The cost of being able to kill the Faceless Men was high, but it was worth it. Without their presence, I did not need to worry about my own safety while I experimented with the type of magic that one would consider... dark in nature.

Without the Dragonbone cores working for me, the proto-Phoenix limiting my casts, and running into Morna White Mask, a Chieftain of the Free Folk, it seemed reasonable to expect visits from the possessors of some sort of Divination-based ability I barely understood. It meant that I was now low on time before more trouble would start finding me or less moral characters than a Free Folk Raider would seek me out.

As such, I was forced to try my hand at Plan B... where B stood for Basilisk. I was, understandably, not the biggest fan of Plan B. A Snake with a venom that could not be countered, with skin hard enough to resist most spells, and toxic blood that may or may not melt metal to such a degree that I was not certain even Valyrian Steel could resist it... all for a Horn that may or may not be a good match for me as a wand? Yeah... not my best plan to date... which included some rather questionable plans in the past.

It had been more than a month since adding Morna's War Band to our ranks... which had been growing steadily to nearly a hundred men. Of the group, there had been two Skinchangers, Sylva and Rolf, who had an eagle and a wolf, respectively, though only the eagle had survived the journey, while Rolf took on one of the hunting dogs with my permission.

Both skinchangers were initially terrified of me and my ability to control almost any beast I wished, and I had a feeling that they felt me when I was reading their surface thoughts, catching thoughts of 'Varamyr Sixskin' and 'Greenseer' which made me worried. Luckily, Free Folk had a certain amount of reverence for the Greenseers, even if Morna knew nothing of the Three-Eyed Crow. The panic they felt upon feeling my presence kept them in line, and they had some unique insights regarding skinchanging that earned them a place of honor among my men... a status that was different enough from how they were treated as pariahs when beyond the wall that it got me their respect in turn. There was also the fact that Huan towered over most men these days, so they knew not to act out.

As a precaution, I had everyone sign into a notebook with ink containing their blood, inspired by the practice of the Second Sons; I did not really have a method of enforcing said contract through magic for now. The mark of the Deathly Hallows on my arm was definitely a form of a contract, a Geas that was formed through the curse left behind by the Faceless Men, which I was able to tame and control into a less dangerous form. The rune for the mark itself was a conceptual representation of Death and my authority over it... but it was going to take longer to actually find the method. That being said, I simply told them that if they broke the contract, a curse would be upon them... and given my more magical capabilities, they all bought it without question. Now, all I needed was to keep track of the ones most likely to sell me out and have some misfortune happen to them. The rumors and superstitions would take care of the rest.

My eyes focused on the wand twirling between my fingers, the one of Rowan and Raven's Feather. The wand was good for a few healing spells but limited my options unless I used the backup wand once it ran out of its daily charge. I had a smaller wand kept up my boot, but that one was far more temperamental and lacked precision. Most healing that I needed to do to get the man's loyalty required a bit more finesse than what I could do without a wand, and I was not going to lead men to war without the capabilities of stitching them up, given I could not afford to lose any of them.

The spell I had cast pinged at the back of my mind. The soul of the raven I bound acted as a bridge to provide me the information in a form that was interpretable for my mind as I stashed the dead wand into its holster, picking up my other weapon.

"Three hundred paces forward, twenty to the left," I stated, opening my eyes and slowly walking, followed by Ser Richard, Wat the Eyes, and Wat the Brains. This was the type of hunt that required... experience and preparation with regard to Higher Mysteries... and none of my other men were ready for this level of operation.

In my hands was a spear, the reason for why I was taking this type of risk in the first place, a six-foot white wooden shaft tipped with a Valyrian Steel in the form of half of Lamentation that I did not mind partially damaging, unlike my Morghul Knife or something like, say, Blackfyre that I had planned to track down but failed due to the nature of Valyrian Steel and it's ability to undo spells.

