Philistus sat on the wooden chair for a while after seeing off Hipparinus…
Although Dionysius and Philistus paid more attention to Theonia when the Theonian envoy came to Syracuse to protest, they didn’t regard them as equal. Yet now, 80,000 soldiers and more than 400 ships – such a powerful force sufficient to sweep through Sicily were unexpectedly defeated by Theonia, who independently supported Magna Graecia?! If Dionysius and he had known that it would result in such a situation at the start, I am afraid that they would rather postpone the attack for a few more months to make some preparations, but it's already too late for them to regret it. The only thing they could do now was to win this war with everything they could; otherwise, Syracuse's fate-
Philistus could not stop shivering when the ruins of Catania, Naxos and Carthage, who were forced to seek peace, appeared in his mind. Although Sicily's situation is currently calm, who knows whether this calm will breed a greater storm?
After clearing up his worries and was about to summon the finance minister to discuss the cash and food needed for the second expedition, Philistus saw Hipparinus, who had already left, burst in again in a hurry with an unconcealed panic on his face.
Philistus' heart jolted when he heard Hipparinus say in a hurry, “I just received an urgent report from my men that the Theonians had landed in Sicily and captured Megalos!”
The bad news came one after another, like a hammer striking Philistus and making him dizzy. After grabbing the table as support, he sharply asked, “Is this report true?!”
“I think the Sikurian's messenger would come soon asking for help.” Hipparinus said anxiously.
Philistus was shocked that he suddenly shouted to his subordinates, “Quick! Quickly call Herolis, Macias, Kalidmus, and the other officials!”
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
Although the meeting place remained the same, the atmosphere became tenser. Although everyone was already shocked at the news of the Syracusan army's defeat in battle, that had happened in Magna Graecia after all. But now that the war had reached Sicily, their sense of urgency became even stronger. However, what worried them more was Theonia's daringness to send troops to Sicily, which showed that they were confident of completely defeating their army in Magna Graecia and that Dionysius' situation in Magna Graecia was terrible.
“How many Theonians landed on Naxos?” Macias asked the most crucial question.
“My men reported that they have about seven thousand, and most soldiers wore all-black armour. From our intelligence about the Theonian army, that was something only soldiers of their so-called ‘official legion' could wear. Furthermore, they could attack quickly as the enemy had only taken just more than an hour to occupy Megalos since their discovery. Although there were riots among the Naxosian slaves, we could still see that they are not Theonia’s regular army!” Hipparinus reminded with extreme seriousness.
The others frowned even more.
“Regardless of their strength, we must eliminate them as soon as possible!” Philistus glanced at everyone with a serious expression, tapped his left hand hard on the table and loudly reminded, “I am afraid that our army's defeat at the Battle of Magna Graecia had given some city-states in Sicily other ideas. Still, the news of Theonia's landing in Sicily will only unsettle the seemingly calm situation in Sicily, as evidenced by the riots of the Naxosian slaves! Therefore, we must wipe out this army as quickly as possible and use this victory to tell the other city-state in Sicily that, ‘We Syracusans are still powerful!’ only then could we maintain the current situation; otherwise, it will bring us endless trouble once this panic spread!”
“I will immediately go out to summon the soldiers for war, and I could at least get 6,000 soldiers. In addition to the thousand mercenaries on the island of Ortygia-”
Hipparinus immediately interrupted Macias before he could finish his words, “We can not summon the mercenaries on the island of Ortygia! Their duty was to ensure the safety of Lord Dionysius, his family and all the officials!”
Herolis rolled his eyes slightly.
“Can we call up our citizens in the city tomorrow?” Philistus asked.
Herolis shook his head and said, “That would be difficult. The people causing trouble outside the city hall have not yet stopped, and I estimated that it would take at least three days to have them gather in the square…”
“You still have to do your best!” Philistus didn't have much hope at Herolis, so he said to Macias, “I will now send someone to inform our allied states in the north, Taunis, Leontinoi, Catania and Sikuri, to gather their armies and for you to lead them north tomorrow. With Theonia invading Sicily and taking Megalos, these city-states will be the first to suffer, so they should do their best. At the same time, we will recruit more troops to reinforce you…”
“With our allies' troops, especially Catania, I think they would be enough to deal with the Theonians!” Macias said confidently, “I'll head out and gather the soldiers now.” With that, Macias simply stood up and left.
