Chapter 40: The Chosen One
Caesar looked at the candelabra on the altar. Most of the candles were still burning, but little was left. An ordinary candle could burn for four to five hours, but in such an important ceremony, the candles used were much thicker than ordinary ones, almost as long as an adult man’s arm, requiring both hands to hold—this kind of candle could burn for at least a day and night…
He immediately realized that he had also made a mistake. Although he had asked Heraclius about “Chosen by Michael” and “Chosen by Raphael” before the ceremony, as one of the few bold people in faith in this era, the monk still found it hard to describe clearly to him—and the facts told him that it was indeed indescribable, and describing it might even be incorrect, leading others astray.
At this moment, he couldn’t help but want to curse. Heraclius should at least have told him that after they entered that state, the time they lost consciousness would be much longer than he thought!
Past experience had misled Caesar. He thought that in all mental activities, the flow of time should be faster than in reality, but here it was the opposite. He hadn’t asked Heraclius about this aspect, and Heraclius, out of trust in this new student, hadn’t mentioned it either.
But those who set this trap here knew. They knew he would pray at the altar with Baldwin for a long time, and—if they were chosen—this time would be even longer. They also knew that, to increase the chances of being chosen, Heraclius, proficient in medicine, would definitely prepare special potions for these two children under the king’s orders.
How careful and cautious Heraclius was when preparing the potions—just because with this potion, a little too much or too little could cause the tragedy they didn’t want to see.
Their enemies exploited this. They put poppy paste in the lamp bowls, possibly covering it with a thin layer of olive oil. Before Baldwin and Caesar entered the Temple, the Templar Knights had checked every corner, even sending agile escorts up to the beams, but who would notice those shiny lamp bowls?
Even the distinctive, heavy sweet scent of the poppy paste was masked by the aroma of other spices. At first, the scent of the poppy paste was very faint. It had to wait until the wick burned through the olive oil and reached the poppy paste, burning continuously for several hours, before the poppy paste components in the air could break the balance in their bodies.
Their previous vomiting, spasms, constricted pupils, and halted breathing were all clear symptoms of medicine overdose.
Baldwin reacted too. He raised his hand, wanting to stick his fingers down his throat to induce vomiting, but he was immediately stopped by Caesar. After more than ten hours, even that fish bladder was probably fully digested. The medicine had entered the blood circulation. Vomiting would only consume energy and injure the throat without effect—though if there was a lot of water, drinking it could at least dilute the medicine content in their bodies.
But here there was only lamp oil.
Baldwin found strength from somewhere. He grabbed the altar and stood up, pulling Caesar toward the exit.
The corridor and nave had far fewer lamp stands, and the poppy paste scent was fainter, but Baldwin didn’t stop there. He reached straight for that glaring black silk rope. Caesar yanked him back: “What are you trying to do?!”
Pulling that rope would ring the bell outside, open the door, and of course, declare the Selection Ceremony a failure.
Baldwin turned around, looking at Caesar with firm eyes. If he hadn’t met Caesar, if he were alone here, he would rather die than walk out that door bearing humiliation and infamy.
But Caesar—Caesar was a healthy boy with a beautiful appearance. Even if not chosen, he was already Heraclius’s student. Heraclius could easily secure him a holy office.
And in the Church, there were indeed “chosen” people among past popes, but more were ordinary people. They drove priests and monks who were “Chosen by Michael” or “Chosen by Raphael” just as they drove hunting dogs and horses—who knew if Caesar might have such a day too?
“You can’t die here,” Baldwin paused, then realized he had spoken his mind aloud, and quickly emphasized: “We can’t die here!”
Caesar stared at him without speaking, just leaning over to hug his friend’s shoulder. But after a brief moment of warmth, a bucket of ice water hit him—he reached out his hand for Baldwin to see. Before Baldwin could look down, he smelled a strong bloody scent. He thought Caesar was injured. “From the door crack,” Caesar said softly.
Guess what awaits you when you pull the silk rope and the door opens—guards or assassins?
“This is the Temple.” Baldwin murmured in a daze.
“So what?” Are you still planning to reason with these utterly vile guys? Caesar stood up. “Follow me.”
He walked to the side aisle, where the saints in the small niches still maintained their solemn silence. Caesar looked around and pulled the axe from Saint Jude’s hand.
Ancient Roman sculptors had once vividly “extracted” knotted muscles, smooth skin, fluffy curls, and dense, rhythmic folds from marble, but this exquisite craftsmanship seemed to quietly vanish with the collapse of that colossal entity.
Today’s stone craftsmen were considered skilled if they didn’t sculpt men as women, children as old men, or saints as devils. For things like axes, long swords, clothing—familiar yet requiring fine workmanship—they couldn’t do it at all.
