Chapter 359: 354: Big News

"I will need to have a look with my own eyes on how did the situation became like this." Antonius stood up taking his coat and took a deep breathe before he left the tent, exhaling a line of white fume in to the air. "Yuri should have finished his job by the time we arrive."

The soldier standing on guard immediately bowed down acknowledging the order, and started packing up while Antonius went back in staring at the teenager. "Boy, where would you want to go after this?"

The teenager hesitated a bit, and then raised his head again looking determined. "My lord, may I humbly request to follow you on this trip? I can prove myself to be helpful as a guide inside the city."

"I grant your request." Antonius nodded rubbing the teenager on his head. "But I have not heard of your name yet."

"Your highness, my name is Mikhail." The teenager answered. "That boy outside is my brother over there, he is, called Yakob."Nikola."

"Mikhail… Yakob…" Antonius tried to remember this two names in to his brain when he realised some thing. "You two are not local inhabitants, aren't you?"

The teenager called Mikhail lowered his head with his lips twitching, and slowly nodded his head.

Realising that this question might be quite sensitive, Antonius asked no further question sighed, leaving a trail of white smog in the tent. Then he left the tent to prepare his own things before he sets off, while the guard standing behind went forward too following his superior, and not forgetting to give this teenager a slight whack on the head with a stare containing an easy message – you said way too many things.

The team of cavalries started travelling again, this time at full speed totally not caring about the health of the horse's hoes. Antonius knows that he must get in to the city of Drama fast before the others could have time to react, as the execution of the local governor will surely strike on the nerves of some fellows making them jump in scare, which in the end of the day might force them to do some thing extreme. Thus, Antonius must be fast, control the city as soon as possible and put every single suspect under control. In order to achieve this, he would need the help of the local garrison force, Antonius is never worried of any thing if there is an army on operations beside him.

They arrived fast, fast enough to see blood still dripping from the head of Governor Tom dripping from the gates, with Yuri standing by the side. He has fulfilled his task of sending the governor to the after world, and now he is here guarding the corpse of the corrupt officer, chasing the bystanding crowds away and preventing any one from approaching forward to steal or damage the corpse – he still needs to show it to the admiral as a prove that he has accomplished his mission.

Upon seeing this Antonius moved through the crowd stopping his horse by Yuri, and asked him. "Did this man say anything before the execution?"

"Aye, admiral." Yuri replied after finally having a seat as his comrades are now here to take over the job from him. "He was having lunch when I bursted in to the doors chasing the guards, asked me first that why am I here, and I replied that under the order from the admiral I am here to take your head. Then surprisingly he said nothing, ordered his guards to back off closing the door, and kneeled on the floor mentioning that he knows he have disappointed you, willingly letting me chop his head down… A strange request, but I did it accordingly to what he wanted."

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Antonius bent over and pressed his kneel on the shoulder of Yuri as a form of compliment, then continued riding off to the government building totally ignoring the corpse of the corrupt governor lying there. He has no time and mood to be wasted by bothering over a dead person's body. Actually, he only needed to know the fact that this man is dead, he is completely not interested in the tales he got before he dies to pull people's sympathy towards them.

Yuri being Yuri, as careless as usual, forgot to allocate man power to continue guarding the government house after he has left for the main gate with the blood dripping head of the governor. Thus when Antonius and his calvaries rode in to the government building, they are completely not surprised when they saw a bunch of suspicious people, most likely the clerks of the regional government and may be the men of those 'kind merchants' going up and down busy carrying paper works to the back of the yard.

Before Antonius reached the back yard he could already three smoke rising in to the air with a foul smell resembling the burning of charcoal and flesh together. Antonius went to one man, arresting him on the spot and snatched the goat leathered paper from his hands. And indeed, just like what he thought, these people are busy climbing up and down here just to burn all these government paper works including the tax profiles, trade records, appointment histories and property ownership profiles. This is a clear sign that some one, inside the city and most likely also holding and important officer in the regional government, has been so damn distressed and perturbed by the sudden execution of the governor that they decided to take things to the extreme.

Burning of official documents with out authorisation is considered a severe offence under the codex written by Abdullah which is punishable from a heavy fine up to a life time locked up in prison cells depending on the importance of the documents. And the true master behind these minions dared to do this when knowing that the central government already have their eyes on this God damn place, Antonius is not sure whether it is the complacency of the culprit at force, or it is simply because this dude thinks that he is already so damn powerful in this city that he can mess around like this. But either ways, Antonius is already pissed looking at the scenery happening right before him.

"Yuri! Yuri!" Antonius called out for Yuri. "Arrest these people! Right on the stop! Do not let any one of them go away! And save as much government papers as possible! If you meet any resistance! I authorise you to kill on the spot!"

With the new order Yuri immediately marched in to the back yard with a hundred soldiers supported by the local garrison, whose commander is still faithful to Antonius after the admiral rushed to his tent telling him that the governor has been executed and questioning him who does he support. It did not take long before the commander made his choice standing on the side of Antonius pledging his allegiance again, sending out almost half of the available forces in his garrison to assist his lord in this operation against his old political ally.

Antonius read through the files one by one, and the more information he acquires the more astonished and shocked by these staggering amount of land transactions that is done with out the original owner's will. Just as what the teenager called Mikhail has mentioned earlier on, he could also find several letters written by the scribe of the deceased governor, boasting about the amount of taxation and revenue he managed to collect over the past year under his leadership, and of course several return letters from the central government praising him for his achievement, making his profile a demonstration to all other governors making others learn his experience.

It is only know when Antonius reads and recalls these things again does he finds out what an irony full of sarcasm this is; The star of last time achieved his results by cheating and exploiting the weak giving benefits to the reach, and instead of getting investigated and punished then, they made him as a statue, a totem for every one else, until the problem has became way too serious to continue being covered up.

Antonius does wants to summon Yuri again and arrest every one on this damned list who is associated to this crime, but he also knows that if he wipes them out at a single time and confiscate their wealth, the merchants and riches will start to flee from his lands refraining from trading in his ports again, and this might even cause another round of embargo or sanction from those Latin merchant republics, with some of their business associates included in this list too.

So, is there really no way to curb the crimes of these twits?

Antonius thought to himself staring at the dense winter clouds outside the wooden framed almost transparent windows, another luxury owned by the deceased governor.

There must be some way.

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