Independence Declaration

Nearly three years have passed since the beginning of my alliance with Aristodemos. We had made good progress with the plan. With two hundred thousand Egyptian men, sixty thousand men from Aristodemos, and a hundred thousand now loyal Roman soldiers, we were ready for any conflict that comes our way. Hopefully, those conflicts will be a rare occurrence.

Observing my surroundings, I look at how Alexandria has grown. It went from a good port city to a city good enough to become the capital of the world. Its outer walls were dragged outwards and now lay after the previous roman camp. Houses filled the area that the camp had previously occupied with new homes. The city now had wider passages- for easier transportation- and sewers had been installed. The walls sported protection for the archers, and the military stations were built near them. The city was reinvented. Battle ready.

"Salih, recap our progress for me."

"Sure, we have captured Rusuccuru, Tipaza, ... basically everything up to Caesarea."- he looked at me with an annoyed and confused gaze, as if I had lost my memories-" I honestly don't feel like saying all of the cities that we conquered. There are just too many of them. Did you forget them?" Stupid question. Just because I asked for a recap does not mean that I've suddenly lost all my memories."I don't have memory loss. Don't be foolish."

"Still, I guess these are about to get taken down soon, right?" Staring in the direction that he pointed at, my eyes quickly found the roman vexillum. "Yes, Salih. Very soon, this will be replaced with our own vexillum. One much better than this one."

We were still under the disguise of being part of Rome but had already started cutting off the loose ends. Soldiers loyal to Rome were killed, and soldiers loyal to us were trained to their limits. Each month we gain more and more soldiers. People seem excited about the prospect of rebelling against the Empire. I don't really care about that. I only care that it benefits us by making our armies bigger. The thing that will differentiate us from the Romans was that we gave a lot of attention to the training. Don't get me wrong, Roman soldiers were well trained, but they have a lot of room for improvement. I was making sure that this didn't happen to our armies.

"What about Aristodemos? How is his end going?"

"Perfect. All armies of Greece are comprised in majority by his men. The Islands will be harder to capture, but for now, he is content with Greece."

Everything is going perfectly. I wish it stayed like this for longer, but I know it would get a lot more complicated as soon as we announced our independence."Our next target should be Nubia. Our lower neighbor is filled with precious gold. We will need all the possibilities to get our economy up as soon as we go independent. "Is anyone positioned near Nubia?"

"We have ten thousand people positioned at the city of Elephantine. That should be enough, right?"

"It's more than enough. Order them to attack as soon as possible."-Looking at my friend, I stared at his tired eyes.-" It would be best if you rested, Salih. Worrying over this is normal, but you need to sleep. We are still young." That was true. We were only sixteen years old, not far from seventeen, yet we had the rebirth of an empire on our backs. "I know, Ramses, but when I think of all the people who are depending on us I...." I understood his thinking. It was as if a weight had been placed on us by everyone, "Go rest. Don't worry about me." and he honestly shouldn't. I don't feel that tired. A few yawns escape me from time to time, but there is never an occasion where I'm even close to how Salih seems to be.

With Salih going to sleep, I guess I'm the one that has to send those orders. "Ok, here we go." with a crack of my fingers, I began to write.

Inside of my quarters, hours flew by. The sound of the quill fighting the paper in unison with the dark ink was all I could hear. It was as if everything quit making noise to allow me to concentrate. I had finished writing in just a few hours and quickly began looking over what I had written. Thankfully

Most of what I wrote was sent to the soldiers; To kill all that were still loyal to the Romans and an additional note for the soldiers positioned near Nubia. This would be a mass operation in the middle of the night.

The only letter I had written that was not for the soldiers was meant for Aristodemos. It was a heads up that everything was to happen tonight.

"With everything written, I only have to call a meeting to prepare ourselves." And just like that, the pigeons flew away. Carrying with them my letters.

