Chapter 266: The Wildfire Dragon’s Frenzied Dance

It's hard for soldiers to stay motivated on an empty stomach. So, while Robert hosted his own banquet, he made sure to improve the soldiers' situation a bit. Although the supply of alcohol and meat was limited, for these soldiers—most of whom came from poor families—it felt like a feast. The officers, however, still received a sufficient supply of both meat and alcohol.

Among them were the Clegane brothers, and Sandor, known as the Hound, was eating with a group of Gold Cloak officers. Due to a childhood "accident", half of Sandor's face was horribly burned, leaving the scalp on one side unable to grow hair. He let the hair on the other side grow long, using it to cover his scars.

Sandor spat out a bone he hadn't fully chewed, his mind drifting to thoughts that unsettled him. Despite his fearsome reputation, he was deeply afraid of facing Viserys and his dragons. The childhood incident had left him terrified of fire, and he had heard the terrifying stories of dragons spewing flames.

In the original timeline, the thought of those flames brought back his deepest memories, while the wildfire consumed the Blackwater Rush, causing him to flee in terror.

Sandor knew the tales of Aegon the Conqueror and the devastation wrought by his dragon, Balerion. The combined forces of the Kingdom of the Rock and the Kingdom of the Gardener had been reduced to ashes in that war, with 4,000 men perishing under dragonfire. Tens of thousands of troops couldn't withstand the attack of a single dragon, and Viserys had seven. Sandor couldn't fathom how Robert could possibly win.

"What do you think a dragon looks like?" a bearded man in a golden robe asked.

"It can fly, so it must have wings," another replied.

"Does it have feathers?"

"I don't know. I heard a singer say that the dragon has claws like steel, wings that block out the sun, fire that scorches the earth, and its body is covered in scales as tough as iron, making it invincible. Our armor definitely wouldn't stop it."

The Gold Cloaks' armor was worn and in poor condition—Robert didn't care much for them, and their commander, Stannis, was too tight-fisted to replace it.

A young Gold Cloak spoke up, "But I heard that Aegon the Conqueror's dragon was killed by the Dornish. I think its name was... Meraxes."

"So that means King Robert has a chance to kill Viserys' dragons too?"

"Maybe...," another soldier muttered uncertainly.

Sandor listened to their conversation. If dragons could be killed, perhaps there was less to fear... or at least, less than he'd imagined.

Suddenly, a Gold Cloak soldier burst into the room, shouting, "Oh no, a ship is on fire! Go put it out!"

Everyone dropped their food and rushed outside. Stannis had sternly warned them that if anything happened to His Grace's battleships, they would pay with their lives.

Sandor's hands trembled when he heard the news. He was terrified of fire. Fortunately, he wasn't part of the Gold Cloaks' chain of command, so he didn't have to go near the flames. But where there was fire, there was chaos, and he knew he had to be there to prevent any malicious incidents.

When the Gold Cloaks arrived at the port, they found the situation had spiraled out of control. A high wall of emerald green flames, starting with the warship closest to the Mud Gate, loomed before them.

"Help me! Help me! Ahhh..."

Soldiers engulfed in green flames screamed as they leaped into the frigid waters of the Blackwater Rush. The warship they abandoned creaked and groaned as it was consumed by wildfire.

Boom!

A sudden explosion of flames drew everyone's attention. Pillars of fire erupted into the sky not far away, igniting new patches of green flames wherever they fell. As the flames illuminated the night, the gold-cloaked men finally saw the source of the devastation.

"Dragon! Dragon! It's a dragon!"

The man who had earlier described the dragon's appearance to the group now realized his worst fears had come true. The creature before them matched every terrifying tale the minstrels had sung.

Viserys rode the largest of his dragons, a massive yellow beast, as it flew over their heads. Instead of targeting the soldiers with dragonfire, he directed the dragon to set ablaze the banners representing the various noble houses that adorned the battlefield.

The situation was far more dire than the original Battle of the Blackwater Rush. During that battle, Tyrion had loaded a few ships with wildfire and sent them into Stannis's fleet, igniting the firestorm from a single point. But now, under Ronan's command, wildfire had been secretly placed on nearly every other ship in the fleet. The result was a continuous chain of destruction—a line of wildfire stretching across the entire fleet.

With the added power of dragonfire, the ships burned faster than Viserys had anticipated.

Panic spread among the soldiers still on board, especially those near the mouth of the sea. Desperately, they tried to steer their ships to safety, but the iron chains blocked their escape. Trapped between the chains in front and the burning ships pressing in from behind, there was no way out. With no other options, the soldiers abandoned ship and fled for their lives.

Viserys commanded the Yellow Dragon to spew its flames from the Mud Gate toward the estuary, while the Green Dragon and Red Dragon torched the fleet from the estuary back to the Mud Gate. In less than ten minutes, the entire fleet was ablaze.

The sight of thousands of warships burning was so overwhelming that even the nobles at Robert's feast sensed something was wrong before the guards could report it. From where they stood, they could look down upon the mouth of the Blackwater Rush and see the inferno consuming everything in its path.

"Your Grace! No! Our ships!" someone shouted, and in an instant, the feast descended into chaos.

"Out of my way!" Robert bellowed as he roughly shoved the person in front of him aside, charging up to the city wall. This fleet was his only hope of victory!

The others scrambled to follow, but when they reached the top and looked down at the river below—now a raging inferno—they were struck silent, as if a vise had clamped around their throats.

"No—my ship!" Ardrian cried out as he reached the top of the wall, frantically scanning for his vessel. It was already swallowed by the greenish flames. He had entrusted only six ships to Stannis, but Lord Redwyne of Arbor and Tywin had lost 300 ships between them! Stannis had lost 100 more.

From their high vantage point, they could see that the Blackwater Rush had transformed into a river of green fire. The sky above the river was so saturated with the eerie green glow of wildfire that it reflected ominously in the water below.

The ropes that had once held the ships in place snapped as the wildfire consumed them, and the burning warships began to drift down the river toward the sea. But the iron chains stretched across the mouth of the river stopped them, causing the wreckage to pile up at the estuary.

Even from their distant position atop the city walls, they could feel the heat of the flames searing toward them. The sheer number of burning ships and debris was so overwhelming that the chains finally gave way under the pressure—they snapped and broke, releasing the flaming wreckage into the open sea.

"It's a dragon! A dragon!" someone cried out again, their voice filled with terror as the reality of their situation sank in.