Chapter 128: Is It Logical? Seriously?

"Minimise your presence, preserve your strength, and wait for change…." Antonius murmured following Abdullah's words.

"Yes."

"Thank you." Antonius stood up holding Abdullah's hands and bowed towards him, while the later hurriedly jumped to one side dodging the bow by his friend.

"We don't have time for this, my friend." Abdullah stopped Antonius before he could hug him with that Italian courtesy and rapidly spit out his words. "Right now, Zaganos Pasha and his men should not be very far away, they might come back and surprise us at any point of time!"

"I shall immediately order my men to loot all the valuables in the camp and go back at once!" One of Antonius' captain called Baron standing by the side guarding his captain all the time responded before his commander hoping to earn some image.

Both Antonius and Abdullah is startled by these words of absurdity that just jumped out of this fellow captain's mouth as Antonius almost laughed out proofing the idea off this captain' head. "How are you going to pass the command to everyone when they are all scattered around in the dark?"

Abdullah followed with a wry smile. "How do you tell how much loot is enough? Do you know that the Great Prophet once mentioned that lust of men is a hole that can never be filled up?"

The captain backed off with his face turning red in shame.

"That triggers another point I want to remind you, my friend Antonius." Abdullah stopped smiling and said. "Remember you are no longer a pirate, so both you and your men need to stop behaving like one… An image of a pirate will refrain you from gathering fame and people with intellects."

Antonius approves the words of wisdom.

"Send the flares, call everyone for a retreat, at once!"

"Roger."

Soon, three bright white flare is sent into the night skin filled with the moon and stars by a metal tube that resembles the thing used to spit off the Greek Fire, grabbing the attention of every Roman scout in the compound within the visible range. They know what the flares means; One means advance, two means assemble, and three means retreat at once. A simple but effective code. Most soldiers began falling back without any hesitation back to the city, while some who probably got something luring their eyes, chose to remain behind.

…

Meanwhile in a distance away from the camps, there is a patch of woods on the hill that perfectly hides any human activities inside yielding a thousand men strong Siphai calvarias mostly armoured with blades and fire torches in their hands and ten arrows each in their quiver. In front of them stands their commander; Zaganos Pasha, whose attention are also grabbed by the three white flares rising up in the black sky.

Zaganos Pasha looked at his banner flying.

The wind is blowing south east, not perfect but still towards the direction of Constantinople.

"For whatever reason, the Romans have found us." Zaganos Pasha organised his turban and drew out his Kilij blade. "Advance! Kill every Roman in your path! If by the might of Allah, they all ran back behind those cursed walls like how a rat runs from a cat, I order you to set fire on every single tent, may the mighty Allah bless us and the fire, that it will spread all the way to Constantinople burning the ill fated city down! Allāhu ʾakbar!"

"Allāhu ʾakbar!"

The roar of the thousand knights shook the hill and woods, they quickly commanded their mounts up from the ground and leapt onto horse backs charging down hill towards the camp following their pasha.

Unsurprisingly, they met little resistance, most of the Romans have already ran back to the city leaving those greedy ones behind who learnt their lesson in a hard way. Frustrated by the disappointment, Zaganos Pasha spit towards the direction of Constantinople, stared at it, threw his torch onto a tent and galloped towards the allocated exit.

The rest of the riders soon followed, leaving the entire plain and the massive camp in flames soaring up high engulfing all the air in the night like a black hole. The fire even ignited some unused black powders stored in various locations creating an even more violent chain reactions creating the level of heat that the Roman guards on the walls can almost feel like the temperature in the surrounding has increased by a bit.

The flames seem to be truly blessed by the Ottoman's God as it slowly burns towards the direction of the city devouring every single plantation in the process, looking like it will reach the city in no time. Antonius, who are already back onto the walls, knows very well that the city will suffer once more from a flame like this, it is already beyond descriptions, just imagine the feeling when you see an entire forest burning down forming a wall of fire stretching from this this extent of your sight to that extent of your sight.

"What should we do now?" Constantine, who are called to the walls observing the situation of the fire, pretends to be peaceful and calm despite his heart already beating up and down, asked his courtiers at the back.

His courtiers looked at each other trying to discuss out an answer or find one from their memories in the books but are all to no avail.

Antonius pulled the ridge of Abdullah's robe, while the latter shook his head silently with a reluctant smile.

Seeing this, Constantine could maintain his noble image no more as he cried out to his courtiers. "I demand a response! Now! Oh, Jesus Christ be praised, what did I even pay all of you for!"

A senior senator, instead of giving ideas and suggestions on how to stop the fire, began reprimanding Constantine for not having an imperator and a Roman citizen's noble standard towards 'outside guests.

Constantine almost felt like he want to draw out his blade and slit it into the tongue of that bloody senator.