"Holy Grail! Monk cannibalism? And the loss of the sword of Damocles, six dead and five wounded! ”

The Emperor's furious voice echoed in the palace, and Licinius, who was waiting at the door, narrowed his eyes, this crushing defeat must have dealt a serious blow to the position of the Sword of Damocles in the heart of His Majesty the Emperor, and he was ready to accept the storm.

"Licinius, get in here!"

Poor Licinius was already the chief eunuch in the court, but he still had to stumble into the emperor's bedchamber, and fell to his knees, his face pressed to the ground, eager to be buried deep in the ground.

Alexios looked at the eunuch who was kneeling on the ground, and smashed the pile of papers on the table directly over his face, and one of the vases was also thrown out by him, directly on the forehead of Licenides.

Red blood began to flow slowly from Licinius's face, and two blood marks were left on his scalp, and if he had dared to dodge just now, he believed that His Majesty would not mind telling him what punishment was with the hammer of the court warrior.

"Your Majesty, the people we sent suffered heavy losses due to the mistakes of our ministers, but we did not gain nothing, in the monastery left behind by the cultists.

We found a chalice that appeared to be the Last Supper of the Son Jesus, and a large number of bones that we unearthed in the crypts of the monastery. ”

Speaking of which, Licinius had stopped, believing that although the mission had failed, it had unexpectedly obtained the great scandal of the infiltration of the monasteries of the Orthodox Church.

This will certainly help the Emperor in his next actions against the Church, and perhaps he will be able to escape the shadow of defeat.

Alexios grabbed the handle of the throne and squeezed it tightly, looking at the man who had served him in the day, who had been silently cleaning him of the enemies watching in the dark.

"There's no next time, let's find a doctor for yourself!"

Licinius breathed a sigh of relief, His Majesty the Emperor still let him go after all, but this kind of affection was accumulated with great difficulty, and he had to find a way to regain His Majesty's favor.

Licinius, who walked out of the hall again, looked at the scorching sun outside and closed his eyes, thinking about the resources he could use, and believed that the Orthodox Church would definitely be eager to come to the door for cooperation!

……

The Vondus camp was originally a military base for the Imperial Guards, but after the last rebellion, the Emperor disbanded the original Guards and the camp was set up as a garrison for the guards.

Usually Alexios spends half of his day here watching the training of the guards, who have grown from 400 to 1,200 men.

The newly recruited soldiers, all descendants of peasants near the imperial capital, were selected as knightly squires and then assigned a new type of silver wing armor to be incorporated into the reserve force of the guards and pro-army, and these people would be awarded medals on the battlefield and finally promoted.

Behind Alexios were eight tall and burly knights, who were the captains of the Emperor's own choosing: John, Thales, Chiron, Pias, Periande, Andrew, Enoch, and Jaas.

"You will be the cornerstone of the Empire, and this new army will have a resounding name - Hussars! Angel wings of the Empire, Rome will be proud of you! ”

The knights galloping on the field did not know that they had received a meritorious title in later generations, which would be the glory of their future martial name to deter the infidels, one of the strongest in the world.

"Your Majesty, Grand Imam Basil begs to see you!"

The guards who came to meet him said Basil's name, and the emperor soon understood that now several of the Grand Imam of the Orthodox Church should have been summoned to Constantinople, and the Holy Grail incident began to ferment, and these old men could no longer sit still.

These old men were all familiar with the history of the Church, and remembered that the centuries-old campaign to destroy icons was a struggle between the Emperor and the Church for control of the Church.

Since the fourth century AD, the Eastern Roman emperors have enjoyed the "supremacy" of controlling the Church, a power that came naturally from the early Eastern Roman Emperors as patrons of the fledgling Church.

However, before the outbreak of the iconoclasm, the struggle for power between the emperor and the pope had not ceased and intensified.

After Constantine I personally presided over the First Ecumenical Council in 324 AD, Theodosius I, Theodosius II, Marchian, and Justinian I presided over the Ecumenical Councils.

The Bishop of Rome, Martin, attempted to preside over the Second Ecumenical Council, but he was immediately ordered by Constantine II to be taken to the capital and imprisoned, and then exiled.

Secondly, the Eastern Roman Emperor had the right to appoint the top ecclesiastical leaders who controlled the five dioceses, namely Rome, Constantinople, Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch.

Constantine I, Theodosius II, and Justinian I removed the patriarch and bishop of the diocese respectively, and Pope Vigilus was placed under house arrest in Constantinople for seven years.

But the Church was always trying to free itself from the control of the imperial power, and under Constantine I, bishops had the right to hear any case ever heard by the secular courts.

The bishop's judgment was considered final, and under Theodosius I, the Church was granted further privileges in areas such as taxation and justice.

In the seventh century, the Church opposed Heraclius' "theory of unionism" and "monosexuality", and Bishop Gregory I of Rome openly opposed the emperor's edict forbidding officials and soldiers to enter monasteries until they had completed their duties, and used the great secular nobility of Eastern Rome to compete for imperial power.

By the end of the seventh century, the Roman bishop Sergius was openly inciting his army to rebel against the imperial court in his struggle against the emperor. The increasing power of the Church eventually led to the iconoclasm of Leo III in order to limit the development of the Church.

That unforgettable clerical struggle has left all Orthodox monks hating to this day, and when the iconoclasm was completely quelled, both the empire and the Orthodox church were defeated.

The empire was preoccupied with the struggle with the church for the right to appoint and to collect taxes and to administer justice, ignoring the threat from the Saracens, the external enemies of the empire.

This eventually led to the siege of the imperial capital, and it was not until the siege was lifted by the Bulgarian cavalry that Constantinople was declared safe and the Eastern Roman Empire was continued.

And the church was also torn apart in that struggle, not only the split in the church ideology led to the split between the eastern and western churches, but also the orthodox church was severely attacked by the poor believers at the bottom, and many people even abandoned the belief in God and joined heresy.

There are no winners, and that's why it's unforgettable.

When the new Pope ascended the throne, the Emperor immediately sent a large number of the backbone of the Church to preach to the barbarians, in the name of proclaiming the power of God.

However, several senators in the church are also ready to fight back, and once the emperor is ready to attack, they will also unite the nobles and poor people of the imperial capital to launch a Nika uprising to replace the emperor.

It's just that what caught them off guard was that the emperor hadn't launched it yet, and they couldn't stand on their own, and the Holy Grail incident spread extremely fast, and even Constantinople began to have some rumors, which even led to a certain panic among the people.

Some of the monks began to panic when they found that the former believers were not even coming to pray.

This is not the same as in the past, they can also mobilize the power of the people, this is the people's spontaneous boycott of the church, the situation is cruel and panicked.

As a result, representatives of the church came forward to hope that the emperor could reach a reconciliation and use the imperial administration to block the news.

"I also want to meet Patriarch Basil, may God bless him and hold on."