Chapter 500

Chapter 500

Chapter 500 – Dionysius’ Cruelty

“And-” Ariandos hesitated and stopped.

“What else?!” Henipolis asked angrily.

“Some people outside the city hall claim that their loved ones didn’t betray you. Yet they were still killed by the mob, so they hoped you could bring justice to them…” Said Ariandos.

“Wrongly accused?” Henipolis scratched his hair in annoyance. That is what he fears hearing the most, so he pushed the responsibility and said, “I will leave this matter to you to deal with. Besides that, you should start working on allocating lands to those vagrants.”

After hearing Henipolis, Ariandos froze and shouted, “Milord, I don’t know how to do this!”

“If you don’t know, you can find someone else to do it.” Just as Henipolis uttered this, he suddenly froze. Find someone? Where? The mobs killed almost all the officials in the city of Laos. And to begin with, there are already very few people who have administrative experience in the city.

Henipolis sat down in dismay, ‘Should I do it myself?’ Then again, he doesn’t know where to start as he only gives orders after becoming the archon, and they are mostly not carried out. Moreover, he always hated those tedious and complicated political matters. After all, he already gets a headache just thinking about those…

Then he began thinking of the time he lived in Davos’ residence and saw mountains of bills, city-state matters, letters and so on piled up in Davos’ study. Moreover, Davos still spent most of the time dealing with official business whenever he came home… Henipolis suddenly felt, ‘Maybe I am not really fit to serve as the archon!’

Just as the two of them stared at each other, not knowing how to proceed, Hielos entered inside and said, “Lord Henipolis, now that the situation in the city has calmed down, I would like to ask when you can prepare the ships? By now, Lord Davos must be anxiously awaiting the news of our actions!”

‘Oh, this matter as well!’ Henipolis was in a trance the whole day that he forgot about this important matter. He then looked at Ariandos and said, “Go to the port immediate and prepare the ships to transport the Theonian soldiers to Clampetia.”

Ariandos then said with an embarrassed expression, “Milord, the port is now in chaos. All the sailors came to the city while the port’s managements were either killed or hiding. So where can I find people to prepare so many ships?”

Henipolis froze again and could only look at Hielos helplessly.

Hielos, on the other hand, didn’t expect this to happen, and he became a bit anxious.

Henipolis was familiar with Hielos because he went in and out of Davos’ residence several times,  so he could only look at him apologetically. Suddenly, a light flashed through his mind, and he said, “Lord Hielos, I remember that you served as a city’s praetor two times.”

Hielos didn’t know what he meant, so he nodded truthfully.

“And there is also Lord Bagul, who is currently serving as Grumentum’s praetor.” The more he spoke, the more excited he became, “As you can see, there is great chaos in the city of Laos as most of the administrative officials were killed by the mob, so the whole city could no longer function normally. Thus, I would like to ask you to help me in managing the city so that Laos can return to normal as soon as possible, which would allow you to travel to Clampetia without any problems.”

When Henipolis said this, the two people present thought they had misheard him.

“Lord Henipolis, are you kidding?” Hielos blurted out.

“Am I in the mood to joke with you in such a bad situation now?!” Henipolis impatiently said, “Do you want to leave by ship or not? Otherwise, you will have to lead the army by land!”

If they were to go to Clampetia by land, they would have to cross the entire Consentia plateau. Although there are now roads, it would still take two days. On the other hand, they still won’t set off by ship tomorrow even if they work efficiently to return Laos to normal operation. So both options would take about the same time, but Hielos was no longer a mercenary who only led people to battle. After several years of administrative management, he is sensitive to the significance of taking over Laos’ administrative authority, “I will first go back to the camp and discuss with Lord Bagul.” after saying that, Hielos left in a hurry.

“Milord, that doesn’t seem right.” Ariandos vaguely felt that something was not right.

“What’s not right?” Henipolis immediately retorted, “If you think that isn’t right, then I will leave all these things to you.”

Ariandos became embarrassed and unable to say anything.

Then, Henipolis smiled with his eyes brightening as he had come up with a brilliant idea that would allow him to get out of the city that had turned into a quagmire filled with hatred.

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

It was almost noon when Dionysius stood at the top of the broken city wall of Crotone. He then withdrew his gaze that was looking to the north and coldly said, “It seems that the young man of Theonia has no intention of accepting the war letter and having a decisive battle with us.”

