The shockwave arrived.
Without warning.
It was as if an invisible giant had raised a sky-covering hammer and smashed it violently into the face of Rome’s inner fortress.
Crack!
The massive oak gate of the inner fortress didn’t even last a second.
The doorboards were blasted off their hinges like two dead leaves.
Caesar was standing right behind it.
Just moments earlier, he had been peering through the crack in the door, despairing at the mushroom cloud outside.
The next instant—
The door slammed into his chest.
PFFT!
Caesar didn’t even have time to scream. His body was sent flying like a rag sack, carried by the door into the hall.
He smashed through two stone pillars.
Finally, he crashed hard beneath the consul’s throne.
“AAAAHHH!!!”
Only then did the pain reach his brain.
Caesar clutched his right leg and rolled on the shattered ground.
His right shin was bent at a grotesque right angle.
White bone fragments pierced through his expensive silk trousers, exposed to the sulfur-filled air.
Blood instantly soaked the floor.
“Someone! Someone help!”
Caesar’s voice cracked into a hoarse roar.
His wig had fallen off, revealing a bald head.
His face was covered in blood and dust—no trace of a Roman dictator’s dignity remained.
No one answered.
The hall was filled with senators pretending to be dead on the ground.
Marcus, who had earlier vowed to stand and die with Rome, now had his head buried between his legs, butt raised high, trembling violently.
A foul stench spread from beneath him.
“Help me up…”
Caesar grabbed the armrest of the throne, trying to pull himself up.
“I am Caesar! I am Rome’s ruler!”
“Where are my legions?! My guard?!”
BOOM!
Another explosion.
But this one wasn’t from the battlefield.
Something had just crashed through the roof.
Caesar looked up abruptly.
A massive golden object, howling through the air, plunged straight into the stone floor before him.
It missed his nose by less than half an inch.
Debris struck his face, leaving cuts of blood.
Caesar froze.
He stared at it in disbelief.
A golden eagle.
The soul of the Roman legions.
The supreme golden eagle standard granted by the Senate.
It had once stood atop the inner fortress, overlooking all of Rome.
Now—
It was broken.
The eagle’s head hung crooked, its wings snapped, like a dead chicken with its neck twisted.
“The… eagle… banner…”
Caesar’s hands trembled.
He reached out toward it.
Thud.
The banner could no longer support itself and collapsed onto the ground, splitting into two halves.
With it, Caesar’s final pillar of mental strength shattered completely.
“It’s over…”
Caesar collapsed to the ground, muttering:
“Rome… has fallen.”
…
Outer city.
This was no longer a battlefield.
It was a slaughterhouse.
The explosion of the main arsenal had not only destroyed buildings—
It had destroyed the Romans’ sanity.
To them, the giant mushroom cloud was divine punishment from Jupiter.
A god’s wrath against their greed.
Punishment for their theft of cursed food and fake gold coins.
“Run!”
“The divine punishment is here!”
A centurion violently threw his sword to the ground.
He tore at his armor as if it were burning his skin.
“I won’t fight anymore! I’m going home!”
He cried out and turned to flee.
He knocked down his own soldiers.
They knocked him down in return.
No one helped anyone.
Everyone ran like headless flies through streets filled with ruins and fire.
“Move! Get out of the way!”
A cavalry unit galloped past.
They weren’t charging.
They were escaping.
Their horses trampled civilians and allied soldiers alike.
Screams were drowned beneath hoofbeats.
Rome’s entire command structure collapsed in that moment.
No orders.
No organization.
Only primal fear remained.
…
On the main road near the city gate—
A massive figure staggered up from a pile of broken bricks.
It was the blacksmith, Bach.
His face was covered in blood.
One ear had gone deaf; everything sounded as if it were underwater.
But in his hand, he still clutched his blacksmith’s hammer tightly.
He saw the cloud.
That black-red, still churning cloud.
“Devils…”
Bach spat out a mouthful of blood.
“The Qin are not human… they’ve summoned demons!”
He didn’t want to die.
He didn’t want to be turned into that kind of charred corpse.
“I need out… I need to get out!”
Bach turned and looked toward the massive main city gate behind him.
Although several cracks had been blasted into it by the shockwave, it still remained shut.
Rome’s final barrier.
Now it had become a coffin sealing them inside.
“OPEN THE GATE!!!”
Bach raised his hammer and roared like a beast.
He charged toward the gate.
Behind him—dozens, hundreds, thousands of desperate Roman civilians surged forward like they had found an outlet for their fear.
“Open the gate! Let us out!”
“Let us out!”
The crowd became a raging tide, crashing into the gate.
Inside the gate tunnel—
A handful of remaining guards were still desperately holding the line.
The captain drew his sword and pointed it at Bach.
“Back off! Without Lord Caesar’s order, no one is allowed—”
“Go to hell with Caesar!”
Bach didn’t slow down at all.
Like a mad bull.
His hammer swung through the air and came crashing down.
Bang!
The captain’s head exploded like a rotten watermelon.
Brain matter splattered across Bach’s face.
He didn’t even bother wiping it off.
He kicked the corpse aside and threw himself at the massive gate bolt.
“OPEN IT!!!”
Veins bulged across Bach’s forehead as he screamed.
He poured every ounce of strength into the iron bar thicker than a man’s thigh.
It didn’t move.
“Help! Everyone help me!”
Bach roared backward.
Countless hands reached forward.
Hands covered in soot.
Hands wearing fake gold rings.
Hands that had just been killing each other moments ago.
Now—
They all had only one purpose.
To open this gate.
“One! Two! Push!”
“One! Two! Push!”
Thousands of people’s strength converged into a single point.
The iron bar began to groan in agony.
Creaaak…
It bent.
It warped.
The gate, designed to keep out enemies, now wailed under pressure from within.
“Again!”
Bach raised his hammer and smashed the rivet connecting the bolt.
CLANG!
Sparks flew.
The rivet flew off.
The bolt snapped completely.
BOOM!
The two ten-zhang-tall gates lost their final restraint.
Under the pressure of thousands of bodies, they slowly began to swing open.
Sunlight poured in.
Wind rushed in.
Inside the once chaotic, maddened, crowded gate tunnel—
Everything suddenly went silent.
Deathly silent.
Bach froze in the posture of pushing the gate.
His body stiffened.
The crowd behind him also stiffened.
They all looked outside.
Less than a hundred steps beyond the gate—
A black army stood in formation.
Silent.
Motionless.
Not even the horses dared to snort.
Eight hundred black-armored cavalrymen held crossbows, coldly watching the Romans who had crawled out of hell.
At the very front—
A child of about eight sat on a tall warhorse.
In his hand was an apple, half eaten.
He looked at Bach, covered in blood and holding a hammer.
Then he looked at the completely opened gate.
Ying Ziye swallowed the bite in his mouth.
He smiled.
A very pleased smile.
He raised his hand, using the small knife still stained with apple juice, and pointed at Bach.
“Not a bad gate opening.”
“Reward him.”
“Give him real gold coins.”
Discussion
Comments
0 comments so far.
Sign in to join the conversation and keep your activity tied to this account.
No comments yet. Start the conversation.