Finally CARIA has had rulers again from the Galestid family. Opheltas Galestus rose to power one 5th of May and died to lunacy one year after. Currently, Keramewos I 'The Besieger' Galestus is the king of CARIA. Eight years have passed since he was elected as king. The Galestid family has increased its prestige and only the Philothid family rivals them. Wadukhaserwos Galestus would be very proud of them and all the CARIAN people achievements. The nation sits at a very high level of civilization (84%) and among the Great Powers of the era.
CARIA has expanded in the lands of the Minoan (Phaistan), Proto Thracian (Corpili) and Luwian (Saranduwan) culture groups. They are not happy and they are ready to revolt. Like the tribal chiefs of old, Kerameweos enslaves all these rebellious cultures. He will not have anyone that does not want to be in CARIA or to make trouble. They will become slaves and with time assimilate to the Orestae culture if they want to promote harmoniously in society.
Phiwergos Galestus, the Chancellor, has a more difficult task as he needs to rebuild all the trade network that has been neglected in all these years of conquest. Many provinces if not all are not importing goods and the surplus goods produced by the CARIAN slaves are not being traded away. His job is going to convince the current king and the future ones to go abroad and open new trade routes.
Phirwergos realises that CARIA is so big that makes sense to push for national trade. He starts developing bazaars and palaces in all provinces to increase trade routes for national products. This will increase import trade routes for all the surplus that now has no market, increasing monies for the treasure and decreasing the dependence from foreign nations.
His next move is to increase production of highly valued and scarce goods like spices, precious metals, copper, gemstones, honey, papyrus and dyes. In CARIA there are abundant copper and precious metals mines, as well as honey. There is some dyes produced in the newly acquired island of Kriti. But CARIA has no papyrus, gemstones or spices, those must be imported. Phirwergos dedicates the resources needed to increase production in those mines to get the most ore out of them. Afep is an example of double production thanks to the slaves moved there by the CARIAN elite.
Soon enough, Phiwergos realizes that internal trade is not as profitable for taxes as trade with other kingdoms. Taxing goods in ports is much easier than controlling internal routes. After much thought, he finds that the only option is to create CARIAN vassals that import and export to the nation. With this idea, Phiwergos goes to talk to the new king of CARIA, Eutroquos I Galestus to convince him for a new campaign. This time it is not land that CARIA wants but as many feudatories as possible. The target is going to be the settled tribe of PAGAE, a small tribe in the Attika and Euboea region. If this expedition goes well, the next target will be the CARIAN nemesis, Peloponnesos. The expeditionary forces of CARIA start the invasion from the Cyclades isles.
The war ends after CARIA seiging all PAGAE and the deal is to liberate Karystos and Pelagasian become a tribal vassal of CARIA. We want to control the trade between our nations. Karystos will become CARIA vassal with no time. With this idea in mind, the new king releases and acquires many vassals.
After many years in the chancellor post, Phiwergos is murdered and dies before finishing his dream to dismantle the evil power of Peloponesos and vassalizing all the land on the west of CARIA. Many small nations have grown under his tenure as chancellor and trade has doubled the taxes for the nation thanks to that. As every time a great man dies, a period of change and uncertainty looms. But we are sure that a new strong man will emerge in CARIA to lead the nation to the next part of its great history.
