Late at night, the next day, Thebes royal palace.
A cold wind passed through the doors and windows, pouring into the hall.
King Pentheus, who was sitting alone on the throne with his eyes closed and resting, heard a creaking sound and could not help but shiver as he immediately stood up in a fluster, pulling out the bronze longsword from the rack beside him and looking around vigilantly.
"Who's there? Pretending to be a god, come out!"
Pentheus waved the bronze sword in his hand at the air, issuing a warning.
However, what responded to him was only the whistling wind outside the door.
It was just a false alarm.
Pentheus's face flushed slightly and he resentfully put the bronze sword back into its sheath, his suspended heart relaxing a little.
But even so, just thinking about the handsome young man from last night in the hall, who came without a trace and left without a shadow, made the young king's expression turn uncertain.
At that time, with so many divine-blood guards watching in the hall, they still did not discover how he disappeared.
Even after searching the entire palace and city for two consecutive days, the guards still could not find any trace of that person.
Since he could sneak in and disappear so easily, did that not also mean that if that guy wanted to assassinate the king, it would be equally easy?
Realizing that this threat might still be hiding in some corner of the palace, Pentheus suddenly felt a chill and could not help but lower his head to look at the token beside the throne engraved with the image of a poisonous dragon.
The heretics of the wine god cult were still locked in the underground prison.
If he released them...
Accompanied by drifting thoughts, a hand hesitantly reached downward.
"What? A mere little trick performed by a false god has made you timid?"
A sudden voice echoed through the empty hall.
Pentheus's expression changed immediately as he drew his sword and turned to defend himself.
However, a fair, slender index finger gently pressed against the sword's edge, effortlessly pushing down that sharp weapon capable of cutting gold and chopping iron.
"It is me..."
A low and somewhat hoarse voice came from a patch of blood-red light in front of the throne, and at some unknown moment, the entire hall had already been filled with a faint crimson glow.
A pair of narrow eyes stained with scarlet examined the young Theban king before her, shaking her head and sneering.
"Descendant of the dragon-slayer Cadmus, blood relative of the war god Ares, a true divine descendant, actually fearing a mere false god.
You are simply shaming your ancestors."
"I am not!"
Pentheus's blood rushed through his whole body, his cheeks flushing red.
He immediately stiffened his neck and loudly refuted her, as if wanting to prove something to the mysterious figure before him.
"Then where is your courage? Show it to me." The crimson figure looked down and leaned forward, guiding him patiently. "Being humiliated to your face and letting him escape in front of everyone, such an arrogant person who made you lose face, how should he be dealt with?"
"I will kill him sooner or later!"
Pentheus's anger surged in his heart and he immediately snorted coldly, speaking with sinister intent.
At this answer, the crimson figure nodded in satisfaction.
"This is the right way, my king.
You should be the noblest existence in this land. Any being that dares to defy you will pay with blood!"
Hearing the blood shadow's praise, the young king felt a surge of excitement in his heart.
But then, thinking of last night's scene, he could not help feeling somewhat depressed and troubled.
"Those words are right, but that guy ran too fast. My people could not catch up at all. If I cannot catch him, what can I do to him?"
The blood shadow glanced at Pentheus, who was complaining directly to her.
A trace of disdain flashed through her eyes, and she smiled faintly as she spoke. "He can run, but there are always some people who cannot escape."
"You mean?" Hearing her words, Pentheus looked thoughtful.
"Since that heretic god claims to be 'merciful,' would he be willing to make a small sacrifice for his innocent believers?"
Hearing the meaningful whisper by his ear, Pentheus instantly understood.
He immediately grabbed the city-builder token beside the throne, injected divine power into it, and activated the runes within it.
Soon, a team of divine-blood guards opened the main doors of the palace hall, filed in, and asked the king on the throne in deep voices,
"Your Majesty, what are your orders?"
"Immediately go to the underground prison, escort all the heretics to the square, and hang them one by one until the heretic who escaped last night is willing to surrender himself!"
Pentheus threw out the token with a sinister smile and issued the order.
Hearing this, the guard commander could not help being stunned and carefully reminded him, "But Your Majesty, your mother and several aunts are still in the underground prison. Should we...?"
However, this hesitation instead made Pentheus's face turn gloomy, and a flash of angry scarlet appeared in his eyes.
"Shut up! No matter who it is, worshiping a false god and joining a heretical sect is a capital crime! Execute them! Execute them all!"
