When the Gardener family ruled the Reach, the Mandalay family's expansion in power aroused the vigilance of King Pithon III of the Reach, who ordered his vassals to expel the family from the Reach.
After wandering for many years, about 900 BC, the King of the North accepted this southern family whose flag was the mermaid, and gave the Mandalay a large territory near the mouth of the White Blade River.
After that, the mermaid family used the wealth they brought to build White Harbor, one of the five largest cities in Westeros, and allowed the family to maintain prosperity for thousands of years.
Like the Lannisters of Casterly Rock, the Manderly family is best known for its management and wisdom.
In fact, among the recent generation of lion and wolf families, only a few have the characteristics of their ancestors, such as the smart, eloquent little devil, Arya with the blood of running wolves. Tywin's strength and Ai
The noble character of De is caused by special reasons, not the image these two families have shown to the world for thousands of years.
As the first heir of White Harbor, Willis behaves very much like the Manderlys.
"Could this be a scam?"
He first raised his doubts, and then suggested not to negotiate and the army set off directly.
Willis's words won over some stability-seekers.
For the current coalition forces, with Joffrey as the most important hostage, they have considerable initiative.
Arthur thought for a while and said: "That's okay. You go first. I will take people to King's Landing. Without entering the city, I will chat with them for a few hours in front of the gates of the gods. The golden robes don't have a lot of horses.
, unable to pursue quickly. I will catch up after the army has gone far."
Although the number of defenders in the city is only five or six thousand at most, if Queen Cersei, who is dedicated to protecting her son, goes crazy and sends the defenders out to snatch her son back, then the coalition forces of 10,000 will also die.
Only a few people can escape.
And when Robb had no intention of the Iron Throne and only wanted to pursue the independence of the United Kingdom of the North and the River, the conflict between the Lion family and the Starks was actually not as intense as the conflict between them and the two kings Baratheon.
After all, both Renly and Stannis claimed that they were the masters of the Iron Throne, and the other kings were all false kings.
But Renly, who has nearly a hundred thousand soldiers and is eyeing the Bitterbridge, should be Lord Tywin's biggest headache.
Sansa discussed with several great nobles in the north for a while, and felt that what her brother Robb wanted was to have a truce with the Lions at the right time, and then have the Iron Throne recognize the independence of the rivers in the north.
"Then you go ahead. Each of the adults present will give Arthur some people, under the banner of your family, to make this protracted negotiation look more formal."
Sansa suggested.
Everyone nodded in agreement, so Arthur set off with twenty mercenaries, one hundred and twenty coalition soldiers, as well as some food and water.
In order to increase their momentum, these one hundred and forty people actually carried eighty or ninety flags, including the Stark family's white-headed wolf, the Bolton family's X-shaped skinned man, the Mandalay family's blue-green mermaid,
From the Stark family's black sun star, to the Frey family's twin tower flag, to the Tauhar family's brown sentinel tree, to the Severn family's silver battle ax, to the Horwood family's orange moose, and then to the North.
The small families have flags of various colors and shapes, but in short, they really look like the same thing.
Of course, Arthur's golden sword and horse flag were at the front of the team.
After the negotiating team left, the 10,000 coalition troops began to cook, and after having a meal, they headed north along the King's Road.
…
Outside the gates of the gods.
From a long distance away, Arthur ordered not to advance any further, and then sent a senior Stark officer to deliver a message outside the city gate.
After being tricked once outside Shili City, he began to pay attention to traps.
King's Landing obviously didn't expect Arthur to be so cautious. After waiting for a while, everyone from the Royal Council appeared on the tower.
Considering Bracken's deeds of capturing Jaime and kidnapping Joffrey on his own, no one on the tower dared to leave the city.
The distance between the coalition's negotiating team and the city gate should be greater than 500 meters, but communication is still impossible.
So Finance Minister Baelish was sent to have the first confrontation with Arthur.
"Her Majesty Cersei promised that after the coalition forces release His Majesty Joffrey I, the North and the River will be allowed to be independent, and the war between Lannister, Baratheon and Stark will end."
Littlefinger was wearing a knee-length black close-fitting robe, looking smart and capable.
Behind Baelish, there were more than a dozen gold-robed men riding horses. They also carried more than a dozen flags. In addition to the Deer Family and the Lion Family, there were also some flags of the royal nobles.
"When will our independence be allowed again? This is too disrespectful to His Majesty Robb. Let your Queen Mother reorganize the terms."
