-Chapter 215-

-Chapter 215-

-POV Trystan Sunfyre-

Lying against a wooden wall to remain unnoticed, I watched, heart pounding, as the enemy soldiers ran disorderly after our exhausted and desperate troops, who had held the ramparts all day.

‘Not yet,’ I thought, gripping my spear tightly as another of our soldiers screamed in agony, unable to keep pace with the group and caught by their pursuers.

‘Just a little further,’ I told myself, waiting for them to fully commit to the street before springing the trap on them.

"Catch those Westerosi dogs!" shouted an officer, jubilant in his so-called victory.

"NOW!" I yelled, standing up and thrusting my spear through a window, piercing the throat of one of the soldiers wearing Lorath colors.

"Soldiers, form a shield wall!" shouted a knight to the fleeing troops, desperate to save their lives.

Some didn’t comply and continued running, seeking safety, but the majority, still loyal to their commanders’ orders, stopped.

As one, they created a perfect shield wall that halted the enemy pursuit.

It was more than enough to destabilize their attackers.

Almost simultaneously, the enemy soldiers, who had been in a position of strength, suddenly found themselves trapped.

They were now facing archers on the rooftops, crossbowmen in the upper levels, and my men and me on the ground floor—more dangerous than the others, as our mission was to exploit their confusion caused by the sudden rain of arrows and crossbow bolts.

Before we could even strike a blow, the damage inflicted by my archers and crossbowmen had already turned the tide, sowing panic that drove the enemy to flee.

‘But where will they run?’ I thought with a grin, watching the long line of men crammed into the narrow street, stretching for miles, where I had stationed several choke points with my men lying in wait to exploit their fear.

‘The trap stretches over a kilometer,’ I thought, spearing an enemy through the mouth, the point of my spear exiting the back of his head as his jaw hung open in shock.

"Advance!" shouted the knight commanding the unit that had just been fleeing the enemy.

The shield wall advanced a few steps, gradually forcing the trapped foes as the dominos began to fall.

‘That silly game Aegon taught us,’ I thought, recalling one of his inventions with small wooden blocks.

‘We were the trigger that ended their so-called victory,’ I thought, piercing the side of another enemy soldier, who fell to the ground with a piercing scream.

‘And they were the first domino that would bring down all the others,’ I said to myself, hearing distant cries that signaled our ambush teams’ success. Confusion and fear had now changed sides.

"Don’t stop! Kill every one of these dogs! FOR THE EMPIRE!"

"FOR THE EMPIRE!!!" my men roared, doubling their efforts as one, further exacerbating the enemy’s panic as they made more mistakes.

‘They’re so panicked they’re trampling each other in a desperate attempt to escape,’ I thought, watching as the trap Samwell and I had set closed perfectly without even needing to call in our two assets, who were engaged in a different but even more crucial mission.

---

-POV Boqoro Maegyr-

‘It was inevitable,’ I thought, listening to the Unsullied commander recount how Vynassa had died.

‘That man was far too arrogant and selfish for his own good,’ I told myself, recalling the numerous warnings I had given about his tactic of sacrificing as many of our soldiers as possible to achieve his goals.

Raedatario, Vynassa’s second-in-command, stepped forward and said, looking each of us in the eyes in turn: "Since I was the second-in-command of our late and much-esteemed commander, I suppose it falls to me to…"

"To what? You’re nothing but a peasant’s descendant," interrupted Mydas Raelio, the commander-in-chief of the Volon Therys army.

Mydas was the heir of my maternal uncle, Rydario Raelio, the current Prince of Volon Therys, making him my cousin.

"I will not allow you…" Raedatario began, rising to his feet, bolstered by the support of the Elephant faction.

"Enough," I said, cutting short any needless debate, despite being the lowest-ranking among everyone gathered here for one single reason…

‘…Leadership,’ I thought.

Even though I was the youngest and least high-ranking, my social status was nevertheless the highest.

My lineage was more noble than theirs, as I belonged to the Ancient Blood, a member of the Maegyr family, whose history could be traced back well before the Doom of Valyria, and my father was the current Triarch of the Tiger faction.

"You want command?" Mydas asked me, likely convinced I was trying to undermine him.

‘He thinks I’m trying to take what is rightfully his, as it was true that within our faction, he was initially expected to become the overall commander of our troops,’ I thought, understanding my cousin’s bitterness toward my sudden intervention.

‘At least, that was the case before I decided to join the army,’ I thought, knowing that some, including my father, hesitated to give Mydas that position now that I had shown interest in it.

‘But not for the same reasons as him,’ I told myself before explaining.

I observed him briefly before turning away and stating: "It’s a trap."

Everyone frowned, and Mydas asked: "What are you talking about?"

I pointed to the harbor and said, frowning: "They’re trying to make us believe they’re fleeing by sea, but it’s not true. Look closely at the port—barely a tenth of their fleet has left the docks in the past half-hour."

‘If they were truly fleeing in panic, there would be far more ships escaping,’ I thought.

‘They’re hiding in the city, counting on our eagerness to pursue them to lure us into a trap.’

‘If Vynassa hadn’t died, I wouldn’t have even thought to observe this.’