If they couldn’t do it, they had ways: drape cloth over the statues（ and sell it as relics）, or simply place real long swords, axes, skinning knives in the saints’ hands.
Baldwin thought Caesar wanted to fight the people outside with these weapons, but instead Caesar walked toward the wooden partition on one side of the corridor. There should be a narrow space behind the wooden partition. “You know a Saracen proverb, right—cleanliness is half of faith.”
As the heir to the King of Ayyarasa Road, Baldwin of course knew this saying, as it was spoken by their greatest Prophet, so every Saracen bathes before worship.
Caesar raised the axe and cleaved it into the face of the Virgin Mary of Mercy!
The blueprint he got from Damara, provided by the Gerard family, was more accurately the Aqsa Mosque, or more precisely, this grey-domed mosque transformed by the Templar Knights into a church.
Saracen doctrine had no harsh requirements for temple construction, only that it must face east, have a pulpit and prayer niche, and most importantly, a water room.
The grey-domed mosque looked rectangular from the outside, but the Saracen worship hall was square. So what was that extra small rectangle for?
Two water rooms, plus a small courtyard and pool. When the Templar Knights arrived, they demolished the walls of the worship hall but sealed off the water rooms to make the interior space look like a “cross.”
Sealed, as mentioned above, just covered with cedar wood planks. The Grand Master of the Knights Templar thought long and hard but ultimately didn’t completely destroy the water rooms. After all, Temple Mount—as the name implies—is a hill. All water had to be brought in from outside the city, from underground.
The Templar Knights now got water from another source, but wouldn’t an extra hidden water room be even better?
While cleaving, Caesar tried hard to recall the underground tunnel blueprint he had sketched after getting the blueprint, combined with descriptions in scripture.
Before 700 AD, King Hezekiah of the Isaacites, to resist the Assyrian attack, buried the city’s external water source. So how did the residents of Ayyarasa Road get water? Before that, he secretly ordered craftsmen to build a deep underground tunnel. This tunnel, 1,600 feet long, ran from the Gihon Spring outside the city to the foot of Temple Mount, flowing into a square pool called Siloam.
In ancient times, Isaacites washed their hands and faces in the Pool of Siloam when worshiping the First Temple. After the Savior came to this world, because he smeared spit and mud on a blind man’s eyes and told him to wash in the Pool of Siloam—the blind man regained sight after washing, making it a place of holy relic.
But in the Gospel written by Saint Luke, he clearly stated that the tower of Siloam fell and killed eighteen people.
That is, before 62 AD, the Pool of Siloam had already collapsed and ceased to exist. But Hezekiah’s aqueduct and its connected shafts remained. People of Ayyarasa Road still drew water from them, as did Temple Mount. When Saracens built the mosque here, to provide endless clean water to the water room, they dug a winding upward tunnel.
“The teacher said,” Baldwin also “borrowed” a saw from Saint Simon’s hand, panting as he helped Caesar open the wooden partition. The wooden partition was decades old; even with maintenance, the inside was rotten. Even two weak children had no trouble destroying it.
He already smelled the cold, damp air overflowing from the crack: “In the tunnel, Saracens added Greek water screws to draw the water up.”
“But the water screw used black iron and copper fittings, so the Templar Knights dismantled it.” Caesar went to “borrow” a long sword, inserted it into the crack, crouched down and pressed on the hilt. Amid dizziness, the crack made continuous “crack crack” sounds, followed by a loud “snap!”.
The partition broke, and Caesar lost balance, crashing onto Baldwin. Baldwin yelped as his head hit a nearby pillar.
But that crack had become a vertical door.
“We can go in!” Baldwin shouted. Caesar grabbed his arm: “Wait!”
The tunnel might connect to the outside with air coming in, but for a room sealed for decades— to be safe, Caesar took down a few candles, put one inside the room, waited. The flame didn’t extinguish but grew from small to large, so they crawled in one by one.
The room was larger than they imagined, with smooth stone material on the floor and walls. By candlelight, Caesar saw the black small holes left after the metal faucets were removed—clearly the Templar Knights back then were really short of money.
Baldwin held a Seljuk-style covered oil lamp, walking to a raised base, unsure of its use. “The wheel of the water screw…” Caesar said. No need to explain, it was a large metal component, probably turned into Templar Knights’ spears and shields…
They quickly found the tunnel entrance along the base of the wheel, but this tunnel mouth was filled with stone blocks.
“Let’s check the other room.” Baldwin said immediately.
Demolishing the second room’s wooden partition exhausted them. They even leaned against it, slept a bit before having strength to continue exploring.
