I'm the king of the roll at Hogwarts

Chapter 174 Eat some strawberries
The French prepared their artillery fire with eighty guns, not just the planned twenty-four twelve-pounders, but the power was not as daunting as Napoleon had expected.

Mewington still used his old method of hiding his infantry behind the top of the mountain. Most of the French artillery shells penetrated into the rain-soaked mud on the front slope and did not cause any damage.

As we all know, in this era, artillery basically uses solid shells, and the lethality generally relies on ricochets to cause damage, that is, the shells hit the ground and bounce back to cause multiple casualties.

Of course, for the shells to ricochet, the ground must be hard enough, otherwise they will get stuck in the mud. In addition, the angle of incidence must be as small as possible, only in this way can they bounce. In order to ensure the angle of incidence, the cannons at that time generally used flat-firing cannons, which were also called cannons.

In rainy weather like this, it is almost impossible for the artillery shells to cause the kind of casualties that Napoleon hoped for.

What is the situation now? When the artillery sounded a second ago, all the British units were frightened and shrank their necks. After the shells hit the ground, there was no reaction. They shrank for a long time before realizing that the French artillery was just making a lot of noise but little results.

What's there to be afraid of? A large orange cat on reconnaissance duty happily poked its head out to see what was going on, but was hit in the ear by a flying rock from a cannonball.

He screamed in pain, but it was of no use. Who made him deserve to be kicked?

There was still some time before Napoleon launched a formal attack. Under orders, the British soldiers took out the enamel jars tucked into their field backpacks. People from the quartermaster department or bored officers held the bottles and distributed wine to everyone. Everyone got a big sip of gin.

Enamel jars were a treatment only available to elite troops like the Guards. The calico cat regiment that Louis had met before could only use large jars used for eating to hold wine.

"Here comes the drink, men—drink it if you can," cried the officers, as they moved through the ranks.

Arriving at the 72nd Regiment where Little Sans-Cat was, the officer looked at Little Sans-Cat, who was praying with a string of beads in his hand, and stood in front of him with a bottle of wine and asked, "Jack?"

"No, thank you, sir," Jack refused politely.

The officer said nothing, but stretched out his cat paw to rub his head and continued walking to the side.

When the officer left, a bicolor cat beside him held his big rice bowl and nudged him with his elbow: "Have some gin, Jack, this is a greeting from His Majesty the King."

Then he added, "Remind me to thank him next time we go to the palace."

Jack didn't answer, but asked in a daze: "Lawrence, do you think... there will be a lot of them?"

Lawrence took a sip of wine and exclaimed "ah" at the spicy taste. He calmed down a bit before answering Jack's question: "I don't have X-ray vision, Jack. How would I know what's going on over the mountain? Why don't you go over and ask, you say, hey, damn French, how many people are here? See if they will answer you..."

"You are unlucky after all. You met Napoleon the first time you participated in the war. Haha..." Lawrence saw that Jack was silent and patted his head again. "Forget it, don't think about it. Even if there are 100,000 people on the other side of the mountain, you can't persuade them to go back by praying. If prayer is useful, I don't think we would have formed an anti-French alliance."

Jack finally turned his head, looked at his chatty friend and asked curiously, "Aren't you afraid?"

“Nothing frightens me, my dear Jack, except the presence of a mysterious friend,” Laurence replied in a rather sarcastic tone.

As if he really wanted to dispel his fear, he picked up his big rice bowl and took a big gulp of wine.

He also put the wine that belonged to Jack into his own rice bowl.

"I'd better drink it all, otherwise the French will snatch it away..." Lawrence made amends to himself and drank the rest of the wine in one gulp.

Following the commander's shout of "72nd Regiment, forward!", Jack and Lawrence quickly put away the things in their hands, picked up their rifles from the side, joined the marching team.

Next to the temporary command post, Meowlington also jumped on his horse, looked around, and shouted loudly: "Ubrich, where is Ubrich?"

"Here, sir." A silver tabby came out of the tent in a hurry. He had just gone to the toilet.

