Crusader Kings: Prisoners of War

The other party was indeed knowledgeable and pulled out this word from his mind: "I've heard that it seems to be a branch of the Germanic people. Many people migrated to the British Isles. Did you meet him on the island?"

"Yes, I met him on the British Isles. I have a few Germanic people under my command. You may have some impression of him. He is the leader of these Germanic people. You ascended the throne and I killed the Egyptian governor Antonius. This was inseparable from their help.

But one thing is one thing. They did something very sorry to you and the locals. After the coup, he said goodbye to me and went to adventure in the south."

Orville briefly talked about the glorious deeds of Astolfo and the adventurers. Cleopatra's expression was fine at first, but later she was a little embarrassed.

They went upstream along the Nile River. At first, they wanted to see the source of the Nile River, but because the Nile River was too long, they had to give up in the end. Even so, they successfully arrived at Aksum, which was the area of ​​the Kingdom of Ethiopia in the future, and met the people there.

After wandering around there for a few times, Astolfo led the team back, passing through the land of the Nubian Kingdom and returning to Egypt. They even got some "confidential information", such as the location of several gold mines in the Nubian Kingdom. So far, they have been quite successful.

But after returning to Egypt, they began to abstract. Apart from other things, they came to a group of tombs and actually started to dig graves and rob tombs. They even succeeded in robbing them. Astolfo returned to Alexandria with a lot of treasures.

After hearing this, Orville probably understood the seriousness of the matter - they were not robbing the tombs of ordinary rich people, but the famous Valley of the Kings in the future, where the tombs of many Egyptian pharaohs were located.

Although the Valley of the Kings has only reappeared in the vision of Europeans in modern times, it seems to have been developed into a kind of "tourist attraction" in the ancient Roman era. The evidence is that we can now find thousands of "visited here" inscriptions from that era in the Valley of the Kings: Greek, Latin, Phoenician, Aramaic, and Coptic.

At this time, only about one-third of the tombs discovered by the ancients in the Valley of the Kings were intact, and the rest had been visited by tomb robbers. Now there is one less tomb that Astolfo had visited.

Perhaps it was a problem caused by cultural barriers. Astolfo was still very happy and thought that he was exploring treasure hunting and was very successful. He planned to select a few of the best treasures for Orville first, and then send the rest back to his hometown for display. Orville was also very helpless about this idea. Things had already been done, so he could only admit his mistakes to Cleopatra first, and then discuss how to end this matter.

To be honest, tomb robbing has always existed in Egypt. The Valley of the Kings itself existed because the pharaohs were worried that their graves would be dug up, but unfortunately it did not play any substantial role.

When the dynasty existed, tomb robbers naturally did not dare to attack the tombs of the pharaohs, but after the change of dynasties, it was very common for the pharaohs of the previous dynasty to be dug up and exhumed. The Egyptians did more than the British, American, French and German countries in later generations.

Even when warlords were divided, one of the financial sources of some warlords was to dig the tombs of the pharaohs. When the kingdom was unified again, this phenomenon was generally curbed slightly, but when the ruling power of the dynasty declined, tomb robbing began to be rampant again. I am afraid that the locals have gotten used to it. Astolfo just took advantage of the lack of manpower in Ptolemaic Egypt.

In terms of right and wrong, it is definitely lack of virtue, but Astolfo is not the only one who lacks virtue. The main problem is that some people do not see this matter in this way.

In the eyes of some people, Astolfo is an outsider and a member of Orwell. His tomb robbing is equivalent to Orwell's tomb robbing, which is equivalent to Orwell coveting the wealth of the pharaohs and the gods. It may not be something that can be made into a fuss.

Egypt is not a powder keg that will explode at any time, but it is obviously flammable and explosive. The contradictions in this place have been quite sharp since ancient times, and there have been many uprisings and unrests.

Orville is afraid of this kind of thing now, and so is Cleopatra, so the two of them now need urgent "crisis public relations" to shut everyone up before someone makes a fuss and leave no handle.

After thinking about it, Cleopatra said: "You have come to discuss it with me, which obviously means that the matter cannot be concealed, so let's deal with it in a way that cannot be concealed. I will take out a part of the treasure from the treasury and sell it together with the pharaoh's treasure. The money from the sale will be used to help the Egyptian civilians. There is no point in pushing the matter to Astolfo. They will still point the spearhead at us, which will make things worse.

Say that the treasury is empty and there is no money for disaster relief, so we can only think of the treasure. I have some accounts of temples that owe taxes, and I will turn the tables and say that these temples do not pay taxes and hide people, causing tax difficulties. If the temples are more obedient, the matter will be over. If they make trouble, it is just right to deal with them, and the resistance should be much smaller."

To various degrees, this is a more appropriate disposal plan. Orville didn't point out any major problems anyway, so he nodded and agreed with the other party's idea.

"That's fine, and there's one more thing, Ivar has returned from the sea."

Cleopatra couldn't help but stand up after hearing this, with a little excitement in her eyes: "What's up?"

She also knew that the Indian Ocean trade was highly profitable, so of course she was very concerned about this matter. This was a profit that could really support the country's finances, so it was hard not to pay attention to it.

Ovel saw her excitement and scratched his head, saying, "Not a success. Only two ships came back, half of the crew were still alive, and Ivar himself was injured."

"How could that be? Isn't he a very good warrior? And he is familiar with the sea conditions, so he shouldn't run into a storm or run aground."

"The problem is not the ocean, people everywhere don't welcome them very much."

The Romans want to steal business, which is not a good sign, so both the Arabs near Yemen and the blacks in Aksum on the other side are quite repulsive to Ivar.

It was fine if there was only one warship before, but now it's a small caravan, they will definitely have crooked ideas.

Ivar is indeed worthy of his reputation for amazing military power. One man and one sword can completely kill a small fleet, but he can't withstand the frequent disturbances of pirates from all over the place. It was the result of his desperate efforts that he was able to come back, otherwise it is estimated that this fleet would have sunk into the sea.

Cleopatra fell silent after hearing this. This was indeed a big problem. The trade network had already been formed and was even basically complete. It was not easy for them to intervene. The cake was so small and no one liked to share the profits with others.