I will be crowned king

Turn the time back an hour...

Along with the deafening roar, the ground began to shake slightly; not far away, the Yangfan City militia position guarding the farm began to shake under the baptism of artillery fire.

Under the smoke and dust that filled the sky, the Western Front Crusaders who had just "retired" regrouped again, held high the Ring of Order and King Clovis's flag, and launched another attack.

As soon as the battle started, the situation became almost one-sided.

Although there is a slight advantage in strength and position, it is far from enough to eliminate the combat advantage between the two sides: the Yangfan City militia is equipped with homemade guns and captured trophies, and a variety of equipment is uniformly equipped with the Leopold of the Jihad Army. German and Leyden rifles were almost incomparable. They had no shooting training at all, and the counterattack they organized in a hurry was not successful at all. The casualties caused to friendly forces even exceeded the total number of enemies killed.

In contrast, Ludwig's Crusaders almost proved with actual actions the impact of training and discipline on an army.

The skirmishers deployed in the front and on both wings started harassing and firing at the farm positions from the moment they stepped into the shooting range. The crisp gunshots of the breech-loading rifles were like the scythe of death. Almost every time they sounded, they would definitely reap lives.

The four line regiments of the Chinese army were arrayed in formation, advancing steadily under the choking smoke and sparse firepower of the position. Facing the fallen comrades who were hit, they still ignored them and indifferently stepped on the drums beaten by the military musicians. Drums.

After arriving at the charging position, each regiment skillfully moved in company units, launching a column assault with loaded rifles, running until they were face to face, and then suddenly opened fire, and then the bayonets turned red.

If it is an experienced regular army of the empire, the knights in charge will organize a supervising team, use orders to force the soldiers to stick to their posts, resist the Clovis people's close-range shooting, and then use a tight formation to beat their scattered charges. go back.

But it is a pity that Louis is not commanding a real army at the moment, and he does not have that many knights to stabilize the more than 6,000 inexperienced militia fighters.

As a result, the already fragile front line was torn open by countless gaps in the smoke. The jihadists maintaining column formation rushed into the position and strangled the panicked militia queues wantonly.

Facing the collapse of the situation, the militiamen relying on the fortifications are still resisting tenaciously; although they are not regular troops, they still vividly display the "imperial style" - morale is highly tied to the leader.

As long as Louis is still leading the battle, the militiamen loyal to him will not stop fighting even if they are defeated steadily.

This extraordinary morale has caused a lot of trouble for the Crusaders, but they are also very experienced in this after years of fighting against the empire; through constant pulling and repeated attacks, they have caused casualties to several times the number of militiamen.

At the same time, the hussars on the western front had also detoured behind the defense line, constantly harassing Louis' attempts to reorganize the defense line, and threatening the rear positions with feint attacks.

Even though the Yangfan City militia still worked hard to keep the front unbroken, and as the leader Louis had already gone into battle personally, they still could not reverse the decline; the balance of victory and defeat on the entire Western Front began to tilt towards the Jihadi Army at an alarming speed.

"It's over, it's all over now!"

Looking at the 11-star ring flag that was gradually being swallowed up in the distance, Alexei, who was hiding in the forest, looked anxious, like an ant on a hot pot: "If this delay continues, the entire front may be dragged down. Damn it, we need to take action quickly.”

"Calm down first!" Roman behind him said coldly, holding his shoulders roughly:

"We don't know exactly what Ansen Bach and Louis Bernard's plan is, and we haven't received any signals from them. Attacking rashly is likely to disrupt the entire battle."

"Signal?!" Alexei suddenly turned his head, with a look of confusion on his face: "The commander-in-chief doesn't even know whether we are here, how can he send us a signal?!"

He threw his arm hard to get free, but found that Roman's palm was like cast iron, and it was motionless when clamped on his shoulder; instead, he moved too hard, so much that he seemed to have sprained his muscles.

"An...he knows." Roman paused and said word by word:

"He even knew exactly where we were, right down to our numbers and equipment levels."

"He..." Alexey's eyes narrowed:

"H-how do you know?!"

Roman's face was expressionless: "I just know."

