Chapter 77 — Dragonbone, and a Target
The tunnels beneath the city were long and suffocatingly dull—
yet beneath that monotony lurked a faint, oppressive dread.
As Podrick walked, a strange hush settled around him,
a silence so heavy it felt like a stone pressed against his chest.
Every now and then, something like a whisper fluttered past his ears—
soft, indistinct, like muttering from another room.
But when he paused to listen closely, it evaporated into nothing,
leaving only the echo of his own breath.
The torch crackled as fat dripped and burned.
Light wavered and twisted,
throwing shadows that danced on the rough stone walls—
sometimes stretching thin like distorted limbs,
sometimes crouching low as if ready to pounce.
But none of this unnerved Podrick.
On the contrary—he was thrilled.
Across two lifetimes, he had never once experienced
the sensation of moving through the bowels of a living fortress—
a hidden, twisting maze beneath the seat of power.
The novelty of it all sent adrenaline singing through his veins, as though every corner promised a secret waiting to be uncovered.
So he walked on—slow, steady, following the subtle tug of airflow,
wandering wherever curiosity led him.
Along the way, Podrick noticed remnants of traps—
some half-disarmed, others still very much intact.
Taken together, they made it obvious:
once upon a time, this entire underground labyrinth
had been a deathtrap.
A sprawling network of escape routes and kill-zones—
designed, no doubt, by King Maegor to guarantee
that if ever surrounded, he could vanish underground
long before his enemies stormed the gates.
Now, instead of royal escape routes,
these tunnels had become the spider's web—
where secrets slithered and conspiracies gestated in the dark.
But none of that concerned Podrick.
He didn't dismantle traps or disturb anything—
he drifted through the place like a tourist in a private museum,
admiring the remnants of another age with childlike fascination.
And without noticing,
the stub of wax in his hand—used to leave subtle marks along the way—
had already been worn down to half its size.
As Podrick continued his wandering, the tunnels around him subtly changed.
Some passages were carved from clean-cut stone—broad, cool, symmetrical—
while others were nothing more than packed earth supported by rotting timbers,
so narrow that a grown man would need to crawl on elbows and knees to pass.
This maze wound beneath the Red Keep like a second skeleton.
Certain corridors ran so close to the castle walls above
that a patient listener could overhear whispered conversations
as though separated by nothing more than paper.
Others seemed to end in strange, forgotten places—
unexpected corners of the Keep where a person might appear
like a ghost stepping out of solid rock.
Locked doors were plentiful.
Podrick, however, broke every lock he found,
never sparing a thought for whatever spymaster or shadow
might later tremble at the signs of intrusion.
The air grew deeper.
The tunnel broadened.
Stone steps spiraled downward—
layer upon layer, step after step—
until the darkness felt almost liquid.
Then—
far beyond the reach of his torchlight—
a colossal shadow loomed.
For an instant, Podrick felt watched,
as though a vast gaze pressed against his skin,
raising the hairs along his arms and neck.
And just as suddenly as the chill came,
a strange warmth stirred in his chest—
a sense of presence.
Through the bars of an iron gate,
he could see nothing but darkness—
yet he already knew what lay behind it.
His breath quickened.
He snapped the lock apart, lifted the gate,
and strode forward with the torch raised high.
There—
revealed by the flickering light—
was a mountain of blackened bone,
a skull large enough to swallow men whole,
its hollow sockets staring down at him
with ancient, extinguished fury.
"Dragonbone…"
The words escaped as a whisper—
half reverence, half disbelief.
His hand rose on instinct, fingertips brushing a single massive fang—
warm to the touch, coarse as stone.
Even that tooth alone was thicker than a man's torso.
"The Black Dread…
Balerion."
No story, no picture, no bard's song
had ever prepared him for this.
Within that gaping mouth, a full-grown bull could vanish.
Those empty sockets could cradle a man curled tight,
and once—long ago—they had held fire dark as midnight
and hotter than molten iron.
Standing before the skull,
Podrick felt—truly felt—for the first time
what "the miraculous" meant.
That which was myth
now existed in reach of his hands.
[You have gained insight into what lies between the mundane and the extraordinary.]
[Experience +500]
[New Skill: Aura of Pressure]
He scarcely noticed the phantom text tingling behind his eyes.
His gaze was fixed on the skull—
on the stories it carried in silence:
Balerion, who swallowed aurochs and mammoths whole.
Balerion, whose wings cast shadows broad enough to drown towns in darkness.
Balerion, whose fire melted stone, forged glass from sand,
and turned towers into rivers of molten steel.
Feeding him had required entire caravans—
and yet even that was nothing compared to what he gave in return.
He was conquest made flesh,
Targaryen dominion given wings.
He was the spine of an empire.
Podrick stepped back, lifting his chin—
trying to imagine flesh on these mighty bones,
fire in the throat, wings spread wide enough
to blot out half the sky.
Dust and cobwebs draped the skull now,
as though history had forgotten it
and simply moved on.
But Podrick didn't forget.
Not anymore.
"If such power once lived in this world…"
His voice trembled—not with fear, but with hunger.
"…could I one day command it?"
Then his eyes lit—
clear, focused, burning.
Not a dream.
Not a fancy.
A goal.
Beyond the sea, miracles had already walked again.
A girl had awakened stone eggs into living flame.
"Yes," Podrick whispered, breath quickening.
"Yes… I will have my chance."
Since arriving in this world, he had felt lost—
dislocated, mismatched, a modern soul drowning in the past.
Battlefields had made him feel small,
and danger had kept him moving without direction.
But now, standing beneath the Red Keep
with the skull of the Black Dread towering over him,
something inside him shifted into place.
The confusion fell away.
And in its wake—
purpose.
"I will see the true face of this world," he murmured, voice low and steady.
"And I will leave my mark upon her."
Beneath the castle, in the hush of ancient stone,
a young man whispered his ambitions to the dead—
and the darkness seemed to listen.