JON I
The King's Road was less a road and more a suggestion of one, a ribbon of frozen mud and gravel winding its way through an endless, unforgiving landscape of grey hills and black, skeletal forests. For two weeks, they had ridden north, a small, grim procession against the biting wind. Jon, Vayon Poole, a dozen household guards, and three shackled prisoners destined for the Wall. Every league they traveled took Jon further from the only home he had ever known and deeper into a future that was a complete, terrifying unknown.
The days were a monotonous rhythm of riding, the nights a blur of cold watches and fitful, dreamless sleep. The emptiness of the land was a mirror to the emptiness inside him. He was no longer Jon Snow, but he was not yet Aemon Targaryen. He was a ghost, a boy caught between two lives, belonging to neither.
During his lonely night watches, he would bring up his status screen. The glowing blue text was a stark comfort in the oppressive darkness, but tonight, something had changed. He stared at the words, his breath catching in his throat.
[Status]
Name: Jon Snow
Title: The Exiled Prince
Rank: 4
Experience: 0/3000
Skill Points: 6
The Bastard of Winterfell was gone, replaced by a title that was both a truth and a curse. The System had acknowledged his new reality, making it feel more permanent, more real, than ever before.
He had been holding onto his skill points since the night he had exposed the quartermaster, and the rank up in the crypt had given him a healthy reserve. He had met the prerequisite for [Wolf's Strike] during his endless spars with the guards—[Land 50 consecutive hits without taking damage]—but had hesitated to purchase it. Now, on the road, surrounded by the threat of unseen dangers, the choice felt more like a necessity. He focused his intent, spending one of his precious points.
[New Skill Acquired: Wolf's Strike]
Description: A powerful, focused lunge attack that can break an enemy's guard or stagger heavily armored foes.
[Tier II Path Complete: The Weapon Master]
[Capstone Quest now available: The Echoing Blade. Memory Quest — This path is now open. Begin when ready]
A wave of instinctual knowledge flooded his mind, not just the mechanics of the lunge, but the feeling of it—the perfect coiling of the muscles in his legs, the precise angle of the thrust, the explosive release of power. He now had three skill points left. He knew exactly what he wanted to do with two of them. He was already working towards the prerequisite for [Surefoot], the foundational skill of the Pathfinder. This journey through the rugged North would surely see that done.
The journey was not without its dangers. On the twentieth day, as they rode through a narrow, rocky pass, Jon's [Sight] flared, picking up a flicker of hostile red from the rocks above. [Intent: Predatory. Desperate]
"Ambush!" he yelled, pulling his horse to a halt.
Vayon Poole, startled, looked at him. "What? How do you—"
He was cut off as three ragged men burst from the rocks, armed with rusty swords and axes. Deserters from the Watch, their black cloaks tattered and faded. They were gaunt, their eyes wild with the desperation of cornered animals.
The guards reacted instantly, drawing their own steel. But the deserters were fighting with a savage, reckless abandon that the disciplined guards were not prepared for. One of them, a big, bearded man, swung a heavy axe at Vayon Poole, who was blocked him with his sword.
Jon didn't think. He acted. He spurred his horse forward, drawing his new longsword. He activated [Wolf's Strike]. His body moved with a speed and precision that felt both alien and perfectly natural. He lunged forward, his sword a blur of motion.
The deserter, focused on Poole, had no time to react. Jon's blade struck the man's axe not with a clang, but with a sharp, ringing impact that sent a shockwave up the man's arms, breaking his guard completely. Before the man could recover, Jon brought his sword around in a flat arc, the pommel smashing into the side of the deserter's head with a sickening crunch. The man crumpled to the ground.
The fight was over in moments, the other two deserters quickly subdued by the now-alerted guards. Jon sat on his horse, his chest heaving, the adrenaline singing in his veins. He looked at the unconscious man at his feet, then at his own sword. This was the first time he had used his skills in a true life-or-death situation. It had been brutal, and terrifyingly effective.
[Side Quest Complete: A Desperate Stand]
[Reward: 100 Experience]
That night, as he sat by the fire, the vast, star-strewn sky above him, the full weight of his new reality settled on him once more. He was Aemon Targaryen. He thought of his father, Rhaegar. His mother's letter spoke of love, but Jon could only see the consequences. A prince whose actions—was it for love, or for some mad reason?—had plunged a kingdom into war. A man who, had he lived, would have been king. Aerys was mad; the lords would have seen him removed one way or another. Rhaegar would have taken the throne. And Jon… Jon would have been a prince. He would have grown up in the Red Keep, with a father and a mother, a true name.
The thought was a sharp, physical ache in his chest. He didn't want a crown. He didn't want a throne. But he mourned that lost life with every fiber of his being. He mourned the family he never had, the love he had only ever read about in a letter. And then, a colder, more terrible thought cut through his grief with the sharpness of Valyrian steel.
The life he was mourning, the fantasy of a prince in the Red Keep, could never have existed. For him to have been born openly, his parents' love would have had to be accepted by the realm. There would have been no war, no tower, no secret. But if there had been no secret, no flight to Dorne... he would never have been born at all. His very existence was inextricably tied to the tragedy that had orphaned him.
He was fourteen years old, and his very existence was the scar left behind by a war. He was the living proof of his mother's and father's actions, and for that very reason, he had to be a lie.
A prince, but of a kingdom made of ash. An heir, but to a throne forged from lies. He was not Jon Snow, the bastard. He was Aemon Targaryen, the exiled prince. The title felt both grand and hollow, a bitter irony that defined his new existence. He was royalty with no subjects, an heir with no inheritance.
As they neared the Wall, the land began to rise, the path becoming a treacherous track through the rocky foothills. The horses struggled, and they were forced to dismount and lead them. The terrain was brutal, a world of sharp rocks and hidden crevices. It was on the twenty-fourth day of their journey that the notification finally chimed.
[Prerequisite Met: Traverse 10 kilometers through difficult terrain.]
[Skill Available for Purchase: Surefoot]
He was about to spend the points when a new, far grander notification bloomed in his vision, its text a regal, shimmering gold.
[New Legacy Quest Issued: Echoes of the Dragonlords]
Description: Your blood calls to the source of its power. True strength is not found, it is forged in fire and shadow. Seek what was lost.
Objective: Journey to the shores of the Smoking Sea and retrieve a Valyrian artifact from the ruins near the coastline.
Reward: ???, [Dragon & Wolf] Branch Progression.
Jon stared at the quest, his blood running cold. Valyria. The Doom. A place of demons and death, a land so cursed that even the bravest sailors refused to go near it. The System wasn't just pushing him; it was commanding him to walk into the heart of a nightmare. He knew, with a certainty that terrified him, that this was a quest he would one day have to undertake. But not yet. First, he had to face the past.
The next day, he saw it. A colossal, shimmering cliff of ice that stretched from horizon to horizon, so vast it seemed to dwarf the sky itself. The Wall. It was more immense, more ancient, more intimidating than any story had ever described.
He had arrived at the end of the world. And he hoped, with a desperate, boyish prayer, that he would find the beginning of his own story here, in the quiet counsel of the one man in the world who shared his name.