"Not only that, according to my judgment, you should already know... at least there is speculation in this regard." He lowered his voice and his expression became colder: "So stop pretending to me, Fire Knight of the Dukaski family !”

It was obviously the pain coming from his shoulders, but Alexey felt his heart twitch; a chill rose from the soles of his feet and poured into his whole body.

In the distance, the Sail City militia's front was about to collapse, and the Confederate army's position, which had seemed to remain calm, began to show signs of wavering.

Roman took the telescope from Alexei who was standing there blankly and stared at the battlefield in the distance for a long time, as if he was considering a very difficult decision.

After a long silence, he stuffed the telescope back into the chest of the commander of the 2nd Infantry Regiment: "Get ready to attack."

"well?!"

Alexei was stunned and thought for a moment that he heard wrong: "Now?!"

"Now."

"But, the commander-in-chief hasn't given us the order yet..."

"The battlefield is changing rapidly, how can we miss this opportunity!" Roman said without changing his expression: "What's more, maybe he has already sent us a signal, but we just didn't notice it."

"What signal?"

"How do I know? I'm not Anson Bach!"

"Then you just..."

"I'm just saying it's possible, not certain."

"..."

Alexey's eyes widened, and he really couldn't figure out how a person could complete the reversal in just a few minutes; since Colonel Roman is also a loyal minister, is this a higher form of loyalty? !

Roman, who didn't notice what the guy in front of him was thinking, continued to say coldly and slowly: "The so-called leader must not only be good at taking advantage of changes on the battlefield, but also be good at creating changes at critical moments, forcing the enemy to use tactics that are beneficial to him. A change of direction, that’s what we’re going to do.”

"Forcing the enemy to change?"

Alexey was stunned for a second, and then suddenly realized something: "You, do you know where Major General Ludwig is?!"

"Thank you to Louis Bernard and his brave militiamen for allowing the central front to support the western front in advance and for letting the flags of the messengers reveal the location of the headquarters." Roman nodded slightly:

"Yes, I already know where it is."

……………………

"So where is it?!"

In the empty headquarters, Alexei's eyes widened: "Major General Ludwig Franz...where are the others?!"

Roman, with a dark complexion, looked at the messy map table and said nothing.

But Alexey was not as calm as him... This was not the first time he had raided Ludwig's headquarters. He had already done it once before when the Huangcaolin suffered a disastrous defeat, and it failed in the end.

Now, in less than half a month, this situation happened again, and he broke into an empty door. A very natural thought emerged in the mind of the commander of the Second Infantry Regiment:

Could this be a trap?

Using inertial thinking, deliberately setting up a fake command center to deceive yourself... No! It is to deceive the Commander-in-Chief, and then attract the main force of the Storm Legion into a carefully arranged trap to annihilate this, this, this, this...

This is very possible!

The trembling Alexei's heartstrings were so tense that he almost forgot to breathe; when he thought that if he jumped into the encirclement on his own initiative, he would most likely send a signal and attract friendly troops to gather here, he felt as desperate as the sky was falling and the earth was falling. enveloped his mind.

What should we do? What should we do to prevent the war situation from deteriorating further? !

"Set fire."

"Fireproof?!"

Alexei looked confused: "You, you mean..."

"Major General Ludwig is not here, and we can't confirm whether the headquarters in front of us is real or fake, so we can simply set fire to it and completely burn it down." Roman said coldly:

"It can not only cause chaos, but also organize the surrounding troops to move closer... The most important thing is that we have been exposed, and we will definitely be surrounded by the Jihadi Army a little later. It is better to burn the headquarters directly and take advantage of the chaos and sail on the Western Front. The city army unites!"

"boom--!!!!"

At this moment, from the Confederate position on the other side of the battlefield, a bunch of fireworks rose up, making a sharp and sharp sound in the sky.

Not only Alexei and Roman, but everyone...including everyone who was fighting bloody battles, all subconsciously raised their heads and looked at the place where the fireworks were rising.

Although it is daytime at this moment, even though it is only a very short moment, it is like an accompaniment when the drama is about to reach a turning point; it is fast, bright, and even mixed with an exciting rhythm.

"What exactly is this..."

