"I, Sandor Clegane, swear allegiance to Jon Stark and his future family, from this day forward, until my death, to the old and new gods." Sandor raised his sword above his head. "My sword will be at your command!"
"My will and my mission will guide your sword." Jon recalled the etiquette he had received with Robb, "There will always be a place for you at the table, and a fire that will always burn for you in the fireplace."
The ceremony was completed, and the subordinate relationship was established.
The hound's face broke into a sinister smile again. He put on a smirking expression and said, "Sir, if you need to call me in the future, just say 'Dog, come.'"
"The dog is coming?"
"My lord!" Sandor stood up abruptly with a fawning smile on his face.
"Is that what Joffrey usually calls you?"
"Yes, sir."
"Now that you are my vassal, I believe that one should treat one's subjects with respect. From now on, I will only call you Sandor."
"My lord—" Sandor felt a lump in his throat, but insisted, "My lord, you can just call me the Hound."
"Gods, why did the Lannisters turn you into this?"
Jon felt a little uncomfortable, but still insisted on calling him Sandor, after all, he wanted a warrior, not a slave.
Calling Sandor a dog might add a touch of wicked humor when one is powerful, but when trouble comes, one will find that this added wickedness is simply not worth it.
Jon looked at Sandor, who was a head taller than him, and said, "Now that you are my vassal, I'll tell you something that many people don't know yet."
"Please speak, my lord." Sandor bowed, his face still bearing a fawning smile.
"His Majesty Stannis has ordered me to go to Riverrun to persuade Robb Stark, my brother, to lay down his crown and pledge allegiance to the Iron Throne again. If I succeed, His Majesty will bestow upon me the title of Duke of Casterly Rock and the Warden of the Westerlands. Of course, I will have to take both Casterly Rock and the Westerlands myself."
Upon hearing Jon's words, Sandor's eyes widened, even his left eye, which was dissatisfied with the burn scars, stared like a boiled egg.
"My lord, you're going to be the Duke of Casterly Rock? Casterly Rock isn't easy to conquer!" Sandor warned.
In his opinion, Harrenhal was not bad either. It was a bit dilapidated, but it was big enough and sturdy enough. Casterly Rock was good, but he estimated that Jon Snow would still not be able to enjoy it.
Sandor, like everyone else, hoped that Jon would not set his sights on Casterly Rock.
He even told Jon precisely how many arrow towers, armories, and hidden troop caves were on Casterly Rock.
Seeing Sandor's genuine concern for him, Jon felt quite pleased.
He asked with a hint of joking, "What if I do intend to attack Casterly Rock? We just had the vassal ceremony. If you want to leave, you can still do so now, and no one will know."
Sandor looked into Jon's eyes, opened his mouth as if to say something but hesitated, then said with a hint of helplessness, "The seven layers of hell, nobody knows, but the gods do. If you insist on fighting, I'll do as you say."
Jon chuckled inwardly. He knew there was no such thing as absolute loyalty in the world, but Sandor's ability to do this much after just declaring his allegiance was far superior to that of the average mercenary.
He stood up, patted Sandor on the shoulder, and said, "Don't worry, I'm not the kind of person who doesn't value human life. I heard that those Western Frontier surrendered soldiers are still in the POW camp. Let's go see them together."
Since Harken and Halion left, Jon Snow has only about two thousand troops directly under his command.
There were about four or five thousand soldiers from the western border who surrendered that day after being surrounded by wildfires.
Although they were almost all Lannister and Westerlands elites with relatively high loyalty, the most loyal Lannisters were burned to death because they charged too fiercely, and the rest were not without the possibility of being recruited.
Moreover, how could a feudal lord possibly have any great favors towards the army? Most of these soldiers came from peasant families, at most their families were slightly wealthy.
What the Lannisters can offer in the future, Jon can offer too; he doesn't believe he can't win over this group.
Dragon's Lair was originally a place where the Targaryens housed their dragons.
