Chapter 140 Extra: Secretary General
◎The loyal die because of trust◎
A cold wind was blowing on the streets of Florence in the early morning. The lonely pedestrians who had not yet returned home wrapped their coats tightly, and began to imagine the warm fireplace and steaming potato soup at home, and quickened their pace.
It was almost time for the cathedral to ring the bell for morning prayers. Even gangsters and beggars would not linger outside at this time. Only the unlucky morning market patrolmen and night soil collectors would meet on the street. It was rare for prosperous and glorious Florence to have such a quiet time.
What breaks the quiet silence is the sound of disorderly horse hooves and the rumbling of wheels on the stone floor. Unlike the usual brisk pace, through the fog people can hear the driver whipping the horses to urge them on. The sound of the whip breaking through the air can easily bring a sense of tension.
The old man who was standing on the ladder and manually turning off the last street lamp squinted his eyes and looked down. He only had time to catch a glimpse of the Portia emblem on the side of the carriage before it disappeared into the morning mist as quickly as lightning.
"Portia...what happened?" The old man muttered a few words, went down the ladder, and looked in the direction where the carriage disappeared, his expression full of anxiety.
That was the direction of the Papal Palace. When it came to Portia, who could enter the Papal Palace at will at this time, only one name would pop up in the minds of the people of Florence: Julius Portia.
The Secretary General of the Papal Palace who holds the power of the Papal Palace, is trusted by the current Pope as a child trusts his father. He has given the Secretary General supreme power. Relying on such trust, Portia has been frantically expanding in the Papal States. It is said that other city lords in the Council of Thirteen have expressed dissatisfaction with this, but the Pope still insists on giving his trust to his mentor.
People living in Florence could more directly feel His Holiness's unreasonable trust in the Secretary-General. They did not understand politics, balance, or game-playing. It was just that since the young Pope wore the crown of Saint Leah, ordinary people at the bottom of society felt that their lives had become much better. The Church's external charity activities increased, and the City Hall also introduced some measures to help the poor. The black bread regularly distributed to children no longer contained a lot of bran, and there was even cheap cheese specially supplied to the slums...
The Pope would also go to various churches in Florence to preach from time to time. He was willing to listen carefully to everyone's questions and patiently answer them, even if the question was stupid and childish to the point of being ridiculous.
Last month, a monastery was built on the edge of the lower town. It is said that it will accept children aged four to nine, and the nuns will teach them basic literacy and writing. This may seem like a trivial matter, but for the people in the lower town who have never had the opportunity to learn to read, learning to write means having the opportunity to escape the fate of beggars, thieves, and vagrants.
People were deeply grateful and loved the young His Majesty. For the first time in so many years, their humble and ordinary fate was seen by this luxurious and holy city.
"I hope the Holy Lord will protect Your Majesty."
The carriage had long since disappeared into the thick fog, and the old man carrying the toolkit muttered to himself.
The carriage rushed towards the Papal Palace almost recklessly. The guards standing in front of the door saw the totem on the carriage from afar and opened the door without any questions. This was actually not in compliance with the regulations. Every visitor to the Papal Palace needed the permission of the Pope to enter, but... that was Portia.
Even the Papal Palace would not turn away Portia.
Before the carriage had even stopped, a man with iron-gray hair jumped down from it. His face was very gloomy, and a terrifying storm was brewing in his deep purple eyes that usually smiled. The chief steward of the outer court, who wanted to come up to him and say hello, was stared at coldly by him and immediately froze in place, not daring to move. When he came to his senses, he could only see an afterimage of the fluttering black cloak at the end of the marble corridor.
Julius hurried through the Great Gallery, so fast that his followers could not keep up. The Pope's butler, who met him halfway, trotted and quickly explained: "...When we found him, it was already past four o'clock, past the time His Majesty usually gets up. When we knocked on the door, we found..."
Julius's expression was so ugly that it was almost distorted. "Where are the Pope's guards?"
"…the duty rosters were switched, and both shifts thought they were the other's shift, so there was no one on guard at night…but the patrols didn't hear any noise…"
Julius suddenly stopped. His sudden stop caught everyone off guard and almost caused a small chaos.
The inner court steward looked over in horror and found that the Secretary-General, who always smiled, had a ferocious expression on his face: "A sound?!"
He lowered his voice, like a snake facing its prey.
"Which assassin would make such a stupid mistake?!"
The chamberlain was speechless and tried to explain himself, but Julius had already left him and walked away.
The corridor in front of the Pope's bedroom was cleared. Julius waved his hand, signaling everyone to leave. After a moment of silence, he slowly pushed open the door in front of him.
