Mediterranean Hegemon of Ancient Greece

And Christod's second brother, Klimides, grabbed the railing with both hands and shouted in excitement.

His vivacious second aunt (Eunice) even waved her fist and kept yelling, "Chris, good job! You're such a brave boy! ......"

Christod laughed, and this time it was heartfelt, and it took away the tension in his heart as he held his head high and held the wooden sign aloft, leading the panel of judges around the arena for a week before entering the center of the arena and standing.

All the spectators were wondering why a wooden cart was being pushed behind the judges' team with a bronze basin half a person high and supported by a golden bronze pillar, when the answer was revealed: the priests pushed the cart to the center of the arena, quickly dismantled it and reassembled it into a small wooden platform.

At that point, the presenter raised another red flag and the audience grew quiet.

"I would like to invite the delegations of athletes from all regions of the Kingdom and the participating city-states to enter!!!"

The band immediately played the "Victory March" in the host's impassioned shout, and the joyful melody rang out on the stadium, invigorating the spirits of the audience, who all looked forward to the entrance of the stadium.

The athletes, who had been waiting outside the main arena for a long time, finally entered in order under the command of the Dionysian soldiers.

With the entrance of the band and the judges, the spectators were already getting used to the novel opening ceremony of the Dionysian Games, and were excitedly wondering who the first delegation of athletes would be, and some were even making bets on it. The answer, in the minds of many, was the region of Thurii, the Holy Kingdom of Dionysia, as it was the centre of the mighty kingdom of the Western Mediterranean and the venue of the Games, and it deserved to be the leader.

But when the Tullian teenager walked in first with a wooden sign and the audience could make out the words on it, they were surprised: the Arcadian League?! Why would it be the Arcadian League?!

Only some VIPs close to the royal stands could barely hear the host's voice over the noise: "...... In order to demonstrate the principles of 'equality and fairness' advocated by the great god Hades in this Games , His wise Majesty Davos proposed to the preparatory team for the Games that the order of entry of the athletic delegations be arranged according to the order of the Greek letters of the names of the participating regions and city-states ......"

The representatives of the Greek city-states were more than a little touched by the realization that Dionysia had practically fulfilled the promise in their invitation letter that "all participating city-states, large and small, would be treated equally".

Lycomedes, who was whispering to Pelopidas, learned that a delegation of Arcadian League athletes were entering, and immediately leapt to his feet, with no regard for his noble status in the Arcadian League, waving his arms at the athletes and shouting loudly, just like the other spectators from the Arcadian League, to cheer them on.

The city-states in the League of Arcadia are small in population and strength, but they are all Greek city-states with long histories and close to where the four traditional games are held, and have been inspired by their traditional athletic aspects, and with the close relationship between Mantineia and Dionysia, and with a strong push from Lycomedes, the League of Arcadia has sent more than 50 athletes who will participate in all but swimming, the Competitive events other than horse racing, racing and archery.

As soon as the athletes of the Arcadia League entered the arena, they were immediately overwhelmed by the deafening cheers that shocked them.

The previous frustration of waiting outside the arena for a long time was quickly put behind them, and they also enthusiastically waved to the audience, creating a good interaction inside and outside the arena, making the atmosphere even more lively.

Davos and his family still hadn't returned to their seats as the delegation of Arcadian athletes approached the royal grandstand and added one person to the railing, the late Adoris' wife, Edouie. They smiled and waved at the teenager holding a wooden sign and shouted encouragement.

The teenager kept moving forward, but his eyes were a little moist. The teenager, who appeared to be two years older than Kristod, was named Enon, and was the only son of Adoris. After the death of Adoris in battle, both Clotokatacus, and Davos felt deeply guilty, and thus took extra care of Aedui and his son.

The second delegation of athletes entered the stadium after the Acadian delegation had crossed the royal stand, and the word "Argos" was clearly engraved on the wooden plaque, convincing the Allied guests that Dionysian was indeed impartial in arranging the athletic delegations in alphabetical order.

