The four people walked silently through the sparse woods.
Claude suddenly remembered a question: "By the way, Vero, when I was reading the history book, the mainland historical records said that there were muskets more than five hundred years ago. Why do we still use match ropes after so long?
gun?"
In my memory, the development process of muskets in the past life did not seem to be so slow. From the emergence of matchlocks to modern advanced automatic rifles, the process only took two to three hundred years. The military forum of Time Travel said that various countries are now developing more advanced
As individual weapons, laser guns and electromagnetic guns are all developing towards miniaturization. But in this different world called Faslan, technology seems to have stagnated in the past five or six hundred years. Matchlocks are still matchlocks, and the most popular among countries in the mainland
The main military equipment is weapons, and even war cannot promote the updating and development of weapons.
Bockar next to him laughed: "What can we use instead of matchlocks, crossbows or swords and guns? War has long proved that matchlocks are the most reliable and sharpest weapons in the hands of soldiers. Without matchlocks, the kingdom would have perished long ago."
"That's not what I meant, idiot." Claude scolded Bockard: "What I mean is, why not improve the matchlock gun to make it easier and faster to operate, or cancel the matchlock and use a more reliable ignition method?
Such as flint, and breech loading..."
"There are improvements. The kingdom has been working hard to increase the range of the matchlock gun. Now the latest Obas II standard musket is said to have a range of 350 meters, with an effective killing distance of 240 meters. The muzzle is still
It can be equipped with a bayonet and used directly as a spear for charging. There is no need for soldiers to carry both matchlocks and hand-to-hand combat weapons when going to the battlefield..." Viricero replied in a buzzing voice from the front.
No...improving the range alone is of no use, you can't even hit accurately...Claude felt that he was almost like a chicken and a duck, and his friends were not thinking on the same line as him at all. He decided to change his approach:
"I think it is too inconvenient to use a match rope to fire. The method of firing muskets should be improved. Haven't those gunsmiths thought about it?"
"My father once said this before." Viricero thought for a while and said: "There are four major gun-making workshops in our kingdom, and the gun-making workshop in our county is the smallest. The four major gun-making workshops produce more every year.
There are nearly 200,000 muskets of various types. In addition to privately customized muskets, the quota and drawings of the muskets they produce are issued by the Musket Research Institute in Wangdu, and must be produced in strict accordance with the requirements of the drawings.
My father said that he once served as a guard soldier at the Musket Research Institute in the Royal Capital for two years. He said that many of the people in the Musket Research Institute were lunatics and had seen many weird musket inventions. Like the flint ignition you just mentioned.
, it’s not that there is no breech loading, but it is inferior to the earliest old-fashioned matchlock guns in terms of range and power.
In addition, safety was also an issue. Seventeen soldiers from their security company went to test the guns and were injured and disabled when their guns exploded. Therefore, my father later applied to be transferred to the frontline troops to avoid being disabled like his comrades.
The ending. It’s just that he was unlucky. By the time he got to the front line, the war was over, and he would just stand guard at the rear..."
It turns out that the kingdom also has a musket research institute that specializes in the research and improvement of muskets. However, in addition to increasing the range and power of muskets over the years, it has not further improved and upgraded the matchlocks. It cannot even make a flintlock gun. It is simply
So incompetent.
"Then apart from the Musket Research Institute in the royal capital, is there no one else inventing muskets? For example, some private musket enthusiasts?"
Claude remembered reviewing some information he had read on the computer in his previous life. The two most important factors in the development of firearms were the need for war, which enabled more advanced weapons to be used more quickly in war, and the second was
Those firearms enthusiasts used various whimsical ways to improve their weapons and made an indelible contribution to the development of firearms from matchlocks to automatic rifles. It seems that the famous weapons manufacturers and arms companies in previous lives originally started from
There are not many small private workshops that have developed.
"Maybe..." Viricero pondered: "My father should be considered a private musket enthusiast, and his two shotguns were designed by himself. It's just that the muskets designed by private individuals will eventually go to the kingdom to make guns.
For customization in the workshop, the designed drawings need to be reviewed to ensure that there will be no safety accidents, and an official number must be given.
If you find a blacksmith shop to make privately, it will violate the kingdom's prohibition. Both the commissioner and the builder will be arrested and sentenced. So it is okay for those blacksmith shops to make swords and crossbows, but if they want to make muskets privately, that is
It’s a big crime. Of course, there are also people who customize muskets from gunsmiths and then take them home and re-make them, as long as the serial number on the gun is not damaged.”
It turns out that there is a ban on making muskets, which should be the kingdom's measure to control muskets. However, in this way, it also limits the further development of muskets. As for the musket research institute in the royal capital, it seems that it has gone astray.
Claude really doesn’t understand why the research on the range and power of muskets is put first. Shouldn’t we research more convenient and faster ways of shooting and loading? To increase the range and power, we should research bullets instead of muskets...
Claude fell silent. There was something strange about this world. It was as if he, as a student, did not take the two basic courses of physics and chemistry. When he asked his teachers and classmates, they asked themselves what physics and chemistry were...
…
No wonder matchlock guns were still used five or six hundred years ago...
Verricro in front suddenly waved his hand twice, which meant that everyone stopped. Claude listened carefully and found that he was in the right place. He had been thinking so much that he didn't even notice the sound of gurgling water.
"Okay, go and ambush over there." Viricero looked at it for a long time, pointed to a pile of rocks not far away and said softly: "See that big rock? We will hide behind that place.
The view is wide and it is downwind. The animals coming to drink water cannot smell us. The stream turns a corner right next to the rock. The surrounding streams within fifty meters are within the shooting range of my musket.
I can’t see clearly, I hope we have good luck..."