"Notify your darlings, it's time to attack... drive back the French guys who are coming over, meow." Meowlington ordered.

The darlings refer to the Scottish Grey Dragoons under Ubridge, which is similar to a joking term.

Ubrich saluted quickly and pulled up his trousers as he ran.

When the order was given, William Ponsonby, the commander of the Union Brigade, was taking snuff with his adjutant.

"Try this, it's quite strong." Ponsonby took out a small box of snuff and watched the adjutant pinch out a bunch of it. He couldn't help but blame him distressedly: "Oh, don't waste it. This is the last stock."

After receiving the order to attack, he drew out his saber with his silver-gray cat claws and put it on his shoulder, then turned around and shouted, "Now! Scottish Grey Dragoons, it's time!"

When the bugler heard the order from his superior, he raised his head, raised the bugle and started blowing it.

Hearing the bugle call, the Scottish cavalry drew their sabers in unison and also carried them on their shoulders.

When the Scottish cavalry attacked, Louis and Chromie were watching the battlefield situation in the command post. Since the command post was reinforced with protective magic, they were not worried about any damage caused by artillery shells.

From the perspective of the high altitude, the cavalrymen wearing tall bear-skin hats moved forward in small steps, gradually speeding up. From a distance, they looked like a wave of black, red and gray, and their speed was getting faster and faster. The galloping horses were wrapped in thick smoke and dust, and they swarmed towards the artillery positions of the French vanguard.

From time to time, shells fell around them, bringing up clouds of smoke, but the Scottish cavalry were fearless and continued to charge towards their target.

Napoleon, who was standing next to the French command post, of course also noticed the charging cavalry. He looked ahead and seemed to be talking to himself.

"Those guys on the gray horses look pretty scary, meow."

"They are the most noble cavalry in Europe, but the worst in command." said Soult beside him.

"Maybe, maybe." Napoleon repeated twice without commenting, and then said: "Where are my Polish Lancers? Order them to attack and let these British guys have a taste of our power!"

Upon receiving the order, the Polish lancers, accompanied by the loud sound of bugles, raised their lances in unison and began to march quickly in the direction of the Scottish Cavalry Mixed Brigade.

Ubrich, who was on the high ground, also saw the conspicuous Lancers. He was now regretting that he should not have sent the Gray Cavalry to attack the enemy artillery position so early. Now, this has become the Waterman Wave Heights. But he did not think about how to deal with the artillery position that has already threatened the center of Meowlington if he did not send this wave.
"Blow the retreat!" Ubrich immediately ordered the bugler beside him.

The bugler did as he was told, but the battlefield was too noisy and the Scottish Greys were so bloodthirsty that their soldiers could not hear his call.
Mewlington was annoyed by the noise. The bugler blew too hard, causing his ears to hurt. He stretched out his cat's paw to scratch his ears and shouted almost in a scolding tone: "Stop blowing your useless bugle!"

In fact, it was also a bit of personal emotion. He obviously felt a little regretful after sending out the Gray Cavalry.

This made the situation even worse for the coalition forces, which were already at a disadvantage in terms of cavalry numbers.

Bugle Cat put down the bugle in his hand and looked at Mewlington aggrievedly. He didn't understand how he had made the Marshal angry.

Meowlington also knew that his behavior was inappropriate and not what a gentleman should do. He quickly apologized, "Oh, sorry. I'm just worried that you might hurt yourself."

The artillery fire became more and more rapid, with shells constantly landing everywhere, bringing up pieces of mud. The situation on the battlefield was too tense, and everyone was concerned about the battle situation of the Scottish cavalry and their own safety, so no one noticed that the shells fell on the tent next to Mewlington and disappeared mysteriously.

It may also be that Ye Ziyan's Muggle shielding spell caused no one to pay attention to them, and Meowlington seemed to have forgotten the existence of Louis and the others.

"Any trace of the Eternal Dragon?" Louis raised his eyes and glanced at Chromie who was in a daze out of boredom.

"No, it seems they have given up on this place." Chromie shook her head. During this period of time, she had been searching the largest range she could scan, but unfortunately she found nothing.

