen got up had to stay in the hall outside the door and wait.

(With a heavy responsibility on her shoulders, how can the queen sleep?)

(Young people can really sleep!)

Littlefinger and the eunuch were slandering each other, watching the sky turn from dark to bright, and then back to dark again, the queen has been in the bedroom for almost ten hours, why hasn't she come out?

Just when the two important ministers were impatiently waiting, Daenerys' lazy shout finally came from the bedroom.

"Missandei?"

"Here, Your Majesty!"

Hearing the sound, the little maid got up from the chair by the fire and walked into the queen's bedroom.

It took another half an hour before the queen packed up her appearance with the help of Missandei, and walked out radiantly after being fully dressed.

"Your Majesty!" The two important ministers shouted in unison, and immediately surrounded her, but in the end Varys' voice was a little louder, and he spoke first, "Your nephew, Prince Aegon Targaryen, is already in Joan Accompanied by Earl Connington, they arrived in Rosby City, and they have been waiting for you in the reception room for half an afternoon!"

As the Prime Minister, Petyr was very dissatisfied with being preempted, but he immediately continued: "The military reports of the Free Militia and the Unsullied are also ready and can be carried out at any time...The River Bend Army and the Golden Regiment have arrived You have reached the south bank of the Blackwater River, and the Dornishmen are on their way north, you..."

"I'm so hungry after sleeping, Missandei, go to the kitchen and help me get something to eat." Daenerys covered her mouth and yawned slightly, interrupting the chattering reports of the two important ministers softly, "Just find something, I'll still have dinner later... Is that Prince Aegon here today? Why does he know as soon as I get back?"

Varys was taken aback for a moment, and quickly replied: "Earl Clinton expressed to me through various channels that he wanted to see you, so as soon as you came back in the morning, I immediately wrote to him. Right now the Golden Regiment and the River Bend Army They are all on the banks of the Blackwater River, which is not far away. It is impossible for you to attack the city alone without them. Since you will see them sooner or later...Please forgive me for my own assertion. You see...Should I see you now, or let them wait meeting?"

***

Daenerys frowned—she was a queen, and she couldn't speak her true thoughts directly like a wayward child, but deep down, she really didn't want to see this Prince Aegon very much.

It's not intentional to neglect visitors or not to be diligent in government affairs...but her inner emotions are very complicated for this "nephew" who suddenly appeared.

Right now, there were as many people who said Prince Aegon was real as he was fake, but even setting aside the subject, on which she wasn't sure yet, she still found it odd: to know there were blood relatives alive, As the original "Last Targaryen", Dany should be happy.But in fact, she has considerable dissatisfaction—no matter how to beautify the past, the fact is: this Aegon Targaryen lived in Robert Baratheon when he and his brother Viserys grew up. In the shadow of chasing and killing, he grew up steadily under the situation of "attracting firepower for him".

She and her elder brother will be the early birds, she will set herself on fire to hatch the dragon, and she will lead her followers to taste the ups and downs and hardships along the way.After she had made all the preparations to counterattack Westeros, a man who had grown up comfortably and comfortably under the care of her since she was a child, had never experienced anything—but was higher in line of succession than her Nephew, with a mercenary to share the fruits of victory?How could she swallow her breath without complaint?

Of course, this nephew who appeared suddenly did not come empty-handed, and the fighting power of the Golden Group is beyond doubt.Theoretically speaking, marrying this nephew to be his queen is the safest and safest plan. After taking this step, the battle of King's Landing will become like hitting an egg with a stone, and the Iron Throne is definitely in the bag... Once, she really couldn't find it. Give any reason to refute this optimal solution.But now, after being educated by the commander-in-chief in the north who watched the Great Wall, Daenerys finally understood what the problem was.

This "theory" supporting her marriage with little Aegon is actually the law of the wheels of Westeros' feudal history!

How ridiculous--she kept saying that she wanted to break the wheel, but for a long time, she couldn't even jump out of the wheel, get rid of the rules of the lord's game, and change the inherent thinking mode of nobles playing power tricks!Living in a daze like this, how can it be possible to realize the ideal!

But now, she was thinking clearly like never before.

The country is easy to win but hard to rule. Marrying Aegon Targaryen and bringing River Bend and the Golden Company into the camp is indeed the shortest shortcut to the Iron Throne.However, when the day comes when I am settling down and intending to change, if my nephew and husband, the king of the Seven Kingdoms, and his interest groups do not support me and think that she is messing around in a whimsical way, then as a mere queen , where should the dream of "building a world free from oppression" start?

She must be queen, and must choose the more difficult path!

***

However, although the thinking is clear, Daenerys has no reasonable reason to refuse to receive the visit of "nephew".Just like a child whose parents arranged a blind date, even if she made up her mind that she would never talk a word after the meeting, she still had to go through the process.

