The days in Rome were always very intense. It couldn't be otherwise since Rome was the capital of the Res Publica as well as the biggest city in the Mediterranean.
The narrow streets of the capital were full of life. The carts pushed by people went up and down the streets and the citizens carried out their business. City guards patrolled the streets, ensuring order in the world's most chaotic city.
In one of these alleys, there was a particular shop full of people waiting in line for their turn to be served. It had nothing special and was even a little hidden, but the owner's genius in printing his mark on his products had made it known not only to the plebeians but also to the Roman aristocracy.
Everyone who had tried his creations knew how excellent they were. Above all, the prices were quite honest, allowing everyone to be able to purchase the forge's products.
The owner was a good-looking guy with blond hair and emerald-green eyes. He may not have been more than twenty, but he had the skill and look of an experienced blacksmith. His skin was lightly tanned by the forge fires. His physique was toned, his muscles strengthened by the constant beating of iron.
"I see this place has become quite known," a man said, looking around. "You're a decent fighter and an exceptional blacksmith."
"Flatter isn't enough to get you a discount," the blacksmith said, placing the piece of hot iron in a bucket full of water. "I knew you'd be back soon, but I didn't think so soon."
After cleaning his face and hands, the blacksmith turned to the customer, smiling warmly.
"What can I do for you, Lord Tiberius?" the blacksmith asked.
Tiberius Vedius Lupis was the commander of the IX Legion. He was taller than the blacksmith, and he himself was quite tall. He had a rather tanned complexion from the numerous military campaigns he had carried out in the East and Africa, thick dark brown hair, a frizzy beard of the same colour as his hair and blue eyes. He wore a simple toga virilis, with a narrow, purple strip, pinned on the shoulder, running down the front.
"I wanted to see how the situation of my best investment was," Tiberius said, taking one of the swords contained in a wooden barrel.
"Business is running good," Yuto said, handing his patron a wooden mug. "I will be able to move the shop to a better area and expand the range of my business soon."
"If you had accepted my proposal, you would have already moved," Tiberius said. "I still think you're wasting your skills here. Think about it carefully, Yuto. You should join my legion."
There was a reason he was freed quicker than other former slaves. He was a monster with the shape of a human, capable of fighting a phantasmal species that raged near Rome.
"I won't," Yuto replied, taking a sip of his beer. "A freedman would not be well received in the army and I would end up getting you into trouble with the Senate and your men."
Tiberius had met many different people in his life but the person in front of him was special. He had seen Yuto's power firsthand when a pack of phantasmal beasts had assaulted the military camp where he had been sent, and his experience on the battlefields suggested that he could very well say that Yuto would have a better career than any other legionnaire. Yet, he had refused, preferring to become a blacksmith in the Suburra, one of the worst neighbourhoods in Rome.
"Is there anything that allows me to convince you?" Tiberius asked, almost resigned to the idea of being able to enlist Yuto into his ranks. "The hand of my daughter Marzia? A higher pay than others? Your own piece of land?"
Yuto shook his head.
If he accepted the proposal to marry his patron's daughter, he was almost certain that he would make her unhappy. And while she would definitely be unhappy, he didn't want to be the cause of it.
Furthermore, his forge had been paid for by Tiberius. The nourishment that Tiberius paid to Yuto was not enough to allow him to purchase what he needed to open the forge, so Yuto found himself forced to borrow money that he had already repaid.
Also, it wasn't even about the money since his affordable prices had allowed him to buy customer's loyalty. This strategy had brought Yuto enough money to repay the debt in just five years, although the maturity time was ten years.
And it was precisely for this reason that Tiberius, a shrewd man compared to many, wanted to hold on to Yuto, a boy with a strong gift for business and a powerful magus capable of forging swords that were beyond human understanding.
"Don't you think I'm helping you a lot?" Yuto asked. "My actions speak louder than words. My loyalty to Rome and you are certified by the fact that the sword and armour you wear in battle are unique."
Yuto stretched his arm out in front of him. Magic circuits flashed on his skin and a large bluish-black sword manifested in his hand.
"I have given you the sword of Lancelot, King Artorius' strongest knight," he said as a hammer with strange carvings appeared in his other hand. "And your armour was forged by the hammer of a God. It is not armour that an ordinary weapon can pierce."
Without forgetting that even the weapons of the IX legion had all been reforged by him free of charge out of respect for his patron who had always treated him well differently from other Equities and senators.
"You can say I'm not ambitious and I can accept that, but knowing that my weapons allow you and Rome to survive one more day gives me relief. It makes me feel good with myself and all the people I left behind me," Yuto said.
He had left a lot behind. His birth family had long been dead, and his adoptive family had probably died as well due to his actions. He had a sister but they had separated a long time ago. His friends and comrades had left him a long time ago, all of them dying due to illness, battle or other reasons.
"Anyway, I guess you're not just here to try to convince me. What can I do for you?" Yuto asked.
"Caesar will make a speech in three days. He wants to try to convince the Senate to give him more power," Tiberius said, his expression hardening as a result of the seriousness of the matter.
"Aren't you allies?" Yuto asked.
"We are, but lately Caesar is going a little further. At this rate, I fear our alliance may make me an enemy of the Senate," Tiberius replied.
