Preparing for War

"Bring up those traitors!"

The guards, who had been waiting for some time, immediately pushed the prison carts into the arena.

There were dozens of prisoners in the carts. Most were dressed quite finely; some even wore silk nightclothes and were barefoot, looking as though they had been dragged from their beds in the middle of the night.

"That's General Cadius. I was wondering why I hadn't seen him today."

"Isn't that Mr. Calinicus from the Masons' Guild? How could he be a traitor?"

One prominent figure after another was quickly recognized among the prisoners, causing a stir.

The Ecumenical Patriarch, seated in a conspicuous position, looked astonished. Nearly half the prisoners in the carts were clergy, and he could not help but frown deeply.

In Rome today, imperial authority was no longer supreme. The days when an emperor could casually appoint a eunuch as Ecumenical Patriarch were long gone.

If the emperors of the Palaiologos family went too far, they too risked being excommunicated and cast out of the Church.

Constantine XI's imperial treasury could not even afford to maintain Hagia Sophia, and had to rely on aid from their Eastern Orthodox Church brethren in Rus'.

Aside from the Varangian Guard, which numbered barely a hundred men, the emperor had virtually no standing army. He could only rely on Latin mercenaries—the Latins being a broad term used by Greeks, equivalent to the Franks in Saracen speech—making him no different from a major feudal lord.

Lothar ignored the Ecumenical Patriarch's ugly expression and angrily demanded, "Last night, the imperial treasury was attacked. Dozens of guards assigned to protect it were killed. Was it because they were not vigilant enough, or because they were incapable?"

"No, of course not!"

"It was because the arrows shot at them came from behind their