Augustus Road

"Now, even the wild beasts of Italy have caves to live in, but the warriors who serve the country have nowhere to stay. They wander around with their wives and children seeking help." - Gracchus

In the bright wind and light, the golden bull and eagle flag of the Thirteenth Legion and the new flag of the Tenth Battalion: the top is the iron hand of Catiline's relic, and below are six silver rings representing full strength, symbolizing six centuries, shining with brilliant glory.

"Sir, I am glad to continue serving under you."

"It is time for us to go to Lusitania and show our skills."

"What is the Tenth Legion? They are like women kidnapped by thieves in the cemetery, waiting for us to rescue them."

"Kill the barbarians, stuff their heads and ears into bags as gifts for the Saturnalia, and bring back their statues of gods as trophies. Our triumphal ceremony in two years will also need fancy things to appear in front of the square in Rome."

The columns on both sides of the temple are full of flag bearers and centurions. They cheered one by one and fist-bumped with Carapis who passed by.

Milu and Tagus are now following Caesar in Gaia, Italy, while Pope and Hortensius are still with him. As for Hebrida, Carabis, considering his family, arranged for him to go to the Pletis Fortress and become a senior non-commissioned officer with an annual salary of 6,000 sestis. In addition to the 10,000 drachmas that Triari paid him for redeeming the eagle flag, this guy doesn't need to move for three years and can enjoy a fairy-like life.

"Arm the troops and go to Ostia Port!" Carabis ordered, and then touched the letter from Julia in his arms.

At this time, the troops following Carabis were about 400 heavy infantry and 300 lightly armed skirmishers, and they had no weapons at hand. The team also lacked packhorses, and the luggage had to be carried by people themselves. Of course, there were also empty numbers of six battalions of the 13th Legion.

But when they arrived at the port of Ostia, they found the power and terror of this monster, Crassus. His extremely large fleet, including full oarsmen, shipwrights and workers, was transporting baskets of vegetables, flour, knives, axes, hooks, garlic, wine and other supplies to the ships. These were all necessary things for sea voyages. Such a huge amount of supplies seemed to be easy for Crassus to obtain. He only gave an order, and countless knights and owners would help him handle any trivial and subtle processes.

"A man who can't even have an army is not worthy of being called rich." This was by no means Crassus's arrogant words.

After boarding the ship, whether it was the light rowing boats that served as the vanguard or the flat-bottomed transport ships that followed closely, all hoisted various sails and lined up in an orderly manner to form a huge arrow shape. Carapis pulled the rope and looked at the approaching coast of Sardinia Island. He did not forget Julia's letter, but he was not a person who acted on his own, especially during the march. He told Crassus about this matter, and the other party replied that as far as I know, Julia is not a woman who will act on personal emotions. Since she asked you to go, there must be a reason.

So Carapis wrote back, agreed on a date for the meeting, and then chose a small port close to Oristano. He gave Pope the responsibility of leading the army, asked the ships with goods and soldiers to continue moving forward without delay, and he and the other ships docked.

On the pier of the small port, Julia came to greet him personally. She had combed her hair and dressed up, and was obviously dressed up carefully. She was sitting in a relatively gorgeous sedan chair. Habaluka and a group of accompanying slaves stood beside her. "I won't be late for long. Come with me tonight." Julia was wearing a woven blouse, but it seemed that she bought it, or asked a female slave to weave it, because the iris pattern on it could indeed be identified with the naked eye, which was the biggest difference from her DIY clothes.

Julia was very frugal with words, which really made Carabis misunderstand a little, but they did not go to the Orphelenu Manor, but braved the night to continue to move forward to the north of the Oristano Plain. The little widow, no, now at least he is his wife in name, did not say much along the way, but always looked at the blurry road ahead.

Around dawn, Julia said to Carapis, who was riding beside her, "The city of Laconia is ahead."

From the looks of it, the local fields did not seem as fertile as the core area of ​​Oristano, and the hillsides also looked rugged and barren. The sheep were driven up the mountain road by the shepherds in the morning light. It was called a city, but it was actually a cluster of gray and shabby houses, with a fairly lively market in the center.

"This is called a camp market, because Laconia used to be a place for veterans to settle down." Julia continued to drive the carriage and said.

"If I'm not mistaken, this place has a lot to do with your grandfather."

Julia nodded on the sedan chair, "Ophelenu is actually my grandfather's manor, but when our family came to Sardinia, this was the first place we settled."

Later, Habaluka explained it clearly. Old Lepidus followed Sulla in the military for his entire life, and later Sulla settled a number of his old subordinates in Laconia, Sardinia, because when you are a soldier, don't expect to be given fertile land and houses after retirement. Most of them are such remote and barren resettlement areas. After the failure of his uprising, Old Lepidus retreated to the Ophelenu manor and never went to Laconia again. Although he meant to escape from the world, he also did it to avoid implicating his old subordinates.

Over the years, the veterans of Laconia have not lived well. Their pensions are as meager as the land there. The big estate owners in the south of the island often manipulate the crop market and exploit them at will. If Julia hadn't brought Karabis here today, the deputy commander of the 13th Legion would never have known that there was such a gray and miserable corner in the rich and beautiful Sardinia.

"Don't look at this appearance. This city has a population of four or five thousand." At the gate of the fortress, Julia looked at Karabis and said. Karabis understood that more than half of the residents of this city were her grandfather's subordinates many years ago, or Klein's retainers. Julia wrote the letter for this purpose. She wanted to use Laconia's "recruitment" as a means of repaying Karabis.

The Senate Consul's order to recruit soldiers was quickly posted on the pillars of the central square of the Curia in Laconia and the camp market. On the platform, Carapis and Julia stood side by side. In the dust, veterans who had just harvested wheat and the younger generation gathered curiously. Soon there were hundreds of people. Many of them recognized Julia, but they were skeptical about her past and whispered to each other.

Julia suddenly grabbed Carapis' hand and showed the ring of King Numa on his finger, which represented the glory of the family, to everyone, "Today, the heir of the Lepidus family needs the return of his retainers and subordinates." (To be continued.)