Game of Thrones: Viserys the Three-Headed Dragon.

Chapter 114 Assassin
"Fool's blood, king's blood, virgin's thigh bleeds, chains for guests, chains for bridegroom, I know, I know, oh oh oh! No one enters the castle, dragons dance"

Viserys had an illusion that the person in front of him was waiting for him to appear and was singing these inexplicable songs in front of him.

"No one?" Viserys walked to the dungeon door and looked at the strange man who was still happily singing and dancing in the dark deep dungeon under the torchlight. Red and green tattoos covered his entire wide face and hairless scalp. This jester, who looked a little creepy in the shadow of the dungeon, was fat and soft, and sometimes twitched and trembled inexplicably, and sometimes couldn't even speak clearly.

Shireen Baratheon once took the initiative to try to find Viserys to rescue her jester, because he was one of her few friends. At that time, it was Daenerys who met the girl who took an unknown amount of time to muster up the courage to take the initiative to meet her. After being evaded by Daenerys, she never came again.

At first, Daenerys didn't know why Viserys locked up this strange jester alone in the depths of the dungeon and didn't allow anyone to contact him. She had seen the jester that day when she disguised herself as Viserys and watched the crowd enter the prison. At that time, she only thought that his behavior was weird and he looked like he had a problem with his brain.

But Viserys said privately that he had an instinctive feeling that the man was dangerous.

From then on, Patchface was locked in the deepest part of the dungeon, with few people coming into contact with him, and only the Unsullied jailer was responsible for bringing him meals.

Today, Viserys was exploring the lower half of the Y-shaped cave in Dragon Mountain, where he discovered the foundation wall of Dragonstone Castle built on solidified lava. On the boiling lava riverbed where ordinary humans can no longer set foot, Viserys discovered an underground factory that was suspected to have been used to melt black stone to make huge black stone bricks for the castle. The factory was deliberately destroyed, and it was suspected that before it was abandoned, someone used dragon flame to deliberately melt the rubble and buried most of it.

In addition, Viserys also discovered some blocked abandoned mine tunnels near the semi-solidified lava riverbed. There were signs of excavation inside, and exposed obsidian mines could be seen from time to time.

Black Stone, this black stone mysteriously appears in every corner of the known world, wherever there are ancient wonders.

But there are also differences between black stones. The black stones related to Valyria are dry rather than oily. They are suspected to be a molten mixture of obsidian and certain minerals in a special ratio fused with dragon flame.

Rather than Valyrian blackstone, which is usually oily and greasy.

To this day, the manufacturing ratio and method of black stone have not been made public, and no one can tell the historical origin of this stone.

But the factory ruins found by Viserys today seem to explain Dragonstone, a huge castle that can accommodate thousands of people, where these huge and heavy black dragonstone bricks came from, and where the castle was built.

After this place was abandoned, it seemed that no one thought that anyone would come here. The temperature of the lava riverbed where magma was present was extremely high. Viserys had no doubt that the flesh of ordinary humans who settled here would be burned into charcoal, their blood would evaporate, and even their skeletons would be slowly swallowed by the half-molten lava.

But there is a high platform similar to the one where Targaryen's tomb was located, above the destroyed Blackstone Factory, which seems to have been left there specially. It is speculated that it was once the observation post of the manager who controlled the Blackstone Factory, with an observation platform and a garrison that overlooked the overall situation.

At the end of the road above, there is a protruding black stone mechanism on the stone wall that is obviously the castle wall.

Viserys spat out the clothes package specially made for the transformation adventure in the lava cave, restored his human form, dressed neatly, and then pressed the mechanism. The black stone wall opened a stone door for him that was similar to the secret passage in the bedroom, and then he found himself in the depths of the dungeon.

But this time, the fun of reverse mapping did not bring him much happiness and joy.

As soon as he came in, he heard the weird lyrics sung by Patchface.

Viserys didn't care where he came from. He walked straight towards the strange figure who was singing and dancing happily in the prison. "No one? The Faceless Man? No one entered the castle. Does that mean the Faceless Man came in?"

The strange jester was mad and made no answer. He just continued to happily perform his strange dance and sing his strange song.

"Under the sea, birds have scales instead of feathers," Patchface quickly changed his song and murmured, standing on one foot and then the other as he sang, "Mermaids have seaweed in their hair, and dresses woven from silver seaweed."

Viserys stood in front of his cell door and took a deep breath. He moved his mouth: "Gurgle, Woo-wa-wa-wa-wa~" He made strange sounds, the kind used to dub murlocs in fantasy games.

"." Patchface's singing and dancing movements froze visibly for a moment.

"Ha." Viserys sneered as if he didn't care, and then ignored him and went back to the black stone door in the wall where he had just come out.