"Then shall we wait here?" Louis was a little annoyed. Not everyone can stay on the battlefield. The feeling that lives are dying at every moment really makes the atmosphere extremely depressing.

The only two dragons in the entire tent who remained calm were Chromie and Kristrasza. The former, as a guardian of time, was accustomed to such life and death scenes, while the latter was heartless.

Louis was fine, and Catherine just looked a little pale, but Ye Ziyan really couldn't accept this scene and returned to her original time and space first.

Come to think of it, this should be the reaction of a normal person. After all, we are not bloodthirsty demons, and it is a bit outrageous to be as careless as Christrasza.

"Fawn." Catherine's voice was very depressed, and her slender hands held Louis' shoulders.

Louis patted her slender waist without saying anything. In the blink of an eye, the French army made new movements.

Oh, it was a French army cruising on the periphery, not in Waterloo, but patrolling and investigating about 20 kilometers away.

It was Grouchy whom Michelle mentioned earlier.

There are many different versions in history, especially in the works of novelist Stefan Zweig, which seems to put all the blame on Grouchy. But it is not so clear who is right and who is wrong. At least it was Napoleon's order that he was looking for Blücher outside.

Now he was riding on a tall horse, holding a basket in his arms and picking strawberries from it.

It looked quite fresh and he seemed quite happy eating it.

The dull sound of cannonballs came. Grouchy put his basket on the saddle, looked around and asked: "Where are the cannons? Where are the cannons?"

"It's the direction of Mont Saint-Jean, sir," replied Gerard beside him.

Grouchy was stunned for a moment, and after thinking for a moment, he replied indifferently, "Oh."

"Sir, there seems to be fierce fighting in the direction of Mont Saint-Jean. Should we..." Gerard asked anxiously. From the sound of artillery, he judged that there must be big movements over there.

It seemed that his beloved emperor did not have such an advantage against the coalition forces.

"I know you are anxious, but please don't be anxious, my general." Grouchy picked up the strawberry basket again and started putting the strawberries into his mouth.

Gerard's face suddenly turned ugly, and his two cat teeth were bared: "For God's sake, the sound of artillery is calling us! March in the direction of the sound of artillery. We are leading one-third of the troops, and our duty is..."

Grouchy's face darkened instantly. He tilted his head and interrupted Gerard in a bad tone: "You don't need to teach me what our duties are, General. The instructions I received from the Emperor are clear. That is, let my sword always chase behind Blücher. Meow."

Gerard was really anxious. Grouchy's lukewarm attitude really made him doubt his current character. He stiffened his neck in annoyance and even spit on Grouchy's strawberry: "If you are not going to march towards the sound of the cannon, then let me go!"

"Divide my army? Humph... the laws of Meow Lancy will sentence me to death." Grouchy remained unmoved and was still eating strawberries leisurely.

"You..." Gerard was choked and couldn't utter a word. He could only point at Grouchy tremblingly, and put it down dejectedly after a long while.

(You will become the sinner of Meow Lancy, Grouchy...)
Unable to change the coach's mind, Gerard could only sigh to the sky and pray silently for the emperor and Meow Lanxi in his heart.

……

While Grouchy remained unmoved, the Duke of Mewington and Napoleon simultaneously discovered that in the distance from the main battlefield of Waterloo, there was a troop of about five or six thousand people marching towards the battlefield.

"Labé Doyet!" cried Napoleon.

Doyle came forward and Napoleon handed him the telescope, pointing it in the direction of the unknown troops he saw: "What is that moving?"

"I see some troops marching in a column over there, about five or six thousand people..." General Duvalier replied.

"He's right," Surt added from behind.

Telescopes of that era were not very effective, and you couldn't see anything clearly from a distance. Napoleon couldn't figure out whose troops they were, so he could only ask the generals beside him: "Whose troops are they? Ours or Prummeau's?"

"This..." The generals looked at each other. At this distance, they couldn't see the uniforms of the troops at all. For a moment, no one knew how to answer.

(End of this chapter)