To the Storm's End!

Sorry for the long delay. I have been busy with life and also writing two original novels. I will still keep updating this one but it won't be as frequent as I hoped it could be. Life is hard when you have to focus on making money. I might get on Patreon if my original novels work out. Then I might be able to write regularly.

Anyway, here is a 2700 word long chapter. Enjoy!

----------------------------------------------------------------------

----------------------------------------------------------------------

{Bran POV}

Brother Raven is weird, he makes me read and write runes instead of doing hunting training. Father… well that man would not have approved.

He'd probably say, "All a man needs to get by in this world are good hands to swing the sword and good enough feet to run away from the dangers his sword can't pierce through."

That's what he used to say every time I sat down to do my wood carving.

But brother Raven says that a man should learn everything he can and never rely on one single thing. I think brother Raven is right. He is so strong, he should know more things than that man who called himself my father.

So I want to carve a statue of Brother Raven. But it is weird, no matter how hard I try, I can't seem to remember his face when I start carving it. The moment I stop thinking about carving his face, it reappears in my mind.

I should ask him about this when he returns. This is too strange!

***************

{Third POV}

Deep into the freezing cold north, much farther than the Frostfang mountains and even further north than any man had ever gone, a man was standing on top of a mountain, looking heroic with his hands on his hips and one of his legs on a slightly raised rock, staring far off into the snowy blizzard.

'What the actual fuck! Why do I feel cold here? Wouldn't normal humans turn into popsicles here if this cold affects even me?' Raven thought as he tried to see through the blizzard.

'Seems like the bastard who fell here has revived. It seems to have lucked out too, falling into the cold north with its power being related to coldness as well. This isn't going to be easy.'

Raven could feel the sense of danger from deep into the icy north. He wasn't sure why but it seemed to be unable to move. Maybe it was recovering. That also explained why the ice zombies appeared and attacked the living. They must be its proxy.

Now, the question was whether Raven should go in and try to fight that thing or should he wipe out the ice zombie bastards. But the answer for both of those was negative.

His power alone wasn't enough to fight that monster hidden in the north and Raven didn't want to do anything to provoke it such that it would attack without caring for its recovery.

Again, he would have to follow the trajectory of the original timeline and let the age of heroes commence, Bran would have to build that wall and fight off the white walkers.

'Why does it feel like I am actually a part of the original timeline? Every action I take ends up leading to the events described in the original timeline that I read and watched.'

'If I didn't exist who would teach Bran the magic of that scale to create something as large as the wall? This is too scary. It is as if the original timeline is swallowing me and assimilating me in it.'

Raven threw those thoughts in the back of his head and locked them in a vault named, Scary shit that I don't want to deal with. He then started flying southward at supersonic speed. He slowed down and descended outside the northern settlement and walked in.

Bran who had been waiting for Raven quickly ran over to greet him.

"Brother Raven! I completed my homework. And I studied the chapter you told me to memorize as well. I can recite all the multiplication tables from one through fifteen." He proudly declared.

"Oh, my little wolf dumpling is smarter than he looks. Great job. Then, I will teach you a new magic today." Raven pinched the chubby cheeks of the cute little Bran.

"Wow, new magic? If you told me about it, I would have memorized it sooner." Bran excitedly followed behind Raven.

"Brat! You won't work hard if there isn't any reward? You need a beating." Raven jokingly kicked Bran into the snow.

Bran got up and dusted himself. He then looked at Raven's receding back with a pout. Looking at the snow on his clothes, he made a large snowball and threw it at Raven's back.

Just as the snowball was about to reach Raven, Bran felt light and the next thing he saw was the snowball that was right about to hit his face. And then he heard Raven's voice.

"You are thousands of years too young to even attempt a sneak attack on me little pup."

Bran was getting used to the bizarre ways Raven appeared and disappeared out of thin air. But this was the first time it happened to him. His face was cold and hurting but Bran was even more excited.

"Teach me this trick, Brother. Please!" Bran started his cuteness attack.

Raven started walking while slinging Bran over his shoulder. "You need to be strong enough before you can do that. With this weak body of yours, if you attempted to move at that speed, not even your bones will remain."