The shaft was made of a special piece of Weirwood that I had been cultivating, one grown from a unique soil that was as much a potion as it was dirt. The secret, as I figured, was to use Dragon Bone mixed into the soil in a pale white potion that got its color from the crushed moonstones added to it. The mixture replaced the red swirls natural to the Weirwood, gaining a strange sheen in the light that contained the very concept of 'motion' that came from combining moonstone and dragon bone. It was well worth half the pile of ash that I had left of my original wand. As I was 'bonded' to that specific dragon who gave me the bone of the dragonbone pin that became my first wand, I could slowly extend that bond to items that contained some portion of the dragon's bones and any additional dragon bone I could add to the construction process. The spear shaft did not really work as a magic staff, lacking a magical core or a focusing crystal where the Valyrian Steel tip would have been, but it flew true when I threw it, and the wind seemed to pick it up and extend its range.

With my version of Gungnir that could hit a target through divination at distances normally impossible for a spear of similar size and weight, I had finally gotten the proper tools to counter a proper Basilisk and use a part of it as Wand Core.

With added insight into Skinchanging, I was now confident enough in my knowledge to consider myself a master of the art of possession. It took a deeper look into the nature of skinchanging for me to understand how and why the magical ability manifested... and specifically why it seemed to be so common North of the Wall and not anywhere else.

All that I knew of Skinchanging pointed to an interesting conclusion... that Furs made wargs... or rather, the skin held an echo of the original soul of the wolf, allowing the wearer to take on some aspects of it. The principles were the same as the Skinwearing of the Faceless Men, and it was a form of Blood Magic in a way. With a weak constitution leading to more time spent under furs, the power of hate directed at your own body making the soul willing to seek out a different host, and voila, you got a person capable of shifting to the bodies of nearby canines... often consisting of Bastard, Cripples and Broken Things.

It also explained why Wargs, people who skinchanged into canines, were more common. Wolf pelts made for warm cloaks... you did not let the ones who sought you out alive because they were probably starving and there to eat you, not to mention how hard they were to tame, and the wolf had enough of a pack mentality to allow for the connection to be formed. Once the soul was attuned through a mix of body dysmorphia, self-hate to leave your own body for another, and a genuine affection for the dogs around the camps, that would make for useful new hosts once the attunement was complete.

With that insight, I now had a white raven feather with red highlights tied to my shoulder-length hair that had grown over the months, meant to strengthen the connection I held to my proto-Phoenix Familiar... and my sister's insistence on braiding my hair. I had briefly toyed with the idea of naming the sun-raven something like Rhaelor to link him to R'hollor and take either a bit of his power or influence the Fiery-Fuck, but that sounded like a recipe for disaster, and the second the thought passed my mind, I felt a deep chill in my spine... before spending the next three days going through Purification Rituals of various designs, and redoubling on my Occlumency and trying to trace the origin of that specific thought... just in case said Fire God did not try to manipulate me to get an immortal avatar and some control over me or something like that.

Furthermore, I modified the snakeskin glove I wore on my burned hand, improving upon it by shadow binding the soul of the snake to purposefully improve my skinchanging abilities when it came to snakes.

The snake skin graft I wore was a bit closer to the skin than wolf pelts that made warging possible... so to speak, but the mechanics were the same. It would allow me some small amount of control over the Basilisk I was breeding, not the six-legged giant lizard version but the more... magical snake one. There were banners and legends of the Cockatrice, and it was a close enough recipe that both would work as I intended... only to be proven wrong.

The problem... as it turned out, was that breeding a basilisk was a bit more complicated than hatching a chicken egg under a toad… apparently... even if it fits with the basics of how I knew magic in this world worked.

Close contact with an animal granted an affinity to the soul of that animal. In a grown person, that affinity manifested as skinchanging, but what happened if said soul belonged to a fetus and was more... mutable? What happens if a skinchanger pulls the soul of their familiar while pregnant?

For a Dragon Rider, the result was children with silver hair and violet eyes, and occasionally a Dragonborn at the worst, a name used in Valyria to describe the dragon-like features of mostly stillborn babes, with a few surviving babes being given to the Onagrion, the Temple of the Blood Mages, to be raised as High Priests and Wisdoms, according to Morrigan's knowledge. It was the dragon pushing the link in the direction of the rider instead of the other way around, often as a result of stress or danger, and I suspected that it also could occur with dragon eggs and unborn children as well, though that specific detail was not something I was sure of. The mechanics also fit in with more... primitive skinchangers in the setting; the Direwolves and Starks both had longer faces than usual, while Borroq looked a lot like his boar, according to the books. For a grown person, the physical changes were minimal while mental effects were easy to counter; for a child, their physical and mental growth was influenced to a certain degree, often making them feral and beast-like in behavior... like Rickon Stark would have become; and for a child in the belly, the result was... what I called Basiliskification, a hybrid with the features of both animals.

