“Father, Lieutenant Schwartz once said that some things must be done by someone,” Lucas looked earnestly at Baron Scheller, “Why can’t it be me?”
“But…”
The young man suddenly laughed, patting his father’s back like an old friend: “Look, so many people are involved this time. As long as we can drive that fellow Tugut out of office, His Majesty the Emperor will surely pardon us.”
Scheller remained silent for a few seconds, taking a deep breath: “Lucas, your brother is dead. I received the death notice two weeks ago.”
He looked at his son: “You’re all I have left now. Please…”
Lucas was stunned, his eyes instantly turning red.
The two stood speechless for a while, before an officer shouted from afar: “Scheller, what are you doing? We have to go!”
“Alright!”
Lucas responded, wiping his eyes and said to his father:
“David sacrificed himself for this country; I can’t let his death be in vain.”
He quickly turned away: “You should go back. I promise I’ll return safely.”
“No…” Baron Scheller watched his son follow a group of new recruits into the distance, raising his hand to grab him but felt a force holding his legs.
Only when he saw a group of sans-culottes come by carrying flintlock guns did he turn and hastily leave, muttering, “Jesus, please protect my Lucas, even if it requires my life in exchange…”
He wandered half a circle in the outer city in confusion, encountering several Hungarian soldiers firing to disperse protest crowds, luckily no bullet found him.
Forty minutes later, he finally returned to the Inner City, seeing his house from two streets away.
The Inner City remained relatively calm, with only occasional groups carrying signs passing through the streets.
Baron Scheller knew this calm wouldn’t last long.
He patted his face and strode towards home, but as he turned the street corner, he saw a familiar-looking figure step out from the hotel ahead.
“Count Graf?”
Rage surged in Scheller’s chest.
If not for this guy extorting a benefit of three thousand florins, Lucas might have already been transferred to Klagenfurt, avoiding today’s crisis.
He grabbed a wooden stick from the roadside—recently protestors tossed these everywhere—and followed quickly.
However, as he reached the hotel entrance, he saw his wife standing on the stairwell from the corner of his eye.
Stunned for a moment, he instinctively hid behind a nearby linden tree.
Soon Mrs. Scheller emerged, noticeably unnatural in demeanor.
Once she left, Baron Scheller immediately entered the hotel, slipped a florin to the attendant, and gestured towards the entrance: “The woman who just left, did she come with anyone?”
“Yes, indeed.” The attendant pocketing the gold coin eagerly replied, “She was with a somewhat stout gentleman.”
“Broad mouth, protruding forehead, wearing a dark yellow coat?”
“Yes, yes, that’s him. They occupied the same room…”
Half an hour later.
At Scheller’s house, Mrs. Scheller wept bitterly kneeling before him, choking out:
“You know the manor in Trondheim Village was destroyed. We can’t afford the three thousand florins. I was just trying to save Lucas… Count Graf promised me that if I stayed with him for a few months, he would only charge us fifteen hundred florins…”
Baron Scheller thrust his fingers deep through his hair and after a long time spoke in a low voice: “Lucas no longer needs to go to the battlefield.”
“Really?” Joy flared in the woman’s eyes, “Was it Count Graf’s help?”
“Absolutely not,” Scheller shouted, turning to the wardrobe, opening it, and pulling out a pistol from the little enclosure, “It was the Hungarians.”
He tucked the gun into his coat and slammed the door as he left.
Mrs. Scheller hastily stood up, chasing after him, but her husband had already vanished.
Pushed by fury, Baron Scheller walked two streets before his mind gradually calmed.
Graf was a member of the military committee, surrounded by guards everywhere, even in his home.
He couldn’t possibly kill him…
His hand began to tremble, and soon his entire body shook.
He felt like a failure, unable to protect either of his sons, and now impotent in avenging his humiliated wife.
Why should such a useless person live in this world?
Scheller suddenly drew the pistol from his coat, thrusting the barrel into his mouth, opened the flintlock, and murmured “Please forgive me, Jesus,” then forcefully pulled the trigger.
“Click…”
Sparks fell into the chamber but didn’t ignite the gunpowder.
Scheller felt an icy coldness through his body, as if standing nude on a winter day for hours, before the boundless fear like a devil smote his brain.
Trembling, he cast the pistol aside, the thing almost consumed him!
He breathed deeply, recalling various miseries and humiliations, yet no longer possessed even a shred of courage to seek death.
Half an hour later, Baron Scheller returned home distraught, locking himself in the study, not emerging for two days…
While Scheller attempted suicide, in the Schonbrunn Palace, Franz II also showed signs of listlessness.
Footsteps sounded outside, eagerly he opened the door to see Baron Tugut and immediately asked: “What is the situation outside?”
The latter bowed slightly: “Your Majesty, it’s established that seven new recruit battalions of the Royal German Legion training camp initiated the rebellion.
“They handed the training camp’s flintlock guns to the rioters and attacked the Debrecen Corps.”
“I asked about the current situation?”
“This,” Tugut paused, “about four to five hundred Hungarian soldiers have been killed, General Grashkovich temporarily withdrew troops from the outer city.”
Franz II turned pale at once: “How many people are involved in the rebellion?”
“At least five or six thousand,” Tugut said, “Four thousand flintlock guns were lost from the training camp. There are more than seven hundred rebel recruits.”
“Will they attack the Royal Palace?”
“Not for now…”
“So they might in the future?”
“This, indeed cannot exclude their potential insanity.”
Franz II immediately summoned several high ministers to discuss how to respond.
At twilight, following Horn Dorf’s advice, he finally decided to temporarily leave Vienna, this gigantic powder keg, and head to Moravia to lay low.
Two thousand soldiers of the Prague Guard were heading southward, just in time to meet him at Brno on Moravia’s southern side.
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