The enemy's formation was very dispersed, seeming to be skirmishers executing harassing operations in front of the line infantry battalion.
Anning heard someone nearby exclaim, "Where are our skirmishers?"
The next moment, Anning saw the flash of gunfire.
The sound of the guns came a beat slower, and the bullet had already pierced through the soldier in front of Anning who was replacing a noble lord as leader.
People next to Anning were also hit by bullets, scattering and falling in heaps, with only Anning and the flag-bearer four places away still standing.
Anning closed his eyes once again, waiting for death to come—damn it, this kind of time-travel is a real trap!
But no more bullets came.
He opened his eyes and saw the skirmishers in front reloading.
However, since the rifles used by the skirmishers sought accuracy with rifling, the bullets and the barrel fit more tightly, so a mallet was needed to hammer the bullet down into the barrel using a ramrod.
In short, these precise muzzle-loading guns were extremely slow to reload.
At this moment, the command from afar on the left came: "All halt!"
Anning's hands reflexively beat the drum signal for "halt!", as the marching drum was used to command the column's progress in the age of line infantry.
"Present arms!" The command still came from a great distance.
After many people's "transmission," the command sounded like it had an echo.
Anning had no rifle, he only had his marching drum.
Some of the opposing skirmishers had finished reloading and, seeing that this side had stopped to prepare to shoot, they fired and immediately turned to run.
The skirmishers' task was to harass, not to exchange fire with the line infantry.
Since there was no volley firing, the killing efficiency of this round was much lower than that of the initial volley firing, but the skirmishers' rifled guns were much more accurate than flintlocks, and quite a few people around Anning fell to the ground.
Anning silently prayed in his heart: Don't hit me, don't hit me!
The command came: "Fire!"
The following gunfire almost deafened Anning.
Anning's entire field of vision was obscured by the smoke created by the flintlock fire, a vast white where he could see nothing at all.
The air was full of the acrid smell of incomplete gunpowder combustion.
At this moment, Anning inexplicably changed his drumming pattern, starting to beat a series of short drumbeats—
Anning realized he was using the drumbeat to pace the troops' reloading; he remembered watching a show on the Discovery Channel, where in the era of execution by firing squad, the completion time for every step of line infantry reloading was akin to a measure in three-quarter beat music.
And Anning's short drumbeats were in three-quarter time.
Anning surmised that he must have soul-traveled to a well-trained drummer, so his body had formed muscle memory.
While playing the beats, he glanced sidelong at his comrades and then noticed the companion closest to him on the left—the closest living companion, his hand shaking as he untied the pre-loaded gunpowder pouch, almost spilling all the gunpowder on the ground.
Then the man simply poured the remaining little bit of gunpowder into the barrel and moved on to the next step.
—Fuck, our army is finished! This level of training…
At that instant, a cannonball flew over, and Anning's observed companion was gone, leaving just two severed lower legs sticking out of the ground.
Anning cursed in his heart, and then, because his hands were too sweaty, he didn't hold the drumstick tightly, and it fell to the ground.
—Damn!
He was about to pick up the drumstick when he saw the white smoke from the recent firing dissipate, and the enemy line infantry also came into view.
The enemy's uniforms looked like they were from Prussia... The Kingdom of France fighting Prussia? The Seven Years' War, perhaps?
Anning could clearly hear the enemy's martial music.
The bright bayonets on the other side, like a neat forest, moved swiftly towards Anning's direction.
Anning, who lived in an era of peace, had never seen such a formation.
The command came: "Present arms!"
Anning felt that the person issuing the command was clearly panicking, as it was given a bit too early.
Anning looked around and found that many comrades had not finished reloading, frantically pulling out their ramrods.
—It's over it's over it's over…
"Aim!"
Anning saw a comrade in such a hurry to stuff the pulled-out ramrod back into the slot below the flintlock that he couldn't make it fit, threw away the ramrod in frustration, and lifted his rifle—
"Fire!"
A shower of gunfire once again assailed Anning's ears.
The white smoke once again completely blocked the view, concealing the enemy's gray uniforms and the shining forest of bayonets.
The results of the volley were completely unobservable.
He could only hear the enemy's martial music growing louder and louder.
In the sky, another lime bomb exploded, and the lime that fell in waves caused many to scream out in pain.
Amidst the screams, the enemy's martial music became even more majestic, while the music of Anning's side was as if it had fizzled out.
With the corner of his eye, Anning saw in their now much looser formation, some people were quietly retreating.
At this moment, the smoke cleared, and the enemy line infantry shockingly appeared within fifty meters in front, Anning could even make out the decorations and medals on the leading officer's attire.
Then the enemy's command was heard.
"Order arms!"
And the column ceased to advance.
"Present arms!"
That uniform forest of bayonets uniformly lowered in a flash.
Anning felt utterly despondent, profoundly recognizing that death was opening its arms to him.
—Damn this is not fair! I didn't even have time to accept that I had traveled through time, now I'm fucking going to die here!