“What should we do then, milord? Shall we attack them instead?!” Astagoras eagerly asked, “Cross the Neto River and attack the Theonian camp?”

Dionysius glared at the reckless strategos and said coldly, “Idiot, that’s exactly what the Theonians want! In the first place, it was because the Crotonians had rashly crossed the river that they lost to the weaker Theonia. Do you think I would be so stupid to do the same?!”

Astagoras no longer dared to speak as he could feel Dionysius was now in a bad mood.

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“Phacipessas, how long can our current grain reserves last?” Dionysius asked again.

“It can last for more than a month if we also include the food we took from the Crotonians.”

‘More than a month!’ With the Theonian fleet controlling the east coast, there would be no more aid from Sicily. Thus they could only get food from Locri and the conquered city-states, but…how much could they have? Dionysius anxiously calculated as he swept his gaze over the slightly worrying strategoi and ministers around him. Finally, his gaze landed on the big city behind him, which had several hundred years long history, and suddenly said, “Burn this place! Burn down the city of Crotone!”

“What?!”

“Destroy Crotone’s wall and burn the city!” Dionysius coldly gave the other, “Afterwards, everyone will retreat to our camp!”

Although both Syracusan strategoi and the soldiers preferred living in the comfortable houses compared to the crude tent, Dionysius had already made his decision, and no one dared to express opposition.

“Milord, what about those Crotonians? With the Acropolis’ height, we couldn’t burn them!” Phacipessas reminded.

“Leave them alone and let them ask for help. Isn’t Theonia their ally?! Didn’t that young man claim he would keep his word?! I’d like to see if the Theonians would really save them!” Dionysius’ gaze turned cold, “However, drive them back as long as the Crotonians dared to escape from the Acropolis in large numbers.”

“Understood!” Phacipessas and the other strategoi understood that this was to force the Theonians to cross the river to rescue Crotone.

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

The city of Crotone burst into flames…

After four years, another Greek city-state in Magna Graecia was burning, but for the Syracusans, this was something they had done more than once. Dionysius, the so-called “protector of Sicily”, had, in fact, destroyed many historical city-states, including Greek cities, and was no less capable of such destruction than his rival – Carthage. Hence the Syracusan soldiers skillfully placed firewoods everywhere in Crotone, soon setting the whole city on fire.

As the raging fire turned the sky of Crotone red, the people in the Acropolis bitterly cried when they saw their homes burn in the fire. Before long, the grieving people panicked due to the spreading of the fire that threatened to surround the Acropolis.

Fortunately, Lysias and Milo had prepared and sent their men out of the city to cut down the trees and weeds around the hillside. However, even though the fire did not burn the Acropolis, the scorching air and smoke caused great trouble for the tens of thousands of people inside, who felt the unbearable heat and had difficulty breathing.

With the Acropolis’ limited water source, Milo originally wanted the people to endure again. However, many frail elderly and women fainted one after another, so he finally agreed to let everyone wet their clothes by the pool and apply them to their faces to get through the difficulties.

After doing the protective measures, they mostly used up all the water in the cistern. Then some of the people began gathering in the temple and prayed devoutly to the statue of Apollo, hoping for his protection through this disaster; some even began repenting to the huge statue because they thought this was their retribution back when Melanseus burned the city of Thurii that was under Apollo’s protection!

Lysias watched the burning city in a trance as fear for the safety of the people inside the Acropolis filled his heart. He knew that without water, everyone would not last a few days.

“Lysias.” Milo appeared from a distance. Strangely, there was a light on his face at this moment, “Don’t worry. Something must have happened that caused the Syracusans to retreat and set the city on fire. I reckon that…the Theonian reinforcements had arrived, and the Syracusans did this to fight Theonia with all their strength!”

“Are you telling the truth?!” Lysias immediately cheered up as he asked loudly.

“It’s highly likely for the Theonian reinforcements to arrive!” Milo was convinced of his judgment, “Didn’t we receive the news of the Theonian fleet defeating the Syracusan navy a few days ago?! Now that Syracuse didn’t have the assistance of the navy, they had lost the opportunity to threaten Theonia’s rear. Furthermore, Theonia had defeated the invading Tarantine army, so they no longer have anything worrying them in sending reinforcements.”