Under the instruction of Constantine, the land measurement work in the empire began vigorously, and the land situation of the empire, the number of free farmers and subordinate farmers, etc., all needed to be re-measured.

In the Roman Empire, the abandoned land also needs to pay taxes, and the land is connected together, for example, the fifty acres of land as a whole, even if half of them are abandoned, the owner of the remaining land has to pay the tax on the abandoned land, which is mainly to prevent the empire's finances from drastically changing.

But this had an obvious drawback, that is, it increased the burden on the peasants, and the upper echelons of the empire also recognized this shortcoming, so every fifteen years they would remeasure the area of cultivated land and the number of people in the country to adjust the tax policy.

However, since Constantine's father, Manuel II, there has been basically no work on this aspect, and it is true that a long time has passed, and the core of the Pronian system is the land, so the land situation of the empire must be understood in detail.

In Constantinople, Constantine was talking to the governors of various places, and the original governor of Moria had been removed from his post and replaced by Alex, the original palace supervisor of Constantine, who was sent to the province of Moria as an official.

After emphasizing the need to cooperate with the land survey team sent by Constantinople as the center, Constantine dissolved the meeting, at which point Sito came over and reminded him,

"Your Majesty, the consuls of Venice and Genoa, the states of Northern Italy, and Ferdinando are all about to arrive in Constantinople, may I ask what format we will receive them?"

"The specifications are higher, reflecting our style, and don't let people criticize them."

"That's... Do I need a religious ceremony? ”

Sito cautiously asked, if religious rituals were to be followed, would it be Orthodox or Catholic?

Constantine paused, then shook his head,

"No, politics is politics, don't associate it with religion, as they say, God's to God's, and the worldly to the world."

After speaking, Constantine picked up the document in his hand and began to correct, and after a long time, he just wanted to raise his head and rub his sore neck, but saw that Cito had not left,

"What, is there anything else?"

Sitoru's amnesty,

"It is so, Trabzon has sent an envoy corpus, which has arrived in Constantinople, and beseeches His Majesty to receive it."

"Hmm... Did you say it was about something? ”

Constantine's hands kept moving.

Cito was a little embarrassed and lowered his head,

"I don't know."

Constantine stopped his movements and looked at Cito,

"Didn't the Ministry of Foreign Affairs communicate with them?"

Seeing that Sito was silent, Constantine waved his hand,

"Alright, call them in."

Sito was ordered to retreat, and after a while, a group of people walked in, and the leader took out a paperwork,

"His Royal Highness John the Despotic of Trebizond has sent an envoy to His Majesty Constantine of Basilius in the Roman Empire, and I have heard recently..."

After a big call, the front was full of praise, and he didn't get to the point, which made Constantine feel a little bored, but in order to show his attention, and he couldn't interrupt, he looked around boredly, and it was easy for him to see another person who was also looking around,

Anna felt Constantine's gaze and looked at him without fear, which made Constantine dumbfounded, but she didn't care about the other party's faux pas.

Finally, when the messenger had finished speaking, he raised his head and waited for Constantine's inquiry,

"The messenger has come from afar, and I don't know that John has sent you, but what is the matter?"

"Your Majesty, His Highness John has indeed sent me here to have a hard time,"

The messenger began to pour out bitter water,

"The Ottomans' expansionist ambitions are endless, even for their own people, and the opposition in Anatolia has been swept away, and our country has found out that Mehmed II is ready to attack Trabzon, the pearl of the Black Sea and a loyal subject of the empire, and hopes that His Majesty can be the suzerainty and can shelter the people of Trabzon, and His Highness John is grateful."

In the final analysis, it's just to ask for help, to be honest, Constantine doesn't really want to care, first, Trabzon is a little far from Constantinople, the land route is not passable, if you take the sea route, the battle with the Ottomans at sea will inevitably affect the development of the country, and if you win the Ottomans, you won't get any benefits, Trebizond is not a very rich country, and the place is small, and it has almost no role in the empire's agriculture and commerce, it is a loss-making deal.

Constantine glanced at Cito, who understood, stood up and attracted everyone's attention, coughing,

"We have deep sympathy for what happened to His Highness John, but the state cannot start a war because of the king's wrath, and it is better to discuss this matter slowly..."

In the middle of Sito's speech, Anna stood up directly, bowed down to Constantine, and interrupted Cito,

"People are looking forward to the Roman army, just like a dry land is looking forward to rain, the Ottomans are extremely vicious, the despicable heretics are destroying everything we have, the ambitions of Mehmed II will not diminish, the strength of the Ottomans will become stronger and stronger, your majesty will not take advantage of the present to contain the enemy, is it possible to wait for the enemy to take the initiative to attack?"

