Chapter 401 Caesar takes office as Governor of Gaul

Before leaving, Maximus repeatedly asked: All personnel must strictly keep the secrets of the tribe, and even the fact that they are from the Nyx tribe must not be revealed to outsiders!

Onomabatis led the team to the east coast of the Adriatic Sea along the road that the rebel army took into the mountains.

The place he chose to settle down was Pula on the Istria Peninsula, which had been an important place for him to sell stolen goods when he was a pirate. He was familiar with it and could easily carry out his affairs.

In addition to buying slaves, Onomabaitis also shouldered another important task - to inquire about news from Rome.

Originally, Maximus entrusted Charles Pampas to do this, but Pompey wiped out the pirates, and this channel to learn about the outside world was cut off.

This is also an important reason why Maximus agreed to Onoma Baitis's request.

More than a month later, ten slaves, escorted by guards, traveled across mountains and rivers and safely arrived at the territory of the Nix tribe...

It has been more than six years since Onomabatis established a business station in Pula. He has received many awards from the tribe for the number of slaves he purchased and important Roman news, and has now been promoted to knighthood.

Onoma Baitis, who walked in, was no longer as restless and decadent as when he first joined the Knicks tribe. He was wearing clothes that only Knicks nobles above the knight level could wear: fine fabrics carefully woven from linen. The top, in dark red, is double-breasted and embroidered with beautiful patterns. The cuffs have pleated moiré patterns, and a jazz badge is pinned to the chest. It is paired with tight breeches and a high straight collar to set off the The whole person is noble and spiritual.

Maximus asked him to sit down, and then asked with a smile: "Onoma Baitis, we haven't seen each other for about four months since you last left, right?"

"Chief, I haven't seen you for four months and eight days." Onoma Baitis replied respectfully.

"How's the situation over there at the store?"

"The sales of cloth and pottery are as good as before. The wood carvings and new cloths of various colors dyed with new dyes that have been sold since last year are also very popular, not only in the Roman province of Northern Italy and Illyria. Province, and some businessmen from mainland Italy also came to Pula to buy, and they complained that our goods were too few..."

There were not many gold and silver coins left in the Nyx tribe's reserves, so after Onomabaitis established a foothold in Pula, Maximus allowed him to sell cloth and pottery and use the money in exchange to buy slaves.

The reason why they sell cloth and pottery is that these two items are common in towns across the Mediterranean. However, the Nyx tribe made technological innovations under the guidance of Maximus and adopted intensive production. Therefore, it is not only of high quality but also relatively cheap. Similar products are also much cheaper, and due to the large output, in addition to personal use and exchange with other tribes, there is still a lot of surplus.

After Onoma Baitis sold these two items, the sales volume was indeed good. Last year, the Nyx tribe added wood carvings and dyed cloth. This is because Maximus has trained a group of carvers with certain modern carving skills (of course, the goddess statue in the Danu Temple was still made by Maximus Carved by oneself), and the staff of the weaving workshop finally prepared high-quality vegetable dyes after long-term and unremitting efforts, and the output was not low.

"It is difficult to increase the quantity of goods significantly, and it is very difficult to transport these goods from the mountains, as you should know very well. Carlsipampas has complained to me several times, saying that in order to help us transport these goods, It has seriously affected their mining operations.

The key is that when there are more goods and more people transporting them, it becomes difficult for us to keep them secret. By the way, you have a lot of businessmen here. Does anyone have any doubts about you? "

"Chief, I think there are always merchants who are suspicious. Although we claim that these goods are shipped from the east, and we also let our ships go out of the Adriatic Sea and cruise around the Greek peninsula from time to time... But there are always Some people are asking, and some even told us directly that they have been to many ports in the East and have never seen similar goods at all..."

"If they want to doubt it, then doubt it. As long as they don't reveal it, you can pretend to be deaf and dumb. But if someone reveals it to your face and presents evidence, then you have to admit that 'these goods are produced by tribes in the Illyrian mountains. I lied because I was afraid that they would look down on me, but don’t say it’s the Knicks tribe! … I think given the quality and price of these goods, they will still continue to buy them.”

"Chief, I feel relieved when you say this. We are selling things very well now, but we are having trouble buying slaves."

"What trouble?"

