Divide and Conquer, Chapter 36: The Dragon Emperors

The Targaryens and their Dragons in 5 IC/131 AC (30 AC)

Generation 1:

Visenya Targaryen, born 53 BE/73 AD (29 BC), 58 years old, rider of the she-dragon Vhagar which hatched on Dragonstone in 76 BE/50 AD (52 BC). Known as the Bronze Fury, Vhagar has bronze scales with greenish-blue highlights and flames and bright green eyes.

Aegon I Targaryen, born 51 BE/75 AD (27 BC), 56 years old, already known as the Conqueror though the epithet has not yet gained its full prestige, rider of the dragon Balerion which hatched in Old Valyria in 139 BE/13 BD (115 BC). Balerion is known as the Black Dread for his black scales and wings and for his black flames with red swirls.

Rhaenys Targaryen, born 50 BE/76 AD (26 BC), 55 years old, rider of the she-dragon Meraxes, which hatched on Dragonstone in 112 BE/14 AD (88 BC). Meraxes is known as the Silver Queen for her striking silver scales and imperious golden eyes and accents that further emphasize her regal nature. Her flames are silver-gold.

Aegon Targaryen married both his elder sister Visenya and his younger sister Rhaenys in the same wedding ceremony in 33 BE/93 AD (9 BC). He has four children with each of them, three sons and one daughter with Visenya, and three daughters and one son with Rhaenys. The eldest two children, Aerion and Valaena, are false twins because they were born from different mothers on the same day and are half siblings through their father and first cousins through their mothers. Their closeness, same nameday, similarly colored red dragons, and obsession with red as their favorite color have given the pair the moniker of the ‘Red Twins’. A moniker they doubly earned with the addition of ‘Bloodstained’ from their bloody massacres in the Wars of Conquest, starting at the tender young age of three and ten.

Generation 2:

Aegon and Visenya’s children:

Aerion Targaryen, one of the Bloodstained Red Twins, known as the Crimson Prince, born 32 BE/94 AD (8 BC), 37 years old, rider of the dragon Caraxes which hatched in his cradle on Dragonstone in 32 BE/94 AD (8 BC). Caraxes is known as the Blood Wyrm for his lean slender build and his blood red scales and wings. His flames are a dark crimson, the color of dried blood.

Aegor Targaryen, born 30 BE/96 AD (6 BC), known as One-Eye and the Cruel, 35 years old, bonded to the dragon Aegarax which hatched in his cradle on Dragonstone in 30 BE/96 AD (6 BC). Aegarax, known as the Black Scourge, has scales as black as coal and menacing green eyes and flames that are the color of wildfire. (Aegon I Targaryen believes Aegarax is the same dragon that would have become the Cannibal in another world).

Daena Targaryen, known as the Daring, born 27 BE/99 AD (3 BC), 32 years old, bonded to the dragon Vermithor which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 26 BE/100 AD (2 BC). Known as the Bronze King, Vermithor has bronze scales, large tan wings, and golden-red flames.

Aemon Targaryen, known as the Admirable, born 24 BE/102 AD (1 AC), 29 years old, bonded to the dragon Telarion which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 24 BE/102 AD (1 AC). Known as the Terror, Telarion’s scales are a rich mahogany brown and his flames are gold with swirls of red. (Aegon I Targaryen believes Telarion is the same dragon that would have become Sheepstealer in another world.)

Aegon and Rhaenys’ children:

Valaena Targaryen, the other of the Bloodstained Red Twins, known as the Ruby Princess and Princess Massacre, born 32 BE/94 AD (8 BC), 37 years old, rider of the she-dragon Meleys which hatched in her cradle on Dragonstone in 32 BE/94 AD (8 BC). Meleys is known as the Red Queen for her regal bearing and queenly personality and she has scarlet scales, pink wing membranes, and a bright copper crest, horns, and claws. Her flames are copper swirled with scarlet.

Rhaena Targaryen, known as the Relentless and the Enchantress, born 28 BE/98 AD (4 BC), 33 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Quicksilver which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 28 BE/98 AD (4 BC). Quicksilver has silvery-white scales and pale white wing membranes. She is known as the White Flame for her pale white fireballs and coloring.

Aenar Targaryen, known as the Bard, born 26 BE/100 AD (2 BC), 31 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Silverwing which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 26 BE/100 AD (2 BC). Silverwing is known as the Splendid for her beautiful silvery scales and blue fire.

Elaena Targaryen, known as the Elegant, born 23 BE/103 AD (2 AC), 28 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Dreamfyre which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 23 BE/103 AD (2 AC). Known as the Blue Queen, Dreamfyre has pale blue scales, wings, and flames, with silver crests and markings.

Each of Aegon’s children with his two wives married a half-sibling from his other wife to ensure that all of his grandchildren will be descended from both Visenya and Rhaenys and they gave him a total of twenty grandchildren.

Generation 3:

Aerion and Valaena’s children:

Aegon ‘the Younger’ Targaryen, born 14 BE/112 AD (11 AC), 19 years old, bonded to the dragon Sunfyre which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 14 BE/112 AD (11 AC). Known as the Golden, Sunfyre has gleaming gold scales and flames and pale pink wing membranes.

Vaella Targaryen, born 11 BE/115 AD (14 AC), 16 years old, bonded to the dragon Seasmoke which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 11 BE/115 AD (14 AC). Seasmoke is a pale silver-grey dragon with blue flames.

Baelon Targaryen, born 7 BE/119 AD (18 AC), 12 years old, bonded to the dragon Arrax which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 7 BE/119 AD (18 AC). Arrax is a pearlescent white dragon with yellow flames, golden eyes and a golden chest.

Daemon Targaryen, born 6 BE/120 AD (19 AC), 11 years old, bonded to the dragon Stormcloud which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 6 BE/120 AD (19 AC). Stormcloud is a turquoise dragon with black horns and claws.

Jaehaerys Targaryen, twin of Jaehaera, born 122 AD (21 AC), 9 years old, bonded to the dragon Morghul which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC). Morghul is a black dragon with copper horns and claws.

Jaehaera Targaryen, twin of Jaehaerys, born 122 AD (21 AC), 9 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Shrykos which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC). Shrykos is a copper dragon with black horns and claws.

Viserra Targaryen, born 1 IC/127 AD (26 AC), 4 years old, bonded to the dragon Vassarion which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 1 IC/127 AD (26 AC). Vassarion is a shadowy black dragon with blue and green accents. His eyes are molten yellow and his wings have gold membranes with golden veins. The edges of his wings, spine, and jawline are tipped in reflective gold.

Valarr Targaryens, born 4 IC/130 AD (29 AC), 1 year old, bonded to the dragon Grey Ghost which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 4 IC/130 AD (29 AC). Grey Ghost is a pale grey-white dragon, the color of morning mist, and he is notably shy.

Aegor and Rhaena’s children:

Valerion Targaryen, born 11 BE/115 AD (14 AC), 16 years old, bonded to the dragon Tyraxes which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 11 BE/115 AD (14 AC). Tyraxes is a pale violet dragon with dark purple horns and purple flames.

Visenya ‘the Younger’ Targaryen, born 7 BE/119 AD (18 AC), 12 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Tessarion which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 7 BE/119 AD (18 AC). Tessarion is a beautiful blue dragon with dark cobalt wings and flames, while her claws, crest, and belly scales are the color of bright beaten copper.

Daenys Targaryen, born 5 BE/121 AD (20 AC), 10 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Moondancer which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC). Moondancer is a slender pale green dragon with a pearl crest, horns, and wing bones.

Maekar Targaryen, born 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC), 9 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Morning which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC). Morning has pale pink scales with a black horn and black crests.

Aenar and Daena’s children:

Daenora Targaryen, born 6 BE/120 AD (19 AC), 11 years old, bonded to the dragon Vermax which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 6 BE/120 AD (19 AC). Vermax has olive green scales, pale orange wing membranes, and orange flames.

Viserys Targaryen, born 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC), 9 years old, bonded to the dragon Viserion which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC). Viserion has cream-white scales with a gold crest, eyes, horns, wing bones, and pale gold flames shot through with red and orange.

Rhaekar Targaryen, born 1 IC/127 AD (27 AC), 4 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Fenerax which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 1 IC/127 AD (27 AC). Fenerax is a green dragon with wings and horns of varying shades of green. (Aegon I Targaryen believes Fenerax is the same dragon that would have become the last dragon in another world.)

Rhaella Targaryen, born 3 IC/129 AD (28 AC), 2 years old, bonded to the dragon Urrax which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 3 IC/129 AD (28 AC). Urrax is a crimson dragon with gold accents, horns, claws, tail spikes, and wing membranes.

Aerea Targaryen, born 5 IC/131 AD (30 AC), less than a year old, bonded to the dragon Terrax which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 5 IC/131 AD (30 AC). Terrax is a sapphire dragon with emerald-green eyes, and wings with a dark blue at the edges. He has onyx-black claws and horns and breathes bright green fire streaked with gold.

Aemon and Elaena’s children:

Laena Targaryen, born 6 BE/120 AD (19 AC), 11 years old, bonded to the dragon Rhaegal which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC). Rhaegal is a green and bronze dragon with dark jade-green scales and wings and bronze eyes. He has black claws and black needle teeth, and his flames are orange-yellow shot through with veins of green.

Gaemon Targaryen, born 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC), 9 years old, bonded to the she-dragon Syrax which hatched in his cradle in Summerhall in 4 BE/122 AD (21 AC). Syrax has yellow scales and flames.

Aelora Targaryen, born 2 IC/128 AD (27 AC), 3 years old, bonded to the dragon Nightfyre which hatched in her cradle in Summerhall in 2 IC/128 AD (27 AC). Nightfyre is a black dragon with streaks of vivid scarlet red on his body and red eyes, horns, and wings. His flames are black shot with red swirls. (Aegon I Targaryen believes Nightfyre is the same dragon that would have become Drogon in another world.)