"Yes, yes, sir..."
Under that fierce and tyrannical gaze, the guard commander did not dare say more.
He immediately braced himself, picked up the token on the ground, gathered his men, and headed toward the underground prison.
After the divine-blood guards who received the order completely disappeared from his sight,
Pentheus immediately turned his head to the side and asked impatiently,
"How did I do?"
The blood shadow in the darkness smiled and clapped softly, her eyes showing approval.
"This is what a wise monarch should look like. You are even more outstanding than your grandfather!"
Pentheus nodded in satisfaction.
That young face reflected in the crimson glow overflowed with excitement and cruelty.
'That's right, I am the king of Thebes!
No one can defy my will! Not even gods!'
However, just as Pentheus was immersed in his wonderful fantasies, the team of guards who had earlier been ordered to go to the underground prison returned with panicked expressions.
"Your Majesty, bad news! Those heretics have escaped!"
"What?"
Upon hearing this, Pentheus angrily stood up from the throne and cursed at the guard commander.
"What are you all doing with so many men? You cannot even watch over a mere hundred or so prisoners?
And they were all old, weak, sick, and disabled!"
Hearing the king's rebuke, the guard commander who came back to report wore a deeply aggrieved expression.
"Your Majesty, this really has nothing to do with us. When we arrived at the underground prison, the door was already open. The jailers had all fainted as if drunk.
And just as our vision blurred, those prisoners disappeared right in front of us. In the cells, only a large pile of handcuffs and fetters that had automatically fallen off remained."
"If they ran, then go find them again! Go catch them again! Many heretics' homes are still in the city.
They definitely did not run far!"
At this time, after that unknown figure's guidance, Pentheus seemed to have already grasped the method of dealing with the heretics, gnashing his teeth as he gave the order.
"If you cannot catch them, then bring back their family members to receive punishment in place of these criminals!"
The guard commander felt bitter inside upon hearing this.
Such large-scale punishment by association would definitely cause chaos.
And the guards responsible for carrying out the orders would inevitably be cursed and blamed by the public.
But the king's command could not be defied.
Seeing that King Pentheus was determined to strike hard at the wine god cult and all related people, he could only take the token, gather the divine-blood guards, and head to the city defense army camp, preparing to launch a joint operation.
There was no way.
The burden was too big for one person to carry alone.
Better to let the accompanying brothers help share some of the weight.
Additionally, he did not want to be drowned in public outrage, so he first planned to pursue and arrest that group of escaped heretics.
If he truly could not produce them, then catching the relatives of those involved to make up the numbers would not be too late.
No matter what, tonight was destined to be a sleepless night.
~~~
.....
Meanwhile, outside the city.
In the dungeon, those Dionysus cult followers, who had vanished experienced a dizzying spin before they groggily opened their eyes.
To their shock, they found they had escaped that dark and damp prison and were now standing in the dense forest of Mount Cithaeron.
Under the hazy moonlight, the blond youth who had displayed a miracle in the palace hall the previous night was standing before them, holding a staff and smiling.
"Saint! It's the Saint!"
"Thank you for saving us!"
"By the Wine God, we've finally escaped."
The believers came to their senses and immediately swarmed forward, all talking at once to express their excitement.
When that group of divine-blood guards had arrived, they had already learned from the noisy discussions that King Pentheus had decided to execute them.
They had all been terrified, thinking they would die on the gallows.
They had never expected that the Wine God would actually order His saint to rescue them from that life-and-death crisis.
This truly was a merciful and just god!
Having just survived a disaster, the believers' gratitude and worship were naturally beyond words.
That strong faith turned into invisible points of light, pouring into the heart-image world of a certain [Saint] present, transforming into a golden divine liquid that poured down.
The grape seedling inside the golden wheel, nourished by it, grew several inches taller in an instant and sprouted several tender branches.
What a group of good people!
Lorne looked at the believers before him, his eyes shining, as if he were seeing a batch of vigorously growing fresh leeks.
Invisibly, the god and the believers rushing toward each other gazed at one another fervently, each feeling they were the one benefiting the most.
"Gu gu~~."
Just as the atmosphere was growing increasingly ambiguous, a rumbling sound of hungry stomachs broke the silence in the dense forest.
A dozen believers awkwardly rubbed their bellies, and the rest could not help but look embarrassed.
After being locked in the dungeon, they had gone nearly a full day without eating.
