Chapter 101: Shine or Go Mad (5)
Chapter 101: Shine or Go Mad (5)
“Traitorous rabble who have seized the government of France! I, the Count of Artois, the rightful heir to the throne who leads the just subjects and loyal ministers, declare this to you! Release His Majesty King Louis XVII, whom you have unlawfully detained, at once, and voluntarily dissolve the blasphemous institution that profanes sacred authority—the Assembly—and I shall not pursue further punishment! Already Prussia and the Holy Roman Empire have dispatched fifty thousand volunteers to the border to set right our France, now plunged into hardship…”
That is one hell of a long sentence.
In short, it is basically, “Prussia and the Holy Roman Empire are going to kick your asses. Repeat after me—you are all dead.”
What is this, some elementary school kid running to call his big brother after a fight?
Actually, now that I think about it, why would Germans be the big brother of the French? If anything, we French would be their big brothers.
“Commander Lafayette, do you believe what is written in this proclamation?”
“No. It is nonsense at a glance.”
At my question, Marquis de Lafayette shook his head.
“To mobilize fifty thousand troops, do you know how much supply is required? That is not a number that moves at the whim of a single sentence.”
“That is true.”
Anyone who served in the 21st-century Republic of Korea Army would know what a ‘fast pace’—that is, combat readiness posture—means.
Right. Dragging out all the supplies hoarded in warehouses, loading them one by one onto six-wheeled trucks, unlocking the weapons racks to sling a heavy four-kilogram rifle over your back, hauling concrete-hardened crates and ammunition boxes with all your strength—how could anyone forget that hellish routine?
And every time we trained like that, the thought hit me—there really is no end to the types of supplies—felt in direct proportion to the pain in my right and left hands.
The funny thing is, in terms of quantity and variety of supplies, an 18th-century army is not that different from a 21st-century one.
No matter the era, a soldier is still human. Humans must eat, sleep, and wear clothes.
At the bare minimum: uniforms for soldiers to wear and bedding to keep them warm, guns and swords to shoot and cut the enemy, food to stave off hunger.
And for the men of this age—romantic on the outside, missing a screw or two on the inside—who live for style and die for style, an essential item:
Alum, applied to their uniforms to maintain sharp creases and color.
And that is before even counting indispensable supplies like gunpowder and ammunition. That terrifying consumption estimate—that is the army.
Just because some lunatic overclocked his happy circuits to the point of bursting and spouted nonsense does not mean you can move armies like chess pieces.
“As for the Count of Artois… think of him as someone frolicking in the flower garden inside his own head.”
“Would it not be more accurate to just call him insane?”
Commander Lafayette merely shrugged.
“We have completed all preparations to launch suppression operations the moment the enemy appears in Nancy. What remains is the seventeenth—when the Duke of Orléans initiates his coup, we crush them all at once.”
“You are confident?”
“We can see exactly what the enemy is thinking, as clearly as the palm of our hand. If we lose under those conditions, I should tear off my insignia.”
“Then all that remains is to control the citizens’ anxiety until everything is over.”
“That is the most difficult task, Minister.”
“Hoo… Difficult or not, it has to be done.”
What is the most frightening thing to a businessman?
Raising capital? A militant labor union with red headbands?
No. It is political instability.
Why?
Even in the Republic of Korea, whenever those hereditary swine up in the northern pig farm feel like it and fire rockets into the East Sea, the stock market freezes and foreign media goes berserk.
No matter how much we say, “Hey, it is just the annual event. Do not worry,” they do not want to consider the one-in-a-million scenario where North Pig goes crazy and slams a Taepodong missile into Namsan Tower in Seoul.
It is the same here.
If the political climate is unstable, interest rates fall. If prices collapse, people who would normally buy two Ears of the Nation convenience meals will not even want to buy one. And Forbes and Maxim sales would surely plummet as well.
That absolutely cannot happen.
Until the day when twenty-seven million French citizens hold an Ears of the Nation convenience meal in one hand and a copy of Forbes in the other as their standard lunch, there must be no decline in sales.
“I will bring you news of victory, Minister.”
“And I will prepare a Paris that does not burn, Commander.”
We clasped both hands and smiled at one another.
“When you capture that Duke of Orléans bastard and drag him to Paris, can you put a dog collar around his neck and haul him in?”
“…It seems you have quite a lot pent up because of him, Minister.”
[Your message has been received, General Dumouriez. However, until the suppression of the royalists is complete, please continue leading the royalists without displaying any unusual behavior. Your safety will be guaranteed. Once again, we welcome your surrender. —Guillaume de Toulon—]
Revolution Is Also a Business
Dumouriez’s hand trembled as he held the secret letter.
“It is done. It is done! I can live. Yes, I have to live. What happens to those stubborn royalist fossils is none of my concern.”
If it is a sinking sailboat, a helmsman who refuses to abandon it deserves to sink with it.
For five days, the shrill survival instinct buzzing incessantly in Dumouriez’s head finally fell silent.
“Ha, haha. They say even when the world collapses, there is a hole to escape through. It seems God has not abandoned me yet.”
Dumouriez bit his lip and muttered quietly in the empty Royal Guard commander’s office.
