Chapter 396 You Played a Big Role

The night of Paris in May, like a frivolous woman, quietly descended on this city of light.

The lights on both sides of the river gradually lit up, from far to near, and the river water was dotted with red light against the backdrop of the night, as if countless stars fell into the mortal world.

The leaves of the plane tree swayed gently in the breeze, making a rustling sound, as if whispering about today's war.

(Note: Paris developed sewers and lighting systems on a large scale during the Louis XIV era, making it the world's first city with public lighting at night. They used thousands of candle-lit street lamps to illuminate 912 streets in Paris, so it was called the "City of Light")

At that time, Charles was sleeping soundly in the dormitory, and was suddenly awakened by a cheer. He turned over and sat up from the bed. Before his head was clear, his feet had already skillfully opened the door in the dark and ran to the command center where the sound came from.

This is a habit that Charles developed in battle. Sometimes he felt that his body and soul were separated. The former would consciously do things according to the wartime set without going through the brain at all.

When he ran to the headquarters, Tijani also arrived, along with several staff officers, all in pajamas, looking at the signalman on duty with a confused look on their faces.

"General." The signalman ran to Charles and reported excitedly: "They have joined us, Italy, just now, they declared war on Austria-Hungary and urgently mobilized the army!"

Everyone was stunned, and then cheered like the signalman, and some people hugged each other to celebrate.

Only Charles had a calm face, thinking what else he thought it was, just this thing!

Charles said "hmm", handed the telegram back to the signalman, yawned and turned to walk towards the dormitory.

Tijani quickly caught up from behind, with a puzzled tone: "Brigadier General, you don't seem to take this to heart?"

"I should take it to heart?" Charles slowed down and asked.

"Of course." Tijani replied, "A country joined us, and it was won by your efforts. Isn't this a major victory? This war may end because of this, but you don't care at all."

Tijani looked up and down at Charles, and he acted as if nothing had happened.

Charles looked at Tijani in disbelief. These guys actually thought that the war might end because of Italy's joining!

But it seems to be okay to think about it. At this time, the Allies were fighting evenly with the Central Powers. The joining of Italy should have easily tipped the scales to the Allies.

But Charles knew that this was not the case.

In history, Italy assembled millions of troops to launch an attack, but was blocked by more than 100,000 people from the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the Isonzo River area and could not move forward. After that, when Germany recovered and sent reinforcements, Italy was almost destroyed.

Does Charles need to cheer for this ally? Still deceiving himself into thinking that the war will end because of this?

Charles sighed softly, and glanced at Tijani with pity: "I'll continue to dream, you do yours!"

Without further explanation, he walked into the dormitory, closed the door, and came to the bed and fell straight on it like a zombie.

I thought to myself that I should tell the signalman tomorrow, and don't make a fuss about Italy in the future to disturb people's dreams!

...

In fact, it's not just Tijani who thinks so, the citizens of Paris, the French people, and even the entire Allied military and civilians think so.

That's Italy, a big country that can easily recruit millions of troops.

The French army now has only millions of troops, and she has fought back and forth with the Germans with these troops. Italy's millions of troops fighting the weakest Austro-Hungarian Empire, with a 5-fold advantage in troops, isn't it as easy as walking across a bridge?

So the next morning, when people saw the news in the newspaper, the whole of Paris was boiling, and there were cheers in the streets and alleys. People were discussing excitedly:

"Charles gave the Allies a heavy blow. The victory in Cambrai enabled us to successfully win Italy, and Italy's joining will completely end this war!"

"Yes, this makes Gallipoli seem less important. The Allies' flanks are exposed to the Italian front."

"No, no, the victory in Gallipoli is equally important. It can tie down the Allies' forces!"

...

By now, many citizens have gone from knowing nothing about military affairs to semi-military experts. They can tell a thing or two about the situation of the war, and some of them are quite reasonable.

After getting up, Charles ate the bread brought by the orderly as usual, and soon received a call from General Winter.

"You played a big role in this matter, Brigadier General." General Winter said.

"I know." Charles replied lazily: "Everyone says that the victory of the Battle of Cambrai is so much that my ears are callused..."

"You think it's the Battle of Cambrai?" The voice on the phone was smiling.

"What else could it be?" Charles asked in confusion.

General Winter replied: "I just said, 'You played a big role', Brigadier General!"

Charles then understood what General Winter meant, it was because of "Charles".

Charles was not wrong. The person sent by Italy to negotiate with General Winter this time was not Foreign Minister Sonlino, but the weathered 65-year-old Italian Chief of Staff - Luigi Cadorna.

When General Winter saw Cadorna come forward, he knew that this matter was almost certain. This was a heavyweight figure in the Italian military. His appearance meant that Italy was ready to declare war on Germany and Austria.

General Winter felt relieved and handed over the prepared information, saying respectfully: "General, this is the details of the Battle of Cambrai. We advanced a total of 8 kilometers and annihilated tens of thousands of German troops. Obviously, we are winning..."

General Winter thought that this was what Cadorna was most concerned about: the Allies were winning, which meant that Italy was not on the wrong side.

However, Cadorna did not open the information, and he did not even glance at it.

"That's not what I want to know, Lieutenant General." Cadorna's voice was slightly hoarse, but his tone was steady: "I want to know about Charles and his inventions. Are those legends true?"

General Winter was stunned: "Of course it is true, General."

Then General Winter became nervous again: "It's just that I didn't prepare any information about him."

A trace of regret flashed in Cadorna's eyes.

Seeing that the negotiations were about to reach a deadlock again, General Winter quickly added: "But I am a good friend of Charles, General. We met in Antwerp when he was still a lieutenant. I know everything about him and his inventions."

"Really?" Cadorna looked at General Winter with interest: "I'm ready, Lieutenant General, tell me what you know!"