Since the Accounting: A Chronicle of the Roman Khanate

Chapter 699: King Wu is convinced of Alemanni's weakness
After the news came that Baisai Khan would personally attend the meeting, everyone hurriedly began to urgently clean up the city of Cherkasy. Not only the residents of the city, but also those who came to attend the meeting were organized to help. Officer Yang, Father Alexander and others also had to help set up the ceremony venue after the meeting, and they were very busy for a while.

There was originally a meeting place in the city. Although in the eyes of the Romans, this place was a bandit’s den because of its remote location, but there are also big and small bandit dens.

Cherkasy is located on the Dnieper River, next to a good port, and has a very advantageous geographical environment. Ordinary bandits can only come here to sell stolen goods once in a while. Those who can occupy a piece of territory in the town must be big bandits.

Bandits like to call themselves "free men". In the gang, they often promote the idea that everyone is a brother and everyone has power over gang affairs, so as to call on everyone to pay attention to gang affairs. Because the social organization of this land is too backward and there are many remnants of primitive tribal customs, sometimes some formal equal rights can be guaranteed.

But it is obvious that as long as the gang develops, there will also be different levels within it. There will always be some bandits who are more equal than other bandits. These bandit leaders are the ones who hold the power of the gang.

However, because the organization is loose, it is difficult for one person to dominate the market, so there is a need for negotiation.

Just like they need to show an attitude of equality and justice internally, when dealing with the outside world, the big bandit leaders also need to show that they are willing to communicate and advocate democracy. After all, when the gang grows bigger, they need some "respectability". Many things still need to be resolved through negotiations and meetings, and they can't resort to knife fights every day - after all, everyone still has to live. And Cherkasy, as the local central city, naturally became the most suitable place to discuss things.

This platform for dialogue is called "Soviet" in the local language.

In this land, most political words are too advanced and are loanwords. However, "Soviet" is a rare, native Slavic word.

It comes from the Proto-Slavic word for "speaking, reaching an agreement", and may be a long-standing local organizational method. In the 9th century, the Cyril brothers formalized the Proto-Slavic language and formed a system called "Old Church Slavonic". This was the first written Slavic language in history, and at this time, people had already begun to call the local parliament "Soviet". This term and the corresponding organization have also been used for a long time in the Russian Church, and with the expansion of the church organization, it has been learned by more people and has continued to later generations.

In Cherkasy, there was also such a meeting. The big bandits would meet regularly to discuss things, just like the boyars in the city. For this purpose, they also built a spacious building as a meeting place. Apart from the Venetian slave pens, this place should be the largest building in the city.

However, this place has completely changed now.

A few months ago, a Roman auxiliary army arrived here. Most of them were immigrants recruited by the Khanate from the Alemanni region. They were called an army, but in fact they were more like a group of refugees, filled with landless farmers, unemployed craftsmen, and even frustrated nobles. They came here because they received the court's promise to distribute land and tools, hoping to open up a new world in this remote place.

No matter how you look at it, these people don't look like a proper army. However, their fighting spirit is very tenacious - after all, they are all here to gamble their lives for a living, and now that they have come here, there is actually no way out.

On the other hand, after hundreds of years of development, the Alemanni region is now facing a situation of too many people and too little land. And because of the chaotic management, many places lack the power to maintain order, and villagers and citizens have to use force to protect themselves, so they are quite tough. In addition, there is a tradition of being a mercenary in the local area. From the children of small nobles who have no inheritance rights to farmers who fight for others to earn extra money during the slack season, they all have some military experience. In this refugee group, there are quite a few old mercenaries.

Although overall they can only be considered a group of rabble, their combat effectiveness is still much higher than that of the Slavic bandits who are also a rabble.

Like all Russian cities of the time, Cherkasy had no defenses at all, just a wooden fence at best. With the support of the engineers provided by the legion, the auxiliary soldiers took only two days to attack the city. The bandits in the city either surrendered or were wiped out. Those who managed to break through also fled in a hurry and dared not come back anyway.

After the occupation, the local Soviet was abolished by the Alemanni, and most of the bandit representatives were tried and executed. However, there were still some who had a particularly good relationship with Italian merchants and were redeemed by them at a high price.

The merchants were always stingy, and everyone was curious about this. The representatives of the Chamber of Commerce explained to them that these people were good slave traders and overseers, especially good at dealing with Slavs.

The elders have always valued talent, and Venice is now actively expanding its business to fill the vacant slave market after the Romans gradually withdrew due to policy adjustments, so they are in need of this kind of talent. It would be better to hire him quickly.

