Soon enough, cheers erupted from the roadside, spreading across the Sybarite plain.
The people's final worry had finally disappeared as they began singing and dancing to celebrate this hard-won victory. Some devout believers had even cancelled their plan to go to the port and headed to the Temple of Hades in Thurii to thank Hades for his blessing…
Once the Senate received the news, they also became jubilant.
“It seems that we made the correct decision! After Lord Davos became king, Hades answered our prayers and blessed Theonia with a quick and continuous victory!” Exclaimed Plesinas aloud while pretending to be excited.
“Yes. It is all thanks to our daringness to make such an amazing decision that we have today's victory!” Marigi responded accordingly.
At this moment, most of the statesmen no longer felt angry after getting forced to elect Davos as their king. Rather, they were now more thankful, so they agreed with Plesinas and Marigi's words.
Kunogelata no longer felt revolted by the two's usual acting. After taking back his gaze from them, he then shouted, “According to the messenger's war report, his majesty Davos has led the army to trap the Syracusans in Scylletium, and the final victory is no longer far away from us! However, our biggest problem is food!”
“Lord Kunogelata is right. Although our current reserves are enough to supply our troops for two months, the food reserves for the people of Theonia, especially the families of the freemen and preparatory citizens, had bottomed out. Now that the port is open, the merchants who come to trade with us raise the food prices, making the people who have already selflessly donated their money and food to Theonia pay even more! I fear that before the war could end, the people of Theonia would have already exhausted all their savings, which is not beneficial to our post-war recovery!” Cornelius said worryingly.
“Those merchants are sickening!” Stromboli said angrily, “They already tripled the food's price, but it is still rising…Marigi, as the commercial officer, you should think of a way to deal with those damnable merchants!”
Marigi smiled bitterly, “We have already taken some measures and even specifically negotiated with those merchants selling food in Thurii, so just keeping the price within three times is already the best we could do. But with Theonia's food shortage and the increasing number of people buying food daily, it is inevitable for the price to increase, and we can't force the merchants to sell them at a fixed price.”
“Why not?!” Stromboli exclaimed, “We have to ensure our people's interest first, so we should immediately adopt a plan that makes those merchants sell grains at a low price, or they wouldn't be allowed to sell their goods in Theonia!”
“That can't happen!” Before Marigi could even speak, Mersis shouted first, “This is a foolish act that would destroy the Greeks' free trade tradition! In the future, no one will dare come to Thurii to do business, and we will no longer receive commercial tax once the port declines!”
“With Theonia's large territory and population, I doubt that those greedy foreign merchants will no longer come to do business!” Stromboli sneered. As an Amendolaran, he dislikes the merchants.
“Even if we coerced them, those merchants would just sail to Heraclea or Crotone instead of selling their grain in Thurii.” Marigi then reminded the statesmen, “If so, our people would flock there to buy grain just the same, and they would complain even more as we just increase their troubles! Instead of that, it would be better to keep the merchants in Thurii, which would even allow us to take some measures to control the prices a bit. After all, the war is still not yet over, and Theonia’s food shortage will continue. Those merchants had risked transporting their grains to come here, so if they can't make a good profit here, I fear that no one will be willing to transport food here anymore!”
After hearing these words, the statesmen, including Stromboli, looked dejected: Indeed, who told Theonia to have a food shortage that they need to rely on those merchants?!
“I wonder what happened to Ansitanos' mission to Africa?” Kunogelata thought of Ansitanos, who was carrying out an important mission.
Suddenly, the conference hall’s door was pushed open, and the guards hurried inside and whispered in the rotating chairperson – Kunogelata's ear.
Immediately, Kunogelata beamed with joy and loudly said to the crowd, “Everyone, you can now feel at ease. Lord Ansitanos has returned with ten large Carthaginian transport ships loaded with food!”
Cheers broke out again in the sparse conference hall, “We have food!” “The people are saved!” “Ansitanos succeeded!…”
“Unexpectedly, it was the ‘enemy of Greeks’ – Carthage, who the Sicilians attacked, that helped us!”
“I told you, Hades will not let disaster befall those who believe in him. Once again, he has fulfilled his promise!”