"What do you think?" Raedatario asked me.

"They’re trying to lure us into the city," I said confidently.

"To ambush us?" Mydas asked, beginning to think objectively about our situation.

‘I don’t know yet,’ I admitted, unwilling to speculate further.

Raedatario frowned and said: "If what you say is true, we should stop sending so many of our soldiers into the city."

I felt faint vibrations from the ground and frowned.

A wild hypothesis crossed my mind.

I immediately knelt, surprising everyone, and pressed my ear to the ground of the ramparts, a technique I had learned from a Dothraki slave.

"Or perhaps we could…"

"A cavalry is approaching," I said, interrupting my cousin and warning everyone of the imminent arrival.

SOUND OF HORN… SOUND OF HORN… SOUND OF HORN…

---

-POV Ser Jonothor Waters-

I roared savagely as I finally spotted our enemies in the distance, bearing the colors of Volantis.

At the head of the Dark Guard cavalry, I watched as the enemy began to scatter in all directions upon seeing us.

But it was too late; we were moving far too quickly for them to escape.

‘Finally,’ I thought, urging my horse forward with small nudges.

It didn’t take long for the clash to occur. We crashed into the Volantene troops who were entering through one of Pentos's gates.

Since they were fleeing in every direction, it was easy to create a massive breach right from the start: part of their army retreated into the city while the rest fled outside the walls.

Only a small fraction of them were caught in the charge we had meticulously planned.

‘Now we must retake the Wall,’ I thought, driving my spear through the leather armor of a soldier attempting to flee.

"KILL THEM ALL!" I screamed, transforming into a bloodthirsty demon like the 10,000 cavalrymen of the Dark Guard at my back.

I spotted several officers in ornate armor escaping over the city walls via ladders.

Though I was tempted to follow and kill them, which would only add to the chaos and panic among their troops, I refrained.

I had a mission, and so did my legionnaires.

‘Speak of the devil,’ I thought as I saw my legionnaires arriving on the scene.

They appeared just moments after us, sprinting to secure the gates.

They quickly sealed them and then began retaking the Wall. In mere minutes, they cleared everything in their path, cutting down any who stood between them and their objective—especially the Unsullied guarding the officers' retreat.

‘They played their role perfectly.’

Once I was certain the situation was in our favor and that my legionnaires could handle the rest, I blew the horn hanging around my neck.

It was the prearranged signal for all my cavalry to understand that it was time to withdraw.

We had completed our first mission with distinction. Now, it was time to press on, shattering the enemy’s morale and breaking their encirclement entirely.

---

-4 Hours Later-

-POV Samwell Tarly-

"Ahhhh," I exhaled, driving my spear into the last enemy before me.

‘Finally,’ I thought, overwhelmed with relief as I collapsed to my knees.

A hundred meters from the walls of Pentos, I could see the imperial banners, once burned, now flying proudly again—a sign of our total victory over the enemy.

‘We did it,’ I thought, staring blankly at the sea of corpses surrounding me.

‘Our losses aren’t insignificant,’ I reflected, roughly estimating that more than a quarter of my men were missing and less than a tenth of the soldiers on the ramparts had survived.

"That was the last gate," said Jonothor, dismounting his horse to join me, along with Corian and Trystan.

"And by far the hardest to reclaim," added Corian, who had been tasked with securing the third gate.

"It’s because of the Volantenes. They tried to flank us and use their elephants," I explained, gesturing toward the lone elephant that had managed to breach the gates, which we brought down at the cost of nearly two hundred legionnaires.

"Bastards," muttered Corian, his tone pale. It was then I noticed he had lost his right eye.

"Are you injured?" I asked, frowning.

"Some Norvoshii priest thought he could take my life. All he managed to get was one eye," Corian replied with a smile that stretched the gruesome wound, making it look even more horrific.

I frowned deeply but said nothing. Then, looking over at Florian, lying in a pool of blood with his throat slashed by a sword, I said: "We all lost many today."

Everyone fell silent, but I caught the exchanged glances between them.

‘They’re hiding something from me,’ I thought.

"What is it?" I asked.

No one answered, which only heightened my concern.

"Did something happen to Dickon?" I asked.

Jonothor stammered, his voice barely audible: "No… your brother is fine… but… he’s fine… but… he’s with the Red Priests and… no, they didn’t harm him, but…"

"It’s your father," Trystan said, deciding to cut through the hesitation and deliver the bad news directly.

"He’s dead?" I asked, clinging to a faint hope that it wasn’t true, though deep down, I already knew the answer.

Trystan nodded, shattering that hope instantly.

I let out a long sigh, then drew a deep breath.

I hardened my heart, processing the information as if it were about any other soldier who had fallen in battle, just as I had done for my legionnaires, to keep my focus.

Then, I said: "Count our dead and stay alert. We’ll attack again tomorrow."

"We were supposed to…" Corian began, but I interrupted him sharply:
"I know what we were supposed to do, but… we’re all exhausted. A night of rest won’t hurt us."

‘I need to break the news to my brother, and many of us require proper medical attention,’ I thought.

‘And I have to tell my little brother that our father is dead,’ I said to myself as I walked away.