Chapter 63

If future historians were to reenact this battle, they would find that its course is remarkably similar to a story from the distant East called "Tian Ji's Horse Race."

The first battle was the war in which Elizabeth I used her finest horses—the most elite of the king's private army—to fight Mary, Queen of Scots.

In this initial war, Scotland suffered a humiliating defeat. Even Mary, Queen of Scots, was forced to flee in disarray, abandoning her armor and weapons, and eventually hiding in a smuggling cave on a cliff by the sea, awaiting rescue at an unknown time.

This was a very risky gamble. If the Queen of Scots had not escaped and had died in the battle, then Queen Elizabeth would have continued to rule the whole of Britain, and perhaps Scotland would have been added to her territory.

But there are no "what ifs" in life. The Queen of Scots won her gamble, and in the two wars that followed, the Scottish allied forces successively defeated the English peasant soldiers and the private armies of nobles.

The Scottish mid-class horses versus the English low-class horses—the Duke of Lorraine led his army to successively capture Tonbridge and Bromley, which were garrisoned by English peasant soldiers.

Scotland's finest horses versus England's medium-strength horses—Captain Albert of the Scottish Guard led Swiss mercenaries to breach the walls of London in a near-mutually assured destruction.

Thus, the Queen of Scots won a great victory.

...

The Crown of St. Edward is very heavy.

This crown, made of pure gold and inlaid with more than 400 gemstones, originally belonged to Edward the Confessor, the English King of the 11th century. It has been passed down for about 500 years and is of great historical and commemorative significance, making it the preferred choice for the coronation of the British monarch.

Elizabeth I may have fled in such haste that she did not have time to retrieve the crown from the storeroom and take it with her, allowing Albert, after the fall of London, to luckily find it, clean it, and place it on the throne.

Wearing the crown, Mary walked to a half-length mercury mirror from Italy, gazed at herself in the mirror, and unusually, her thoughts became dazed and slow.

To be honest, she felt lightheaded and unrealistic, as if she were in a dream.

This feeling of lightness began to set in from the moment the Duke of Guise successfully returned to support him as planned, informing him that London had fallen and leading him and Seton away from that dark, damp seaside cave.

The closer they got to London, surrounded by a large army, the more intense this daydream-like feeling became.

Once inside Whitehall Palace, she felt as if every step she took was on soft clouds, incredibly illusory and beautiful, but she never knew when she might take a wrong step and fall from the sky to the ground, shattered to pieces.

“…How could I have beaten Elizabeth so easily?” Mary muttered to herself.

That was Elizabeth I—the glorious queen who single-handedly created Britain's Golden Age.

Her nemesis from her past life was a powerful being she never met, yet who personally escorted her to the guillotine and beheaded her.

Mary now truly felt like she was living a fantastical dream, because she had been imprisoned for so long that she had gone insane. The idea of ​​being led to the guillotine, dying and being reborn, leading mercenaries to defeat Queen Elizabeth and enter London were all just unrealistic fantasies in her mind.

When her illusions shattered, the moment she opened her eyes, she was back in Fort Lingeburg, imprisoned and waiting to die, where even the birds outside her window and the rats on the ground were freer than she was.

“It’s not easy at all, Your Majesty,” Albert said from the side.

His voice brought the Queen of Scots back to life.

Mary removed the heavy, expensive crown, which weighed over four kilograms, and placed it aside. She turned to look at Albert, then her eyes widened in astonishment.

The blond youth's shoulders, legs, and elbows were almost entirely wrapped in bandages of various sizes, but they were all concealed by his neat clothes, and he acted as if nothing was wrong, without uttering a sound of pain. That's why Mary hadn't noticed it when she first came in. But now, upon closer inspection, she noticed, through her keen eyesight, that there were quite a few bloodstains on the white gauze inside his sleeves.

Besides, his handsome face, which was like Apollo descending to earth and was secretly admired by countless noble ladies of the court, has now been ruined.

Deep scabs remained on his nose and the corners of his eyes, and even after they healed, Mary believed they would leave scars.

Albert is very skilled.

Mary once opened the door of Holyrood Palace during a break from her official duties to watch the Scottish Guards drill. She saw the young man from Jinhua casually defeat ten ordinary guards in hand-to-hand combat, then walk around on the grass, enjoying the soldiers' compliments and praise, like a male peacock displaying its tail feathers.

If even Albert can be injured to this extent, just how brutal will this war be?

Queen of Scots couldn't believe it. She couldn't help but take a step forward, reaching out to touch the scar that ran across Albert's eye. But she pulled her hand back halfway through.

