France, Paris.
A farm owner from Pomerania wore a deep frown. He felt that he understood the world less and less.
On one side was Archduke Charles, who had won glorious victories; on the other was Austria, unwilling to send troops. None of it made any sense.
After all, even when a lion fought a rabbit, it used all its strength. If the House of Habsburg had stationed such an important figure as Archduke Charles in Switzerland, they must have had some ulterior motive.
But in reality, Austria had taken very little: only the so-called ancestral homeland of Aargau and Eagle Castle, which had been reduced to ruins.
Aargau wasn't a small canton in Switzerland, but to the giant that was the Austrian Empire, it was little more than a piece of candy.
Was it worth taking such a huge risk for one little piece of candy? Obviously not!
As for the rumors now circulating that there was a great deal of gold buried beneath Eagle Castle, they were even more absurd. After all, if it had been there for so many years, the Swiss would have dug it up long ago. How could it possibly still be there?
Besides, before the House of Habsburg rose to become the emperors of the Holy Roman Empire, it had been nothing more than an obscure little family. Given the high price of gold in the past, they might have had a few hundred gold coins at most.
But Bismarck was Bismarck, after all. Since he couldn't get to the bottom of things by looking at who stood to gain, he would start with the victims instead.
He soon spotted a problem: the Prussians had their foot on the Frenchmen's throat—or perhaps their arsehole was more accurate, but that wasn't very civilized, so