Anyway, to waste time, Arthur started messing around with such small details.
Many northern soldiers behind him quite recognized this statement and nodded in agreement.
Littlefinger had no choice but to tighten the horse's rope and lead the people back again.
During the second conversation, Junlin's words were much more polite.
They promised that Joffrey would be the guardian of the Five Realms from now on, and that the North and the River would never be within the Iron Throne's sphere of influence.
Arthur refused because the terms were not clear enough, and asked King's Landing to give an accurate armistice time and specific territory.
The little finger looked dark and serious, leading people away again.
Sure enough, he bore the wrath of Queen Mother Cersei again.
"What does he want? This damn Bracken." Cersei stood on the city wall with a distorted face, staring at the group of flags in the distance.
If the Lannister heavy cavalry were here, she would have ordered them to rush over and crush this riverland bug to death.
It was Bracken who took away her younger brother, and it was Bracken who took away her eldest son.
Archmaester Pycelle admired Lord Tywin so much that he secretly joined the Lion family.
So he was also very concerned about Joffrey's capture. After thinking for a while, he said: "Maybe the rebels felt that they didn't get enough benefits. How about we give some golden dragons and treasures first?
Their attitude will be better."
"No, the people in the north are stubborn and self-respecting. If you give gold before the terms are clearly negotiated, they will think it is charity and send them to beggar." Intelligence Chief Varys objected to this.
"That's right, we don't have much money on hand. We spent a lot of money to expand the garrison. If we don't borrow money, the Red Fort will not be able to maintain it."
Baelish knew best how much money was left on the Iron Throne, so he refused to give it to the golden dragon first.
Joffrey's brother Prince Tommen also followed his mother. He suggested: "As long as we keep agreeing to their requests, the people of the North will always be satisfied. Let's talk a few more times."
Cersei took a few deep breaths and told Baelish the terms she could offer.
Littlefinger had no choice but to confirm Cersei's bottom line: "After returning to His Majesty Joffrey, all soldiers loyal to the Iron Throne will withdraw from the Riverlands and ensure that Robb's territory is as large as the two kingdoms marked on the map.
"
The Queen Mother nodded and waved Little Finger away.
The reason why Arthur refused this time was that the soldiers of the West must withdraw from the Riverlands before Joffrey could be returned.
In this way, the two sides negotiated about ten times outside the Gate of the Gods, which lasted for a full four hours.
After feeling that the coalition forces had marched four or five leagues away, Arthur clearly refused to return Joffrey and then left with his men.
On the tower, Cersei was dumbfounded on the spot. She was already wearing a mask of pain, but she was even more confused and resentful.
Now it was her turn to feel Mrs. Stark's mood.
The cruelest thing is to give hope and then ruthlessly extinguish it. The "rebels" sent people to negotiate, which made the Queen Mother think that her son would come back soon, but the way Bracken turned around and left told her that these people were just
Just playing with her.
"If anything goes wrong with my son, I will kill this Bracken. I swear to the Seven Gods!" Cersei gritted her teeth and said bitterly.
…
Hurrying slowly, before dusk, Arthur and his men finally caught up with the coalition forces.
Bad news was waiting for him.
Instigated by many young northern nobles, Sansa wanted to kill Joffrey to avenge her father.
The more rational Willis, Herman Taoha and others are trying to dissuade him from the Chinese army's tent.
Before he entered, he heard constant noises in the tent, and Arthur suddenly felt something bad.
When he rushed in, he saw that the tightly bound Joffrey was looking at the northern nobles surrounding him in horror.
The usually majestic King is now like a little sheep, waiting to be turned into mutton skewers.
"Hey, hey, we can't kill Joffrey now." He hurriedly walked over and separated several northern nobles holding daggers.
"Miss Stark, why are you confused?" Arthur shook his head at Sansa, indicating that he really couldn't kill Joffrey now.
At least it can't be spread that it was the Northerners who killed Joffrey, otherwise the Lions really won't cease the war.
Sansa looked at Arthur who still hadn't cleaned his armor, and suddenly she became ladylike.
"Then listen to Lord Arthur and disperse." Miss Stark said.
Many northern nobles were angry and dissatisfied, but they had no choice but to leave their tent.
Of course, they still spit before leaving.
Joffrey, who was full of panic, was also taken out of the tent by Sansa's soldiers.
The four people designated by Sansa to take part in the command did stay.