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"Commander, you called?" As usual, Philetus only arrived at the finish of the meeting. "I did."-sigh-" Now that you have finally arrived, I will inform you of what was discussed here. Today at the sixth hour of the night, we are to take over Alexandria. I have soldiers spread throughout the city and ready to deal with any resistance at my speech tonight. Not only will we take this city, but all of the territory that belongs to the Romans in the North of Africa will be ours." Indeed. North Africa would practically be ours. In just a couple of years, we had managed to steal such an enormous amount of land from the biggest Empire this world has ever seen. And we were not done. "Gather everyone on the front gate. I'm going to make a speech."

"Yes, sir."

The sixth hour of the night was what we called midnight, and it was no more than thirty minutes from now. Contrary to what I expected, Alexandria was still very active at these hours, but that was of no importance to me. I needed to wake Salih up.

With a slow pace, I made my way to the oldest part of the city. Here, our aged residences looked frail. Weak. They looked out of place, hiding amid the more modernized houses. I had ordered for our homes to be untouched. "tsk." No need to think of the past. I need to wake Salih u-"What're you tutting for?" It seems that he just made my job easier. "Let's go. The speech is starting soon."

The walk to the gate was a quiet one. Not the awkward kind. The good kind of silence. By now, most cities should have already started killing the Romans loyal to Octavian. After this speech, we would be part of the Roman Empire no longer. "Hey, Ramses, the stairs to the podium are right in front of you. Why did you stop?" My breathing became ragged, and my legs felt weak. 'What's happening to me? Why now?'

Without me noticing, Salih was supporting my body and preventing it from collapsing to the ground. My vision blurred ever so slightly until it looked like I was underwater. I tried opening my mouth to speak, but only sounds came out. "Ramses, breathe slowly. Try to mirror my breathing, ok?" I did as he said and breathed at the same pace as him. Slowly but surely, I got better. Catching my breath and lifting myself slowly, I turned to him. "Thank you. I don't know what came over me." That was a lie. I certainly did. My mother would occasionally have fits like these. She said that when she felt too much anxiety, she could not control herself.

I hated this feeling. It made me feel powerless, and that was something I was not. "Let's go, Salih. Please forget what just happened."

"Sure. I promise I won't tell anyone."

That was definitely a lie.

Walking on stage, I took my helmet off and threw it onto the floor. "Hear me, people of Egypt. We have all heard of great conquerors and giant empires. People immortalized in history as the greatest military minds to have ever lived. They were people whose mere name was treated with great respect and fear from every corner of the earth. Now, Egyptians, I ask you this. Do you believe Emperor Octavian of Rome deserves a spot among those names?" Silence permeated the majority of the audience. " I think of that as nothing more than disrespect to them and to us. If someone is to be remembered in history, it should not be a Roman. It should be one of us—an Egyptian. We are the ones that Ra chose." And now comes the announcement. The final words of the speech and a new beginning for Egypt. Passing my eyes over the faces of the residents of the city, I drew a deep breath and continued." My rant is a message to the Romans and anyone daring enough to try and conquer us. We do not need you, nor do we want you on our land. This is our time to conquer an empire. Prepare yourselves." Cheers erupted from the crowd. People ran into their homes and brought out instruments and alcohol. Tables of food were laid out. It looked like tonight, no one would sleep.

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"Ugh, I need some water." My head felt as if it was about to explode. I felt nauseous and unbalanced. "Hey! Ramses, you already woke up?"

"Shhh, Salih, don't speak so loud!"

"I'm speaking normally, though?" The hangover was killing me. It felt as if I was just in the worse shitshow in the history of shitshows."I don't care. Speak lower, please." Blessed be Imsety for giving me a strong liver. "Could you bring me some water, please?" How was Salih not drunk? Did the bastard not drink, or is his liver even stronger than mine? He truly was blessed if that was the case. "Yeah, wait here. I'll be right back." I need to sober up as soon as possible. I need to read the reports of everything that has happened since yesterday. We need to move as fast as possible to establish ourselves as a strong empire. Yes, an empire. We were already an empire as we had Carthage's kingdoms and possibly Nubia's kingdoms by our control now. "Here, drink it." Grabbing the cup, I quickly drank it. "Thank you. I already feel a bit better." Not totally a lie. I felt better but still felt sick. With Salih's help, I got to my quarters. "I appreciate it."

