Crusader Kings: Prisoners of War.

Chapter 21 Persuasion
It is well known that the Romans initially believed in Greco-Roman polytheism. They had a very open-minded attitude towards gods and were not very averse to worshipping foreign gods. To sum it up in one sentence: the more gods the better; the more gods protect the country, the stronger it will be.

Based on this idea, they have many temples, most of which are unmanned. Even if there are priests stationed there, they are generally not hereditary. They are just civil servants of the state, similar to financial officers, legal officers, etc.

Their belief in God is very pragmatic. When Orville and Tia talk about asking for oracles, they are not really asking for oracles. They just go to the temple to inquire about information.

In ancient times, information flowed slowly, and people who wanted to know the news would sometimes go to the door of a specific god's temple to inquire about the news. The temple was roughly equivalent to an information distribution center.

It might be a little troublesome to really get Berenice to change her beliefs, but it would be easy once things were made clear.

She agreed to stay in Cyprus for a few days and told her brother that he had to delay the time himself.

Seeing this, Orville remained silent, but began to make plans behind his back.

The Herod royal family represented by Berenice also had to keep an eye on Rome's movements. I don't know if Berenice realized this, but Architas II did have some considerations when sending her here.

The governor of Syria was not subordinate to Vespasian at all, but he did not send anyone to swear allegiance separately. He just asked Vespasian to deliver the letter on his behalf.

Architas II excused himself from coming and sent his sister to take his place. The problem was that the Parfi woman had no right to receive political education. She was a professional in religious sacrifices, but she knew nothing about politics. This kind of political representative was completely unqualified.

Vespa's Dia was barely qualified. She had no problem getting along with people, but she was sometimes too naive. Vespa didn't even want her to go to Rome, he just asked her to delay.

Orville didn't understand it at first, but after staying on the boat for more than ten days, he finally understood it - the three parties were stalling for time, waiting for the situation in Rome to change further.

Moreover, except for Vespa himself, it seemed that the other two parties were hinting intentionally or unintentionally that they did not pay much attention to the current emperor, knowing that the emperor would never hear about it. This drama was just performed for others to see.

In ancient times, both in China and abroad, the Praetorian Guard and the border guards were the two strongest forces. Leaving aside the Praetorian Guard, Rome had three border guards: the Germanic Legion on the Rhine border to guard against the Franks, which was the strongest and most numerous; the Danube Legion on the Danube to guard Greece and other places and defend against the Dacians; and the Eastern Legion in Syria to guard the eastern provinces and fight against the Parthians.

The former is the strongest, and the gap between the latter two is not much.

Vespa had five Roman legions, each with about five to six thousand men. Two of them were drawn from the Danube Legion, two were drawn from various provinces or recruited as new soldiers, and one was the original local garrison, plus more than 20,000 auxiliary troops. This force was very powerful.

If we add the more than 20,000 elite soldiers of the Eastern Legion and an indefinite number of auxiliary troops, not to mention the small governors of other Eastern provinces, this force will be able to compete with the strongest Germanic Legion and win the battle.

It was hard to say what Vespa’s plan was at this time, but in Orville’s opinion, the other two had some intention of “persuading him to join”.
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While the Romans were worrying about politics, the Parvi people were busy with war.

Inside the holy city, on the city wall, the former high priest Anna looked at the Idumea people in front of him as if he were facing a great enemy. They were different from the honest Idumea farmers under the Herod royal family in the north. Although they were brothers of the Parvi people, they were more violent and direct in character. They lived a nomadic life in the desert in the south and had not yet been exposed to the atmosphere of the farming society.

If they came simply to worship God, then Ana could barely welcome them, but there were 10 to 20,000 people in front of them, all holding weapons in their hands, and it looked more like they were here to rob.

A burly man rode up and shouted at the gate: "I received a letter asking for help, saying that unless we come quickly, the holy city will fall into the hands of the Romans. You despicable traitor, you are going to sell the holy city to the Romans! Let us in quickly, and I can still save your family."

Anna tried to reason with the other party, and after a while, he began to give a speech to the enemies at the city gate: "The Holy City is filled with tears and wailing. Everyone has been persecuted by those greedy demons. They are so crazy that they even transferred the robbery from the Holy City to the Temple. This is something I absolutely cannot accept. If you want to go in, you can, but you must accept the supervision of my soldiers and the people of the Holy City, and you must lay down your weapons."

This condition was absolutely unacceptable. The general was furious: "It is absurd that the city that belongs to all of us has shut us out, but may be decorating the gates with garlands waiting for the Romans to come!"

Ana opened his mouth to continue arguing with the other party, but suddenly he felt an unspeakable pain in his chest. He looked down and saw a sharp knife piercing his chest.

John Levi drew his knife swiftly and kicked Anna off the city wall. After seeing him fall to death, he looked up and saluted the Idumean general.

In front of the city gate, the Zealots hiding under John Levi also killed the gate guards. They opened the gate and welcomed the 10,000 or 20,000 fierce warriors into the city.

They rushed straight to the temple, and the main force of the Zealots who were locked inside and waiting for an opportunity opened the gate of the courtyard at this time, and fought against the army of the priests from both inside and outside.

The priests were outnumbered, many of their leaders were killed in front of the city gates, and they were caught off guard and attacked from both sides. They were at a disadvantage from the beginning, and it quickly turned into a massacre. Although the inner courtyard of the temple had not been disturbed, the outer courtyard was already a river of blood and corpses were everywhere.

After killing all the soldiers of the priest party, the Idumeaites did not stop there. Instead, they rushed to the civilian settlements. They looted houses in the city and killed anyone they saw. In name, they were clearing out the remnants of the priest party, but their main purpose was to plunder property.

The Zealots who rushed out had no intention of stopping their savior. They were not decent people to begin with, and they were full of anger after being imprisoned for a long time, so they simply joined in the carnival.

Simon walked out of the outer courtyard with a sneer, but before he could go down the slope to the residential area, a man dressed as a moderate priest party soldier rushed out from an inconspicuous place. Simon was walking in front, and the man was extremely fast. He couldn't dodge in time and was stabbed in the chest.

Ximen's eyes were wide open with rage. Although the people around him quickly stepped forward and killed the assassin, he was still fatally wounded and would not live long. He was about to die with his breath weak.

"John Levi." He kept thinking of this name before he died.

(End of this chapter)