The Dragon's Lair was originally the Sanctuary of Remembrance, a place Aegon the Conqueror used to commemorate his second wife, Reyne.
However, the Church of Remembrance was destroyed during the brutal "Meg" period, when Meg bloodily suppressed a church rebellion and built Dragon's Lair on the ruins of the Church of Remembrance.
——————
After all, the Church of Remembrance commemorates Renis, and Meg's mother was the Queen Mother of Visonia. Meg was known for her volatile temper, so she naturally wouldn't concern herself with such matters.
After the dragons went extinct, the dragon's lair was abandoned and became the territory of thieves, prostitutes, bandits, and gangs.
After Jon Snow's decisive victory at the Red Keep, he captured the trapped Westerlands troops and imprisoned them all in Dragon's Lair.
Since there wasn't much food left in King's Landing, Jon Snow only gave them one meal a day and a small amount of water to keep them alive so they wouldn't starve and wouldn't cause any trouble.
When Jon and Sandor arrived at the dragon's lair, they heard a cacophony of laughter. As they rode closer, they found a group of Florentine soldiers mocking the surrendered soldiers from the Westerlands.
Several Florentine soldiers surrounded a few Western Frontier surrendered soldiers, tossing and catching rice balls.
The starving Western soldiers could only chase after rice balls like monkeys, looking disheveled and pitiful.
Soldiers from Hejian were also there, making a fuss.
But Jon did not intend to intervene, because he figured these Western soldiers had probably abused civilians in the same way when they were in the Riverlands, so it was only right that they suffered a little.
A moment later, a soldier from the Florentine family sensed that an army was approaching. He turned around and saw an army of over a hundred men approaching.
Upon discovering that the leader was Jon Snow, they quickly came over to pay their respects.
They knelt before Jon, looking rather reserved.
The Florentine army was Stannis's most loyal army, representing the Queen's faction. Jon did not want to have any conflict with them because of some morally questionable surrendered soldiers.
"Get up, I've come to see the surrendered soldiers."
"Yes, sir."
So the group led Jon to the ruined dragon's lair.
Soon, four or five thousand prisoners were brought out. They hadn't eaten enough for ten days, and the long march had left some of them with clearly visible ribs.
Stepping out of the dragon's lair, many people shivered due to the sudden drop in temperature. Moreover, the light outside the dragon's lair was much brighter, causing many to squint uncomfortably upon arrival.
It took almost a quarter of an hour for the thousands of surrendered soldiers to adjust somewhat.
Sandor looked at the timid and cowering Western Army before him, which had completely lost its indomitable spirit, and couldn't help but feel a little sad.
He was also curious about how Jon planned to recruit these Western soldiers.
At this moment, one of the surrendered soldiers suddenly spoke up: "Sir, are you going to kill us?"
The speaker was a soldier with brownish-yellow hair. It was unclear whether he was related to the Lannisters by blood, but even if he was, they were probably completely unrelated.
Jon looked at the soldier and then said, "I am indeed here to kill, but not all of you."
The wind carried Jon's voice to most people's ears, which cheered many up.
Sandor, standing nearby, pricked up his ears and glanced sideways at Jon, wondering why Jon was killing people if he wanted to recruit soldiers.
"I know you people are having a great time looting and pillaging in the Riverlands. If the Lannisters win, you'll probably be able to plunder King's Landing just like you did a decade or so ago."
The surrendered soldiers listened to Jon's words, their faces tense.
"But I also know that Tywin's indulgence played a part in this, but that doesn't mean I will forgive you. If the rest of you want to live, then form groups of ten and vote to execute the person who has committed the most evil deeds. The rest of you can live, and I will take you back to the Westerlands. Let's begin!"
Jon's words immediately caused a huge uproar among the surrendered soldiers, and some of them even revealed their ferocity.
But upon seeing the heavily armored soldiers surrounding Jon, they knew clearly that they had no chance of winning.
To suppress these surrendered soldiers, Jon Snow brought his most elite heavy armor battalion.