On the artillery position at the rear of the battlefield on the Western Front, Ludwig stood behind the artillery and looked up at the sky, muttering to himself in a daze, a bad premonition welling up in his heart.

"Legion Commander! The Legion Commander is in trouble!"

Just as he was deep in thought, the panicked exclamation of the messenger brought him back to reality; following the direction pointed by his trembling right hand, Ludwig stared blankly.

Then, he was stunned again, and everyone in the entire artillery position was so frightened that their mouths opened.

A blazing fire broke out behind the center line position, or more accurately, where the headquarters was located.

And it has great momentum to spread!

This... could this be Anson Bach attacking my headquarters... Impossible! He hasn't even been able to break through the frontal position yet. How could it be... Could it be the Second Infantry Regiment following from Yangfan City? But this is too strange. How come they can guess the direction of their headquarters every time? At which location? !

After only a moment of hesitation, Ludwig quickly regained his composure; now that the legion headquarters was destroyed, the unsuspecting army was almost bound to panic, and they had to stop their losses quickly before an accident broke out.

The Western Front Army knows that it is behind them and does not need to worry too much, so the key is the central position and the troops on the Eastern Front... In order to prevent the situation from getting out of control, it is better to let the Eastern Front retreat slowly, first rendezvous with the troops in the Central Position, and then as soon as possible Rush over there to stabilize morale, and then make another plan.

At this time, Ludwig already regretted running to the artillery position to supervise the battle. Because of the smoke and dust, his field of vision was very limited and he could not accurately judge the battlefield shape. He could only make at least "error-free" deployments based on experience.

According to his experience, Anson Bach's army is currently facing a defeat on the Western Front, so it will inevitably devote more combat power to the Western Front to avoid being attacked on its flanks; there should be no problem if it temporarily shrinks the Eastern Front.

As long as nothing unexpected happens, he can easily defeat the weakest link of the Confederate army and force Anson Bach and Louis Bernard to submit obediently.

And then...sure enough, something unexpected happened.

"According to the Hussars' reconnaissance report, the Confederate Army on the Eastern Front did not merge with the Western Front troops, but launched an attack directly on our retreating right wing; the enemy did not organize a line of fire, but launched a full-line assault and directly attacked There are two infantry regiments on the way to retreat!"

"At present, the eastern front position has been completely broken through, and the formation is completely chaotic; because the headquarters of the central position troops was destroyed, the combat units were unable to communicate with each other, and some did not dare to act without authorization and waited for orders. Small groups of troops tried to block the enemy troops who raided the headquarters. , and because of his inability to cooperate, the enemy successfully broke through!"

After saying that, covered with ashes and mud, the messenger who had just rushed back from the fire raised his head and waited for the next order from the legion commander.

Ludwig was stunned.

After being stunned for a long time, when he finally regained consciousness from the series of bad news, he suddenly heard an extremely familiar and extremely pleasant scream coming from the horizon; and the sound was getting closer and closer, More and more...

"boom----!!!!"

A series of six-pounder shells pierced the sky, took off from the Confederate position, and landed accurately on top of Ludwig's head.

The overly shocked corps commander seemed to have forgotten that he had previously moved artillery positions to support the battle on the Western Front, personally directed the concentrated fire, and exposed his coordinates...

The eardrum-piercing explosions and suffocating smoke continued to roll up. The artillery mounts swallowed by the artillery fire, the soldiers and the lead bullets piled on the ground danced in the wind, rushing towards the blue dome like rockets, and then scattering flowers like a goddess. The same scattered on the ground shrouded in gunpowder smoke.

On the artillery position opposite, Karl and Joseph, who didn't know that they almost blew Ludwig into the sky, and exalted the archbishop's own son, looked at the direction of the rising smoke with joyful expressions on their faces, thinking about the big stone in their hearts. Finally landed.

And a certain commander-in-chief, who was ready to break the rules because his strategic plan was completely out of shape, suddenly saw a glimmer of "hope" in the chaotic situation:

"That's right... according to the current momentum, Ludwig's right wing will be defeated in one fell swoop, and he will take advantage of the opportunity to push his Jihad Army to the original Confederate army position, completely blocking him in this plain, and he will have to take the initiative to come Negotiation...my plan is still perfect!"