Crusader Kings: Prisoners of War.

Chapter 66 Wealth
The city of Rome is indeed short of money now, but at the same time it does need such activities.

Rome has fought many wars in the past two years, with many casualties in both civil and foreign wars. The casualties in the Palphic War alone exceeded 10,000. Even though a large number of Roman allies and slaves were not formally included, the rest of the people still needed to be appeased and dealt with.

This new auction method was proposed for the first time, but everyone thought it was a good method. The rich felt that the donation experience was better, the poor paid more attention, and the auctioneer or someone else could also benefit. In short, no one was dissatisfied.

Rome has always had a tradition of public welfare. The rich would fund the construction of public facilities or roads, and then name them after themselves or their families. Although this kind of public welfare was more limited to the city of Rome and other groups such as citizens, it made Orville's idea more acceptable.

Orville personally hosted the auction, and Tia herself came to support it, and all these measures made the auction a great success. He was not blinded by the interests and claimed that this event was hosted by the royal family. Orville participated as an individual, and Tia participated as a general of the soldiers.

But even this is enough. Orville is selling the spoils obtained in the Palphi War. Both of them are commanders who have made military achievements in the war. This gimmick is very good and has great publicity properties.

Tia was a general who had just held a triumphal ceremony, which was the highest achievement in the life of a Roman general. Vespa even held a grand ceremony for several days. Tia also had the attributes of a female general, a talented person, and a royal family. Basically all Romans knew this young general.

If there was one unexpected thing, it was that Tia definitely didn't understand what Orville meant. She thought the whole point was to raise funds for the soldiers, so she bought a lot of things at high prices out of her own pocket.

Apart from that, everything went smoothly. Orville made money, Tia gained further prestige and a reputation for caring about the people, and the financial problems of the Roman treasury were barely alleviated a little.

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The funds were raised through the auction, and Orville continued his plan shortly thereafter.

He has now seen that the victory has just been won and the whole country is working hard to publicize this matter to stabilize the situation, so he has made arrangements around this matter.

About half a month later, the war history "The Palphic War" compiled by the personal staff of the triumphant general Tia Flavia Vespasia was officially published. As the people's enthusiasm for this war had not faded, they were naturally very curious. Orville also catered to their interests and invited several people to give lectures in the square on time. More and more people came to listen to the lectures every day.

Before printing and papermaking technology made great progress, Orville didn't want to get involved in the publishing industry. He was biting off more than he could chew. Now was not the time to introduce revolutionary new technology. He was not capable of taking on such a big task as promoting new technology, which would only benefit others.

Therefore, after obtaining Tia's permission, he handed over the publishing business of "The Parphelic War" to a publisher with good business in Rome, in exchange for a fairly good one-time payment and long-term dividends.

You can't make much money from publishing a book these days. It's mainly about gaining fame, firstly for himself as the author, and secondly for Tiya as the general.

Orwell did not write this war diary entirely according to later academic standards, but instead asked Procopius to add a lot of things. Overall, it is still fair, objective and detailed, but it is more narrative and readable, making it more convenient for publicity activities and book lectures.

The whole book focuses on the siege of the Holy City. Therefore, under Orwell's deliberate design, the protagonist of the war naturally became Tia. He intentionally or unintentionally changed the main plot of the whole book to this: the upright, brave and kind General Tia defeated the many partisans entrenched in the Holy City through a series of efforts. The plot of the Roman army burning, killing and looting was slightly weakened, and the focus was on depicting the loss of morality and indifference of the partisans, giving the war a kind of "correctness" that the Romans looked like. His book was for the citizens of Rome, so he naturally knew how to write it, but he still had a bottom line, and did not miss anything that should be there, so that future generations can understand the full picture of the war through it, which is concise and clear.

He was not a person who pursued fame and fortune. In his opinion, his current life was good enough. If he had the opportunity in the future, he would be better off arranging a few more lucrative and leisurely jobs for himself. It would be good to live a comfortable life like this. He was now a royal relative, and as long as the Flavian family did not fall, he would be able to live comfortably forever.

Therefore, his goal has always been to keep what he already has. The Senate will be in opposition to Tia in the future, and Orville is using his own methods to avoid this situation. As long as Tia's prestige is great enough to influence the opinions of most people in the Senate, then the opposition will not happen.

Even if a fierce war is inevitable in the future, it is good to have a solid public opinion base. The influence of the Roman people on politics is very large, so large that it cannot be ignored.

Orville waited for a while, having people promote the property until Vespa's promised property was in place.

It took only a month or two, so it was definitely not a new house that was built by buying land temporarily. According to Vespa himself, this was the property he confiscated from corrupt officials during his sting operation, and now he was making full use of it.

After everything was in place, Tia found a time to give a speech to the veterans in the square.

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There were many people watching in the square. One reason was that there were many idle veterans in Rome. The other reason was that many of these veterans retired after the Palphi War. Tia was their old leader and had great prestige in the army. Many people came to listen to Tia's speech.

Tia stood in a corner of the square, surrounded by people. In order to make her voice heard further, Tia had to use her talent.

"Citizens, soldiers, I think many of you have encountered this situation. After a long war, you returned to your hometown and found that there was no place for you in Rome. Lack of professional skills, too old, bad temper, or simply fear of soldiers, etc., there are always reasons to exclude you, and there are always people who reject you.

Do you not want to reintegrate into society? Are you resistant to work? I think that good Roman soldiers would not have such thoughts. Someone has shut you out and made you lose the opportunity to work. Without a stable and normal job, you are outsiders of society. If you are not careful, you will slide into the abyss. I think some of you are suffering from this, and some of you have seen the harm of this kind of thing. "

Many retired soldiers present began to nod in agreement. They felt lost in the idle life after leaving the army. They could not find suitable jobs and were unwilling to leave the prosperous city of Rome. Many of them developed bad habits of overeating, alcoholism or gambling, and as a result, they spent all their retirement benefits and completely became poor vagrants at the bottom of the society. They lived in poverty and could only survive on relief food. Some were even worse off, and they did not want to be like this.

"I believe that moral loss and corruption are the ultimate enemies of mankind. In order to resist these enemies, we need labor and virtue. Now, soldiers, I am willing to offer you a chance to start over and reintegrate into society."

(End of this chapter)