The mountain clans were indeed difficult to subdue. Even though Kal had been lucky at the start—managing to deal with a small branch of the Burned Men and their chieftain, the one-eyed Red Hand Timett—when he led this band to continue raiding other clans, he still met with considerable resistance.
For this, Kal had even been forced to wipe out several smaller clans outright before his campaign could proceed smoothly.
Throughout the Moon Mountains, stories spread of the newly risen Warden of the East, Kal Stone, and his legendary feats.
After Kal had thoroughly subdued the Burned Men—through his personal charisma, prestige, and sheer strength—he finally learned from Timett's mouth that these people were not the entirety of the clan.
Only then did Kal understand why he had always felt something odd about them.
What's more, he now realized that the events he had encountered on the road to the Eyrie to assume the title of Warden of the East had stirred waves even among these mountain clans.
Those corpses, as if torn apart by giant beasts, had been discarded carelessly in the wilderness without any treatment.
By the time other clans discovered them, aside from those partially gnawed by wild animals, the remains left behind were enough to allow them to roughly piece together what had happened.
Judging from the traces, they speculated that this raiding party had been wiped out by men—not many of them—and that the battle had been some strange pursuit and slaughter.
Combined with the recent news of Jon Arryn's death and the kingdom's war with the western Lannisters, even these clans—who were not so isolated from outside tidings—began to grow more restless.
As for the three hundred or so men Timett had originally led, most were warriors, both men and women. The rest, the youths, played more the role of helpers.
It was only then that Kal noticed that this clan truly had no children—only a band of half-grown youths.
Even the elders were merely aged in appearance. In truth, they were all seasoned hunters and the like.
"You brought them out here… to test the outside world?" Kal asked.
Timett looked at his master, to whom he had submitted, with a trace of shame and complexity, then nodded.
Lowering his head, he gazed at his right hand—miraculously restored to how it had been before the burns—and his heart grew ever more certain that his choice had been right.
Thus he led those he had brought out, together with the clansmen who had also yielded to Kal Stone after the wagered duel, and without hesitation became a guide for him.
In the battles that followed, with Timett leading the way, Kal folded them without hesitation into his own ranks.
The Burned Men as a whole numbered around four to five thousand, occupying a sizable stretch of forested mountains, with terrain easy to defend and hard to assault.
And according to Timett, even that was not their full strength.
For the population of the mountain clans was not as fixed as one might imagine. Many were scattered across the countless corners of the range.
Scattered, yet still loosely connected.
The Burned Men were already counted among the strongest clans of the Moon Mountains.
Though it bore some semblance of treachery to his people, Timett did not feel he had done wrong.
The process of winning these people over was somewhat complicated, but not difficult.
Kal accepted their pledge of loyalty to him, and with that, he took the very first step in conquering these mountain clans.
"I promise you this—wherever my domain lies, there will be your promised land!"
The mountain clans and the Andals who had come to the Vale had been at odds for hundreds, even thousands of years. Kal would never be so foolish as to try and force these clans to merge into the Andals, simply on the basis of his temporary title as Warden of the East.
That would have been the act of a simpleton.
To Kal, this population was true wealth.
This was his foundation, and he would certainly not leave it in the Vale.
However, his current campaign made it impossible to bring everyone along. That was simply not feasible.
So, after leaving behind more than two hundred tribal warriors to guard the Burned Men's settlement, Kal gathered the remaining five hundred warriors—including Timett—and merged them wholesale into his army.
With his force suddenly expanded to seven or eight hundred strong, Kal pressed on, continuing his conquests with the guidance of these "locals."
After annihilating one smaller clan by force and subduing another, Kal came upon yet another tribe, scarcely smaller than the Burned Men—the Black-Ears Clan.
Their chieftain was Cheyk.
He had a daughter who left a deep impression on Kal.
She was lean and fierce, flat-chested like a boy, dark-skinned, not beautiful, her laughter rasping and rough.
But to Kal, she was, above all else, a warrior.
According to Black-Ears custom, they cut off the ears of slain enemies as trophies, keeping them as medals of honor.
This woman bore forty-six of them.
