Chapter 360: 355: Romans Love Parties

The world entered the year of 1460 in a pretty violent state, with tears and wears all over it as there is war ongoing in almost every single populated space, from the West to the East. It seems like the hardest thing for human kind is to end their squabbles to have some peace, as obviously when there is tension for profits, troops with sword is the best and fastest way to solve it. Which is a similar case for the past events going on in the Greek Peninsula. But what makes things different is that Antonius has changed his role from the challenger of the Ottoman authorities and dominance to the keeper of authorities trying to build his sphere of dominance with codex of laws and dogma in the lands he have just conquered under his name.
For the most of the times, ruling over a place, making it develop continuously and prosper is much harder than conquering it with blades. There is a reason why the Nomads, like the recent Mongols, came fast and left fast. Obviously blades cannot make money duplicate itself and force crops to sprout out of the lands faster.
Antonius knows that times have changed and he cannot just pluck out all the parasites here in Drama with his cutlass and army, it would be both an economical and political dynamic. So instead he got to do things smart. Seating in the narrow spaced government building of Drama Antonius thought for one whole afternoon, and just as he is thinking there came a clerk in the name of Jerry passing the admiral a stack of documents, who gave a very interesting proposal to his lord when he heard of his problem, that is to organise a kind of concert, gather all the opponents around getting seated in one hall, and find out more about who they can take advantage of, who they can work together, who is their sworn enemies and who are the enemies that can be pulled to their side.
Antonius agreed and sent out one after another messenger informing the names on the list about the event, ordering them to come instead of asking, with a polite attitude of course. These merchants do not have any ways of resisting the order sent by Antonius as they can already see a bunch of armed men surrounding their houses waiting to burst in to their doors if they hear the word 'no'. So, they complied and with no time the whole lot of them, a total of fifty plus people arrived in the designated area settling down, and awaits their legitimate ruler to arrive.
But they waited there for like an eternity chatting with each other, waiting for their lord to arrive, and there is not a trace of Antonius showing up yet. There is also no beverages or even just plain water being served for them, leaving them here to get dried out in this chilling cold weather, as this place is located not in doors, but out doors in a terrace or some thing where there is no roof covering their heads. As time passes the riches here got increasingly frustrated and at the same time, worried with numerous fears in their heads because they know what they have done.
One of the 'guest' wanted to go out of the place to pee or some thing but was blocked off by two armed guards telling him to turn back to get seated as they have received the order from their superiors that no one is allowed to enter or leave with out permissions. The guest looked around and is utterly shocked when he realised that this entire place has been surrounded by an army, literally, with one man standing guard in every two meter interval holding spears and blades by their sides, as if they are going to fight a war.
Before the guest gets chased back in to the place again, the guards kindly offered him a pot saying that he can settle his personnel biological waste inside. The guest, who have also went through a lot of events, took over the pot with a pair of trembling hands. The moment he went back he got surrounded by people asking him what is going on outside those doors. But instead of answering he continued trembling there, and in a short while he started weeping, howling with tears right in front of every person mummering words of remorse, regretting that he has jumped in the ship with the others buying and selling lands illegally, persecuting those farmers, offering bribes to the governor, and trying to build an independent security force.

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It took the others a while to finally dig the information out of his mouth, and indeed this piece of news came as a bolt out of the blue for them, as they knows that no matter how rich or influential they are here at the moment, it is all worthless at this point of time, as money and fame certainly does not give them immortality against these armed to the teeth soldiers standing outside. These people here are all like cunning foxes thriving for years on the battle field of trade and commerce, of course they will not believe that these soldiers are here to guarantee their safety.
But not all the people here are like the man who have already been mentally broke still shedding his tears over there. These people immediately elected a senior merchant here who is the oldest, richest and holds the most amount of influence as the chairman and started discussing on the possibilities of a way out, with the perquisite idea that the Caesar Antonius, their lordship, did not come with good intentions and is possibly going to kill them all for the crimes they have committed.
The merchants quickly divided themselves in to three teams under the guidance of the elder, one team is in charge of plucking out all the grass, removing all the fire retardant materials just in case if the Caesar wants to burn them to death. One team is assigned to explore a possible way to get out of this place through the mountain terrains on their North Eastern direction. One team is on look out on the high grounds giving others enough time to get in to their feet and run if the soldiers outside start going on a rogue mode. While lastly, the elder chose one man to stay with him and came out of the terrace to try to come in to contact with the commander of the soldiers on the outside, acquire some information and if even better, negotiate in to some thing with the army.
They are still hoping that the soldiers outside are from the Garrison of Drama, so they probably can spot some familiar people there and take advantage of their influence. They knows that they have offered a lot of bribes and rewards to the various commanders of the garrisons inclusive of estates, lands, Ducats and women, while the later is supposed to offer them martial support and help them get rid of those annoying farmers who want to stay on their lands. Of course, if they are going to die in the hands of these people who accepted their bribes, they are definitely going to spit it out to pull them to hell alongside with them.
However, they are deemed to be disappointed, as they found absolutely no one familiar. Obviously their ingenious ruler has guessed their intentions and drew troops from the outside, most from the border patrol unites who have faced combat with the Ottomans for years. They did find the commander of this unit, surprisingly a Saracen with a turban over his head and an Arabic curved scimitar by his wrist. The elder and the ambassador expressed their concerns and questions, but the Saracen commander simply smiled looking at them with out saying a single word in response, pretending that he does not understand Greek.
The two men had no choice but to continue looking for their vice commander, and when they found him with the questions, the second in charge just politely brought them back to the terrace asking them to wait there patiently, reassuring them that the admiral, oh no, the Caesar shall be here shortly. Of course, the elder does not believe in his words, but they are still forced back in to the terrace with two soldiers, who proceeded on to stand guard by the gate preventing any one from coming out.
An hour later another group of armed soldiers came back, with the team who are sent out to search for another exit and caught red handed one after another. Then the soldiers obviously tightened their security measures and started watching these criminals under close proximity, which strengthened the tension in this court yard even further. Many believed that today is their doom's day, and their mental defences started collapsing too kneeling on the ground weeping.

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