At this moment, Felicius strode into the room, nodded to everyone, smiled, and politely refused to give up the seat of Sipros, and instead stood beside him.

Seeing this, Milon couldn't help frowning slightly.

Felicius glanced around at everyone and said humbly: "Before I came, His Majesty solemnly told me, 'When you go to Sicily, you can only bring your eyes and ears!'" ’。 Therefore, I am not here to supervise you, let alone interfere with any of your deployments, and any of your needs and suggestions can be conveyed to Your Majesty and the Senate through me.

But before you meet, I have two important appointments to be announced by His Majesty and the Senate! At this, Phellisius's expression became serious, and his right hand raised a papyrus scroll tied with black rope.

Everyone's eyes were immediately focused on it, except for Cipros and Leotizides, who had already known the contents.

Felicius unfolded the papyrus and read aloud: "In view of the possibility of a major attack on our Sicily by Carthage, in order to better concentrate all the forces of the cities and allies of Sicily, to provide logistical assistance and support to the combat forces more effectively and quickly, and to better coordinate the defense between the cities, after discussion with the Senate, it has been decided to appoint Sipros as the wartime governor of Sicily of the Kingdom of Dionia, and to be the administrator of Catanay, and to be responsible for all administrative affairs of Sicily, Actively cooperate with the combat forces in the fight against the Carthaginians, and expect the governors of the cities of Sicily to obey the administrative orders of the governor. Summer name – King Davers! ”

As soon as Felicius finished speaking, a slight sigh and breathing sounded in the hall: O wartime governor! This is a top-level official position with far greater power than the chief executive, and this is the second time since the founding of the country that Dionya has appeared, which shows its preciousness. The last wartime governor, Sedorum, was already one of the five rotating chairmen of the Senate, and often participated in important matters of the royal palace, which can be described as a prominent position.

Everyone looked at Sipros with envy, and Felicius handed the letter of appointment to Milon to the right of Sipros and asked him to look down to discern the authenticity.

Milon glanced at the papyrus scroll with mixed feelings, and the two seals of King Davers and the Senate came into view clearly, although he was jealous in his heart, he also had to admit that Sipros had a greater advantage of becoming a wartime governor than himself, after all, the Catanay he was in charge of had far surpassed other towns in Sicily in terms of population and land, and Catanay had replaced Siracuse as the largest city in Sicily. Moreover, Siblos had been in Sicily for almost seven years and was more familiar with the situation here than he was.

After all, Milon had fought side by side with Sipros and had a good relationship with each other, and after Naxos took office, he also received a lot of help from Sipros, so he exhaled lightly and said softly: "I have no objection. ”

Even Milon, who is the administrator of Dionya in Sicily's second largest city and has the same outstanding qualifications and merits, said so, and no one else would object.

Felicius pulled out a papyrus roll again.

Everyone's eyes suddenly became hot again: Who will it be this time?! What kind of position will it be?!

"Appoint Prosious, commander of the Eighth Legion, commander of Sicily, the commander of all the Dionian land armies of Sicily and their allies, to fight against the Carthaginians. Attribution – Davers. ”

The content of this appointment was very brief, and that was because it was a military appointment, and Davers did not need to go through the Senate to make a decision directly, and there was only one high-ranking army general in Sicily, Prosious, and the other administrative officials would not compete with him, so Davers did not need to elaborate.

Therefore, after listening to it, everyone did not have any unusual emotions, but only felt slightly lost: the appointment is over?

After reading it, Felicius turned his head to look at Leotizides, who was the first high-ranking general to be appointed commander, but the defeat at the Battle of the Ramato River cast a shadow over his military career, and in the face of the laggards, there was only hope and encouragement in his eyes: "Congratulations, Commander Prosous!" May you, with the blessing of Hades, win the war in Sicily! ”

Prosous nodded his gratitude and accepted the letter of appointment, his face still expressionless, but his heart was surging: after more than ten years in Dionia, he finally became the commander of the region - the highest position in the Dionian army (the commander-in-chief and commander can only be King Davers), and he can command tens of thousands of soldiers to fight, no less than a Spartan king!

