Blesschenai, an imperial palace in Constantinople, has always been one of the emperor's residences,

At this time, outside the palace gate, a magnificent carriage stopped here, attracting a lot of bright or dark eyes, Constantine has not yet arrived, and the invited bigwigs began to talk in the palace in twos and threes,

"Do you know what's going on?"

The lord of Ankara, who can also be called the Ankara autocracy, Michal asked the commander of the 3rd Army, Everenos.

"Didn't the Cabinet send us a document? It is said that it is about the contradictions between the various races of the empire, don't you know? ”

"Go, who asked you this, I look like a fool, don't I?"

Michal rolled his eyes, disapproving of Everenos's ridicule, with the relationship between the two of them, don't look at the fact that Michal is now the premier nobleman in Asia Minor, but Everynos's attitude towards him has not changed.

"I mean, why did Your Majesty suddenly remember this? Nothing will happen, right? ”

Michal deliberately lowered his voice, he was puzzled,

"You're the head of the legion directly under the Empire, so you haven't gotten any news?"

Everynos smacked his lips and looked around slightly, his solemn expression suddenly relaxed,

"Actually... It's nothing, the Slavs of the province of Morea are going to start their annual raids again, this is their first and first batch this year, and soon, such raids will emerge one after another, Your Majesty only ordered to encourage production this year, how can you watch this group of barbarians come nonsense. ”

Michal was relieved, and he nodded slightly, relieved.

"Eh, don't talk about this, you guy, Ankara is not fat, you have gained a lot of weight over the years!"

In the face of Everenos's joke, Michal touched his chin very smugly,

"That's not it, Ankara is really a golden city, I only slightly encourage merchants to come here to trade, just the commercial tax flows to my castle every year like a river, I can't spend it in a lifetime, speaking of which, it just so happens that I have the top silk sent from the east, and I will have a few horses sent to you when the time comes."

Everenos and Michal looked at each other, and they couldn't help but laugh.

"The two of you are so interested, why are you so happy to talk about?"

The two of them had a good conversation here, but they attracted the attention of some other people.

The two turned their heads, and suddenly they were silent, and Everynoston was silent, and Michal hesitated for a moment, and responded with a smile,

"The minister laughed, but it was just some trivial matters from the past, and it was not worth mentioning."

"Oh? I'm not going to see it, right? It's rare for the two of you to meet, so let's talk about this? ”

Michal sneered, looked at Everenos, and fell silent.

In fact, Flores didn't care about what the two of them were talking about, and they could think about it, the two of them were just talking about some matters of interest, and the relationship between the two of them colluding with each other was not news at all in the upper echelons of the empire.

"No matter what the two of you talk about and talk so happily, but I want to remind you two that everything is important for the overall situation, and you can't drag down Your Majesty, Your Excellency Michal, I heard that you are the second leader of the Freedom Society, you must restrain them well and don't cause trouble."

Michal didn't speak, but bent down slightly, indicating that he had heard.

Although the words were always said to Michal, Flores' eyes kept looking at Everenos, and seeing that Everynos had been cold-faced, Flores also snorted and left a sentence before leaving,

"Prepare well, Your Majesty has something to ask you today, so do it yourself!"

Although he was very dissatisfied with Flores's attitude, his words made Michal shrug, and he was secretly thinking about something in his heart, but Everynos was calm, just looked at Michal lightly, and did not disturb him.

"Your Majesty has arrived, please enter the palace!"

Without waiting for Michal to think for long, the great eunuch came out and sang loudly, and as the palace gates closed, the palace of Blaichenai was temporarily suspended.

According to the arrangement of the great eunuch, everyone sat down in their places, and then the emperor appeared at the top and unexpectedly beckoned downward,

"Michal, sit next to me."

Everyone present is not good at stubble, they are all old foxes who are good at fighting, and as soon as these words came out, they could vaguely feel some of the emperor's biases.

"Now that everyone is here, I won't say much polite words, let the prime minister introduce you to the specific situation."

Calvo looked tired, yesterday Constantine hastily ordered a meeting, all night, Calvo was sorting out papers on foreign issues, and until now, Calvo has not closed his eyes.

