The Mountain of Ice and Fire

Chapter 656: The Red Smoke Beast and the Dragon King: The Mountain

The forty-odd tribes of the Moon Mountains are all descendants of the First Men.

The First Men worshipped the Old Gods.

All the gods of mountains, rivers, the earth, and the oceans were objects of their worship.

The Old Gods are a broad concept, encompassing all kinds of gods, without specifically pointing to any one in particular.

In Westeros, only the people of the North and the Moon Mountains still worship the Old Gods.

The Seven Gods, on the other hand, are gods with specific identities: the Father, the Mother, the Warrior, the Crone, the Maiden, the Smith, and the Stranger.

The Faith of the Seven came with the Andals' invasion six thousand years ago. When the Andals defeated the native tribes of Westeros, their seven-pointed star replaced the Old Gods, and the Faith of the Seven spread. However, the Stark family of the North blocked the Andals' advance at the Neck, and the North was never conquered by the Andals, thus preserving the worship of the Old Gods.

The beliefs inherited from the First Men are collectively called the Old Gods, while the beliefs from the Andals are called the Seven Gods.

Besides the Old Gods and the Seven Gods, the Ironborn worship the Drowned God, the people of the Claw Isle worship the Blood God, and the Burned Men, who separated from the Painted Dogs in the Moon Mountains, worship the Fire God. In addition, there are extremely few people who migrated from across the Narrow Sea, and they worship the Red God.

The Northmen who worship the Old Gods must find a weirwood tree to pray and hold important ceremonies, facing the weirwood tree to perform the ritual. Because of this, the Northern nobles plant a weirwood tree in the courtyard of every household.

The Stark family's godswood has three weirwood trees that are over eight thousand years old. Forests planted with weirwood trees are uniformly called godswoods by the Northmen. If a weirwood tree is unavailable due to environmental limitations, an oak tree will be found, and a face with red, tearful eyes will be painted on it, before prayers or other rituals are performed.

Prayers and rituals of the Faith of the Seven are held in septs, which have a unified name: the Sept of the Seven.

The people of the Westerlands worship the Seven Gods, and the Mountain has built a Sept of the Seven in Clegane's Keep.

Although the Burned Men worship the Fire God, they are a small group that separated from the Old Gods' faith. The history of the Burned Men's separation from the Painted Dogs is only one hundred and seventy years old, and their tribesmen still choose to perform prayers and rituals under a weirwood tree, following the tradition of over ten thousand years.

In the hearts of the Northmen and the people of the Moon Mountains, the Fire God is a member of the many gods of the Old Gods.

However, no weirwood tree or oak tree has been planted in Clegane's Keep.

*

In the great hall of Clegane's Keep, the Mountain was imposing and unparalleled, as immovable as a mountain. Although he didn't say a word, his eyes said it all. Old Teague saw that the Mountain was willing to join the Burned Men and become one of them, but this initiation had a ritual: first, it needed to be performed under a weirwood tree, and second, one needed to sacrifice an organ of their body to the Fire God to prove their courage and piety. The more important the organ sacrificed, the more it could prove one's courage.

However, Old Teague, who spent his days frolicking with his two wives in Clegane's Keep, already knew that there was no weirwood tree or oak tree here.

"Lord Mountain, you must come with me to the Moon Mountains to perform the initiation ceremony under our tribe's weirwood tree," Old Teague said.

"Good!" the Mountain said.

This simple word made Old Teague, One-Eye Teague, and the other small tribal chiefs of the Burned Men overjoyed. Although Old Teague had already seen from his eyes that the Mountain was willing to become a member of the Burned Men, hearing the Mountain say 'good' in the hall in front of more than a hundred large and small chiefs, generals, and knights, frankly willing to go with him to the Burned Men in the Moon Mountains to perform the initiation ceremony, the old man was still trembling slightly with excitement.

Every tribal chief hopes that his tribe can produce an unmatched strongest warrior, or the most brave and warlike tribal leader, so as to lead the tribe to stand out from the forty-odd tribes and become the leader of the Moon Mountains.

For thousands of years, dozens of tribes have fought each other, and no true leader has ever emerged. As long as the Mountain joins the Burned Men, Old Teague believes that the ultimate unification of the Moon Mountains tribes will no longer be a problem.