From Yuto's point of view, the Senate was like an old tool that could no longer be repaired. The senators who formed it were people who lived in history, without a real vision of what the current state of the situation was. The borders were threatened by foreign kingdoms, the aristocracies made their best and bad weather towards the lower class of Rome.
"I don't know if it can interest you, but I received a strange order." Yuto got up to reach the old desk and took a scroll which he showed to Tiberius. "The guy who made the order said they were for his wife, but the knife model is for hunting."
"What do you suspect?" Tiberius asked.
"He presented himself as a Freedman, yet he wore a senatorial toga. I suppose he gave me a fake name," Yuto replied.
"Do you suspect he wants to assassinate Caesar?" Tiberius asked in an alarmed tone.
Yuto nodded. "I had to produce eighty for them."
This meant that there were eighty conspirators. They wanted to be sure that Caesar would die.
"I tend to brand all my productions to promote my business. They are no exception," Yuto replied, taking the display copy and showing it to his patron. "If they are used to kill Caesar, the blame will fall on me and therefore on you."
In the best scenario, Yuto would have been sentenced to death while Tiberius and his family would have lost everything they had.
"Jack!"
Yuto called and a little girl with silver hair, with a noticeable scar on her face, came from the back of the shop.
"Who is she?" Tiberius asked.
"We are Jack!" Jack replied cheerfully.
"She is my adopted daughter," Yuto replied. "She was an orphan whom I adopted shortly after my enfranchisement. She helps me out in the shop and with other chores."
"Jack is a good little girl. She does everything her daddy tells her," Jack stated happily.
Yuto smiled slightly before turning serious again and turning to Jack. "Can you get me the papers I keep in my room?"
Jack nodded and headed upstairs where she picked up a chest and handed it to Yuto.
"Since I didn't trust that guy, I followed him and found out some things," Yuto said, taking a package sent by Gaius Valerius Valgus to someone he called the King. "I got it from a messenger. It appears to be the report regarding the progress of the conspiracy."
"They intend to assassinate Caesar and then place the blame on me." Tiberius clicked his tongue, reading it.
He promised himself that Gaius Valerius Valgus and all the other conspirators would pay dearly. That was an oath. He had intended to marry his second daughter to Gaius Valerius' eldest son to forge an alliance between their two families, but this changed everything.
"Do you mean to prevent it?" Yuto asked him.
"Of course," Tiberius replied without hesitation.
"How do you intend to do it?" Yuto asked him.
"I will speak to Caesar," Tiberius replied.
"This is impossible. Caesar is not in Rome at this time," Yuto replied. "Even if you sent a messenger, you have no guarantee that it will arrive in time or that he is not killed before he can deliver it."
Tiberius nodded. He too thought the same.
"What can I do?" Tiberius muttered to himself.
He was a senator however on the scheduled day of execution he would have had to leave for Gaul. He wondered if his departure had been orchestrated to make him look guilty.
He had no valid excuse for not going. It was an order from the senate and only with a valid reason could he have remained in Rome.
"He goes to Gaul," Yuto said.
Tiberius looked up at Yuto.
"Jack and I will take care of everything," Yuto said, his expression and eyes showing his determination to prevent the attack.
He wasn't interested in saving Caesar's life, so he felt neither resentment nor friendship, but he wanted to save his and Tiberius' current lifestyle.
"I swear on my honour that I will not disappoint you," he promised.
"What do you want back?" Tiberius asked.
"Nothing," Yuto replied.
Tiberius took a moment to think.
"My lord, bring back the troops. I'll take care of the beasts." Tiberius remembered the hunt he experienced that day. He had taken the credit, which he then shared with his soldiers, however, they knew that the only hunter was Yuto.
"All right. I will wait to hear news from you." Tiberius put down a medallion with the symbol of his gens and left the workshop.
Yuto sighed tiredly. "Jack, let's close up shop for today."
"Who should we kill?" Jack asked, smiling innocently.
If someone had told him that one day he would witness one of the most famous assassinations in human history, Yuto would have easily called him crazy and yet he was here.
The Assassination of Caesar was something Yuto couldn't avoid. The history of Rome would take a drastic turn with the death of the Dictator and the rise of Octavian, later known as the first Emperor Augustus, although modern historians consider Caesar to be the first one.
Sitting on the roof of the Theater of Pompey, the only brick theatre in Rome, Yuto and Jack observed the Senators arriving at the Curia Pompeii. Yuto immediately recognized the man who had commissioned the knives and had to restrain himself not to shoot an arrow at him.
"I remind you just to be sure. Our goal is not to save Caesar. We just have to save our life and that of Tiberius," Yuto reminded her. "Caesar has to die at the hands of conspirators or wounds."
Yuto had done his calculations. Even if Cesare did not die inside the curia but a few days after the assault, history would not have changed much. A detail like the death of the dictator at the foot of the statue of Pompey was easily changeable.
"How do we do it, Daddy?" Jack asked.
"You will use your spiritual form to enter the curia. If they attack, let him get hit with a few stabs and then intervene. Don't kill them because they might interpret your actions as an attempt on the lives of senators. Finally, remove every trace of you from their minds," Yuto said, wearing a mask that covered his entire face and a red and gold coat with a hood pulled over his head. "I'll put the guards out and join you."
Jack nodded and immediately took action.
Yuto took a deep breath, to calm his nerves and concentrate.
"We're going on stage."