Born in the French colony of Vermont in 1770, Gaspard Lefebvre entered the world as an unlikely candidate for military glory. Afflicted with a permanent limp from a difficult birth, a severe stutter, and a sickly constitution, he spent his childhood in the New World isolated from his peers, immersing himself in books on astronomy and the campaigns of Hannibal. Sent to France at age thirteen under a fabricated noble pedigree, he was bullied relentlessly for his colonial origins and physical ailments, deepening his sense of detachment from French society. Despite these challenges, he cultivated a stoic resilience and joined a light cavalry regiment in 1788. His initial rise to prominence was accidental; during the chaos of the 1793 anti-Vanguard uprisings, he assumed command of a leaderless regiment and crushed a Republican force, an act that led to his imprisonment. However, his tactical competence saved him from execution, and the desperate Republic, facing invasion on all sides, reinstated him in 1794 to command a cavalry division in the Army of Belgique.

Lefebvre’s legend was forged during the campaigns of the Rhine and the Low Countries, where he consistently displayed a genius for insubordination and unorthodox maneuvers. In 1794, he ignored orders to remain stationary and launched a rogue offensive into the Ardennes, destroying Austrian supply lines and saving the French army from encirclement. Promoted to lead the Army of the Rhine at only twenty-four, he acted as a sovereign entity, forging an unauthorized alliance with the Dutch to secure supplies. His military masterpiece occurred in the Bohemian Forest in 1796; facing a superior Austrian force entrenched in a valley, Lefebvre led his cavalry through "impassable" woods to execute a surprise flanking maneuver that annihilated the enemy rear. This victory allowed him to march on Vienna and force the Habsburgs to sign the Treaty of Linz, securing French dominance over the Rhineland and Northern Italy while earning him the adoration of the French public and the intense hatred of the ruling Council.

Despite his successes, Lefebvre remained driven by personal whims rather than political ambition. In 1799, motivated by his lover Elsie Dupont’s desire for a specific ancient ceramic mug, he raised a private army of 35,000 men and launched an unauthorized invasion of Egypt. While he successfully conquered Cairo and retrieved the artifact, his attempt to destroy the British-allied Kingdom of Sion ended in failure at the Battle of Kosti. Forced to retreat through the Levant, he managed to salvage the expedition by negotiating a shock alliance with the Eastern Roman Empire before returning to France. Upon his arrival in 1801, the Council arrested him for treason, but a sensational trial ended in his acquittal when a jury ruled his actions were protected under the "Republican Code."

Restored to command during the War of the Third Coalition in 1807, Lefebvre once again took the field to save the Republic from a combined Austro-Prussian invasion. Leading the 65,000-strong "Army of the Republic," he conducted a masterclass in maneuver warfare, chasing the coalition forces across Germany. By October 1807, he had pinned the enemy armies near the town of Woikowitz, positioning himself for a monumental clash that would decide the fate of Europe. the "Vermontais Boy," once a crippled outcast, now stood as the most formidable military mind of his generation, poised to reshape the continent through the barrel of a gun.