Since the Accounting: A Chronicle of the Roman Khanate

Chapter 722: Is the confrontation aimed at destroying the barbarian court, or forcing them to give a higher position?
Soon, Zhu Wenkui and others understood the basic management situation here.

To carry out administrative management, it is inevitable that there will be official documents to be passed around. Even if we don't consider issues such as keeping documents on file, we can't just call the county people to the government office to verbally inform them of everything. Therefore, at the very least, both sides must have people who can write and read.

For example, here, when something happens, the state government will be responsible for forwarding it, attaching a Bohemian translation to the Chinese document and sending it to the county government. After Brother Matt read the letter, he read it to the illiterate officers in the local dialect.

"I haven't seen you for a few years. Is this how you work now? But isn't this too troublesome?" Jessica was a little surprised.

"If I must say, this process requires two retellings, which is not only troublesome but also prone to errors. But in the current situation, it is the best choice." Brother Matt replied: "Also, the format of Chinese official documents is very fixed, and you can just use it when you use it. In fact, you don't need to have a high level of proficiency, and you don't even need to learn grammar knowledge. If it is simply used as a tool for recording official documents, it feels more suitable than Latin."

"I have been learning Chinese during this period. From the perspective of language mastery, I am still far from being able to 'learn Chinese', but I no longer need the help of an interpreter when I am working. If I were not so busy, I would have thought of going to Prague for further studies. It is said that there are special training institutions there that can teach you to learn Chinese systematically, which is more efficient..."

"It's so popular?" Jessica was a little surprised.

"After all, it is the official language of our Ming Dynasty. If you learn it well, you can really become an official. There must be many people who would be happy to do so. Moreover, the recent situation is rather special, as everyone knows. Many people will learn it for religious and cultural purposes even if they cannot use it for the time being." Brother Matt explained.

"What does this mean?" Zhu Wenkui asked.

"Many people here are dissatisfied with the church now." Brother Matt replied, "About a hundred years ago, some scholars began to use letters to spell the Bohemian language and form text. However, the church has always been dismissive of this, saying that these languages ​​and characters are not worthy of being in a high-class place. Especially clergymen should not use them casually."

"However, the government is not as hostile to local languages ​​as the church is. As long as the written documents are well organized, they generally don't care about anything else. Our local language is indeed not as old as the church, but the bishops cannot deny the sanctity of Chinese characters. Therefore, some people deliberately use Chinese characters to fight against the church's Latin. If they say they want to promote local languages, the church will use various means to obstruct them; if they say they want to learn Chinese, the church will be helpless."

"Now, in more developed places and larger towns, people are teaching these things. I heard that someone has compiled a phonetic manual to make it easier for everyone to read. More radical people are still advocating the use of Chinese scriptures to replace Latin scriptures, because they believe that Chinese characters are the most orthodox and reliable writing, and can perfectly reflect Brother Tian's teachings. It's a pity that our place is too remote, and this little knowledge is still temporarily learned from the people in the mansion."

"So that's how it is." Zhu Wenkui nodded.

The cultural level here does seem to be quite low. Therefore, management can only go to the county level for the time being, because below that, not to mention the ability to execute, there are no people who can even read, and it is impossible to manage at all...

"It seems that we still need to do more education." He thought for a moment and said, "You can also talk to the government and organize everyone to go for further studies. That's also possible."

"It was fine before, but it's probably not going to work this time." Brother Matt said, "We've had some bad times with the people of Prague recently. I heard that the nobles and merchants in the city are very angry. Although I'm not a member of the Hussite faction, I also work in the Ming Dynasty. I think it's better to avoid it."

"What's going on?" Zhu Wenkui asked hurriedly.

"The Hussites had a civil strife before." Brother Matt glanced at Jessica and said, "Don't you know yet?"

"It's a big mess here now, and we're still looking for people everywhere." Jessica spread his hands. "Father Prokop wrote me a short letter before, saying that there are many enemies at present, and Mount Tabor is not safe. But he will still try his best to spare some manpower and personally lead people to pick us up. But after that, our contact was cut off again. Now we are moving closer to that side and preparing to meet up with them. If you have any news, please inform us as soon as possible."