".The snow on the bottom of the sea is rising and falling." Patchface started to sing his song crazily again.

Viserys paid no attention to him, remaining focused on observing the blackstone gate.

On either side of the gate were two black stone torch holders in the shape of dragon heads, which were facing each other. The other torch holders were facing the wall.

From this, it can be inferred that if the black stone wall door is to be opened from the dungeon, the two dragon heads must face each other. Viserys touched one of the stone bases and found it to be very solid. He tried hard but still couldn't move it at all. If he didn't know that the stone base was a mechanism, he would have thought that the stone base should be like this.

There were deliberately low footsteps coming from overhead.

Viserys heard the faint sound of swords being drawn and called above him in Valyrian, "Soldier, it is I."

There were the sound of footsteps, and two Unsullied with solemn faces appeared at the corner of the dungeon stairs. They saw Viserys, saluted him, and said in Valyrian, "Your Majesty." When they saw the door that suddenly appeared in the stone wall where Viserys was, their expressions showed surprise for a moment, but they quickly remained solemn.

The two Unsullied who were on duty as jailers were quite alert, probably because they heard some noise. Viserys called to them, "Come here, both of you. Take one of these two stone seats. Try to move them at the same time to make them straight."

The two Unsullied did not suspect anything and stepped forward, one at a time, and simultaneously moved the stone seat with force.

They all seemed to have spent a lot of effort, and their legs stretched out involuntarily. As they exerted force at the same time, a dull clicking sound was heard, and the two stone seats were slowly straightened, and pieces of black stone slabs slid out from the thick wall of the stone door, quickly sealing the entire wall tightly like a puzzle, as if it were one piece.

Only then did Viserys realize that there were two dragon carvings on the wall, with their tails engraved in the middle and their heads resting on the two torch pedestals.

Viserys ordered: "This secret must not be told to anyone."

The two Unsullied replied, "Yes." Viserys did not stay in the dungeon for too long. The Unsullied, who were familiar with the dungeon passages, led him up the winding stairs. They went up all the way, and the walls were all black stone bricks. As they climbed up, the stone bricks felt from warm to cool.

The torchlight shone ahead as the Unsullied and his shadow walked the wall. At the ninth turn, they passed an iron gate and walked into a corridor, and at the twelfth turn, there was another door. Viserys thought he had an amazing memory, but he was still a little dizzy. Next was a wooden door, and they continued to climb. Arrow holes began to appear in the wall, and sunlight shone through the thick stone and sprinkled on the wall.

They finally reached the surface, and Viserys peered through the narrow slits and recognized the prison tower.

For the first time in his trip, Viserys felt that the castle was so empty even though there were nearly five hundred people in the prison.

On the other side of the last heavy iron door was a high stone arch bridge leading to the magnificent central tower. The two Unsullied jailers on duty were sent back by Viserys when they arrived here.

Viserys returned to the main castle from the stone arch bridge, and returned to the Table Hall in the Stone Drum Tower. From the gap in the Table Hall, he could overlook the parade grounds, the blacksmith shop, the guardhouse, and the arrow tower under the castle. Not only that, he walked around the Table Hall and observed the towers of Dragonstone, Aegon's Garden, and the Sepulchre from the four tall narrow windows facing east, west, south, and north.
Daenerys, who was reading in the bedroom next to the Picture Table Hall, noticed her brother's unusual behavior and couldn't help but get up and go to him: "What's wrong?"

"No one enters the castle," Viserys said. "I overheard the song of Patchface. Remember him? His song seemed to tell me that a Faceless Man has entered the castle."

Viserys had tried to communicate with Patchface, but he seemed to be showing off his precognitive abilities, just singing riddles one after another.

So when Viserys saw that communication was hopeless, he answered him with a riddle in the language of the murlocs.

"The Faceless Men?" Daenerys had not yet heard their name carefully.

"The Faceless Men are a religious assassin group who believe in the Thousand-Faced God. Today, the House of Black and White in the Free Trade City of Braavos is their gathering place." Viserys explained to her this assassin organization that ordinary people could not understand and he had not talked to her about in detail. "The Faceless Men are the most mysterious assassins in the world. They will change their identities and disguise themselves with other people's faces. If a Faceless Men assassin infiltrates the castle, we may not even notice it. They are dangerous and deadly. Dany, hiring a Faceless Men to assassinate an ordinary merchant is enough to hire an entire army of ordinary mercenaries at only half the price. If someone wants to assassinate you and me, the cost of hiring a Faceless Men will be unimaginable. But... don't think about who hired them first, we have to find a way to find out."