This tunnel mouth was also piled full, but not with stone blocks—with wood! Baldwin moved the oil lamp closer and saw fine patterns, lines, and Saracen script. Caesar, standing farther, saw more fully: “It’s a Saracen pulpit.”
The pulpit style was distinctive and conspicuous. Even scraping off the script, it couldn’t be placed in a Christian room, so the Templar Knights repurposed it, giving them an opportunity.
Caesar couldn’t help but call out “God bless.” He had prepared, but these days’ events told him preparation was far from complete against surprises or conspiracies. This way, he could abandon the more dangerous contingency plans.
Next, they pried and chopped, finally exposing the tunnel mouth. Baldwin initially blamed the Templar Knights back then for being too careless, but seeing the tunnel mouth, he understood—its diameter was only 1.5 feet, maybe smaller.
A nine-year-old child could curl up and crawl through, but an adult man, especially a knight training daily and eating meat except on fasting days, would surely get stuck!
Don’t believe those legend stories. A child crawling in or out to open gates and let in enemies could never happen. In real campaigns, infiltration required a team of true warriors to threaten a city or castle.
“I’ll go first.” Caesar said. As a leper, Baldwin had been enduring bitterly; Caesar could see it. Baldwin didn’t refuse—they “borrowed” some cloth from the saints, cut and braided it into rope, tied around Caesar’s waist.
“If we get out, we’ll probably need to buy a thousand years’ indulgences.” Baldwin said softly.
Caesar chuckled and slowly descended into the tunnel. This felt worse than rescuing Count Etienne before. It was like a hard esophagus. Fortunately, below the esophagus was the expanded stomach—and here too, a small but enough space to turn around.
Caesar lit a candle. He saw a square pool and traces of long-term friction. That was right. The water screw wasn’t long enough to connect directly from Hezekiah’s shaft to the grey-domed mosque. Saracens must have made improvements—he shook the candle upward, and Baldwin followed down.
“We still have about three hundred feet to go.” Caesar said.
“Mm.” Baldwin said.
The rest of the journey would be unforgettable for Caesar and Baldwin forever. Darkness was common in this era, cramped spaces not rare, oppression routine, but combined they were unbearable—not to mention they weren’t “walking” but slowly climbing downward, not knowing where each step would land.
Baldwin’s reaction was especially strong. Several times, he thought he was dead, buried in a grave, bound in a lead coffin, perhaps with a stone coffin outside, the mortal world gone from him forever…
Then he woke to see Caesar, in dim candlelight, weakly slapping his face, muttering something very softly while slapping.
He tried to listen but couldn’t understand. It wasn’t Greek, Latin, Saracen, or any language he’d encountered, only recognizing a few familiar syllables.
“…You’re awake.” Caesar asked calmly and gently: “Feeling better? Hold on a bit longer; we’re almost there.”
Baldwin wanted Caesar to leave him here, but even if Caesar weren’t a good person, he couldn’t—not unless he wanted to face the lion’s wrath. Amalric I would surely see him as the prince’s murderer.
The last tunnel section clearly gentled in slope. “There’s wind.” Caesar said hoarsely, but Baldwin couldn’t move. He had a high fever. Caesar tied the rope under Baldwin’s elbow, the other end to his waist, and dragged him outward.
Caesar crawled what felt like a century—then suddenly plunged down. He almost thought it was another hallucination, but no—he sank directly into water!
Water—ice-cold but clean, sweet water!
Caesar drank several big gulps without hesitation, then surfaced, found the tunnel mouth, pulled Baldwin over, splashed him awake. This time Baldwin, without instruction, crouched and drank desperately from the surface.
“We… cough,” the cold water lowered his body temperature, Baldwin regained some sense, slowly focusing his scattered vision: “…This is… the shaft?”
“Yes.” Caesar let Baldwin lean in the tunnel. The water was freezing; Baldwin tried to pull him but couldn’t lift his hand. He could only look up the shaft and saw the clearest new moon.
Baldwin smiled, but the next moment, the smile froze.
The new moon was blocked; he saw a smiling human face.
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ps:
Let me tell a little joke.
Much later.
Baldwin: Do you remember when we were nine, we were trapped in the Temple and had to escape through the Saracen tunnel?
Caesar: Yes, I do.
Baldwin: Then do you remember those words you said—&*%￥￥ Amalric I, &*%…… Heraclius, &%*%*&% With his extraordinary memory, Baldwin repeated it）. I’ve kept it in mind but never found anyone to translate it. What does it mean? A blessing?
Caesar（ remained expressionless）: Yes, it’s a blessing, just broader—like blessing many generations and relatives.
Baldwin（ sincerely）: Then I bless you too, &*%￥￥, &*%……&%*%*&%.
Caesar: …Thanks.
