The peasants in the central region of the Roman Empire watched all this in despair, but the officials who had long since enriched themselves would not pay any attention to these peasants.
After all, for these officials, farmers are just tools to make money. They have already taken advantage of the opportunity to make enough money. Naturally, it is impossible for them to take money and food out of their packages just for the life and death of a few farmers.
All this is bound to plunge the Roman Empire into a more unstable and violent situation. But this is just a small crisis caused by this earthquake.
In the larger towns with portal networks, those towns suddenly rose several meters high during the earthquake—
Most of the sturdy houses maintained their original shapes during the rise, but after the earthquake, all the townspeople were stunned to see several meters of height increase under the city wall.
Those were the remains of an ancient city. Many townspeople who had cleaned the sewers realized something and swarmed into the underground. They wanted to see if there were treasures in these suddenly rising ruins that could change their fate. However, they did not notice that the maintenance portal was flickering because of the earthquake and was obviously on the verge of collapse.
In another larger town, the height does not just rise a few meters, but it rises more than ten meters from the ground, which is even more terrifying.
This sudden height completely turned these important towns into isolated towers.
These towns will be isolated for a long time until the residents find a way to build a "bridge" or find the upper and lower exits of the city ruins under their buttocks.
Not to mention that the portal could not withstand such an impact and closed directly during the shaking - the townspeople looked at each other in bewilderment, but for those who had conspiracies, this meant an opportunity.
The members of the Restoration Party immediately contacted their accomplices through magic. The Night Witch, who was far away in the royal capital and also felt the earthquake, received their message, but because of her duties, she could not leave the little queen and the former court president.
She used magic to ensure that the two would not be harmed by the earthquake. Then she used magic to confirm the current situation of the capital. After discovering that the capital's geographical height had risen by more than one meter, she sighed subconsciously:
"What kind of earthquake would cause a city to rise one meter?!"
Later, based on information from her comrades, she realized that this was due to the impact of the nationwide "urban rise", and she also realized the ideas of the Restoration Party.
They planned to take advantage of the fact that most important cities were forced to be "isolated" or the portals were damaged, and launch a coup on January 15th.
But a coup d'état could not be carried out in the palace, so the Restorationists hoped that the Witch of Night would continue to lurk in the palace to provide assistance when they needed it most, and also to ensure that the little queen would not suffer any harm due to the subsequent chaos.
"We still need the queen." After leaving these words, the western rancher asked the wizard to disconnect the communication.
This made the Witch of Night feel very helpless, because she felt that taking the little queen directly out of the palace was the best option, but who made the Cash Back and Restoration Party need her to stay in the palace to provide help
(Let’s take it one step at a time.) The witch sighed, (But since the capital has also been hit by the earthquake, what about Cecilia?)
The witch was thinking about her friend, and what was happening in the diocese of St. Petersburg was far more shocking than the petty commotions in various parts of the Roman Empire.
It was a huge town that rose up from the ground with more than forty stories high.
The believers outside the city were all stunned, and then they prostrated themselves on the ground in ecstasy, praising the greatness of the God of Light.
They believed that this was the grace of the God of Light. The God of Light saw their piety and bestowed grace on them so that the City of Light could accommodate more people.
They believed that this was a signal from the God of Light to allow Saint Cecilia to be born. This was a great signal for the Saint to be born to save the suffering people everywhere in Rome!
But for the priests and bishops above the cathedral, the rise of the city did not bring them joy in any sense, but fear and panic.
"Hurry up! Hurry up! Before the Saint and the Ascetic Sister come over, quickly lock up all the luxury goods and rouge powder smearers along the way! Hurry up!"
Patriarch Peter moved his fat, round body like a ball and shouted everywhere. He frightened all the bishops and priests to move, because he knew that the ascetic nuns and the saints would definitely not be able to stand the luxury in St. Petersburg today.
If the saint could understand that churches use gold and silver decorations to show wealth and attract believers, if the saint could understand that the words on the holy book are more majestic when decorated with gold foil, if the saint could understand that the statue of the God of Light is forged with gold to show the greatness of God—
The saint absolutely could not understand those priests and nuns who did dirty things in public. She absolutely could not understand the brothels that appeared in the holy city, let alone the casinos and lounges in the holy city that served the bishops exclusively.
She could not understand why the bank in the parish would lend money at high interest rates that increased by 30% every month. She could not understand even more why the money of believers deposited in the parish would eventually become the wealth of the parish.
She would not understand why St. Petersburg would break away from the austere precepts, and she would definitely not understand the "corpse rebirth magic" that the Church of Light is currently developing.
If the saint were aware of these problems, she would dare to order the nuns to cleanse the entire diocese!
Patriarch Peter could not stand such humiliation, but he did not have the confidence to fight against both the ascetic nun and the saint at the same time.
Not to mention, if a fight really breaks out, the diocese will also turn from a treasure trove into a battlefield where money is burned! Compared to this ending, Patriarch Peter would rather try every possible way to confuse the sight of the saint and the ascetic nun.
Therefore, he decided to order everyone to clean up everything that could be done from the original first platform upwards before the Saint climbed to the top of the tower!