Using the same principles, you could use the soul of an egg from one animal and bind it to an incubator of a different type of animal together, forcing the egg to develop in unnatural ways. One needed a third soul as well to satisfy the three heads of the dragon rule that Valyrians had noticed. Valyrians used unborn children, using a pseudo-necromancy to transfer the soul of the human babe into the animal that ought not exist... while I used soul-stuff from Tantric Rituals without a physical host in the form of a fetus... as that bit of detail made me... queasy.

On the other hand, it also explained the weird nature of the naturally found Basilisks of the Basilisk Isles. Brood-parasitism was rare, but it occurred often enough for a type of Basilisk to occur in the wilds of Sothoryos... in the form of the six-legged bastards that still left me bewildered as to its parentage... which I was half sure was part-crocodile or lizard-lion... and another half that had me scratching my head.

So, I got a chicken egg and placed it under a toad, as per my knowledge of how to hatch a basilisk... which worked, but it did not work as I expected. Hence why, the impromptu hunt where we had to catch the bloody thing that left a trail of rot and decay through the forest.

"There," yelled out Wat the Eyes, pointing at the air, before loosing three Weirwood arrows, striking a single hit before the creature disappeared into the woods.

Wat the Brains growled; his body held more hair than usual, his facial structure resembled closer to a wolf than a man, and his ears slightly elongated and twitched. "Left, twenty paces... moving to... king," he added in a more gruff tone, the Belt of Wolfskin having the effect of turning him temporarily into a werewolf.

The Belt of Wolfskin was the other result of my newfound expertise. It combined the Skin-wearing of the Faceless Men, but instead of a human, using an animal to create a partial transformation. The changes were temporary and were undone once the belt was removed, though it did bind the soul of the animal and the human for the duration.

Unfortunately, Wat was the only person who seemed to be able to use the damned thing without turning into a murderous rage monster. Whatever made him have common sense also prevented him from being influenced by the soul of the wolf... too much, at least.

I held my hand out upon his warning; the four rings in the four fingers of my left hand shimmered. Dragonglass for the spellfire, Moonstone for the force, Sunfyre for the purification and power of the sun, and finally, the Diamond for the strength and order, all four rings made combined to protect me from the attacking creature the size of a small dog.

The space before me shimmered for an instant, spellfire, invisible a moment before turning a light blue, with distinct lines appearing in thin air as the air before me took on a fractured look, not dissimilar to a diamond, just as something crushed into the Shield Spell I had finally figured out how to cast properly.

Touching my Shield Charm sent the creature back into the air through the built-in Banishing Charm I added... while I was left with rings that were warmer to the touch. The rings that the gems sat on were made of Weirwood to improve my control over the spells, though the added heat tended to either cause the gems to burn the wood and fall off or had the weirwood crumble when its magic ran out.

The basilisk hit a tree, only to jump back towards us in a wide arc.

"How high can that thing jump?" asked Ser Richard, coming to a stop and tracing the creature in the air while wearing a pair of goggles that I had made from Weirwood and Nightwood Ash and normal Glass. The anti-magic goggles were thoroughly tested on rats and a couple of murderers and pedophiles I picked up from Sealord's Dungeon... same ones who were then used to evaluate the creature's poison when they survived the killing gaze, at least.

"It is part frog and part chicken… so it should not be high enough to be considered flight," commented Wat the Eyes as he traced its path with the crossbow, launching another set of three weirwood bolts at once from the Myrish Crossbow... missing with two and grazing with one.

Said creature was… ugly if the word ugly had a definition. Two large yellow 'eyes' that were not eyes but worked to cast a light that petrified, as the rats and the pedophiles of Braavos found out before they died, a black tar-like skin with spikes that left wounds refusing to heal... as the pedophiles of Braavos found out. A body that was toad-like-like with a tail. Front legs had wing-like membranes that ended in three fingers with claws that hinted at its origins as a chicken and small razor-sharp teeth... filled with poison.

