Salicardo looked towards the end of the night. Everything was so obvious. The beam of light penetrated the darkness and advanced all the way to the dock of Old Dunling.
Shermans also glanced at the dark night outside the window, his eyes full of sadness.
"The leader is Anthony Russo. Do you have any impression of him?" Salicardo asked. It was not difficult for him to get the list of envoys. After all, he was also a distinguished duke.
Maybe we will have to attend the welcome dinner in a few days.
"It's him..."
When Shermans heard the name, his eyes changed slightly, with a bit of fear and melancholy.
"It seems like he left a deep impression on you." Seeing the changes in Shermans, Salicardo paid attention.
After the night of Lawrence's attack, a new world unfolded before Salicardo's eyes. The scavengers had washed away his memory of that night, but they never thought that he would think of it all again in his future nightmares.
.
Old Dunling is on the eve of a storm, and different forces are trapped in this cold steel city. At this moment, the group composed of Salicardo and Shermans is still hiding in the darkness. Salicardo knows very well
Once exposed, they would inevitably be liquidated by the mysterious agency. They tried their best to hide and watch the changes in the situation.
"He is a traitor. Anthony betrayed us, betrayed the holy cardinals, and turned to the new pope."
Shermans said slowly.
"Anthony was originally from our side. Although he is not outstanding in the Knights Templar, in fact, with our assistance, he has secretly controlled a large part of the power."
Salicardo listened quietly and said nothing.
"After the Night of Advent, the vitality of the Evangelical Church was severely damaged. The old Pope was also injured in that incident. Time was running out. After his death, we needed to elect a new Pope. But at that time, the situation in the Seven Hills was chaotic.
Unbearable.”
Unlike other exiles, Shermans is already very old. The things he has experienced over the years have destroyed his will. Power and authority are not what he expects. Just like a stubborn old man, what he is doing now
All he did was for a little bit of boredom.
"Perhaps this is the bad nature of human beings. Even faith and fear of darkness cannot curb the growth of their greed. Originally, there were two strong candidates for the next pope, one was Cardinal Miguel, and the other was
Cardinal Medici," Shermans said.
"The Medici in charge of wealth?"
"Lorenzo Medici, the great Lorenzo, he once led Florence to the golden age, but it came to an end because of his own death."
At the mention of this great man, Shermans couldn't help but feel in awe.
"When I was a young man, he was already a distinguished cardinal. I thought he would become the pope, but he didn't. What he did was more terrible than I thought." Shermans recalled that day.
The age has turned yellow,
"Cardinal Medici did not become the pope, but he secretly supported several cardinals to ascend to the throne of the pope," Shermans looked at Salicardo and explained to him, "Being a pope means being separated from the secular world.
This will inevitably weaken its secular rule, and the foundation of the Medici family is finance."
"The pope became the puppet of Cardinal Medici. He ruled both faith and secularity at the same time. This situation has never existed in the history of the church."
Although he didn't understand the various aspects of the Evangelical Church, Salicardo still sensed Shermans' fear from his words, and he was a little confused.
"No one objects?"
"Of course," Shermans laughed, "but when you object, the Medici family will easily bankrupt your family without a drop of blood and support others to take your place. At that time, the entire Medici family
Leng Cui belongs to him. The supported pope wanted to resist, but he put him under house arrest and publicized that the pope was bewitched by demons."
"He finally committed suicide in his bedroom. Cardinal Medici held a grand funeral for him, and then the next puppet took office. Only then did we realize that he had completely taken control of the place, and he did a lot.
good."
Shermans looked out the window at the steel city. It was in this city that the steam engine was born, and the roaring operation of the factory completely defeated faith.
"One of the reasons why we were not wary of steam engines in the beginning was Cardinal Medici. Although your torrent of steel is terrifying, under his leadership, Feilengcui has also entered a golden age. He is a ruthless tyrant.
, defeated the enemy with gold, and then plundered all his assets, wealth poured into the church continuously, and even the original opponents gradually turned to him."
"Kai people will always grow old..."
Shermans sighed, the legendary life of Cardinal Medici ended here.
"He is getting old. Cardinal Medici seems to be tired. He continued to let go of power in his later years. With his retirement, the golden age came to an end. Without him, we discovered how important he was."
"In the first half of his life, he had gold and prestige. The entire Feilengcui was under his rule, managing faith and secularity. But in his later years, he put down all his weapons and turned to sponsoring artists. He was amiable and approachable.
Every artist sings about his kindness and selflessness."
Salicardo laughed when he heard this. Although he had never met this legendary cardinal, he still admired him sincerely.
"In the first half of his life, he was like a tyrant, but in the second half of his life, he was regarded as a saint."
Shermans nodded. Salicardo's words were very suitable to describe Cardinal Medici, "Like a blood-stained thug, his actions in his later years may be atonement."
"After Advent, we need a new leader. There are two people who are highly regarded by everyone. The newly promoted Michael, and the other is the elderly Cardinal Medici. In fact, everyone is more inclined to
Cardinal Medici, I hope this old lion can turn the tide and lead us back to that golden age again,
But it was then that we discovered that Cardinal Medici was dead, that he died silently on Advent Night."
Shermans said slowly.
"No one noticed these things at all. In his later years, he lived in seclusion, dismissed all his servants, had almost no social interaction, and had only one priest serving him, and that priest also died."
"We examined the rotting corpse. According to speculation, Cardinal Medici died on the Night of Advent. The riots that night were not just in the Cathedral of San Naro."