Argos is in a bit of a bad spot here today.

In the past, it had been trying to bring the entire fertile Argos triangular plain in the northeastern corner of the Peloponnese under its control against the mighty Sparta, but several city-states in this area, such as Mycenae and Tiryns, had been in conflict of interest with it, with the secret support of Sparta, and even Cleonai (where the Nemean Games were held), which was under its control, had wanted independence from time to time.

Although after the Greek War, because of the timely surrender of Argos and some contribution to the siege of Athens, after many requests, finally received the support of Dionysia, largely completed the unification of the plains of Argos, and declared the "League of the Argosian Plain". However, Argos was an oligarchy, similar to Sparta, and lacked such excellent political leaders as Pelopidas and Lycomedes, the simple and brutal means of integrating the whole plain region in these years caused the discontent of other city-states in the region, and conflicts broke out. It is hoped that Dionysia's support will be renewed at the next Greek Union meeting when issues relating to the conflict in the Peloponnesian Argos triangular plain are discussed.

Although there was a small Argosian crowd in the arena, the enthusiastic Dionysian crowd still gave the Argosian League players a friendly cheer, as they did the Arcadian delegation.

But the formation of the delegation of Argos athletes was somewhat odd, with a large number of Argos gathered together and walking in front, and a small number of Argos allies gathered together and trailing behind, with a considerable distance between the two, and anyone with a good eye could see what was going on.

Plato, who knew the ins and outs of this, asked directly, "What is Dionysia going to do about the conflict in the plains of Argos?"

"This will be an important topic at the meeting of the Greek Union early next month. At that time we will summon all the main councilors of all the city-states of the plains of Argos to discuss it, and not only listen to the opinions of Argos, but also to the reasonable demands of the other city-states ......" said Davos with a serious look, and implicitly: "Try to come up with a A solution acceptable to all parties, a peaceful resolution of this dispute."

"The Argosians are somewhat similar to the Spartans, conservative and stubborn, and with a long and deep-rooted tradition of dominating the Argosian plains alone, I'm afraid they won't compromise easily," Plato warned.

"Originally, Argos was underpowered, and although there were minor battles with other city-states in the Argos Plain from time to time in the past, it was basically able to keep the peace, but now that Argos has received great support from Deionia, it has intensified the conflicts in the region, leading to the current tension, and Deionia should bear a great deal of responsibility!" Xenophon, however, was rudely critical.

"Just some conflict, not a war, the situation is much better than before when there was fighting at every turn, how can we say that it intensified the conflict-" Plato defended in place of Dionysia.

"That's only because the Greek League has decreed that city-states that start wars will be severely punished, so they're all exercising restraint-" retorted Xenophon.

"Isn't this the work of Dionysia? It was because of Dionysia's establishment and leadership of the Greek Union that there was a long period of peace on Greek soil-"

"I'm not denying what Deionia has accomplished in this regard, I just think that Deionia has been a bit lackluster in dealing with Argos and the other city-states of the Plains of Argos-"

"You have to understand that Argos did provide some help during Deionia's pacification of mainland Greece, and since Deionia could have helped Mandinia and Thebes integrate their respective regions, there was nothing wrong with supporting Argos, after all, city-states such as Mycenae hadn't given Deionia any help throughout the Greek War."

"But it turns out that Deionia was wrong to make that choice in the first place!"

"You can't deny the reasonableness of the decision made in the first place just because the results were wrong! And it's not a bad thing to make mistakes, and Deionia can make improvements accordingly. But I am of the opinion that in today's situation, Argos is still adopting the same oligarchy as old Sparta, and it is almost impossible to lead the other city-states on the plains of Argos-"

"The former Sparta was not an oligarchic whole at all, but rather it was a hybrid polity of kingship and democracy with more classical traditional virtues than any other native Greek city-state -"

"This is the 1st time I've heard this, but I don't agree. First let's see, is Sparta a kingly system? --"