The marriages in Generation 3 that eventually take place as the respective spouses come of age are as follows:

Aegon II (112 AD) ∞ Visenya the Younger (119 AD) – 136 AD = Cousins

Vaella (115 AD) ∞ Valerion (115 AD) – 132 AD = Cousins

Baelon (119 AD) ∞ Daenys (121 AD) – 138 AD = Cousins

Daemon (120 AD) ∞ Laena (120 AD) – 139 AD = Cousins

Jaehaerys (122 AD) ∞ Jaehaera (122 AD) – 140 AD = Siblings

Viserra (127 AD) ∞ Rhaekar (127 AD) – 145 AD = Cousins

Daenora (120 AD) ∞ Gaemon (122 AD) – 141 AD = Cousins

Maekar (122 AD) ∞ Rhaella (129 AD) – 148 AD = Cousins

Valarr (130 AD) ∞ Aerea (131 AD) – 149 AD = Cousins

Viserys (122 AD) ∞ Aelora (128 AD) – 146 AD = Cousins

Nine of the ten matches are cousin matches, with only one being a sibling match due to Valyrian culture surrounding the sacredness of the bond between twins making the marriage of Jaehaerys and Jaehaera preferential.

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The Dragon Emperors of the West

The Wars of Conquest began in 29 BE/97 AD (5 BC) with the Liberation of the Riverlands from the yoke of the black line of House Hoare. This was soon followed by the Iron and Gold War in 24 BE/102 AD (1 AC) which saw the annexation of the Iron Islands and the Westerlands. The Faith-Coalition War soon followed beginning with an invasion in the Vale in 19 BE/107 AD (6 AC) which led to the declaration of a Holy War by the last High Septon, resulting in rebellions in both the Westerlands and the Vale and invasions by the Stormlands, the Reach, and the Faith Militant.

The North also took advantage of the chaos to opportunistically and unprovokedly invade the northern borders of the Riverlands and the Three Sisters, a sequence of events that eventually led to Brandon Snow’s attempted assassinations of the entire Targaryen family and the unleashing of the Dragon’s Wroth on the North in 18 BE/108 AD (7 AC).

After rebuffing the initial rebellions, invasions, and assassination attempts, and rallying in morale with the discovery of a lost vault of lore on Dragonstone and the subsequent reclamation of their full heritage and power as the Last of the Forty Families of Old Valyria, House Targaryen went on the offensive in late 17 BE/109 AD (8 AC), carrying out a series of campaigns that resulted in the final conquest of the Stormlands and Reach, the dissolution of the Faith Militant, and the end of all resistance to Targaryen rule in the Andal kingdoms of Westeros. These campaigns concluded with the Field of Fire and the Submission of Highgarden in 16 BE/110 AD (9 AC) and the Fall of Oldtown in 15 BE/111 AD (10 AC).

The brutal Warg War followed in 10 BE/116 AD (15 AC), lasting two years before the Targaryens finally defeated the Warg King, Brandon Snow, and his eldritch allies, in 8 BE/114 AD (17 AC), annexing the North into their realm.

The Conquest of Dorne in 3 BE/123 AD (22 AC) saw the last independent Westerosi kingdom south of the Wall conquered and annexed by House Targaryen and was immediately followed up with campaigns into Essos from 2 BE/124 AD (23 AC) to 1 BE/125 AD (24 AC) which resulted in the annexation of the Stepstones, Tyrosh, Lys, and Myr, and the vassalization of all the remaining Free Cities and their subjugation as tributaries to the nascent Empire of Westeros during the Disciplining of the Daughters.

Said empire was formally forged in the Sixth Moon of 126 AD (25 AC), with all dates in the year before the official proclamation on Midyear’s Day (henceforth known as Empire Day) being declared as 0 BE (Before Empire) and all dates afterward until the turn of the new year being declared 0 IC (Imperial Calendar).

After twenty-nine years, the Wars of Conquest had finally ended, ushering in the beginning of the new Imperial Peace. From the Forging of the Empire in 0 IC/126 AD (25 AC) to the date of writing in 128 IC/254 AD (153 AC), six rulers have held the Iron Throne of Westeros, becoming renowned across the Known World as the Dragon Emperors.

As the Wars of Conquest have been expounded upon in many detailed texts, this volume shall not repeat them and instead focus on the reigns of the six emperors: Aegon I, Aerion I, Aegon II, Aerion II, Daemon I, and Aegon III.

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I, Aegon I the Conqueror, 37 BE – 35 IC

Aegon the Conqueror was born to Lord Aerion Targaryen of Dragonstone and his consort, Lady Valaena Velaryon, in the year 51 BE/75 AD (27 BC). He reigned for an astonishing seventy-two years from 37 BE/89 AD (13 BC) – 35 IC/161 AD (60 AC), ascending as Lord of Dragonstone at the age of fourteen upon his father, Lord Aerion’s untimely death.

Aegon I ruled as Lord of Dragonstone for eight years, King of the Rivers and Hills (and all subsequent kingdoms) for twenty-nine years, and Emperor of Westeros for thirty-five years following the Forging of the Empire and his iconic Iron Throne.

The entire tenure of his reign as Lord of Dragonstone and King of the Rivers and Hills was dominated by the planning and execution of the Wars of Conquest which lasted for twenty-eight to twenty-nine years from 29 BE/97 AD (5 BC) to 0 BE/126 AD (25 AC). Interspersed with the wars were the fathering and raising of his eight children with his two sister-wives, Visenya and Rhaenys. By the year 5 IC/131 AD (30 AC), Aegon’s children had given him twenty grandchildren, all of whom intermarried with each other.

The formal unification of the various kingdoms of Westeros (and the Stepstones, Tyrosh, Lys, and Myr in Essos), was in truth only an officialization of what had been an ongoing process for the past three decades already.

The new Dynastic Laws of House Targaryen and the code of laws that had been developed for the Kingdom of Rivers and Hills were reworked and recodified as a new Imperial Code of Law that was dominant in all corners of the Empire, knitting the realm together legally. Aegon I also continued to physically knit his new empire together with infrastructure, paved or macadamized roads, bridges (including specially designed drawbridges allowing ship traffic), aqueducts, cities, and more, as he had already been doing as King.

The draining of the Neck’s swamps and marshes to remove the geographic barrier between north and south and create new arable farmlands and settler colonies continued to progress well, as did the ongoing work on the capital city surrounding Summerhall Castle. Previously, that city had been known as Summerton but after the Forging of the Empire, it was officially rechartered as the Imperial City of Summerhall and was often referred to either as the Imperial City or simply Summerhall in conjunction with the castle it shared its name with.

Plans were laid down decades in advance for a great river diversion and canal project to create a waterway linking Harroway on Trident River to Summerhall on the Dragons Eye Lake to facilitate the movement of goods and provide the capital city with fresh flowing water for its sanitation and consumption, but while the total completion of this project would take many decades more, earlier stages were already completed even before the Forging of the Empire and after the Forging, proceeded to accelerate as efforts were redirected from war and conquest to construction and infrastructure expansion.

The Alternate Attendance system that had been imposed on the thirty-four Wardens of the Empire helped fuel and fund the expansion of infrastructure and the local economies as the Wardens constantly traveled between Summerhall and the Wards. The court in Summerhall also continued to attract countless elites and nobles from both within and without the Empire and this further enriched and sped up the development of the Imperial City.

Countless new buildings, neighborhoods, monuments, markets, manses, and more were constructed in this period.

Many of them helped to further strengthen the prestige and legend of House Targaryen, as many large monuments and statues (some even rivalling the size of the destroyed Titan of Braavos) were made of Aegon the Conqueror and his wives and children all over the empire or in busts, portraits, frescoes, and more memorializing the Wars of Conquest and the glory of the Empire’s unification and Forging. The crowns, thrones, and other heirlooms, treasures, and relics of the conquered kings and kingdoms were also placed on display in the Castle of Summerhall to help accentuate this.

This cultural centralization was also supplemented by economic and political centralization as well as all the construction was also used to create and house new institutions while expanding and growing older bureaucracies to Aegon and his Elder Council, further accelerating the centralization of the Empire under the absolute aegis of House Targaryen.

The University of Summerhall, for example, was expanded massively to continue training new bureaucrats and civil servants and absorb the knowledge and resources of the Citadel and the Order of Maesters. This helped to drive innovation in various sectors, including agricultural advances with better tools such as seeding drills and better crop rotations.

Some of the royals also sponsored colleges and schools of their own, such as Prince Aenar, who sponsored a Bards College which helped to greatly enrich the culture in the capital and later the whole Empire, as well as strengthen the growth of House Targaryen’s legend and the Imperial Cult.

The Alchemists’ Guild was maintained though many of its members helped to found other new guilds for the teaching and learning of magic and other knowledge rediscovered in the lost vault on Dragonstone, including the shaping of dragonstone, providing the Empire with mages and indestructible building materials. The Qohorik smiths, led by Taro Mott, and other experts, created a Guild of Smiths and Craftsmen who made many fine crafts and were also responsible for producing Valyrian steel (rediscovered in the Dragonstone vault).

The overall combination of these new institutions, infrastructural expansions, the unification of Westeros, the ushering of the Imperial Peace, the decades-long brain drain of Essos’ finest artisans and skilled workers, and the final vassalization of Essos and the annual tribute received from it led to a huge economic boom.

Westeros’ full economic potential was unlocked as the continent’s cities were now given charters at long last allowing them to grow rich, populous, and autonomous of the nobility while the Empire’s domination of the trade routes in the Stepstones and the new territories and tributaries in Essos brought endless wealth and further supported development and growth.

The long endless wars of the Century of Blood and the subsequent vassalization to the Targaryens had broken the Free Cities and thus the ancient dynamic where the Free Cities and Essos had been more advanced than Westeros had now reversed. Despite the depopulation and devastation in some regions due to the Wars of Conquest, Westeros was recovering far faster than the Free Cities were and constantly draining wealth and immigrants from them.

The newfound economic prosperity of Westeros and the consistent flow of resources and peoples from Essos was also responsible for enormous demographic, cultural, and linguistic changes in the Empire.

Large portions of Westeros, especially the North, Dorne, Iron Islands, and to a lesser extent, parts of the Reach, Stormlands, and Vale had been severely depopulated due to the devastation of the Wars of Conquest. Some estimates suggest that the Iron Islands had lost sixty to seventy percent of their pre-war population, and the North and Dorne anywhere between thirty to forty percent (some more extreme estimates even suggest fifty to sixty percent for them.)

A large number of Essosi that were culturally and/or ethnically Valyrian had been immigrating to the Targaryen domains for decades, ever since Aegon I had first become Lord of Dragonstone, and they had been instrumental in slowly converting the Riverlands into the Valyrianized loyalist Heartlands of the new Empire. The veteran colonies founded by retiring imperial legionaries given lands also contributed to this process.