Although people from the forty-odd tribes have migrated to the Westerlands, and warriors are serving under the Mountain, this is not the real unification of the tribes. The contradictions between the tribes still exist; those who do not submit to each other still do not submit; and those who must hate still hate.

Living together in the Westerlands and serving as soldiers under the Mountain is not a true unification between the tribes. They fight together, but they are not yet brothers in arms.

Lord Mountain is their lord, but he is not a tribal person in the true sense, nor is he the leader of the tribal people themselves.

Lady Jeyne's thoughts are far-reaching. When the Moon Mountains tribes migrated into the Westerlands, the threat to the local people of the Westerlands was obvious. Moreover, the contradictions between the tribesmen and the nobles of the North are gradually becoming prominent, and the rift is deepening. This is not what Jeyne wants to see. The people of the Claw Isle do not have this problem, because the Mountain is the king of the Claw Isle.

By joining the Burned Men, becoming the Red Hand of the Burned Men, and then obtaining the Sheepstealer, the Mountain will not only become the leader of the Moon Mountains tribes, but also leap to become the true strongest in the eyes of the Westerlanders, Northmen, Crownlanders, Valemen, Reachmen, and Dornishmen, worthy of the true family motto of 'Unmatched'.

When the strength is undeniable by everyone, the implementation of various rules will be easier and more successful.

Letting the Mountain become a Burned Man and get the dragon; and then becoming the leader of the Moon Mountains tribes, this hidden goal is actually similar to the role played by marriages between great nobles. Marriage is to make the other party one of your own. The Mountain joining the Burned Men has the same effect!

This is what Jeyne has carefully considered!

*

Besides Jeyne, the Mountain is also an understanding person.

He knows his legion very well: a truly motley legion!

Each of the Mountain's legions is very brave and can stand alone in one place. But if these people are put together, the internal contradictions are like reefs in the sea when there is fighting and when there is no fighting. When the tide recedes, the sharp reefs emerge.

The Mountain has long known—and seen—

Sweet Raff and Big Chiswyck and others are the Mountain's direct descendants. They look down on the upstart cavalry legion of the Claw Isle. They call the tribal leaders of the Claw Isle barbarians to their faces!

The Claw Isle cavalry is invincible. All the warhorses are thoroughbreds, traveling thousands of miles a day. They take the Mountain as their king, win every battle, and have outstanding military achievements. They have the capital to be proud, so they look down on the Mountain's direct descendants, whether it is Sweet Raff's cavalry or Big Chiswyck's infantry. The warriors of the Claw Isle despise them all; they despise even more the warriors of the Moon Mountains who ride small ponies, calling them fools to their faces. In fact, they look down on all legions except their own! Only Ser Jekar Lok of the Westerlands has trained the cavalry of the Claw Isle. The islanders respect Ser Jekar Lok, so they respect the legion led by Jekar, but only that Westerlands legion.

Of course, even the most valiant leaders of the Claw Isle would not dare to provoke the Mountain's guard cavalry battalion!

The tribes of the Moon Mountains are hostile to any nobles, soldiers, supervisors, and officials in the Westerlands, and are full of hostility and arrogance towards them. Even if local soldiers drink with them, if it were not for strict military orders, a brawl would definitely occur every time...

Because of the constant warfare, the Mountain has no time to integrate the hostility, contradictions, and rifts between these legions. He adopted the simplest solution, which is to divide the troops to fight.

He himself leads the Claw Isle people as the main force, focusing on cavalry operations; while General Jekar Lok leads the Moon Mountains people and the Westerlands army as the main force, focusing on infantry operations. The contradictions within the internal legions that are not harmonious are perfectly concealed... But deep in the Mountain's heart, he silently watches the ethnic friction and contradictions between these legion warriors from different places, and thinks deeply...

In leading the troops in battle, the Mountain gradually completely subdued the strongest cavalry legion of the Claw Isle, but with the re-joining of the Moon Mountains warriors, and with the re-migration of the Moon Mountains tribesmen into the Westerlands, the strength of the Moon Mountains tribesmen has been greatly strengthened, which will breed their arrogance and warlike character, but if the Mountain is their own tribal leader, is their tribesman, while satisfying their vanity, the Moon Mountains people will inevitably have a greater sense of identity and belonging. In the Westerlands, their identity label as outsiders will be weakened.

