Chapter 32

Around the time your eighth Birthday came in Sight, the World, your Life, and even the War began to slow down even more, which surprised you, seeing as you didn't even know that a War that didn't have a single proper Battle can actually slow down any further. You decide to blame the Taxes for screwing up your Plans, your current reasoning being that Years without the Taxes of the Rock left the Treasury more vulnerable to the usually so tender and undoubtedly skilled administration of the King than anyone truly expected.

And while the coming Years of Winter will only bring a few Months of Snow with them, not having the Gold to start up the Economy and Food production once the last Snow melts should be the greatest problem the Crown has faced in who knows how long. Starving Peasants don't make for especially great Soldiers after all, or well, they would probably do just fine as long as it would involve getting the current King's Head on a Spike. A problem, said King has probably realised a bit too soon, hence the lack of real Conflict, leaving your Plan of getting the little Prince on the Throne in Shambles, especially seeing as the King can now only pardon your House, which your Father would take every Day of the Week over wasting his Troops.

Though it's not too big of a problem, you would prefer having your Plans work with the first try, but you guess that the Opportunity of renewing the Strength of the Realm was just a bit too enticing for you to truly work. Mayhaps you should work on making your Plans a bit more complex in the future, so that they rely on you and not the World around you a little more. There are still plenty of Positives to be had from this failure however, and you would say that it feels as good as always to be validated, for what good is a Continent spanning Realm if some lacking Taxes are all it takes to break the Strength of the Crown.

For now you can only hope that your Father will remain in the Westerlands, which seeing as there is little Love between the King and your Father, is at least something you don't think you truly have to worry about. You guess that following the lead of your Father until you have a better Plan of achieving War isn't really a bad thing, especially with how quiet he is most of the time. Having some of his Plans play out before you actually seems like a good Idea, and who knows, mayhaps you can actually learn something from the way he will squeeze the Crown for everything they've got.

Seeing as the Westerlands have a Population of nearly twenty-million to the Crown's measly thirteen-million, you actually see little in the way of time pressure. The thirteen-thousand Troops the Crown could actually send directly just didn't qualify as a serious Threat, not even against your Family's Boarder Castles, with how reinforced they were during the first Years of Winter. You wonder how long you will have to wait until a new Opportunity to split the Realm presents itself, probably Years all things considered, Years that the Realm will waste with Peace.

Instead of open Conflict, the Crown will most likely make the Attempt to settle the matter with Cloaks and Daggers, while upholding the Peace of the Seven Kingdoms as always. You decide not to complain any further, seeing as their lack of Strength still benefits House Lannister, yet you can't quite help but lament how simple your work would be if your Age would finally catch up to your Ambitions. Not even your Parents can truly take you serious, instead seeing your failures as Proof that you're still a Child, on both the inside and outside. Which while frustrating can't be helped with how you can't just tell them of your last Life, seeing as you aren't Brain-dead.

Something you honestly doubt you could currently say about your Siblings, with how your Mother happily corrupted the two of them this very Morning, so as to entertain the three of you a bit. Thus instead of planning for the future, or simply reading a new Book you now have the Goal of surviving the worst Jokes anyone could possibly come up with, like for Example, what is Brown and sticky, a Stick. Which is funny exactly once, not that your Mother and Sibling seem to agree with your Words, despite them containing a rather simple Truth of the World.

You thought they would get tired of the madness eventually, but it only degraded even further to Jokes like, what do you call a Fish with no Eyes, a Fish, which is just terrible, and really begins to strain your Mind despite your best efforts to ignore them. In the end, you just used the size of your Home to your Advantage which did the Trick after a few short Weeks of avoiding them, leaving you once more with enough time to focus on the future and Mankind.

Betting on the predictability of a Lunatic was what denied you your War, and after thinking about it some more, quite deservedly so, for what you were thinking when you made that Plan is truly beyond you. Instead of your own House opposing the Crown, and so potentially going against half the Realm, you should have first learned more about the World, but you still can't really accept that Humans would genuinely follow a Maniac that burns hundreds on mere Suspicion, just what is wrong with these People.

You could understand that they would follow if he was a Man of Greatness, but neither the Realm nor the King's Dynasty can afford such madness from the Man on the Throne, so even the most loyal of Vassals should see reason, shouldn't they? They can't truly fear the Crown's all in all mayhaps twenty-six-thousand Men this much if House Lannister alone can bring around thirty-nine-thousand Men to the Battlefield, now can they? You truly can't see their reasoning at all, and it's not like the King will take kindly to his Nobles lacking Reinforcements anyway, so why is no one taking the Opportunity?