Simba was almost six years old and about 1.3 meters tall, which was not particularly exaggerated.
For children in modern China, plenty of six-year-olds were around 1.1 or 1.2 meters tall.
The dwarf, however, had been only ninety centimeters tall before the Dragon Queen reshaped his appearance. Even now, after being stretched to his absolute limit, he was only about 1.4 meters tall.
In the end, he was simply too short.
"Jhaqo Khal…" Tyrion's heart stirred as he suddenly remembered who Jhaqo was.
After all, with the Dragon Queen currently at the height of her power, the "achievement" of brutally killing the Dragon Queen's own son seemed incredibly significant.
When he thought about how the allied forces had mobilized the strength of entire nations and assembled an army of several hundred thousand, yet had only managed to inflict that small amount of damage on the Dragon Queen, and then compared it to Jhaqo, the rulers of the Free Cities would feel like crying.
"You…"
"Tyrion, what are you doing here?"
Just as the dwarf was about to ask another question, the bloodrider Jhogo walked over.
"Have you finished your task today?" Jhogo asked Simba with an expressionless face.
Simba lowered his head and bowed. When he raised it again, he scratched his head in confusion before carrying the water bucket back to Little Red.
The hand Tyrion had placed on Simba's head slowly clenched into a fist. Staring at the bloodrider's face, he probed cautiously, "His father was Jhaqo, yet you still let him live?"
"Drogo Khal slaughtered my parents' khalasar, and now I serve as Khaleesi's bloodrider.
Generally speaking, a brave and broad-minded khal will not kill the children of a defeated khal," Jhogo replied calmly.
Tyrion frowned. "Your Dothraki customs are truly strange."
"The attitude of your Westerosi knights toward oaths is even stranger," Jhogo replied flatly. He glanced at Tyrion, then started walking away.
"Wait." Tyrion's suspicion had not faded. He called out to the bloodrider. "I heard that Jhaqo's son was born around the same time as the queen's child. Is that right?"
Jhogo nodded expressionlessly. "Only a few days apart. Khaleesi gave birth to a son, and Jhaqo's wife gave birth to twins."
Tyrion was startled. "Simba has a sister? Where is she?"
"She serves the queen in the pyramid. She is the child who often runs around behind Jhiqui."
Tyrion stroked his chin, recalling that thin and tiny girl. She was indeed a silver-haired half-blood little horse-lord.
"If my poor nephew were still alive, would he look like Simba? Whenever I see Simba, I can't help but feel a sense of closeness," he sighed as if absentmindedly.
This was not a lie. He truly felt an inexplicable closeness toward Simba.
While saying this, Tyrion kept watching the bloodrider carefully from the corner of his eye.
Unfortunately, he was disappointed. The Dothraki man seemed like a wooden statue. His expression remained exactly the same as before, completely blank.
"The little khal does not look like Simba. He inherited Khal Drogo's black hair," Jhogo said.
"Black hair?" Tyrion felt a wave of disappointment.
The difference between silver hair and black hair was too great. There was no way to pass one off as the other.
"Where is Tessa?" he asked casually, as if trying to conceal his emotions.
After the Holy Paladin's seal was reformed and the Dragon Queen lifted her control over Tessa, the man and the dragon could sense each other again.
Before leaving, he turned back to glance at Simba one last time.
After hesitating for a moment, the dwarf stopped himself just as he was about to casually throw away the strand of silver hair he had been pinching between his fingers.
Instead, he stuffed the hair into the leather pouch at his waist. Casting aside his previous distracting thoughts, he ran excitedly toward his wyvern.
"Hisss!"
A few minutes later, the enormous wyvern leapt into the air, carrying the reborn dwarf toward the homeland he had longed for.
"You are… Fenni?"
After the dwarf left, Jhogo was preparing to leave the dragon pit for the Great Pyramid to report Tyrion's earlier suspicious behavior to Khaleesi. At that moment, he noticed a small figure hiding at the entrance of the tunnel connecting the pyramid and the dragon pit.
It was the female dwarf Fenni, gazing wistfully as the wyvern disappeared into the dim sky.
"Ah, Lord Jhogo! I… I… I…" Fenni immediately changed from melancholy to embarrassment. She became tongue-tied and flustered.
"You came to see Tyrion off?" Jhogo asked, breaking her awkwardness with his usual blank expression.
"Yes." Fenni lowered her head, her voice as faint as a mosquito's buzz.
Jhogo frowned slightly. "After he returned, he never came to see you?"
Fenni nodded gently.
She no longer lived in the Great Pyramid.
She had come to Slaver's Bay because of Tyrion, and she had been able to live in the Great Pyramid because she was the dwarf's girlfriend. Aside from Tyrion, Fenni did not have particularly close relationships with Clinton or Ashara.
Therefore, after the dwarf ran off to Westeros to help Aegon conquer the realm, the female dwarf voluntarily moved out of the Great Pyramid.
It was not as if she had nowhere to go.
After arriving in Slaver's Bay, she easily obtained Astapor city residency through Tyrion's connections and became eligible to receive a house and land.
Later, she joined a performing troupe and gradually became one of its main performers. Her monthly salary was quite respectable.
She had her own home in Astapor, and in Meereen she had staff housing assigned by the troupe. She did not worry about food or clothing, and life was fairly comfortable.
However, after leaving the Great Pyramid, she and the dwarf never had any contact again.
The last time Tyrion was injured and came to Meereen to receive the queen's treatment, Fenni visited him a few times. Unfortunately, Tyrion was unconscious, and the two missed each other again.
"Why didn't you go out to see him just now?" Jhogo asked with a blank face.
