Family Dinner
Center of the training yard.
Two men, each gripping a wooden sword, stood facing one another. All around them, the eyes of the encircling soldiers fixed on the pair.
"So how's this going to go?"
"How will it go? ...The little lord's about to humiliate himself again, that's how. Jackal's a 1-Star knight, after all."
Brienne stepped between the two men and spoke in a level, clipped voice. "The rules are simple. It ends when one of you calls surrender, or when I declare a halt. Are you both ready?"
They nodded at the same time.
"Ready."
"Let's begin."
Brienne's hand rose high into the air, then dropped straight down.
"Begin!"
Fwip!
Jackal moved first. With an agility that belied his bulk, he twisted his body and swept his wooden sword in a wide horizontal arc.
Whoosh!
The sound of it cleaving the air was sharp enough to bite. But in that very instant, something strange appeared in the corner of Bran's vision.
Huh? What's that yellow line?
It was tracing out, with perfect precision, the path Jackal's sword was about to take.
[ Visualizing the opponent's attack trajectory. ]
It seemed to be yet another bonus feature of GPT Mode, and the corner of Bran's mouth curled up.
Oho, an attack-trajectory prediction function. Well, against someone like Jackal I hardly need it, but it'll be plenty useful later on.
Bran twisted only his upper body, letting the attack slide past as though he had foreseen it — and Jackal's eyes widened a fraction.
He dodges that that easily? Didn't see that coming.
But he didn't stop. As if the first strike had been nothing more than a probe, a faster, fiercer barrage came crashing in like a storm.
Whish! Whap! Whish!
Yet Bran, moving like flowing water, evaded every last one of Jackal's attacks with the barest minimum of motion — narrowly, and yet perfectly.
After a few more strikes fizzled into empty air, Jackal's face flushed dark red. He roared as if wrenching the words out through his teeth.
"How long are you going to keep dancing around like that! Don't you know you'll never win scurrying away like a rat!"
The soldiers ringing the training yard murmured along with him.
"Tsk. All that big talk, and look at him — nothing but running and dodging."
"Can't help it when you've got no skill. No wonder they call him the shame of House Stark."
But Brienne's thoughts ran in exactly the opposite direction. Something out of the ordinary stirred in her sharp eyes.
There isn't a single wasted movement in the young lord's footwork. Every motion reads the flow of the attack and answers it with the bare minimum... that isn't simple evasion. Even I couldn't manage efficiency that perfect.
At that very moment, Bran pointed his sword forward for the first time. Gone was the stance that had concerned itself purely with defense; in its place, a blade's edge of a posture, ready to turn to attack at any instant.
"Jackal, you'd better keep your head on straight from here on. I'm coming at you for real."
"What pathetic posturing...!"
Before the words had even left Jackal's mouth, Bran's body shot forward.
Fwip!
Whoosh!
It was a speed beyond all comparison with before. With a vicious crack of parting air, Bran's wooden sword came around with terrifying force.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
The violent shock of wood striking wood shook the training yard to its bones.
"Ghk—!"
Jackal barely got his sword up in time to block, but the impact overwhelmed him and sent him staggering back several steps. His whole arm buzzed numb to the bone, and bewilderment was written plainly across his eyes.
Damn it, what is this? When did this piece of trash get so strong? Right up until a few days ago he was living pickled in booze...
Jackal clenched his teeth. He had a great deal riding on this duel as well. If he lost to a degenerate who'd never trained a day in his life — humiliation aside, he stood to lose even the trust of Victor Stark, the second son who had been backing him from the shadows.
And in that moment, the light in Jackal's eyes changed.
Gooooh—!
The air itself shuddered. A vivid red aura bloomed up from his body and sheathed the wooden sword.
"Th-that's Sword Energy! A 1-Star knight's Sword Energy!"
"Has he lost his mind? Using Sword Energy in a mere sparring match!"
Wreathed in red, Jackal radiated a presence altogether different from before.
"Young lord, surrender now, while you still can! Sword Energy is dangerous even through a wooden sword! You could be gravely injured!"
But Bran didn't stir an inch. He simply watched Jackal with what looked like interest.