"Forget it this time. Before arranging a meeting for me next time, discuss it with me or my Queen's Hand first." Daenerys stared at Varys with a slight dissatisfaction, and turned her head to look at the person who was about to speak. Petyr, who talked a lot, said, "I am going to see this Prince Aegon now, and report to me what has happened in the past few days at dinner, and arrange a meeting with the envoys of the Reach and Dorne after the meal. Draw up a reasonable itinerary for me tonight, and tomorrow I'll ride a dragon over the ring around King's Landing - make sure every one of my soldiers looks up and sees me."

Varys glanced at Petyr with a smile. The latter nodded helplessly and swallowed thousands of words—even if he had more to say, as a subject, he could not publicly question what the monarch had done. out of the decision.

Just as a group of people surrounded Daenerys and walked towards the drawing room, preparing to welcome the historic moment of the meeting between the two Targaryens, the soldiers sent to guard Rosby's crow cage hurried in through the door.

"Your Majesty! A cage of ravens that Lord Maqiluo brought to the Great Wall a few days ago suddenly flew back at noon, and they all wrote exactly the same content. I can't understand things like strange ghosts and dead people. I don’t know if it’s some kind of secret words and codes that he agreed with you, so I hurriedly brought them here to show you.”

"What?" Daenerys' originally unwilling and tired face was filled with solemnity, "Bring it!"

After taking a glance at the note, the expression on the little queen's face turned into determination. She, who was rushing to the living room, turned a corner and walked straight to the door.

"Your Majesty, where are you going?"

"Some emergencies happened, I have to go back to the Great Wall immediately."

"What? But you've only been back for a day, you only slept, and you haven't done anything yet!?" Varys was so anxious that he wanted to vomit blood. Seeing that things were almost finished, why did such an unimaginable accident suddenly occur? ? "Prince Aegon is waiting for you, His Majesty will see you before leaving!"

Although he really wanted to stop Varys' plan to match the Queen and little Aegon, even Petyr couldn't understand it and had to oppose this inexplicable and absurd behavior: "Your Majesty, even if there is an emergency on the Great Wall, If you rush back now, you will arrive tomorrow at the earliest. If the night watchman can’t guard it, you can’t rush there in time. If you can guard it, it will definitely not be a short time. You rest overnight and do things tomorrow Let’s go when we’re done, there won’t be any major problems!”

……

It took more than ten minutes to walk from the castle to the open space, and the two important ministers continued to persuade them all the way, but it didn't have any effect after all their saliva was said.And Daenerys called Drogon as soon as she saw the warning letter, and when everyone approached the open space, the huge shadow of the black dragon passed over their heads and landed in the center of the field.

"I'm going to fulfill a promise now, a promise that I value very much. Are you trying to persuade me to break the promise?" Daenerys turned her head and raised her eyebrows at the two staff members angrily, "Stop talking nonsense and go back to the castle. Go, tell Prince Aegon, either wait for me here, or go back to your barracks, and come back when I am here again! Don't attack King's Landing until I come back!"

"Your Majesty~ Your Majesty!" Missandei chased after her panting, holding a snack box, "Don't you want the snack you wanted?"

"Give it to me!" Daenerys, who was ready to mount the dragon, stretched out a hand to the little maid and took the food box, "Drogon is flying very steadily, I will eat some time on the way!"

-

Chapter 432 Armageddon?

The letter crows from Shimenzhai delivered the latest news: the army of ghouls did not attack the fortress, but detoured far away.

At first, everyone, including Iger, thought that the enemy jumped over the last stronghold and attacked the Long Night Fort directly, but it was completely different from the situation outside the Great Wall—this time, the White Walkers did not use any magical means to harm Birds possessed by skinchangers, preventing them from observing.The large-scale aerial reconnaissance that began after dawn quickly proved that people were wrong: at noon, a sea of ​​corpses was found in the northwest of Houguan Town.

Maybe it's because he knows his whereabouts can't be hidden, maybe he's willing to scare the living people from miles away... Under the gloomy sunlight shining through the clouds, the overwhelming tide of corpses looks so impressive shocking.

Since the refuge rate of civilians has reached 100%, the ghouls have passed through countless villages along the way, but their number has not increased except for the thousands of soldiers killed and injured in the capture of the fortress last night.However, due to the different types and states of ghouls moving at different speeds, and the Night King didn't want to separate the troops, so—looking down from the sky, the ghouls were moving towards Houguan Town on the land-grant snowfield as if taking a leisurely stroll. The sea of ​​ghosts has been stretched from head to tail into a long and narrow strip with uneven distribution and density, and because the front stops from time to time to wait for the tail to form waves, connecting and stretching for several miles.

The dead people who were marching rather than fighting were not as densely packed, turbulent and crazy as they were when attacking the fortress, but after spreading out a little for the convenience of movement, the increased land size from a distance made them seem like East African The migrating herbivores on the prairie are also hard to see the end, and it makes people feel desperate with another overwhelming momentum.

