SYNOPSIS:

After the fall of Boudica, Emperor Nero’s paranoia consumes Rome. Fearing the defiant northern kingdom of Nida may rise next, he sends his trusted prefect, Pretorio, to eradicate its royal line before it becomes a new symbol of resistance. Battlefields of mud and fire meet palaces glittering with decay, as Pretorio’s legions bring both order and ruin in equal measure. Queen Cassia dies protecting her newborn son, Basileus, whom Pretorio entrusts to Tuccia — a Vestal Virgin torn between duty and compassion. Meanwhile, King Tamack, betrayed by Rome, launches one final doomed strike to reclaim his child. Amid the ruin, a ten-year-old blacksmith’s son named Varak survives — forced to watch Pretorio’s conquest burn his world to ash. Pretorio’s loyalty earns Nero’s favor, while Basileus grows under his rigid tutelage — half Roman, half exile. In the shadows, Varak becomes a weapon of vengeance, training for the day he can confront the empire’s enforcer. A decade after Nida’s fall, Tuccia summons Varak to Rome, hoping to rekindle the lost spirit of Nida — unaware that Nero has already sent Pretorio and Basileus on a staged rescue mission to Queen Cartimandua in Britannia, a gesture of imperial theatre that recasts Basileus as “Nero’s young Aryan soldier.” In her summons, Tuccia reveals the buried Roman gold she once hid. Varak, now hardened and aligned with rebel bands, forges a sword from the gold and steels himself for the journey — his path set inexorably toward Rome. As famine and rebellion spread, Nero’s misrule and extravagance turn Rome’s generals and senators against him; abandoned by his Praetorians, he is declared an enemy of the state. The emperor takes his own life — plunging Rome into chaos and ushering in the Year of the Four Emperors. Varak finally reaches the capital but is swiftly apprehended. When Pretorio and Basileus return to Rome, the Senate questions their loyalty, forcing Pretorio to choose between Rome and the son he once raised. To prove his allegiance and silence Nero’s false myth of the Aryan race, Pretorio is ordered to execute Basileus during the Oresteia — a masked festival meant to honor justice through blood. But as the chaos of the arena collides with the roar of the empire, where belief and brutality intertwine, history itself demands sacrifice. Where love and power shift in a swift exchange of masks, it is Varak who strikes — and the blade meant for Basileus falls upon Pretorio.

PRAETORIAN: THE YEAR OF THE FOUR EMPERORS