This immigration accelerated exponentially once the Wars of Conquest had concluded as the aforementioned depopulation of regions of Westeros created space and opportunities for vast hordes of migrants from Essos who were now freed from the yokes of slavery and desperately seeking better opportunities in Westeros, aided by subsidies from the Targaryens. This was further supplemented with the Imperial Settlement Act, which saw vast domains of empty lands opened to all settlers, promising ownership of empty lands after a period of successful cultivation. Not only did this attract many poor from Essos, but several second sons from within Westeros itself.

In addition, cities such as Summerhall, Dragonport, and others were built from the ground up as planned cities and attracted many Essosi and Valyrian migrants as the economic and political centers of the new hegemon of Westeros and Western Essos. Not all of this migration was voluntary as well for the Targaryens had forcibly seized many hostages and elites from the Free Cities they had conquered and moved them back to Westeros, often prioritizing those with Valyrian pedigrees or skills in bureaucracy or craftsmanship.

A significant Valyrian ethnic minority formed due to the sheer scale of the immigration from Essos and it was accompanied by the entrenchment of Valyrian culture and its favoring over local culture, being seen as superior and more civilized and practiced in an attempt to imitate the highly popular and powerful Imperial House Targaryen.

Many younger sons of Valyrian mercantile and noble from Essos, as well as Valyrian smallfolk and commoners, did however voluntarily immigrate knowing there was great reward and opportunity in Westeros simply for their ethnicity or culture. The Riverlands, later known as the Heartlands, were the most culturally and ethnically the most Valyrian region in Westeros due to the proximity to Summerhall and Dragonstone, the length of time they had spent under Targaryen rule, and the fact that the vast majority of Essosi Valyrian immigration had been to them for a long time but other regions started rapidly catching up, especially in regions like Dorne and the North which were largely resettled by settlers from Essos.

This was further amplified due to House Targaryen’s avid beliefs in blood purity and their own Exceptionalism, codified in the Dynastic Laws. Though not legally distinct by law apart from the Dynastic Laws protecting House Targaryen’s purity, those with Valyrian blood or culture were often preferentially treated not just by the Targaryens but by the common non-Valyrian peoples of Westeros as well who came to see them as the pinnacles of beauty and civilization due to their association with House Targaryen and its legendary looks and reputation. This entrenched a cultural preference for Valyrian looks, customs, blood, and supremacy and made many non-Valyrians aspire to become more Valyrian through cultural assimilation and intermarriage. It was seen as a way to elevate one’s status, especially among the elites who became disproportionately Valyrian.

About 90% of the Pre-Conquest Andal, First Men, and Rhoynish nobility of Westeros was wiped out during the Wars of Conquest, apart from a few notable survivors such as the Reynes, Farmans, Baneforts, Crakehalls, Daynes, Yronwoods, the Riverlords, and some landed knights. The rest were all replaced by three main groups, Essosi Valyrian families such as nobles from Lys and Myr, dragonseeds and cadets of families noble or otherwise from the three islands of Blackwater Bay, and cadets of the Riverlander noble houses who had been culturally intermingly and intermarrying with the Valyrians and were halfway on their way to assimilating as it was.

This Valyrian culture and blood purity was further reinforced after the Disciplining of the Daughters when the Targaryens arranged and encouraged the intermarriage of all their hostages and immigrants from Volantis and the other Free Cities with their newly established nobility and upper merchant classes in Westeros.

As a result, by the end of Aegon I’s reign, it was a safe estimate that all the nobility in Westeros from the lowest rank of Master all the way up through Keeper, Defender, and the highest rank of Warden, were all significantly influenced by Valyrian culture (though some holdovers from Andal culture such as knighthood and their religion did remain), and at least 70% of them were descended from Valyrians and had some level Valyrian looks whether or not their family names were also Valyrian.

These demographic and cultural changes had enormous implications for Westeros’ language and religion.

From the very start of their reign in the Riverlands, the Targaryens had made High Valyrian the official language of court though for many years it had coexisted with the Common Tongue of Westeros as a court language of equal status to ease relations and communications with the local peoples the Targaryens sought to rule. However, as the people became increasingly accustomed to Targaryen rule and the elites and smallfolk became increasingly appreciative of Valyrian culture, a notable shift began to develop, aided in no small part by the enormous influx of Essosi immigrants to fill the ranks of the nobility, bureaucrats, merchants, and even smallfolk in some regions.

By the end of Aegon I’s reign, the so-called Common Tongue, or Westerosi Common, was no longer recognized as a language of court, with official decrees and laws being written in High Valyrian first and only then translated. Common began being seen as uncouth and drab, with everyone at court preferring to converse solely in High Valyrian or its dialects which were seen as more sophisticated and elegant.

A favored pastime for anyone educated in the Empire by that point, regardless of whether or not they had Valyrian descent, was reading and writing Valyrian treatises, philosophy literature, songs, poems, books, and more. That soon transitioned from a pastime to an expectation for those wishing to be seen as educated, literate, and sophisticated, ushering in a Valyrian Renaissance, with Valyrian festivals and customs being celebrated and practiced.

Westerosi Common itself eventually ceased to exist in a familiar form recognizable to what it had been before the Conquest. The cultural domination of High Valyrian in the upper spheres of Westerosi society created a downwards pressure from above while the massive influx of Essosi immigrants brought countless speakers of Valyrian dialects such as Lyseni, Myrish, Tyroshi, Volantene, Pentoshi, and to a lesser extent, Braavosi, Norvoshi, Qohorik, and Lorathi, to Westeros where they intermingled with the local language and applied pressure from the ground up.

Westerosi Common had originally evolved from the original Old Tongue of the First Men which had been heavily influenced and corrupted by Andalic during and following the Andal invasions, especially as the Andalic alphabet and writing replaced the primitive First Men runes. The Old Tongue-Andalic hybrid that had been Westerosi Common evolved again now, absorbing words, grammar, and more from the various Valyrian dialects as well as the High Valyrian spoken in the upper echelons of society to create a new mongrel creole language known as Imperial Common or simply as Westerosi abroad.

Imperial Common was not at first officially recognized or sponsored but with every year that passed, it became less and less mutually intelligible with the Common that had existed before the Conquest, which became known as Old Common. Late in Aegon I’s reign, efforts were taken to begin formally defining and standardizing the new language and its increasingly rapid evolution and absorption of more and more Valyrian from many diverse dialects to prevent linguistic fragmentation and drift in the Empire.

The continued monitoring and guiding of this new language and its evolution has created the Imperial Common of the present day, a language that has evolved from the Old Tongue-Andalic base to absorb High Valyrian and several other Valyrian dialects and become near universally spoken in the entirety of Westeros south of the Wall, with regional variations not too much greater than that Old Common had had. Imperial Common is spoken alongside various Valyrian dialects (which are themselves mutually intelligible to an extent) and the progenitor language of High Valyrian, helping to maintain linguistic unity in the Empire.

Targaryen rule and influence also slowed down and possibly even reversed the linguistic drift of Tyroshi, Lyseni, and Myrish away from High Valyrian and in the present day those cities and their hinterlands’ regional dialects have arguably returned to speaking standard High Valyrian.

The religious composition of Westeros was also greatly altered. The Old Gods and Drowned God religions had been entirely annihilated and outlawed during the Wars of Conquest and the Faith of the Seven had been greatly shattered, delegitimized, and politically crippled. In addition to the massive influx of immigrants and their religions from Essos, this eventually led to a cosmopolitan culture of religious tolerance and freedom in Westeros under the aegis of House Targaryen though the plurality religion remains to this day, the reformed sect of the Faith of the Seven that holds to the tenets of Exceptionalism and submission to Targaryen Supremacy.

Other religions commonly practiced include the Red Faith of R’hllor, the worship of the Trios, the Patternmaker, the Weeping Lady of Lys, the Love Goddess, Pantera, Yndros of the Twilight, and many, many others. All religions were accepted and legal within the Empire so long as they submitted to the supremacy of House Targaryen and were not aggressive to other religions and their practitioners and did not advocate for dark traditions and practices such as the reaving of the Drowned God Old Ways or the eldritch dark magics of the skinchangers and greenseers of the Old Gods.

Many were even multi-religious, syncretizing religions and gods where possible or worshipping multiple gods and practicing many religions so as to not offend any deities, should their religions allow it as only some like the Faith of the Seven and the Red Faith explicitly forbade this (though in practice that exclusion was not always followed due to the tolerant cosmopolitan culture that had developed).

The original main Valyrian religion, the Fourteen Flames, and the lesser gods in that pantheon, that the Targayens at least nominally adhered to also became more popular as Valyrian cultural dominance and Targaryen supremacy became entrenched, with many worshipping their own gods alongside the Fourteen Flames or at least adopting them as cultural symbols and motifs.

A quasi-religious and sociocultural movement also began to develop that was centered around the veneration of House Targaryen and its blood purity, based on the tenets of Targaryen Exceptionalism and Supremacy and their exalted status above all gods and men, as the imperial titles proclaim. This Imperial Cult was not a formally defined or legal religion by any means but it became an important cornerstone of the Empire’s culture and its beliefs and a dominant ideology and political force among its people and elites.

By the end of Aegon’s reign, Westeros was completely unrecognizable to what it had been like before the Wars of Conquest, and with how long Aegon had ruled, living memory of what the continent had been like before House Targaryen had come was increasingly fading away.

House Targaryen by that point had solidified its position and its legitimacy just as much if not more than all the royal dynasties they had conquered and deposed and the very concept of separate independent kingdoms was being extinguished and replaced with fervent pride in the Empire and its united Imperial identity.

One way in which this showed was in how the previous surnames for noble bastards all across the continent such as Flowers, Sand, Storm, Waters, Rivers, Hill, Stone, Snow, and Irons, had all fallen out in favor of Embers as a new standard bastard name across the whole empire, a small indicator of how the old regional identities and divisions were fading away.

Aegon hadn’t just conquered the kingdoms, he had made them into empire with a unified system of codified laws, roads, trade networks, and so much more. Yet perhaps the most important step he had taken was the leashing of the nobility.

Though the majority of the nobility was by this point Valyrian due to a combination of wartime elevations replacing the old nobility, intermarriage, and cultural assimilation, the Targaryens were not content to simply trust that a common culture and value system would ensure loyalty (though it certainly helped) and solidified their power over their vassals in several ways.