Fenni muttered something while keeping her head down, then turned around and ran off with her short legs.
Jhogo watched her back, feeling puzzled.
A few days later, he vaguely heard Irri mention the female dwarf. It seemed she had gotten married. Her husband was a comedic actor in the troupe, also a dwarf.
But that was a story for later. Seeing the female dwarf run away, Jhogo quickly forgot about the small incident.
"…That's how it was. I suspect he is beginning to suspect Simba's identity." In the queen's study, Jhogo reported Tyrion's "improper behavior" to Daenerys.
"I see." Dany thought for a moment, then said to old Aemon beside her, "He might come to you asking for the witch's lens as an excuse. Old man, keep an eye out."
Aemon nodded and sighed. "I guessed he would become suspicious. There is a strange sense of closeness between Targaryens."
Dany glanced at the dragonglass magic mirror leaning against the wall and smiled.
"Whatever feeling he has, he will forget it completely once he returns to Westeros.
With the current chaos in the Seven Kingdoms, if he is not careful, he might even lose his life."
Hearing this, Aemon's expression became complicated. "I never expected Stannis to be so ruthless."
"That is not Stannis. The real Stannis Baratheon already died beneath Winterfell. The man burning his daughter and destroying cities now is an evil spirit sent into the world by R'hllor."
"I should have burned his corpse immediately," Dany said regretfully.
"The matters in Slaver's Bay are almost finished. Do you want to return to Westeros and make him restrain himself?" Aemon asked hesitantly.
Dany's eyes gradually grew deep and dark. She tapped the table a few times with her fingers and shook her head.
"I am going to the Sea of Sorrows to fish. To be honest, while we criticize him here for his cruelty, we must admit that he has done something I have always wanted to do but could not."
"Dany, you…" Aemon was first shocked, then his shock turned into worry. "Do not act impulsively. Do not follow that bad example!
I am certain Stannis is finished. Even if he has a two-headed demon dragon, the people of the Seven Kingdoms will never accept him."
"You worry too much. Follow his example? Do you think I am that foolish?" Dany rolled her eyes.
Aemon sighed. "To be fair, Roose Bolton and Saigon Thern certainly made mistakes, but their actions are not completely incomprehensible.
It is impossible to expect everyone to face death calmly.
When we fought the allied forces to the death on the battlefield, we still allowed enemy soldiers to surrender to each other, did we not?"
Dany disagreed. "If you do not want to die, does that mean you will not die? If the Long Night does not end, everyone will die sooner or later. If people truly stop fearing death, they might even carve out a path to survival."
As they were talking, the little dark-skinned girl Missandei came over.
"Your Majesty, that Dick Tywin has come to see me several times. How should we deal with him?"
The little girl was no longer that little. Nearly five years had passed since they first met. Now she had grown into a fourteen-year-old young lady, graceful and poised.
After helping the queen handle administrative affairs for years, she had developed an intellectual and noble temperament.
"Didn't Tyrion make arrangements for him?" Dany asked.
"He is looking for Prince Leo, but Prince Gene says he is Tyrion, not the Fourth Prince of Elephant Island," Missandei said helplessly.
"He does have a point. What does Lu Xun have to do with Zhou Shuren?"
After laughing for a moment at the confused looks of the others, Dany asked again, "What does Dick want with Tyrion?"
"He wants to find his mother-in-law. He also wants Prince Leo to fulfill his promise to go to Volantis, bring his wife back, and then go to Elephant Island to become a lord. Oh, and twenty elephants as well."
"That dwarf truly is shameless. Whether Lannister or Targaryen, one should always keep their word and repay their debts."
"He probably knows about your relationship with the elephant driver and plans to throw him to you," old Aemon guessed.
"Throw him to me?" Dany sneered coldly. "Explain the matter between the Imp and Leo clearly to Dick. When the wyvern returns to Dragonstone, send him there as well."
"Actually, you could grant him a small knight's holding on Gene Island," Aemon suggested awkwardly.
Dany waved her hand. "That was the dwarf's promise, not mine."
Two days later, Dragonstone.
"Mother above! You really are Tyrion?" The Princess of Dorne's jaw nearly dropped.
"You have completely changed." Barristan looked at the dwarf with astonishment and suspicion.
If he had not already communicated with the Dragon Queen, he would certainly have suspected that the man before him was a fake.
"Your height has increased by more than half, and your face…" Bronn could not help reaching out and pinching the dwarf's Leonardo-like face several times. "You are not a Faceless Man, yet you are ten thousand times more terrifying than them. How did you do it?"
"You do not seem to doubt my identity," Tyrion said, pushing aside his old companion's hand with a grin.
"Your appearance can change, and even your height can change. But your vulgar temperament and your soul that reeks of decadence have not changed at all," Bronn said with a cold laugh, crossing his arms.
"Your voice has not changed, and neither have your mismatched eyes," Arianne said. Her gaze drifted downward from his handsome face and finally stopped at the crotch of Tyrion's trousers. She swallowed. "Your body has become well-proportioned. Your head is no longer too big and your legs too short."
When Tyrion met Arianne's moist eyes, his heart stirred slightly. He smiled and said, "Some changes can only be felt. You cannot tell just by looking."
"Ahem. Tyrion, are you a Lannister now or a Targaryen?" the old crab interrupted their flirtation and asked seriously.
"What does that matter?" The dwarf's eyes flickered, and he did not answer directly.
"I do not care about your identity, but Dragonstone will report your return to the other nobles. They need to know your choice.
You are the son of Aerys recognized by the queen. Do you understand what I mean?" the old crab said meaningfully.
"I… I need to see Jaime, and Sansa," Tyrion said hesitantly.
(End of Chapter)
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