Herald of Steel

Spotting the Adhanian Queen in that state on the bed, Alexander was at first a bit surprised because he had no idea how she had managed to infiltrate his room.

He might have not locked his bedroom door, but it was certainly guarded.

But whatever tricks she might have used, Alexander decided to let it slide upon seeing her slumbering face.

She seemed too tired.

Thus suppressing the desire in his loins, he decided to skip the nighttactivities as he gently laid Lady Nanazin on the bed properly.

And then tentatively spooned the lovely curvy body, hugging her close to his chest and enjoying the soft, warm sensation of the fleshy breast and the thick thighs squeezing against him, as a gentle lavender fragrance pervaded through his nose.

Alexander recognized this to be the lady's favorite perfume.

And the pasha very much wished to continue to enjoy the current sensations, from feeling the warm body to taking in the scent but found those to be too straining on his body, as no sooner he had hit the pillows, the exhaustion of the whole day instantly took over and slumber reaped his senses.

Thus the couple slept like logs, fortunately with no disturbance, as the night was quite eventless for them.

Remus had indeed chosen to stay his hand, and not lead a team in a night raid on the Great Harbor, done almost solely as a show of respect to Alexander's sincere promise of figuring something out.

However even though Remus might have stayed his hand on the matter, that did not mean the other side had.

"Wha… what are you doing… arghhh!' The astonished and pathetic cries of a dying priest rang across one of the temples in the city, as a group of men dyed in blue armor and dressed like Alexander's legionnaires slashed and hacked through the sacred premises.

"Move! The Lord wants his gold… you filthy hoarders. Take it! Take it all. Load it into the ships and leave not a single coin. We will leave the people of Caira poor and destitute. Our lord wills it!" Then, entering the place with a staggering swagger, one of the men very animatedly shouted this long speech, before heavily kicking the dying priest away.

Something which incensed a small priestess, who had been hiding under the dark corner of an alter till now.

Seeing this the little eleven year old was unable to tolerate it for longer and jumped out of the shadows to shout with reddened eyes, "Yo…. you… are you not afraid of the gods? How can you do this? Muti… hurting the body of a priest!"

The girl could not even utter the word mutilate because it hurt in her heart so much.

She did not want to even say the filthy word out loud.

The girl had been a homeless orphan who was picked up by this dying priest and then raised like he was his own daughter, so it scarred her when she saw the men disfiguring him, piercing into his already dead eyes and spilling out the brain matter.

So much so that she wanted to cry out in tearful horror.

But instead, the frail little creature only stood accusingly at the group of 'legionnaires', literally shivering in her feet in both rage and fear, although none of that was betrayed on her face, only fury and indignation.

"Hehe… so what? You people are no priests. You only worship false gods. Our lord spits in the face of your belief." The leading 'legionary' however blew the small girls's threat like dust, with a few also then joining in on the fun,

"Hah! That's right! Now that we are here, we will destroy all your temples and put everyone into shackles."

"We will torch the whole place if that's what we need to collect our debt."

"Yes! Gold! The lord only cares for gold. The people of Caira can go to hell if he can just have his gold. That is all that matters."

"Haha, yes. Maybe he will even sell a cute creature like you as a slave. You will surely fetch a pretty price."

It was only with this last sentence that the girl noticed the evil glint in the surrounding men's eyes and understood the kind of danger she was in.

Thus she shivered, "Sto… stop! I'm a priestess. Are you not afraid of the wrath of the gods? Noooo… you cannot do… mmmmmnnnn!"

The howl of the small kitten however had no effect on the burly men save for the good chuckle that it got from them, as they then pounched on the pubescent girl like wild wolves, unceremoniously pushing her to the stone floor, and sneering one last phrase, "Heh, when did Pasha Alexander ever respect the gods?"

Then a quick while later muffled but mournful moans of pain shot out from that temple as each of her limbs was pinned down by strong men, her robes were literally torn apart, revealing her tanned, healthy skin, her developing bosom and a thin pure crack down below, which was soon turned muddy by repeated assaults.

The helpless girl was not even allowed to let out her cry as the brutal men took her roughly, not at all caring about the fact that she was just a little child.

To these beasts, she was just a toy.

The only silver lining here was perhaps the fact that she would get to least live through the ordeal.

Although whether even that was actually good could be debatable, given the trauma she suffered.

But she would live and then furthermore would go on to retell her ordeal to all the city, where she would be joined by many others like her.

Because naturally, these hooligans had not assaulted just one temple.

It was hilarious how easy it was to pin it all on another innocent man.

Because any observer with a modicum of attention would have easily noticed the huge flaw in all the narration of these affected individuals.

Such as just how clearly telegraphed the words coming out of the soldiers were.

When they spoke, it was apparent that rather than ordering their men, these 'officers' were more concerned about making sure the people around them heard them, which then they would remember and propagate to others.

Their exaggerated way of saying the words clearly showed that.

But perhaps even more damning evidence of this being a setup was the fact that they all spoke in the local Galisian language, rather than Azhak or Thesian, which was what you would expect the legionaries to speak if these were really Alexander's men.

But it seemed that 'Alexander' had oh so generously made sure to use very good 'translators' to inform the local populace just how evil he was, in a language that they all understood.

What a nice, considerate guy!

Of course in actuality, all this was done by Lord Parker and Achillas and if you thought they did a sloppy job in it, then yes, perhaps they did.

However, at the end of the day, all of that did not really matter.

Because upon seeing the burnt temple, the empty vaults, the destroyed statues, the killed priests, and the violated priestesses, the people were engaged beyond any logic and reason.

And if you thought these people were foolish for being so gullible, no, they were not.

At least not any more than people of any other time.

It was human nature that when tragedy struck, people looked to find the most likely culprit and make them pay, whether it made sense or not.

And this mob mentality was clearly present even in Alexander's previous life.

Just look at the reaction the shocked American public had after 9/11.

And having never experienced such a tragedy, the people were left too vulnerable to resist the grand promises made by the then administration, allowing them to pass various controversial motions that had long lasting deleterious effects on various regions of the world, as well as even on the US itself, such as losing thousands of lives and 1 trillion dollars of taxpayers money, only to replace the Taliban with the Taliban.

Even the hawkish supporters of such policies would agree to sextent that in hindsight the situation could been handled better.

And this was only one consequence of the hasty act, never mind the various insurgencies that sprouted up elsewhere around the world, which claimed even more lives.

Of course, this is not to say the American public was too foolish to allow this to happen. Absolutely not.

But such a reaction worked to highlight that when people are hurt in their homes, they lose their ability to think and see through things clearly.

This was simple human nature.

And just like the following example, the people of Caira too were incensed at seeing the destruction of their beloved prayer sites.

Once was enough, yet the hooligans dared to strike again, and consecutively at that!

How could they allow this to happen?

Hence when Lord Parker stood in the center of the market and gave a grand speech, pointing to the mansion and saying that is where the culprit lived, the people were in arms with axes and pitchforks!

Alexander was being thrashed in the battle of public opinion and he did not even know it.