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
While the statesmen of the Senate rushed to the port of Thurii and welcomed the arrival of the Carthaginian envoys, 15,000 soldiers of the joint Theonian-Rhegian army led by Hielos, Hieronymus, Pheidon and Ledes marched from Terina to Hipponion.
However, they found the city gates wide open when they arrived at the city, and the Hipponians had taken the initiative to surrender. Last night, the news of the Locrian army's defeat had already scared the Hipponians and panic when the defeated Locrian soldiers refused to enter the city to participate in the defence and their straightforward flight back to Medma. So the Hipponians, who had only a thousand soldiers in the city, held an emergency ecclesia and finally made a painful decision…so when they found out that tens of thousands of Theonian were heading towards the city of Hipponion the following day, the Hipponians surrendered without hesitation.
Before Davos divided the troops, he had already discussed with Hielos how to deal with the allies of Locri, so Hielos' accepted Hipponion's surrender. However, he asked that every family in the city must hand over a hostage to ensure their loyalty.
Faced with Theonia's massive army, the Hipponians could only agree.
Under the city wall, a heartbreaking and touching scene happened as the Hipponians cried and wept as they reluctantly bid farewell to their children.
Hielos, however, remained unmoved as he sent a thousand troops to escort the hundreds of children to Terina. At the same time, he put forward new requirements to the Hipponians: ‘Collect the food in the city as much as possible and provide it to the Theonian soldiers as military reserves. Otherwise, their children will have nothing to eat first if the Theonian soldiers starve.’
The Hipponians had to submit once again as they were now fishes on a chopping board.
While the Theonian-Rhegian joint troops camped outside the city of Hipponion, they assisted the Hipponians in collecting food and fodder. In addition, they sent their scouts to check on the enemy's situation in the south. At the same time, they let the engineering brigade lead the soldiers to construct siege equipment to prepare for their attack on the city of Medma.
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
At the same time, Davos, who had learned of Caulonia's return to the South Italian Alliance, wrote another letter and delivered it by fast horse to the city of Caulonia. The letter reads, “…I am glad that Caulonia had made the right choice, and I, together with Lysias and Siprus, are thrilled to hear this news! Now that the Syracusan army is weakened by the brave attacks of the soldiers of Theonia, Crotone and Terina, I believe that the day of their defeat is not far away.
Therefore, we hope that you, as a member of the South Italian Alliance, will join us in mobilising all the citizens of the city who are able to fight, take up their shields and spears, and launch an attack on Locri's territory, so that the culprit who caused this cruel war can also feel the pain of being ravaged by the flames of war, and make them afraid of sending reinforcements to help the Syracusans that we are besieging, which would ensure that we can successfully recapture Scylletium and wipe out these vicious invaders! Theonia, Crotone, Terina and Rhegium all look forward to your action!…”
This letter caused Caulonia's council to convene an emergency meeting. Evidently, the primary purpose of Davos' letter was not to praise Caulonia's correct choice but to urge them to take immediate action and not stand idly by, and the last sentence was more like an implied threat.
Of course, Caulonia, who was on the string, knew the serious consequences of refusing Davos' request, so the ecclesia quickly passed the resolution of “attacking Locri”.
Although a thousand of their soldiers were trapped in Scylletium, Caulonia still suffered the least loss among the city-states in South Italia in this war. In the afternoon, Caulonia soon mobilised 4,000 soldiers.
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
Due to Locri dispatching their main force outside, resulting in the city being empty, the Locrian had long been uneasy about their decades-long enemy – Caulonia, so they closely watched Caulonia's movements. So as soon as Caulonia dispatched their troops towards the south, the scouts quickly rode back to report it.
At this time, Locri was shocked and overwhelmed by the bad news that came one after another. The Syracusan army’s defeat, Locri's main force’s defeat, the city of Hipponion was in danger…and now, the Caulonian army suddenly went south. Thus any rational Locrian could judge that it is definitely not to help Locri.
The sharp turn of the war situation made Locri's polemarchos – Demodokas, panic that he actually abandoned his half-year dictatorship and held a meeting.
Demodokas repeatedly said, “Those damned Caulonians broke their promise and invaded our territory! Now that the situation is urgent, what should we do?!” However, a strange sight shrouded the meeting place…
