In one of our previous articles, we theorized that the Night King was waiting all this time for a chance to capture a dragon and use him to breach the Wall, along with his large army. But still, the question remains: why did he choose to attack at this particular time in history? To answer this, we'll have to go all the way back to the Dawn of Days and the war between the Children of the Forest and the First Man. So let's jump right into this.
The creation
As we learned in "Game of Thrones" Season 6, the Children of The Forest performed a ritual.
A man was tied to the tree with the stones surrounding him in a spiral formation.Then, they plunged a piece of dragonglass into his chest, and suddenly his eyes turned blue. That's how the first White Walker a.k.a. the Night King was created. He was supposed to help the Children in the war against Men, but something went wrong, and he ended up as the ultimate force of destruction. But did he really?
If there was anything "Game of Thrones" taught us, it was the fact that everyone is the hero in their own story. The same goes for the supposed villains -- The White Walkers. There's a reason they are called the Others in "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels. They are the heroes of the other side; we just don't have their perspective.
So to understand The Night King better, let's look at things from his point of view.
The Long Night
He was just a man; now he is trapped inside the body of the White Walker. He used to be free and now he is just the tool for the Children of the Forest to achieve their goal. As a result, the seasons changed, and the frozen wasteland that later became known as the Lands of Always Winter was created.
Then, realizing what they have done, the Children signed the Pact with men on the Isle of Faces, near the God's Eye. But it wasn't until 2.000 years later that the Others came for the first time seeking revenge in an event known as the Long Night.
Eventually, the War for the Dawn came to an end when Azor Ahai, also known as the Last Hero tempered his sword Lightbringer and drove the Others back into the Lands of Always Winter.
That's when the Wall was built and the Night's Watch established.
The return of the Others
Apart from the story of 13th Lord Commander of the Night's Watch and how he fell in love with a female Other and became the Night's King ( not to be confused with the Night King), we hear nothing of Others, until the beginning of "A Game of Thrones" when they attacked those rangers beyond the Wall.
We later found out that the Night King was turning Craster's sons into the White Walkers. There's no doubt that he was building an army. But the question remains: why at that particular time? Perhaps he knew that magic would soon return to the world with a birth of dragons. And that those dragons will eventually go North of the Wall, which will enable him to acquire one.
Because it's the only way for him to get past the wall that is protected by ancient spells.
The Night King's ultimate goal
With all of this being said, it seems like the ultimate goal of the Night King is to become human again and put an end to this misery that is the "life" of the White Walker. When we put things like this, it stands the reason to believe that his real enemies are the Children of the Forest, while men are just a means to an end.
It is said that the Children are still residing on the Isle of Faces, so maybe that's where the Night King is heading. That would also explain the symbols the White Walkers are leaving behind. The one we see in the very first episode could easily be interpreted as the God's Eye with the Isle of Faces in its center (see our photo gallery).
While the spiral one perfectly recreates the formation of the stones and the tree where the Night King became what he is today. And that means one thing one thing and one thing only -- the Night King remembers what The Children of the Forest did to him and winter is coming for them.
