Dusk.
The main commander’s tent.
Tyrion Lannister had changed into a coat that was only barely clean.
Nero and Bronn stood to one side.
The air inside was ice.
There was no trace of satisfaction at having driven the enemy back.
Lord Tywin Lannister stood with his hands clasped behind his back in front of a massive map.
“We routed them,” Tyrion said.
His voice was hoarse.
“You bit into a screening force of infantry.” Tywin did not turn.
His voice sounded like cracking ice.
“That was Roose Bolton’s rearguard.
Robb Stark and every last one of his cavalry were never there.” Tyrion went still.
Tywin turned slowly.
“Also, you may not know yet.
Robert Baratheon is dead.” The mockery on Tyrion’s face froze solid.
“Robert is dead?” He repeated the words carefully, as if testing whether he had misheard.
“Then who sits the Iron Throne?
My dear nephew?” “Joffrey has been crowned.
Cersei holds the Red Keep.” Tywin spoke as calmly as if he were discussing a sack of wheat that no longer mattered.
Tyrion’s expression shifted.
“Cersei holds the Red Keep.” He tugged at the corner of his mouth.
The resulting grimace was hard to look at.
“That is truly reassuring.
Father, are you certain the Seven are not punishing us?” Tywin ignored the sarcasm entirely.
“Your brother Jaime has crushed the main strength of the Riverlands at the Golden Tooth and is presently besieging Riverrun.
Jaime is winning true glory for the family with his sword.
You, meanwhile, have been wallowing in the mud with a pack of savages.
However—since you have proven your head is not entirely filled with wine and whores—you will go to King’s Landing.” Tyrion looked up.
“To King’s Landing?” he asked.
“As a prisoner, a pet, or my sister’s newest toy—” “As the voice of House Lannister on the Small Council.” Tywin’s tone remained cold.
“Joffrey is young.
Cersei is impulsive.
The court needs someone to remind them that the war is not finished.” Tyrion was silent for a moment.
Then he laughed.
“A seat.” He said the word slowly.
“Father, you are truly generous.
You finally grant me a chair so I may sit beside my sister and watch her set the Seven Kingdoms on fire.” Kevan frowned slightly.
“You will sit there,” Tywin said, expression unchanged.
“You will watch.
You will listen.
You will write.
When necessary, you will advise her.
You are at least more useful than the fools she currently keeps around her.” Tyrion gave his father an exaggerated bow.
“That is likely the gentlest compliment you have ever given me in your life.” Nero felt a sudden, sharp surge of calculation.
If Tyrion became a minister, Nero would become the right hand of a minister.
The path upward had just opened.
“I need to take my people,” Tyrion said.
“King’s Landing is not a dining table beside a campfire, Father.
Every smile there hides a blade.
I need the Mountain Clans.
And Bronn.
And Nero.” “The Mountain Clans stay.
They will be placed under Ser Marbrand as scouts.” Tywin refused without hesitation, stripping Tyrion of his only independent force in a single sentence.
His eyes passed over Tyrion and settled coldly on Bronn.
“The sellsword you may take.” Bronn raised an eyebrow, as if he had just been evaluated and found to be a serviceable table knife.
Tywin’s gaze shifted to Nero.
Those pale green eyes, flecked with gold, narrowed slightly.
“As for this Ser Nero…” Nero kept his head lowered and said nothing.
The gaze lingered too long.
It felt like the flat of a blade pressed against his throat.
Tywin did not finish the sentence.
The tent curtain was ripped open with a violent bang.
A blood-stained, dust-covered messenger stumbled inside.
His voice was shrill and cracked.
“My lord… something has happened!” Tywin’s gaze turned instantly colder.
The messenger looked up.
His lips trembled.
“The Young Wolf was never at the Green Fork!
He took his cavalry to Riverrun… the Whispering Wood… we were ambushed!” Every sound in the tent died.
The messenger nearly wept.
“Lord Jaime… Lord Jaime has been taken by the Stark army!” Silence.
Tywin Lannister’s hands, still clasped behind his back, stiffened by a fraction.
On that face that never revealed emotion, a hairline crack appeared for the first time.
Jaime.
His proudest son.
The golden lion of Lannister.
Captured by a fifteen-year-old boy.
“Get out,” Tywin said.
The voice was terrifyingly soft.
The messenger scrambled away.
Tyrion opened his mouth, then closed it.
The mockery had vanished from his face.
