In the French court, Louis de Bourbon, Duke Louis de Bourbon, was not a very popular man.

Many people think that this person is not only frivolous, but also vain and likes to brag.

It is said that Anne of Brittany, as the queen of Brittany, was not very fond of this country nobleman of Navarre in the time of Charles VIII, and after Louis XII succeeded to the throne, although she seemed to look at the Duke of Bourbon differently, the queen still did not like this duke very much, and everyone else thought that this person would not have much success in the future except to please the king.

Even the Duke of Bourbon himself did not think that he could really take on any important responsibility.

Even though the king entrusted him with the task of capturing Florence, even Louis de Bow himself knew that it was only because it was not a very difficult task.

But now, the Duke of Bourbon suddenly found that the fate of the entire French expeditionary force was in his hands.

The surprise of the Roman Thesian general named Gompati on the other side completely subverted the Duke of Bourbon's military common sense, which was not very rich.

Although he did not receive the desired support from Louis XII, the Duke of Bourbon felt that after such a long pursuit, it was unlikely that the Romantesians would attack him immediately.

So after rushing back to his troops, the Duke of Bourbon allowed his exhausted troops to rest for a while, while he also carefully considered how to use his existing forces to sustain them until Louis XII defeated the Neapolitans.

But the sudden appearance of the Roman Thesians completely shattered his previous assumptions.

Even when the Bohemian light cavalry of Rome Tescia appeared on the flank of his camp, the Duke of Bourbon did not fully understand the meaning of the scout's statement that the enemy had attacked.

After all, the enemy was not only equally tired, but also had to engage the French rearguard troops along the way, and no general would be foolish enough to let his troops who were demoralized by extreme fatigue go into battle so quickly.

People like that are crazy.

And this Gompati is such an out-and-out madman!

This was the thought that the Duke of Bourbon kept screaming in his heart until he was hit by a stray bullet and fell off his horse.

The scrambled attendants dragged the Duke out of the way from the mount, and dragged him into flight.

From time to time, the sudden sound of fierce gunfire mingled with the dying prayers and desperate screams of the soldiers, and the ears of the Duke of Bourbon were filled with the panic of the soldiers in front of him, some even pushing him and his retinue aside in desperation just to get in their way.

At this time, no one cared about the majesty and status of the Duke anymore, everyone only thought about being able to save their own lives, and at this moment the humblest soldiers and noble nobles were also doing their best to save their lives.

Not far in front, a group of soldiers wearing red felt hats and semi-triangular robes attracted the attention of the Duke of Bourbon, and he was surprised to find that these people could still be arranged in an orderly formation under the command of an officer, which made the Duke who was already about to despair a lot more excited.

He ran towards the group and shouted from afar, "Whose troops are you, and where are your officers?" ”

The officer, who was busy commanding the troops, immediately ran over, and he gasped and said to the duke, "My lord, we are soldiers of Count Anvy from Baras, and unfortunately our lord has died in battle, but he died bravely. ”

"That's a terrible thing," the Duke of Bourbon replied casually, looking at the officer who seemed to be somewhat familiar, "and who are you?" ”

"Victor de Condé, in fact, I am your distant cousin." The officer replied loudly.

"No wonder I look familiar to you," the Duke of Bourbon hurriedly looked at the soldiers, "tell me if they can still fight?" ”

"Of course, my lord is always ready." The officer, Victor de Condé, continued to answer loudly with his characteristic northern accent.

"Well, my distant relative, whether you want it or not, now you are the officer of this force," the Duke hastily drew his sword and struck it a few times on de Condé's shoulder, "I appoint you deputy commander of my troops, with full authority to command all my troops in my place, and I allow you to use all means as long as you can win." ”

"Yes, sir." De Condé hastily knelt down and immediately got up and turned to give orders to the soldiers, while he drew his sword and personally stopped the retreating soldiers, and then urged them to turn and face the approaching enemy.

The Duke of Bourbon breathed a sigh of relief from the army, and he asked his attendants to find a new horse for him, and after jumping on horseback, he looked seriously at the enemy position opposite.

To the surprise of the Duke de Bourbon, the enemy did not seem to be in the same formation as before, but were still in pairs of columns, between which some strange-looking and suspicious-looking carriages followed them.

