Descending On France 1780
Chapter 245 - 238 musicians lost their hearing

Chapter 245: 238 musicians lost their hearing

Beethoven watched as the enemy began a full-scale assault and quietly sped up the tempo of his drumming.

This should urge his comrades to shoot faster.

Beethoven glanced at his fellow soldiers and was pleased to find that they hadn’t noticed the quicker tempo; they were purely focused on loading, their movements quickening with the music.

Because of the urgency, Frost had issued orders a month earlier that the newly drafted National Guard soldiers would not train in formations but only shooting and loading.

Now this order was proving effective; the soldiers had developed basic muscle memory for loading such that they didn’t notice Beethoven’s subtle acceleration.

Due to the continuous shooting, Beethoven could scarcely see the riverside in front of him; his entire field of vision was filled with white smoke.

In such a situation, the soldiers were still able to continue shooting because reference points had been set up on the fortifications during construction.

As long as the soldiers aligned their guns with these reference points, they could ensure the gun barrels were roughly aimed at the enemies on the bank.

Then the rest could be left to probability.

As Beethoven continued drumming, he watched everyone’s condition and quietly sped up the drumming a little bit more, which quickly led to problems.

He saw a soldier, after ramming down the wadding paper with the ramrod, forget to withdraw the ramrod.

That man then fired his musket with the ramrod still inserted.

The ramrod flew out of the barrel, drawing a very small parabola, disappearing into the darkness.

Beethoven wanted to apologize to the soldier who lost his ramrod, blaming himself for arbitrarily quickening the pace of the music which led to the mistake.

Then he watched as the hapless Ma Daha began a new loading cycle. The first step of reloading was to pull the ramrod from underneath the gun’s rest, and use it to clear out the barrel, dealing with unburned gunpowder and such to prevent jamming while loading.

But after fumbling underneath the gun barrel for a long while, Ma Daha realized that his ramrod was gone.

While Ma Daha searched for his ramrod, Beethoven did not stop drumming.

So Ma Daha became even more frantic and quickly grabbed someone else’s ramrod, starting to complete his own loading steps.

The one whose ramrod was taken was bewildered; he punched Ma Daha on the shoulder and demanded, "Where is your own ramrod?"

Ma Daha spread his hands: "I don’t know! It vanished in a flash; it was just fine a moment ago. Anyway, let me borrow yours..."

"What should I use then?" asked the musket owner impatiently and, with a swiftly raised hand, snatched his ramrod back.

Now it was Ma Daha again, standing there with a musket, ramrodless and dumbfounded.

The bad news was, he was now on the battlefield, and having his ramrod stolen effectively rendered his musket useless.

The good news was, they were currently in free-shooting mode, and there was a dire shortage of French Army officers, so no one was momentarily taking care of this soldier who lost his ramrod.

Ma Daha continued his futile search, until Beethoven, unable to watch any longer, whispered a reminder, "Your ramrod flew out with your bullet just now, it’s landed a bit in front of the fortification."

Ma Daha immediately looked ahead and spotted something the shape of his ramrod on the ground.

He quickly vaulted over the barricade.

It was then that the officer of the company noticed this fellow and yelled out, "What are you doing! Get back here! Get behind the cover! Ricochets are everywhere; it’s dangerous to run around now!"

The officer said this just as Ma Daha bent over, satisfied to pick up his lost ramrod, straightened with contentment—

At that instant, an enemy artillery shell came flying, striking the unfortunate ramrod holder in the waist.

In a split second, the poor man was blown in half, his spine and everything else severed at once, with only some skin and nerves on the left side holding on by a thread.

The sudden appearance of such a gruesome scene deeply shocked Beethoven.

It was then that he became acutely aware that he was on a battlefield where death was a hair’s breadth away.

Beethoven suddenly felt nauseous, likely due to the too-stimulating event he had just witnessed.

In order not to affect his drumming, Beethoven forcefully swallowed back the vomit that had reached his mouth.

Because of re-swallowing the vomit, Beethoven’s mouth was filled with the bitter taste of bile and stomach acid, as if he had a mouthful of swill.

He couldn’t help but feel relieved, fortunate that he was playing the drums, not the flute.

The shooting continued.

Suddenly, a cannonball hit the wooden fence in front of where Beethoven was located.

The flying wood chips injured many people at once.

Beethoven suddenly felt a buzz in his head, followed by severe ringing in his ears that overwhelmed his hearing.

He could hardly hear the sound of his own drum; even though it was him beating it, it sounded as if it came from hundreds of meters away.

Beethoven had an ominous premonition.

Could it be that he was going deaf?

The most cruel punishment for a musician is the deprivation of their hearing!

An intense anxiety took hold of Beethoven, and he wanted to flee the battlefield immediately to see a doctor about his ears.

But he overcame this impulse and continued to play the military music by relying on his physical skill.

**

Anning was unaware that in this time and place, Beethoven had just lost his hearing to an ear disease.

He was observing the battlefield, ready to personally lead his guards in a countercharge at any moment.

All of his elite forces were in Paris; the only well-trained ones left were Anning’s own guards.

Deploying the guards at a crucial moment would deliver a decisive strike!

However, a better option soon presented itself to Anning.

Anning suddenly heard someone shouting, "Look! It’s Colonel Lasalle!"

He immediately turned around and saw Lasalle’s cavalry brigade coming along the river from upstream.

He quickly tore off a piece of note paper and handwrote an order: Lasalle, I command you to charge along the riverbank and sweep the enemy who are forcefully crossing the river.

After writing it, he shouted, "Messenger! Come, take this to Lasalle."

The messenger soldier saluted and ran off.

Moments later, Lasalle’s troops changed direction and began to advance along the riverbank.

The horse hooves kicked up a great deal of spray on the riverbank, and from afar, Lasalle’s cavalry brigade appeared to be walking on the waves.

Then came Lasalle’s distinctive battle cry, "ALIALIALIA!"

It was almost similar to the sound shouted by the King of Conquerors, Iskander, when he launched the King’s Army in "FATE/ZERO."

The cavalry coming from the flank charged into the enemy that had just crossed the river.

The raised horse swords reflected the sun’s light.

The blood of the coalition soldiers cut down by the swords dyed the Marne River red.

The enemy attempting the forced river crossing collapsed, those at the back turned around and ran towards the opposite bank through the water, while many in front knelt down and surrendered.

Some stumbled over nothing, slipping into the water, and were washed away by the current.

The first day of the Marne River bank offense and defense was a victory for the French Army.