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The creature looked more like a toad than a chicken; its skin secreted some of the most corrosive substances that I had ever encountered, capable of eating through anything organic, making its escape relatively easy. Luckily, the features that made it dangerous also made it easy to track for experienced hunters, though it had enough magic to be a threat to four of the most competent people in Braavos when it came to facing magical threats.

The creature was mostly toad with features of a chicken, yet the only aspect that I truly considered weird was the 'eyes.' The ritual of creation must have also latched onto the image of a Basilisk from one of the games I had played in my old life because the creature looked rather similar to that specific form… though its most powerful weapon was… "CROAK!"

Right.. that.

I sighed as the magic of the Basilisk burned up against the combined conceptual weight of the concept of sun and death that had latched themselves onto my own soul. As its creator, I seemed to have certain... privileges when it came to the deadly croak of the toad-basilisk, not a lot, but enough to afford me some small protection. It was a paralysis effect or petrification sent through the medium of sound, and while it did not kill, it temporarily locked you out of your own body... so it was still annoying to go through. I felt the push it made for my soul to move out of my body as the sound wave hit me, feeling the oily presence of the spell burning up against my own soul.

My perception slowed down as I closed my eyes, feeling the strain I felt from undoing the petrification from the croak of the Toad-Basilisk. The little fucker was getting stronger by the minute, and I had a feeling that in a few weeks, its croak would be strong enough to push a soul permanently out of its victim's body, killing the victim instead of temporarily sending them on a permanent Astral journey.

A subtle flex of my will released the rest of the group from the petrification before they could fall, the three men holding a small fragment of my burgeoning divinity in the forms of a small amount of soul-stuff and, therefore, my protection... which worked to counter the petrification, the soul-stuff acting like a spring to pull their souls back to their bodies. Ser Richard was the first to recover, his own blood burning up the remaining enchantment, while Wats were shaking themselves to get their souls oriented the right way... so to speak.

While I was not a god yet... or even a demigod in terms of spiritual capabilities, my presence was more akin to Fey of stories... and the three were my warlocks… in the manner of D&D and not the Servants of the Undying, holding a fragment of my power that I could reach out to. On second thought, the Warlocks of Qarth may have worked the same way... I was not sure. It had been a calculated risk. The Ser Richard already had my 'blessing,' the bit of soul-stuff that absorbed the souls he killed. I had fixed the issue of soul-absorption of the binding, a bit of modification changing the nature to have those souls permanently boost his physical capabilities, with me getting a bit as 'tax,' so to speak. It was all very Medieval as far as Magic went.

Wat the Eyes and Wat the Brains had been loyal; they had been there, watching my back in the toughest times, facing a Faceless Men and after, when I was at my weakest. They were "Dragon's Men', as they called themselves, finding the life of being far more than mere bandits stealing from others to feed their families preferable to their old lives.

They would need me to process and purify the added souls, but that worked for my benefit as well, keeping them close to me. I did not even know how the mutations would take place. It was a good countermeasure in case someone I empowered in the future decided to go rogue.

And the three stood with me in our hunt... hunting a creature that was anathema to the world.

In the next attack, Ser Richard proceeded to bitch slap the toad back to the forest, using the edge of his sword, which started to smoke as the edge seemed to do nothing against the magical skin covered with magical acid. I noticed that the Weirwood arm gave Ser Richard a boost in short-term precognition like it gave me precognition when it came to magic, making him better than most fighters. Syrio said it was cheating after losing the tenth time in a row, It was a weird and subtle bit of magic, but it made Ser Richard a better fighter, so I was not going to take it back. I looked at the superficially enchanted blade. A thin coat of shadow that was bound to the Qohoric Steel by yours truly smoked, and there was a thin line of blood that was eating away at said enchantments, proving that I was wrong in my assumption that it was completely useless against the toad-basilisk. I had hoped that it would have been enough, but the nuclear option it was... well, not the literal one... that one was a bit too excessive.

My focus turned to the basilisk in the air that was trying to change its flight arc with its small, winged arms.

Eyes closed, I concentrated before making my move when I heard the crack of the basilisk hitting one of the trees upon landing. My spear flew through the air, the weirwood shaft foreseeing its impact, and the shaft swaying in the wind in just the right way, causing cause and effect to happen at once, as the blade at the end impacted the toad-like creature sticking into the tree and pinning it, despite its futile attempts change it's fall, leaving two pieces connected by a small patch of skin and a slowly dissolving tree trunk.