The bishops and priests were particularly efficient in their actions when their lives were at stake.
They forced all priests who were wearing gold and silver jewelry to return to their churches and dress in a simple manner. They also arrested prostitutes who were still walking on the streets disguised as believers.
They tried every possible means, even resorting to divine powers, to make the city look simpler rather than more luxurious. These divine powers even made believers other than St. Peter believe that it was another divine blessing, making them even more pious and bowing their heads even more.
But everything they did could not catch up with the speed of the saint ascending in the elevator.
This was the first time that Patriarch Peter hated how sturdy the elevator system of this ancient city was.
He watched the indicator on the elevator go up all the way, and finally watched the elevator indicator stop at the original floor.
Saint Cecilia, finally forced to break her vows after the city's rise, once again ascended to St. Petersburg with the Ascetic nuns.
She was still dressed as a nun, holding a holy book in one hand and a cross in the other. Behind her were dozens of nuns, who were strong believers in the commandments.
Each of them is a weakened saint, and the saint can release terrifying divine arts without believers. In other words, each of the ascetics is a strong clergyman who can fight alone.
And now, including the ascetic nun and Saint Cecilia, they are all puzzled by one question: What exactly happened in St. Petersburg
They did not think this was the so-called "divine grace" because they could clearly hear the creaking sound of the gears turning rapidly while living deep underground.
They thought it was man-made, and the first suspect was naturally Pope Peter who lived on the top of the tower.
They believed that this might be the decision made by Patriarch Peter to force Saint Cecilia to be born.
After all, Saint Cecilia's vow to live underground must be observed underground. And now, because of the objective physical "ascension", Cecilia has broken the commandment.
She was so angry about this that she had to ask Patriarch Peter for clarification - but the moment she came to the surface with this thought in mind, the rouge and various pungent dusts that had not yet dissipated entered their noses.
"What is this? Who allowed those prostitutes to bring rouge into the Holy City?!" The Saint was furious and loudly denounced the mess in front of her: "We allowed those poor women to enter the Holy City in the hope that they could confess their sins in the church and atone for what they have done -
But we did not allow those women to continue to enter the Holy City as prostitutes to seduce believers for pleasure!
You! Stop it now! Stop pretending to be those disgusting things! Tell me, who allowed them to enter the holy city? ! "
Saint Cecilia directly cast her magic. Without any believers gathering divine power for her, her magic made all the priests and deacons on this floor stop all their actions.
They looked in horror at the enraged saint, as well as the crosses and iron whips on the backs of the ascetic nuns.
They trembled all over, and finally, under the angry glare of the saint, in front of a carriage, a greasy priest who had just changed into a patched priest's uniform could not bear the mental pressure and collapsed:
"It was Patriarch Peter who ordered us to do this. It was Patriarch Peter!"
The ascetic nuns passed by the priests and deacons with expressionless faces. They easily opened the carriage, and what appeared before the saint were some beautiful women who were captured and used as prostitutes for the bishops to use at will.
The saint was stunned. She thought it was just a prostitute.
The priests trembled even more frequently because this was the "garbage" that a certain high-ranking bishop ordered them to clean up. After all, the Saint would definitely investigate the lifestyle of the bishops after she was born. Instead of letting the Saint discover the traces of these poor women, it would be better to take advantage of the rising of the city to throw them out directly from a height, and smash them to pieces under the excuse of "accidentally falling on the way up", thus saving the effort of covering up the crime.
But as luck would have it, no one expected the saint to act so quickly.
No one expected that this carriage could not escape the saint's sharp eyes.
Now, these poor women who were wantonly abused to vent their animal desires were suddenly and completely exposed in front of everyone, and it couldn't even be explained by the name of "prostitutes"!
Everyone could see blood dripping from Saint Cecilia's right hand as she clutched the cross.
She angrily summoned the Spear of Light and nailed the priest and deacon who were escorting the carriage to the ground. She rushed forward and rescued those poor people together with the ascetic nuns.
"Poor girls, tell me, who on earth made you suffer such an insult?!"
There is no healing system in the magic of the Church of Light, and Saint Cecilia can only hope that these girls still have the strength to speak.
As she expected, a girl who was the least tortured cried out the names of dozens of bishops, and these dozens of bishops were all the people on the list of the Bishops' Council.
Saint Cecilia was incredulous: What on earth had happened here during the time she had been practicing asceticism underground
What has the Holy City become? Why did the former bishops succumb to desire
She couldn't understand.
After ordering two ascetic nuns to protect the girls and take them back to the underground where they were originally for treatment, she angrily walked towards the elevator leading to the top of the tower.
She wanted to get to the bottom of it. She wanted to judge these sinful people who had lost their faith in the name of the God of Light.
That was three days after Saint Cecilia went to the top of St. Peter's Basilica.
Accompanied by the personal visit of the God of Light.
On January 4th.
The diocese was split. The Protestants and the Catholics fought each other under the grace of the God of Light. Their leaders were Saint Cecilia and Patriarch Peter. At this moment, the two sides no longer had the friendship between fellow believers, but only the anger to crush and kill each other.