Each and every single one of the old kingdoms (with the exception of the Iron islands which were small and had been depopulated after the Iron and Gold War) had been balkanized and divided into new Wards, with some Wards even having territory across the borders of the original kingdoms. The smaller administrative divisions were individually less powerful, with weaker regional identities and independence movements. No one Warden had the power to rebel and hope to win, even if dragons weren’t used.

Civil wars or private wars among the nobility were now unimaginable, a thing of the past with the Imperial Peace as the foremost law of the land. Pre-Forging era policies continued and became even more comprehensive, such as Alternate Attendance and the systems of Imperial courts, justiciars, intendants, rangers, spies, and so forth that had already been established earlier as well as meticulous oversight of the nobility and their rights.

This ensured that all disputes would now be arbitrated not by conflict but by imperial mediation and law, and the Wardens and the lesser nobility flocked to Summerhall either due to law or choice to jostle and compete in political intrigues for favors and positions in the bureaucracy and imperial government institutions that increasingly did all the real ruling instead of the traditional feudal customs and lords.

More often than not, the nobility would become distracted from their political objectives by the luxurious and hedonistic culture and pleasures at court, with many tourneys, feasts, balls, hunts, games, and other forms of entertainment and amusement readily provided for their pleasure in the Imperial City and Castle. There they would intermingle, interact, and intermarry with peers from all across the Empire, further strengthening the developing united Imperial identity.

Laws were made forbidding the nobility (or anyone else) from bearing arms in the presence of the Emperor (unless permitted to as guards or for ceremonies, spars, and the like) as well as ensuring sensitive positions in the imperial household such as the chief of staff, attaches, esquires,  manservants, maids, and ladies-in-waiting, were given to thoroughly vetted, trustworthy, and capable individuals, and not simply handed out as political favors. All of this was done not just for security purposes but to further weaken the nobility’s power and privileges and remind them of their place.

All nobles in the Empire were required to swear oaths of fealty to the Emperor in addition to their direct liege (if the Emperor was not their direct liege already), and the oath of fealty to the Emperor superseded that to their direct liege should the latter prove treasonous.

Wardens and Defenders were required to report to Summerhall within a year of inheritance to swear fealty and pay homage directly to the Emperor to be formally confirmed in their fiefs and titles in lavish ceremonies which helped serve as reminders that the Emperor was the allodial owner of all lands in the empire. Lower-ranked feudal nobles such as Keepers and Masters were given the option to swear their oaths in front of local imperial officials and representatives such as sheriffs, intendants, justiciars, rangers, and the like, and receive their confirmation writs from them instead.

To ensure consistency and the unification of laws across the entire realm, the succession for royalty, nobility, and peasantry alike was universally codifed as Andal Law, or male-preference primogeniture, where a man’s sons inherited his lands and titles before his daughters, and his daughters before his brothers. The sole exception was given to the Orphans of the Greenblood for their services in the Conquest of Dorne, allowing them to keep their traditional Rhoynish customs of absolute primogeniture which did not differentiate inheritance rights between men and women.

The main branches of all thirty-four Warden Houses were required to inform Summerhall about all births, deaths, marriages, and changes in succession. All betrothals, fosterings, marriages, and succession changes for the Warden Houses had to be sent to Summerhall for approval and only on receiving imperial assent would they be formalized, allowing the Emperor to monitor the Wardens and prevent them from accumulating lands in other Wards or their own or making too many overly strong alliances with their peers.

Defenders, Keepers, and Masters were not monitored to the same degree due to their reduced power and prestige, but records were still kept in Summerhall as part of the centralization and bureaucratic process.

Towards the end of Aegon’s life, he began focusing more on the long-term projects he wanted his successors to continue. This included the draining of most of the Neck, and the continued progress of infrastructure projects, such as the expansion of Summerhall City and the vast road networks and their potential remaking in dragonstone as well as the completion of the Harroway-Summerhall Canal.

He also paid special attention to the maintenance of his Imperial Menagerie and Zoo in Summerhall and the breeding project for exotic animals both there and in the North. Aegon’s interest in exotic animals had amassed a collection greater than any in the world, even the Sealord of Braavos, and included specimens such as mammoths, elephants, unicorns, direwolves, shadowcats, snow bears, aurochs, great elks, Little Valyrian lemurs, walking lizards with scythes for claws, basilisks, wyverns, manticores, phantom tortoises, hrakkars, lions, tigers, spotted tigers, pouch tigers, and many more.

The North’s human depopulation and slow recovery also led to an explosion in the wild populations of mammoths, reindeer, great elks, aurochs, snow bears, unicorns, direwolves, and shadowcats. With the mammoth populations in particular estimated to have increased from a few hundred to more than two thousand.

Not only did this recovery enrich the natural heritage and biodiversity of House Targaryen’s domain, but it also brought massive ecological and economic benefits for the North and its slowly recovering population, bringing great prosperity despite the harsh northern climate and helping to encourage growth.

Aegon spent a great deal of time detailing all his hopes for the continuation and completion of these projects in various journals along with wise words of wisdom, ideas, and advice, and these writings from him would end up becoming treasured heirlooms of House Targaryen and copied many times and stored in libraries for future rulers to peruse at their leisure.

Most of his reign as Emperor was spent consolidating his conquests and winning the loyalty of the conquered peoples through his domestic policies and economic enrichment but in the latter half of his rule, he did begin showing some interest in foreign expansion and affairs once again.

In the year 17 IC/143 AD (42 AC) Aegon formally created the Guild of Venturers, with a charter to explore the unknown regions of the world by ship, especially the Sunset Sea, which had long been an interest and passion of his younger wife, Empress Rhaenys. Under the Guild of Venturers, expeditions and voyages were sent to explore into the Summer, Shivering, and Sunset Seas, visiting faraway lands like the Summer Isles, Ibben, Mossovy, and the Jade Sea realms and making plans to venture even further.

The enormous wealth accrued from expeditions heading towards the Jade Sea eventually led to the creation of the East Empire Company, an enterprise entirely owned by the Imperial Family and given a charter monopoly on all trade coming from east of Volantis in the Summer and Jade Seas or east of Lorath in the Shivering Sea in order to ensure the Guild of Venturers remained focus on exploration (though the two organizations continued to work closely together).

The East Empire Company brought back tremendous amounts of wealth, spices, goods, innovations, and foreign crops for the Empire, greatly strengthening the Empire’s economy and agricultural base and enriching the already extremely wealthy House Targaryen.

Continued interest in the eastern trade routes eventually led to an expedition to colonize Gogossos and the Basilisk Isles in 25 IC/151 AD (50 AC). The reasons were varied and numerous. Gogossos was a former colony of Old Valyria (if one with a dread reputation) and had once grown so powerful from slavery and sorcery it had even been dubbed the ‘Tenth Free City’.

The Targaryens, who claimed to be the Heirs of Valyria, would have had interest in the city for that reason alone as it would be an enormous cultural victory and boost to their prestige and could potentially further strengthen the magic knowledge of their house and empire if they could recover any lost treasures, grimoires, and artifacts the city’s ruins might hold.

In addition, the Basilisk Isles were strategically positioned to be a key stopping point for their trade routes and ships in the East Empire Company and the natural climate and soils of the archipelago made it well suited to grow exotic tropical products such as fruits, silk, goldenheart trees, and spices.

Rather conveniently or perhaps inconveniently, the Basilisk Isles were practically deserted as an outbreak of the Red Death seventy-seven years after the Doom had killed nine in every ten afflicted and led to the desertion of the islands. Not even corsairs and pirates had yet dared to return and the only local inhabitants left on the isles were a small village of strange people with webbed hands and feet and unpleasant fishlike faces on the Isle of Toads.

Bearing in mind the potential dangers of disease and other magical threats from the ruins of the city, the initial expedition force sent was primarily made up of soldiers and mages and command was given to Prince Aegon the Younger, grandson of Aegon I by his eldest children, and second in line to the Iron Throne. Aegon the Younger was accompanied by several of his siblings and cousins for the expedition and it served as a good opportunity for many of Aegon’s grandchildren to win some glory of their own and prove themselves capable of leadership and war, skills they would need when they inherited the Empire.

Under the command of Prince Aegon, the expedition fleet swiftly occupied the entire archipelago with the exception of the Isle of Tears where Gogossos was located, subjugating the few local inhabitants in the islands and combating the local diseases with advanced sanitation, medicine, and magic.

Finally, once they had established a strong foothold, they directly investigated the ruins of Gogossos, eventually encountering a remnant population of Gogossi chimeras that were infected with the Red Death. With superior military might and magical prowess, Prince Aegon’s expedition culled all of the chimeras and cleansed the entire city of the Red Death before proceeding to loot the ruins of the city, retrieving an astronomical amount of Valyrian steel, gold, silver, gems, jewels, and other goods and items and perhaps most importantly of all, entire vaults full of magical lore, artifacts, grimoires, and tomes on the magic of the Gogossi blood mages and flesh smiths.

Everything related to magic in the city was immediately seized by Prince Aegon for the Iron Throne and it represented the ultimate crystallization of House Targaryen’s magical ascent and the full reclamation of their heritage. Combining their inheritance as the Last of the Forty retrieved from the lost vault on Dragonstone with all the lore of the infamous Gogossos enormously empowered House Targaryen and accelerated their magical mastery and assimilation, with many predicting they could one day be on pace to match Old Valyria at its height.

The Basilisk Isles were then formally annexed into the Empire as its fifteenth Crown Province, the Crown Province of Gogossos, and work immediately began on rebuilding Gogossos and other settlements and establishing colonies, with settlers sent from Westeros and tributary states in Essos and safeguarded from disease by sanitation, medicine, and magic. Some settlers and colonists were also recruited from the Summer Islands and Naath, though in limited amounts.

Prince Aegon and those of his siblings and cousins that had taken part in the expedition returned to Summerhall in triumph, having been wildly successful beyond anyone’s wildest dreams and more than proven their capabilities to one day lead and rule the Empire in the place of their grandparents and parents.

The last major thing of note that happened in Aegon I’s reign after the Gogossos Expedition was the increasingly westward focus of the Guild of Venturers. While the East Empire Company and its own captains began settling into already trailblazed and established trading routes heading east, now supported by bases and stopover points in the recently colonized Basilisk Isles, the Guild of Venturers continued to remain daring and brave explorers and set their sights on charting the uncharted western seas now that their compatriots in the Company were handling the east.

