Chapter 352: Expanding Strength (Part 2)

"Oh, nice to meet you, Mr. Paul." Luca said a few words, and suddenly he felt less panicked. He stroked his chest, trying to slow down his rapid breathing.

"Let's get straight to the point, Master Luca." Paul then asked, "Tell me, you mentioned Britannia, and then you said you wanted to attack it and reclaim this land that has been lost for thirty years. You could just march north now, so why are you sharing your strategic intentions with us now?"

It seems that Paul can't wait to know the answer, Luca thought to himself, and he began to hesitate whether he should tell the elders in advance.

"Yes, yes, sir, I think in such a short period of time, you have not forgotten the fundraising issue that I talked about with you a few days ago in this position." When Luca said this, he felt much better, at least his speech was not as fluent as before.

"Fundraising?" Paul then asked, "How much do you want us to pay?"

"The cost of maintaining a legion, that is, ten to fifteen field regiments, or even more." Luca cleared his throat and continued, "I need your financial assistance to take over the two provinces of Britannia and restore the original territory of the empire. You are all meritorious officials, and naturally you will receive rewards from Augustus. Of course, I will not treat you unfairly after I take over these two provinces, and I will definitely make your investment pay off."

"Return? Great Britain returns, ha, very interesting place, also, very interesting question." Paul sat there, he was very relaxed, or to say, he came to see Luca just for fun. He didn't intend to give Luca a chance to explain, he just heard him continue: "I remember that it was thirty years ago, when Augustus Honorius was in power, the Gruon-Saxons cooperated with the barbarians north of Hadrian's Wall to attack the province of Great Britain, the barbarians were crazy and rampant, and wherever they went, there were lives lost, fortresses were destroyed, villages were looted, and all civilizations were destroyed by the barbarians." At this point, Paul stood up from his seat and looked back at the elders.

Seeing Paul speaking, the elders straightened their backs, sat up straight in their seats, and pretended to listen attentively. Paul's status in the Senate was not low, and the elders took his speech as a serious matter, so as long as Paul could be silenced, the vast majority of the elders present could be convinced. Thinking of this, Luca couldn't help but reach for the pocket tied around his waist, secretly calculating that now was not a good time.

"You all lived in the time of Honorius. At that time, the province of Britannia was not a wealthy place. After all, it was far away from the civilized world and was threatened by barbarians all the time. Think about the taxes it usually paid to the empire. Now it is full of barbarians and has been completely abandoned by civilization. If we recapture it, how do we deal with the ruins and restore the vitality of those captured cities?"

"That will require a lot of money, which we may not be able to afford." A veteran on the stage spoke, and what he said made a lot of sense.

"And we cannot guarantee that Flavius ​​Luca will be able to recapture that place. Don't forget that those tall and ferocious barbarians are different from lawless slaves." Another senator raised an objection. With such powerful and convincing evidence one after another, the senators present whispered to each other in private and nodded in agreement with their statements, making the whole situation even more unfavorable to Luca.

"Oh, no, oh, no, gentlemen, gentlemen!"

Just when everyone was talking, Paul stood up again, waved his hand and said to them, "Britannia was indeed our territory, but after thirty years when it became a wasteland for barbarians, warriors like Luca volunteered to recover this barren land for the empire. But here comes the problem. I have to ask you, Mr. Luca."

As he spoke, Paul slowly walked up to the stage. He looked arrogant, and it seemed that he had come to oppose Luca since he sat there. Perhaps he argued with Luca for the benefit of the Senate and discussed the issue of the recovery of Britannia. However, he was not very optimistic about Luca's proposal.

He then asked, "Sir Luca, what can you guarantee us? What can you really get from the barbarians' territory? How can you compensate us? The barren land can only grow wheat and produce bread. Do you want to use bread to exchange for the Suledes in our hands? We are not poor people who can't afford bread!"

“Hahaha…” Paul’s words tickled the funny bones of the elders present. They laughed out loud. They must have been laughing at the way Paul refuted Luca and left him speechless. They seemed to enjoy Luca’s frustrated look and wanted to see what method Luca had to convince them.

Soon, the laughter stopped abruptly between Luca's movements. Even Paul, who was still smiling at everyone, felt something was wrong. He turned around quickly and saw Luca's left hand raised high, with a small piece of gold tightly clenched in his palm.

"My Lords, I think you will all recognize this." Luca raised the unpolished gold in his hand and deliberately showed it to the elders. The elders stared at the gold in Luca's hand with wide eyes in surprise, and the whole venue was silent.

"What? Sir, are you using this? I really don't understand what you want to express." Paul shook his head and said to Luca.

"This is a piece of gold I accidentally found when I was fighting against the Bagaudah rebels." Luca said loudly, "According to the owner of this piece of gold, there is a mountain across the sea in Britannia, where gold is everywhere. This is an ancient legend. There were footprints of God on this mountain. God stepped on the golden light and turned all the stones on the mountain into gold."

Such words shocked the elders present. Although Luca knew that the whole thing was a lie, from the expressions of these elders, they seemed to be skeptical about the lie. Who would have a problem with money?

"This is a gift from God to Rome, but the Gruon-Saxons came for this mountain of gold. They were willing to be enemies with the Romans, just to get the gold all over the land, just to take away the gift from God to the Romans!"

"Then how do you know this is true?" Paul was also a little hesitant, but at this time, he still chose to remain distrustful of Luca. "Do you know the exact location?"

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"South of Hadrian's Wall, that's what the old man told me." Luca said calmly, "Then let me go and see it. If there really is such a golden mountain, you all know what you will encounter."

(End of this chapter)