The place that Viricolo found was really good. When the creek flooded, the rocky beach would often be submerged, so the area around the big rock was very clean, and there were no snakes, insects, lizards or scorpions. The four of them happened to be hiding there.
Behind the rock, Viricero found a few places to step on, climbed up, put his matchlock on the rock, and then exposed his head to observe the movement of the surrounding creek.
Erikson's arquebus is of little use at this time. Even if an animal comes to drink water from the creek, unless it is within ten meters in front of you, if it exceeds ten meters, the range is insufficient and the lethality is insufficient, so it can only be used for warning.
.
Bock'ar's stone crossbow and Claude's longbow have enough range, but neither of them has been trained in night shooting. Even if they find prey, they can only aim in a general direction. God knows where they will shoot the arrows, so this
The only thing he could really rely on for this night hunting was Verricro's matchlock gun.
The night wind was very cool, and the moonlight filtered through the shade of the dense trees and cast a little bit of light on the stream. The stream gurgled and made a tinkling sound from time to time, as if singing an endless song.
The shadows of the trees swayed with the wind, changing into various shapes in the moonlight. The leaves made rustling sounds from time to time, and strange sounds occasionally came from the woods, sometimes sharp, sometimes rapid, and sometimes chilling.
Screams...
Bockaar shrank his head and involuntarily approached Claude.
Claude found that his body was trembling slightly, and chuckled: "Don't be afraid, they are all normal sounds. The wind blows through the treetops, and some of the sounds in the woods are animals calling. It sounds a little bit...
horrible……"
Thanks to watching that documentary in my previous life, I only watched one episode, The World of Darkness, which records the movements of nocturnal animals in the forest. I didn’t know it until I watched it, but I was shocked when I watched it. Only then did I realize the bustle in the forest at night.
Ah, although it was all done in the dark, the scream was loud and there were all kinds of sounds, and the infrared camera also captured the scene of the leopard catching food at night, as well as the screams of the frightened monkeys.
Compared with that documentary, the sounds in the woods here were already insignificant, so Claude was very calm.
"You don't feel scary at all?" Ericson asked in surprise.
"What's so scary? In fact, many of them are your own associations. When you hear scary cries, you think of scary monsters. You don't even think about the scary monsters that would have rushed out of the woods to catch us. It's a waste of time.
Did you scream in the woods with such force for a long time? Also, didn't Ike catch a toad last time? Do you still remember how loud the toad screamed? If you throw that toad into the woods at night, what will its scream be?
The sound also sounds terrible..."
"You three, shut up and stop talking!" Viricero was very angry and lowered his voice and shouted: "Don't you know that animals have very sensitive hearing? If they hear you talking, they won't come to drink water!"
So the three people shut up and stopped talking and continued to lie behind the big rock.
I don't know how much time passed, but Claude was almost in a daze when he was suddenly stabbed a few times by Vericro: "Shh, don't make any sound, there's something going on."
Vericro was talking almost close to his ear. Claude did not dare to be careless and cautiously poked his head out from behind the rock and looked in the direction pointed by Vericro.
But I saw a rustling sound in the weeds and bushes in the woods in the distance. As the shade of the trees swayed, a few black figures jumped out of the bushes and ran to the creek, lowering their heads to drink water.
Playing in the stream.
Vericro sighed softly, slid down the rock, and pulled Claude's clothes to signal him to come down too.
"What's wrong? Don't you want to shoot?" Claude asked softly, a little strange. Those black figures were only about 40 meters away from here.
Viricro shook his head and replied in the same low voice: "It's useless, that's a wild boar. I can't kill the big one with my gun. If I hit the small one, the big one will go crazy and seek revenge on us. Now we are here at the rocky beach, the big one can't kill it."
The wild boar is charging at us and we can’t even run away..."
I bet those black figures are wild boars... Claude really didn't see clearly.
"But it's okay. The wild boar came to drink water and play in the stream. Soon other animals will come to drink water. We will wait patiently..."
Only then did Claude realize that Bockar and Erikson had fallen asleep next to each other. Fortunately, they didn't snore or disturb the wild boars...
Viricero was right. After more than half an hour, a group of animals appeared again by the creek, about seven or eight of them.
"What's this?"
"We are lucky, this is Shanlu..."
The two of them were talking almost to each other's ears. Verricro slowly and gently cut off more than half of the match rope wrapped around the gun's clamping handle and the casing: "You take the match, and I'll let you light it."
Just order it right away..."
Claude nodded nervously, indicating that he understood.
Verricro glanced at it for a long time, and finally said softly: "Light the fire."
With a "chi-la" sound, the fire light came on and the match rope was lit.
Claude only felt that time passed too slowly and the match rope was burning too slowly. Looking at it secretly, the mountain deer in the distance seemed to be alarmed by the light here, but they did not run away. Instead, they raised their heads and stared curiously at the scene.
side……
For what seemed like an eternity, Claude finally heard a "boom" sound. A mountain deer in the distance shook its body a few times and fell into the stream. Its four legs were still twitching feebly. The other mountain deer next to it
He turned around and rushed back to the woods...
Bockaar and Erikson jumped under the rock: "It's thundering and raining?"
Viricero slid down from the rock excitedly: "We hit it. Light the torch and let's go over."
Claude saw that his face was half blackened by the smoke of the musket.
The mountain deer in the creek was a little bigger than a goat, and it had short antlers about ten centimeters long on its head. It should be a half-grown deer, not a young deer, but not yet an adult.
Verricro's shot was very accurate. It penetrated the side of the face and directly pierced the head. No wonder he fell into the creek all of a sudden.
"You three stick the torches in the ground, and then stand guard with weapons. I will peel off the skin and divide the flesh here, so as not to bring it back to the camp and make it bloody, and we will not be peaceful the whole night..."
Vericro pulled out the short knife from his waist and said.