After cursing himself for being an idiot and raising a bloody death flag for no good reason, Jon immediately gave up all of his leisurely attitude and began to speed up his drawing speed, wanting to take care of all his enemies before anything changed due to some indescribable cosmic rules.
Meanwhile, back to the very beginning of the battle, when Ser Gregor first laid eyes on the face of the infamous Red Viper, the man had gotten so shocked that it had taken him more than a few seconds to simply comprehend who was standing in front of him.
"Martell!"The knight growled as he raised his great sword while sending a fierce glare towards the spear wielder, "How did you enter the Westerlands?"
The Mountain, of course, recognised the man in front of him to be Oberyn Martell, the second prince of Dorne, as he had seen the man during his younger days when he was a squire training to become a knight at Casterly Rock.
This hateful foreign prince had always been a thorn in his side and was one of the key reasons why Gregor rarely left the Westerlands, why he always preferred travelling with his whole party, and why he had created his tiresome habit of always wearing his bulky armour all day long...
All because of this man's unquenchable desire to slay him.
That is not to say that the Mountain was afraid of him coming to kill him... no, no, that would be too laughable.
The Mountain was scared of no one when it came to a fight, not those so-called greatest warriors of the realm in the Kingsguard, not those fancy knights from Reach or Vale, not those brutal savages from the North, and especially not this pancy from Dorne.
This knight had absolute faith in his ability and had always considered himself to be the strongest in Westeros, across all kingdoms, no questions asked.
And the Mountain had every right to be this arrogant, as none of his opponents, no matter how famous they were among the smallfolks, or how righteous they were, or how many gods there were with him, had ever been able to take a hit of his great sword and survive— no one.
So, no, the Mountain was definitely not scared of this man's ability to kill him, as he was just another one among those countless other idiots who were after his head, and he never cared about them.
But what he absolutely loathed about him were those so-called cowardly tactics this man was well known for, the kind of shit that he could not fight against.
He was one of those few in Westeros who not only had the resources but was also despicable enough to try and kill him by using poison or other gutless tactics, such as sending an assassin to take him out in his sleep.
The thoughts of dying in such a way had made the Mountain so paranoid that he had been forced to keep a poison taster in his keep, as if he were one of those fat, fancy lords who were afraid of their own shadows.
And why was this man after him?
Just because he had played with that damn sickly girl more than a decade ago, before killing her as he was ordered. As if she would not have died without him.
So, safe to say, the Mountain had always been hoping for a chance to get rid of this pest in the past, but since this man had never appeared anywhere near Kings Landing or the Westerlands, he had never gotten lucky enough to get one, but now...
Now this idiot prince, who knew a little bit of dancing with a spear and considered himself to be a good fighter, had delivered himself to him on his own accord... probably under some delusion to claim vengeance with his own hands.
'Oh, how he would enjoy hearing this Dornish trash's screams of agony,' Mountain thought with a deranged gleam in his eyes.
"Dead men have no need for information," Oberyn replied with such a cold gaze that it would have made Eddard Stark proud.
"You are right about that," Gregor smirked and then lunged at Oberyn in the very next instant, putting all his speed and strength into his sword, wanting to take him down with a single swing.
But Oberyn seemed to have been expecting the surprise attack and, with a simple jump back, dodged the attack that would have cut down most of the elite warriors in this World.
'Tsk,' Gregor clicked his tongue in irritation at the missed chance, but his sword did not stop for a single second, as he continued his attack, with every slash, hack, and swing of his great sword containing a brutal ferocity that made the wind scream.
Most people only knew about Mountain's incredible strength, but they did not know that this beast also knew how to convert this strength into speed, making it impossible for anyone who had not spent their entire life training in combat to even be able to see the sword trajectory, let alone fight back.
In fact, an average person's first reaction upon seeing this bull-sized man coming at him while waving a man-sized great sword would be to panic, cower, and run away, or simply stand there and accept their fate.
But Oberyn was one of those rare few individuals in the world who had lived half his life amongst blades and blood, so he neither feared the man nor panicked at the sight of his might.
His mind was as calm as a pool of water as Oberyn weaved in and out of the Mountain's mighty strikes as if he were a leaf floating in the wind.
Every inch of his body was tightly wound, moving according to his exact wishes, and his spear was almost a shadow in his hand, attacking and deflecting at the tiniest of openings, rotating faster than a man could blink, and every hit of his was precise and always focused on the joints of the knights armour, wanting to take the man's limbs out of the equation first.
This was what all those months of training had been for, this was why he had foregone wine, foregone sweets, and all his other indulgences... he had trained until he dropped, from sunrise to sunset, and it had all been for this very moment.
And it paid off...
As Oberyn was feeling more level-headed in this battle than he had ever been before in his life, every single move of his enemy was as clear to him as if he were reading them from a book.
At this moment, in this battle, Oberyn felt that his combat ability was at the very peak of his life; he had never been better than this, nor did he think that he could ever become better than this.
In fact, Oberyn felt that if he wanted to, then it would only take him less than a dozen precise stabs into the small openings in the armour around his face to bring this beast down, but no... that would be too easy; Oberyn would not lose himself to momentary bloodlust; he would control himself and only attack to disable the Mountain.
And while it was a lot harder to subdue than to kill someone, especially someone like the Mountain with his thick armour, Oberyn knew that he could do it.
It would just take a little bit of time and patience...
"ARGH! Just stop moving, you insect!!" The Mountain roared as the Dornish prince once again ducked under his swing at the last moment, all while attacking his knee joint with the butt of his spear, which the Mountain completely ignored like every other hit of his. But even with his abnormal physique, Gregor was slowly starting to feel the burn of those hits piling up.
But the Mountain still did not think that he would lose, as no matter how many times this bastard managed to duck or dodge, there would eventually be a moment when he would get tired, and make a mistake, and that... is all the Mountain needed, just one chance to get in a solid hit, and he knew for sure that the man would immediately go down like a house of cards.
'Now, if only this bastard could stop moving for one fucking second! Ugh!'
But no matter how much effort and power Gregor put into his attacks, or how fast he tried to be, he just never caught up to the Viper, who circled him again and again, always managing to keep just enough distance to be able to dodge his attacks, but still stay close enough to hit him accurately.
Before this, the Mountain had never felt that his skills with the sword were inadequate, but now... Now he realised that, except for training his strength and stamina, he had never paid much attention to those complicated sword forms that those other knights practised daily, considering them just stupid, useless dances, but now he regretted that choice, thinking that perhaps it would have been better if he had practised them a few times.
"Huh... huuh...huuh..."
Slowly but surely, the Mountain got tired as he began to breathe heavily, his swings began to lose their previous ferocity, and while he still had enough stamina to go on, his muscles had already started burning from the continuous overexertion.
And since misfortune never comes alone, at the exact moment that the Mountain was feeling the most weary, his head was suddenly hit by a jarring disorientation spell, which made his surroundings blurry and his focus also narrowed by a large margin.
"Wha—" The Mountain faltered as he vigorously shook his head, trying to shake off his dizziness, but it did not help much, and his irritating headache also decided to flare up at that moment, with an intensity like never before, 'What the hell is happen—Argh! Damn it! Must be that damn poison!'
That's right, it had taken a while, but the poison had finally started working its magic; in fact, the rest of the party, those who were still alive, were already half dead because of its effects, unlike the Mountain, who was just having small vision problems.
But that small momentary problem was the straw that broke the camel's back, as Oberyn did not miss the opportunity and slammed the butt of his spear into the back of the Mountain's knee with all his body's strength.
And all his efforts finally paid off as the Giant was brought down to his knees.
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