The heavy door was painted platinum and embossed with cute little angels and patterns of laurel and lilies. It opened easily without making any sound. A thick smell of blood hit Julius in the face, causing him to pause at the door for a few seconds.
He closed his eyes, composed himself, and walked in quietly - in fact, he didn't need to be so careful, because the owner of this bedroom could not hear any sound, and even if he shouted rudely, there would be no response.
The light in the room dimmed a lot. Julius walked around the living room where the sofa and tea table were placed, picked up a pillow that had fallen on the ground, and put it back to its original place. The wall lamp was still as bright as it was late at night, and the curtains were not opened. Everything remained the same as it was last night.
Julius walked through the archway and saw a large four-poster bed. The curtains were not drawn, so the tragic scene came into Julius's sight without any obstruction.
His long, messy light golden hair and lavender eyes were fixed blankly on one point. His pale and handsome face was distorted, and his plain white robe was soaked with dark red blood from the chest to the waist. His ten thin and long fingers were stretched out ferociously, as if trying to grab something, but they looked stiff and terrifying because he didn't grab anything.
An ordinary dagger was stuck in his chest, and blood that had not completely dried was still flowing out. Drops of blood fell from his cuffs, forming a small pool of blood on the carpet.
Julius stood two or three steps away from the bed, his whole body frozen.
He never thought that he would face Raphael's death in this way.
Although... he couldn't say he knew nothing about it.
Julius took a step forward, his toes almost touching the pool of blood. After a brief pause, he bent down and scanned the painful face of the deceased inch by inch from a distance. After a while, he raised his hand and gently covered Raphael's eyes.
For the first time in his life, Julius, who was good at handling things, didn't know what to say.
He could say all kinds of sweet words to the living, but to the dead, no matter how sweet the words were, they were useless, not to mention...
This was Raphael, the student he had taught, the rose he had lifted to the center of the vortex of power. He had seen Raphael at his worst, a skinny little cripple who dragged his useless legs and broke into the flashy and dangerous upper class of Florence with nothing, and dared to bare his fangs at him like a little wolf.
Julius couldn't help but smile. He never denied the badness and corruption of his own nature. He was curious about how such a small animal that thought it was ferocious would face this strange world. He was also curious about what would happen to this vibrant flame. Would it go out or burn even more vigorously? So he took over this little trouble and patiently taught him the rules of survival in Florence for the first time.
Oh, of course, he admitted that he had some thoughts of creating a new life of his own at that time. This is normal, isn't it? In the boring and monotonous life, there is suddenly such a new seasoning. Who can resist not instilling his own things into it and completely make it his own property?
At least Julius was very restrained. He did not do anything unnecessary. He just observed Raphael with curiosity. If Delacroix had not entrusted Raphael to him before his death—
Julius felt the cold touch on his palm and thought coldly that this might be a terrible choice. \
He gave Raphael the best he could, even offering him the papal crown, but the game of power had no room for such a soul.
If you can always listen to me, Julius slowly closed Raphael's eyes, if you can give up your useless persistence and unnecessary kindness, if -
Julius suddenly remembered that when Raphael was still imprisoned in Castel Cantrera, he had not yet conceived the idea of pushing Raphael to the papal throne. He had already prepared a manor and a piece of land in the countryside, which was not too far from Florence. He could visit Raphael regularly. With this idea in mind, he could have taught Raphael more during those four years, but because of a little useless selfishness, he did not do so.
An ordinary landowner living in the countryside does not need to be on guard against others all the time, nor does he need to know how to seize power or how to deal with turbulent times. He allowed Raphael to waste those four years, talking about astronomy, poetry, history, and literature on cold and windy nights.
He gave Raphael a peaceful dream, and then sent him into the vortex of death with his own hands.
Julius took off his cloak. He was still wearing pajamas underneath the cloak. The messy collar and wrinkled satin showed that he had hurried out of bed. Leaving the bedroom in pajamas was an unprecedented rudeness for him, but he did not notice it at the moment.
He shook open his cloak, and the black silk with a pearly luster spread out in the air with the movement of its owner. It fell softly like the wings of a crow, covering the body of the Pope on the bed and hiding the bloodstains.
"...Goodbye, Rafa."
Countless Raphael's smiles flashed through his mind, and in the end, he only left these words.
The attendants guarding the corridor straightened up immediately after hearing the sound of the door opening. Julius came out, took the spare cloak from another attendant and wrapped it around himself. As he walked down the stairs, he quickly gave instructions: "Watch over the members of the guards and the staff on duty at the Papal Palace last night. Reassign their posts after the review. Also, contact Cardinal Lombardi. I want to meet with him alone today."
When he mentioned that name, his expression suddenly became much colder.
