novelnext Chapter 377 377: The True War Between the Living and the Others Begins Anew
Chapter 377 377: The True War Between the Living and the Others Begins Anew
A creeping veil of frost and snow rolled in without warning.
With a thunderous boom, trenches—dug to knee depth outside the camp at some unknown time—erupted into bursts of flame.
Then, one line of fire after another spread out in staggered formation between the two armies, stretching two hundred meters across.
Crimson flames roared to life. The sudden warmth flushed the soldiers' faces, and in that same light, revealed the enemy trudging forward through the freezing mist.
In the next instant, it was as if the flames had awakened something.
Those stiff, staggering figures suddenly lifted their heads—pairs of blue eyes flaring to life.
A howl beyond words tore from the broken mouths of the wights.
And beyond the vast curtain of cold mist, it seemed as though something had sounded the call to charge.
The freezing wind howled. The flames surged three meters high. A black tide of the dead came crashing forward like a flood of mud and corpses.
"Maegor's tits!"
"Seven hells—what in the gods' name are those things?!"
When they drew close—when the soldiers truly saw what the enemy was—though they had long been warned, the first reaction of the expeditionary host was not to kill.
It was fear.
The sight of corpses—guts spilled, bodies torn apart—dragging themselves across the snow as they charged, was not something any man could face without trembling.
Hands holding swords shook.
Archers could not draw their bows.
Shields were raised, yet lacked even a shred of the steadiness of a wall.
"Hold formation! Defensive lines!"
"Any man who breaks ranks—beheaded on the spot!"
The commander of the army that had landed upon the frozen coast was Lord Randyll Tarly of Horn Hill—now Master of Laws upon the Iron Throne.
The moment he grasped the danger, he rose at once and issued his commands.
Counted among the finest warriors in all Westeros—and one of the greatest commanders in the Seven Kingdoms—Randyll's will was unyielding.
Mercy has no place in command.
And so, as the army teetered on the brink of collapse, his orders rang out. Horn calls followed one after another. Mounted messengers galloped through the lines, shouting, cursing, forcing the living out of their fear.
With each command relayed, the chaotic camp swiftly reformed into ordered blocks of infantry.
At the very front, ranks of spears and blades rose in a forest of steel. Tower shields stood five feet high, locked together. The formation took the shape of a spearhead, pointed straight ahead.
Sunlight pierced through the mist, glinting across the weapons. And upon closer look—
Each blade, each spear, was bound with dark shards of dragonglass.
The moment of trial had come.
Now.
The war of eight thousand years past… had begun anew.
The tide of death that loathed the living sought once more to swallow the world in an endless night.
It was here.
WOOOO—!!!
The long warhorn sounded across the frozen plain.
At the forefront of the human lines, the charging wights surged forward like a flood, trampling snow beneath their feet, crashing straight into the burning trenches without the slightest hesitation.
Those withered bodies—deceptively frail, yet unnaturally tough—ignited the instant flame touched them, like dry branches soaked in oil.
Strange, inhuman wails hissed into the air.
The burning wights collapsed, writhing, thrashing, trying to smother the flames consuming them.
It did nothing.
Fire was their bane.
Once touched, their fate was sealed.
They became walking torches, their already ruined bodies charring under the flames—limbs cracking, breaking, falling away piece by piece.
After only a few desperate struggles, they burned to ash, scattered into the freezing wind and snow.
And yet—
From the endless tide of frost and mist beyond, the wights came on without end.
They knew no fear.
They felt no dread.
The only thing they possessed… was an unending hatred for the living. A hunger for blood.
Warmth itself was their enemy.
Only when every beating heart turned cold—when every drop of warm blood froze—would they cease.
The first wave burned to nothing.
The next followed without pause.
They pressed forward, step by step, through the blazing line of fire.
Every inch gained was a test of the fragile defenses carved into the frozen earth.
The plain stretched for miles, the ice beneath unknown in depth.
To carve these trenches at all had been a feat.
And so, the line of fire had its limits.
The clay jars filled with oil, once ignited and shattered, could not burn forever.
Though the wight army suffered grievous losses in the flames, their relentless advance slowly wore down the defensive line.
At last—it broke.
But that had been the intent.
For in that time, the expeditionary host had steadied itself, reformed its ranks—
And prepared, at last, to face the enemy.
Prepared… to face what lay beyond all knowing.
Now, part of the wight host had already forced its way through the shattered fireline, squeezing through the gaps in the flames and surging forward.
"Archers! Nock—fire arrows!"
The moment the enemy broke through, mounted messengers riding between formations shouted the command.
The archers, already prepared, set their oil-soaked shafts alight.
The next instant—
In the howling wind, as the order rang out again, bowstrings snapped like thunder in unison.
The sky—once dim beneath the shadow of the oncoming horde—suddenly lit with golden fire.
The soldiers at the front, tense to the breaking point, could not help but look up.
A cloud of fire rose behind them.
Like a second sun, it cast its warmth upon their faces, lighting their trembling eyes—
And igniting the hearts within their chests.
Fire rose.
Fire fell.
The wight host that had broken through was struck head-on by a rain of flame.
And once more—
Fire proved their doom.
Even the smallest spark was enough.
Where flame touched, annihilation followed.
Before they could ever reach the human lines, the wights were turned again into burning torches—collapsing, smoldering, spreading patches of fire across the snow, melting pits into the frozen earth.
What little remained burned into the blood-melted ice—
Then froze again.
Grey stains upon a white world.
Even the wind—sharp as blades against the face—
Now carried with it… a strange warmth.
Seeing that the two sides had not even yet come into direct contact, and already such devastating damage could be inflicted upon the enemy, the soldiers—who had once feared facing such an unknown foe—could not help but feel confidence and courage rise once more within their hearts.