If unarmed surrendered soldiers dared to retaliate, they would face slaughter; otherwise, if they obediently accepted being whipped, they would have a 90% chance of surviving.
Jon waved his hand, and at Martin's command, the Riverlands soldiers behind him pulled out groups of ten soldiers from the Westerlands and made them vote for each other.
"I only killed two people, and you told me to do it."
"Bullshit! You clearly killed four people, two of whom were women who were raped to death!"
These soldiers were mostly rough men, and when faced with a life-or-death situation, they didn't have many nice words left.
"Those two women were already dying, and you! Jayne, you were the strongest when you were with them, so you should be blamed!"
"Stop arguing and vote now!" a soldier from Hejian shouted angrily.
Soon, the first group of ten voted out a soldier with a long, thin face. The soldiers from Hejian gave each of them a dagger, and each of them stabbed the soldier once until he collapsed and convulsed.
Next group ————
Just before darkness fell completely, the eleven-day execution, ostensibly for the purpose of punishing crimes, finally came to an end.
Because when they were divided into groups, soldiers who knew each other were often grouped together, and they were killing people they knew, which further eroded the remaining cohesion among these surrendered soldiers from the western border.
When the more than five hundred corpses were laid out to one side, these surrendered soldiers from the Westerlands were completely like lambs to the slaughter. Soon, soldiers brought firewood, and Jon set fire to the bodies of those who had been voted to be executed.
A huge bonfire was lit in the dragon's lair.
The orange bonfire shot into the sky, dispelling much of the darkness.
This was another mass execution more than two hundred years after Megat burned church rebels.
The orange glow of the fire illuminated everyone's faces, and the air was filled with the nauseating smell of burnt protein.
Sandor looked at the trembling, surrendered soldiers, then at Jon Snow, who was behaving as docilely as a dog. The ruthlessness of killing hundreds of people so readily reminded Sandor of Tywin Lannister's annihilation of the Reyes family years ago.
Tywin Lannister poured water into the underground hideout of the Reyes family, drowning them all, and thus the Reyes family was expelled from Westeros.
The flames were still burning. Jon looked at the surrendered soldiers and could sense that their morale had not only declined but had completely vanished.
In other words, their army as a collective has completely disappeared.
"Alright, let your sins disappear with this flame. I said I would take you back to the Western Territory, but if anyone dares to harm innocent civilians, then I think they know what will happen to them."
Jon had finished speaking, but no one answered.
After a long while, a still somewhat childish voice came from the corner: "Sir, will you really take us back to the Western Border? You won't continue, you won't kill, no—"
Even though the soldier who was speaking was a little stuttering, the people around him automatically made room for him so that Jon could see his face clearly.
Jon looked at the young soldier, who appeared to be no more than seventeen or eighteen years old.
"How about this, I won't leave tonight, I'll sleep here with you all."
"Hey, sir?!" Sandor tried to stop him, but Jon swept him away with a wave of his hand.
Jon walked into the middle of a group of surrendered soldiers in front of the soldiers, and then chose a small, relatively high mound to ensure that most people could see him.
He spread his cloak on the ground and lay down on it. "It's getting late. Anyone who wants to sleep can go to sleep. I'll have someone bring breakfast tomorrow."
"My lord, I will accompany you—" Sandor was interrupted by Jon before he could finish speaking.
"Go back and protect my sisters. Make sure there's enough food for tomorrow, and bring some wine too. That's all."
After saying that, Jon was about to lie down with his head on his arm, but then suddenly sat up again.
He casually tossed aside the sword Stannis had given him at his waist, muttering "It's hard to hold," before lying down again under the dumbfounded gazes of the soldiers.
A gentle autumn breeze blows, and the stars overhead shine as brightly as lanterns.
At first, the soldiers sat in small groups, whispering among themselves, but soon some of them fell asleep with trepidation.
Once there was one, there was a second and a third, and soon thousands of soldiers were lying in the open in a large area.