The blood smoked, burning through the wood and grass alike and darkening it as I felt myself returning to my own body. While not as powerful as channeling the power of fusion, bending causality over a barrel and having my way with it was a useful trick to have.

I sighed, removing the spear from where it was launched and inspecting it. The Valyrian Steel blade that made up the end of my spear smoked; the blade was missing a bit of its pointy end, and its edges looked far too dull for Valyrian Steel, while the shaft itself was darkening up to a third of the way, forcing me to use my knife to cut it down to four feet.

Costly hunt that... it did mean that I had a better understanding of Basilisks, at least.

"What has that achieved?" asked Ser Richard as he made his way next to me.

"That brood parasitism leads to the creation of weird creatures with primary traits from the host instead of the progenitor?" I started before getting empty looks at me, repeating the hypothesis that was proven by the creature before me. "It means that a Basilisk inherited its looks from the creature it was incubated by more than its progenitor, meaning a Cockatrice would be a snake egg incubated by a chicken… or was it a rooster, and a proper Greater Basilisk, which is what I need, was made from a Chicken Egg incubated by a Snake… probably," I theorized, as I inspected the corroded tip of the Valyrian Steel Blade. Fortunately, Lamentation itself was already partially damaged; the shadow-binding had been undone sometime between the Storming of the Dragon Pit and when I reclaimed it from House of Black and White. Even if I managed to add a bit to its enchantments myself... Its tip most definitely needed reworking and sharpening.

Barth had theorized that Valyrian Dragons were fleshcrafted by breeding Firewyrms and Wyverns. A bit of mental math made me decide that it was not impossible for a skinchanger of sufficient strength to force a Wyvern to incubate a Firewyrm egg to create a fire-aligned ever-growing winged creature with attitude problems and smoking blood though it was a process that I did not want to be part of.

At least my understanding of the twisty logic of Magic was still as impeccable as it got.

As part of the project to create a Basilisk to use its horn as a Magical Core of a Wand, I needed to take certain precautions for the creation of a Basilisk. The murderous croak of the Toad Basilisk was quite possibly the single best hint I could get for the next experiment I had in mind and a way to counter the petrification that would be possible for the more unnatural version of a Basilisk than one connected to a creature of Metamorphosis that was the Toad.

Yna had been making certain observations, one of which was a more recent one. She had seen me as a cloaked man covered in darkness, wearing my own funeral shroud... yet everyone looked normal to her, apart from a few animalistic features. Apparently, Dany looked like a small red dragon nestled against a larger white dragon with fire for wings. Everyone looked like a symbolic animal, everyone except Verago... who apparently also had a shroud over his face, same as I did... though his was a more recent change that had nothing to do with another soul possessing his body... meaning he ought to be dead for some reason. I mentally checked if I killed someone who may have harmed the nephew of the Sealord of Braavos, but I was drawing a blank... chalking it up to all the butterflies. I had killed way too many people for me to narrow it down to some disgruntled idiot or another.

Dany watched me work, having taken a break from practicing her spells and mastering the shield charm, which took priority for her. "What are you doing, Wiz?" she asked, watching me inspect the yellowed piece of calcification.

"This is the fake eye of the creature we hunted... it is... fascinating," I noted, holding up the fake eyes of the Basilisk Toad. They had no basis in the physical rules... yet they still existed. There was nothing, no logic, no grounding... it was a round yellow bone-like piece that looked like an eye that grew on top of the actual eyes of the Toad-Basilisk. "It is a calcification, a Tumor, and potentially similar to a Bezoar in composition than anything else I can think of," I stated, running the tenth Scroll of Detection on the item.

The stone had 'Un-changing' as the main concept bound to it... as though the toad-basilisk poured out that aspect of its existence to a single location. The fact that the stones were connected to the voice box made me assume that the stones acted as a focus for the Petrification that came with the croak and eye contact someone made with said 'eyes.' I chalked it up to the nature of the Metamorphosis that Toads went through, being reversed in the creature that was unnatural and anathema to its parents.

