Chapter 36: Campaign Anatolia (Part 7)

*** POV: MC

Receiving reports of my brother's progress and a signed treaty with the Empire of Trebizond. I arrived outside the city of Ankara. Which had a decent wall guarding the city, as it was considered a capital of a theme. But this city was never too large, and today is the same.

This city maybe has a population of 14,000, but the interesting thing about this city is its form of government. It is run by a guild council, some form of a republic or democracy... This city is run and operated by the guilds that work from within the city, this to me is very intriguing, especially at a time when democracy isn't even discussed anymore.

But I do doubt these guilds will be very loyal to my sultanate, so instead of giving them the city and just allowing them to pay taxes, I must forcibly move these guilds around my empire. I arranged my army in an assault formation.

I used four carriages usually used to carry supplies, to load up a few barrels of black powder. Then I sent these carriages with the horses pulling them towards the city's four gates. The plan is to have the two carriage drivers on each carriage, leave the carriage when it is close enough to the gate... hop on the back of the horses who pull it cut the ropes, and move out of the way letting this fire carriage blow the gates and maybe the wall away.

I want to see if such a weird plan could work, I mean there is no reason it shouldn't I mean maybe the defenders pour water all over the barrels. But I guess I will see soon, as just now the men riding the carriage is now moving back toward my army and the carriage toward the wall at least it is working up to this point at the gate I can see.

Soon the carriage got close to the gate but never actually touched the gate itself... Exploded *BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM* UHH... This is the largest explosion I have created since I decided to pursue a career as something like a pyromaniac.

The gate itself disappeared as well as the second gate behind that one, and the gatehouse itself seemed to have lost its stability collapsing into rubble. This left plenty of openings for my army to run through, there are even spaces with less rubble where cavalry can enter.

Blowing the horn the part of the army closest to me launched an all-out attack toward the opening immediately. As the horn blew another three explosions went off simultaneously... Though only one was successful out of the three in blowing apart the gates, another of the three damaged the gate enough to be exploited by my army on that side.

Watching the attack in front of me was rather boring as the defenders really had no chance. With my black powder and my superior soldiers, there is a zero percent chance the enemies could muster a fighting chance without rousing the city's entire populace. I do not know exactly how long the battle in the city lasted but I can estimate it was less than a few minutes before the defenders quit.

This is a big moment for me specifically as I have gained another system city. And right after the battle concluded I received notice that my imperium level has now entered level two. This means my cities will become a little harder to manage with the citizen's happiness and if it gets out of hand rebellion could become a reality in my cities.

Another downside to the expansion of imperium is that each level extends my recruitment by one week. So now my recruitment will take two weeks, and system construction will also take two weeks. But there are also bonuses like my army units receive attack and defensive bonuses as well as marching speed bonuses.

*Sigh*, this is a good and a bad thing I guess, but I like that it makes me feel as if someone is recognizing my accomplishments. Though my true goals lie further down the line, I am more than satisfied with what I have achieved here in Anatolia, and I shall extend my lands here just a little more before all is over here.

My final goal for the campaign in Anatolia is the city of Caesarea or Kayseri. A very famous trade city, not a huge city population-wise, but not small either. I do not think any of the sultans who ruled over Kayseri used it to its full effect, except one by the same name as me, Sultan Alaeddin Kaykubad of the Seljuks of Rum.

This city houses one of the more famous monuments commissioned by Sultan Alaeddin Kaykubad the caravanserai there is known far and wide still to this day a hundred years later. There is a famous story told about his building of these monuments.

My brother Suleyman told me the story recently it goes like this... **"Any aggression to travelers on the roads of my lands is an aggression to my very own honor!"

bellowed the Sultan to his Grand Vizier. And so, in this way was the order given to the Grand Vizier to oversee the construction of a series of caravanserais between the larger cities of the kingdom, to ensure the safety and comfort of the travelers on the roads in the lands under his charge.

"You will build hans worthy of both me and my ancestors, worthy of both their kingdom and mine. One han shall be built at a day's journey to the east of Kayseri, that is to say at the place at the end of one full day of travel, and another shall be built in the same manner to the west of the city.

