Chapter 497: Settlement 3

"Wow, that's a lot!" Looking down at the parchments on the ground, Luca couldn't help but sigh and shook his head, thinking, "In addition to being pretentious and improvising, these idiots are even better at making complaints. Look at the parchments on the ground. Maybe they poured out all their grievances into them, making Theodosius II a little overwhelmed!"

Even though he was extremely reluctant, Luca had no choice but to take a few steps forward, bend down, pick up the parchments on the ground and rearrange them. In front of Theodosius II, he was very careful, fearing that he would make any mistakes, otherwise he would be scolded again.

Seeing that Theodosius II was furious, Luca tactfully lowered his head and remained silent, just like a child who had made a mistake.

"Tell me, Luca." After Theodosius II yelled twice, he felt that most of the anger in his heart had been reduced. He looked much better now, and even his tone of voice was not so impulsive. "Tell me honestly, how many nobles did you injure? And how much money did you rob from them?"

"Let me do the math!" Luca muttered quietly, and actually began to count on his fingers, muttering to himself, "When we beat up the nobles, they didn't leave any of them behind. I led the people to search every house, and we found a total of 13,000 pounds of gold. I didn't want any other jewelry, I only wanted the gold!"

"What?" Theodosius II stared at Luca in confusion, as if he had heard it wrongly, "Are you sure you only took 13,000 pounds of gold?"

"Oh, no!" Luca proudly puffed out his chest and said to Theodosius II with a righteous look: "I have been very reasonable. You don't know how much gold these bastards have saved. I just asked them to take it from every house instead of rushing in to rob. It's only 13,000 pounds. If I rushed in, humph, maybe what I am holding in my hand now is not my helmet, but Attila's head!"

"But the nobles of Athens unanimously accused you of robbing them of 20,000 pounds of gold!"

"This is complete slander, Caesar. No more, no less. I only took thirteen thousand pounds, and I asked them for it. How can it be said to be robbery?" Luca became more and more excited as he spoke. He held his head high with a shameless look, as if he was not afraid of anything. It made him seem that he was not only not wrong in this matter, but also wronged!

"Enough!" Seeing that he could not win the argument with Luca, Theodosius II waved his hand and hastily ended the topic. He glared at Luca, not amused at all by Luca's behavior. This made Luca extremely embarrassed. Such a self-righteous performance suddenly became a one-man show. The audience still didn't buy it, so he could only bow his head again and remain silent.

"You, Augustus, my adopted son, not only condoned the soldiers' looting, but also led the way yourself. You are a member of the Flavius ​​family! Do you know that your actions have brought shame to me and our family?" Theodosius II pointed at Luca and cursed. He was so angry that his face turned red. It seemed that Luca's behavior really disappointed him.

"I understand, Caesar!"

At this moment, Luga instantly became like a deflated ball, and his tone became heavy.

"The nobles protested to me collectively. If I can't give them a reasonable explanation, then what will they do? What will they say? If they are dissatisfied with us to a certain extent, they will definitely rise up in rebellion! You know, so many refugees are starving, they may be bribed by a little bit of food! Then they will form a legion to shake our control over the province! We have just suffered a disaster and were destroyed by Attila. Now is the time to recover. We can no longer afford war!"

"Now you are worried about your position!" Such a sudden sentence coming out of Luca's mouth made Theodosius II close his mouth suddenly. He widened his eyes and pricked up his ears, as if he had heard it wrongly.

"What did you just say?" Theodosius II asked.

"Attila marched southward and destroyed Thrace and Macedonia. When I was recruited to Thessalonica, I had less than 5,000 soldiers under my command, and they were all defeated!" Luca looked at Theodosius II with courage. He pointed outside the door and asked Theodosius II, "There are nearly 80,000 well-equipped soldiers in Constantinople, while Attila only has 50,000. But these 50,000 soldiers can sweep across Magna Graecia without restraint just because you didn't give them 6,000 pounds of gold!"

"Luga..." Theodosius II called out Luga's name in a low voice, his eyes full of confusion, why did Luga teach him a lesson at this time! "I'm in Athens!" Luga paused, and finally ignored Theodosius's call. He continued: "Look at these nobles you want to protect. They regard the money in their arms as everything, even above the glory of Rome. They choose the latter between protecting the country and protecting wealth, but I choose to protect the country and I must take action! So I took away their seemingly extremely important things to protect what I think is extremely important!"

"But you have lost more! Flavius ​​Luca!" Theodosius II looked at Luca with a serious face. He continued to say to Luca very calmly: "Your deeds have spread far and wide, and you have lost your position in the hearts of the nobles. In their eyes, you are just a selfish robber. They hate you, spit on you, and even plot to kill you!"

"Then let them be!" Luga said indignantly, "At least I am plundering their gold to protect their lives. The fact that they are still alive instead of dying under Attila's butcher knife and have the energy to hate me is the best proof!"

"But they don't care!" Theodosius II interrupted Luca, "They don't care. What they see is that Attila is still far away, and you, you are right in front of them in the form of a bandit!"

"These can't be changed, Caesar, no, my father!" Luca didn't know why it was so natural for him to call Theodosius II his father. "At least I protected you. I am loyal to you. I am as pure as a mountain stream. You can't see any impurities in me if you hold it in your hands!"

"I can see and feel your loyalty." Theodosius II said in a heavy tone, as if he no longer wanted to blame Luca. "I never doubted your loyalty from the beginning, Luca. You are my child. I trust you immensely. I love you even more than Licinia. But what you did this time shocked me. I have always regarded you as my successor, Luca. You deserve to be the new Augustus for everything you have done for Rome!"

"But I lost this opportunity, didn't I?" Luca said. Perhaps he should have been very frustrated or even angrily questioned Theodosius why. "Okay, I understand!"

Theodosius II was surprised by Luca's calmness. He was even mentally prepared to listen to Luca's impulse to yell, but Luca was frighteningly quiet, as if nothing had anything to do with him.

"In short, let me bear the blame and criticism!" Luca said, "I hope it won't damage your reputation. After all, in a situation like this, we have to make a choice about who will stand up!"

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"Luca..." Theodosius II was moved. He looked at Luca and saw him turn around and want to go out. He tried to call him, but the words froze at his lips and he didn't speak.

"Squeak!" Luca opened the door, walked out without looking back or saying a word, leaving Theodosius alone in the huge hall.

"Thank you!" Looking at Luca's disappearing back, Theodosius II finally spoke with trembling lips, even though the sound was as thin as a mosquito's buzz.

(End of this chapter)