It really was a dream.
That was the first thought that crossed Aegor's mind as he opened his eyes. There was no surprise or emotion, only a faint sense of relief.
Any lucid dreamer who has reached a certain level of proficiency must have had this concern: what if, one day, they wreak havoc in what they believe to be a dream, giving in to the darkest parts of human nature, only to find they can't wake up? What if they've gone mad and can no longer distinguish dream from reality?
Because of this, every time Aegor woke from a lucid dream, he would first sigh in relief in his groggy state. At least this time, he wasn't insane.
But before he could finish that sigh, he caught a burning smell. Looking down, he saw his blanket was on fire.
"Holy hell!"
His drowsiness vanished instantly. He didn't even finish cursing before he kicked off the burning blanket and jumped out of bed. Standing on the floor, he looked back and saw that the fire was just a small one, smoldering on the surface. The forceful kick had already put it out, leaving behind only a few sparks and a wisp of blue smoke.
Without stopping to think further, he took the safest approach. He rushed over, flipped the other half of the blanket onto the glowing sparks, and smothered them by cutting off the airflow, completely extinguishing the risk of reignition.
Just then, he heard urgent footsteps outside the bedroom door. Two guards on duty in the outer room burst in, kicking the door open. They only stopped awkwardly once they saw Aegor standing safely inside.
"My Lord… uh… we heard a loud noise just now, and then you shouted."
"We thought something had happened, so we rushed in."
Aegor didn't blame the guards for being too eager. He nodded to show he understood and then turned to look around the room, trying to determine what had caused the fire.
The oil lamp was hung on the wall, not above the bed, and it had not been lit while he slept, so that wasn't it. The doors and windows were properly shut before the guards broke them open, and there were no signs of forced entry, so it couldn't have been an intruder.
He picked up the blanket and examined the source of the fire. At the center of the scorched area was a hole, just large enough to poke a finger through…
He hadn't figured out the exact cause yet, but as he scanned the room, he found the source of the loud noise the guards mentioned: directly above the bed, in the ceiling, was a fist-sized hole, through which the bright daylight was clearly visible.
Looking around for debris, he confirmed that pieces of the ceiling had indeed fallen onto the bed and surrounding floor.
Only now, with the initial panic fading, did Aegor realize that the sharp pain he had felt in his chest just before waking up was still present.
He touched his chest and found a small, burned hole in his inner garment, slightly above the breastbone. Beneath the skin at the center of the burn… was something flat and hard.
A scale from the red god?
His now-clear mind quickly pieced everything together. The "advance payment" R'hllor had promised in the dream—a half-dragon scale—had actually fallen from the sky, smashed through his roof, pierced the blanket and his sleepwear, and embedded itself just beneath the skin on his chest. The most bizarre part was that this violent descent, which tore through a fortified roof, set the blanket on fire, and pierced his clothes and skin, had not killed him. He hadn't even been seriously burned. There wasn't even a visible wound, only a slight sting.
This was undeniably a miracle, a naked demonstration of divine power.
That insane woman.
Aegor took a deep breath, wondering if he was still dreaming.
He suppressed the urge to curse aloud and considered going outside to check for anything strange in the sky, but he subconsciously knew there would be nothing to see. After standing in a daze for several seconds, he gradually realized something.
R'hllor hadn't done this impulsively. On the contrary, it was clearly a deliberate decision.
She could have made the scale appear quietly at his side. At the very least, She could have sent it in through a window or door, avoiding damage to the building. But instead, She had chosen the most dramatic, violent, and unrestrained method: crashing it through the most important part of the house—the roof that shielded against wind and rain—and leaving a hole behind.
Not just because it looked impressive, but because it sent a clear, undeniable signal, reinforcing the credibility of everything She had told him in the dream.
...
No matter how reasonable and flawless that goddess's story had sounded in the dream, Aegor had never completely believed it. Not just because it had taken place in a dream—which inherently made it suspect—but because too many people, or non-human entities, had the means and motive to deceive him with the same method.
He could think of at least two immediately.
First, the enemy he had defeated in the last war—the cold god.
The woman in the dream had said the cold god "already had the power to reclaim the world, he just didn't realize it." That sounded plausible, but the truth might be the exact opposite. The cold god had truly been defeated, his strength accumulated over thousands of years in the Land of Always Winter wiped out overnight. He was now weak, maybe even dying, to the point that a mortal expedition could finish him off. That might have driven him to create a fake dream to manipulate Aegor, the one most likely to act against him, into abandoning the plan and sparing his life.
Second, the Greenseer currently in Crown Town. Though he wore black and appeared to be an ally, his actions raised suspicions.
Bran had used Catelyn to reveal Jon Snow's true identity, which had caused Aegor considerable trouble and confusion. Now that he had calmed down, he was already wary and quietly preparing to guard against him. The boy had every reason to create a false dream to disrupt Aegor's thoughts and conceal his own hidden schemes.
Now, the violent, high-profile arrival of this "advance payment" shattered all such doubts.
As Lord Commander, Aegor's office and quarters had been doubly reinforced. The roof was wind- and rain-resistant and could even withstand some long-range magical or siege attacks. He did not believe his body was sturdier than the roof. The force contained in that falling scale was enough to pierce the ceiling. If that power had struck him directly, it could have killed him several times over.
If one of his enemies had such power, wouldn't it be far easier to simply kill him outright, rather than fabricate some elaborate and self-consistent lie, and even send him a gift, just to keep him on his current path?
And if it wasn't R'hllor but a powerful shapeshifter or other supernormal being with ulterior motives, creating the illusion of Her to influence his worldview and manipulate him into acting in their interest, then things got even more interesting.
If a villain strong enough to kill you with a flick of the finger chooses to lie to you and guide you into doing what they want, what should the deceived person do?
Naturally, he should play along, pretend to believe it, follow instructions to stabilize the situation, and look for a way to escape.
In short, the power displayed by this sky-falling miracle had immediately simplified the whole issue: if this R'hllor was real, then everyone was happy. If She was fake, Aegor still had to treat Her as real and not overthink it.
From a rational standpoint, Aegor gave up his doubts. From an emotional one, he also truly believed: this really was exactly the kind of thing a goddess who once destroyed her own city would do.
He touched the flat, warm object embedded under his chest, clearly hotter than the surrounding skin. His thoughts swirled rapidly. Meanwhile, one of the guards who had broken down the door looked up at the roof, still baffled.
"What just happened? It's like something smashed through the ceiling and fell in, but it's a clear day outside."
The second guard had also more or less pieced together what had happened but wisely focused on something else.
"My Lord, are you alright? Should we call for a medic to check you over?"
"I'm fine," Aegor replied, gathering his scattered thoughts. He realized the most urgent thing now was to keep the dragon scale a secret and quickly figure out what it could actually do. "Notify the Artisans and have them come in the afternoon to repair the roof and the door. You can go now. I'll come out once I've dressed."
The two guards nodded and returned to the outer room. After pausing at the fallen door, they picked it up, hesitated, then set it back in the frame. Clapping their hands to dust them off, they left.
Once he was sure they were gone, Aegor walked to the window, tore open the hole in his inner garment, and, using the light filtering through the window, began examining the scale embedded in his skin—the cheat code, the standard protagonist's artifact that had finally arrived for him, a transmigrator, after many years in this strange world.
(To be continued.)
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◇ One bonus chapter will be released for every 200 Power Stones.
◇ You can read the ahead chapter on Pat if you're interested: p-atreon.c-om/Blownleaves (Just remove the hyphen to access normally.)