The town's alarm bells rang frantically, and the already tense atmosphere was stretched to the extreme in an instant. Soldiers and residents were running around everywhere on the walls and between buildings... But when the ghouls arrived outside Houguan Town Instead of launching an attack directly, it slowly spread its left and right wings to both sides, swallowing the package of Houguan Town like a bloody mouth, and finally turned into a huge black ring, completely surrounding the town.After being elongated and spread out in this way, the originally vast tide of corpses was only a narrow black line, but their majestic momentum extending to the end of the field of vision from south to north still made everyone who could see this scene on the city wall All timid.

……

The Night King is waiting for dark—this battle is different from the attack on the Shadow Tower and the Sentinel Tower: the tactical purpose is not to quickly capture a specific target, but to capture the town of Queen Crown, including hundreds of giants, with as few casualties as possible. All the residents inside were killed and transformed into puppets to increase their strength, increase their strength and solve future troubles, and then go north to attack the Long Night Fort, and still take down the Great Wall in one go without using magic!

And if you want to reduce your own casualties, there is no more favorable condition than fighting at night: the cover and fear bonus brought by darkness can at least double the battle damage ratio of the dead to the living.

For human beings, the good news is that while the sky is still bright, Houguan Town has time to communicate the new version of the defense plan that was revised overnight to the ears of every grassroots officer and relevant soldiers and civilians, and make relevant arrangements; the bad news is that ——At this moment, it is only two hours before it gets dark.

***

Under Iger's inquiry, persuasion, and request of the highest authority, Bran Stark, who has become a night watchman in black, finally revealed a new message: he can control the crows, even if the Night King and the White Walkers Find out their approximate locations without casting spells—of course, the premise is that the enemy does not cast spells to attack those crows.

Fortunately, with the protection of the Great Wall, this condition was barely met.

Therefore, under the cover of different birds controlled by various skinchangers from various tribes, among the flocks of birds flying around the ghoul army in Houcrown Town, there are still many untamed birds that are about the same size as ordinary letter-delivering ravens The large crow, blinking its seemingly lifeless eyes, scanned and sensed the enemy's formation over and over again.

"Haven't you found it yet?" In the inner castle of Houguan Town, after watching Bran close his eyes and controlling the crows for a few minutes, Iger couldn't bear to ask.

"The Night King has been found a long time ago, in the northwest of us, but I found another not-so-good situation, so I explored for a while." Bran opened his eyes: "The Night King didn't get together with his men. Instead, it seems that the ghosts are evenly distributed in all directions of Houguan Town."

"This is bad news." Iger took a deep breath, "So, together with the big battle, the pressure in other directions of Houguan Town may not be inferior to that of the Night King, or even worse?"

"Yes."

"Understood." Iger nodded solemnly. Fortunately, this point has been considered in the new plan, "But after all, people cannot be separated, and this battle can only be won by killing the Night King. I have no choice. Must face the damned White Walker. I led the men out of the inner castle, and the crows guided me—to the wall closest to the Night King."

……

The snow gradually increased, and the temperature seemed to drop a few degrees with the arrival of the strange ghosts.The sun, which had been hiding behind the clouds all day and hadn't even risen above its head, barely illuminated the world for less than ten hours, and helplessly began to sink into the horizon.As the sky darkened, cooking smoke rose everywhere in the town—because it was judged that the battle would break out after dark, Iger ordered the meal to be served an hour earlier than usual, and the defenders took turns to eat to avoid the situation of fighting hungry.

Finally, the night was lifted up by the gods from the east to the west to cover the sky above everyone's heads, and the army of ghouls standing waiting a mile away also merged with the dark sky in the distance.When the invisible murderous aura and chill gradually pervaded, for the sake of courage... some soldiers even pretended to be calm while chatting with each other and bet on when the ghouls would attack.

Then, the other side immediately revealed the answer.

After the last ray of sunset light refracted by the atmosphere disappeared in the western sky, the army of ghouls did not waste even a minute, and immediately started the general attack.

……

Amidst the shrill horns, under the walls of this town where nearly one-third of the land-grant's population gathered, a war between humans and ghosts broke out with an intensity and scale unprecedented in history.

Since Houguan Town is not connected to other fortresses through an ice wall, it is impossible to obtain support after the war begins, so it directly reserves combat readiness equal to or even exceeding the proportion of the population.The abundance of wildfire allowed them to use fire more generously for defense.The moment the tide of corpses began to move towards the wall, two fire walls were ignited by rockets and formed to wait for the visitors—but this time, the enemy's decisiveness also exceeded the expectations of the defenders: without any foreplay, after several The White Walkers, who were already familiar with human tactics after the battle, used their hole cards at the first moment of the battle.

Anyway, magic would be difficult to take effect when attacking the Long Night Fort, and saving mana was meaningless. The Night King simply made a bold and correct decision: let the priests who still had enough mana go into battle in the attack on Houguan Town, Replace the casualties with mana loss, and reduce the consumption of ghouls as much as possible!

So, the defenders around the wall were shocked to find that the entire defense line was facing the three directions of the three gates, and the fire could not be ignited from the beginning!

This situation was indeed mentioned in the new supplementary plan, but even the writers only used it as an addendum, and no one thought that this worst case would happen in the first minute of the war .