His brother was a prisoner.
This was not absurd news to be turned into a joke.
It was a knife driven straight into the heart of House Lannister.
Nero lowered his eyes.
His pulse accelerated hard.
The opportunity had arrived.
Tywin had intended only to give Tyrion a seat on the Small Council—a position from which he could watch, listen, and carry messages, but not necessarily act.
That was no longer enough.
Not nearly enough.
Nero took half a step forward.
His boots made a soft sound on the carpet.
Tywin’s gaze locked onto him at once—cold, sharp, and openly displeased.
Nero did not retreat.
Under the full weight of Tywin’s rage he spoke, not spelling everything out, only offering a single bloody key.
“Lord Tywin.” Nero’s voice was steady to the point of coldness.
“Lord Jaime is still alive.” Several people in the tent looked at him at the same time.
“If the northmen only wanted a victory,” Nero continued, “there would be one more golden-haired corpse lying in the Whispering Wood.
They did not kill Lord Jaime.
That means they want to sit at the table.” Tyrion’s mismatched eyes narrowed slightly, as if waiting for the next piece.
Nero raised his eyes.
His voice dropped lower.
“The question is whether we hold chips heavy enough to make House Stark willing to negotiate.” Tyrion turned toward his father.
“What about Eddard Stark?” he asked.
“Robert is dead.
Cersei holds the Red Keep.
Where is the Hand of the King?” Ser Kevan answered in a low voice.
“Imprisoned in the black cells.
Charged with treason.
His eldest daughter Sansa remains in the Red Keep.
The younger daughter Arya is missing.” The blood drained from Tyrion’s face.
“Cersei locked the Lord of the North in the black cells and managed to lose one of his daughters.” His voice was soft.
“Gods above.
I have been gone only a few days.
Has King’s Landing become this stupid?” “Watch your language,” Tywin said coldly.
“My language?” Tyrion laughed.
The sound was sharp, like a blade scraping silver.
“Father, Jaime is in northern hands.
Eddard Stark and his remaining daughter are the only chips we have left to trade for him.” He turned sharply to Kevan.
“If that little madman Joffrey, or that impulsive idiot Cersei, decides one day to take Eddard Stark’s head out of pure spite…” Tyrion looked back at Tywin.
His voice had gone completely cold.
“Then the northmen will hang Jaime’s head on the walls the following day.” The tent was dead silent.
Ser Kevan’s face had changed as well.
“Tyrion is right, Tywin,” he said slowly.
“Cersei may not be able to control Joffrey.
The boy has only just been crowned.
He is desperate to prove he is no longer a child.” Tyrion sneered.
“And the way he will prove it is almost certainly by cutting off the head of a man who possessed more honor than his own father.” Tywin did not speak at once.
His gaze moved from Tyrion and settled on Nero’s face.
The look was deep and measuring.
Nero kept his head lowered, as if he had merely asked an ordinary question.
Tywin knew better.
The young man had not said “Eddard must live.” He had not said “Joffrey will kill him.” He had simply offered a single thread and allowed Tyrion to pull the entire net free.
After a long moment Tywin spoke.
“You leave for King’s Landing at first light.” Tyrion looked up.
“You will carry my orders,” Tywin continued.
“As Acting Hand of the King you will control your sister and keep Joffrey in check.
Until House Stark returns Jaime, I want Eddard Stark still breathing inside the Red Keep.” Tyrion let out a slow breath.
He had won.
At least in this moment, he had won.
Nero felt a corresponding surge of relief.
Tyrion now held the office of Acting Hand.
The door to King’s Landing had been forced open.
As long as Nero could remain at Tyrion’s side, he would step into the densest, richest, and most lethal heart of the main plot.
Tyrion clearly understood the same thing.
“Ser Nero.” Tywin’s pale-gold gaze locked onto him.
There was no emotion in it.
He deliberately stressed the word “Ser.” “A clever man is wasted as a bodyguard.” Tywin’s eyes returned to the sand table, as if weighing the ownership of an object.
“You handled those beasts well enough, and you proved you have an eye for terrain in the mud.
Beginning tomorrow you will command the First Baggage Train Patrol Battalion.
You will be responsible for the security of the supply routes in the war zone.
You are granted one hundred gold dragons.” Tyrion’s face tightened at once.
“Father—Nero saved my life.
He is my right hand.
He was the one who saw the path to saving Jaime—” “Precisely because of that, he cannot go with you.” Tywin looked at Nero again.