"Before I came, my father instructed me that if the Roman Emperor was willing to send troops, Trebizond was willing to give up the independent status of the kingdom and become a province of the Roman Empire, under the control of the Roman Emperor."

Hearing this, Constantine became interested,

"So, you want me to start a holy war? Aren't you afraid of the Arabs and Persians uniting? ”

"I'm afraid, but I know it's impossible,"

Anna looked straight at Constantine,

"The aggressiveness of the Ottomans is known to the whole world, Uzun Hassan will not be willing to join forces with him, the Mamluk dynasty has recently suffered a great defeat, and will not be willing to send troops, Abu Saeed Mirza of Timur is busy reviving the Timurid Empire, and Uzun Hassan is joining forces to fight against the Black Sheep Dynasty, the whole Persian region is in chaos, if Your Majesty wants to revive the Roman Empire, now is the best time, and I advise you not only for the survival of Trebizond, but also for the sake of Your Majesty."

Constantine tapped his fingers on the armrest, and said flatly,

"Then why should I save Trebizond? Can't I fight the Ottomans later? Anyway, the Persian region will not calm down for a short time, and it can also buy time for the development of the empire. ”

Suddenly, Anna's face turned white, she thought that this would convince Constantine, but she still miscalculated.

Constantine smiled,

"Are you John's daughter? You're still young, learn more, there are some things that you can't do if you want to, and Uzun Hassan doesn't necessarily want to see us win. ”

After saying this, Constantine looked at the master,

"Please rest for the two of you, there will be an international conference in a few days, Anna can come over and follow me to participate, okay, let's stop here today, I'm tired, you can step down."

Seeing Constantine leave on his own, everyone silently retreated.

A few days later, in Constantinople, in the newly renovated Hagia Sophia, representatives of various countries gathered together, and not only the invited people arrived, but even the uninvited countries of the HRE, France, Aragon and other countries also sent envoys to witness the convening of the meeting.

Constantine sat on the throne with Anna at his side, and after a short speech, the crowd began to discuss the details,

"First of all, in order to better promote economic exchanges, do the countries agree to the establishment of economic alliances?"

Constantine made the first move.

The ruling countries of various countries have thought about it in their hearts and have expressed their approval.

It is not surprising that in these years, there was no trade in Western Europe, new routes had just begun, there was almost nothing but slaves, and it was monopolized by the Portuguese, and the trade in Northeast Europe was the main one, so I was very interested in Constantine's proposal to liberalize trade and form an economic system together.

Constantine did not speak, and the whole meeting was handed over to Sito to preside,

"China proposes that countries in the economic system, without harming their own interests, should grant tax reductions or even tax exemption privileges to certain commodities in order to promote the development of trade."

"At the same time, in order to facilitate the circulation of goods and prevent the disorder of exchanges, all countries should unify their currencies and exchange currencies freely within the economic system."

Don't get me wrong, this is not a good thing, many people when it comes to currency issuance, the first thing that comes to mind is the high benefit of seigniorage brought by printing currency, in fact, in this period, there is basically no seigniorage,

The reason is very simple, the seigniorage is only after the paper money comes out, through the circulation of money, the tax that can be collected, but now the metal money is used, such as gold and silver coins, even if these precious metals are not minted into the style of coins, it can still be used, and it will not depreciate because you don't know which country's currency it is, anyway, gold sells well everywhere, as for you say that one gram of gold, you mint it is written on it to be used as ten grams, and in this way "make the difference", you see that people ignore you and you are finished.

Now there is no paper money in Europe, people will not recognize, are to trade gold and silver, the reason for coinage is mainly because of showing off, the monarch's head is printed on the gold coin, in order to show the wealth of this person, and therefore, the large and small nobles in Europe can mint coins, basically no one cares, your own gold, play your own head, no one cares about it.

Therefore, as long as the paper money is not produced for a day, or the country's reputation is so good that a very light gold coin can be used as a lot of money, the seigniorage is equivalent to nothing, and gold itself is a commodity.

But it was a very glorious thing to cast a statue on a coin, and in the Roman Empire, only the emperor's head could appear on the coin, comparing himself with the emperor, which was a great honor for the people of the northern Italian Republic, and if the coinage was obtained, the chances of the consuls wanting to be re-elected would also be greatly increased, which was a great temptation for them.