For the next few nights, Lynd stayed in the House of Black and White. During the day, with Jaqen's help, he disguised himself as different people and walked around Braavos to understand the situation.
Braavos is a very special city, both conservative and open.
It is conservative because there are a large number of ancient rules and ways of life. Countless gods forgotten elsewhere are still worshipped here, and traditional customs and stubborn ideas constantly influence the city.
However, such a conservative city is home to different races from all over the world, from the mysterious and ancient Thenn people beyond the Wall in the North, to the Sothoryos people from the continent on the other side of the Summer Sea, or even the Yi Land people from the Golden Empire further east.
In short, in this city, you can see all kinds of races. It is no exaggeration to say that if one day you saw the legendary winged people who can fly in the sky, it would not be surprising.
To be honest, Lynd was also surprised to see so many races here, especially when he saw the Yi Land people from the Golden Empire, he felt a strange sense of familiarity. Although he knew very well that the Yi Land people here had nothing to do with his own ethnic group in his previous life, their distinctly oriental features still made him feel some goodwill.
Unfortunately, this goodwill only lasted until he was robbed by these Yi Land people. In the end, he chose to send these foreign compatriots directly back to their hometowns, so they wouldn't suffer any more in the world.
While touring the entire city, Lynd, influenced by the memories of the parallel traveler, also considered how to conquer Braavos if a war were to break out.
His conclusion was that with the existing weapons and equipment, even with an army of 100,000, it would probably be impossible to conquer the city from the outside, provided there were no dragons, and they had to be flying dragons, not the Glutton, a dragon that can only swim in the sea and crawl on land.
It is theoretically possible to conquer this city from within, because although the internal political situation of Braavos is dominated by the Sea Lord's family, who awe the entire city, this does not mean that he has no opponents. In fact, since the first Sea Lord appeared, various power struggles in Braavos have been continuous, and almost every Sea Lord has faced countless assassination attempts, and those who assassinated him were either the Key Holder Family or the Trade Governors from the city.
This is only the power struggle between the Sea Lord and his subordinates, and the power struggle among the subordinates is equally fierce. This struggle is mainly concentrated in two factions: one is the Iron Bank Key Holder Family with ancient traditions, and the other is the Trade Governors, who are a rising force.
There are twenty-three Key Holder Family, and they hold the keys to the Iron Bank and pass them down hereditarily. Although the keys have now become ceremonial items, according to the ancient system, they still hold a seat in the secret council of the Iron Bank. Even if a Keyholder Family has declined, as long as they hold the key, their position in the Iron Bank will not be shaken.
In Braavos, the Iron Bank controls all trade. Even powerful Trade Governors must obey the orders of the Iron Bank.
Although for many years, the Trade Governors have tried various methods to infiltrate the Iron Bank and successfully occupied several seats, the leadership of the secret council has always remained in the hands of the Key Holder Family, unshaken.
Therefore, the two sides have been openly and covertly fighting for control of the Iron Bank for centuries, and from various signs, this struggle has no possibility of stopping and will continue to exist.
As long as there is conflict, cracks can be created within Braavos, and these cracks can be made larger and larger, eventually leading to its collapse, but this process would be very long, possibly lasting decades or even centuries.
Although it is difficult to conquer Braavos, whether by external assault or internal division, this does not mean that Braavos is impregnable. In fact, on the first day of his visit to Braavos, Lynd had already discovered a fatal weakness of Braavos.
The entire Braavos is built on atolls and islands, and it is extremely short of drinking water. All drinking water needs to be guided into the city from the land outside the city through a raised aqueduct called the Sweetwater Canal, passing through swamps and shoals.
Once this aqueduct is destroyed or captured, the entire order of Braavos will completely collapse within a few days.
The Braavosi also realized this, so they specially established a well-equipped aqueduct guard army for this aqueduct.
This army has a standing force of 10,000 warriors, each skilled in combat and equipped with the finest armor and weapons, capable of dealing with most enemy attacks.
