The Roman Forum was more than a marketplace, it was a theater of ambition.
Columns of marble stood like frozen pillars of pride, casting long shadows over the heart of the Republic.
Elian stood at the edge of it all, watching senators in flowing togas stride across the cobbled roads, voices raised not in anger but in calculated persuasion.
They were in 55 BCE now. Rome's republic was alive, but its heart beat uneasily.
Selene stood beside him, quiet, almost reverent. Her eyes scanned the forum with practiced understanding.
"Do you feel it?" she asked.
Elian didn't answer right away. He was watching a speaker raise his hands to address a gathering crowd his voice sharp, his tone measured.
Another senator paced behind him, eyes narrowed. The tension was palpable.
"It's like every word has a weight," Elian finally said. "Like one wrong sentence and the whole system could shatter."
Selene gave a slight nod. "Because it could. Rome at this time is a volcano beneath a velvet curtain. Politics here is a game of masks and knives."
They moved slowly through the forum. Elian absorbed every detail: the stone platforms used for public speech, the expressions on statues worn down by time, the senate house in the distance. People walked quickly, with purpose.
Merchants called out from shaded stalls, selling bread, olives, scrolls. And in the middle of it all, power pulsed like an open flame.
"What do we see today?" Elian asked.
"Cicero is set to speak," Selene replied. "A master of rhetoric, brilliant, dangerous to both his enemies and his allies."
As if on cue, a man in his fifties stepped up onto the Rostra, the raised platform near the senate house. His toga was crisp, his posture confident. Elian recognized him instantly from books and lectures. Marcus Tullius Cicero. Philosopher. Politician. Orator.
Cicero's voice was commanding, but not loud. He didn't shout. He spoke like a man who already knew everyone was listening.
And they were.
"He speaks against corruption," Selene said, softly. "But it's never that simple. His enemies will call it theater. His allies call it strategy."
Elian tried to follow the Latin. It came in waves some words he knew, others lost to time and dialect. But the emotion cut through. There was passion in Cicero's cadence, anger in his pace, pride in every pause.
"He's not just fighting for Rome," Elian whispered. "He's fighting for control over its soul."
Selene looked at him then, as if surprised by his insight. "You're beginning to understand."
The speech ended in applause and murmurs. Cicero stepped down and was immediately flanked by men whispering at him. Elian saw one senator nod curtly, another scowl and turn away.
"Every speech makes an enemy," Selene said. "Every alliance is a temporary peace."
They walked through the forum again, this time watching the subtle exchanges between men in white togas trimmed in purple the senatorial class.
Some exchanged coins. Others shared scrolls, sealed with wax. Whispers were more frequent than words.
"Is this the republic everyone praises?" Elian asked, frustration creeping in.
"I thought it was about the people's voice. But I only hear scheming."
Selene stopped beside a statue of Romulus.
"Idealism fades when power becomes the goal. The Roman Republic began with noble intentions. But ambition is a storm few can survive."
Elian looked up at the stone eyes of Rome's mythical founder. They stared blankly into the future.
"What happens next?"
Selene's expression darkened. "Caesar waits in the wings. Pompey builds his influence.
Crassus seeks wealth and war. Rome will not stay a republic for much longer."
As the day wore on, the sun dipped low, casting a golden hue across the stones.
Elian and Selene sat beneath a columned archway, watching as the forum quieted. A few boys kicked a cloth ball near the edge. A pair of women haggled over dates and grain. Senators began to disappear into marble buildings, and the pulse of politics dulled to a faint beat.
"It's... exhausting," Elian admitted. "Watching this. Knowing it leads to Caesar, then emperors, then centuries of control and collapse."
Selene turned to him. "And yet Rome lives on in ways no empire ever has. Its ideas. Its words. Even its failures."
He looked at her, eyes searching. "How do you carry all this, Selene? All these eras. All these stories?"
She didn't answer immediately. When she did, her voice was quieter than usual.
"By remembering that every age is a mirror. And every traveler sees themselves in it."
Elian closed his eyes for a moment. He felt the weight of the city, the echoes of ambition and betrayal. Politics wasn't just speeches and scrolls it was lives. Lost, remade, consumed.
As the stars began to prick the Roman sky, he stood.
They stepped into the dark, and the portal opened once more.