"This...this is not the way he should die."
Salicardo lamented that such a hero died in obscurity in the end, dying in a secluded place, and it was not until someone looked for him that his long-decomposed body was discovered.
"We have no time to find out the cause of his death. Without his competition, Cardinal Miguel was almost determined to be the new pope, but at this time, Seny Lothair appeared."
Shermans's voice was trembling. It was the owner of this name who forced them into this situation.
"He became the final winner?" Salicardo remembered this name, now the name of the Pope.
"Seni Lothair, he suddenly appeared, holding the appointment letter left by the previous pope... This thing is actually useless. Every pope is elected by the cardinals, but with his appearance, everything
Everything has changed. As if planned, the Cardinal who was originally on our side suddenly turned against him.
The whole situation became chaotic. His votes were tied with Miguel's. We urgently investigated his identity, but the result was very strange."
Shermans had an indescribable confusion in his eyes, and even today he couldn't understand these things.
"Seni Lothair suddenly appeared, but none of us knew that there was such a person beside the old pope. Those priests who survived the night of Advent have not seen him either, but it is clearly recorded in the information he gave.
Everything in his life... it's like... it's like the power of God is controlling everything, suddenly inserting a non-existent person into this world and paving everything for him."
He couldn't understand, and neither could Cardinal Miguel, as if everything was doomed.
"Then what I told you, Seine Lothair's votes are getting more and more, and we don't want to lose. In order to make the Evangelical Church glorious again, we even decided to use dirty methods."
Sherman paused, took a deep breath and continued.
"Speaking of Anthony, Anthony is one of ours. He is a secret chess piece we installed in the Knights Templar. We originally wanted to use him to kill Seni Lothair. Everything went smoothly until the mission started.
, he didn’t even show the slightest intention of betrayal.”
"We thought that night was the beginning for us, but we never thought it was the end. The Knights Templar had our list. They were supposed to attack the Cathedral of Saint-Naro, but they appeared in front of us. We were unprepared.
Rivers of blood flowed."
It was a nightmarish night.
"We were almost wiped out. The only man we had left escaped from the Seven Hills overnight. After that, Seine Lothair was directly promoted to the Pope, and all the other cardinals took orders from him."
This was the cause and result of this group of exiles, of whom Salicardo was one of their sponsors, who also attempted to attack the new pope.
"Anthony is a cunning guy. Although he looks cold and tough, he is very good at planning. The new pope definitely has no good intentions when he sends him here."
Salicado nodded and was silent, not knowing what he was thinking about. After a long time, he spoke slowly.
"Are there any more? Those secrets related to you."
In that constant nightmare, Salicardo repeatedly dreamed of all the frightening things that ordinary people might be afraid of, but this business giant found a new desire in the constant fear. The mystery was like
It seemed to attract him, constantly pulling him.
Shermans shook his head, refusing.
"Secrets are also one of the benefits. You already know enough."
"That means I need a better price to know that, right?" Salicardo noticed something keenly and smiled.
"Make a bid, Cardinal Shermans. This must be what Miguel wants you to do, right? You have nothing now except the knowledge hidden in your mind. You need money, you need manpower, you need too many things.
, after all, you can’t get back to the Seven Hills with slogans alone.”
Salicardo's eyes were like a jackal. He did not take them in and support them out of kindness, but for the sake of secrets. When all the secrets were known to him, these exiles also lost their role, and Shermans also knew it.
This, but nothing can be done.
They exiles have been pushed to the extreme by the cruel new pope, otherwise these noble people would not bow to Salicardo.
"Some secrets are taboo, and I can't make the decision alone." Shermans said, compared with Salicado's strength, he is like a dead tree that is about to die.
"Actually, I'm already tired."
Shermans sighed and glanced at his robe, which was as bright as blood.
"I wanted to quit as early as Advent Night. I didn't care about those struggles for power. At that time, I could understand why Cardinal Medici chose to loosen his power."
"What about you now? If you say so, you should surrender to the new pope."
Salicardo looked at the sad Shermans. This guy was indeed very old. His skin was folded together like an old tree.
"No, this is the bottom line. I can accept these, but I cannot accept those new popes," Shermans replied. "I am a cardinal. No matter how you judge the right or wrong of the evangelical church, I
Always a member of it, the new pope is different."
Shermans opened his mouth to say something, but after hesitating for a moment, he swallowed back the words and refused to reveal the key secret.
"At least I want to die with dignity, instead of living under the pity of that kind of person."
He said again, with the tiredness of a foreigner in his voice.
Salicardo looked at him, and Shermans looked at the end of the night, in the direction of the Seven Hills. For a moment, he seemed to see through everything about this old man.
"You are different from Miguel. That guy just wants to be the pope, but you just want to die, right?" Salicardo said.
"Every cardinal should be buried on the Seven Hills, among the other saints, and not die in a foreign land."
Shermans said in an old-fashioned way, but this seemingly ridiculous old-fashioned way was the old man's last insistence.
"I am different from them. I still believe in the ancient holiness and am willing to spend my life defending it. Miguel and I came together just because we seem to have the same stance."
"I don't care who the pope is, I just hope that the holiness I believe in will not deteriorate."
Shermans has a firm belief. Even if he is reduced to such a situation, he is still unwilling to take off the red robe. This is not power and status, but represents his belief.
"Then why can't the Pope be Seny Lothair?" Salicardo asked.