Nova Roma

Chapter 218 - Road outside of Rome

Julio toured the tunnels while he holds the candle holder so as not to remain in total darkness until he reached some stairs which climbed, he prepared his sword because he did not know what kind of creatures could be up, he climbed slowly while he saw that the flame of his candle was moving.

That meant that there was a stream of air above, he walked slowly and found a wooden door that was closed with a piece of wood, very carefully removing the wood and pushing the door.

Sunlight dazzled Julio who had to close his eyes to avoid being dazzled, when he adapted to sunlight he realized that he had left in a collapsed and abandoned house.

He checks to find something of value among the destroyed wooden boxes in the place but the only valuable thing he found was an empty backpack something old but which was perfect for storing things.

He walks through the place which was an olive farm that didn’t seem to be very well maintained but that didn’t stop Julio from eating some black olives that were in the olive trees.

While eating olives, some tears came from his face for thinking of Estela, it was going to be complicated but he had to overlap the loss of another, he will not be able to give up in combat.

He cannot die until he has completed his mission in any other way everything he is doing will not make sense, after filling his stomach with olives he walked a little to a small hill to be able to locate in what northern part he had left.

He climbed slowly and was horrified by what he saw, the beautiful city of Rome that was a few kilometers away was burning in fire much of the city, the great colosseum that could be seen in the distance was burning.

Julio could see how the colosseum collapsed leaving a lot of dust, he did not want to continue seeing how his beautiful city was being destroyed, he already knew where he was.

Now before him, he has two options to arrive at Gaul by the coast or to do it by the center of the peninsula, the advantage when doing it by the center of the peninsula is that the amount of population will be smaller.

So the risks of encountering cursed beings such as those in Rome will be less, but if you go along the coast it can be more dangerous, you may have the opportunity to find a ship to reach Galia quickly or take a trip in Sea until you reach Britain.

After thinking about it a little, he decided that it was safer to go through the center of the peninsula because on the way he could recruit the auxiliaries and troops who were in charge of defending the region of barbarian tribes.

His first stop was to reach the city of Veii where he would try to stock up and then depart for the city of Volsinii novae, where he would try to find some way to advance to the Alps.

He undertook his walk along the desolate road that did not seem to have a trace of any person, he walked for about 10 minutes when he could see a cart that had the remains of a horse.

When he approached he could see more closely the body of the half-eaten horse, he prepared his sword and approached the back of the cart to see if there was anything useful.

He carefully opened the cloth that covered the carriage and could see a girl of about 5 years devouring the body of what appeared to be a young man, the girl stopped and turned to see Julio see him with his bloody mouth.

The girl jumped towards Julio who dodged the attack of the little girl, was surprised to see that unlike the cursed beings she had known the girl was moving quite fast, the girl ran to try again to eat Julio.

But the steel sword cut off the girl’s head leaving only the decapitated body to fall to the ground, Julio did not like killing girls and boys but would not hesitate to kill if his life is in danger.

He opened the back door of the carriage and could see the body of the young man that the girl was eating approached him and cut off his head to prevent him from getting up from his deathbed.

After this, he checks the boxes in the carriage to see if he found anything of value could find some meat and vegetables pickled in jars, grape and apple juice as well as wines

He used his backpack to store as much food and juice as he could, he did not want to drink alcohol because with the sun and the walk it would only cause a serious poisoning that could cost him his life.

After saving the food and having a portion of better food than just olives, he continued on his way, the journey was only a few kilometers but with a backpack full of food and the hugging autumn sun had to rest between sections.

On one of his breaks, he could see in the distance a watchtower, which is on all roads to take care of merchants and farmers from dangers along the way such as renegade barbarians or thieves.

He rests a little and walks to the watchtower, where he could see the two guards doing their patrol activities without knowing of the chaos in Rome, he approached them "Soldiers need your help I am Julius Octavian son of Emperor Augustus. "

The two soldiers who were taking care of the tower heard the young man in special forces clothes speak, for a moment they hesitated but one of them recognized Julio.

He had seen it in one of his triumphs years ago when he came victorious from Britain, so he quickly ran and informed his partner that the head heir was the crown prince.

The two stood in front of Julio and greeted "Hail Julio"

Julio looked at them and greeted them "I need you to tell me your reports today and yesterday, Rome fell today and Estela my wife died.

Dark times await Rome but we will overcome it or die in the attempt, I hope you are willing to die because what we face is something we do not understand."

The soldiers looked at the prince’s sad face and quickly went to look for what he needed, they knew something serious had happened ...