A thief can be a thief for a thousand days, but you can never be on guard against thieves for a thousand days. Over time, there will always be a time when you are careless. Viserys has implemented semi-military control in the castle, which is considered to be a strict defense. Those who are qualified to enter the castle have been carefully examined by him. But if Patchface's song is true, perhaps someone in the castle has been replaced by the Faceless Men.

"If they are such strange assassins, then aren't we in danger?"

"No, let me think about it. It's not difficult to check." Viserys gritted his teeth and thought. "The Unsullied guards in the castle can basically be ruled out. They always act in small teams. Even if something happens to one of them, it is extremely easy to be exposed if they disguise themselves as Unsullied and move with the team. Although they are silent, they still know something about their teammates. The prisoners in the prison can also be ruled out. There is no point in pretending to be them. Then the only people left are the chefs in the kitchen, especially the chefs and porters who went out to purchase supplies for the banquet before. They need to be strictly checked; the servants and clerks under the maester, they and the laundry servants who washed the clothes of the injured all went out, and they also need to be checked; and the batch of clerks in training, although they have no problems on paper and come from the vassal families under their rule, they are the most recent group of people to enter the castle..."

Seeing that he was lost in thought, Daenerys seemed to have an idea and asked, "What should we do?"

"Have the guards escorting us go find the maester and get two bags of salt from the warehouse. We will make large barrels of salt water and find two wash basins. Inform all castle personnel that this is a means for the castle to prevent disease. Have everyone line up in the square in front of the sanctuary to wash their faces. Everyone must wash. Begin with Missandei and the guards, followed by the Unsullied on duty, then the officers in training, all the kitchen staff, the maester's officers, the laundry servants, the prisoners, and wait until everyone is done before dealing with them."

-

The castle, which was under semi-military rule, acted quickly.

In less than a quarter of an hour, everything Viserys needed was prepared, and they began to carry out the orders he gave.

"What? Wash your face in front of the sanctuary? To prevent disease?"

Barristan's mind was full of account number comparison tables and various common accounting rules, formulas, and mathematical models these days. Viserys's accounting method was not changed very deeply. He just asked several officials to coordinate a set of rules that could be widely used on the existing basis. The only requirement was institutionalization, unification, and clarity. The only major change was the implementation of some commonly used mathematical models and accounting methods, and the accounts were changed from text to coordinated and unified digital numbers.

But even with such a small change, these literate people, who were similar to those on Earth in the Middle Ages, felt a huge difference. They felt dizzy and dizzy to learn, and it took the experienced accountants a long time to adapt. However, after getting familiar with it, the efficiency and accounts did become clearer.

At this moment, Barristan also found it strange and bizarre when he heard such news from his friend, Miles, the well-informed bastard son of Celtigar.

The castle's notification generally does not take into account personal wishes, and they all have to go.

Barristan was inexplicably nervous. He had entered the castle in disguise and had not been recognized until now because the nobles and knights under the Dragon King had never seen him. However, he could not guarantee that his disguise would not be exposed when everyone gathered in the Cathedral Square. After all, among a group of young officials, an old man with white hair and beard would be very eye-catching.

But the guards in charge of the castle were waiting there, so he had no choice but to go over.

When they arrived, the guards on duty at the castle had already lined up, and a large number of them had washed their faces and went back to their respective tasks.

In front of Barristan was his new friend, the chatterbox Miles, who always had a lot to say: "Hey, where's that steward Max? I saw him coming to the castle this morning."

Miles especially liked to tell jokes about Max. From him, Barristan learned about Max's experience in becoming the general steward, which was also an interesting story. It was said that the general steward was chosen between the two former account managers of Dragonstone. Viserys's acting finance minister asked them to do the accounts for a week according to the new rules to see who did the best. Max played a little trick and recorded the bribes he received in the account in the name of financial administration income - although the Dragon King might not have promoted him for this reason, people who knew about this believed that this was the key reason why he became the general steward.

When Barristan heard this, Lord Gunther, who was standing on the stone arch bridge, didn't look at him. Lord Gunther had been to King's Landing to participate in the tourney. Barristan was afraid of being recognized, so he hurriedly said, "I'll go call him. The general manager probably didn't hear the notice."

Miles was about to say, "Astan, what do you care about him——"

But before he could finish his words, Barristan had already strode off to the side room of the hall where they were receiving training.

I know that the adventure part is not well written. The previous chapters about cave adventure were very bleak. But the setting part cannot be absent. I am looking for a new way to incorporate the setting into the text.

I am not very satisfied with these two chapters related to the adventure and puzzle part. The author is still trying to find ways to improve it.

By the way, those who are interested in medieval lords are advised to listen to the two episodes of the “Lords of the Manor” radio program on Jihe Network. After listening to them, the author had new feelings about traveling through the medieval world.

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(End of this chapter)