The look was colder than before.
“A knife that is too sharp, if not held properly, cuts the owner first.
In King’s Landing you need only an obedient dog.” Bronn bit the inside of his lip and cursed silently.
You’re the dog.
Tyrion opened his mouth to argue further.
“Enough.” Tywin’s voice rose only a fraction, yet the full weight of the Warden of the West filled the tent.
“He stays.
This is a military order.
One more word, Tyrion, and you will push mules in the logistics camp beside him.” Tyrion’s jaw locked.
He did not speak again.
Nero kept his head lowered so that no one could see his pupils contract.
He understood in a single cold instant.
The careful hint he had offered in an attempt to climb higher with Tyrion had become the very poison that would cost him his life.
Cleverness brings its own undoing.
The old lion was ruthless beyond measure.
Tywin had seen at a glance that Nero was a hidden danger.
He would never allow an uncontrollable, clever man to follow his son into the center of power.
Leaving Nero in the Riverlands as a patrol captain was not merely praise in public and demotion in private.
It was a quiet death sentence.
Today on the battlefield Nero had already offended House Crakehall and slighted the quartermaster.
Once Tyrion left, Nero would lose his only protective umbrella.
He would not survive a month inside an army of twenty thousand Westerlands nobles.
He would be assigned the most dangerous grain runs and then “accidentally” die under a northern scout’s arrow or a Westerlands knight’s private blade.
He had to escape this quagmire.
He had to reach King’s Landing.
Nero’s mind raced, searching for any remaining chip that could break the deadlock.
He found none that could be played now.
He slowly went down on one knee.
“As you command, my lord.” His voice was steady.
Not a single ripple showed.
The moment he stepped out of the great tent the night wind cut like ice.
Only then did Nero realize the coarse linen shirt on his back was soaked through with cold sweat.
The internal damage left by the northern knight’s shield and the torn wound on his shoulder throbbed in the chill.
Bronn patted his shoulder.
For once there was something like sympathy in the sellsword’s eyes.
“I told you before—don’t show off your brains in front of the old lion.
Brother, being a patrol captain in the Riverlands… dealing with moldy wheat and marauding soldiers every day.
I wish you a long life.” Tyrion stood in the wind, face full of guilt and helplessness.
“Nero, I… I will find a way to issue a transfer order once I control the situation in King’s Landing…” “My lord, go rest.
The road to King’s Landing tomorrow will not be gentle.” Nero interrupted him calmly and looked up at the black sky.
He was firmly trapped inside the death trap.
To his left were Westerlands nobles who might arrange an assassination at any moment.
To his right was the northern army that could appear without warning.
The weakness of his body had already nearly killed him in the mud that morning.
Then the cold mechanical voice spoke inside his skull, sealing the entire game of power and flesh with a final stamp.
[Ding.
Stage Objective Two: The Lion Father’s Chessboard — Settling…] [Objective One: Preserve Tyrion and the core combat strength of the Mountain Clans.] [Judgment: Partially successful.] [Tyrion Lannister survived.
Core leaders of the Mountain Clans survived.
The unit did not scatter.] [However, the Mountain Clans’ organization has been forcibly stripped by Tywin Lannister.
Host’s and Tyrion’s actual influence over this force has dropped significantly.] [Objective Two: Obtain substantive independent troop command within the Lannister host.] [Judgment: Failed.] [Host has obtained nominal command of the First Baggage Train Patrol Battalion.
Position is judged a high-risk isolation post.
It provides no stable military power and carries constant risk of purge.] [Overall Evaluation: Partial victory.] [System Comment: You saved the chess piece, but failed to save the chessboard.] [Settlement Reward: Honor +10.
Current Honor: 17/100.] [Ding.
Detected that Honor has again broken the ten-point threshold.] [Low-tier white card selection permission unlocked.] [Select one temporary white card.
Validity: 10 days.] [A: Weapon Card — Balanced Short Staff (White): Obtain a hardwood short staff with an exceptionally stable center of gravity.] [B: Skill Card — Staff Fighting (White): Master basic staff holding, blocking, sweeping, thrusting, and disarming.] [C: Skill Card — Breath Holding (White): Improved breath-holding stability.] Nero looked at the three choices and was silent for a moment.
A short staff was useful.
But in any army camp the one thing never in short supply was wood—spear shafts, torches, wagon poles, branches that could be snapped off at will.