"This won't work. There are more than 10,000 coalition forces. If we can't protect them all, someone will sneak out and kill Joffrey." Arthur said.
Earl Taohar suggested: "Perhaps a group of people can take Joffrey first and send him directly to Harrenhal or Riverrun."
Willis said: "What if the news leaks out and King's Landing knows about it, and they send a bunch of elite riders to snatch Joffrey back?"
King's Landing does not have a large cavalry force, but a small force of one or two hundred nobles and knights can still be assembled.
"I can send Joffrey to each other, and I don't have to decide which castle to go to. This way, even if someone in the coalition forces reports this to Cersei, they won't know my route."
Arthur suggested.
In fact, he wanted to take Joffrey to hatch the dragon, but Yule had no news at all, so he thought of going directly to the Summer Hall.
"Okay." Robert had a pretty good impression of Arthur and nodded in agreement.
Glover, who always held his head high, only recognized a river man like Arthur.
So the plan was finalized.
At ten minutes past midnight, Arthur took all the mercenaries of Qohor and left with Gendry, Qyburn and Joffrey.
Gendry was brought in because he is Robert's illegitimate son, and Robert's grandmother is from the Dragon family. In other words, Gendry has slightly more than one-eighth of the Dragon family blood.
The reason why I say a little more is because the Lu family itself is a close relative of the Long family, and there is always a little bit of bloodline bonus.
Although Gendry cannot ride a dragon, the blood of the dragon family allows the young dragon to get close to him.
Arthur himself has no trace of the Dragon family blood, and he doesn't know if the dragon hatched in this way recognizes him as its master.
If you don't admit it, Gendry will have to take care of the baby dragon.
There was still a lot of movement in the team of more than 200 people. Several spies who were closely watching Emperor Qiao's movements immediately reported it to the masters.
Of course, what puzzled these potential young men, Sansa and others was that Arthur actually led people to the south.
…
Four days later, Arthur's team walked out of the Royal Forest, and five days later, they arrived near the Summer Hall.
This was once the summer residence of the Targaryen family, the castle where they spent their summers.
In the year 259 of the Conquest Calendar, in order to celebrate the birth of his grandson Rhaegar, Aegon V decided to hold a grand party in the Summer Hall, where some dragon family members and half of the courtiers gathered.
At the same time, Aegon V wanted to use some magical rituals to hatch dragons, so he used wildfire to heat the fossilized dragon eggs.
But this caused a fire, and the entire gathering of nobles was burned to the ground, as was the Summer Hall.
This made the Targaryens, whose population was already declining, even worse.
Twenty-four years later, the Long family dynasty, which had lasted only two generations, was destroyed.
Along the bone road leading to Dorne, Arthur led the team eastward and saw the ruins of this huge castle.
Even if he looked at it from a distance, he had to admit that the fire was big enough. Almost forty years later, the ruins of Shengxia Hall were still scorched black.
After taking people closer, we found that there were actually more than a dozen people active at the ruins.
Among them were the soldier Piper and Arthur's uncle Jules.
"Why are you here in person, nephew? I heard that the battle in the north is fierce. Wouldn't it be possible without a strong general like you?"
When Yule saw Arthur coming with his troops in person, he hurriedly came up to greet him with a smile on his face and held the horse's rope.
"How's the stone hunt going?"
Yule glanced at the riders behind his nephew and whispered: "The approximate location has been determined, but the search was slow because of lack of manpower."
Because Shengxia Hall is still a large castle, it would be impossible to find it in a short time with just two people, so Yule went to a nearby village and hired a dozen farmers and peasants to help search.
According to Yule, they had already gone through about 80% of the area and confirmed that there were no "oval stones" inside.
The remaining 20% of the area is where the dungeons and halls of Summer Hall are located. Because most of the buildings are made of stone, it is a bit difficult to search, which delays the progress.
"Since you have brought so many people, they will be found soon," Yule said.
Arthur also wanted to end this matter as soon as possible. After all, Cersei, who lost her son, was not far from crazy.
So more than two hundred mercenaries were also sent to find the "ellipsoid stone".
Under the command of Yule, who had already planned the search plan, the entire team devoted themselves to the intense work of finding stones.
During this period, Arthur also helped move several large rocks, and then found seven pearlescent dragon egg fossils under a huge pillar.
According to the current timeline, Dragon Mother has hatched three dragons, so the magic of the entire world has begun to revive.
