Solovyov in Tsarist Russia 1796.

Solovyov also knew that because Mihlima had seen so much blood since childhood, she was either very brave or had become numb to such a bloody environment. It could be both, or there could be other factors involved.

But in his impression, even the brave Maria would be afraid of mice. Just like Catherine, she was really brave enough to fire a gun and was a bit wild. Napoleon doted on her so much that he neglected his other mistresses. Although this is a bit off topic, she was not afraid of firing a gun. During a demonstration of blasting, she was frightened enough that she went straight into Alexander's arms.

Mihlima was very calm in this regard, and even Solovyov found her calmness a little strange.

Now, she made some tea and brought it to Solovyov.

"Girl, aren't you afraid of the explosion?"

"What's the big deal? I was with that bastard and I was just afraid of his whip."

"You're not afraid of being my maid? I'm also a murderer!"

As he spoke, Solovyov pinched her nose.

"Sir, I am here to serve you. I am your loyal servant. I will do everything you say. Just don't always treat me like a child. I am already thirteen years old."

Well, Solovyov also felt that attacking a girl of this age would indeed easily attract the gendarmerie.

I had forgotten to ask her age before, and Mihrima had been with me for less than half a month. As a maid, she was conscious of her service to her master and looked very close to him.

Soloviev also felt a little emotional, so he said: "Good girl, you are not much older than my oldest daughter. To me, you are just a child."

He also took out some candies from the box and put some of them in her waist pocket.

"You are reluctant to spend the silver coins you give me, so I might as well give you candies."

Although this girl loves to eat candy, she also pays attention to oral hygiene.

When she smiled, Solovyov could also see her neat teeth. After all, girls of this age had just completed their replacement of teeth.

I was in Paris, watching Silvia's two daughters and Giuseppe. They all had missing teeth, especially Giuseppe, who had just lost a large front tooth.
Her teeth are really good and she doesn’t need any braces. And it’s really rare to have teeth so white.

But just as he was paying attention to Mihlima's teeth, another explosion was heard from Vidin City.

This girl is indeed only afraid of whips, but she is not afraid of rivers of blood and rolling heads, not to mention the huge explosions.

Well, it seems that the British method is really effective. Sometimes people's fear of whips may be greater than death.

Solovyov stopped playing with the child and looked in the direction of the Taurid Regiment.

"That explosion was quite impressive. Is it the Kiev Regiment's turn next?"

"We have to wait for a while. If you want to launch an attack, you need to create a time difference to hold the enemy back."

"Yeah, I always say that. Carl, am I a little anxious now?"

"No," Clausewitz said calmly, "You are just absent-minded, which is not a good thing for a commander."

"Indeed, but in a battle like this, we also need to let the enemy know exactly how strong they are."

As they were talking, the final explosion was about to come.

The Moscow Grenadiers have already launched an attack. The reason is simple. Solovyov has offered a reward to the four main attacking grenadiers for being the first to reach the plate. At times like this, there will always be brave men who take advantage of the huge reward.

As long as the first soldiers can survive and receive a bonus, their entire company will also be able to get extra meals and clean tents to sleep in. Naturally, everyone is willing to fight and protect their comrades.

Igor was a lucky guy, as he followed the veteran Semenov. This old guy was indeed capable, as he was a privileged veteran - Semenov was one of the few veterans who had been able to obtain twenty years of perfect service at an early stage.

He has never made a mistake that could be caught, so it's hard to say what happened behind his back.

Such an experienced veteran was standing at the front with his bayonet, but it was a pity that he was not as good as Igor. Igor was at least a rare literate serf soldier. Although Semenov was a civilian, he couldn't read.

This brought him bad luck, and now he is only a sergeant and can never become an officer. However, he has won the St. George Medal twice after its establishment, and with his 24 years of "perfect service", the officers always respect him.

When he knocked down a Turk who was rushing towards him howling, his opponent realized that this old man was indeed not easy to mess with.

So someone tried to shoot from behind, and actually hit the old soldier in the shoulder.

There was ammunition in Igor's gun chamber. He discovered the gunman a little late, but he would not give the man a chance to retreat.

The bullet he fired even made a hole in the gunman's crown.

Only Semenov was shot. He provided cover from behind and brought the veteran to a relatively safe place.

"Igor, you are such a fool. Why did you save an old man like me? Do you want the bonus from our 'little commander'?"

This stubborn old man was injured himself, but he did not forget to remind his companions.

The grenadiers following behind also launched an attack, but they engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the Turks in the gap in the city wall blasted open by artillery, and were unable to break through for a while.

When it came to the hand-to-hand combat, the Turks did not retreat, but many soldiers holding rifles replaced them with scimitars at their waists because they despised bayonets.

This would make it easy to suffer a loss in hand-to-hand combat, after all, the infantry were lined up like a wall, and the attack from the front with bayonets would be more powerful.

The Turkish troops fighting alone were quickly defeated, and many of them were sent to see Allah by the Russian bayonets.

Now, in addition to the wounded, the grenadiers of the Moscow Regiment also rushed forward and finally took the lead in seizing the gap.

Subsequently, the Tavrid Regiment and the Kiev Regiment also succeeded one after another, and all three gaps were opened. The troops directly attacking the city gate also succeeded with the cooperation of artillery.

As a result, the Turks could only retreat to the local governor's residence and the inner city fortress to resist. They did not dare to engage in hand-to-hand combat with the Russian army in the citizen settlement area.

It's not because of anything else, but because there are many Slavs and Orthodox Christians of other nationalities living in Vidin, so this is probably the case.

