Alessandro arrived beneath the "pyramid."
It was not as tall as he had imagined, perhaps only fifty feet or so. It looked fairly easy to climb.
He looked around and saw that no one was paying attention to this side, so he stepped back a few paces, took a running start, and leaped up.
Then he suddenly realized that his modern self had never received this sort of training. He had learned it in a "dream."
Alessandro did not dwell on it. He climbed the "pyramid" directly, following the techniques taught by the "instructor."
Standing on the platform, he looked down over the surroundings. This inland city marked by a ship had neither sea nor ships in sight.
There was an enormous artificial rock in Lyon, with a Temple of Concord atop it and many flags at its base. It was solemn enough at a glance, and the founding ceremony of the Southern Alps Republic could have been held there, yet Bonaparte had chosen a monastery instead.
Before unification, Italy had always been at the mercy of others. Neither the War of the Spanish Succession nor the later Napoleonic Wars had anything to do with Italy. Yet it was the italians who ultimately suffered. Italy had once possessed a glorious civilization—Rome, the Renaissance—but as Gaetano had said, they could not break free from those outsiders.
In the eighteenth century, France and Spain built the most roads, while Spain largely followed France's example with its "royal highways." After all, the Spanish royal family was also part of the House of Bourbon. Vast sums were poured into roads leading to royal palaces, while the roads used by commoners were dreadful. Passenger travel was exceedingly difficult, and freight transport was basically impossible to complete on time.
Italy's situation was even more complicated. At