"We haven't heard any new news for a while." Brother Matt replied, "But a while ago, a merchant came here and said that there was an internal conflict in Prague. The nobles who originally sympathized with the Hussites and those on Mount Tabor had a quarrel over whether to declare war on Sigismund immediately."

"Well, they have conflicts to begin with. The nobles and wealthy citizens centered in Prague call themselves the 'Holy Grail Faction' and they don't get along well to begin with." Jessica shook her head helplessly: "In other words, if there wasn't a bigger common enemy at the moment, it would be strange if these two groups didn't fight. But don't worry, this is a daily occurrence and they have ways to deal with it."

"This time it's not ordinary, it's said to be much more serious than before. I think you should be careful." Brother Matt shook his head and reminded: "I heard that the two sides were just quarreling at first, but later, His Majesty the King of Wu sent someone to deliver an imperial edict, which was read out in public, publicly condemning those hesitant Bohemian nobles."

"Your Majesty said that now all places have taken action. Those with military capabilities have organized rebel forces, and those who cannot fight are also transporting supplies and food. Everyone is working so hard just to drive out the barbarian chieftains and recover the country. This kind of war is a just war to punish the barbarians and bandits. It can benefit everyone from top to bottom. It is also for this reason that people in various territories and strangers can come with food and drink to welcome the royal army." He thought for a moment and repeated it.

"However, at this critical moment, some people are still delaying. Loyal people should not wait and see, and wise people should not be unclear about which side to stand on at this time. These Bohemians have never seen the power of the royal army, so they are arrogant. They must face reality as soon as possible and understand the basic right and wrong, otherwise they will be crushed into dust together with the thieves when the heavenly soldiers arrive."

"There are some contents that I don't remember clearly - my Chinese is still not very good." Brother Matt scratched his head: "In short, he scolded those nobles and rich people, saying that their minds are easy to guess and they just want to please both sides. But this will definitely not have a good result. After he has dealt with Sigismund, he will come here to deal with the local princes and punish them for their rebellious behavior."

"I suspect he wanted to scare those people and force them to return to the Ming camp. But in the eyes of the Prague people, this was a naked threat. Considering that he was reducing the power of the vassal states every day, it actually forced those people to rebel. They are very angry now and cursed back -"

He hesitated for a moment, but still told Jessica truthfully: "Didn't you ask the court for money before and adopt a lot of orphans? Now they are using your Majesty's experience and these charitable works to make a fuss, calling him the king of beggars and orphans..."

Jessica opened her mouth, not knowing what to say. But Zhu Wenkui didn't react. He didn't seem surprised, and he didn't even get angry at the insults. "You'll get used to this kind of thing." He also comforted the others: "We were prepared to deal with a bad environment. Compared to what we thought at the time, the current situation is not that bad."

"This is still very troublesome." Jessica said with some worry: "If the Holy Grail Faction is enraged and leaves, or even becomes hostile to us, it means that we will lose most of our cavalry. Because the remaining brothers are generally too poor to receive much horsemanship training. If these people join the enemy, the situation will be even more dangerous. We must march quickly and establish contact with the Prokop brothers."

"Well... although it's not nice for me to say this, you are the one who has been in charge of the actual affairs of the palace during this period. If you come forward to talk to them and clear up the misunderstanding, there may be a chance of turning things around." He hesitated, but still said: "At least, it will buy us some time to organize everyone."

Zhu Wenkui thought about it and nodded.

They received the baggage, checked it, and invited Brother Matt and the guides to have something to eat. Zhu Wenkui didn't have any gifts, so he gave them a few bottles of Georgian wine that the Romans had given them when they set out, as a reward.

The following teams also caught up one after another. When they were about to set off, another team came. It turned out that Tang Sai'er was returning with his subordinates and just caught up. The timing was just right, Zhu Wenkui was very happy, and told them what he had just learned. Li Lilue was a little worried, but Tang Sai'er didn't care.