"No worries. Well, I have to go and send the people who are sleeping on the ground to their homes. See ya"

"Sure, see you later." Sitting down on my chair, I quickly looked at the mail that littered my desk. One by one, I opened them and was...pleasantly surprised that everything had gone so smoothly. As planned, our army was now only comprised of soldiers loyal to Egyp. Adding to that, our units that were positioned near Nubia had started their attacks. Using their training, they were faring well against larger forces though sending reinforcements would be better. "Hmm, no letters from Aristodemos. I should probably send him a letter."

"You called, Commander?"

"Yes, Philetus, come here. Could you read the reports from these letters and sum the number of casualties? I've got to reply to some of them, and doing the math myself would waste my time. Can I trust you with this matter?"

"Yes, sir. You can count on me." It doesn't matter whether he does this well or not. I already took note of the number of dead and injured soldiers and plan to do the math later. Letting him be in charge of summing the casualties and injured in the reports could end very badly. I don't trust myself to do that. This occasion will be a good trial to see if he is more intelligent than I thought. "Good. If you need me, ask for a soldier to call me." Leaving my quarters, I looked for the people I had arranged to meet yesterday.

"Hello, Commander Ramses, it's an honor to meet you."

"Likewise. Should we start?"

Ankhta Soliman. A scholar who during the occupation of the Romans had managed to become an official in the Empire's high-level politics. She was going to be an essential person in our future. Economics, Diplomacy, and anything else needed for the ruling of an empire was her playing field. I had much to learn from her.

"First things first, economy. My advice would be to take Rome's economy and modify it to our needs and desires." I see—that made sense. Using an already advanced economy and further improving it would undoubtedly give us an advantage against everyone. "I agree." -seemingly happy with my answer, she continued-" The first modification that we should do is to our armies. We need to increase training, research, and the salary of the soldiers. War is incoming, and we need our soldiers to be motivated and strong. A low income would not be motivating, and our strength would quickly deteriorate. After the armies have been taken care of, I'd advise that you invest money in agriculture and mining.

For politics, I'm going to assume you will take the crown. The best advice I can give you regarding this matter is that you can not rule an Empire alone. And now, for the most daunting of the subjects, I wish to discuss today. Diplomacy. It truly is a tricky subject. During my time in Rome, I have been present in discussions with the Persian Empire, which weren't very good. It would be better first to grow our armies and economy so that we can talk from positions of power. We need to remember that Egypt has just been reborn after being controlled by Rome for nearly three years." A hard pill to swallow but the truth. Any alliances we had have certainly already moved on. We were back to a blank slate.

'tsk.' I guess I will need to build relationships with other civilizations from zero."Alright, this is what I propose."

...

I was tired. The meeting was finally over after so long. We talked of so many things that my mind feels hazy, but I had learned a lot. I'm sure this knowledge was going to be helpful in the future.

"Thank you for coming. I'll be needing more of your help in the future. Please take good care of me."

"Likewise, Commander." After having said goodbyes to Ankhta, I headed to my quarters. I needed to sleep, but as I walked in, that need became nothing more than a dream.

"Why are you still here?" Philetus was sitting at my desk. He seemed to be writing. "I'm doing what you had asked from me, sir."

"I'm glad you are. My question is why you are doing it at my house."

"I apologize, sir! I will leave now." What an evil bastard. "Philetus."

"Yes, sir?"

"Take your things."

"Ah! Pardon me."

'Shut up.' Dragging my feet, I fell facedown onto my bed and blacked out.