Constance II's grandfather was named Heraclius, who was the founder of the Heraclius dynasty in Rome, but although Heraclius successfully prevented the Persian invasion, he could not best resist the rapid rise of the Great Eclipse, and during his reign, he lost Syria, Egypt and other provinces.

Later generations evaluated Heraclius as the emperor in a very regretful tone, although he was a hero, but he met Muhammad, the great prophet of the Arabs, which made Heraclius's life doomed to be a tragedy.

After Heraclius' death, his eldest son and second son ascended the throne together and became the co-emperor of Rome, of which the eldest son Constantine III was the father of Constantine II, but unfortunately, this Constantine III died as soon as he ascended the throne, and there were also accusations that Heraclius's second son poisoned his brother, so after a rebellion, the only remaining emperor of Rome was exiled, and the ten-year-old Constantine II ascended the throne.

Although Constans II and Prince Theodosius were brothers, they were not born to the same mother, with the mother of Constans II being the first wife of his father Constantine III, while Prince Theodosius's mother was the second wife of Constantine III, and the two were half-brothers.

Prince Theodosius's mother was an ambitious woman who wanted to make her son emperor of the Roman Empire, so when Constans II ascended the throne, she was strongly opposed to her, and proposed that her son Theodosius ascend the throne, but unfortunately it did not succeed. Later, she proposed to give her son the title of "Augustus", making Theodosius the co-emperor of Rome, but because Constantes II's father was murdered by another co-emperor. So her proposal was again rejected.

Neither effort could make her son emperor, but the mother did not give up. In the years that followed, Prince Theodosius' mother bullied Constans II at a young age. tried to seize power several times, but unfortunately her methods were not very clever, so she has not been able to do so, and died of a sudden illness a few years ago.

It is precisely because of Theodosius's mother that the relationship between the two brothers is not good, so after Theodosius lost the protection of his mother, he was sent to the front line of Asia Minor by Constans II, but even what he didn't expect was that Theodosius was extremely talented in military affairs. With the Roman phalanx, he fought with the big cannibals, and even united a group of generals by his side.

Seeing this situation, Constance II was worried that Theodosius would not be able to lose his tail outside, so he promoted him to the consul of the Roman legions and transferred back to Constantinople from the front. Not much of an army can be charged at all.

Most of the upper echelons of the Eastern Roman aristocracy knew about the feud between the brothers of Constans II, and also knew that Prince Theodosius, although he seemed to be a high and powerful person, was in fact a prisoner. Therefore, the average nobleman was reluctant to deal with him, lest he be misunderstood by Constans II and get into trouble.

After figuring out the entanglements, Li Ke finally understood the current situation of Prince Theodosius. The reason why he invited himself that day was probably because he wanted to make friends with him. After all, if he can make friends with him, the prince of the Tang Dynasty, then his life will be better in the future. It's just that Li Ke doesn't need to get into this kind of trouble because of a stranger.

In addition, except for the matter of Prince Theodosius. Li Ke also learned some secrets among the Roman nobles from Irina, which were really filthy, such as the youngest son of a certain grand duke was actually his grandson, and the two marquisses fought because of a handsome male slave, etc., although Irina did not deliberately collect them, but she still heard a lot of them under the influence of her ears and eyes. In addition, when she and Li Ke were in love, these things were all told, and they were all jokes.

Compared with these domestic situations in Eastern Rome, Li Ke was most interested in the surrounding areas of Eastern Rome, especially the situation in the Mediterranean Sea, which aroused Li Ke's great interest.

When Rome was at its strongest, the entire Mediterranean Sea was Rome's inland sea, but later the division of Eastern and Western Rome, under the invasion of the northern barbarians, Western Rome perished, and Eastern Rome also suffered from the rise of the Great Eclipse, which led to a large shrinkage of territory, but even so, the Eastern Roman Empire was still the hegemon of the Mediterranean, at least on the sea, no force could compete with them.

The Mediterranean Sea is the dividing line between Asia and Africa, of which the southern shore is North Africa, which originally belonged to the territory of the Roman Empire, but more than ten years ago, Egypt was captured by the Great Eclipse, and some of the remaining North African territories were also invaded by barbarians in Western Europe, and they had already become independent from the Roman Empire.

The situation is much more complicated on the northern shore of the Mediterranean, which consists of three main peninsulas, including the Iberian Peninsula in the west, the Apennine Peninsula with the city of Rome in the middle, and the Balkan Peninsula in the east, which is closest to Constantinople.