"Of the two thousand Swiss mercenaries, only 561 are still alive. We have lost three-quarters of our soldiers. Of the survivors, 103 will be left with lifelong disabilities. They will never be able to be mercenaries again and will have to return to their hometowns to become farmers..." Albert said, kneeling down on one knee again and looking up to say, "...Our victory was by no means easy, Your Majesty. Although they are risking their lives for money, and we are only buying our lives for money, I still want to implore you to give them more of their wages."

Mary closed her eyes, feeling as if a bottle of ice water had been poured over her.

These are not just a few numbers, but lives lost because of her ambition. The joy of taking over Whitehall Palace vanished like mist, replaced by the cold reality.

“I understand. Once the situation stabilizes, I will increase their original hiring price by 30%. As for the soldiers who have died, I will have their identities investigated and then send people to deliver their pensions to their homes. For the disabled, I will also give them an annuity to support them in their old age,” Mary nodded and said.

Albert gave a brief laugh, then tipped his hat to the Queen in farewell and prepared to leave.

The Queen of Scots, standing before the mirror, called out to him.

“Thank you, Albert,” Mary said.

Thank you for being willing to risk his life for her on the battlefield.

The blond youth's contributions far exceeded the compensation she offered.

...

Having acquired London and Whitehall, the Queen of Scots immediately began handling state affairs, including but not limited to appeasing and winning over the nobles, maintaining order in London and throughout Britain which had been disrupted by the war in recent months, mobilizing grain into the city to stabilize prices, and restoring London to its former life as soon as possible.

At the same time, Mary also mobilized a large number of clerks to inform the sheriffs and nobles in various places of the outcome of the war, emphasizing that the Queen of Scots had rightfully and legally entered Whitehall Palace, and ordered them to also publicize this fact to the people under their jurisdiction.

Those clerks were all quite opportunistic and adept at reading people's minds.

In the announcement, the clerks described the cause and end of the war in a rather embellished manner from the Scottish perspective, emphasizing the Tudor bloodline inherited by the Queen of Scots, her status as the first in line to the throne after Elizabeth I, and how the latter, while the Queen of Scots was away, completely disregarded sisterly affection and shamelessly helped an illegitimate child seize the throne, thus prompting the Queen of Scots to launch this war of revenge.

Finally, they also brought up the illegitimate marriage between Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn in his early years, implying that the "illegitimate daughter" Elizabeth had no right to sit on the British throne.

This ability to adapt to changing circumstances saved Mary a lot of trouble.

She could almost imagine how furious Elizabeth I, who was fleeing to Portsmouth, would be upon seeing this announcement.

This smooth and uneventful approach to governance successfully appeased many of the nobles who had been living in fear for the past few months. In particular, after the Queen of Scots summoned them and had a very cordial conversation with them, they immediately knelt down to pledge their loyalty to the Queen of Scots without the slightest thought of resistance.

The situation had not yet calmed down, and the Duke of Guise, the Queen of Scots's uncle, remained in London.

The nobleman, who had spent half his life on the battlefield, looked down on these people. He contemptuously commented that these nobles had no backbone whatsoever, and were nothing but a bunch of opportunists who swayed with the wind. He said they could not be relied on at all, and that once Queen Elizabeth launched a counterattack, they would immediately kneel before Elizabeth's throne, without even changing their oath of loyalty.

After making his assessment, the Duke of Guise cautioned, "Be careful, Mary. Don't be fooled by their sweet words. These are English nobles who naturally look down on the Scots. Of the nobles who fawn over you, I suspect half of them are secretly plotting something to keep secret from Queen Elizabeth. If you suffer a setback in the war, they'll turn on you."

Mary thanked her uncle for his kindness.

She was certainly aware of this, but she was now eager to consolidate her army and march on Portsmouth to defeat Elizabeth, who had not yet joined forces with the Spanish navy, and had no time to deal with these noble forces.

“There is one more thing, Mary…” The Duke of Guise looked at the Queen of Scots, who was busy reviewing documents, hesitated for a moment, and wondered whether he should say it.

"What?"

Mary put down the quill pen she was holding.

“A rumor has been spreading all over Portsmouth lately…” Duke Guise said, his eyes revealing barely suppressed disgust, his fingers tapping rapidly on the table, “…Now the people are saying that London has lost a Bloody Mary and is about to welcome another one, that you should set up the stake in the square again and throw them into the fire to be burned to death.”

Those rat-like Protestants are now jumping up and down over this.