Lucas had been on the Kingsroad for around ten days, and had covered around half of his journey to Winterfell. While Lucas and his entourage could have moved faster, he had chosen to travel at a leisurely pace. He was really not in a hurry to reach Winterfell.
And after days of travel, he had finally entered the North. The biggest of the seven realms of Westeros. As Lucas had set his first foot inside the North, he could not help but recall the conversation between Roose and his bastard son about the size of the north.
"Tell me what you see," Roose had asked.
"Nothing," Ramsay replied.
"Not nothing. The North. Ride seven-hundred miles that way, you are still in the North."
"Ride 700 miles that way, you are still in the North. Four-hundred miles that way, three-hundred miles that way. The North is larger than the other six kingdoms combined. And I am the Warden of the North."
The North was vast, very vast and isolated from all the realms and now Lucas Lannister was going to get involved with it.
Lucas had been traveling along the Kingsroad and he had no intention to leave the Kingsroad. And though this distance was a bit longer compared to what it could have been if he had chosen to cross the Twins, the Kingsroad was far easier to travel.
Despite being only a dirt path, traveling on the King's Road was much more convenient. The road was wide, the chances of encountering a bandit group were very low, and inns could be found at regular intervals. Thus, Lucas had hardly ever needed to camp in tents.
But today was one such day. They had not travelled very far into the North yet, and they could feel the changes.
The population was becoming scarce, the temperature was dropping and they could feel that it was a different world that they were stepping in.
Not finding any convenient inn in the previous evening, the entourage had camped along the Kingsroad. The group had just finished their breakfast and were preparing to move when Lucas heard a faint rustling sound coming from the forest.
Thanks to his enhanced physique, his senses had grown sharper, allowing him to hear sounds from much farther away than most.
He did not know why, but curiosity stirred in his heart, and instinctively he followed the noise.
"My Lord," Tillie's voice called from behind. "Where are you going?"
He did not stop. Lucas had travelled about a hundred metres into the forest when he stepped into a small clearing.
At its centre lay a massive, struggling beast. It was enormous, over seven feet in length.
Its stomach had been badly shredded by claws and canine teeth, and it was on the verge of death. It resembled the panthers of his previous world, but there were differences. Panthers were never this large, and in this life, he had neither heard nor read of such a creature. It must be a rare species.
Standing across from the beast were two lions. Both were badly injured as well, though still in better condition than the black creature. But what drew Lucas's attention was not the battle itself. It was the two cubs hiding behind their mother.
They were identical to her, their coats the same deep and dark black. Yet their eyes set them apart. Unlike their mother's dark eyes, one cub's eyes gleamed blood red while the other's shone bright yellow.
As a Lannister, he should have felt some sense of kinship with the lions, yet his mind was captivated by the cubs. Their eyes were mesmerizing.
In those few moments, Lucas pieced together what must have happened. The black beast was likely stronger than both lions combined, and under other circumstances, she would have slain them easily. But the presence of her two cubs had burdened her.
She had been forced to defend them as well as herself and she had been pushed onto the back foot and thus suffered those fatal wounds.
Now that Lucas stood in the clearing, the attention of all three beasts shifted toward him. The lions growled, threatening him to step back, while the black beast whimpered.
She was only moments from death. One more strike was all the lions needed.
Lucas' hand instinctively reached for the sword at his waist as he drew it out. The sight of him pulling his weapon made the lions even more hostile, and they let out another roar.
Lucas smirked in a provocative manner, and one of the lions grew rattled. Or perhaps it simply thought to kill the puny human before turning to its real enemy, the black beast.
Letting out another roar, the lion charged and leapt at him. It was massive and bulky and heavy and powerful. But what happened next was almost impossible to believe.
Lucas raised his spare hand and caught the leaping lion by its throat. The sheer force of its leap should have knocked him tumbling to the ground, but no such thing happened.
Lucas did not budge, and the lion remained suspended in the air. His palms and his grip were obviously not big enough to hold the entire throat of the lion. He was clenching a small piece of flesh and was clenching it too tightly. They were like iron pincers clamping on a piece of flesh.
The lion struggled, clawing both its paws across Lucas' back, just below his shoulders, leaving deep wounds and drawing blood and chunks of flesh. But Lucas stood unfazed, as though he did not care.
Remaining perfectly still, he slowly and deliberately raised his sword and pierced the lion's neck. Blood sprayed on his hands as he pushed the sword deeper and deeper until it emerged from the other side.
It thrashed and struggled for a brief moment, clawing even deeper into his back. But the struggle continued for a brief few moments before life fled its body.
Lucas pulled his sword out and threw the lion aside like a rag doll, and it collided with a tree at the edge of the clearing before slumping lifeless to the ground.
Even before the body of the lion had landed on the ground, the wound on Lucas' back had already healed. The healing power of the Sky Poison Pearl coming into effect.
His skin was brand new, without a single scratch. Only the shredded fabric of his clothes and the blood staining it gave the slightest hint of the injury that had been.
Lucas then turned his gaze to the other lion, which, though growling, now seemed terrified.
Lucas narrowed his eyes, "I do not want to kill you…"
Whether or not it understood his words hardly mattered, but it certainly understood his intent. The lion made a complete U-turn and vanished deep into the forest.
With the lions gone, Lucas shifted his attention toward the black beast. The massive creature struggled to rise, likely thinking Lucas might kill them as well. She kept glancing at her cubs, silently urging them to flee, but they were far too stubborn.
Lucas took a step toward them, and the cubs responded in kind. They leapt in front of their mother, standing protectively before her, letting out what they thought were ferocious growls.
To Lucas, however, it was little more than the whining of children, and a smile spread across his face.
"I am not going to kill her," he chuckled as he stepped closer. Though the cubs understood his intention from his smiling face, they were still stiff and nervous. Even so they let Lucas approach their mother.
He crouched next to the black beast and placed his palms on her. The power of the Sky Poison Pearl surged, and before the shocked eyes of the three beasts, the mother's wounds began to heal.
The shredded muscles knit back together, and every injury was patched, her deep black coat reappearing seamlessly over the once broken flesh and torn bones.
The beast rose to her feet with a shudder, almost in awe that all her wounds had vanished. She gave her body a shake and examined herself thoroughly. Even the eyes of her two cubs lit up. They seemed almost eager to bounce toward Lucas.
The mother beast stepped closer and lowered her head slightly toward him. Lucas placed his hand on her head, rubbing her fur, and instinctively used the power of tame on her. And it worked.
What greater gratitude could there be than saving one's life? Even without tame, Lucas would have earned her loyalty forever. A grin spread across his face as he felt a spark of excitement over taking a small family as his pets.
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