In fact, if you think about it carefully, the Duke of Bourbon will find that he actually did not really fight with the Roman Thesian army from beginning to end, and before under the city of Florence, the whole formation collapsed suddenly because of the sudden shelling, and then the escape along the way gave the French army no chance to start a formal confrontation with the enemy, and even the chaos that had just occurred was caused by the sudden attack of the Roman Thescian army.

"They are savage and vile like infidels, and these men fight not at all like knights with honor, but more like a band of robbers and Tatars," said the Duke of Bourbon to the people around him, and when he heard them echo him, the Duke whipped a servant next to him in annoyance, "but they have defeated me, do you think I am even more stupid than these barbarians?" ”

Some of the retinue, who did not know what to answer, looked at each other, knowing that the Duke was angry at the previous humiliation, but fortunately the knight of Victor de Condé had reorganized his troops, and after fleeing back for nearly two miles, the French army had finally re-established a line of defense not too far from the king's main force.

Standing on a carriage and carefully watching the formation of the French army, he was somewhat surprised that the enemy was able to reorganize the counterattack in such a situation, so that he looked at the Duke of Bourbon a little differently, but then he smiled slightly, and gave the order to the troops who had not even had time to form because of the pursuit all the way: "Stop advancing. ”

Finally stopped, the two almost numb legs of the Roman army barely managed to maintain order and slowly spread out in formation, but from a distance it was clear that they were indeed exhausted.

"This is a good opportunity," said the knight Victor de Condé, who was almost at the forefront of the position, excitedly shouting to one of the knights beside him, "if we do not attack at this time, then even God will not forgive us." ”

The knight looked at this lucky guy with dissatisfaction, even the less intelligent people could see that at this time Rome Thessia was in the most disadvantageous situation, and it was really as the Knight of Condé said, if you give up such an opportunity, even God will not forgive.

"Lucky hillbilly." The knight cursed in a low voice, he knew that after this battle, the country knight was likely to soar, and maybe he would have to be respectful to him the next time they met, but this was probably God's arrangement.

Under the command of the knights of de Condé, the French army mustered up the courage to launch a counterattack against the enemy, in order to boost morale, as the deputy commander of the knights of Condé took the lead in the front of the ranks, which somewhat inspired the morale of the French army, with a shout, the French knights began to leap out of the ranks, they lined up in two tight lines in front of the formation, and in the loud cheers of the soldiers behind them, the knights began to charge the enemy.

"It was a touching scene," Gompati said to those around him, "and if it weren't for their enemies, I would have written a hymn to their bravery, but now I can only entertain them with death." ”

As he spoke, Gompati gave the order to shoot at the chariot team, which was already impatiently waiting.

As the fierce and dense gunfire rang out, Gompati stared carefully at the seemingly complex weapons, although he had seen the power of such weapons during experiments, but it was the first time he had actually seen them wreak havoc on the battlefield and slaughter the enemy.

Gompati was interested in this expensive "toy" but somewhat unimpressed, believing that although it seemed to be powerful, it still could not be compared to artillery.

It was only after that dense and chilling firing that Gompati felt that he should change his mind a little.

It must be admitted that this kind of cluster musket, which was inexplicably named "Alexander's favor" by the Queen of Naples, although posed a great threat to the dense formation, but perhaps because of the amount of charge, it was not very powerful in the face of heavily armored knights.

Bullets are often shot everywhere on the armor of the knights, and even if someone is unlucky enough to be shot into the naked body, it is often not critical, and the real threat to these knights is actually the war horse that has been hit one after another.

Perhaps in the eyes of the soldiers who shot the knights with firearms, the majestic knights and their horses themselves were the perfect targets, and the "favor of Alexander" was obviously not aimed only at the master on the horse, so when the knights rushed forward desperately with their heavy armor, their mounts endured almost the same oncoming rain of bullets as they did.

Even if they were also clothed with armor, the protection of the war horses was obviously unable to withstand the rain of bullets, one by one the war horses neighed and fell to the ground, some knights broke their necks on the spot and whimpered, some broke their bones and tendons and lay on the ground and kept shouting, and more people simply couldn't get up immediately because the fake photos on their bodies were too heavy.

Some of them were trampled by the horses behind them, and even if they dodged, they could only put down their faces and shout for help to the French soldiers who followed, and for a while the passion and romantic fragrance of the French knights who had charged before were completely masked by the pungent smell of gunpowder and blood on the battlefield.