Just like the rising rain of fire, shattering the darkness.
Within the command tent standing at the rear, as the two sides moved from discovery, to contact, and now into full engagement—
Seeing the battle progress to this stage, the unease and uncertainty that had lingered in everyone's hearts receded somewhat, and they quietly let out a breath of relief.
It seemed… the enemy was not as powerful as they had imagined.
Inside the once solemn and rigid command tent, the cold tension eased slightly as well.
Yet, as they looked into the distance—where the endless horde of wights still pressed forward from the freezing mist, drawing ever closer—and with the frontline fire trenches already spent, and the volleys of flaming arrows weakening as time passed and manpower grew exhausted, the brief easing of tension did not become relaxation.
"The trebuchets are ready. Shall we commence bombardment now?"
Someone in the tent spoke, asking the question.
At those words, many gazes turned toward the two men standing at the head of the long table, their eyes fixed upon the battlefield.
The commander of this expeditionary host was Lord Randyll Tarly of Horn Hill, while the deputy commander was Lord Yohn Royce of Runestone.
One held command, the other oversight. Each restrained the other.
Faced with the question, Randyll and Yohn exchanged a glance.
They both understood what was truly being asked.
For what the trebuchets would hurl… was their secret weapon—
Wildfire.
Jar after jar of wildfire, flung by levered engines, could strike from afar. And by its very nature—explosion coupled with flame—its destructive reach would spread wide.
Combined with wildfire's unnatural ability to seep and cling, if all their stored jars were unleashed at once, then without question, halting—or even annihilating—this wight army would not be a problem.
The battlefield would be swallowed by a sea of fire. Wherever wildfire fell, only blazing craters would remain, tearing apart the wights' advancing formation.
In short—
This stockpile of wildfire, together with those engines, was the expedition's killing stroke.
And so—
"No. Not yet."
Randyll shook his head, rejecting the proposal.
Without waiting for further questions, he continued: "The battle is still within control. I propose we allow our soldiers to make their first true contact with these things."
"Otherwise, even if we win this engagement, when we face a different kind of battle later, it will bring about a far more devastating destruction upon us."
"Moreover, our true enemy has yet to appear. These mindless, witless corpses do not count as the real foe."
"We must let our men truly understand what they are facing."
"Otherwise, when that moment comes—will they fall into chaos again, as they did just now?"
As one regarded among the finest warriors in Westeros—and among the greatest commanders in the Seven Kingdoms—Randyll's vision clearly reached farther than most.
Hearing this, the men within the tent exchanged glances, their expressions turning more solemn.
They all understood what he meant.
"The Others…"
Yohn murmured softly. He raised a gloved hand and brushed the strange, rune-etched bronze armor upon his body.
"I agree with Lord Tarly. We must understand who our enemy truly is—not face them through imagination alone."
"Only when our soldiers strike them with spear and steel will they truly know what these things are."
"More than anything else, our army needs courage."
At these words, those present hesitated—but in the end, they could only nod.
To prepare against the storm before it came—even at the cost of some sacrifice—was worth it.
Seeing no opposition, a cold light flashed in Randyll's eyes.
"Then make ready. I will personally report this to His Majesty afterward."
"Yes, my lord!"
…
The decisions of commanders were far removed from the soldiers on the front lines. Matters of grand strategy were not for them to concern themselves with.
What they could do—
Was kill the enemy.
After wave upon wave of attrition, the wight army finally broke through every line of defense and reached them.
An archer's strength is not endless. Nor are arrows, nor oil, nor the supplies of war.
In the end, all war returns to blade against blade.
From the sky's vantage, across the battlefield, the sea of flame gradually died down. The long tide of death, carried upon wind and blizzard, finally crashed into that black "reef."
Like a black tide streaked with white foam, smashing against a dark reef veined with red.
"Kill these damned corpse-things!"
"Long live His Majesty the King!"
"Fuck your mother!"
"…"
The moment they met, life and death collided.
The wights opened their shattered mouths—broken, torn, clotted with blackened blood and unrecognizable filth—and roared at the living.
Facing their assault, the shield-bearers at the very front slammed forward with their shields embedded with dragonglass shards. Then, bracing with all their strength, they drove their shoulders against them, refusing to let the tide of wights break their line.
In that instant, from the gaps between the shields, long spears thrust out—over ten feet in length—their tips set with sharp dragonglass, stabbing forward in a frenzy.
Yet—
To their shock, the wights showed no reaction to their attacks.
None of the fragility they had shown in the flames before.
The hardened, sharpened spears struck their bodies to no effect.
Whether piercing the belly, the heart—even the skull—
The dragonglass weapons achieved nothing.
Some spears, striking at poor angles, even had their dragonglass tips snapped clean off.
The shards set into the shields broke away piece by piece.
"Damn it!"
"We can't kill them!"
"What's going on?!"
The feel in their hands—the sight of wights pierced through by multiple spears, their vital points destroyed, yet still swinging their weapons in retaliation—
The allied army, whose morale had just been rekindled by fire, felt their hearts shudder.
Their weapons struck the wights' bodies as though chopping into dry wood—utterly useless.
And in that brief moment of stunned hesitation—
Failing to destroy the first wave at once—
From behind the wights, more surged forward, crashing once again into the human line.
And the enemy that had seemed as brittle as dry birch bark moments before—
Now became something else entirely.
Like moving trunks of wood.
Killing trunks.
The formation that had seemed unbreakable—
In an instant, a small crack appeared.
In no more than a few minutes, from the very moment of first contact—
The balance of attack and defense… reversed.