The stone gave me an idea, along with the conceptual 'leverage' I needed to create a rather distinct bit of flora if I wanted to counter the Petrification of the Basilisk. What I needed was a Mandrake to be able to brew a Restorative Draught based on my potions knowledge.

Mandrake Plant already had an offshoot of turnips that was poisonous with neat little concepts that I never got to work with due to how weak said connections were compared to the toxicity it had. To make it magical was an entirely different process, and it required a bit more active magic from my end, something more potent than what nature could create.

The first step was binding the shadow of some slaver scheduled for execution in exchange for the large spider egg I gifted the Sealord gave me a life to bind to the plant.

The soil I created for the Mandrake contained the fake 'eye' of the Basilisk in the form of a potion that I had to brew in a golden cauldron because it melted any lesser metal. The blood and the body of the toad-basilisk also joined into the potion, its death reversing its effects and making for the perfect starting point for countering the basilisk's magic itself, with human and dragon bone added because the thing was named man-drake. I did not really have a justification for most of the materials I added, having fallen into a trance to pull a bit of divination-based shenanigans to get the results I wanted.

Once the potion was ready, a purification ritual to remove all the negative energy, which was a lot more than expected... and I could feel the stirring of the Mandrake within the soil.

Right... let's try chicken egg under a snake next... that should get me a snake-like creature.

A few months later, I idly thought of the nature of Skinchanging. Snakes... for Skinchanging was a wonky experience. Their understanding and perception of the world were rather unique, and I could not say that the memories and thoughts I retained were pleasant.

That being said, while possessing a snake, I understood snakes to a degree... specifically the snake-like creature with a single feather on its head. The effect was not so similar to Parselmouth ability, even if it was less refined and limited to when I took the skin of a snake, but I had the urge to obey the demands and questions of the King of Snakes, only to be broken by my chronic need to disrespect authority.

There was no talking... no real language... not really, more of a mental presence that forced itself against my will. Ser Richard mentioned that I was hissing, but that was the same mechanics that made a warg howl in their sleep. I noted the effects of the command the Basilisk had over other snakes for my improvements on the Imperius Curse before bringing the remaining sharp edge of Lamentation down to the snake that hatched in a cage under a shadow-bound silk.

The snake, with a single feather atop his head, died in darkness before I took apart its body with gloves coated in a thin layer of gold.

My newest wand was made through a Ritual I had devised to speed up the usual process. Rowan and Basilisk Horn, twelve inches, with a core bound by Sunstone, Moonstone, and Dragonglass... and the soul of the basilisk itself bound to the wand after purification rituals I pushed it through. The wood was grown in soil containing dragon bone, weirwood ash, and the second fake eye of the Toad-basilisk to make it take on the properties of the two materials and resonate, and the pommel looked like the head of a snake, with a piece of black diamonds in its eyes.

Where the Weirwood Wand was bound to me by blood, I had used the basilisk's own blood and soul for the process to create greater cohesion between the wood and the core. Once I figured out how to render said blood non-toxic using the mandrakes, I started cultivating and the purification rituals.

The result was a wand specifically good at protecting and healing charms... ironically. That also meant that my theory of using a Basilisk part as a core allowing for me to cast the Killing Curse, would have to wait; the nature of the wood and its affinity to protection and healing did not make for the best tool of death... resisting any spell that directly caused pain to another... with a few exceptions.

The wand was still good for levitating a large boulder and dropping it onto the head of some idiot, though, so it was only direct harm that the wand opposed. The wand, however, was surprisingly robust when it came to casting the Petrification Hex, which almost came naturally to it. Since petrification did not mean any form of harm and lost its effect in an hour, it was a useful non-lethal option.

Cutting Curse was mid, and the fire-based spells were actually harder to cast. But the piercing spell I derived, along with the Shield Charm, worked wonders... probably another residual affinity from the basilisk itself, its fangs and scales, which were comparable to dragon bone. The Shielding Charm, or the variant I was able to cast with my new wand, actually completed the aspects that I had been lacking to a degree, greatly helping in refining my own understanding of the spell.

I still had the actual eyes stalks of the snake-basilisk as well, though I had not managed to find a wood compatible enough to handle the more destructive properties of the nerve cells that could channel the killing gaze of the Basilisk. It did not help that the wood started to rot when they touched the eye stalks.

