Prologue

My name is Lucus Secundas Vorenus.

I am a Cleric of the Order of Chi Rho.

Constantine himself laid our Orders' foundations  in 313 A.D. through Edict of Milan soon after his vision of Christ and victory at Milvian Bridge in Rome. It allowed Christianity to be openly practiced in the Roman Empire and soon began to take a prominent place within every part of Rome.

Also decreed, but kept in secret, was the commissioning by Constantine for a military monastic Order of Warrior-Priests titled Clerics, called the Order of Chi Rho. The mission of the Order was to be guardian to both the Church and Empire, answerable only to God, the Senate and Emperor. After the death of Constantine the Order remained, but the Empire became fractured and was split into two. The Western Empire with its capital of Rome, now north in Ravenna, and the Eastern Empire and the Order of Chi Rho with their capital in Constantinople. For over 100 years we have been commissioned as the keepers of the secrets and sanctity of the Church and the Imperium Romana. Each one of us both ordained priest and warrior, sworn to teach the cross and pick up the sword in its defense. The twin cities of Rome and Constantinople have always stood through the tracks of time as the guiding light and pillars of strength.

Until now.

Rome's outer defenses have fallen and barbaric warriors named Visigoths are at the gates. Somewhere in the city there is a priest who holds the secret to a prototype of "liquid fire," a weapon so destructive that we have been tasked by both Emperors themselves to locate it and secure it to Constantinople 854 miles East. Capable of such catastrophic destruction that it can be shot from cannon on both land and sea and be inextinguishable on both with a radius in miles cannot fall into enemy hands. 

But first my partner and fellow Cleric, Alexius Iohannes Pullo, must first make it into the city.