The Mountain hopes that the Moon Mountains people of Castamere and Tarbeck Hall can live in harmony with the local people and be more willing to obey the Mountain's decrees and military orders, rather than hating each other and then having bloody violence every day.

The hearts of the people and the hearts of the army are equally important and cannot be underestimated. A thousand-mile dike can be destroyed by an ant nest!

The Claw Isle people, whose cavalry is invincible, have another title: Dragon Clan warriors! Before the Mountain, the only identity they submitted to and were proud of was becoming a legion of the Targaryen family, fighting for the Dragon Clan! And across the Narrow Sea, Daenerys Targaryen has three three-year-old dragons. If she crosses the sea and issues a call to the Claw Isle people as a Dragon Clan member, how many warriors of the Claw Isle will still be loyal to the Mountain... This is a potential huge crisis...

If Daenerys Targaryen and the Mountain cannot coexist in the end, the Mountain believes that Daenerys's call to the Claw Isle warriors in the name of the Dragon Clan will definitely tear apart the most powerful cavalry legion around the Mountain...

And the Mountain's motley army has always been feared by other knowledgeable nobles! A motley army, with ethnic divisions, will inevitably be unable to unite the hearts of the army.

This is also what the Mountain is worried about, and it is also one of the reasons why he often divides his troops to fight on two fronts at the same time in battle...

And now, the Mountain, in addition to having the Red Smoke Beast, he is about to have a dragon!

When the Mountain has a dragon, the Mountain believes that everything will truly change!

The Mountain predicts that when he conquers the dragon and brings the dragon back, the forty-odd tribes of the Moon Mountains, the entire Claw Isle, all the Westerlands army, the Northmen warriors, and the refugee long spear legion will become a true monolithic whole. He will be truly—unmatched!

He will become: the King of the Red Smoke Beast and the Dragon!

*

Melisandre's mood was also agitated. She thought she might have finally found the Azor Ahai reborn true king—most likely Gregor Clegane, known as the Mountain. As for the Mountain's notoriety as the most evil person in the Seven Kingdoms, his past bloody atrocities and heinous sins, to Melisandre, were all insignificant.

Azor Ahai is the lightbringer of the Age of Heroes. If the Mountain is the reincarnation of the lightbringer, then he is Melisandre's master, the true king she must respect and serve.

"Lord Mountain, Red Hand Teague said that there are no weirwood trees or oak trees in Clegane's Keep?" Melisandre asked, with a respectful tone towards the Mountain. The arrogance and aloofness of her peerless beauty on her body became thinner and lighter. Melisandre's humility began to appear. Only this time, she could not clearly say if her judgment was right or wrong.

"Yes, madam."

"What about the mountains outside Clegane's Keep, in the Silver Hill Mountains, are there any weirwood trees?"

"There are weirwood trees in the Riverlands, in Riverrun, there is a young weirwood tree," Sansa said in her heart. She kept her silence. Although Sansa was still Lady Jeyne's maid, everyone knew that the beautiful she had a marriage agreement with Raynald Westerling, her identity was about to change, and she would become the mistress of the Crag in the future, a countess.

"There are no weirwood trees in the entire Westerlands. The weirwood trees have long been cut down, madam," Lady Jeyne said.

"Then please Lady Jeyne give me a pot of fire," Melisandre said.

She was a decisive person who never procrastinated. She wanted to help the Mountain get the dragon as soon as possible. Time was tight. Perhaps at this moment, the Black Castle had already fallen. As long as the Others and the wights broke through one point of the Wall, the entire defense line would be in jeopardy. There was no time to delay. The Mountain had to become a Burned Man as soon as possible, and then become the chieftain Red Hand, and then get all the secrets about the dragon from Old Teague's mouth.

"Bring a pot of fire," the Mountain shouted.

A pot of burning fire was brought in by the servants, and Melisandre said to the Mountain: "Lord, I need you to come down."