"Thank you Your Majesty and the Senate for the trust you have placed in me! Now, with Carthage tearing up the friendship agreement, Sicily is in great danger not only for our Dionian domain, but also for the rest of the Greek city-states! I hope that I will have the full help of your lordships and their friendly city-states to assist Commander Prosous and thwart the Carthaginians' ambitions to get their hands on Sicily! The newly appointed wartime governor Sipros made an emotional statement of his inauguration: "Next, I would like to ask Commander Prosous to conduct a pre-war analysis of the military situation. ”

Leotizides immediately stood up, walked to the wall with a large map of Sicily, picked up the slender wooden stick by the wall, and said: "Everyone, according to the analysis of the Ministry of War, according to Carthage's current national strength, it can send at least 100,000 troops, and if you count the army in the hands of Margo, the governor of the Iberian Peninsula, at least 150,000 troops can be invested in Sicily——"

150,000 people?! Everyone present, including Milon, couldn't help but be dumbfounded.

"Of course, the Carthaginian army was numerous, but their soldiers were far inferior to our legions, and probably more than half of their soldiers were Numibians, Mauritanians, Iberians, and mercenaries from elsewhere...... "I don't think it would be possible for Carthage to commit so many troops at once, not more than 100,000 at most!" ”

This figure is the conclusion of Leotizides with reference to the previous two wars between Carthage and Dionysius Syracuse, and he pointed to the western end of Sicily on the map with a stick: "Carthage's army is likely to land at Liliba or Erlux, and their attack routes are two, one is to march along the northern coastline of Sicily to Messina, there are not many Greek city-states on this road, and the strength is not strong, but the northern mountains are dense and forested, and the coastline is narrow, and the force cannot be deployed, and the Carthaginians cannot take advantage of their large numbers." It took a long time for Dionysius to attack Carthage along the northern coastline when he had a large advantage in his forces, so I don't think the northern coastline would be the main direction of attack of the Carthaginians.

The other line of attack was along the coastline of southern Sicily, where the terrain was gentler enough to accommodate the deployment of large armies, which had been the main line of attack of the Carthaginian and Syracuse armies in the past, and I think this time would be no exception. ”

Leotizides affirmed, and the sticks in his hand were pointed on the map in turn: "Minoa, Agrigento, Gera, Camanlina...... Although the Greek city-states on the southern coastline are numerous and relatively strong, I do not think that they will be able to withstand the attack of the Syracuse army for a long time, and I am not prepared to send troops to reinforce them. ”

As soon as these words were spoken, there was a whisper of discussion in the venue.

Amicles, the governor of Messina, objected: "Although these Greek city-states have not formed an alliance with us Dionyas on the surface, they have always maintained friendly relations with our kingdom, and they have been active in many of our actions in Sicily, such as against the Sichaels and the isolation of Syracuse...... So they can be considered de facto allies. In the event of war, they will surely ask for help from our Dionia, and according to the traditions of the kingdom, how can we leave it alone! ”

Amicles' words spoke to the hearts of the chief executives present, after all, they had gotten along well with the top brass of these Greek city-states during their tenure.

Leotizides was unmoved, and said in a cold voice: "Since there is no alliance agreement, there is no breach of the alliance. Our army in Sicily is not very large, and the Eighth Army plus the reserve is only more than 20,000 people, and if there is an urgent mobilization, the number can be increased to about 50,000, but if that happens, the kingdom's territory in Sicily will be almost completely drained of young people, and it will seriously affect the winter sowing that is about to begin, and the daily order of the whole region, which I think is not what the Administrators want to see, let alone what Your Majesty wants to see!

What's more, even if you gather so many troops, it is easy to form a standoff with the army of Syracuse to go to reinforce Gera or Agligento. On the one hand, can we in Sicily afford the pressure on food supply caused by the long-term stalemate? On the other hand, the grain transportation lines have been lengthened, and the troops in the territory are empty, and if there is a surprise attack by foreign enemies, it will be a disaster for the army we send out and the cities in the territory! ”

The crowd was touched by Leotizides' heavy tone, and what attracted their attention even more was that the stick in Leotizides' hand pointed to a city icon on the map, Syracuse.

"Syracuse, the only Greek city-state in Sicily that does not interact with us, has a lot of strength and occupies an important strategic position in the east. The other day, it did not respond to the emissary we sent to ask for an alliance, which shows that it has a grudge against Dionia. According to the information we have received, the presence of Carthaginians in the port area of Syracuse in the past two days cannot but arouse our vigilance! We have to beware that Syracuse became the tarantum in the war between South Italy and Italy that year! ”