Herald of Steel

"After he was crowned, we were called by King Ptolomy to take new oaths. Many followed the order. Some of us however refused, vowing to honor our previous allegiance."

"Our rejection naturally made the king furious. We were furiously whipped to change our minds. And some of us did. But the truly bullheaded ones… hehe well His Majesty finally ran out of patience and wanted to have us all killed."

"Fortunately, his advisers intervened on our behalf. They convinced His Majesty that such a brutal act would look too bad. The other priests would not take kindly to seeing their own perish like this, while the commoners and nobles would find him too cruel and tyrannical."

"His Majesty had just taken the throne back then and his rule was still unstable. He certainly did not want others to think he was following in his father's footsteps. So we were ultimately demoted to servants and attendants of the Grand temple."

"I worked there for about five years. But one day, I was finally unable to take all the scorn and humiliation. I felt it would be far more honorable for me to work as an enslaved tutor for some rich merchant or small noble.

So I intentionally built up gambling debts, amounts that I could never hope to repay. Then when the lenders finally came looking for me, head priest Ollosh banished me, deeming me a shame to the Grand Temple."

"The lenders first beat me to try and get what they could. Then I was sold to Farshat and eventually ended up here."

Darrus had succinctly retold his entire life story in a very nonchalant tone like he was dictating the biography of a strange, not his own.

There was very little emotion in his words and Alexander found the man appeared very relaxed and accepting.

The pasha was honestly quite impressed by this demeanor- very few would have been able to take such a huge fall from status so easily.

However although Darrus seemed to have tied the ending in a very nice way, Alexander still had a lot of questions.

"You would rather become a slave than bow to Ptolomy? Becoming a meister is probably the hardest thing a commoner can do! You would rather throw away all your life's hard work and the bright future just over a vow?" He asked in an incredulous voice, feeling genuinely surprised.

As already said, becoming a meister was the greatest achievement a commoner could have.

In fact, that pass rate of 2% actually grossly understated that difficulty.

Because it only counted the number of examinees that failed, it did not take into account how many did not even have the opportunity to sit for the exam in the first place.

How many peasants had the time or resources to study even if they had the will in the first place?

Very very few.

Most did not even know the names of the books they were supposed to study, forget getting access to these expensive literary works or have an experienced tutor to guide them through the syllabus, pointing out what was important and what was not.

So most of the men who got to sit for the exams were from wealthy merchant families.

As a side note, men from noble families were automatically excluded from the test. If they truly wanted to enter the Grand Temple, they had totally renounced their family and status.

But very, very few ever dared to do this, because if they failed the test, well they would be stuck as a commoner for their entire life.

The renouncement was a one way street, there was no going back, which of course fully made sense once one thought about it as otherwise, it would be simply too easy for the nobles to game the system.

They could become a commoner when the test season came and then revert to a landed elite once it ended.

But this is not to say the nobles had no influence within the walls of the Grand Temple. They could exert some pressure through their daughters!

Because other than a few exceptions, most of the priestesses of the temple came from the nobility, with even the Head priestess traditionally being the oldest princess of the king.

These women did not have to take the meister exams like the men but would be either sent there to study until marriage or serve for the rest of their lives depending on the exact circumstances of their family.

Such as an unruly or illegitimate daughter could be made a permanent priestess, swearing a life of sort of celibacy. Although it was only a 'sort of celibacy' because these permanent priestesses were part of the king's informal haram, and many of them would even participate in the various 'parties' he held at night, entertaining the various noblemen.

But somehow, even though those special priestesses did many acts that no married couple would ever get to experience in their bedroom, this did not invalidate their purity.

The theological reason was it was done under the king's orders, who was a divine figure and capable of making the impossible possible.

While the reality was far more transparent- it helped them have the best of both worlds. Stay tuned with empire

These beautiful women were shown to the people as being utterly holy and pure, acting as a sort of eye candy drawing in new men and someone womenfolk all over the lands should follow and emulate.

While back behind the doors, the elites got to savor many of these carefully cultivated flowers to their heart's content in every lewd way possible.

Alexander had smirked a most disdainful smile upon learning this, but he did not find the act really too surprising.

Celibacy rarely worked - just look at how many illegitimate sons and daughters those 'Fathers and Brothers' had.

It was an open secret among the clergymen that despite their oaths, the priests fraternized with women. Many popes even came from established noble families, like the Borgia.

Alexander believed this failure was because it was almost a human instinct, a biological need to want to mate and reproduce.

And restricting such a primal urge rarely yielded good results.

It was just a shame the outlet came in such an abusive way.

If these priestesses had husbands, the nobility would have found it ten times harder to coerce them into such acts.

And Alexander had good evidence to prove that.

The Ramuh temples were also used as a sort of punishment- acting as a kind of banishment for really high level ladies who fell out of favor with their husbands but were politically too sensitive to divorce or send back home.

But these ladies would rarely be called to serve in those parties, only if their husbands expressly wanted them to.

However, things would suddenly change if their husbands died. Then they would be free game and many times, the nobles would try their best to make up for all the lost time.

Thus having a man was almost a requirement for most women in this day and age.

Anyway, coming back to the topic of why Darrus gave up such a bright future, the man gave a kind of foolish chuckle,

"Hehe… as I said my lord, I have a hard time controlling my tongue. Perhaps I did feel some remorse over my words. Perhaps if given another chance, I would be more diplomatic over my denial. But what is done is done." The forceful statement was said with perhaps the first hints of some suppressed regret, as the man let out a large sigh,

"*Sigh*, I already said those words to His Majesty and there was no taking them back. Even if the others can be forgiven, I could not. I was marked as their leader, hehe" Darrus then slightly smirked at his words, possessing a proud undertone.

It seemed in his mind, to be able to lead a group of meister priests at such a young age was quite an accomplishment. Even if that success brought him only doom and misery.

"So my life was made especially difficult in the temple. I was beaten, starved, whi…. well there's no point going into the details... Hehe what is done is done. But I was definitely singled out to be made an example out of."

"And I endured all of it for five years... I had no choice. Until His Majesty finally got bored of me. I was finally able to escape then."

"And they let you go just like that? Is it so easy for priests to leave the Grand Temple?" Darrus's story however only raised more questions in Alexander, pointedly asking,

"And if you have truly escaped, why are you here? Zanzan city is under the hands of His Majesty's most fearsome lackey. Shouldn't you be heading for Ankoot, the seat of Amenheraft's power?"

Any reasonable person would think to do so because it was loyalty to him that got the poor priest in hot waters in the first place.

"If my lord can also think this, can't Head Priest Ollosh too?" Darrus's tone suddenly turned a bit wistful,

"None of my actions went unnoticed by him. It was just that he felt a bit sorry for me. So His Holiness did not expose me but only set out two conditions."

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