"Brothers, this road is closer to the Governor's Palace!" In addition to the grenadiers, the Russian army also had infantry covering the flanks. After the grenadiers opened a gap, several infantry regiments also successively launched an attack on the city in a column with their own grenadier companies at the front.

If the Turks still want to surrender now, they do have a chance, after all, the Russian artillery will not keep pouring shells over their heads.

It is still a question whether the Russian army, which only wants to gain merit and receive rewards, will be forced to surrender.

Surrendering with weapons and being captured are two different concepts.

Therefore, the Turkish commander defending the city always raised the white flag when his official residence was surrounded, indicating that he wanted to negotiate with the Russian army.

"negotiation?"

When Solovyov came near the city gate, he heard Christian say this.

"Yes, the remaining Turkish forces have retreated to the fortresses and more solid buildings in the city. They have indeed expressed their willingness to negotiate with us."

"Then bring their envoy up, Christian. Be careful. I always suspect that the Turks will pretend to surrender."

"You are still being so cautious at this time. If they really dare, we can just use cannons to send them into the sky."

"Well, Christian, you must be careful."

Christian went to the regiment's position in person to see what the Turks' attitude was.

As for Solovyov, the conditions he offered were simple.

"Either lay down your arms and surrender unconditionally, or be blown up by Russian artillery. That's what the Russian general said."

"Oh shit!"

For the Turkish defenders, this condition was indeed embarrassing.

But he thought about the treasures he still had in the fortress in Pleven, so he naturally didn't want to die at this moment.

Moreover, the Russian troops outside had been preparing for action step by step, moving explosives and setting up artillery, and the infantry had also found cover and were ready for battle.

It looked like this wouldn't give them much time, as Christian had someone shout through a megaphone, asking them to surrender quickly.

From this situation, the people inside also knew that the Turks had very poor credibility when they fought against European armies in the past.

The Russians, who were now fighting the Turks the most, no longer had any expectation of their unconditional surrender and were even ready to open fire with their artillery.

As a result, the remaining Turkish troops knew the attitude of the Russians, and under the order of their own master, the Baiyi, they quickly laid down their weapons and chose to surrender unconditionally.

However, after the Turkish troops in the city were disarmed, what awaited them were not only the Russian troops, but also the angry citizens.

Think about the daily life of the Ottoman army. Any town in the country that showed even the slightest tendency to pro-Russia would be brutally suppressed. In many towns with a population of tens of thousands, the residents were expelled or massacred, often leaving only a few thousand or even hundreds of people. Some towns may no longer exist.

The place of Vidin has been an important link in the Danube defense line since the Roman Empire, which is why it was not destroyed too badly.

Just think about it, among the European cities under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, the second largest city was Sarajevo, which gives you an idea of ​​what the Ottoman Empire’s rule here was like before.

As for Sarajevo, it was because a pasha married an imperial princess and became an official there that the city developed.

A large part of the center of civilization in the eastern Mediterranean has become a village or town level, and its ruling ability is really too poor.

Solovyov quickly entered the city and saw the locals attempting to retaliate against the Turkish army, if it were not for the Russian infantry blocking them on both sides.

Maybe it's not rotten vegetable leaves and stone bricks, these Turks want to taste the power of the local people's knives.

Under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, it was somewhat easy for the local people to become unruly people.

After the Russian troops moved in, the situation was better. Solovyov always demanded strict military discipline, and he was probably the strictest among all Russian generals in disciplining the army.

Now it is the turn of spring and summer, and the climate is still good. He will have the troops entering the city set up tents outside the city, and he will only stay in the city with his personal entourage and two grenadier regiments. In addition, he also plans to leave an infantry regiment to maintain local order.

Solovyov also did not want to stay in Vidin for a long time. He wanted to launch further attacks, just like Suvorov, with bold and fast strategic maneuvers, appearing in unexpected places of the enemy and then delivering a fatal blow.

Speaking of which, when the old marshal was still alive, he was known for his stronger mobility. When he was commanding on the battlefield, there were inevitably some more or less problems. Considering that Suvorov was already quite old when Solovyov met him, it was inevitable that an elderly person would make some omissions in command.

It was another old man, Marshal Melas of Austria, who was too cautious at the time, but the cooperation between the two old men was still very successful.

As for Solovyov himself, he was actually a little impatient. After all, the opponent in this operation was relatively weak, and he really wanted to show himself.

This battle, from the beginning of the river crossing operation to the final capture of Vidin, plus the negotiations with the Serbs and the resolution of the internal instability factor Stojkovic, took only eleven days.

The effect of this battle did not shock the Sultan himself as much as Kamensky's victory over the Turkish army's 6 reinforcements with only 8 men on the front line.

After all, the direction where little Kamensky was heading was the main road to Constantinople. No matter how serious the situation was with Solovyov, he would still have to take a long detour to get to Constantinople.

Solovyov would naturally not go south to Macedonia and then advance eastward just for the sake of greed for merit.

His first goal was to fully arm the Serbian rebels, and then to march south to Macedonia and establish contact with the Greeks.

He still remembered that his good friend Prince Mikhail's branch had some influence in Greece. If he could take advantage of this opportunity to get the Greeks to launch an uprising, the entire Balkan geopolitics would change.

However, if this happens, France and Austria, who have always tried to make moves in the Balkans, will definitely be unhappy, and the British, who are now confronting Russia, will not let him get his wish easily.

However, advancing towards Greece is still very useful in the overall strategy.

As for Serbia, if the Russian army returns home, the Ottoman Empire is likely to fight back, so it is more important for them to protect themselves.

Therefore, Solovyov decided to meet Karageorge. After all, he was helping him to deal with the problem and eliminate a huge internal hidden danger. (End of this chapter)