During the battle against this clan, Kal personally took the field—for he could not afford to lose even a single one of the men who now truly belonged to him.
Every death pained him.
And the Black-Ears proved to be a formidable foe, their will to fight fierce and unyielding.
With nearly a thousand warriors, Kal could not split his forces into small groups in the mountain forests, so he resolved to launch a direct assault.
In this battle, too, Kal wore no armor. He did not even draw the gilded longsword at his waist.
Instead, wielding two random weapons scavenged from the battlefield, he tore through the Black-Ears warriors like a raging whirlwind, standing out as a figure impossible to ignore.
And his terrifying strength shattered the Black-Ears' morale as well.
When the two battered weapons in his hands finally snapped, Kal immediately seized another fighter—one who had stood out on the battlefield.
He dragged him up to a high point where all could see, lifted him overhead in full view of the combatants, and held him aloft.
Kal's eyes were cold and merciless. With one hand gripping the man's face and the other forcing open his jaw, he tore slowly, brutally, ripping him apart from mouth to gut.
Windpipe, skin, muscle, blood, and flesh all came apart in a grisly spectacle, accompanied by the man's strangled, abruptly silenced screams—a vivid and horrifying scene etched into all who witnessed it.
Warm blood drenched Kal from head to toe, but he paid it no mind.
For with it, the battlefield fell into silence.
At last, the Black-Ears Clan announced their surrender.
Chieftain Cheyk—Kal left him behind to gather his people and join with the Burned Men.
Then, taking more than three hundred of their warriors and Cheyk's daughter, Chella, Kal pressed on with his conquest of the Moon Mountains.
"I will conquer you in a woman's way!" Ever since her clan, along with herself, had been subdued by Kal, Chella had been clinging to him all along the way.
"I have no interest in you," Kal refused her again and again, his tone weary.
But to Chella, that was no obstacle.
"That won't stop me. You know it," she swore, meeting Kal Stone's gaze with fierce confidence. She licked her tongue across her lips, tossed him a brazen smile, and swaggered away, leaving those words hanging behind her.
One-eyed Timett stepped forward from the side.
"She isn't declaring love for you," Timett said. "She simply can't accept defeat."
"I know," Kal answered calmly with a nod. Then he added, "If she were the chieftain of the Black-Ears Clan, we might have had to pay with many more lives to truly conquer her."
"And I'm not concerned. In time, she will give up her notions."
Hearing this domineering declaration, Timett—who knew better than anyone how mysterious and terrifying this man was—nodded without surprise.
When Timett remained silent, Kal turned his eyes to him. "You didn't come here just to make small talk, did you?"
At that, Timett wasted no words. His voice was steady and without emotion. "Shagga, son of Dolf, current chieftain of the Stone Crows, has united several of the remaining clans. They are preparing for war against us."
"That is good news." Kal's eyes lit up at once.
Timett thought the same.
"This spares me much trouble. A temporary alliance is never as solid as it looks. That too is our opportunity."
After conquering several clans one after another, Kal suddenly realized that such a method was nothing but a waste of time.
So, in the battles that followed, he deliberately slowed his pace. He wanted the mountain clans—who were not so swift in receiving news—to have time to react, to realize that another army was now hunting and subduing them.
And the Stone Crows fulfilled his design perfectly.
By then, he had already spent a month in the Moon Mountains.
No doubt the Vale lords who had returned to their lands to arrange governance and set up defenses were ready by now to march with their armies.
If he did not quicken his pace, he would become the one to hold everything back.
So when he heard this news, Kal could not help but smile in delight.
In the war that followed, fought in the wilderness against seven or eight great clans united together—a force of at least two thousand—Kal, unsurprisingly, emerged victorious.
To utterly break these last remnants in a single battle, Kal showed no mercy.
He had even prepared to annihilate them all to the last man.
For his purpose in coming here had already been achieved. Now, all that remained was to sweep aside the final, greatest armed power in the Moon Mountains, paving the way for what he would build in the Vale to come.
So if these people refused to surrender, Kal would not keep them alive.
Even though the force that truly belonged to him now numbered barely over a thousand.
This battle began hastily, but it ended swiftly.
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