"Ahem... Let me now give you a brief update on the situation,"

He cleared his throat and pulled out a slightly thinner document from the thick paper,

"From Emperor Justinian, and even back to Constantine the Great, foreign legions have continued to occupy most of the history of our country, after Emperor Heraclius, the financial system of the empire gradually collapsed, the treasury did not have enough cash, and could only rely on the rewards of land to envelop foreign legions, but due to war, the output of these lands gradually could not support the daily activities of foreign legions, so the previous Macedonian emperors included our Emperor Michael VIII, Emperor Andronica II and' The rebels, 'Kantakuzin, etc., gave the foreign legions the power to plunder the localities,"

"After these foreigners entered our borders, they occupied the lands of the indigenous peoples, not to mention the arrangements of the empire, and established tens of thousands of large and small strongholds in the Balkans of the empire, Asia Minor, Cilicia, Armenia and other places in the form of group settlement, including the Slavs in the north, the Turks in the east, the Egyptian Arabs in the south, the Latins, Saxons, the Franks in the west, and so on.

"These foreigners still retain their own local cultural customs and traditional habits, and when they encounter dissatisfaction, they do not turn to the government for help at the first time, but resort to force, and the struggle between camps can span dozens of miles, regardless of the hardships on the road and the persuasion of the government, it can be said that they have no scruples and act entirely according to their own will."

"They do not approve of the rule of the Empire, they have no confidence in the rule of the Empire, their leaders consider themselves to be objects that can be equal to us, only interests can drive them, they do not see themselves as having any obligations to us, even if they are also Orthodox, they do not care about the arrangements of the government, for reasons of faith, they may still listen to the words of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople and the monks of the monastery of Athos on the Holy Mountain, but once their vital interests are touched, they can immediately turn their faces, and there are good reasonsand they don't belong to us,"

"This group of people has a special status, it cannot be said that they are free people, but they are not slaves, and most of them are very resistant to their obligation to serve in the army, so that the problem of military resources has not been solved for a long time, and they are unwilling to pay taxes, and the tax collectors are often driven out, and the farther away from Constantinople, the more common this phenomenon becomes, and under their leadership, some families and villages that were willing to fulfill their obligations to the empire also began to resist the arrival of the imperial tax collectors, and the collection of local finances was maintained only by a few cities, The countryside has become almost a blank space,"

"Greedy and sexless, without principles, almost no one obeys the prohibitions of the empire, collects tolls privately, for the merchants of the past, layers of exploitation, every settlement passes, they have to be exploited once, the merchants complain, since the year of the battle of Constantinople, the merchants expect the new government formed by the new emperor to give them shelter, but the empire is often powerless, the traveling merchants are disappointed in this, but it is gratifying that due to our strengthening of the management of the city, the citizens have a high support for the empire, The city was now an important source of imperial finances,"

Calvo paused, picked up his teacup and moistened his throat,

"Here I would like to repeat the policy of the Empire, that the Empire must be based on a small-scale peasant economy, that it must stimulate the enthusiasm of the people in production, and that this situation is beginning to spread from Armenia to the Kerson Military District, from Asia Minor to Serbia and Bulgaria, and this is not something that can be formed overnight, nor can it be removed overnight, and this is probably the case, you can speak freely."

Rao is everyone was prepared, and they didn't expect that the situation had reached such a critical situation, the entire territory of the empire was almost full of "Diao people", to be honest, this is really a sign of the death of the country, thinking of this, everyone's worship of Constantine is undoubtedly stronger.

A short period of coldness, this does not mean that everyone and there is nothing to be done about it, but it needs to be considered.

"It's better to... Following the example of Emperor Heraclius, the military region system was comprehensively rebuilt, dividing the empire into dozens of military regions, and letting the generals of the military districts manage these foreign tribes, which made it easier to manage the foreign tribes. ”

This is the Minister of War Cesipe, a staunch supporter of the military district system.

"It's not impossible, the administrative units will be increased, the areas under the administration of each general will be greatly reduced, the pressure on the officials will not be great, and the army can be replenished, they are all believers in God, and if the ecumenical patriarch and the abbot of the monastery of Athos can speak, they will probably listen."

Admiral Hossepe agreed, though he knew it was only possible.

Foreigners may also be Orthodox Christians, compared to the emperor of Constantinople, the prestige of the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Orthodox Church and the Monastery of the Holy Mountain Athos is not limited to Constantinople, especially the Monastery of the Holy Mountain Athos, the Ecumenical Patriarch can also be said to be the emperor's tool of checks and balances, and the Monastery of the Holy Mountain Athos has a very high status in the minds of Orthodox Christians, but, again, people are loyal to the church, why do you people in Constantinople call me, I am not a Roman.

Some people died, but not completely......