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OK, but We Still Have 1 Very Important Question About This Week's Game of Thrones Battle

15/05/2019 - 11:05 AM

Warning: Game of Thrones season eight spoilers ahead.

By the strength of the Old Gods and the New, we've almost made it through season eight of Game of Thrones [1]. With only one episode of the series left to wrap up the last eight years of death and destruction [2], we have a lot of burning questions we're afraid might not be answered. Personally? I can't stop wondering how the heck Drogon's dragon fire was able to cut through the stone walls of King's Landing like a hot knife through a stick of butter.

Look, I wasn't surprised when, back in season seven, Viserion's superpowerful blue dragon fire [3] managed to cut through the Wall in the North because, well, it was made of ice. Also, blue fire is hotter than red or yellow flames. But King's Landing is made of STONE. OK, maybe there are some wooden beams spread out here and there that might have weakened the kingdom walls' structural integrity, but that doesn't mean Drogon can just slice through an ancient fortress with one fiery blow, does it? One Reddit user might have the answer.

So far, we've seen Daenerys's dragons use their fire to roast armies of men, burn down an entire fleet of ships, and also, apparently, cut through stone. While more than a few Thrones fans have tried to solve the dragon fire conundrum [4], Reddit user MrBananas [5] posits that, in order to roast hundreds of people and immediately carbonise them into ash, which poor Arya witnesses [6] firsthand, the dragon fire could have reached heights of 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Of course, we can't know for sure.

"Most castles used limestone or sandstone, depending on whatever type of rock was nearby to be quarried," the Reddit user wrote. "The melting point of limestone ranges from 825 C-1339 C. The melting point of sandstone is about 1,300 C but varies based on density." Of course, we can't know what kind of stone was available near King's Landing when it was first built since it's, ya know, fictional. But, assuming C stands for Celsius, these temperatures would indicate that a dragon's fire would have to be at least 2,400 degrees Fahrenheit to cut through stone, as we witnessed on the show's most recent episode. That's way hotter than your average oven (375 degrees Fahrenheit for fresh-baked direwolf bread [7]).

So, it might stand that the dragon triplets grew more powerful with age and that all of their fire has been strong enough to burn through stone for a while now. Drogon, given his special connection to Daenerys [8], might have also fed off of her Mad Queen anger [9] in last weekend's episode to really pull out all the fiery stops and take down all of those innocent people in King's Landing.

Of course, we can't really be sure how dragon fire works in the Thrones world, and I'm still not really sure how Drogon developed his laser-like precision, but it definitely could have come in handy when the Iron Fleet killed Rhaegal [11] — just sayin'. As for whether he has any fire left in him, we'll have to wait for the Game of Thrones finale [12] to see whether Drogon's fate is any better than that of his brothers.


Source URL
https://www.popsugar.co.uk/entertainment/How-Hot-Dragon-Fire-Game-Thrones-46156072