In addition, there are 20,000 city guards within Braavos. In the event of war, half of them can be drawn to support the aqueduct, plus the large number of mercenaries in the city, as well as the guardian warriors of temples or shrines, etc., which gives Braavos the strongest military force in the entire Free Trade City States.
In the eyes of the Braavosi, such a powerful military force is sufficient to protect the safety of this aqueduct.
However, that is relative to ordinary people. If Lynd were to operate, he would first send people to infiltrate the aqueduct, then poison it, paralyze the city's support forces, create panic, then attack the aqueduct guard, seize control of the aqueduct, and then persuade Braavos to surrender. If Braavos did not surrender, he would directly pour Wildfire into the aqueduct.
The Sweetwater Canal runs through the city from south to north, and countless pipes deliver water to various parts of the city. Once Wildfire is poured into it and ignited, the entire Braavos will be engulfed in flames, and the city will be burned to ashes, just like being burned by dragonfire.
However, after Lynd thought of this plan to attack Braavos, he put it on the lowest priority. Unless absolutely necessary, he would probably not use this method, because he wanted a complete Braavos, not a ruin.
Fortunately, Lynd's desire to control Braavos was not as strong as it was for the Disputed Lands. As long as Braavos did not hinder him, he would not act against Braavos, at least not in the short term.
While Lynd was touring Braavos, the Sea Lord of Braavos remained in a state of high tension due to his appearance. Originally, his personal guards consisted of only one chief swordsman and ten death soldiers, but now the people protecting him had increased to fifty death soldiers and a hundred-man squad composed of Water Dancers and other warriors.
At this moment, the Sea Lord had completely confirmed that the archer, who used the alias Li, was Lynd, and his people had also found the guide Lynd had hired at the first opportunity, and followed the clues to find the inn where Lynd was staying.
However, when Quorro led his men to the inn, it was already empty. In their opinion, Lynd had obviously known in advance that they would come and had left earlier.
Afterward, the Sea Lord ordered Quorro to conduct a city-wide search to find Lynd, but to no avail.
However, this wave of searches allowed him to confirm that Lynd should be in one of the temples or shrines on Godsway at this moment, more precisely, very likely in the Storm God Temple not far from his inn.
The reason for this certainty was that investigations revealed that on the day Lynd arrived in Braavos, Liza, a priestess of the storm god, met with a foreigner dressed in local Braavosi attire. The two talked for a long time, and coincidentally, when they were talking, it was precisely when thick fog appeared in the city, dark clouds suddenly appeared, and heavy rain poured down.
Although Lynd never admitted it, almost all believers of the storm god believed that Lynd was the incarnation of the storm god. Even the statue in the Storm God Temple was carved entirely in Lynd's image, so it was natural for Lynd to choose to hide in the Storm God Temple.
However, if he sent people to search the Storm God Temple, it would not only provoke hostility from the Storm God Temple but also draw criticism and resentment from other temples and shrines on Godsway, unnecessarily pushing this powerful force in the city to his enemies.
Therefore, he could only choose to monitor the Storm God Temple.
The Sea Lord's great commotion naturally could not be hidden from the city's powerful figures. Soon, they all knew the reason for the Sea Lord's agitation, and each of them felt a little schadenfreude. Everyone was waiting to see the Sea Lord become a laughingstock.
It should be noted that at the magical armor exhibition, many people, based on the design of the magical armor and the armor of the storm god statue, concluded that this magical armor must be related to Lynd, and speculated that Lynd would come calling.
Therefore, many of them tried to deliberately spread this news to Summerhall, just waiting for Lynd to come and then watch the Sea Lord become a laughingstock, allowing the Sea Lord to be disgraced.
However, to their disappointment, although the news had spread, Lynd remained unresponsive, as if he knew nothing about it. After waiting for a long time without result, they all gave up the idea of watching a show.