What was truly scarce was the knowledge of how to use them.
Breath holding had value as well.
Underwater, thick smoke, ambushes, concealment—any of those moments could save a life.
Yet the place he was being sent was the First Baggage Train Patrol Battalion.
That post was not merely a battlefield.
It was wagons, sentries, grooms, deserters, night roads, and the quiet knives of men who already wanted him dead.
A sword was too conspicuous.
A staff could appear anywhere and look like nothing at all.
“Select B.” [Selected: Skill Card — Staff Fighting (White).] [Detected that current trait slots are full.] [Currently equipped traits:] [1.
Beast Vision (Beginner)] [2.
Wandering Swordsmanship (Proficient)] [3.
Black Blade Mastery (White)] [4.
Intimidating Voice (White, 9 days remaining)] [Select a trait to replace.] Nero’s gaze moved across the list.
Beast Vision could not be removed.
Wandering Swordsmanship was the foundation of every open fight.
Black Blade Mastery had just kept him alive in the mud of the Green Fork.
The only disposable piece was Intimidating Voice.
That trait had once helped him leash Shagga, Timett, and the half-mad Mountain Clans.
Those men had now been stripped away by Tywin.
What waited ahead were Westerlands nobles, quartermasters, patrol soldiers, deserters, and knives in the dark.
“Replace Intimidating Voice.” [Uninstalled temporary trait: Intimidating Voice (White).] [Equipped temporary trait: Staff Fighting (White).] [Current trait slots: 4/4.] [Currently equipped traits:] [1.
Beast Vision (Beginner)] [2.
Wandering Swordsmanship (Proficient)] [3.
Black Blade Mastery (White)] [4.
Staff Fighting (White, 10 days remaining)] Nero stared at the words “again broken the ten-point threshold.” A sudden thought stirred.
If Honor dropped below ten and then rose above it once more, would the low-tier white card selection trigger again?
Could he keep the number deliberately between nine and ten and farm temporary white cards through successive mission rewards?
The idea lasted only an instant, yet it made his breathing quicken.
It might be a loophole.
It might be a trap.
The system offered no explanation.
The most dangerous part of this system had never been what it said—it was what it refused to say.
One fact remained certain: if Honor points existed, they could be spent.
Nero looked down at the bandages wrapped around his chest.
The shield blow on the Green Fork had nearly driven his ribs into his lungs.
He was about to walk into the First Baggage Train Patrol Battalion carrying northern scouts, hidden Westerlands knives, and a body that was still half-broken.
He could not afford to enter that place as he was.
He issued the command silently.
“Consume 8 Honor.
Strengthen Constitution and Strength.” [8 Honor consumed.] [Strength: 18 → 20.] [Constitution: 15 → 21.] [Current Honor: 9/100.] [Injury status updated: Rib fracture remains unhealed.
Chest concussion alleviated.
Continued high-intensity combat may still worsen existing injuries.] A heavy heat surged up from deep inside his bones.
It was not the tearing nerve-pain of raising Agility, nor the cold needle that had driven into his skull when Intelligence increased.
This felt like molten iron poured into his chest and then hammered back into place while it was still liquid.
Nero let out a muffled groan and steadied himself against a tent pole.
After several breaths he stood straight again.
The pain remained.
Breathing no longer felt quite so much like swallowing knives.
The panel refreshed across his vision.
[Current Personal Panel] [Strength: 20] [Agility: 22] [Intelligence: 23] [Constitution: 21 (Rib fracture unhealed)] [Current Honor: 9/100] [Current Traits] [Beast Vision (Beginner)] [Wandering Swordsmanship (Proficient)] [Black Blade Mastery (White)] [Staff Fighting (White, temporary)] Nero stood in the cold wind and looked at the numbers.
Honor had fallen back to the dangerous edge—one step away from the ten-point line once more.
Whether he could endlessly farm card draws remained unknown.
The eight points had not been wasted.
At least now the first assassination attempt would not put his ribs through his lungs.
The system’s final comment scraped across his aching chest like a file: You saved the chess piece, but failed to save the chessboard.
He had not obtained the ticket to King’s Landing.
He had not truly seized command of any force that belonged to him.
There was no despair in Nero’s eyes.
Something colder and sharper had taken its place—a madness born of being pushed to the limit.
You will not let me walk out openly?
He slowly closed his fist inside the blood-stained bandages.
Fine.
Then I will carve my own bloody road to King’s Landing.