The Knight of the Pocket was obviously stunned by this unexpected scene, but he immediately ordered to attack the enemy again, and his bravery and steadfastness obviously played an important role, and the French army, which had been shaken by the unexpected frustration of the knights, involuntarily followed the team forward and approached the enemy in the sound of rapid war drums.

"I bet it's not the Duke of Bourbon who is now in command of the French," said Gompati with some strange oddity, "I don't know who this man is, but I must admit that he is a great soldier." ”

The armor glittered in the sunlight, the sword flashed with a terrifying edge from time to time, and Gompati looked behind him, knowing that even with all the pack horses and light gun carriages designed to transport artillery, his artillery was still far behind, and now he had to fight head-on if he wanted to defeat the enemy in front of him once and for all.

"If none of us die after this battle, I'd love to get to know the man who is now in command of the French," Gompati nodded to the heralds who were already waiting, and watched the heralds turn their horses and run away, Gompati glanced in the direction of Siena, "I hope everything goes well, otherwise the Duke will not spare me." ”

This is the sixth day of the siege of the city of Montina, and Charlain writes about his feelings on this day in his diary: "I am very disturbed, the candle in front of me fell during the prayer last night, which makes me believe that it is not a good sign, that my soldiers have shed enough blood under this castle, and the most terrible thing is that whenever we think that we have adapted to the tactics of the enemy, we find that it is really only the tip of the labyrinth. ”

Charron closed the diary and looked up, he saw a place on the castle was rising puffs of smoke, which was a method that one of the French gunners came up with, wrapping a thick layer of tar around the outside of the stone projectile, when the cannonball landed on the enemy's city, even if it was not directly hit, the tar on the cannonball splashed around and the hot heat could make the skin on a person's body instantly burn.

This method has worked, this primitive "incendiary bomb" has already caused a lot of casualties to the Roman Thesian soldiers in the city, and more importantly, the burn wounds left by the marks look horrific and shocking, which is enough to deal a great psychological blow to the enemy.

Charron rewarded the gunner with a few florins, and then asked him to teach the others how to make this tar incendiary bomb, which was probably the only good news since the attack on Montina Castle, but it did not hide the growing anxiety in Charlon's heart.

Charlaon was now certain that Gompati's main army of the North had bypassed itself and marched south, which made him even more certain that the Venetians and Austrians had finally joined the fray.

Charlon's speculation proved this fact, and the intelligence brought back by the waiter proved that the Venetians had been approaching Montina with Ferrara's troops, which made Charlon not only begin to worry about the situation facing the French army.

The originally powerful French army was finally divided into different parts for various reasons after entering the territory of Rome and Thesia, and these processes seemed to be made by the French themselves, but Charlon always felt that all this seemed to have been arranged a long time ago, and when he thought of the undefended Florence, Charlon felt that the city full of literature and wealth was actually like the famous apple that tempted the French king.

And the Duke of Rome Thesia, Charlon, though he did not want to compare him to the poisonous snake, now it seems that he feels more and more that that Alexandre Giulian Cambrai has been playing this role all along.

But immediately withdraw from Montina?

The thought only flashed in Charlon's mind and he threw it aside.

The French king hoped to completely crush the will of resistance of the Duchy of Rome and Thesia by occupying the castle of Montina, and even if it could not force them to withdraw from the anti-French alliance, he could deter the entire anti-French alliance by striking a severe blow to the arrogance of the Duke of Rome and Thesia.

Sharron had to admit that the Duke of Thehir had become a formidable enemy of the king before he knew it, and because of this, the king slowly fell into the trap that the duke had laid for him a long time ago.

Another scout came in a hurry, and this man reported to Scharlon, ignoring the kettle handed by others: "Venetian, my lord, it's a Venetian!" ”

"Are the Venetians already here, where are they?" Although Sharon had already known the movements of the Venetians, he was still nervous when he heard that the Venetians had finally arrived on the battlefield.

"The Venetians have about 5,000 men, and a Ferrara army of about 1,000 men," said the scout nervously, "and they are not fast, but the strikers have crossed the lower reaches of the Season and will arrive at noon tomorrow at the most." ”

The scout's words made Charlen suddenly wrinkle his eyebrows, and he quickly walked to the map to look closely, and saw the large inward bend between the lower reaches of the Jiya River and the castle of Montina, and Charlon's heart slammed.

The Venetian crossed the river not from the nearest place, but from a little further downstream, which did not make Charlon feel a hint of relaxation, on the contrary he smelled of intrigue.