"Those who should disband should disband as soon as possible, which will be better for everyone. Forcing them to stay together will only make things uncomfortable." She said to everyone: "Those Prague people are from different factions. I think they are not reliable at all. If they surrender to the enemy, we will be more relaxed."

"Don't say that." Zhu Wenkui quickly stopped her: "We want to do big things, so of course the more allies we have, the better."

"You don't understand. We have completely different ideas from them. We are determined to fight the enemy, but they are always thinking about peace." Tang Sai'er disagreed: "They don't want to rebel at all, they just use rebellion as a tool to gain bargaining chips to compromise and negotiate with the old king. People like this will only ruin our big plan."

"I don't deny that many people in the Holy Grail sect do think this way. But our strength is limited. If we don't take advantage of our common interests and borrow their strength, it will be even more difficult to succeed." Jessica explained: "Everyone is aware of this, so you don't have to worry about anything. In the short term, we can still cooperate with each other."

"No, these two have no common interests at all. It's better to say that their interests lie in betraying us." Tang Sai'er was uncharacteristically firm and even a little excited: "We want to destroy the Barbarian Court and establish our own, a brand new world. And their goal is just to gain a higher position in the Barbarian Court. It seems that both sides want to fight the Barbarians, but the ultimate goals are completely opposite. If we succeed, they will fail."

"I'm being polite when I say they use the rebellion as a tool. We are just tools in their eyes. Do you really think they take the distant Seris and the King of Wu seriously?" She said bluntly, "I think they are using our lives to supplement their strength by insisting on this useless cooperation."

"And don't worry, those who only seek amnesty will not have a good end. They are too uneducated and don't know what they are doing. Even if they succeed in destroying us and gain a higher status through this, will King Alemanni let them go?" She shook her head and said, "The family interests they are obsessed with will soon be gone, because the Alemanni will kill them all sooner or later. What's the point of cooperating with dying people?"

Jessica was speechless for a moment, and Zhu Wenkui quickly reached out and pressed her shoulder: "Don't be so confident, as if you can be sure of everything. I have read a lot of history books since I was a child, and Commander Yang has lived here for decades. How can we not understand as well as you?"

"You haven't rebelled before." Tang Sai'er said unconvincingly, "I rebelled in Shandong when I was ten years old. Do you think you understand better than me?"

"I came here because I was unwilling to give up. I mixed with you because I wanted to pull you to rebel and create a new world." She raised her arm to open Zhu Wenkui's hand: "If you want to mix with this kind of people and seek a future, you should have talked to your fourth grandfather at the beginning - even if you accept the imperial edict, you have to find a good man to join. As for traveling thousands of miles to pay homage to this stupid King Xiji?"

"Okay, okay, I understand your determination." Zhu Wenkui had no choice but to comfort her again: "Let's not talk too much for now. Anyway, the information we have now is not enough to make any decisions. Let's figure out the situation first."

He told everyone to take the time to replenish their drinking water and eat some dry food. Then, he asked Tang Sai'er and others to take all the riders to the direction of the town as planned after resting, so as to make the Mongols behave themselves.

Jieshika and others thought that the situation was even more dangerous now, so there was no need to go there. It was nothing more than asking everyone to endure for a few more days. But Zhu Wenkui thought that since Tang Sai'er came back early, it was a good opportunity.

Moreover, just because the residents here have been enduring, it does not mean that he can calmly ask everyone to continue to endure. The common people turned to the court just to stop suffering. If the court still lets them maintain the status quo and continue to endure, then what is the court for? Can't people just endure it themselves?
So Tang Sai'er and the others turned southeast along the road and headed for the market town, while Zhu Wenkui led the remaining main force and continued to march northeast.

After walking for an hour, a scout returned hurriedly from the front and began waving flags and setting off smoke from a distance to signal a warning.

"What kind of enemy is this? Why did they appear so suddenly?" Zhu Wenkui was surprised.

"Uh, I don't know either..." Brother Matt was also at a loss.

However, the others reacted quickly. Jessica had already organized the troops quickly, deployed the troops, used the baggage carts as barriers, unloaded and loaded the firearms, and the soldiers immediately entered a state of war.

(End of this chapter)