“Lord Kalidmus, send envoys to our allies in the south to urge them to provide troops as soon as possible and immediately lead them to Megalos after gathering them!” Philistus continued.
Knowing that the situation was urgent, Kalidmus did not argue with Philistus and immediately agreed.
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
When Herolis finally persuaded the people outside the city hall to leave, it was already dusk. He then returned to his residence, exhausted.
But after closing the door, his seemingly exhausted energy immediately recovered as he hurried to his study, followed by his most trusted slave – Thesta.
And as soon as he sat down, Herolis hurriedly asked, “Is there any news over there?!”
“Yes, master.” Thesta quickly and carefully handed over a piece of parchment folded into small squares.
After quickly opening it, Herolis saw a dense and strange symbol for the outsider. However, he knew that these strange symbols were the mysterious ‘Davos' numerics’ popular in Theonia.
Herolis suppressed his excitement and said to Thesta, “Go outside and wait.”
After Thesta left the study and closed the door, Herolis pulled out the book《The Histories》 from the bookcase. Afterwards, he searched the page number, number of lines and the first few words corresponding to the numbers on the letter. However, that was not the end, as a few small ink dots at the front of the letter indicate that he needs to count back a few from the words he found are the real target. Only after he connected these words could he read the message that the Theonian head of intelligence in Sicily wanted to convey. And the reason for such complexity is that even if they captured Herolis' trusted slave and took the letter away, Hipparinus wouldn't understand its secret. What's more, Hipparinus' men might even throw it away if they were careless and thought that it was something the slaves scribbled.
In fact, it had taken Herolis several days of painstaking study before mastering it, making him sigh at the thoroughness, carefulness and orderliness of the Theonians in this regard that they were far better than Syracuse, which already had decades of intelligence experience, and gave him confidence in Theonia.
And Theonia's performance on the battlefield had made him even more confident of them.
After reading the classified letter, he wrote back a reply in the same way. He then called Thesta and said, “Tomorrow early morning, bring two containers of wine to Philoxenus and personally tell him that the weather is warm, so he should go out more.”
Thesta immediately repeated what Herolis had said. After nodding with satisfaction, Herolis carefully handed him the folded parchment, “After delivering the wine, go to the wine shop and wait there. Only when someone matches the code will you hand this to him.”
“Understood, master.” Thesta was already familiar with this matter. However, he did not leave immediately after receiving the order but hesitantly asked, “Master, I heard Dionysius lost in Magna Graecia. Will Dionysius' rule be overthrown?!”
Herolis knew after seeing the longing in Thesta's eyes: Thesta was originally a citizen of Catania, but Dionysius' massive invasion had destroyed his home, killed his family, and he himself became a slave, so his hatred for Dionysius was extremely deep. But because of this, Herolis trusted him to do these things.
“Yes!” Herolis said without hesitation. He then saw off Thesta happily.
At this time, a memory emerged in Herolis' mind from a few months ago: At that time, a merchant said to be from Cyrenaica wanted to buy wine, but due to the large quantity, Herolis decided to negotiate with the merchant in person.
Who knew that on the day of the meeting, the young merchant turned his back and solemnly said, “Esteemed Lord Herolis, I am a Theonian citizen named Antrapolis. I have bought you the sincere greetings of Lord Davos, the archon of Theonia, to you…”
And it was Antrapolis' idea to use Herolis' wine merchants outside the city to deliver messages and then have slaves frequently hang out on the port to distract the intelligence officer…
‘The winner and loser will be divided within a few days!’ Herolis clenched both his fist as he was both nervous and excited…
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Knowing about Hielos' attack on Medma, Davos sent Orophes, who had already gained some insight into Syracuse's siege towers, to lead more engineers and experiment on Medma.