"Now don't make a fuss, I will teach you ice magic today. Your mother's blood should help a lot with that." Raven added.

Bran became serious at the mention of his mother. If it was his mother's legacy, he had to learn properly.

Seeing the serious little face, Raven chuckled. Lulun had given birth to a kid as cute as herself. Ah, he missed that little pup's soft fur.

//////////////////////////////

Magic in the world of Planetos had many forms. But the practice of magic could be divided into two methods; the internal and external methods.

They were self-explanatory, internal magic depended on the user to draw the magic into their body and create an imaginary reserve in their body to store it. Then the magic user would imprint their will into that magic using the magic circles in their heart.

Based on the amount and purity of magic they had in their body, their body would adapt and grow a little as well. This didn't require any special physique and only needed some talent and a lot of hard work.

For the external magic, it was simply imposing your will into the ambient magic of the surroundings and making it do your bidding. Those with special physiques and bloodlines were the only ones capable of this kind of magic.

For external magic users, the stronger your physique or bloodline, the stronger your magic would be. So you had to have a good birth for this kind of magic.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, many species in this world had some amount of magic blood in them. Even Taelar had some of it, which was why he was bad at magic.

As for Bran, he had hit the birth lottery, his mother gave him Direwolf blood and his father seems to have been one of the pure first-men bloodlines. With this combination, it was easy to see why he was growing so fast and was intelligent beyond his years.

/////////////////////////////

"Yes, let the magic do its thing. Don't rush it. It will follow your will but don't push it." Raven instructed while little bran had his hands extended with his eyes closed and brows furrowed.

Slowly, ice crystals started to emerge from thin air and merged to create a shape over Bran's open palm. As more crystals merged, the shape started to get bigger and Bran started sweating.

Finally, Bran gave up and the floating ice structure fell into his palm. Looking at the shape, Bran frowned.

"Little wolf dumpling, you are too young to think of these things, Hahaha" Raven started laughing hard while looking at Bran's frown.

Bran threw the ice structure on the ground and yelled, "It is supposed to be an ice tower!"

It had been five years since Bran started learning magic from his Brother Raven. He was already eight name days old. So he understood some of the dirty jokes that Raven and the other men in the village made.

"Sure, sure. I believe you." Raven controlled his laughter and looked at the kid who had grown way too fast.

It was as if someone put fertilizers on this kid, at just eight years of age, he looked like a boy who just turned thirteen. He was still cute though, with his chubby little face.

"Why can't I sculpt things in ice just like I imagine them?" Bran asked in frustration.

Raven ruffled the kid's hair and answered, "You need a lot of practice to be able to give detailed instructions to ambient magic. It's already great that you can already make basic shapes with just three years of practice."

"But I wanted to build the tower!" Bran was indignant.

"Talking about building, have you completed the homework I gave you last time?" Raven asked.

Bran nodded, "Yes I read the book about structural engineering completely. And I did all the homework you left me."

Raven would go back to that mountain in the north every now and then to check if there was any movement from that monster hidden in the ice.

So, Raven would simply just write books based on his past world memories and his own deductions and give them to Bran to read. In raven's past world, Bran would be equivalent to a civil engineer and architect from the mid-1800s.

Obviously Raven didn't teach him too much about the architecture of his past world, he didn't want this world's architecture to be too influenced by his own thoughts.

"If you are done with it then pack your bags, we are going down south to Storm's End. There is a king who needs a castle built. You can go provide your service and earn some gold." Raven said.

The Storm King Durran Godsgrief was having trouble with some beings who claimed to be the sea god and wind goddess wrecking his castles.

Bran's eyes lit up. He loved building things. But he had never built anything as big as a castle.

"Really? Are we really going, Brother Raven?" Bran asked excitedly.

"If you don't pack up soon, we might not really go!" Raven waved his hand, annoyed.

********************

{Durran POV}

"Your majesty, we should not challenge the gods. It will only bring down their wrath upon us. We already had six of our castles destroyed. We should move away from this cursed place." One of my advisors was repeating the same words that everyone else said.

I can't fault them for being afraid. Going against beings who call themselves gods should be scary. But they won't believe me even if I told them we aren't really facing gods.

