Jarod nodded, and his end went under his coat completely, before bringing back another paper, much bigger. He unfolded it on top of the diagram, revealing it to me a rough map of the world.
"Land is indeed an... Issue. We are aware that church infrastructure is not exactly perfect for looking over large amounts of land, and that beyond a certain portion of a world, it simply becomes inefficient to manage an administration for it... Which is why I have a proposal.
As you may or may not know, my grandfather has taken a loan. A rather sizeable one, to be precise. He is planning to use it to greatly expand Nova's economy throughout the planet. What this means is that of course we shall get much higher revenues from the taxes, but that you will also see the church's tithes greatly increase in size. Of course, only we will pay for this. As such, considering that your administration of too much land is inefficient and that you are gaining sizeable funds from the tithes on ours, we propose a... Trade, of sorts."
He took another sip.
"If you were willing to part with some of your lands - the least valuable ones, of course - we could overhaul their infrastructure and economy. Both sides would greatly gain from this. If you kept what your administration could manage easily - a fifth of the world, perhaps - and a quarter of that for your vassals, we could take the least profitable lands and overhaul them. You will get full tithes, of course - I understand there was a problem related to that in the past? - and the right to pass through those lands. You'll also want to keep enough to pay off whatever debt you had towards Cr'tok. In exchange, we will do our best to keep the tithes high, ensure they get sent to you alone, and initiate a technological partnership with your people, to ensure we'll be both able to profit from the things coming out of my labs."