The successive lands outside the city were originally the concentration of the Roma royal estate, which Gawain felt was clearly superior to the Komnenian emperor: in Seleucia, it is said that the same was also in Konya, that is, the royal estate, which occupied a very important share of the local area, and also dominated in fertility, and the income generated was used to pay the salaries of the army and the state, while the Iqta fiefdoms of the various Gazi were concentrated in the border areas. Even so, these Iqta fiefdoms had no hereditary powers: when the Gazi warrior was killed or died in battle, most or all of his fiefdoms were reclaimed by the Sultan's court according to the law of succession, and soon passed to another warrior willing to fight for the Sultan by paper as a reward for motivating him to kill his enemies.

But now many of the Brotherhoods, dressed in red-handed sword robes, are armed and constantly driving away the local peasants who are trying to usurp the fields by means of chaos, and they are also enclosing them with wooden poles and fences, and ordering the former tenant farmers not to flee at will, but to continue farming for their new masters.

Seeing this scene, Gawain understood that he and Anna had replaced the original emirs and beys, and concentrated these lands in their own hands in the name of the sacred estates, which were not only in the suburbs of Seleucia, but also around the various military towns, which was why he split the various detachments in the division and went to garrison and inventory.

In short, he and Anna are now the "most powerful landlords and landlords' wives" in the land.

The suburban farms, with their mills, barns, garages, stables, etc., are conspicuously well equipped, and the tenant farmers live in rows of rudimentary huts separated by roads or ponds. Apart from the main wooden beams, only a few clay pots and cart plates remain on the edges. On both sides of the road, a few trees are planted. But it was not large-scale, and the fields were dominated by barley, wheat, and peas, mixed with vegetable gardens and gardens for the enjoyment of the Turkic Beys, as well as a large number of pastures, because the Turkic and Greek nobles were fond of war horses and oxen ploughing, and there were many implements and workshops around the walls of Seleucia.

I followed the road that passed through it for about three guri. Anna and Agnes' corsets and blouses were also soaked with sweat, and in such weather, they lost their original "interest in playing" and no longer chatted and laughed, only Stareucajos was still replenishing the ice cubes for Her Royal Highness to quench her thirst and cool off, and Agnes's servants next to her were holding their umbrellas high to provide shade and shelter for everyone.

The red canopy drifted away and soon arrived at the Akum Bazaar. Gawain was familiar with this seaside bazaar when he was in Bari, but it was not as large and imposing as Bari's trade bazaar with its Romanesque cloisters, which centred on a large double-storey roofed Basilica building. The waterfront was adjacent to the waterfront where ships could be moored, and the surrounding open space was erected with tall wooden stakes that set up tents during trade. or inscribe the price of the goods for the merchant to peddle under them. The ground floor of the two-storey building provided a place to store goods, and the upper floors were once the offices of the tax collectors and inspectors of the Imperial Market - but now they exist in name only. Originally, the three trade days a year were discontinued, because the Turks were not keen on sea trade, and when they occupied the area, the merchant ships of the surrounding islands were not willing to come here, so the bazaar was abandoned, and the trading base was moved to the northern river valley, with the Arakhan Monastery as the core.

"There aren't many people here, just some fishermen." As she stopped on the seashore, Anna wondered as she looked at the desolation as far as her eye could see, and at the huge, lonely trading station.

"Yes, it has been abandoned for a long time, and many of the empire's rich and thriving military towns and cities were originally able to provide trading locations and technical support for the surrounding villages, but now due to the invasion of the Turks and your father's exhaustion of the fishing taxes, they are all deserted." Gawain was also a little sentimental, looking at the remnants of the ruins of the colonnades of the Archaic era (which once carried the pride and glory of the Roman Empire) on the hills.

"Isn't it normal for the state to levy taxes? Without taxes, you can't afford to raise an army, and without an army the country will perish. Anna was dissatisfied with Gawain's accusations and protested.

"Then princess, come with me to the village commune north of the Akoum market." Gawain had also been prepared for Anna's confusion and made this suggestion, and it was also a necessary part of their inspection.

At the hottest time of the day, the whole party came to a country commune, and when the shoulder stopped at a moment, Anna and Agnes were silent, and the scene before them was something they had never seen before, two young girls, one born in the purple dormitory, the other in the famous manor of the island of Respos, even after seeing Agnes in the countryside. It was only within the walls and beautiful arches of her family that Prani watched the Phrygian and Paphragonian geldings, nicknamed "little grandsons" by her grandfather, running around, carrying the deeds of the family's land to the storeroom, or transporting the surplus of the manor's harvest into a cart in exchange for a large amount of money and ornaments from the merchants.

Plani's manor, which was a small palace, but "in the countryside", was later seen by Agnes to the valley of Springs, on the edge of the imperial capital, to see the vendors in the Snake Pillar Square, the fishermen in the fishing village, the hunters selling furs, but this real village of Asia Minor, she did, like Anna, for the first time.

Xiao Suo's huts, in the shape of concentric circles, faced the open and barren sandy land in the center, on which a few feathered and emaciated poultry were pacing, drinking the murky depression water, the fence was crooked, the stables were empty, there were no cows, no mules and horses in them, and behind the huts, there seemed to be small fields artificially divided, but most of them were covered with wild grass, and behind the collapsed earthen walls, there were scattered poplars, and a dirty long-haired pig was gnawing on the leaves above, The fields in the distance also looked completely ruined, the shelves in the vineyards were crooked, and a few gray people in rags and rags like cattle were lying half-dead in every corner.

"This is the village under the reign of Emperor Komnenos, or the Sultan of Konya." Gawain immediately said to Anna on his shoulder.

"Maybe the village has been abandoned," Anna naively argued.

"No, Anna, Agnes, eighty percent of the village communes in Anatolia are the same, and two percent are worse than that. Now there are only two options left, either we revive Seleucia to save this twilight, or we can leave it in ruins, as long as we can extract the tax money, drain the last drop of oil and water from the bones of these peasants, let everyone die miserably, and wait for the future generations to come and change the seeds! Gawain's tone, like the scorching heat, made Anna's forehead dripp with sweat. (To be continued.) )