Well, Elenei's mother might be the closest being to a god in this world but her father is just a human mage who was taught by her mother. But with their absurd powers, who would even believe me if I claimed them to not be gods?

"I have already declared this, I will continue to build a new castle until I have one that can resist them. You all can choose to live away from here. But the castle will be built!" I will not bow down to them. I'll play this game with them until the end.

"Your majesty, please reconsider." "Your majesty!" "Your majesty, think about your subjects!"

I knew their concern, but I can't give up now. Those two had killed my entire family and were prepared to kill me and Elenei too. I'll go against them in any way possible until the end.

"The discussion ends here, you can all go back now." I sent away my vassals. I need some time alone.

Right after the vassals went away, a guard came in to report, "Your majesty, there are two people outside who request your audience."

I am too tired to meet anyone at this point. "Tell them to come tomorrow. I won't be meeting anyone today."

The guard seemed to be deciding something before he added, "Your majesty, they claim that they can help you build a castle that can withstand any storms. Even those created by fake gods."

Fake gods? Does someone else know about Elenei's parents' identities?

"Send them in, quick!" I have to meet them even if to just ask how they know about the fake gods.

A little later, one of the guards led two people into the throne room. The older one looked mysteriously handsome but weak, and the younger one looked very cute and strong but he was too young.

"Greetings to the Storm King, I am Bran Stark." The young one only gave a slight courtesy bow that one gives their elders.

The older one didn't even bother speaking. The younger one, Bran, smiled awkwardly and spoke in his stead, "And this is my Brother Raven"

If this happened any other time, I would have had both of them thrown out for disrespect. But I needed to know. "How did you know about the fake gods?"

The older one, Raven, spoke coldly as if he was talking about some insects, "Real gods wouldn't need to hide in the seas and resort to stupid means like destroying some castles in order to kill you."

Bran then brought out a large scroll with some drawings and writings on it, "Your majesty, this is a design I have come up with for a castle to withstand any kinds of winds and storms. I can guarantee that this will work."

Although I wanted to know more about this Raven and his attitude, I was tempted to see what this young man called Bran had to offer.

I asked, "And how can you guarantee such a thing?"

He smiled a confident smile, one that said that victory was always within the palm of his hands, he just had to grab it. "You can build a scaled-down model of the castle that I drew up and test it…"

The more I heard it, the more I found this young man to be unfathomably talented. Building a smaller but proportionally scaled-down version would indeed be cost-effective.

And the other ideas that he was presenting were also very novel. Using different shapes to deflect the water and winds, using specific materials to stop the erosion of sea water, everything was thought out.

"Bran Stark, I commission you to help design and build this castle. What price do you ask for it?" I stated straightforwardly.

The young man looked at me maintaining eye contact, "My request is simple, if I were to ever make a claim over the north, I want you to support it."

I was stunned by that answer. He did not even waver a bit when making such a statement. And he looks so young too. This was definitely someone who was born for greatness.

Even the older one, Raven had a look of surprise in his cold eyes for a moment, before he started laughing hysterically. Only after a long time did he control his laughter.

"Haha, little wolf dumpling is already prepared to be a king? You brat! You barely turned eight, grow some hair first before thinking of becoming a king." Raven seemed to be teasing the kid.

Wait, 8 years? That kid? He looks at least 13 to me! With that kind of body, if he maintains the same growth and attitude, he might really become a king.

"Very well. As the Storm King, I Durran Godsgrief give you my word today that if you were to ever make a claim for the northern lands, I will support your claim." I sincerely answered.

Suddenly, Raven who hadn't spoken to me from the start, looked at me and said, "That's for later, but for the period of construction, you will pay him handsomely for his work, yes?"

I suddenly felt all of my muscles tense up as if I was being stared down by a predator. A voice in my head was screaming at me to answer with a yes. I had a feeling that if I said no, it would be the end of me.

"Yes of course. One should be justly rewarded for his work." I managed to speak before the tension in my body was gone.

I have seen Elenei's mother and even she wasn't this scary. Who is this guy?

Wait! Raven! This man is called Raven!