Chapter 510: Hell Kitchen
There is one thing that Apostolos has never told his colleague before, that they are two different men coming from two different world. He, Apostolos, certainly did not come from a noble background with all those resources for him to go around the metropolis to study, he is just a mere son from a big land owner family in that village which under his countless years of efforts, became the landlord and the de facto ruler of that village, until the Caesar came at that point of time and forced him to leave. Thus, unlike Alexios, Apostolos knows what the situation is really like in the rural areas, what are the sufferings of the people and what is the motive behind them asking all these questions, though he often used to think from a land lord’s perspective representing the land owner’s interest in the government.
Time passed fast and after all those preparations, the soup is finally boiling, and it is now time to put the chopped mutton inside. Having a picnic session in the wild before some splendid sceneries is considered a very romantic thing among nobles in this era who, strangely speaking, are obsessed with hunting in the wild for days in a row. But these two big men who have never stayed in a kitchen for more than thirty minutes in a kitchen before are absolute newbies when it comes to culinary skills, these two big men does not even have the slightest idea that they need to remove the bad smell of the lamb meat first before cooking it as the main dish.
Hell kitchen vibe intensifies.
The two big men gulped their saliva as they eye greedily at the pot waiting for it to be cooked, though there is another thing that attracted their attention, a rider with a red flag behind his back equipped with a full set of armour and several guards galloped pass them heading straight towards the commanding tent.
"The flag of urgency." Alexios twitched his mouth as he gazed at the rider. "From the direction of Thessaloniki."
"Of course, where would you expect the message to be from if it is not from Thessaloniki?"
"Ture."
The two men settled down again with their plates and forks in their hands eyeing at the hot pot boiling in front of them, due to their lack of culinary skills they have almost spent all the time till noon preparing this dish and now it is finally the time for them to harvest and fill their stomach, but just as they have gotten everything set, a series of sound produced by drums and horns teared through the sky into their ears, the two men looked backwards, and saw the flag of the white lion being flown high on the flag pole before the commanding tent, it is a signal for all high ranking commanders and advisors to gather for meeting, and that signal also means that their plan of enjoying their hard prepared pot of mutton is pretty much doomed.
"What are you waiting for, let’s go!" Alexios swiftly got up throwing the dish and the fork onto the bank of the lake, and shrugged Apostolos on the shoulder asking him to get up. But the later still seems to be reluctant as he remained sitting there grumbling. "The meat! The meat!"
Alexios laughed in frustration. "Which is more important, meat or military law? Come get up! Lets go! We can come back for this later!"
"Wait! Put off the fire!"
Alexios and Apostolos hastily came back to the spot trying to put out the fire with dirt and soil, but the ground on the lakeside proved to be way too hard for them to dig. They then tried to fill up a bucket with the water from the lake, only to find out that water has all sipped away from a hole at the bottom, leaving the two men with no other way except to use the only source of liquid they still have as a man.
After everything has been settled, the two men ran their way to the commanding tent, which is not that far away of course but still they found out that everyone were already waiting for them with their Caesar staring at them too, seating over there. Upon seeing the two men arriving, Antonius did not bother wasting any more time and ordered. "Everyone, gather up your men and we shall march into the city, remember to maintain high discipline level at all times, all serviceman is supposed to disturb the local population unless when I told them to do so, we have already disgraced ourselves once in front of the crowd in that village last week, I don’t want to settle any more of this kind of nuisance again, get it?"
"Yes, your majesty." The various commanders bowed down in acknowledgement.
"Alexios, I need you to assemble every single scribe, letter writer, basically anyone who is literate ith the ability to write in the camp and surrounding areas, I want five hundred copies of the script which I am going to give to you later, and then send equally to the other two armies, ask them to paste it on every single gates of any new towns, village or cities they capture."
"Yes, your majesty."
Antonius seems to be in a rather good mood today humming a tune as he left the tent, the commanders and Alexios left too carrying the task that they are assigned to, leaving only Apostolos standing here with nothing to do, just as always being the freest person of the entire army without a formal role, without a military rank, without nothing. Apostolos took notice of that letter being left over by Antonius with a seal indicating that it came straight from Thessaloniki. Being simply curious, Apostolos sneaked up to the letter after looking left and right making sure that there are no one watching and opened the letter.
Of course, this sender of the letter is easily identifiable to be none other than that Abdullah through his unique Ottoman calligraphy style. Apostolos knows that his liege sent this man a long letter asking him on his advice on his advice on the current issue, and now as it seems from this piece of letter that the letter only replied to him with a short paragraph.
"You are the liege my friend, and the people wants to hear and know your words, not mine. They have offered to give you their everything, and in exchange they want you to take up the responsibility of leading, guiding them and most importantly, defending them. No offence my friend, but I slightly disapprove your decision of waiting outside the city for a long period just to wait for my letter. This can be seen as a sign of your indecisiveness in the eyes of my dear colleagues, and also create concerns and turbulences in the minds of the citizens of Kastoria, making them wonder what is the reason that tied your foot, worry whether you are reluctant in taking up the responsibility, or whether there is some big news coming up, like a defeat in the other armies, this can potentially cause their confidence on you, the liege to decrease and even change their mind."
Apostolos heaved a huge gasp of cold air, he knows from a long time ago that only this man called Abdullah in the court can point out the Caesar’s mistakes and faults in front of everyone else, but he certainly did not expect him to be so straightforward, and the Caesar even seemed to be joyful after receiving this letter, weird indeed.
"I have checked through the three questions that the man called Torhan has given you, they are pretty simple I must say, as all of them are actually revolving around this simple concept of safety. Which is kind of understandable, especially for me as I, being an Ottoman Turkish leaving in a society with the majority being Romans. Since their main concern are nothing but safety, then what you only need to do is to grant them the safety they desire, and at the same time display the posture that you are a strong leader capable of protecting them, not like the way you are doing now stagnating outside the city."
"Well since you are asking me, a humble servant of the Roman people, then I shall offer you the advice on behalf of the Roman people. Do you still remember that decree that you have published eight years back when you entered the city gates of Thessaloniki? You promised to everyone that everyone shall be equally treated by you no matter of their difference in social statues and wealth, I think that it is time for this decree to have a little bit change added, you know what I mean my friend, harmony and stability is all we need to build ourselves the dream state that we promised to build to make the world a better place."