They walked through the corridor and met Kane, the young Bishop of Portia, who was in high spirits. As the only bishop of the Portia family, he would obviously have more resources after Raphael's death, and the most special one was the vacant papal throne.
The Portia family will not allow anyone else to sit in that position. It is almost a foregone conclusion that he is the only one who can inherit this position.
"Uncle Julius."
Kane walked up to Julius and bowed his head to him. Facing the man who controlled the Portia family, even though Kane was now the Pope, he did not dare to look down on him.
His obedience did not make Julius feel better. The head of the Portia family stared at him coldly for a few seconds, staring until Kane could no longer maintain the smile on his face and became uneasy. Then he said coldly: "Put away your smiling face. Even if you sit in that position, you must maintain respect for Raphael."
Kane nodded with a pale face. Julius stopped looking at this idiot who was too proud of himself and asked abruptly, "Who came up with the idea of poisoning?"
Kane was shocked: "What do you mean by poisoning..."
Julius did not slow down
, his tone was cold: "Don't treat me like an idiot, Kane Portia. A knife is not enough to prevent Raphael from even having a chance to ask for help. You reached an agreement with Lombardi behind my back? Then what? How are you going to distribute this papal crown?"
His voice was full of sarcasm. Kane hesitated to explain: "This is what the elders think... They think Raphael is too disobedient, so..."
Julius's hand twitched under his cloak.
Yes, he knew they were unhappy with some of Raphael's actions, and he knew they wanted to change the pope, but he had not expected them to act so quickly and bypass him.
"What a self-righteous fool."
Julius did not hide his sarcasm, although he did not know who he was mocking.
Kane was about to say something when he heard footsteps coming from the front. Kane looked up quickly, but it took Julius a moment to notice the changes in front of him, and he met Redrick's inquiring eyes.
“Why are you here?” Julius felt empty, tired and bored. “I’m busy now, you should go home first.”
Redrick did not hold back: "I heard that guy died."
Julius wanted to get angry for a moment, wanted to pull out the sword of the attendant beside him and cut something, wanted to let the violent and sad emotions in his heart vent, but he firmly suppressed his emotions, hiding everything that shouldn't appear under a hard and cold expression: "Yes."
It took all his strength to utter the word, which was short and quick, but Julius felt great pain when he uttered each syllable.
Raphael is dead.
He thought a little dazedly, yes, he saw it with his own eyes and covered his eyes.
Raphael is dead.
He admitted it himself.
Frederick kept asking, "Why don't you ring the bell?"
Julius was almost angry at his own ignorance, and a little surprised at his late realization. Indeed, the bell should have been rung as soon as the Pope died, but he actually forgot the most important thing.
It's strange that he would forget things.
Julius found an excuse and subconsciously quickened his speech to cover up his previous blankness: "After the cardinals have made preliminary discussions on the candidate for the new pope, the bell will be rung."
Redrick looked at him for two seconds and laughed: "I said, it's bad luck for him to meet you."
The reckless young man left. Julius stood there for a while and continued to give orders without changing his expression: "No need to send Lombardi over. Tell him to hand over the assassin who attacked Raphael to me. We can discuss the rest with Portia..."
He did not deny Redrick's last statement.
The biggest mistake Raphael made in his life was to trust him.
He gained the wholehearted trust and love of an innocent soul, and then watched him go to death with cold eyes. This is a crime that cannot be atonement.
If there is a next life, I hope he can die before Raphael, or not let Raphael meet such a bad mentor like him again.
Julius let out a breath and said tiredly, "You will be the pope nominated by the Portia family. Before that, I have to get rid of Lombardi first."
Before Kane could even smile with joy, he was startled by Julius's cold and murderous tone. Before he could say anything, the Secretary General of the Pope's Palace turned his head and looked straight at him with deep purple eyes. The flash of contempt and arrogance in them made Kane's heart chill: "... And you, be obedient, that's all I ask of you."
Is this also the Julius that Raphael faces? For the first time in his life, Kane showed some respect for his deceased predecessor.
Julius walked out of the Papal Palace like a gust of cold wind. He stepped onto the carriage and looked back at the huge and luxurious tomb. No one could catch the secretary general's emotions. He seemed to just look at it casually. No one knew what he wanted to see, and no one knew what he saw.
"Let's go."
The coachman heard the master's order and waved his whip, and the carriage started moving quickly.
"I also have to plan his funeral."
His voice was lower than a whisper, and ultimately became a warning addressed only to himself.
The author has something to say:
Julius is a very difficult character to write about. His emotions are too reserved and secretive. I wanted to write about his psychological activities, but no matter how I write, it doesn’t feel right. He is a character that needs to be appreciated by grasping at the smallest details. He is a stuffy and reserved person. [shaking head.jpg]
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