Their boldness only grew as new innovations were adopted including compasses and sextants, and finally the creation of revolutionary new class of ship known as caravels that could tack into the wind. These ships and their unique sail plans and hull designs were the brainchild of Lady Elissa Farman, a daughter of House Farman who had defied all societal expectations and norms of the day by refusing to marry and by some chance of fortune managing to impress the Emperor enough to receive his personal sponsorship for her lifelong ambition of membership in the Guild of Venturers.

There in the Guild, Elissa’s personal designs for a new ship, the Sun Chaser, eventually received the attention of her superiors and was given special funding for its immediate construction and testing. The results were groundbreaking and Elissa was rewarded with the funding and ships needed to lead an expedition of her own to explore into the Sunset Sea, something she had dreamed of ever since she had been a child growing up in Faircastle and looking out into the western sea every day, wondering what lied beyond it.

In the year 31 IC/157 AD (56 AC), Elissa Farman set off into the Sunset Sea with a fleet of five caravels, including her beloved Sun Chaser. The caravels made it further into the Sunset Sea than ever before and eventually before the year’s turn, Elissa made landfall far to the southwest of Oldtown, at a small grouping of islands further west than even Lonely Light and anywhere else in the Known World.

The discovery extremely excited both the Guild of Venturers, as it was the first ever discovery their guild had made in the Sunset Sea, and Empress Rhaenys, who had in her youth once dreamed of flying west on Meraxes, an aspiration she had never gone through with for the sake of her family who had feared her disappearance.

In honor of her patrons, Lady Elissa Farman named the three islands she had found Aegon, Rhaenys, and Visenya, known collectively on maps as the Three Conquerors. Unfortunately, none of the three would live to see Elissa Farman make any more discoveries for they all perished only a few short years later.

In the year 35 IC/161 AD (60 AC), Aegon the Conqueror, the First, the Dragon, the Unifier, the Great, finally passed at the ripe old age of eighty-six. He had accomplished everything he had set out to do in his life and left behind a powerful secure empire to his many, many heirs, having lived long enough to see the birth of his great-great grandson, Daemon, who would eventually reign as the fifth emperor, in 31 IC/157 AD (56 AC).

His lifelong companions and sister-wives, Empresses Visenya and Rhaenys, did not long outlive him. Both of them perished the following year from grief and old age, being respectively eighty-nine and eighty-six years old.

With the deaths of the Targaryen Triarchy, a great era of history came to a permanent close.

II, Aerion I the Crimson, 35 IC – 38 IC

Aerion the Crimson was born on Dragonstone in 32 BE/94 AD (8 BC) to the future Aegon the Conqueror and his elder sister-wife, the future Visenya the Victorious. He was born on the exact same day, though a few minutes earlier, as his half-sister Valaena, the daughter of Aegon and the future Rhaenys the Ruthless.

Due to this, the pair were known as false twins from a young age, becoming very close and growing up together, eventually becoming known as the Red Twins due to their association with the color and the dragons Caraxes and Meleys. A moniker that would eventually become much darker after they went to war at the tender young age of thirteen and destroyed three separate armies in the Deluge of Blood.

As the Wars of Conquest progressed, the Red Twins continued to bathe themselves in blood, gaining a reputation for brutality, viciousness, and cruelty, that was in all likelihood overestimated due to the shock value of them being so young when they started. Nonetheless the damage had been done and they were forever remembered as the Crimson Prince and Ruby Princess Massacre of the Bloodstained Red Twins.

Despite the hotheadedness and temper that had gotten him into quite a bit of trouble and the brutal reputation that forever lingered over him like a shadow, Aerion was an exceedingly capable statesman and a worthy successor to his father. He served as Crown Prince of the Kingdom of Rivers and Hills and then of the Empire of Westeros for several decades and also became Chancellor after the retirement of his uncle, Lord Orys Baratheon, the Warden of Seagard, establishing a long-lasting tradition of Crown Princes serving as their father’s Chancellors that has been continued without fail to the present day.

By the time his father died, Aerion was already quite old himself, being sixty-seven years old, but he was exceedingly prepared and ready to rule. Unfortunately, history mostly remembers him and his wife Valaena as the Crimson Prince and Ruby Princess precisely because his reign was exceedingly short, lasting but for a mere three years.

All of their most famous deeds and accomplishments had been done as Prince and Princess, during the Wars of Conquest especially, and later on in their father’s reign as Emperor when they had sat on the Elder Council.

As rulers, the Red Twins continued nearly all of their parent’s policies and projects exactly as they had been on schedule before they had died and did little to interfere with everything that had been set in motion before finally, in the year 38 IC/164 AD (63 AC), they passed away peacefully and suddenly one night in their sleep, still wrapped up in each other’s arms. They left the world the exact same way they had come into it, together.

Many theories have been proposed as to the reason for the relatively early deaths of the Red Twins, for while seventy was a venerable age by all accounts, it was still noticeably younger than their parents, all of whom had died in their late eighties. Most tend to agree that the Red Twins had died younger due to the damage their bodies had received in their youths from the arrows and poisons of the skinchanger attempts on their lives and while it had appeared to heal and they had lived healthy lives, it had still shortened their lifespans.

III, Aegon II the Glorious, 38 IC – 88 IC

Aegon II was born in 14 BE/112 AD (11 AC) as the eldest child of the Red Twins and the eldest grandchild of the Three Conquerors, the Targaryen Triarchy. From the moment he was born, his parents believed he was destined for greatness as the eventual third emperor and so they gave him the name of their own father, Aegon.

The young prince’s future seemed even more promising when his dragon hatched in his cradle. Sunfyre the Golden was largely believed to be the most magnificent and beautiful dragon that had ever flown over the skies of Westeros, with gleaming gold scales that shone like beaten gold in the sunlight and pale pink wing membranes. Sunfyre soared freely over the Empire at all times, a resplendent creature of gold and flame whose growth and later size were said to rival, and perhaps even surpass, that of the greatest of the dragons of the Targaryen dynasty.

Aegon II was exceedingly devoted to his dragon and was often seen astride his mount, aloft over Summerhall and all over the realm where he would visit the various imperial projects and places of learning with his dragon. Sunfyre was seen as a highly fitting dragon for Aegon II in several ways and many in the future looked back and wrote that the birth of the Golden Dragon would herald the eventual Golden Age of Westeros.

Beyond just having a splendid dragon, Aegon exhibited a precocity and natural brilliance from birth that set him apart from his kin. His tutors and the maesters of the Imperial University at Summerhall soon recognized him as a prodigy, a boy of unbounded curiosity and sharp intellect who by his twentieth year, had distinguished himself as a scholar of great renown, earning accolades in philosophy, architecture, governance, and the magical arts.

Upon reaching his majority, Aegon was entrusted with ever greater responsibilities by his grandfather and father, who appointed him to several positions befitting his station as the second in line to the Iron Throne where he could put his talents to use. He was early on given wide-reaching authority to oversee the administration of the vast Imperial Demesne consisting of the Crown Provinces of the Empire.

Under his stewardship, the infrastructure of the Empire flourished as he directed the construction and expansion of his grandfather’s road networks and other projects. It was during this time that Aegon began developing an ambition to create the Dragonroads, a vast network of highways made out of dragonstone like the old dragon roads in Essos that crisscross all over the land like a spider web and replace the paved or macadamized roads his grandfather had commissioned. It was an aspiration that both his father and grandfather agreed with and encouraged though it would take many years before the Empire had the resources to carry out the plan.

He also oversaw the meticulous planning and development of both urban centers and rural lands alike but his touch was most deeply felt in the capital itself, where Summerhall rose from a rapidly growing city and bloomed to become a true Imperial City, laid out with precision and a vision that would draw comparisons to the glories of Old Valyria.

Aegon married his cousin Visenya, the eldest daughter of his uncle Aegor and aunt Rhaena, in the year 10 IC/136 AD (35 AC), and their eldest child, Aerion, whom they named for the Crimson Prince, was born less than a year later in 11 IC/137 AD (36 AC). Aegon fathered many children on his young bride and proved to be a devoted family man and father, raising them as well as his grandparents and parents had raised their own children.

Beyond just domestic matters however, Prince Aegon also proved himself exceedingly capable in military affairs, expertly commanding the expedition that had reclaimed Gogossos for the heirs of Valyria in 25 IC/151 AD (50 AC), vanquishing the chimeric horrors within and claiming its treasures and secrets for the Empire with minimal losses.

With the rapid deaths of first his grandparents and then later his parents in 38 IC/164 AD (63 AC), Aegon II became Emperor at the seasoned age of fifty-two. By the time the Crown of Conquest passed to him, Aegon II was no longer a mere prince but an experienced statesman and administrator well renowned for his accoladed accomplishments, political acumen, and sage-like wisdom. His ascension was thus met with great excitement and hopes for the future and he did not disappoint.

As the third emperor, Aegon II inherited the great projects and works of the previous generations, and it was during the long decades of his reign that near all of the long-term projects his grandparents and parents had set into motion were at long last brought to fruition. Some had even been expanded beyond their wildest dreams.

Aegon II’s reign is thus remembered as the dawn of the Golden Age, a new era of prosperity, learning, and culture. The common folk and nobility alike reaped the benefits, enjoying greater stability, trade, wealth, and the flourishing of arts and sciences, and earning Aegon many illustrious epithets, including that of the Sage Emperor, the Wise, the Golden, and especially the Glorious. Monikers bestowed in recognition of his vast contributions to the welfare, wealth, and advancement of the empire.

His name was spoken in the same breath as the legendary Bran the Builder, for he not only completed grand structures of stone and mortar but also wove together the strands of commerce, law, and education into a cohesive and enduring legacy. His vision for Summerhall saw the Imperial City adorned with monuments, triumphal arches, and public works of such scale and elegance that they rivaled the greatest cities of the known world.

Some of the many great projects that Aegon II completed during his reign include the aforementioned Dragonroads he had long dreamed of, replacing the entirety of the imperial highway network with roads made out of indestructible dragonstone that cut through mountains and forests alike and bridged even the greatest of rivers with ease to allow quick and easy trade and travel across the entire realm. These Dragonroads were even extended into Essos where they extended from the Empire’s territories in the Heel out to Pentos, Chroyane, and Volon Therys, linking up with the old dragon roads that had been made by Valyria.

Aegon II also even undertook the highly expensive, difficult, and ambitious task of remaking the entirety of Summerhall Castle in dragonstone, finding it not fitting and proper that the imperial castle was not made out of the material. The project took decades to complete due to the enormous size of the castle and its critical importance to the Empire’s governance and court but it was completed by the end of his reign.