I sighed and went to find Dany. There were spells I could not teach her, and I had to update her wand for a Shield Spell as well.

"What is this one now?" rasped the voice of Ser Willem, trying to rise from the bed he had been confined in for the last week.

It had been a few months since I had struck the Faceless Men, and Ser Willem had been steadily getting worse, to the point that he had not managed to hide it from me until recently.

"A new potion," I explained, having integrated Basilisk parts for healing potions. Not the blood, which melted more cauldrons than I could count, while the heart was just toxic waste at this point without a way to counter the blood. The liver, however, resonated with the potion I crafted. Said potion would remove any harmful substance from the body... which formed the basis of the latest version of my healing potion when combined with the Magical Mandrakes I cultivated... the ones that now screamed and knocked souls out of the bodies of people.

"Is it as bad as the old potion?" asked Ser Willem, giving me a look. I did not mention the Basilisk parts, but my silence was his answer. Ser Willem drank the potion and started coughing. "What is this one supposed to do that the old one did not do?" he wretched as I passed him a cup of water. The potion did not look appetizing, even if it did not kill the rats I tested it on.

"Burn anything harmful within your body," I said, still unsure if it could actually heal the old man.

In the books, Ser Willem had died of Spring Sickness... which I was sure was Flu or Common Cold. The main problem was that such a disease was more likely to affect those who were already infirm... in Ser Willem's case... it turned out to be lung cancer, which took too long for me to figure out after I noticed the symptoms he tried to hide away.

The potion I gave him was essentially magical Chemotherapy... good for a small while but deadly in the long term. I had slowed down the Basilisk's venom enough and gave it a target, but I was improvising at this point... since there was no other option I could take. The body fighting itself was the one thing that the magic I had could not counter.

"There are better things to do than to keep an old man alive, your grace," said Ser Willem, his eyes blinded by age, looking at me and seeing through me. He lifted himself up from the bed he was spending more and more time in.

"I am not letting you die," I declared, causing the old man to place his hand on my shoulder.

"All men must die... you know that" the old knight said, and I took a sharp breath. I flexed my hand, feeling the burn on my forearm where the glyph of Death was, hidden beneath the skin of the snake.

The vase in the corner shattered... before I pointed my wand and whispered, "Reparo," pulling on the memory of the object to make it return to the whole.

"Does it hurt?" rasped Ser Willem, wincing as he forced himself to get up.

"Does what hurt?" I asked, taking the cup and holding a second potion that was meant to increase the healing of the body... one made from the Eyes of Newts, of all things... talk about cliches. The regeneration of the Newts passed into a Healing Potion.

We both knew that it was not working, yet I did not want to give up.

"Dying... does it hurt?" asked the old man, making me sigh.

"Faster than falling asleep," I admitted, and I meant it. My first death, I did not recall... but the others... sharp pain and the cold... a sacrifice of myself to myself every time I killed something after possessing it.

"How many times have you died now?" asked Ser Willem, seeing my resignation.

"Every sacrifice I make... it has to be done willingly; I need to live through it fully," I stated. "Every animal I possess, to bind to a spell, an object... there is a flash of pain, cold, then nothing. It is strangely peaceful and terrifying at once."

"Do you know what comes after?" asked Ser Willem, whom I did not think to be that interested in philosophy.

"Same thing that happens when you wake up from a dream; you become something else. I am sure the Faith has a better explanation than what I can provide," I said, thinking of my 'next great adventure'... it was a nice one, I had to admit, but it was one that I had carved out of nothing myself, bleeding for it every step of the way.

"Apologies for my language, your grace, but fuck the Faith; they know less than a boy barely grown," said Ser Willem Darry, making me snort.

I sighed after that, my spirits lowering as I understood that Ser Willem was trying to make peace with his fate. "I think it depends on who you believe. When you die, your soul joins the God that you worship, to feed and nourish them, or to be tortured by them in their stomach."

"Pity, I would make for horrible food," jested Ser Willem, "Grant mercy to our weak; it is part of the oaths... I never told you what that meant... but I never had to."

"Don't," I said instead.