It was just that he didn't notice for a moment whether this conspiracy was against him or someone else, and it made Scharren feel very uncomfortable, he felt as if he had stepped into a huge cobweb from the beginning, and what was happening now was actually only a small part of some terrifying and huge conspiracy in the future.

Charron did not think that he was thinking nonsense, because from the current situation, the army had been unconsciously divided into many large and small parts, which was extremely unfavorable to the French army, which was in the huge quagmire of war in Italy, and Louis XII had obviously been attracted to Florence, so that the main force of the French army had penetrated deep into Rome and Thesia.

Is it too late to withdraw troops from Montina immediately to stop all this before the situation gets worse?

The thought crossed Sharron's mind, but he knew that even if he could, it wouldn't be easy.

If he withdraws his troops without permission, then the besieging of Pisa will inevitably face pressure from three sides, and even the slightest carelessness may lead to the encirclement and annihilation, if then he will be the greatest sinner in France.

"Send a letter to the Count of Proswan at once." Sharron hurriedly began to write a letter, he wanted to explain what was happening to Borgwicken, although the relationship with Borgwicken was a little delicate, but Sharron believed that the Count of Proswan would not deliberately ignore his advice because of personal grudges.

It's just that whether all this is still in time makes Sharron worried.

All day on July 15, the central part of Italy was filled with fire, fighting raging in Montina, in Pisa, and outside Siena.

The French army had launched several successive attacks on the Neapolitan army, and at the same time, the Papal army, after the declaration of war, had launched a fierce counterattack on the flank of the French army from the direction of Siena after the initial active attack was repulsed by the French army.

The earth-shattering sound of artillery resounded everywhere on the battlefield, and the staggered battle lines on both sides were almost impossible to distinguish between the front and the rear, and often a unit would find that it was actually the enemy who was "fighting side by side" with itself after a burst of attack, while others would just withdraw from a failed battle, but unconsciously find themselves entering another battlefield and becoming the vanguard at the forefront.

The casualties on both sides have become more and more large, the previously neat and solemn and majestic troops have become embarrassed at this time, the damaged artillery has been casually abandoned in the wasteland, the war horses that have lost their masters are running blindly on the battlefield, and from time to time a military flag will be raised or fallen, and no one can care about those who are wounded, and no one will have time to ask for their lives, because their lives are threatened at any time.

Kulash rode back and forth on his horse, feeling that the situation was not very good, and that the French army clearly had the advantage of the so-called interior battle, which allowed them to gather enough troops in a shorter time and speed, and the coalition forces were likely to be the target of each French attack because they were to attack from the south-west flank.

"General, the Queen's orders!" A contagion shouted loudly.

"Well, tell me what the queen is going to do!" Kulash said angrily, he felt annoyed that a woman was actually pointing fingers on the battlefield.

"Your Majesty said her troops would move their positions."

"What?!"

Not only was Kulash taken aback, but even Skop, who happened to come over, let out an unexpected exclamation.

"General, you heard it right, Your Majesty wants to move your position, she wants you to stabilize the formation and not move, her army will move closer to you." The herald roared into Kulash's ears with all the strength of the distant cannon sound.

"Doesn't she know how dangerous it is to move the formation at this time?" Skop anxiously asked Kulash, "You must stop her as soon as possible." ”

"No, wait a minute," Kulash, who had been on the verge of a thunderstorm by accident, suddenly stepped nimbly on the back of his horse and climbed a high branch, and stood there for a while towards the battlefield, and then let out a loud laugh, "My God, I must say that this queen is such a strange woman, and I swear that if anyone refuses to obey her orders because she is a woman, I will be the first to duel him!" ”

After saying that, Kulash jumped on the horse's back from the branch, drew his saber and drew a scar in the air: "Listen to my orders, stop the attack, hold the position, and let us wait for the meeting of the queen!" ”

On the afternoon of July 15, after a stalemate of fierce fighting for most of the day, the coalition forces began to encircle the central part of the French army centered on the royal army of King Louis XII of France, at the cost of the heavy casualties caused by the fierce French attack of the Neapolitan army.

It was also on this afternoon that a priest from Montina, after difficult lobbying, finally persuaded the Regent of Pisa, Lucrezia, to begin a counterattack against the French army besieging the city, with Nicolas Macioni as the commander.