Aegon did not make any major changes to the dimensions and design of the castle for the most part, leaving it entirely as his grandparents had envisioned (including the Dragonpit they had built in the Dragonwood from the ground up with dragonstone), with one exception. The heights of the five towers had been more than doubled, something only possible due to their remaking in dragonstone.

Each of the five towers was now over a thousand feet tall, taller than the Five Forts in Essos, the Wall to the north, and even the Hightower in Oldtown before its destruction, by far, making them more than equal to the topless towers of Old Valyria. The Tower of Autumn increased from 400 to 1050 feet, the Tower of Spring from 450 to 1100 feet, the Tower of Winter from 500 to 1200 feet, and the Tower of Summer from 550 to 1300 feet. Dragonsreach increased the most, going from 650 to 1,650 feet in height, a gargantuan awe-inspiring height that almost rivalled Casterly Rock’s 2100 feet in height though not in enormity.

Advancements in technology and magic created elevators, pipes, and plumbing that could somehow scale these heights as well, reducing the burden on the inhabitants and servants of the castle while the Targaryens continued to fly from the tops of the towers to the bottom of the castle upon their dragons.

The draining of the Neck that had begun in the reign of Aegon I was also fully completed early in Aegon II’s reign, permanently destroying the geographic barrier between the north and south of Westeros though a moderate wetland preserve remained in the heart of the old marshes where lizard lions and other native flora and fauna could still survive and thrive, unmolested by imperial law. The rest of the Neck was made into arable farmland and became quite the prosperous province, more densely populated than other regions further north that remained sparsely populated despite the increasing amount of colonization and growth.

With less humans to compete with, the population of mammoths, unicorns, and other unique and large wild animals in the North began to enter into the tens, if not hundreds, of thousands, with much of the Stony Shore, Rills, Barrowlands, and beyond altered into a highly productive mammoth steppe ecosystem that was well suited for farming and grazing while the Wolfswood continued to expand and grow. All of these replenished natural ecosystems and resources helped to support the ongoing colonization efforts and slowly made the North more and more attractive to migrants despite the harsh wintry climate.

Aegon II carefully oversaw the colonization of the North, managing the settlement of legionary veteran colonies and the influx of migrants from the rest of the Empire and Essos in such a way that it would not damage the thriving ecosystem and large populations of megafauna that had brought such benefits to the region.

His reign also saw the final completion of the Harroway-Summerhall Canal, also known as the Trident-Dragons Eye Canal. Beginning during the reign of his grandfather, several rivers which flowed into the Dragons Eye, including the Rippledown Rill, were diverted to run through Summerhall City and provide flowing water for sewage, sanitation, drinking water, mills, steelworks, tanneries, and more. Rivers flowing into the Trident such as Big and Little Willow were diverted to run through Harroway where the Trident’s three major forks all merged. A canal was then built to link these diverted and accumulated rivers, centralizing toll collection and control of the river trade network and massively promoting the growth of both Harroway and Summerhall which had already been thriving. Harroway expanded onto all sides of the Trident River and canal at the convergence point while another town sprang up on the convergence of the Green and Blue Forks a few miles upstream.

Beyond Westeros, Aegon II oversaw the formal treaties that turned the Lannister Kingdom of Hardhome, the Butterfly Isle of Naath, and the Principalities of the Summer Isles, all into tributaries and vassals of the Empire of Westeros, strengthening its political and diplomatic power as well as its economy as each new tributary contributed vast goods, many of which the Targaryens found ways to grow and source in their own domains such as the Basilisk Isles and North.

The official submission of House Lannister of Hardhome to the suzerainty of House Targaryen also ended decades worth of uncertainty and fear in the former that the Targaryens would suddenly conquer them and end their new realm. Though they had been made to become tributaries, they had been allowed to keep their kingly title and were not directly annexed into the Empire, remaining at least nominally independent. The formalized relationship also eased the movement of imperial prisoners and malcontents to Hardhome, making official what had already been the state of affairs since Hardhome’s original independence under Loren Lannister.

Hardhome officially replaced the Night’s Watch as a penal colony though the Empire would also make great use of the colonies in the North and Basilisk Isles for this purpose, helping to grow the populations of all three regions.

Elissa Farman and the rest of the Guild of Venturers continued their westward and southward explorations into the Sunset Sea under Aegon II as well who had continued his grandparents’ sponsorship of them. They continued to find new lands and islands in the Sunset Sea though none of them were ever inhabited by any civilizations until they finally reached landfall on a huge continent to the far west that they only later realized was the far eastern coast of Essos.

Meanwhile, the East Empire Company continued expanding its operations in the Shivering, Summer, and Jade Seas, funding more voyages to both explore and trade ever more eastward. A new rising star in the East Empire Company around this time was Ser Corlys Velaryon, the heir of House Velaryon of Duskendale and Driftmark, who improved on the original caravel designs of Elissa Farman and built the ship which would give him his epithet, the Sea Snake, the first ever carrack in the world. Carracks would soon become as common if not more so than caravels in the use of both organizations, greatly easing trade and exploration.

As a member of both the Guild of Venturers and the East Empire Company, Corlys took part in countless expeditions in all directions, becoming as renowned a seafarer as Elissa Farman whom he admired.

Though the East Empire Company was owned as a monopoly by House Targaryen, Corlys’ membership of the company allowed him to take home some of the profits for himself, especially given his key role as a seafarer in the company and the Guild of Venturers. The wealth allowed him to enrich his branch of House Velaryon, further expanding Duskendale into a mighty city and building another city and castle, Spicetown and High Tide, on the island of Dritmark to complement Hull and Castle Driftmark.

It was during Aegon II’s reign that between Elissa Farman and the Guild of Venturers and Corlys Velaryon and the East Empire Company, the world was finally circumnavigated. Their ships eventually met each other in the middle as they traveled past the Sunset Sea and the Saffron Straits and Mossovy respectively into the unchartered seas and lands of Far Eastern Essos, reporting back to Westeros that the lands of Essos on the maps of the Known World were but half of the continent which extended further beyond Asshai by the same distance Asshai was from Tyrosh.

The voyagers also began exploring the coasts of Sothoryos and Ulthos, with aspirations to eventually chart every coast in the world.

Curiously, the explorers found no major civilizations in the new lands, instead finding only desolate wastelands, eldritch horrors, tribes of barbarians and monsters, and virgin wilderness.

Claims were officially laid to many of these new lands in the name of the Iron Throne, but apart from the original Three Conquerors Elissa Farman had discovered which were annexed into the Empire, partly due to their flattering name, and made a waystation, the Empire showed little interest in these lands during the reigns of Aegon II and his successors.

Exploration was sponsored for the sake of it, to make productive use of a great excess of wealth and for the excitement of finding new lands, and potentially new civilizations to trade and exact tribute from. It was therefore disappointing when no civilizations were ever discovered and the increasing danger and risk of the explorations convinced Aegon II to reduce funding for exploration.

Many ships and crews had been lost to madness or had never returned due to the dangers and horrors lurking beyond the Known World, with sites similar to Yeen, Asshai, the Grey Wastes, and the Green Hell making it extremely perilous. Exploration was giving little for the lives lost for it and so Aegon II eventually redirected the Guild of Venturers and the East Empire Company to focus on trade and adventure in the Old World instead of their hopes of charting more new lands.

Aegon II had no desire to annex or colonize any of these dangerous and strange faraway places. The Empire had more than enough lands and resources in its own domains and tributaries already and the resettlement of their still depopulated regions would need to be long completed before he or any of his heirs would even consider colonizing those far off and dangerous wildernesses.

No one else in the Old World showed much interest in colonizing the new lands either. All across Western Essos, there were vast swathes of empty and depopulated lands in the Rhoyne, the Dothraki Sea, Ghiscar, the Plains of the Jogos Nhai, and more that could be much more easily colonized or at the very least contested against the nomadic Dothraki and Jogos Nhai than to send ships to extremely far away and even more dangerous wildernesses with unknown horrors.

Few also wanted to tread on the toes of the fearsome Dragon Emperors of the West, for though Aegon and his heirs lacked any interest in colonizing those lands for themselves, they did not wish any others to claim them either out of pride for they had funded the voyages that had discovered them and their explorers had laid claim to them in their name.

Aegon II finally passed away at the exceedingly impressive age of one hundred and two in the year 88 IC/214 AD (113 AC), having reigned for half a century, and becoming consequently known as ‘Aegon the Old’ in addition to all his many other epithets. His reign reign longer than any other emperor, though still technically shorter than the rule of his grandfather if the latter’s tenures as first Lord of Dragonstone and then King of the Rivers and Hills were included.

His rule is remembered as being enormously successful both domestically and abroad. The Empire was more populous, united, and wealthier than ever before. In fact, it became so wealthy that travelers and merchants from overseas began to say to each other, ‘precious stones are pebbles in Westeros for children to play with.’

This prosperity, along with the greatly altered religious, cultural, linguistic, and ethnic demographics of Westeros from years of immigration and integration finally won House Targaryen the complete loyalty of their Empire, much of which had been brutally conquered and resentful for decades.

The last of Aegon I’s children and compatriots died during Aegon II’s reign and their passing marked the end of all living memory of what Westeros had been like during the Wars of Conquest, let alone before them.

By the end of Aegon II’s own reign, there were none left in Westeros that remembered the devastation of the Wars of Conquest. All of those things were just numbers on a page, words in a history book, necessary sacrifices for the vision of a united empire. People only remembered the enormous prosperity and wealth the Empire had brought and the new united Imperial identity, the culture of loyalty to House Targaryen, religious tolerance and freedom, and the ever-evolving Imperial Common Tongue all solidified.

IV, Aerion II the Hundred-Day Emperor, 88 IC – 89 IC

Aerion II was born in 11 IC/137 AD (36 AC), during the reign of his great-grandfather, Aegon I. Due to the longevity of his family, Aerion II spent the vast majority of his life as a prince. He was twenty-four when Aegon I died, and twenty-seven when his namesake and grandfather, Aerion I died. For the next fifty years, he served ably as his father, Aegon II’s Crown Prince and Grand Chancellor, playing arguably as important a role as his sire in bringing about the Golden Age.