"I have lived a long life, your grace, a life of regret," said Ser Willem. "But you and your sister are one regret I will never have. As your sworn shield, it was my honor to protect you... and I would ask to do so even in death." I stopped at that, trying to understand what he meant. "Make use of it, turn me into Valyrian Steel, and wield me in battle if you must, but don't let my death be in vain to feed some self-righteous cunt of a god."

"It takes more than sacrificing a man to make Valyrian Steel, Ser," I said, my fingers playing with a single coin-sized steel I took out of my pocket... about four grams in total. The coin felt heavy, made from the corpse of a slaver, burned in spellfire. It was not Valyrian Steel, not yet, but I could feel that I was getting close. I understood it better now... or I suspected. "Not enough iron in their blood..."

Metals were tricky to enchant and required some Alchemy to modify to bind the souls to the metal and provide an enchantment. The binding itself decayed rather fast, or the enchantment was weaker. The only exception was the iron that came from the blood, which was naturally attuned to the soul of the body that the blood came from, the purest form of Blood Magic I could think of. Blades of Qohor tapped into the same concept, though their best works quenched in the blood of a sacrifice only held a thin layer of blood-iron upon the surface of the blade that allowed improved resilience, yet doing nothing against breaking or chipping. It was fitting that Fire and Blood was what made Valyria's steel, just as it made up all its other Magics.

"How many?" asked Ser Willem, making me sigh.

"About four hundred for a longsword... maybe fewer if you made it thin enough. The red in the blood is from the rust that is formed from the life-fire." I tried to explain the process. "No metal holds the soul as well as its original vessel, and spells can make it stronger if you know the right ones," I added, knowing I could pull the hardness of diamonds and pour it into a spell.

"With all due respect, your grace, but the Valyrians were right cunts, weren't day?" said Ser Willem, grimacing as he noticed my glare.

"You haven't the faintest idea, Ser, though it does explain the cost of a single blade being equal to that of an army," I said, my face twisted in disgust. "And you are the only one I would allow to insult my ancestors..." I added with a glare, however. There were lines that a king ought to have.

"Not all of them were that bad..." countered Ser Willem said, looking at me. "A few could even be worth being called King, really," he joked, making me snort.

"It is your health that is declining, Ser, don't let it drag your sense of humor with it," I said, making the old man laugh, only for the laughter to turn to coughing. I let the healing spell fix as much as I could... but the lungs were tricky... I left too much scar tissue, and I could not remove it all.

"Your grace..." started Ser Willem once he recovered from his coughing fit.

"I will take your request under advisement, Ser," I said with a sigh "though, I would ask that you refer to me by name when it is just us two... you were more of a father to me than Aerys ever was... and that is an order from your king," I said, giving him a look that had made an assassin shit himself in fear.

The silence was one we were comfortable with at this point.

"Viserys... I know I will not see you reclaim Westeros... I have made my peace with it but know that whatever you chose, you will never be left alone, not with your power... not with your claim or name," said Ser Willem with a calm tone, his mind focusing on ensuring that I was ready for when he died. He did not seem concerned about our safety, knowing that I would be able to take care of myself and Dany, but he still had his own thoughts on the future... on what was best for me.

"Holding the throne is trickier than taking it, Ser... it requires people to... follow you," I said with a sigh. Westerosi were prickly folk... not so different from the Free Folk in the regard of whom they followed... and most were against me already. I would find little support among the nobility, and unlike the Faceless Men, I could not kill all of them without risking more chaos in turn.

"I know..." said the old man, giving me a look I was familiar with, "You need more allies. What do you say to contacting Dorne?"

"Like you have not already reached out to them, Ser?" I asked with an amused look "Reliable lot they will be," I muttered, making the Crownlander knight chuckle. I knew that Ser Willem had his own efforts, of course, and I let him do as he wished, mainly because I knew how that particular move would play out and I did not really care about the Dornish as Doran Martell would only make a move when he was sure to win... when winning itself required you to make moves.

"Give them a chance," he said, "they are surprisingly resilient."

I nodded, listening to the advice of the men who had made peace with his death and still cared to protect me and support me as he had once promised.

AN: This chapter was becoming far too long so I decided to split it up instead of letting you wait longer.

Basilisks, Plots and Valyrian Steel, kudos to those who figured it out in the comments.

As always, I am singularly motivated by likes and comments.