"In recent years, we have frequently purchased slaves in Pula, and in large quantities, we have become the largest customer in the slave market. The slave market in Pula is not big, and there are fewer and fewer good slaves, and the price is getting higher and higher. When those slave merchants see us buying, they will raise the price. If this continues, we will suffer too much. I want to buy slaves somewhere else? "

"Where do you want to go?" "To the Italian seaside towns in the south, like Sarapia, Tarantum, Crotone, Regim...the maritime trade in these port towns is much more prosperous than Pula. There must be more slaves being bought and sold.”

"Well... don't think about going to the south for now. You can first check out Padua and Milan in the west."

"Chief, the two towns you mentioned are both inland. I don't think they have more slaves than Pula."

"Maybe, but in half a year or a year, the situation will be very different. By the way, is there any new news about the Caesar in Rome that I asked you to pay special attention to?"

"Chief, yes!" Onomabaitis cheered up and responded loudly: "I came back early this time mainly because of him. I heard that this Caesar has resigned from the post of Roman consul and became the governor of three provinces: Northern Italy, Illyria and West France! He has taken office and started recruiting a large number of soldiers to form an army as soon as he took office."

"Chief, this Caesar doesn't want to use force against us Nix?" Onomabaitis asked with some concern. The reason why he had such an idea was that Maximus not only paid special attention to this Caesar, but also listened to him very seriously every time he told the news about Caesar.

Maximus shook his head and comforted him: "Don't worry, he shouldn't have such an idea yet."

After Onomabaitis left, Maximus's expression became solemn: Caesar is finally here! In the next eight years, this man will conquer Gaul, attack Germany, and even attack Britain. Finally, he will ascend to the throne of dictator, shaping the embryonic form of an empire for the loosely managed and weakening Roman Republic, and rejuvenate it. By then, the Nix tribe will be in danger! Time is getting tighter and tighter, and the Nix must speed up its actions!

"Immediately notify the three chief officers of the Ministry of War and tell them that I will hold an emergency military meeting to discuss crossing the river to attack the Boii!"

"Yes, chief!" The attendant responded excitedly.

Watching the servants leave, Maximus fell into deep thought again: It took so many years to completely conquer the Pannonian tribal alliance. The Boii tribe is stronger than the Pannonian tribal alliance in terms of land area, population and strength. If you want to conquer the Boii before Caesar ends the Gallic War, time is still a bit tight...

Thinking of this, Maximus couldn't help but laugh at himself: I thought that he was ambitious to unify the Danube Plain and then fight Rome with all his strength, but now he even finds it difficult to conquer half of the land in the Danube Plain, not to mention that the other half is occupied by the more powerful Dacians...

Through the intelligence on the Dacians that I have specially collected in the past few years, Brebiste, who is respected as the king by the Dacians, is not a simple person. It is by no means an easy task to defeat him and conquer the territory of Dacia. If you fall into the quagmire of war with the Dacians and miss the best time to attack Rome, you will regret it! ...

Maximus tapped the back of the chair with his fingers, and suddenly said to another attendant: "Go to the Ministry of Commerce and call Pigris. I have important things to discuss with him!"

"Yes, chief!"

Because there are many Scodisci people in the Nix tribe, the relationship with the Scodisci tribe has been getting better and better in recent years. Maximus decided to send Pigris to the Scodisci tribe to convey friendly messages to the Dacians through them.

In Maximus's previous life memory, he did not have a deep impression of the historical figure Bleibiste, but he remembered one thing-Caesar was preparing to send troops to conquer Dacia before he was assassinated, so he decided to give up treating the Dacians as opponents and try to make an ally with Bleibiste.

………………………………………………………………………………

The Spartacus rebels had severely damaged the 7th and 8th legions of the northern Italian province, and then the two legions were rebuilt. Together with the 9th legion of the Illyrian province and the 10th legion of the Western France province, there were a total of four legions in the three provinces ruled by Caesar. Moreover, these four legions were seriously understaffed due to long-term non-combat, and the actual strength of one legion was even less than 5,000.

After Caesar arrived in Ravenna, the capital of the northern Italian province, he immediately asked for large-scale recruitment of soldiers, just as he did when he took over as the governor of Spain. Not only should the four legions be fully staffed, but two more legions should be built.

For Rome, the three provinces in northern Italy had four legions, which were gradually built up over a long period of time. It was more than enough to ensure the safety of the provinces and defend against barbarian invasions.