On the same day, a large number of peasant rebellions broke out in various parts of the central region. They occupied the main roads leading to the capital with various slogans, completely surrounded the isolated cities, and fought with each other for the little food and supplies left.
As the portal in the royal capital could be used normally, but the portals in other places were paralyzed and almost unusable, Prince Gasson did not dare to send Knight Robert and the rest of the army out of the royal capital.
He ordered the knights to defend the capital, and asked all the powerful warriors to guard the square in front of the portal. He also sent an urgent letter to Arese's messenger, hoping that Arese's "reinforcements" could help them eliminate a few rebels on the way to the royal capital, so that Prince Gasson could send out the knights to eliminate the remaining traitors with peace of mind.
Faced with Prince Gasson's request, Arese's messenger could only nod reluctantly: This is really unexpected.
In less than four days, the Roman Empire had changed completely. But these changes had little to do with the culprit that caused this series of unexpected events.
In Constantinople, the capital of the new Byzantine Empire, Yang Hao is having a headache over the development of Byzantine Empire.
For no other reason…
Just because he seemed to be short of money.
Chapter 1: We are broke! But we have Kingsoft 8K
January 4th, 006 of the Imperial Calendar.
Yang Hao, he's probably out of money.
Constantinople of the Byzantine Empire, in the Purple Palace, in the office of Basilisa—
Theresa, who has become Bartholomew, is concentrating on studying the political art of Bayerjans, striving to become a qualified queen as soon as possible.
Yang Hao assisted Theresa in this small office, helping her handle all the important matters that needed to be dealt with by the new Bayer Janssen.
Finn and the elves have gone back, and the half-elves who are willing to stay here have also begun to rebuild their homes together with the people of Bayerjans.
They taught the Baierjans people, who had lived underground for too long, farming techniques and how to clear the vegetation on the ground to cultivate their own living areas.
With the aid of the elves, it would not be a problem for Bayerjans to survive until the end of this year.
But the crucial farming work still had to be prepared in advance, and the planning of arable land still had to be carried out in advance, not to mention that after Constantinople rose, there were many useful forests around that needed to be cut down, and the stones and loose soil on them needed to be cleared, and materials needed to be searched everywhere to meet the needs of urban reconstruction.
But these are not the main points. With the cheerful efforts of the Bayerjans, these tasks that only require effort are progressing very smoothly. Not to mention that the patients who were corrupted have already recovered with the help of the elves.
All people, regardless of gender, age or status, are working hard for the development of the motherland. However, Yang Hao is concerned that the Bayer Jans Empire has been in a "rationing system" for too long, so that they can no longer see any trace of "currency trading"...
In other words, there is no business in Bayer Zans now. No business means that the treasury is extremely empty. An empty treasury means that it will be extremely difficult for Bayer Zans to keep up with the times.
To this end, in addition to focusing on developing basic agriculture and improving the lives of the Bayerjans, which have been dry for thousands of years, Yang Hao also needs to establish the foundation of business in advance.
He promoted two adjutants from Bayerjans.
One is a male noble known as "Mysophobia", whose real name is Barry. He is a clerical talent who is not only very sensitive to words and numbers, but also has a smart and changeable mindset.
Another female noble known as "Poltergeist", whose real name is Kate -
She seems to be Barry's girlfriend. She is a strong officer, but her arm was seriously injured in the previous war.
Although the hand was rescued by the elves, after the extremely brutal war, many people no longer had the intention to continue fighting in the short term.
This is the case with Kate. She chose to give up her military career and become a clerk. Yang Hao just happened to pair them up.
With the help of the two, and combining the various information and budgets provided by the elder nobles, Yang Hao finally came to a conclusion.
He has no money.
"After all, the wealth that we robbed from the Demon City belongs to Caparia, and I am embarrassed to ask Finn directly for it... Besides, Theresa, you know, if the "wealth" is just piled up there, it will be meaningless!
I need that money to start circulating and rebuild a stable economy. I need our "currency" to have actual purchasing value. More importantly, only a circulating economy can create wealth for Bayer Zhans and give Bayer Zhans a boost in development...
But now we have no money at all!"
Bayer's "budget" actually refers to "labor force and population", "usable weapons", and [resources that can be made into weapons or eaten].
Their budget is not the "budget related to money" that Yang Hao remembers in his mind...
Even if Yang Hao wanted Bayer Zhans to have gold or silver coins, Bayer Zhans' treasury does not have those things at all...
Why do you say that? Because gold and silver coins were useless to the demons during the underground war!
Therefore, during hundreds of years of bloody battles, the Bayerjans gradually threw away gold and silver that were of no use at all in order to expand the space for storing food and resources. As a result, they are now penniless.
Although it is not impossible to mine the gold and silver again from the remaining elevator, to be honest, Yang Hao is really tired of being in the current situation where he has no money at all.
What's more, if these gold, silver and jewelry were just piled up in the national treasury, they would be meaningless.
The most important thing about gold and silver when they become "currency" is national credit and circulation...
Strictly speaking, what Yang Hao needs is not only various kinds of gold, but more importantly, the circulation between commodities!