Lorne smiled slightly, reached out, and handed the wooden staff in his palm to a woman in the crowd who seemed somewhat familiar.
"Use it."
The woman took the staff in surprise and delight, then followed the saint's instructions and tapped the rock wall.
Clear springs and fine wine immediately flowed from the cracks in the stone, milk flowed in the stream, and honey dripped from the hollow tree trunks.
The sweet aroma made the starving believers try scooping up the wine and milk or sucking the honey from the trees.
The fragrance of the food in their mouths and the real feeling of fullness invigorated them and excited them beyond measure.
They kept murmuring the word "miracle" and prostrated themselves in worship to that benevolent Wine God.
As a result, the divine power in Lorne's body and the grapevine in the center of the golden wheel grew a little more, and his mood became even more joyful.
Watching the believers feasting all around him, this cult leader wore a face full of sincere smiles, like a diligent old farmer happy to see the leeks in his own field growing vigorously.
As expected of fellow countrymen, they are really simple and honest.
Give them a little real benefit, and they are willing to believe in you, and they believe more thoroughly than the next.
Of course, it could also be because these Greek gods are usually not decent at all.
They do everything based on preference and mood, without any understanding of sustainable development or mutual benefit and win-win.
They either cut the leeks by the roots or turn the entire field over.
So, when it comes to farming, one still has to look at other divine powers.
While Lorne secretly sighed with emotion, he quietly sketched Hermes' script behind him, cutting through space.
Although he had become a god, his authority was not yet strong enough to create something from nothing.
Therefore, part of these foods was produced by using the pastoral god power of [Goat] and the hunting god power of [Wild Boar] to accelerate the growth of nature, while the other part was the result of spatial transport, bringing some things over from the city.
Of course, Lorne had also left some gold and silver as compensation.
As the former secretary of Crete, he still had quite a bit of precious metal in his hands, enough to support a hundred or so people for several months with ease.
Just as Lorne was thinking whether to take advantage of the believers' eating to rehearse a pre-meal prayer ritual and strengthen their faith and sense of belonging, a noisy sound of horse hooves came from outside the forest.
Soon, hundreds of fully armed figures appeared in the woods.
"It's the guards!"
Seeing the venomous dragon-elephant emblem marked on the armor and weapons, the believers fell into panic at once as they picked up wooden sticks and stones one after another, surrounding a certain saint and looking as if they were making a last-ditch struggle.
"Stop!"
Lorne stopped the believers' irrational behavior, walked out of the crowd, looked at the leading guard commander, and smiled as he spoke.
"I heard your king wants to see me? How about this, I'm willing to surrender. Just don't make things difficult for the people behind me."
The guard commander thought seriously for a moment, glanced at the hundred or so people present, and nodded slightly.
There were quite a few nobles from Thebes among them, and the king's initial order to him had only been to find a way to lure this "saint" out.
It was just a job.
He really did not need to exterminate them all.
They were all fellow countrymen.
They saw each other often.
It was always good to leave a way out.
Moreover, that majesty in the palace seemed to have some serious illness.
Seeing that a consensus had been reached, Lorne proactively put shackles on himself.
"We can't let them take the saint away!"
"Fight them!"
"..."
However, just as the guards were about to put this prisoner into the prison cart, the believers finally could not bear it anymore and they all surged forward together, trembling as they raised their wooden sticks and stones.
The guard commander, seeing this, helplessly spoke up to remind them.
"His Majesty Pentheus has ordered that if you dare to resist or escape, your relatives and friends in the city will be thrown into prison together.
For the sake of your families, everyone should surrender."
Upon hearing this, the Theban locals among the believers could not help but look ashen, but there were still quite a few believers with resolute expressions, obviously prepared to martyr themselves for the saint.
Lorne raised his hand once more to stop the believers' resistance and smiled as he spoke.
"Rest assured. You all wait here. I'll be back soon. This trip is the will of the Wine God."
There seemed to be a convincing magic in those words.
The believers gradually relaxed, all nodding obediently and choosing to continue eating and praying.
Since it was the will of the Wine God, He would surely protect His believers.
And seeing the believers use the staff to conjure honey, wine, milk and other foods out of thin air, the guards, one after another, showed shock.
Their attitude toward Lorne, this heretic, also gained a bit more caution and awe.
Soon, the guards escorted the heavy criminal in the prison cart, heading toward Thebes, preparing to report back to the monarch who had issued the order.
(End of this chapter)