Chapter 878: Altrus’s Gift
While Zhang Heng was still investigating the true identity of Altrus, he did not expect to receive a gift from him. Earlier, when the two met for the first time, Altrus promised Zhang Heng that he would give him a gift.
However, he did not receive anything from Altrus after waiting for a few days. Zhang Heng thought that he must have forgotten about the gift. After all, Altrus mentioned that Zhang Heng would not remember a single thing after he drank the glass of wine that contained scopolamine alkaloids.
Technically speaking, no one would know whether he had fulfilled his promise. However, someone as noble as Altrus would never break his promise, even if the person might not remember it. Around two weeks later, Zhang Heng received a card at noon. There was no signature, and there was only a sentence written on it.
[Your gift has been delivered; I hope you like it.]
In the afternoon, a piece of shocking news broke out from the Senate, saying that senator Divo Braille was suspected of accepting bribes and involving a tremendous amount of money. Accepting bribes was a severe crime in Rome. The amount of money a person took determined their punishment. The offender could receive the death penalty or exile from Rome. Usually, such a crime would only be committed by lower-level officials.
The nobles usually had a way to clear their names after accepting bribes, let alone a powerful man like Divo Braille. He would never come forward to take the proceeds in person, so even if something went wrong, the authorities could only trace it back to the men that worked for Divo Braille. Otherwise, Lockheed would not need to worry that Divo Braille was getting greedier and greedier.
There was nothing that Lockheed could do about it, which was why he agreed with Zhang Heng. He was willing to let the patrol team and Soap continue to expand their power, but in return, Zhang Heng had to help them to deal with Divo Braille.
But this time, Zhang Heng learned that Divo Braille was not in a good spot. The authorities collected detailed evidence, more than enough to expose Divo Braille. Besides, there were many witnesses. At the same time, most of the bribery offenses were carried out when Divo Braille was a financial officer.
This amount of money was also closely tied to a new park in the city of Rome.
The park was built by the former emperor Aurelius to commemorate his deceased wife. The royal family was responsible for most of the fundraising. Other than that, the former emperor received a lot of donations from the nobles as well. According to the latest news, Divo Braille had embezzled one-third of the money. When he used the money for his personal gains, it meant that he had offended all the nobles that donated their money to the former emperor. The situation was not looking good for him.
However, those selected to join the Senate consisted of more simple-minded folk. Everyone could see that someone was targeting Divo Braille because the evidence presented by the other party was too perfect and convenient. It seemed like the whole thing had been premeditated. The senators in the Senate had to admit that whoever was targeting Divo Braille had to be indeed very powerful.
Even if all those pieces of evidence were fabricated, the person would have to be of great influence to execute such a complicated plan. Generally, the senators from the Senate would choose to stand by Divo Braille’s side. After all, if the person could do such a thing to Divo Braille, it meant they could also pull the same trick on other senators. No one was squeaky clean in the Senate. Besides, Divo Braille had always been neutral, and he rarely offended the people around him. His character made him a very popular and likable person in the Senate.
To everyone’s surprise, none of them expected that only a handful of people would step up to support Divo Braille this time. On the one hand, the incident happened so suddenly that no one could receive any news beforehand. The evidence and allegations were brought forward by a young senator who had no sense of existence in the Senate. Everyone had yet to figure out the powerful people that supported him secretly. On the other hand, nobles who had donated their money to build the park fell into a foul mood when they learned that their money had fallen into Divo Braille’s pockets. It made no sense for them to support him right now.
Other than that, Divo Braille chose to side with Commodus during the Binota mine incident, causing others to resent him. The neutral image that he worked hard to build had now been weakened. At that time, they did not have enough evidence to put him under the spotlight. Hence, no one came forward to trouble him.
On the contrary, senators who were close to the royal family stood up and defended Divo Braille. It seemed the rumors of Divo Braille siding with the royal family were further confirmed with their support.
Now, there were not many options left for Divo Braille. With the previous relationship that he built in the Senate, no matter who made the waves, he could always get insider news in advance. The waves were clearly targeting him this time, and he did not receive anything in advance. Completely kept in the dark, he was indeed terrified.
…
Zhang Heng might be one of the few people in Rome who knew the person targeting Divo Braille. At the same time, he also knew that Altrus showed kindness to him while simultaneously sounding a fair warning. Altrus played the whole thing perfectly. While fulfilling his promise, he had also used this opportunity to show Zhang Heng what he could do.
In just two weeks, Altrus was able to unearth most of Divo Braille’s dark secrets. It made a powerful senator lose almost all of his reputation overnight, and the incident had surely embarrassed him. His ability to plan and execute was top-notch. He deserved to be the chief adviser of Commodus. Clint had always regarded Altrus as his competitor. However, Zhang Heng thought that the gap between the two parties was probably bigger than he expected. Both of them were not on the same level. Although the outside world called the two of them the right-hand men of Commodus, the influence they had on the emperor was very different.
When Zhang Heng thought of this, his expression suddenly changed, and he realized what he missed out on earlier was. It was actually something self-evident. However, Zhang Heng’s understanding of Roman history caused him to rule out this possibility immediately.
There could be only one explanation to how he was born a nobleman, and Commodus still trusted him unconditionally.
He must be Commodus’s relative!
And Altrus was not just some distant relative of Commodus. Instead, they shared the same father and mother as Lucilla. At the same time, unlike Lucilla, his physical disability would never allow him to walk on the stage like Commodus. Hence, he could only assist him in the dark.
Only after all the above conditions had been met did Commodus trust Altrus unconditionally.
Zhang Heng soon thought of someone: Commodus’s twin brother.