His hands, feet, and face—pale as a sick man from tension—slowly began to regain color.
“Hoo… I feel completely drained.”
With a sigh, Dumouriez dropped heavily into a chair.
“Damn it. Once I am promoted to major general, I will quietly transfer to a regional command and live out my days. At this rate, I will either collapse from a heart attack or fall like Icarus.”
He uncorked a bottle of wine on the table and tilted it, pouring slowly into his glass.
A celebratory drink after surviving was sweeter than anything.
After swallowing a mouthful of sweet wine, Dumouriez took a deep breath and once again studied the map of France laid out before him.
“First priority—survival. Achieved. Then only one thing remains. As a surrendered general, how do I secure my position?”
The political sensor that had once guided Dumouriez to the rank of brigadier general began working briskly again.
A surrendered general.
If things continued like this, Dumouriez would be exactly that. A surrendered general. And a surrendered general from the die-hard royalist camp at that.
Had he surrendered after fighting a foreign enemy, he might at least be treated honorably. But who would value a general who sold out secrets in a civil war? People would whisper behind his back.
And unless the revolutionary faction relinquished the post of National Guard commander, Dumouriez—once affiliated with the royalists—would be lucky to be exiled to some nameless mountain backwater and serve as commander of a small city guard.
The life he wanted was a respectable regional command—not some unremarkable rural old-age home and ossuary course.
Then there was only one thing to do. Become the most enthusiastic lapdog of the revolutionary faction.
Some might ask how, as a soldier with honorable pride, he could bow his head to Lafayette, a junior by far, and to a mere boy not yet twenty.
But does that glorious honor put food on the table?
Shining honor lasts a moment. A warm and comfortable general’s seat lasts a lifetime.
August 15, 1790.
Outskirts of Nancy, eastern Kingdom of France.
2 a.m.
Hundreds of horses and thousands of figures reached the outskirts of the city under cover of darkness.
“The enemy is stationed just below Nancy, at Ludres. The vanguard will be the 12th Chasseurs Regiment. The Rouffach Light Cavalry will support behind them. The artillery will take control of the western high ground and bombard any enemy soldiers who emerge into the open. The infantry will block the eastern entrance of the garrison and shoot down any who come out. Understood?”
“Yes, Commander Lafayette!”
“Gentlemen. Those before us are rebels who attempted a coup. If we fail to sweep them away here, all of France will burn in civil war. Do not forget—France’s peace rests in our hands.”
“Yes, General Kellermann!”
Half-shadowed by candlelight, the officers exchanged firm looks.
They unpacked their gear carried from Paris, took out alum and spread it thinly over their uniforms, checked the edges of their bayonets and the condition of their muskets.
They serviced the cannons and checked again that no powder was leaking.
Everything was perfect.
Standard-bearers mounted their horses.
When the muzzles used to muffle neighing were removed, the horses snorted and drew in the humid August dawn air.
“Vanguard, move out.”
“Yes, Colonel.”
The young lieutenant of the Chasseurs Regiment, leading the vanguard, drew his cavalry saber.
“I, Joachim Murat, take the lead! Follow me!”
“Waaaah!!”
Hundreds of sabers rose along arms tied with red cloth, catching the moonlight and gleaming.
The ground trembled.
“Enemy, enemy raid! Corporal! Sound the al—”
Bang!
The royalist second lieutenant who had been about to speak to the soldier could say no more. Only the sound of wind left his lips, likely because of the bullet lodged in his chest where his lungs had been.
“Ugh!”
The corporal’s neck was cut by a cavalry saber.
The main gate was breached.
“Lieutenant Murat! Where to next!”
“Where else? We have entered the lion’s mouth—we tear its guts apart! Trust me and follow! Execute!”
Deeper. Further, further in.
Lafayette’s sharp blade began splitting enemies in two.
“If you have measured the ammunition, fire! Fire, you idiots! You half-witted—”
Bang!
“Hiiik! The sergeant has been shot!”
Behind the loosely formed royalist infantry ranks, the non-commissioned officer waving his sword and driving them forward had his head blown apart.
“The rebel soldiers are nothing but rabble scraped together from everywhere! Focus on the ones acting as political officers—blow their heads off!”
“Yes!”
“W-what is this! What on earth—ugh!”
Tat-tat-tat!
Several cavalry pistols fired at a royalist officer who had only half-dressed after waking moments ago.
“The south and west are already blocked! Regroup to the east, reorganize, and resist!”
“Artillery! Take cover!”
“Aaaah! My leg! My leg!”
A heavy iron ball smashed the leg of an unlucky royalist officer to pieces.
“Solid shot! To the high ground! To the high ground in the east—if we reach—!”
“Come on, you rebel bastards.”
Tat-tat-tat-tat!
“Ugh!”
“First rank reload! Second rank, stand by to fire! …Now! Second rank, fire!”
The wheat of the Nancy plain absorbed blood drop by drop.
“…We will have to discard this year’s Nancy wheat.”
“To calculate compensation for all that, the Finance Minister will have quite a task.”
The Duke of Orléans’ final card was burning to ashes without leaving a trace.