Capítulo 44: Hogwarts Toy Company
It was early, the sun just beginning to peek over the horizon.
Doran stood in the training yard of his family's mansion in Oldtown, the ground was covered in a layer of snow and icicles hanging from the roof. His family bought a modest two-story, 20-room mansion in Oldtown to stay during their visits. Doran lives mostly at the Citadel but spends weekends at the mansion. Every morning since that day in Tyrosh nearly two years ago, Doran trains with Lothar and his friends.
His training consists mainly of fencing but in recent months Lothar has started to add other weapons to his routine.
Doran was currently training with his cousin Theodan Toland, both boys wearing thick wool doublets under their leather breastplates to protect them from the winter chill. Winter started a few months ago and Oldtown was covered in snow and ice.
`If it's this cold this far south I can't even imagine how cold it might be in the North,` Doran thinks absently as he dodges one of his cousin's attacks.
Rickard told him in one of his letters that the snow falls day and night without stopping and that it reaches more than two meters high. Doran had never seen so much snow before, the winters at Hogwarts were white but the snow never rose more than a meter and he spent most of his adult life traveling the southern hemisphere where snow is as rare as peace. Doran is curious about this climate, he plans to visit the North during the winter when he is older to experience it for himself.
Doran blocks Theodan's blow and spins the sword, disarming him. He points his sword at his cousin's neck and tells him:
"Yield."
"Aye," Theodan groans, rubbing his wrist. "I didn't see that coming, cousin."
"That was the point." Doran jokes.
"Well fought."
"Likewise Theo. Lothar, are we still training or can we get out of the cold?" Doran asks half complaining.
"You haven't finished your training yet, my prince." Lothar looks at him amused. "Put away your swords and gear and come back here." He orders them.
The two boys obey his orders, after removing their protectors and storing them in the small armory they return to the courtyard, where they see Lothar drinking hot wine wrapped in a warm fur cloak. Both children look at him with envy.
"What are you looking at? You already know what you have to do. Get going."
The two children start to run around the mansion, every day after finishing their training they have to run around the mansion ten laps, Lothar tells them that it is to strengthen their muscles and increase their resistance but they can't help but think that Lothar's being a sadist.
`After two hours of hard training, running is the last thing I want.` After the fourth lap his muscles started to burn and he slowed down. Theo being older has more resistance and does not have such a problem, Doran sees how his cousin moves further and further away.
"Come on, my prince! You are the one who wanted to train!" Lothar laughs as Doran reaches where he is leaning against a wall.
The prince looks at him annoyed without stopping running, he tries to ignore his knight's taunts but with each turn his annoyance increases more and more. On the eighth lap his legs felt like blocks of stone and his lungs sounded like the bellows of a forge, his heart was beating so fast that the prince almost feared it would burst out of his chest. Hearing Lothar's taunts, Doran looked at him with such annoyance that if he were a basilisk the knight would be dead.
"Come on, lil prince. Your cousin finished his laps a while ago." Doran focuses on the snow on the roof above Lothar and with a wave of his hand all that snow falls on top of the unsuspecting knight. With another wave of his hand the snow melts a little soaking Lothar as if a tub of cold water had been poured on him.
"Fuck!" Shouts the knight buried in snow.
"Are you alright Lothar? Aren't you cold?" Doran scoffs as he runs past him.
Doran feels his body scream at him to rest but ignores him and keeps running, to his satisfaction on the ninth lap he doesn't see Lothar in the courtyard and after finishing his tenth lap and entering the warm mansion he sees the knight with another pair of clothes and his hair still wet.
Doran flops down on the bearskin in front of the fireplace, Myria offers him a glass of hot milk sweetened with honey, and Doran drinks greedily. After catching his breath he looks at his sworn shield with a shit-eating-grin.
"In Yi Ti they have this concept called Karma." He tells him with a laugh in his voice.
"What 's that?"
"It means that for every action an individual does there will be an equivalent reaction. If the individual is good he will be rewarded and if he is bad he will be punished."
"And who rewards or punishes him?"
"The gods my dear knight, the gods." Doran replies after taking another sip from the cup.
"Are you saying that the gods punished me by throwing snow on me?" Lothar scoffs.
"You said it, not me," Doran looks up at the ceiling and thinks about the last few months. After Tytos' Nameday banquet the Martell family spent another two weeks at Casterly Rock, spending a lot of time with all of his friends. He even introduced more games from Earth for their entertainment, he introduced Risk, Trivia, Checkers, Parcheesi and Domino. Everyone loved the games, even the adults.
Duncan, Trystanne, Lothar, Tywin, and Lewyn preferred Risk. Tytos and Genna really enjoyed playing Checkers, Mors preferred Parcheesi and Domino. Obella, Rhaella and Kevan preferred to play Trivia.
As happened with his other games, these became famous quickly, his grandmother wrote to him with the idea of creating a small company for him to sell his games. Doran named it the Hogwarts Toy Company in memory of his beloved school. With a company to distribute them Doran introduced more Earth games to this world and made a small fortune selling them in Westeros, from the North to Dorne everyone loves his games.
Risk, Chess and other strategy games have become very popular among warriors as it allows them to practice and improve their strategy and tactics.
This company not only brought him a lot of money but also fame, Doran earned another nickname for his inventions: Doran the Bright.
Doran had planned to introduce the modern inventions that he knows from his old world but he never thought of introducing games, he never thought he would make a fortune selling them. But after thinking about it for a while he saw the reason for the success of his company.
`Entertainment,` he thought with a smile. Humans require food and water to survive but they seek much more to live, they want delicious food and a wide variety of drinks, they want elegant and expensive clothes, they want and they want. And something that humans have sought and needed since its inception in ways to entertain themselves. `In this world the forms of entertainment are few, tourneys, parties and little else.`
That is why the great variety of games that Doran introduced were very successful. The ladies enjoy spending the afternoon in a room gossiping and playing parcheesi, the lords love to test their strategic minds playing chess or risk, the children entertain themselves by playing dominoes or other games.
`In Westeros there isn't much to do after you've done your duties for the day, just talk and drink.`
Doran has plans to expand his business and at some point create "Game Houses".
`Should I feel bad for wanting to introduce gambling into this world?` the mage asks himself briefly.
Game Houses will be not only a means to increase his fortune but also a great method to gather intel.
`It could be my spy network headquarters.`
PENSAMENTOS DOS CRIADORES 
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