By the time his father finally passed away however, Aerion was already seventy-seven years old himself and his health was failing from his advanced age and the stress of his years of service. He reigned for barely one hundred days at the turn of 88 IC/214 AD (113 AC) into 89 IC/215 AD (114 AC), giving him the appellative, ‘The Hundred-Day Emperor.’

Aerion II’s short reign and quick death after the incredibly long and prosperous rule of Aegon II mirrored that of their respective namesakes, as Aerion I had similarly died after a short rule of just three years after the extremely long reign of Aegon I. This uncanny repetition of history led many to begin privately wondering to themselves if the name Aerion was cursed, especially since Lord Aerion Targaryen, the father of the Conqueror, had also not lived as long as he could have.

Many rebuked this argument however, insisting that it was simply the natural passage of time and the occurrence of fate. Both Aegon I and Aegon II had been blessed with exceedingly long lives and though shorter-lived than their fathers, Aerion I and Aerion II had both lived far beyond the average lifespan. Furthermore, both Aerion I and Aerion II had contributed immensely to the reigns of their respective fathers and thus to call their name cursed was an enormous disrespect and discredit to their long and storied service as Crown Princes.

In summary, just because their reigns as Emperors had been short, did not mean that the two Aerions failed to make their mark on history or live fulfilling and long lives.

V, Daemon I Darkflame, 89 IC – 104 IC

Daemon I was born in 31 IC/157 AD (56 AC) during the reign of his great-great grandfather, Aegon I, and his birth caused a bit of a happy problem for the Targaryen Dynasty due to the question of his title. The Dynastic Laws of House Targaryen automatically entitled the children and male-line grandchildren of any reigning Emperor or serving Crown Prince to the styling of His or Her Imperial Highness, Prince or Princess of the Empire.

Daemon I however was neither of those at the time, as his grandfather, Aegon II, was himself but a mere Prince of the Empire as son of the Crown Prince and grandson of the Emperor. That Aegon I and his heirs had been blessed with long enough lives and great enough success in having children to encounter this ‘problem’ was seen as a very good omen for the Targaryen Dynasty indeed and Aegon I soon resolved it by formally issuing Letters Patent to his descendant, granting him his rightful styling and honors as a Prince of the Empire.

This was permissible despite his removal in descent from Aegon I himself due to clauses in the Dynastic Laws allowing the granting of titles to the children or male-line grandchildren of any reigning or eventual Emperor; Daemon I, his father, and grandfather, were all in the apparent line of succession, guaranteed to one day reign as Emperors should they live long enough.

And reign he did. In the year 89 IC/215 AD (114 AC), after the brief hundred-day reign of his father, Aerion II, Daemon ascended the Iron Throne as the fifth Emperor of Westeros at the age of fifty-eight.

During the reigns of his predecessors, when he had been but a mere prince, Daemon had become renowned as a peerless swordsman and knight, taking part in countless tourneys, jousts, and battles.

He was also an avid battlemage, mastering the technique of bloodfire and taking it to new heights; historical records indicate that Daemon’s fire was darker and hotter than was typical, at times appearing almost black in color. Some traced a connection between this and his dragon bond with Balerion the Black Dread, whom he claimed as his mount at the age of twelve, eight years after the death of Balerion’s previous rider, Aegon I.

Much like his predecessor as Balerion’s mount, Daemon I was destined for glory and war. During the Golden Reign of his grandfather, Aegon II, he was instrumental in the campaigns that compelled the submission of Naath, the Summer Isles, and Hardhome as tributaries and vassals to the Empire and the experience made him hungry for more.

Upon his own ascension to the Iron Throne, Daemon immediately commissioned plans for further expansion and glory. In the greatest expansion of Imperial power eastward since the Disciplining of the Daughters and the colonization of the Basilisk Isles in Aegon I’s reign, the Order of the Dragonlords, the Imperial Legion, and the Imperial Navy waged a war of extermination on the Dothraki.

The Empire and its dragonlords had long protected the Free Cities from the predations of the Dothraki and had at times engaged in competitive sports amongst each other to hunt khalasars for leisure, but this campaign marked the first time that the Empire made a concerted effort to drive out and destroy the Dothraki.

Using glass candles to hunt down and destroy as many Dothraki khalasars as they could, the Empire’s dragonlords drove them far beyond the Sarne River into the depths of the Great Grass Sea. The final and most punishing blow came when the beleaguered Dothraki withdrew to their most sacred site, the city of Vaes Dothrak, and the dragonlords followed them there, scouring the entire city and slaughtering hundreds of thousands of the barbarians. All but extinct, the power of the Dothraki had been broken though it would take Western Essos centuries to recover from the devastation they had wreaked upon it.

In the aftermath of the Dothraki’s defeat, the Empire collaborated with all of its tributaries in the Free Cities to collectively rebuild the Lost Free City of Essaria, which was established anew as another tributary and client state of the Empire. To the north of Essaria, Saath, the last surviving remnant of the Kingdom of Sarnor, similarly became a tributary and could finally breathe easy with their city under imperial protection and the Dothraki scourge gone for good. Many began to even hope that they might one day restore the entirety of Sarnor to its former glory.

Meanwhile in the south, the cities of Slaver’s Bay and Ghiscar had long been both wary and defiant of the Targaryen Empire and its policies against slavery. With the Dothraki destroyed, the Empire turned its attention towards humbling these errant subjects of Old Valyria. Imperial armies and fleets sacked almost every city in the region, extracting enormous amounts of wealth and freed slaves to take back home to Westeros.

The city of Tolos was rewarded when it backstabbed all of its neighbors and gave aid to the Targaryens, agreeing to abolish slavery and become a tributary of the Empire. Tolos was then allowed to annex the weakened Mantarys and Elyria as well as occupy the empty ruins of Bhorash and the Isle of Cedars and with his power as Archon of Valyria, Daemon I formally chartered Tolos as a Free City.

The creation of Tolos as a Free City as well as the resurrection of Essaria helps to demonstrate the exact relationship the Empire had with the Free Cities. House Targaryen and the Empire defined themselves as the Heirs of Valyria, with full inheritance of the Freehold’s authority and role as protector and hegemon of the Free Cities, the Daughters of Valyria, whom they granted protection and the right of self-rule so long as they remained disciplined and loyal.

In the days before the Doom, Volantis, Lys, Myr, Tyrosh, Pentos, Lorath, Norvos, Qohor, and Essaria had been the only Free Cities formally chartered with self-rule by the Freehold, though Braavos as the Bastard Daughter was often considered a Free City. After the Doom, Essaria was destroyed by the Dothraki and Gogossos rose to such prominence that like Braavos it had been considered a Free City for a time before its own fall due to the Red Death.

During the reign of Aegon I, Tyrosh, Lys, Myr, and Gogossos had all been annexed into the Empire directly, while Volantis, Pentos, Lorath, Norvos, Qohor, and Braavos had all been subjugated to the Empire as vassal states though allowed self-rule, as the former five had been in the days of Old Valyria, reducing the number of Free Cities to six.

Now with the resurrection of Essaria and the upgrading of Tolos’s status, the Empire had eight vassal Free Cities to project influence across Western Essos and cement their political and economic dominance.

Despite expectations that he would similarly make Meereen, Yunkai, Astapor, and New Ghis into tributaries, Daemon I refrained from doing so. He greatly disdained the Ghiscari and their mockeries of Valyria and its culture, refusing to grant them even a fraction of the protection they would be entitled to if they abolished slavery and became vassals of the Empire.

Instead, Daemon contented himself with brutally sacking all four cities and taking almost all of their wealth and slaves before using the new tributary of Tolos and its control of the Isle of Cedars as well as the Imperial Crown Province of Gogossos to cripple the slave trade and economically strangle the Ghiscari cities out of pure spite. A policy which caused the total collapse of Yunkai and Astapor and their subsequent incorporation into a weakened Meereen that was barely stronger.

It is likely that the only reason the Ghiscari cities weren’t utterly destroyed is because the earlier removal of the Dothraki, ironically also by the Targaryens, ensured there was none in the region that could and would finish them off.

Beyond these campaigns, Daemon also sent fleets and dragonlords to levy tribute and homage from Omber, Ibben, the Thousand Isles, Mossovy, Lhazar, Qarth, the Cinnamon Isles, Yi Ti, Leng, Asshai, and the islands of the Jade Sea. Though none of those lands were made formal tributaries, all of them consented to giving the tributes and gifts to remain on good terms with the Dragon Emperor and the power, prestige, and wealth of the Empire of Westeros continued to swell.

Part of the tributes levied were incredulously favorable concessions for the Imperial-owned East Empire Company which became more powerful and wealthier than ever before.

Daemon’s faithful dragon, Balerion, accompanied him throughout all of these campaigns and affairs, and it was during Daemon’s time as his rider that Balerion reached his greatest size and ferocity, though by the end of his reign, the ancient dragon had undeniably grown old and sluggish.

The King of Dragons had already been one hundred and eighty-two years old when Daemon had claimed him and when Daemon passed away in the year 104 IC/230 AD (129 AC) at the age of seventy-three, Balerion was two hundred and forty-three years old and it was clear to all that he did not have long left.

VI, Aegon III the Dragonkeeper, 104 IC – Present

Aegon III was born the eldest son of Daemon I Darkflame in the year 53 IC/179 AD (78 AC), during the reign of his great-grandfather, Aegon II the Glorious.

He became Emperor at the age of fifty-one in 104 IC/230 AD (129 AC), and his ascension helped to solidify the perception in the Empire that the emperors were always long-lived, experienced, sage-like, and wise older men, with this worldview even making its way into books, paintings, portraits, and other works of art both fictional and non-fictional. Emperors were almost always portrayed as wise and older individuals.

But even old emperors were young and full of youthful passions once.

From a very young age, Aegon III had always greatly loved dragons, more even than the rest of his family. He would constantly and devotedly study dragonlore and learnt at the feet of the Dragonkeepers and Dragonguard, taking personal charge of the care and grooming of dragons, including his own eventual mount. Something that was unheard of for a Targaryen Prince and thus Aegon was named the Dragonkeeper, though many wondered if that nickname was meant more as a mockery than a compliment by rivals jealous of his status as heir to throne who wanted to disparage him as being more like a servant than a prince.

Aegon’s family also despaired for he showed more interest in dragons than girls until he finally met someone who adored dragons nearly as much as he did: Laena Targaryen-Azantys, Princess of the Blood Azantys, his future wife.