Hm. So this is a 1-Star knight's Sword Energy.
Bran gave a light shrug.
"Doesn't look like much to me?"
Shff!
The instant Jackal's sword, dragging a red afterimage, plunged down toward the crown of Bran's head, Bran flowed aside with a dancer's grace and let the blow pass him by — then, in a heartbeat, he had driven in under Jackal's guard.
Wham!
With a dull, heavy sound, Bran's fist caught Jackal's jaw squarely from below. The savage impact wrenched his head back and lifted his massive frame a hair's breadth off the ground.
His vision wheeled, and the iron taste of blood burst across his tongue.
"Ugh... h-how... how is this..."
Jackal landed on stumbling feet, legs buckling under the shock, his unfocused eyes swimming.
Bran watched it all with an icy gaze.
No need to bother with the sword after all.
He slid the wooden sword he'd been carrying into his belt.
Tap.
Wiping his split lip with the back of his hand, Jackal barely managed to square his stance again. Then he glared at Bran with eyes full of disbelief and shouted:
"What do you think you're doing in the middle of a duel! Pick your sword back up! Are you trying to insult me?"
Bran chuckled. He walked toward Jackal, unhurried, as he answered.
"I'll draw it again if I decide I need it. But right now..."
He balled his fist and held it out.
"This is more than enough."
Jackal's face contorted, flushing scarlet with humiliation and fury.
"You arrogant...!"
Red Sword Energy flared up along his wooden sword once more, fierce and bright.
"I'll teach you what it truly means to be a knight!"
But Jackal's fighting spirit could not bridge the gulf of Bran's overwhelming skill.
Wham! Wham-wham! Thud!
Dull impacts burst out one after another. Bran's fists and feet hammered Jackal's body without mercy. He couldn't block it; he couldn't dodge it. It was one-sided violence, like a seasoned butcher pounding meat tender.
Wham-wham-wham! Crack!
Blood sprayed in every direction, and the sound of snapping bones rang through the training yard, cold enough to raise the hair on the neck.
The watching soldiers held their breath. Even those who had been sneering at Bran alongside Jackal found their mouths clamped shut and their heads bowed before they knew it.
"Ghhk! Ghk...!"
Jackal lay sprawled on the ground, drenched in blood. His face was contorted beyond recognition with pain and terror, and the red Sword Energy that had sheathed his sword had long since vanished without a trace. Blood laced with froth leaked out between broken teeth; his cheekbone had caved in.
"Y-young lord... please... s-stop...!"
He crawled across the ground, clutched at Bran's trouser leg, and begged.
"I yield... I surrender!"
His voice had dissolved into a sobbing wail. The arrogance of moments ago was nowhere to be found.
Bran looked down at him without a flicker of emotion. A wreck beyond all pity. And yet Bran's eyes remained as cold as ever.
"No. Not enough yet."
A voice like a slab of ice.
"When you provoked me, you should have braced yourself to pay at least this much."
Wham!
Bran's foot drove into Jackal's side, dead center. A hideous crack rang out as four, five ribs gave way at once.
Wham! Wham! Wham!
"Ghaaah—!"
Jackal vomited bloody foam and crumpled where he lay. His body jerked in convulsions; that he still breathed at all seemed nothing short of a miracle.
"Stop!"
Brienne threw herself between the two men and shouted. "Jackal has surrendered — the match is already over!"
Bran looked down at the groaning ruin beneath him.
"Remember this, Jackal."
His voice was low and bleak.
"The next time you raise your hand against me, it won't end this lightly."
Jackal only huddled where he was, shivering.
Once a week, the children of House Stark gathered for an evening meal. It was a tradition of the family, a time as much obligation as custom — and today was that day.
Having washed the training yard's dust and Jackal's blood from his skin, Bran changed into crisp formal attire and made his way to the lord's residence. As he walked the corridor, every soldier and servant he passed bowed deep at the waist and offered him a careful, courteous nod.
"Good evening, young master."
"May you enjoy the dinner hour, my lord."
These were people who, not long ago, would have tossed off a greeting laced with mockery and brushed on by. Overnight, their manner had reversed completely. Only yesterday he had been called "the shame of the family" — but overwhelming Jackal alone had been enough to turn his standing on its head.