The Mountain got up and walked to Melisandre's side. Melisandre, set off by his figure, was like a little girl.

"Red Hand Teague, in the name of the Fire God, I ask you to bestow upon Lord Mountain the faith, blood, courage, war prowess, passion, and loyalty of the Burned Men, and accept him as a member of the Burned Men."

"Madam, there is no weirwood tree here," the old man Teague said.

"In the name of the Fire God, do sacred things, great R'hllor, please grant us a holy fire tree—a weirwood tree!" Melisandre began to chant spells around the fire pot in a beautiful voice. After a circle, she stopped and took out colorful powder from her pocket and sprinkled it into the flames. With a bang, the flames burned violently, and the tongues of fire danced wildly, rolling up as if they had life. The temperature in the hall was rising, and the heat was gradually pressing, and the flames in the fire pot began to rise, twisting, like a fiery snake.

Everyone was stunned!

The Mountain stood by the flames, almost forced to retreat by the heat of the fire, but the old man Teague did not move, so he did not move.

To everyone's surprise, the flames made a soft sound, spiraling back and forth, gradually forming a tree, a tree made of flames: a weirwood tree.

On the weirwood tree, the wrinkled faces, the weeping eyes, the dry mouths, were extremely similar to the three faces painted on the weirwood tree in Sansa's home.

"Lord Mountain, please kneel on one knee," the old man Teague murmured.

The flame weirwood tree shocked the old man, and it also shocked everyone present.

This is a miracle!

The Mountain knelt before the flaming weirwood tree. The old man drew out a small knife and stabbed it towards his heart, causing several women to gasp in alarm. The knife pierced his skin, stopping a hair's breadth from his heart. When he withdrew it, the tip was stained with blood. He smeared the blood on his right index and middle fingers, then painted it on the Mountain's forehead, muttering incessantly in the Burning Men's language, which the Mountain couldn't understand: "In the name of the Fire God, the Burning Men's Red Hand Tormund, grant Gregor Clegane the Fire God's light, the purity of blood, the warrior's courage, the loyalty of the tribe… From this moment forth, forevermore, Gregor Clegane is a member of the Burning Men."

The old man used blood to draw a strange, ancient pattern on the Mountain's forehead, resembling a snake, a dragon, a flying eagle, and a double-bladed axe all at once.

"Tormund Red Hand, under the gaze of the Fire God, bathed in the light of the sacred flame, beneath the weirwood tree, there is no moment more sacred than this. As a servant of the Fire God, by clear divine decree, I command you to pass on the chieftain's Red Hand to the Burning Men's warrior, the Mountain," Melisandre chanted.

Then, with a devout expression, the old man drew from his waist a palm-sized, black-red axe of unknown material. The axe and its handle were simple and ancient, covered with flame patterns and ancient writing. Amidst Melisandre's incantations, the old man knelt before the flaming weirwood tree, followed by One-Eyed Tormund and the rest of the tribe, who bowed their heads and softly chanted something…

Melisandre's eyes twitched. Her age wasn't merely that of a beautiful woman in her twenties, as she appeared. She was hundreds of years old (some sources speculate she was thousands, but hundreds is more reasonable here). She possessed a red gem that maintained her youthful, ageless beauty, but for a significant reason, the gem was not currently with her.

Melisandre recognized the ancient writing on the axe handle. It was High Valyrian, containing instructions on how to control dragons. The script, as Melisandre saw it, was poorly written, but to the Mountain, it appeared as ancient and awe-inspiring text, dating back hundreds or thousands of years.

But Melisandre knew the writing was recent, because it was written in a lost form of Valyrian, which gave it a particularly mysterious aura and charm.

Melisandre's eyes turned the color of flame, a manifestation of her agitated emotions.

Dragon-riding commands, ancient High Valyrian script… Judging by the old Tormund's expression, he wouldn't recognize the writing on the axe handle.

Those who could recognize these ancient characters were practically extinct.

Watching the Mountain receive the small axe symbolizing the Burning Men's chieftain's Red Hand, and seeing the dragon-riding commands on it, Melisandre was certain: the Mountain was Azor Ahai reborn, the true king she needed to serve. She had made mistakes in the past, but this time, Melisandre believed she was absolutely certain!