Chapter 211: Children In the Crossroad

The children, naïve and energetic as always have finished those lighter chores their parents have assigned to them for the day, ran around the recruitment officers naked laughing and cheering, and then hide behind a wall poking their heads out looking at Antonius and his booths with a widened curious pair of eyes. 

They know who this big brother is, he is the one who showed up from no where on the seas landing on the beaches two days ago, chased down and killed all those bad people who bullied them and their family, gave them food to eat, and most importantly, the big brother gave their fathers and mothers happiness. Despite being only children but they can still fill it, the entire atmosphere in the neighborhood coming for a sudden change ever since the entire chain of events happened, from a gloomy despaired neighborhood to a much brighter, lively and cheerful one. 

Antonius too noticed these little heads bobbing out of the walls, with nothing to do he searched through his bags and pockets and found a few rock candies which his men have looted from a Saracen convoy ship from Syria and gave it to their admiral. Then he waved and smiled towards these kids signaling them to come forth to him. 

The kids hesitated at first but still made up their mind approaching their new lord timidly. Their parents have emphasized to them lots of times to pay respect and be afraid of their new lord as who knows if the new lord is going to follow the path of the old one.

Antonius giggled looking at these cute little fellows showing them his hand palm, which is filled with those rock candies, some thing these little fellows had never ever seen in their lives before wandering what these pale coloured little rocks that looks like crystal sands on the beaches are. They looked at each other trying to see from one another's eyes whether any of them got an answer to this, but sadly there are none.

Seeing this Antonius sighed, picked up a rock candy, showed it in front of the eyes of these little children, and dropped it into his mouth tasting the aroma of its sweetness spreading on his toughies, something one rarely gets in these times even for the kings. The children soon understood, and they followed picking up the rock candy and immediately they widened their eyes out of shock tasting the sweetness that they have never experienced before. They gobbled down one after another rock candy down into their mouths like they are having a feast, a feast that would probably be remembered in their entire life. Finishing the bunch of candies in Antonius' hands in no time.

No child can resist the temptation of sweets and candies.

Antonius watches these children snatching each other's candies enjoying it with a gleeful smirk on his face holding his chins with his hands on his table. Watching cute little children play around zestfully and vibrantly is indeed a great way of relaxing one's strained mind.

The children finished gobbling down the sweets. They gathered round in circle discussing something and soon decided that since they got such a saccharine gift from their lord, they must gift some thing back to their lord following the teachings of a grateful decent Christian; They decided to sing their lord a rhythm, as that is the only and the best gift they can really think of at this point of time.

Watched by Antonius these group of children gathered in circles with Antonius in the middle, holding their hands, and began jumping singing their rhythm.

"O praise our lord! May the light of destiny shine upon you,

For you have pulled us straight from the error pining hell;

O praise our lord! May you be showered with gold, silver and jewellery,

For you have laid riches before us humble folks;

In the darkness there comes a hero, a saviour,

A glow of hope, tinkle of a glorious morn,

For our lord shall break the old world and make the drowsy world rejoice;

O Be on your knees! All evils trying to block the light of Christ!

For the voice of angel has came, here by giving us an eternal protection;

The divine sip, the divine sea, the sea where our lord set foot,

Led by the defender of Christianity with his light serenely beaming;

Our lord, praised 'nd blessed by Jesus himself,

Knows our need, knows his strength, knows your weakness;

Behold your lord! Before him show your humbleness with your body bent!

Restrain your evilness! For his luminous fire of all Saints shall see through you!

…

He giggles fair as the new spring, as toward he lures you.

His sword sharp as tack as he penetrates you.

Your sins he see, as he swears to punish you.

Dues need to be returned, as he shall look for you.

Black and white on paper, with no compassionate feeling left for you.

He shall break your neck, eyes glowing afire of rage.

To gore and torture you until the star fades,

Until the sun dims,

Until the moon dwells."

The entire rhythm was alright at first, as Antonius leans his head backwards closing his eyes soaking himself in the delightful cheering voices of the youth, but it went straight down after the chorus making him frown a little bit. The final few sentences really made his spine tinkle from the unknowing sense of awkwardness recounting on the dream he had yesterday.

"Wait what?" Antonius opened his eyes and looked for the children. But seeing the lord has opened his eyes, the children scattered away off from the booth to all corners of the streets giggle and laughing away under the cover of the darkening sky.

"What… The…"

Still, it is time for work.

As the sun goes down, the waves splatters and the tide rise, the ones who are out in the sea or in fields working slowly came back to their straw homes evading the all evils lurking around on the island in the darkness even with it being a relatively isolated place. And this is when their attentions are caught by a new thing right in the middle of the street that they have never seen before, a make shift booth with a bunch of looking to be tired guards, and their new lord seated right there awaiting for them. Realising that their new lord and also saviour have some things to say to them, they approached and gathered in front of the booth.

Antonius forced a dry smile on his already sleepy and tired face standing up and let the his subjects come fourth and bow before him as a courtesy seeing their sovereign, then asked them to have a seat on the ground, with stiff bread and pottage stews provided for each of them soothing their already famished stomach while taking the time to listen to their lord speaks.

Antonius stood on the stage shouted out his plans to construct a new fortress by the sea facing the directions of Anatolia and Constantinople for the better defence of the chain of islands preventing a surprise attack against them, open an iron work to produce more efficient tools, swords, artilleries, a mine to better extract the exposed copper and iron minerals out of the lands.

The crowd listened. After Antonius has finished, the elder of the village realised what Antonius is going to say and he stood up asking. "My lord! We understand your broad blue prints! What do you need us to do, just say the word!"

"Good question." Nodded Antonius. "I have a plan, I will recruit people with money, coins, for them to stop their simple life of farming or fishing, and change their career to miners, construction workers, and iron smiths. What do you say about that? If you come and work for me, you shall not have the need to pay tax forever in your life, and you can learn a new set of skills, with it I can assure you that you will earn a rich life in the future!"

The crowd started gossiping and discussing before the village elders, and reluctantly looked at their lord. Seeing this the heart within Antonius' chest hampered and hindered as this is definitely not a good sign, it seems like it is not that easy to pull these people out of their usual familiar life styles on fishing boats and farm lands. However, if he cannot rely on his own subjects, who shall he use? Back to forced slavery of foreigners? Or forced labour on his own subjects?

Both choices are definitely not going to work.

Antonius continued waiting on the stage for a final reply. Whether it is an aye or a nah, he needs an answer. The discussion beneath him became louder and louder in their own Greek dialect that Antonius cannot really understand. Although he is already guessing that he might encounter an utter failure tonight, he persisted seating back down and waiting for the final result.