Then—
Ding.
[ Mission: Raise your fallen standing within the family. ]
[ Reward: 50 Coins ]
The corner of Bran's mouth stole upward. Well, that's an unexpected bonus.
Wearing a satisfied smile, he tapped the [Claim] button.
Heh. Turns out beating Jackal into the dust had its rewards after all.
At the end of the corridor, the guard posted at the door hurried to open it.
"This way, young master."
The moment Bran stepped inside, a long table aglow with lavish candlelight met his eyes. A splendid chandelier hung from the ceiling, and the table groaned under roasted meats of every kind, fresh fruit, bread and cheese still warm from the oven, and the finest of wines.
The seat at the head of the table stood empty; beside it, two of his brothers had already taken their places — two men who looked to be in their mid-twenties.
"There you are, little brother."
His second-eldest brother, Victor Stark — sharp-eyed, wearing his trademark cunning smile — greeted Bran.
"What's this? Right on time for once? Normally you'd come staggering in drunk — or not show your face at all."
He swirled his wineglass, the corner of his mouth twisting.
"And I hear you made a bloody rag out of one of my men at the training yard today. They say Jackal's still hovering between life and death in the infirmary. Your hands have gotten quick, little brother."
Bran settled calmly into an empty chair and answered without a care.
"Yeah. The dog didn't know its master and barked at me, so I taught it some manners. Don't expect me to go easy on him just because he's yours — you'd better see to his leash from now on."
When Bran fired back, proud and unintimidated, nothing like his usual self, Victor's brow twitched for an instant.
"What did you say?"
His hand clenched white around the wineglass — then released.
"Well, well. Our youngest is finally talking like a son of House Stark. All this while I thought he took after his mother, doing nothing but drinking himself blind and wasting the days away."
Then his third brother, Drake — gentler in feature, milder in manner — spoke up in a soft voice.
"Congratulations all the same, Bran. Word's already everywhere that you took a clean victory over a 1-Star knight. That's impressive."
Drake wasn't twisted the way Victor was.
"I suppose that makes you as good as a proper knight now? I'm curious how far you've come — let's spar sometime."
Victor cut in as though he'd been waiting for exactly that, sneering.
"What's so remarkable about beating a single 1-Star knight, this late in the game?"
With a thin, venomous smile, he tilted his glass.
"Drake and I had already broken through the 1-Star wall at fifteen. And how old are you now, again? Past twenty, isn't it? Rather late for a man said to carry the blood of House Stark, don't you think?"
And then he added, with leisurely cruelty:
"Well, I suppose it can't be helped. The youngest is a concubine's son, after all. Unlike those of us born of the true line, his Stark blood is bound to run thin."
Drake cut in with a troubled look, trying to rein his brother in. "Victor, that's going too far."
"Why? Am I wrong? How could a whore's son ever be our equal?"
The air in the dining hall froze solid in an instant. Even the servants held their breath.
But Bran didn't so much as blink. Smiling as though he found it all rather entertaining, he took a slow sip of wine.
"Well, aren't you a concubine's son yourself, Victor?"
He swirled his glass lightly and went on. "None of us but the eldest is the lawful wife's child anyway." Then he aimed a meaningful smile at Victor.
"Though — rumor has it your real father isn't Father at all, but Count Seymour? Could that be true, by any chance?"
In an instant, Victor's face twisted into something hideous.
He shot up from his seat, seized Bran by the collar, and wrenched him close.
"What did you just spew, you lowborn bastard! Take those words back this instant!"
Rough energy burst from Victor's body, rattling the plates on the table. Bran answered in kind, raising his own without a hint of retreat.
"Let go."
The two forces collided, and a suffocating tension settled over the hall.
Hoh? Why, this little—
Seeing that Bran wasn't being pushed back an inch by his aura, Victor was startled despite himself.
So crushing Jackal wasn't mere luck. This drunk who spent every night whoring and drinking himself stupid... when did he get this strong?
At that very moment—
Boom.
The massive main doors of the dining hall boomed open.
And then, the Lord of House Stark — Eddard Stark — entered.