However, what they never expected was that the event they had been hoping for would come so suddenly. Lord of Summerhall, Chosen of the Seven, and the incarnation of the storm god, Linde Terra, had quietly arrived in Braavos. Thus, everyone's attention fell on the Storm God Temple, because like the Sea Lord, they all believed that Lynd should be hiding in the Storm God Temple.
But some also believed that Lynd might be hiding in the Sept, because Lynd himself was a Chosen of the Seven, and his status among the Seven's believers had surpassed that of the Archbishop in King's Landing, becoming the spiritual leader of the Seven's faith. Therefore, the Sept would certainly not mind Lynd's arrival.
However, no matter how these people speculated, none of them would guess that Lynd was hiding in the House of Black and White, because they never knew what relationship Lynd had with the House of Black and White, and the House of Black and White had always been known for its ruthlessness, never interfering in the city's power struggles. They would only follow the oracle of the Thousand-Faced God to reap the lives that must be reaped, so everyone thought it was least likely for Lynd to be hiding in the House of Black and White.
However, Lynd, contrary to everyone's expectations, had been hiding in the House of Black and White these days, and even disguised himself as others during the day to wander around the Storm God Temple, chatting with those who were monitoring the Storm God Temple, completely integrating into the local way of life.
After Lynd drank the water from the pool in the House of Black and White that day, Jaqen consciously taught him some disguise techniques of the Faceless Men. According to her, as long as one drank the pool water and did not die, one was qualified to become a Faceless Man.
However, Lynd always felt that Jaqen was not telling the truth, but he could see that Jaqen's identity in the House of Black and White was very special, holding a high position, and teaching him the disguise techniques of the Faceless Men would not affect Jaqen in any way, so he did not think much about it.
These days, he was both touring the city and practicing this disguise technique. It must be said that this technique was very useful to him, at least much better than the Lion Knight Onstein persona he had taken for granted. If he had known this when he left Summerhall, his identity would not have been exposed now.
Perhaps it was because the continuous monitoring annoyed Liza, or perhaps Liza wanted to use this opportunity to make a name for herself, preparing for the establishment of a religious order in the near future.
During a routine sermon, she directly reprimanded those who were monitoring the temple, calling them blasphemers, and in plain sight, demonstrated her ability to control dark clouds and storms.
Lynd was also nearby at the time, and to enhance the might of the storm god, he also activated the runic power of the Nameless King, making the storm controlled by Liza stronger and more widespread, not only covering the temple but also the entire Braavos.
Liza also knew that Lynd was helping her in secret, so after achieving the desired effect, she immediately stopped unleashing the power she had gained, and then announced that she had received the grace of the storm god and had mastered the ability to control storms, solidifying her identity as the high priestess of the Storm God Temple.
This event caused a huge sensation in Braavos. Although Braavos had various religious beliefs, and all temples and shrines claimed that the gods existed and watched over them, no priest or cleric had ever truly demonstrated divine power granted by the gods. They only showed some tricks that looked more like some kind of magic.
But now, the great power of controlling the weather displayed by Liza, the priestess of the storm god, was clearly something that tricks and magic could not achieve. Everyone subconsciously had one thought: the storm god truly exists and is truly watching over this place.
For a time, the number of storm god believers grew rapidly. Former general believers became devout believers, and former devout believers became fanatical believers. Without waiting for Liza to speak, the believers proactively proposed that they hoped Liza could establish a religious order to standardize the storm god's faith.
The temples and shrines of other gods in Braavos were also envious and jealous of the divine power displayed by Liza and the surge in believers of the Storm God Temple, but they also gained considerable benefits from this event, because in the eyes of the believers, since the storm god was real, then other gods should also be real.
Thus, the entire Braavos entered a state of massive religious revival. Not only the local people of Braavos, but also other foreigners would go to the temples of their worshipped gods to pray, and even many forgotten gods who had been placed in sanctuaries were brought out again and received offerings from people.
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