The Galhapertinikeauyan had abandoned Ierantaia, ran back to Opertin, gotten himself arrested and sent to forlorn. All to escape Cicero Paulomo's wrath.

It was that very cleverness that made Paulomo recruit Galinha in the first place. Now, infuriatingly so, the Galhapertinikeauyan Bené Galinha had escaped the Crime Lord in Quitso's grasp. And now that very crime lord, Cicero Paulomo was left to clean up the mess made and try to regain Ierantaia.

The way to do this was, of course, smuggling bread.

Ordinary bread.

But this was no ordinary bread: the Maestraleans were in open revolt. Protests erupted, and the fields were scourged clean by an unfortunate series of droughts. Food had to be brought in from Castrisya. And Glimmer.

And of course, when people are hungry, they thought with their bellies and not with their brains. And, by the great golden elephant in the sky, did Ierantaia have quite the surplus of the hungry.

So by 925, Paulomo managed to buy his presence in Ierantaia back with nothing more than bread. He managed to evade the crackdown that reverberated through the region in the aftermath of the Rapira.

But now, he was going to do something else entirely.

"You are certain of the location of their command?"

"Yes, maestro." Said Paulomo's Lieutenant. In the aftermath of the Rapira, the Lucchese had gained power. Now, Paulomo intended to eat their hearts.

"Strike. Now."

"Yes, maestro."

The order given, Paulomo's men would storm the Lucchese hideaway. He could not be defeated.

Because of the bread.

It was no ordinary bread. Should Paulomo's men lose this encounter, he would not be harmed. His bread made certain that any strike against Paulomo was also a strike against the people. Even the common criminal would defend him, for even the common criminal needed to eat.

And even if he the Lucchese prove more stubborn than usual, a bribe here and a couple loaves there and the soldiers of Salvadare would come howling bloody murder down the Rapira and rip the Lucchese to shreds. Ierantaia would be his, one way or the other, and so would the rest of Mertonia.

Paulomo loved situations where he couldn't lose.

Almost as much as he loved bread.