After that, the city began to transform. Most of the dilapidated buildings were demolished and awaiting replanning. However, the venue was built by professional craftsmen hired by the bandits from Kiev, and it would be a waste to demolish it. Therefore, it continued to be used as a conference hall.

In order to welcome Baisai Khan, the place was specially renovated. After a discussion, everyone decided to clean up the messy decorations left by the bandits and rearrange them. Now, the walls are covered with black and red "Qin" flags, which are the favorite of the Romans. In the center, a group of axes and wooden sticks are specially hung as a symbol. It looks much more formal.

After arranging the venue and the church next to it, Father Alexander and his men hurried out of the city with their men to help build the road. Originally, there was a dirt road extending southward along the river. However, like most places in the land of Ross, this was simply a path gradually formed by the large number of people coming and going, and there was not even a strict road surface. Although there were frequent caravans coming and going, the city had never thought of tidying up the road. It was fine in the winter before, but now after the beginning of spring, the road has gradually become muddy and inconvenient to use.

Therefore, all the idle people in the city, under the command of the army, went out in full force to repair the road in preparation for the inspection of Baisai Khan. People from the church, from the bishop down, also went to the construction site to help, and they had to speed up the progress.

However, on the second day, he encountered an unexpected situation.

In order to show his respect and help with management, Baisai Khan often led his men to conduct armed inspections in areas where his control was not yet strong. A large proportion of them came to the Russian region. At such times, the surrounding Russian countries would also send delegations to pay homage to the garrison - this was also a long-standing rule in this land.

The inspection plan had been set before. However, due to the recent changes in the situation, the Khan temporarily added a lot of itineraries and planned to visit more distant places. Therefore, after the news was conveyed, not only the people from the legions here, but also representatives from various principalities rushed to the city.

While Father Alexander and his companions were working, a delegation passed by with a convoy carrying baggage and family members. A noble lady from one of the families happened to know him before. She saw that the group of people were covered in dust and digging in the mud, so she stopped.

The priest came forward to say a few words and wanted to ask them to take a detour. But the noble lady began to laugh at him, saying that he should have listened to the advice and taken the opportunity of further study to find a job in Kiev. Now, after so many years, he is still doing hard labor with a group of mud legs. The other nobles in the delegation also laughed.

Father Alexander disagreed with this and just replied that everyone's way of looking at problems, and even the concept of honor and shame, is completely different. In his view, doing labor is a way to get close to the Heavenly Father. Even Brother Tian has done it himself before, so it is obviously not a lowly job.

But since they had different understandings, there was no need to force them to convince each other, let alone attack each other. Therefore, he did not get angry afterwards. When the people around him asked him what happened, he just described it once and continued to work.

Obviously, in his opinion, this situation no longer needed to be explained, nor was it worth getting anxious about. However, he could take it lightly and persuade other priests not to get too excited. But others might not be able to accept it calmly.

There were also many legion engineers working with them. When they heard this, they immediately became unhappy.

For the legion, construction and road building are one of the most important achievements after combat. Attacking road builders is not just a matter of despising labor, but a denial of their military merit system. If road builders are lowly mud-legged peasants, then wouldn't the entire legion be pariahs? If they can tolerate such talk, what else can't they tolerate?
The soldiers were not the type to be bullied, and they immediately started to make a fuss. They took their tools and overturned the carriage, dragged out the entire team, and beat them up. The legion sent officials to inquire about the situation, but they did not reprimand them, but just asked them not to delay the progress of the project, and then they went back.

Afterwards, no one dared to cause trouble here anymore.

But after the road was repaired, Baisai Khan did not come. They waited for another week before receiving new news.

The imperial court sent an envoy to tell everyone that the emperor's journey was delayed because of a major incident in the west. However, after discussion, the imperial court decided to complete the routine inspection.

Everyone was very curious about what could have delayed the matter for so long. The priest and his companions found out through Sergeant Yang that something had happened in the Alemanni—the King of Wu, who had a good relationship with the Romans, had launched an attack on the Alemanni Kingdom.

"I have never heard of this Wu Kingdom." Father Alexander asked curiously, "Who is stronger, him or Alemanni?"

"They should be stronger now." Sergeant Yang said, "My comrades told me that the King of Wu launched the war with great momentum this time, and he was almost certain to win. He sent us a letter to inform us before, but we were not ready yet, and he started it."

"Is it so urgent?" The priest asked worriedly.

"It's okay. He specifically said later that there is no problem. It's enough for us not to help. Besides, he is from the Ming Dynasty." Sergeant Yang was full of confidence: "If we didn't have this confidence, we wouldn't have started the war in advance."

(End of this chapter)