-Make sure that they are built as solidly as a fortress so that our enemies can see that we are stronger than they are and that they are under the shadow of our swords should they cause harm to anyone!" continued the Sultan.

The Grand Vizier nodded. "So shall your orders be granted, my Sultan," he said, leaving the room. He immediately gathered together the best workmen and gave them their instructions. Several of them were to start that very day on the construction of a han near Tushisar, and the others were to start on a site on the Kayseri Road near Aksaray.

But the Grand Vizier Celaleddin Karatay, who had been given the responsibility to oversee these two projects, thought to himself: "The Sultan has ordered the building of these two hans, and I am but a humble servant in his shadow.

-Still, I am the second most powerful man in the kingdom and because of this I should not remain totally excluded from this endeavor. These hans shall become my monuments as well." And thus, he established a plan to build his very own han southeast of Kayseri, in the present-day village of Karadayi.

The monuments commissioned by Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad were completed in the year 1236. They came to be known by his subjects as the "Sultan Hans", and their doors were opened to all. One spring evening, Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad gathered his viziers together in his palace at Keykubadiyye. He explained to them the responsibilities he expected of them concerning the services and operations of these hans.

"My knights, it is our duty to provide a sign of the respect and the consideration we hold for the personal safety of the foreign and local travelers on our lands, as well as for their goods. If a caravan or its travelers should be attacked and their goods plundered on our roads, it is to be considered a violation of our very own personal honor. You must show no mercy to the bandits, brigands, and thieves on our roads.

-You must designate men to constantly tend to these roads so that all travelers who use them will always feel welcomed. Every traveler in our hans is to be my guest for three days, and no fee is to be charged to those who remain for that length of time. Their hungry stomachs are to be filled with meals paid for from my very own purse. Medical treatment will be provided for any illnesses, and their cleanliness will be assured by my hammams.

-Their horses will be shod, and their lame and tired animals replaced. At the end of three days, their repaired shoes will be placed in front of their door. They can then choose to leave or to remain, and if they do stay, a small daily fee will be charged. This honorable tradition has come down to us from our Central Asian ancestors, and we are thus beholden to continue this same custom as we spread our culture westwards…

-We must not fail in this duty to carry on the principles which formed the base of our sultanate. Once defects and bad habits are incorporated into the kingdom we are building, it will be difficult to remove them from the character of the people of this nation. And this heavy responsibility is our duty to ensure. In this, we must be very vigilant..."

After the viziers left the meeting, the wisdom of Sultan's words became very evident to them. And so, instructions to fulfill his orders were sent out by special couriers to those in charge of the caravanserais. And when their doors opened for business, the people of the kingdom started to live in the light of a new and secure era…**

This is the way my brother Suleyman told me the story though it could all be embellished I heard about Sultan Alaeddin in my past life as well, so it probably holds true. But I say this story to show how these caravanserais were built on a grand scale to accommodate the number of merchants and travelers going through the lands.

I wish to hold these lands just for this reason, the Sultanate of rum was rich just based on its geographic location on the silk road and the fact it is the land route to Europe, which allowed the gold to flow like rivers. And they did not usually hold Bithynia, making my lands even more strategically important than theirs, so I should be able to amass a fortune in these lands.

All the other lands held by the beylics are not as important to me, except the old Seljuk capital of Konya, which is a system city that needs to be secured. But let us return to the topic at hand, the army is now resting here in Ankara as I begin to process all the information on the city, and began to set up the construction queue with the system.

This city has a special building that other cities do not have and that is a building called "guild academy". This is a very unusual building, and something I have never seen before in the game, this is a true special building.

This building is like it says capable of training men into guild members of whatever guilds were in the city, this is very special as this will make my lands even more prosperous. As of now I was solely relying on local talents and the small number of system-educated men. Trained by the two system guilds I currently hold but this expands that too many other fields, though the number trained will not be many it will be a small bonus for me.

- Authors note- Short bonus chapter I was going to delete but it isn't so bad.... So how about I just post it as a bonus?