Originally, these three peninsulas belonged to the territory of the Roman Empire, but after the division of East and West Rome, the Iberian Peninsula and the Apennine Peninsula in the west belonged to the territory of the Western Roman Empire.

It is precisely because of this that of the three peninsulas, only the easternmost Balkan Peninsula still belonged to the Eastern Roman Empire. As for the remaining two peninsulas, they are controlled by two major powers.

Among them, the Apennine Peninsula, which is the birthplace of the Roman Empire, had the most twists and turns, when Western Rome was invaded by the Visigoths of the Germanic side, as a result, the city of Rome was captured, and the Visigoths slaughtered and plundered the city for three days, and the entire Roman city was seriously damaged.

More than 30 years later, the Vandals who had migrated to North Africa invaded from the sea and recaptured the city of Rome, which was devastated, leaving Rome with fewer than 7,000 survivors. At the same time, the emperor was killed, and the empress and two princesses were also snatched by the Vandals, one of whom became the queen of the later Vandals.

It is also the successive invasions of foreign races, the strength of Western Rome is declining, especially the invasion of the Huns Alathi, and finally the Western Roman Empire and the northern barbarians united, but they could not resist, the two major Roman empires in the east and west were all mortally threatened, fortunately, after the death of Alathi, the Hun kingdom he established was also divided, and the Eastern and Western Roman Empires were also relieved.

However, the Western Roman Empire, which was already extremely weak, was no longer able to support it, and the subsequent Western Roman emperors, almost all of them were abolished by the barbarians in the north, and even many barbarians directly set up their sons as emperors, and this situation lasted until the late fifth century, when the last Nepos of the Western Roman Empire was assassinated, and the Western Roman Empire officially ended.

Although the Western Roman Empire fell, the Apennine Peninsula was still there, but the entire peninsula fell into the hands of the Germanic barbarians, and later the Lombards in the north who belonged to the Germanic tribe rose up and unified the entire Apennine Peninsula, and at the same time established a powerful kingdom on the island, that is, the Lombard Kingdom, which lasted until Li Ke arrived, and this kingdom still occupied most of the Apennine Peninsula.

And on the Iberian Peninsula in the west of the Apennine Peninsula, there is also a kingdom founded by the Germanic people, and the founder of this kingdom is the Visigoths who had previously sacked Rome.

After sacking Rome, these Visigoths settled on the Iberian Peninsula and drove the Vandals and Arans to North Africa. Later, these Visigoths established a kingdom, the Visigothic Kingdom, which ruled over the entire Iberian Peninsula, so in a sense, this kingdom was the half of the later Kingdom of Spain.

In general, the entire northern shore of the Mediterranean Sea was divided into three major powers, from west to east, the Visigothic Kingdom, the Lombard Kingdom, and the Eastern Roman Empire. It is also worth mentioning that the northeast of the Visigothic kingdom and the northwest of the Lombard kingdom are the famous Frankish kingdom in later generations, but this group of stupid Germans is still playing the game of unification, division, reunification, and division for the time being, and the kingdom is in chaos, and it has no impact on the Mediterranean for the time being.

After figuring out the distribution of forces along the Mediterranean coast, Li Ke suddenly had an extremely bold idea. The purpose of his trip to the Americas was actually to find a place for him to develop independently, but whether it was Africa or the Americas, he felt a little dissatisfied, and after understanding the situation around the Mediterranean, Li Ke suddenly found a stage that was very suitable for him to play.

Now the Eastern Roman Empire is not only threatened by the Great Eclipse, but also the northern barbarians are also their eternal enemies, and the northern barbarians have never stopped bloodshed, and even the homeland of Western Rome cannot be recovered.

So in this case, if Li Ke also joins the competition of various forces in the Mediterranean in the name of the Tang Dynasty's aid to Rome, although it may cause dissatisfaction on the part of Rome, but under the threat of the Great Food, they will definitely not dare to oppose it openly, and then try to choose a place far away from Rome to develop, do not stimulate Rome's nerves too much, and wait until he has a foothold in the Mediterranean region, then Rome's reaction will be insignificant. Even at that time, the other party may try to win over its own strong force.

This idea was that when Li Ke was chatting with Irina, he suddenly had a flash of inspiration, and then he was firmly grasped by him, and quickly took root in Li Ke's heart. And he also made some deductions about this idea later, and the more he thought about it, the more feasible he felt.

But after all, this is just Li Ke's idea alone, if it wants to become a truly feasible plan, it must be verified by others, at least Li Ke has to convince the two right-hand men Cen Changqian and Wang Fangyi around him. (To be continued......)