The pair bonded over their love of dragons and after their marriage was finalized, both were finally allowed to claim dragons of their own (Emperor Aegon II had forbidden his namesake from claiming a dragon earlier in fear that he would cease paying attention to women entirely.)

After his marriage in 70 IC/196 AD (95 AC), Aegon chose the mount of Empress Visenya, Vhagar, the Bronze Fury herself, as his dragon, and his bride was allowed to claim Caraxes the Blood Wyrm.

Along with his father’s bond to Balerion the Black Dread and his mother being allowed to claim Meraxes, the Silver Queen, after her marriage, this arrangement ensured that the Imperial Family continued to maintain direct control of the oldest and largest dragons in the entire world.

But even dragons would die as the endless march of time progressed. Balerion the Black Dread died at the age of two-hundred and forty-nine in the year 110 IC/236 AD (135 AC) and Meraxes the Silver Queen also passed away at the age of two-hundred and thirty-six in the year 124 IC/250 AD (149 AC).

Both ancient dragons had died peacefully and graciously from old age, but their passing nonetheless came as a shock to the Empire. Many mistakenly believed that Balerion and Meraxes were the first dragons to have ever died since the Century of Blood when the four older dragons that Aenar the Exile had brought from Valyria had perished but this was not true. Several dragons had died in the century or so that had passed since the Empire’s founding, usually hatchlings who had been sickly or malformed or killed by older dragons, with the occasional uncontrolled fights between dragons that ended in severe injuries and fatalities, as was a natural phenomenon in all aggressive animals.

Nonetheless it was true that Balerion and Meraxes were the first truly renowned and famous dragons to die during the Age of the Empire, and their passing was mourned by many as the impending end of an epoch of history. Balerion had been the last-living creature in the world to have seen Valyria before the Doom and with his and Meraxes’ passing, Vhagar was the last-living dragon of the Conqueror and his sister-wives.

Aegon III was greatly aggrieved by the passing of Balerion and Meraxes, feeling not only the historical weight of it but also the loss of yet another remaining piece he had of his parents, whom had been their last riders. Nonetheless, he did not wallow in his grief and allow the shock the Empire felt at the passing of the ancient dragons to weaken the legendary reputation that dragonkind enjoyed overall.

Instead, he took advantage of it to elevate that legend. Aegon gave both Balerion and Meraxes extremely lavish funerals that memorialized and immortalized their lives and great deeds in the service of House Targaryen before, during, and after the Wars of Conquest. Those ceremonies also stressed and emphasized the venerable age both dragons had died at and their passing from explicitly natural causes. Thus, the reputation of dragons as invincible and unstoppable remained intact in the eyes of the Empire, though with the caveat that like all animals they could and would one day die from old age.

To further reinforce this legend, Aegon commissioned a grand Imperial Mausoleum and when it was completed, he had the ashes of all the previous members of the Imperial Family as well as distinguished dragonriders from the rest of House Targaryen removed from their previous resting places and reinterred in the mausoleum.

There in the mausoleum, the skulls of both Balerion and Meraxes were placed on platforms that almost resembled altars, surrounded by candles and constant vigils and the ashes of their riders were placed nearby as well with statues, portraits, and descriptions of their lives. Aegon the Conqueror and Daemon Darkflame were both reinterred near Balerion’s skull for example, though still honoring their respective wishes to be interred beside their wives.

The Imperial Mausoleum was also opened to the public after the elaborate and public ceremonies in which first Balerion and later Meraxes’ skulls were laid to rest there and the entire mausoleum was made almost into a shrine venerating the Imperial Family, the Conquerors, distinguished dragonlords, and of course, the dragons, reinforcing and strengthening the Imperial Cult that had first developed in the reign of Aegon I.

The skulls of the four dragons who had perished during the Century of Blood were also moved to the mausoleum and given their own shrines, but the skulls of dragons who had died young such as malformed hatchlings were kept in storage along with the rest of the remains of the large dragons.

The vast amount of dragonbone, hide, scales, teeth, and claws that House Targaryen had accumulated over the centuries was enormous. A single large dragon like Balerion could alone contribute a huge sum and this store of treasure had been made use of over the centuries to make weapons, armor, and jewelry, a tradition that Aegon III continued.

He outfitted the Dragonkeepers with dragonhide leather clothing and uniforms to help protect them from the dragons they cared for while the Dragonguard increasingly made use of dragonbone for bows, hilts, blades, and armor in addition to their traditional weapons and armor. Valyrian steel was too expensive and prestigious to give to the Dragonguard in large numbers and so dragonbone or dragonbone-steel composites were seen as a good alternative.

Aegon III also gave more of the Rangers dragonbone bows, though he refrained from making it standard issue due to the value of the material and the dangerous lives the Rangers led.

True to his reputation as the Dragonkeeper, Aegon III undertook great efforts in his reign to improve the care of the dragons. He massively expanded the ranks of the Dragonkeepers and the Dragonguard both and also built countless new Dragonpits to solve the overcrowding that had developed in the existing infrastructure.

He also ordered the transcribing and copying of all dragonlore and knowledge held in the vaults as an update and expansion on Aegon I’s old policies of holding three copies in Summerhall, the Isle of Queens, and Dragonstone, sending additional copies and backups to other strongholds such as Casterly Rock and Storm’s End where they were placed under heavy guard by the Dragonguard.

The Isle of Queens meanwhile fully blossomed into a prosperous settlement and location under Aegon III’s rule, full of manses, castles, vaults, Dragonpits, and resorts. Aegon reorganized and reformed the Order of Dragonlords to be more efficient and further expanded their headquarters on the Isle of Queens and in Summerhall.

During Aegon III’s reign, the population of dragons surpassed two hundred for the first time since the Doom of Valyria and the epithet which had once been used to mock him now acclaimed him for his efforts in ensuring the continued longevity of the species that gave House Targaryen its power.

Dragons were not the only species to thrive under Aegon III’s reign. During his rule, with more than a century having passed since the Wars of Conquest, it was officially recorded in the Imperial Census that every populated region in the Empire had recovered from the devastation of the Wars of Conquest and the Century of Blood.

The North, Dorne, the Iron Islands, and the devastated parts of the Vale, Reach, and Stormlands, had all either returned to or surpassed their pre-war populations, though the language, loyalties, religions, and ethnicities of those populations had been greatly altered by decades of immigration from Essos and other regions of Westeros. Over in Essos, the Verdant Heel of Essos and the Stepstones that had once been war-torn and disputed were thriving and Tyrosh, Lys, and Myr were larger and richer than ever before.

Gogossos’ colonial population meanwhile still had yet to recover to what it had been before the Red Death but it was no longer a struggling frontier colony. Gogossos and the Basilisk Isles were now a well-established Crown Province, with a thriving main city and several resource plantations, outposts, and waystations for the East Empire Company’s trade routes.

Even the tributary Kingdom of Hardhome beyond the Wall had prospered, with its borders having expanded and its population estimated to have increased from around twenty thousand in Aegon I’s time to about one hundred and fifty thousand in the reign of Aegon III after years of internal growth, assimilation of wildlings, and the continued dumping of prisoners and malcontents in the fledgling kingdom by its overlord, the Empire.

Though his favorites remained his beloved dragons, Aegon III showed favor to other animals and wildlife as well, continuing his predecessor’s policies of protecting the last remnants of the Neck’s wetlands and conserving the populations of mammoths, unicorns, aurochs, reindeer, shadowcats, direwolves, and other unique species for ecological and economic uses. Under his reign, their populations reached new heights and even began expanding into other regions of Westeros like they had in ancient times.

Unicorns were reintroduced into the Red Mountains, the Mountains of the Moon, and the western hills, while mammoths and aurochs found use as beasts of burden, war, castle, and other domesticated uses in southern Westeros though their wild ranges still remained largely restricted to the north of the Neck. Lions, shadowcats, direwolves, and other major predators continued to have tense relations with local communities but the mediation of the Crown and the cunning policies of the Dragon Emperors had helped to discover means for coexistence.

The Imperial Menagerie and Zoo as well as the Botanical Gardens and other societies meanwhile continued to expand and flourish, cataloguing all the wondrous plants and animals to be found within and without the borders of the Empire, finding economic and ecological uses for them as well as promoting appreciation of natural beauty and wonder.

Dragons and other animals are not the only things that Aegon III concerns himself with though. After his grandfather’s short reign and his father’s occupation with waging war and expanding the power of the Empire over foreign, he is the first emperor since his namesake, Aegon II the Glorious, to have a long and peaceful reign and he has begun to devise grand new infrastructure megaprojects that continue where the Glorious left off.

Foremost among these is a plan to widen, deepen, and overall upgrade and expand the Harroway-Summerhall Canal so that it can support the free passage and shipping of oceangoing ships instead of just river barges in order to simplify logistics and trade. In addition, another canal is being planned that will link Seagard to the Green Fork and create a passageway between the Sunset and Narrow Seas navigable to oceangoing ships (with the Green Fork and Trident being dredged and widened and bridges modified to drawbridges where necessary).

The latest advancements in infrastructural and architectural knowledge in addition to magic such as wildfire and stoneshaping (for dragonstone) and the use of mammoths or possibly even dragons are all being considered to speed up the projects and make them less costly yet even so both of them are estimated to be multigenerational. Not that that is a failing. Indeed, much like the Dragonroads and the first iteration of the Harroway-Summerhall Canal, such long-term multigenerational projects are proof of forward thinking and a testament to the enduring legacy and promising future of House Targaryen. They will be here for many more centuries to come, and Westeros is better off for it by far.

Emperor Aegon III is now seventy-five years old and has reigned for twenty-four years. Though old, he remains hale and sound of mind and continues to rule ably and wisely. Long may he reign! Long live the Emperor! Long live the Empire!

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Author’s Note: The Targaryens basically got everything from Gogossos that the Velaryons did in High Tide and afterwards they used it to grow everything the Velaryons did though they didn’t colonize it in exactly the same way (via Naathi and Summer Islanders) but instead used blood magic to help combat the local diseases.

Thanks to Poke_verse for making the table for the emperors!

I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and this nostalgic tradition as this chapter greatly resembles the history interludes of High Tide or the Annals of Kings from Land of the King! Please let me know your thoughts, suggestions, and questions in the comments below or over on Discord!

There’s just one chapter of Divide and Conquer left, the epilogue, so I’m hoping you will all stay tuned for the ending and then stick around for my next fic; The Force Shall Free Me (SW Sith Anakin AU)!