When the news came, An Ning was leading his troops on the way to aid Babi Village.
Nearly 200,000 French troops lined up in an extremely long line on the post road, and it was very shocking to see them.
The messenger ran all the way along the marching column and finally found An Ning's flag. He rushed over and delivered the news: "Report to Your Majesty the General that the allied forces besieging the Sedan Fortress were defeated by us and captured Archduke Karl alive, the commander of the Austrian army."
An Ning immediately took the letter, read the contents carefully, and then said in shock: "Hey, Napoleon arrested Archduke Karl? Shouldn't it be Archduke Karl who beat Napoleon violently?"
An Ning's impression was that the direct confrontation between Karl and Napoleon had always been a pity. The two sides were originally prepared to fight to the death, but Archduke Karl's brother voted for him.
The real "I'm waiting to fight to the death, why did your Majesty surrender first?"
Later, Archduke Karl defeated famous French generals such as Jourdan and Masséna in succession. After the Austrian army was defeated at the Battle of Hohenlinden, he was ordered to stop Moreau's advance.
But he never had the chance to fight Napoleon head-on.
There should have been a chance, but Archduke Karl achieved great success after becoming the savior of the country. In addition, he learned from the experience of the French army to promote military reforms and established a nation-state army like the French army. This threatened the imperial power and was finally suspected by his brother.
Lost military power.
In fact, this has always been a regrettable thing for military history enthusiasts. Everyone wants to see Archduke Karl fight Napoleon with all his strength.
The result is now good, Archduke Karl has directly become Napoleon's prisoner in this time and space.
An Ning shook his head. He felt at this moment as if the big show that he had been waiting for for a long time had finally kicked off, but it turned out to be empty and lackluster.
He didn't know at this time that Archduke Karl was just shorter than Napoleon.
He did not know that Archduke Karl was shocked by the power of the French army at this time, and began to abandon his outdated military ideas and accept new ideas.
All in all, An Ning didn't know at this time that this was just the catalyst for Archduke Karl's transformation.
At this time, An Ning actually wanted to complain about Napoleon's record to his confidants, but unfortunately, none of his old team members were here.
Berthier was still acting commander, Davout was in Italy, and Lazarus was injured and hospitalized in Paris.
So An Ning could only look at Murat, who was not yet his confidant, and said to him: "Look, Napoleon has arrested Archduke Karl, the younger brother of the Austrian emperor."
Murat was a little surprised when An Ning suddenly spoke to him. He didn't know that An Ning already considered him a confidant. He still had the mentality of ordinary people towards An Ning. He responded very respectfully: "What a beautiful victory, Your Excellency."
An Ning frowned, and such a distant answer made him a little disappointed.
Also, you can't ask others to be the same as your old subordinates as soon as they come up.
An Ning handed the letter to Murat: "Take a look."
Murat borrowed it with some restraint, read it carefully, then raised his head and looked at An Ning.
Perhaps he saw that An Ning was expecting him to express his opinion, so he said: "As for the disposition of Archduke Karl, are you going to let the parliament decide?"
"No," An Ning shook his head, "The parliament is crazy now. They might send him to the guillotine. He is a prisoner of our army. Naturally, it is up to our army to decide how to deal with him. It has nothing to do with the parliament."
When Murat heard An Ning say "Parliament is crazy", his expression was a little subtle, as if he was saying: "Is this what the hell I can hear?"
An Ning ignored Murat's expression. He just wanted to turn all future famous generals into his good buddies.
"We are just like before," he said, "signing an agreement not to participate in military operations against France within one year, and then collecting a ransom. Habsburg is still very rich, and can swindle a lot of money. As a result,
Future start-up capital.”
Murat looked confused: "Start what?"
Also, An Ning hasn't told him about his grand idea of using steam engines to reform all production in France.
An Ning: "The steam revolution used steam engines to replace traditional manpower and push productivity into a whole new field."
Murat: "Uh...ah, that's it. That's a very grand idea."
It felt like he didn't understand.
An Ning suddenly missed Lazarus. If this living treasure were here, he would definitely complain crazily, such as: "You have cut off the tax revenue of Northern Italy, and you continue to persecute Franz of Austria!"
I hope La Salle gets better soon.
**
La Salle: "Mrs. Fannie! I'm out of wine!"
The landlady appeared with a speechless face: "I started drinking in broad daylight, and this is my third bottle!"
"It's a lot of money for you. I'm a hussar. A hussar just drinks wine and eats meat, and yells very uneducatedly while eating."
As he spoke, Lazarus patted the landlady on the breast.
The landlord said angrily: "Take your dirty hands away! If you weren't the general's favorite, I would slap you."
Lasalle laughed heartily, as if he was amused by the landlord's reaction.
Just then, he heard crying coming from outside.
Just then the landlady came with wine, and Lazarus asked: "What is this cry?"
"Human cries," the landlady said angrily.
"I know it's people crying, but I want to tell you the truth, who is crying and why?"
"Mrs. Langle opposite, someone reported that there were royal pamphlets in her house, so her husband was taken away. He was taken away in the morning, and he came back lying down in the afternoon, with his head cut very neatly." As she spoke, the landlady drew a picture.
Made a cross.
Lassalle was obviously in a depressed mood: "Fuck."
He looked at the wine the landlord had just brought and pushed the bottle gently: "Take it away, this crying makes me not in the mood to drink."
"Then I'll tell her not to cry?"
"No, don't go. It's too much to ask people not to cry at this time. Let her cry, poor woman."
Lasalle said.
**
While Lazarus was resting, the Austrian cavalry major Jonas had just dispersed the third wave of French troops.
These French troops were very strange. They did not form a square formation at all. Seeing the chaos after the cavalry, Jonah thought this would be another easy and happy victory.
Ordinary armies, without forming a square formation, would immediately break up when they saw the momentum of the cavalry charging towards them. Then the cavalry could comfortably chase down the fleeing enemies and practice their sword skills.
This French army was different. They did break up, but after escaping to a place where the cavalry could not perform well, they turned around and started firing guns.
To disperse such a French army, one would have to rush forward and chop off a few heads with a saber. Just scaring them would be useless.
As a result, after a morning, Major Jonah's hand was numb and his saber was notched by some tough-headed person.
However, the French troops continued to appear, brigade after brigade.
What was a good reconnaissance mission turned into a constant drive to disperse the emerging French troops.
While slashing, the major asked loudly: "Why are there so many French troops? Where did they come from?"
The major's subordinate replied: "Major, have you read One Thousand and One Nights? There is a story in it about a seed that can turn into a soldier if you scatter it. Maybe that Andy Frost got this treasure!"
Jonah cursed and was about to chop at a new head, when he was shot.
He fell off his horse, and when he saw the spinning scene, he wondered: What happened to me? Was I shot?
Then he hit his head on the ground and passed out.