In the early days, Kal stayed put in Mok Village, sticking to safe and productive tasks that could bring him real, tangible benefit.
After the farm, the next place to consu most of his ti was the village blacksmith's forge.
Not only did he earn so money working there, but more importantly, he gained sothing far more valuable—experience points, which allowed him to level up.
And what leveling up ant didn't really need much explanation.
Sure, the experience he earned from smithing was pitifully small—but for Kal, who prioritized safety above all, it was good enough.
More than that, he discovered sothing else through the process: he wasn't just wasting his ti grinding for coins and scraps of XP.
Because after two or three months of working the forge, Kal suddenly realized—he had actually learned how to smith.
Like, really learned it.
He could now craft all sorts of items on his own.
It sounded absurd, almost too good to be true—but it made sense. He had genuinely spent ti working at it, day after day.
The heat of the flas on his face, the burst of sparks with each hamr strike—they were all real. The world might be incomplete, but it didn't lie to him.
And so, in those early days, Kal buried himself in quiet, focused developnt.
Once he'd built up a solid foundation, he took advantage of his 'position' at the smithy to buy iron ore, and forged himself a full set of gear.
Only then did he take his true first step in this world—setting out to tackle the story quests that would normally advance the plot.
The flow of ti in the ga world depended on him—since each entry required him to load a save.
And the difference in tiflow between the real world and the ga world was precisely what gave him the space he needed to grow.
As for the ti ratio between the two worlds, Kal couldn't calculate it precisely, but roughly speaking, two hours in the real world seed to equal about a full day in the ga world.
And so, with days spent working under the sun and nights spent grinding in the ga, ti passed quietly. In the real world, a full year had gone by since Kal first arrived.
He had no idea how many years he'd lived through inside the ga world. What he did know was that he had completed every quest the ga had to offer—there was simply nothing left to do.
And in that ti, his real self had undergone a complete transformation, thanks to the developnt he'd achieved through his in-ga efforts.
The skinny twelve-year-old boy who once got knocked out cold by a donkey's kick had grown into a man nearly 1.8 ters tall.
He now looked powerful—his body sculpted with muscle, the kind that looked like it could kill a bull with a single punch.
And it was then that Kal made a decision. One he had quietly resolved long ago.
He was ready to leave this place—a world where looking up revealed only a sky of shifting moods, where every direction led to either gray-white stone, black-brown wasteland, or endless green forests and adows, all while the braying of donkeys echoed around him day and night.
Life here was unrelenting.
There were no 'eight-hour workdays' in this world—no weekends, no rest. For a commoner, life was labor, dawn to dusk, and often beyond. There was barely ti to think, let alone dream. Muscles ached not from exercise, but from necessity. Hunger gnawed at your gut, not because you skipped a al—but because food was a luxury you hadn't yet earned that day.
And for a bastard like him? That life was even harsher.
He wasn't just invisible in the eyes of nobility—he was unwanted. Born of sha, a walking reminder of sin, he'd grown used to the sneers, the slurs, the threats. In Westeros, being a bastard was a stain you could never wash off. People didn't even try to hide their contempt.
And Kal—Kal who had once lived in a world of rights, dignity, and personal freedom—had never truly gotten used to it.
Not the backhanded insults, not the cold als, not the expectation that he'd always bow his head, stay silent, and know his place.
He wanted out. Not just from the village or the farm—but from this life.
He was done pretending he belonged here.
He wanted to see what the real world was like.
Once his preparations were complete and his resolve clear, he submitted his resignation to the Arryn family, who had been providing him work.
Then he casually packed a few things—items he didn't actually need, more for show than for use—and went to say goodbye to the woman who had once, in her youth, shared a forbidden night with Robert Baratheon and given birth to him.
She was a farr's wife now—still carrying faint traces of her old beauty—and had since remarried a shepherd, raising four more children in her new family.
Kal felt no real connection to that household. In fact, this visit was the first ti he'd ever set foot there.
After all, it had never truly been his ho. As one of Robert's bastards, Kal had grown up in the Eyrie and Gates of the Moon.
Surviving on his own, and thanks to Jon Arryn, who had once shown him genuine affection.
And because of that, he had barely seen this peasant woman at all. All he had to go on were vague, fading mories.
So his farewell was quiet and uneventful, though the woman—his mother—did express so worry about his decision.
Still, as a bastard who was ant to live out his days in the place where he was born—raising donkeys or tending the land—Kal turned instead toward sothing far greater.
He set out in pursuit of the world.
A Farr's Quest.
...
"The wife of a Dornishman is as radiant as the sun,
Her kiss warr than the spring breeze."
"But the swords of the Dornish are forged from black steel,
And their kiss is far more terrifying."
"When the wife of a Dornishman bathes, she sings,
Her voice as sweet as a ripened peach."
"But the swords of the Dornish have songs of their own—
Sharp and cold as a leech's bite."
"He lay on the ground, darkness swirling around him,
The taste of blood fresh upon his tongue."
"His brothers knelt to pray for him,
While he laughed—laughed and sang aloud:"
'Oh brother, dear brother, my end has co.
The Dornish took my body, but no matter—
All n must die,
And I've known the wife of a Dornishman!'
"Ahh~ mmm~..."
Kal sat atop Fawkes, softly humming the exotic tune under his breath.
Beneath him, Fawkes trotted forward with even, asured steps, his neck slightly extended, breath puffing rhythmically from his nose.
In the far distance, the outline of a massive column ca into view.
Even as twilight descended and the light grew dim, that long line of troops stirred up a trail of golden-brown dust behind them as they marched—gleaming still beneath the setting sun, just like the black-crowned stag upon a field of gold waving atop their banners.
Upon seeing the approaching host, Kal quieted his humming. He moistened his parched lips and straightened in the saddle. His deanor quickly shifted—no longer relaxed, but solemn and focused.
The song he had been humming was one of unknown origin, a ballad titled 'The Wife of a Dornishman'. He'd picked it up during his wandering years after leaving the Vale, drifting through the Free Cities of Essos.
If mory served him right, he first heard it sung by a minstrel stationed in a brothel.
As the lody echoed through the air, laughter and coins would follow—copper clinking as they were tossed his way.
And the song, true to its na, told the tale of a man who bedded a Dornishman's wife, only to die from wounds suffered in a fair duel with her husband.
Yes, it sounded absurd. But that was the tale.
Kal wasn't sure if the song was ant to mock the Dornish, or if it simply catered to n's tiless fascination with stories of this kind. Either way, it had spread far and wide.
Over ti, after hearing it enough, Kal had morized it.
Kal pulled on the reins, bringing Fawkes to a halt and guiding him to the side of the road.
No sooner had they stopped than a troop of silver-armored knights rode past, leading the way for the large host that continued marching down the road.
Kal's eyes lingered briefly on them before he turned his head, scanning the ranks for his target—until he spotted him: a stout man walking just behind the cavalry, flanked by two Kingsguard clad in snowy white cloaks, right in front of the massive wheelhouse.
Seeing the black hair, watching him pant just like Fawkes did, Kal drew a deep breath. But as he opened his mouth, a gust of dust—kicked up by the hooves of the advancing army—rushed into his throat and made him cough violently.
"Damn it… maybe I should write a song about how miserable it is marching at the rear of the column," he muttered, just loud enough for himself to hear.
With a small tug of the reins, he nudged Fawkes forward in the direction he needed to go.
Fawkes flicked his ears, as if displeased.
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