Alois Palffy had not only squandered the general reserve in Venetia; he had also allowed Vicenza, one of the Quadrilateral Fortresses, to fall.
These rebels were no ordinary rabble, either. They had blown up the nearby railway and bridges at the first opportunity, forcing Franz to gather his troops much farther away, in Verona.
Franz had no intention of besieging the city. He planned to bypass Vicenza and make straight for Venice.
At the time, Venice still had twenty thousand defenders and more than two thousand naval personnel. Outside the city stood over a hundred batteries, large and small. Its defenses were practically monstrous.
In theory, a fortress like this could never be taken by rebels who did not even have artillery. But wherever there was a hidden dragon, there was bound to be a nestling phoenix. The commander of Venice's garrison was Ferdinand Li Qi, one of the most infamous deadweights in the Austrian Imperial Army.
A miracle worker who could let Garibaldi escape despite having ten thousand men against his eight hundred might well manage to lose Venice, too.
Ferdinand Li Qi and Alois Palffy had entered the Austrian Army's order of battle solely thanks to their families' influence.
They were the result of a compromise reached by the imperial government after a contest of interests. Both men had extraordinary records, but those records were the product of their families' efforts to manufacture heroes.
The older the family, the more it liked to create idols for the world to worship. A flawless public image helped secure its standing.
That was also why so many people in power looked down on Franz's accomplishments.
Franz had brought only his Royal Dragoon Regiment and the guards he had trained in Tyrol, for a total of just over five thousand men. A