Chapter 375 Kingdom Assembly During the War (2)

Cornelus was old, his voice was not loud, and even trembled a little. It was impossible for the people at the back of the venue to hear him clearly, but in front of him there were several speakers who repeated his words in loud voices.

At this time, he took out a papyrus scroll from his arms, unfolded it carefully, coughed lightly, and then began to recite: "Dear elders of the Dionysian Kingdom! All the towns and cities of the Dionysian Kingdom. Deputies of Parliament! I am not able to attend the meeting of the Kingdom Assembly, for which I express my deepest apologies! We did not start this war with Carthage, Rome, Samonay, but we did We have to fight, because it is related to the life and death of the Kingdom of Dionia, and it is related to the fundamental interests of each of our citizens!

Up to now, this war has been going on for a year. During this year, our soldiers fought bloody battles on the front line, while you in the rear worked hard to maintain the stability of the domestic order and worked tirelessly to prepare for the war. With a lot of materials, we were able to defeat Rome and Samone one after another, which is inseparable from your painstaking efforts!

Some time ago, our Sicilian Fleet and the Third Fleet almost wiped out the Carthaginian fleet, and just yesterday when I wrote, our land army severely damaged the Carthaginian army of 100,000 at Serinus, Captured Marco, the military commander of Carthage—"

When Cornelus read this, he deliberately paused, and as he expected, thunderous cheers erupted in the venue in an instant.

"Great! Another big victory!"

"Win! Win! We won this war!"

"We have won Carthage! We have become the new overlord of the Western Mediterranean!!"

...

People danced and hugged each other, and their joy was beyond words. You must know that Carthage has dominated the Western Mediterranean for many years. Most of the people present, including the elders, did not have much confidence in this war. The results surprised them.

At this time, even the order officials in charge of the order of the venue smiled, and did not immediately stop the commotion in the venue. After a while, they asked for silence again.

Cornelus continued to read: "...We defeated the Carthaginian navy, and now the Carthaginian army, the Carthaginians have basically lost the ability to fight our Dionia. , so they sent messengers to ask for peace talks with us.

Ladies and gentlemen, I know that the war this year has had a great impact on the kingdom. The treasury is almost exhausted, food prices are soaring, a large number of young and middle-aged citizens have been siphoned off, labor is lacking, soldiers have suffered many casualties, and some territories have been ravaged by the enemy. Urgent rebuilding... Many of you may wish to reap some benefits,

Make peace with Carthage and restore order to the kingdom.

However, although the Western Mediterranean Sea is large, it cannot accommodate two powerful countries. Do we want to see the battered Carthage, after the armistice, learn lessons, cultivate and recuperate, and challenge us again after regaining its strength?

I think your answer must be 'No! ', so we can't stop at the current victory, but continue to fight until we finally get the desired result we want, that is, we Dionia want to gain an absolute advantage, so that Carthage will never be able to challenge, Let there always be only one overlord in the Western Mediterranean, and that is us - Dionia! "

When Cornelus read this, his voice could not help but become louder, and everyone present had bright eyes and raised their chests.

"... Therefore, I hope you will continue to unite, make the greatest efforts, continue to appease the people, maintain the stability of the kingdom, and do your best to provide the army with sufficient supplies until we win the final victory!... The above is what Your Majesty wrote. The content of the letter." Cornelus read the letter and handed it to Lycias next to him.

At this moment, someone in the venue suddenly shouted: "His Majesty Davos wins!"

Let the venue liven up again: "His Majesty Davos wins!!!"

"The Kingdom of Dionia is Victorious!!!"

...

Publius, who was sitting in front of the venue, was enveloped in this passionate atmosphere. He never imagined that on the first day he stepped into the temple of the highest power in the Kingdom of Dionia, he felt the ambition of this kingdom. ——Become the only hegemon in the Western Mediterranean.

Although he was not as excited as the others, he was also a little more proud in his heart, and at the same time he breathed out: Fortunately, he was lucky enough to become a citizen of this kingdom in time!

At this time, Cornerus took the opportunity and said: "It seems that everyone has no objection to the decision made by His Majesty, and supports it very much. In the next two days, we will discuss how to better fulfill His Majesty's proposal. But now, we first invite the chief officials of each department to give everyone a summary of the situation in the kingdom last year. Since everyone is interested in the military situation of the kingdom, first of all, we will invite the Minister of Military Affairs, Hiros, to come to power.”

According to the previous procedures of the Kingdom Conference, King Davos first made a comprehensive summary of the situation in the kingdom last year, and then the chiefs of each department made a specific introduction to the situation in charge of the department, but now Davos is out on an expedition. , the prudent Cornerus and Lycias did not dare to overstep their responsibilities, so they simply skipped the first link, and each department usually starts from the finance department. After all, money is everyone’s biggest concern, but now The military has become the most concerned issue for everyone, so Hiros is the first to appear.

After years of training, this mercenary-turned-military minister stood in the center of the venue, with a calm and dignified bearing that attracted everyone's attention.

He comprehensively and briefly described the entire process of the war between Dionia and Rome, Samona, and Carthage from the occurrence, development, and current status of the war with a speed of speech that was not in a hurry. The strategies and tactics developed by King Firth and the Ministry of War against these three hostile forces also mentioned the contributions of each legion and each fleet in the war.

Even though everyone has a general understanding of last year's war through various channels, Hiros's comprehensive and professional narration still makes them refreshing, so they are all listening carefully.

For Publius, it was only then that he knew why Dionia dared to ignore the attack of the Carthaginians in the first place, and King Davos first led the army to attack Rome. It turned out that they had already carefully discussed and agreed Deductions, careful preparations, and perfect plans were made, but how could Rome be undefeated in a hasty challenge!

Publius roughly felt the horror of the establishment of the Military Affairs Department in the Kingdom of Dionia, and asked a group of people with rich war experience to do nothing else, specialize in military affairs, and only study how to defeat the enemy every day. A lot of time was spent on the affairs of the city-state and foreign affairs, how could the Roman aristocrats who rallied citizens and considered tactics when war came to match!

What surprised Publius even more was a series of data from Hiros' mouth: In the past year's war, the Kingdom of Dionia used a total of eleven regular legions, one reserve legion, four The cavalry corps and four fleets have more than 700 warships. The army alone has used 110,000 people (not counting the reserve soldiers added later). This is such a powerful military force, and it can make this powerful military force. The normal operation of the power for a year also shows that the national power of the Kingdom of Dionia is strong!

Publius, who had been a Roman elder for many years and had been engaged in cumbersome government affairs, was deeply aware of this, and now recalls it: the Roman Senate rejected the Dionysian messenger's "hope that they will reach a truce with Volsi". Demanding, and arrogantly shouting "don't be afraid of Dionia joining the war", how ridiculous it is to think about it now.

Of course, at the end of the speech, Hiros also mentioned with a heavy expression: Although the Dionysian army won a huge victory in this year's war, it also paid a lot of casualties. So far, a total of nearly 3 10,000 people were killed and 40,000 more wounded (including the sailors of the Navy, who made up the bulk of the death toll). The Ministry of Military Affairs will try its best to arrange the funeral of the soldiers who died in the war, send pension funds to their families as soon as possible, and properly solve the livelihood problems of the families of the dead and wounded soldiers, so that the soldiers who are still fighting have no worries.

When Hiros finished speaking, almost no one asked any questions, and everyone responded with warm applause.

The second person who came to the stage to make a summary was Mersis, the Minister of Finance. His speaking style was obviously different from that of Hiros. As soon as he opened his mouth, he complained that the war had wiped out the savings of the kingdom's treasury for many years. The expression on his face was definitely not installed.

In the whole process of narration, he was mostly complaining that the war cost a lot of gold and silver, even if he also mentioned that he had obtained a lot of spoils in the captured city-states such as Rome and Syracuse, and had already He began to mine precious metals from the mines in Corsica and Sardinia, which actually made up for the huge deficit in the treasury, but his tone and expression seemed to indicate that these were not worth mentioning at all. Stop the war now, and this year the kingdom will be in trouble due to lack of finances.

Publius knew from the whispers of the people around him: this is the usual style of the greedy minister of the kingdom, who is always complaining about the lack of gold and silver in the treasury.

However, Publius was still taken aback by Mersis’s statement: The monthly tax revenue of the Kingdom of Dionia is seven or eight hundred talents, and this year it is close to tens of thousands of talents. This is also due to the impact of the war, resulting in a significant drop in tax revenue. But even so, compared with the former Rome, its income was only a fraction of that of the Kingdom of Dionia. If Rome was more or less capable of fighting a war militarily, it was not worth mentioning in terms of financial resources. Death may be expected.