The western boundary of the border town, by the Chishui River.

The snow made it difficult for the wagon to move, and it took the group half a day to haul the first field gun outside the town.

"What is it this time?" Carter felt a little accustomed to the new things the prince kept coming up with, "an enlarged musket?"

"Almost. After Roland instructed his subordinates to remove the hook, he personally adjusted the angle of the gun carriage so that the gun body was flattened and the pole was pressed into the snow.

The principle of the cannon and the musket is exactly the same, so it is very appropriate to say that it is an enlarged version of the musket. The gun fired twelve pounds of solid iron balls, and the shells and gunpowder were front-loaded and the fuses were ignited. Referring to the mature designs of history, Roland instructed the carpenter to build a wooden gun carriage for him. In order to improve durability, the parts that have more friction with the ground and are stressed more during firing are edged with iron sheets.

It took Roland almost as much time to make the gun carriage and wheels as he did to drill the gun breech, and the three carpenters were busy for a week to get it done, especially for the wheels with a diameter of more than half a man, and the carpenter first cut out four square strips of wood of equal length, soaked them and baked them with fire until they were bent, cut out grooves and tenons at the ends, and beat the outer edges of the wheels with iron sheets. This process took four days.

Therefore, in Roland's eyes, this all-handmade, limited-edition twelve-pounder field gun exudes dazzling light throughout. When it was dragged out for test firing, the accompanying lineup was very large - not to mention the chief knight Carter and the militia team commanding the iron axe, the personal guards and knight apprentices were all in battle, and the militia team also dispatched twenty people to be responsible for clearing the field and guarding. In addition to this, he brought a nightingale and lightning for the first time. Tona Nava's blessing, the militia's prejudice against the witch community was minimized, and Nanawa herself became the second most prestigious person in the ranks after the prince.

"Let's do it according to the process, first clean the chamber. "Although Roland is very clear about the construction of the artillery, the specific operation is blank. He racked his brain to recall the shots from various medieval films, trying to sort out a process, and as for the actual effect, God knows.

Lightning excitedly pulls out a mop-like cleaning rod from under the gun carriage and stabs it into the muzzle of the cannon - unlike other witches' contracts, Lightning offers to work for Roland without paying any pay, as long as she can handle all kinds of novelty inventions herself. Faced with this money-saving condition, Roland naturally agreed, anyway, when it was his turn to study the confidential project, it would be good to study it secretly. He still had a lot of ideas and inventions in his head waiting to be realized, and a few random ones would be enough for her to toss around for a while.

After a few fiddling sessions, the mop didn't bring out any clutter, but according to the process, she had to clean up a second time. Replace it with another mop, pump it a few more times, and the breech cleaning is complete.

"Do you see everything?" asked Roland as he turned to the knights and militiamen who were watching. The test was also a drill, and now that the production of muskets has increased dramatically, the militia will inevitably evolve into full-fledged infantry, and wooden guns will be replaced by muskets and artillery. This requires a lot of shooting training to become proficient in handling these two hot weapons on the battlefield.

Seeing everyone nodding, he let Lightning proceed to the next step.

The little girl took out a bag of gunpowder wrapped in a roll of paper, stuffed it into the chamber of the cannon, and stabbed it with a wooden pole to the end. Then put in the cannonball and poke it again. Remove the drill pipe and insert it through the lead hole at the rear end of the barrel, puncture the packet, and then insert the lead, so that the preparation for firing is complete.

In order to prevent accidents, everyone retreated thirty steps away and hid behind cover. Lightning brought the torch closer to the lead, only to see the spark at the end, and in the blink of an eye, it was already in the barrel.

Then there was a loud bang-

The high-speed air flow from the muzzle of the gun lifted the snow and raised a layer of snow mist on the ground. The theoretical effective range of the twelve-pounder gun could reach more than a kilometer, and even without rifling, the trajectory of the shells in the front section remained in a straight line. The armor target, which was placed about 100 meters away, made a bang, and was hit head-on by the twelve-pound iron ball, and the whole thing flew up. The iron ball castrated unabated, bouncing continuously after falling on the snow, stirring up columnar snowflakes.

When the smoke cleared, Carter and the Iron Axe ran to the target as soon as possible. I saw that the front of the armor had been completely dented, the front deck was attached to the rear deck, and a palm-sized hole was located in the center of the armor. Even when it rolls on the ground, it contains amazing power.

"What a terrible penetration!" Carter lamented, he could already imagine what it would be like when the enemy gathered together and were pierced by several shells.

"The three gods are above," the iron axe began to believe a little, Roland is the messenger of the mother earth, who can exert the power of the flame in such a state except the divine envoy? Those gunpowder particles, he had repeatedly studied, as long as they were crushed into powder and spread out and ignited, were ordinary flammables. The flames were Mother Earth's surging wrath and her most powerful weapon—and the thought of the never-ending orange fire erupting from the burrows in the far south made him feel the urge to bow down to the Prince.

Roland was not surprised by this result, the twelve-pounder field gun can be described as a classic generation, especially the Napoleonic cannon that shined in the American Civil War, which fully proved the truth that a large caliber is beautiful.

He then tested the strength of the barrel with different charges, which was necessary even though he knew that it might cause damage to the gun.

It has been added to the three packets of charge, and the muzzle has risen and the gun mount has shifted when the gun is fired, and the barrel has not yet been significantly deformed. It seems that the steel cast barrel is very good in terms of strength, and Roland finally determined the standard charge at 1.2 times the test charge, and the rest is to select the gunner and practice repeatedly.

"Your Highness, this weapon is indeed powerful, but it is too heavy. As long as it encounters a mud puddle, it can be immobilized. Carter immediately saw the shortcomings of the new weapon, "and each round of fire required cleaning the barrel and reloading." In addition, gunpowder and shells are much heavier than muskets, and I am afraid that a single cannon requires five or six people to operate. ”

"Indeed, but it is all worth it, as long as you are armed with two or three guns, the Duke ...... No, I mean the beasts, the giant tortoise's kind, can't break through the walls again. Roland coughed twice, secretly saying that it was dangerous. As for the shortcomings of the twelve-pounder gun being too heavy, he intended to solve it by shipping. The steam engine was intended to be transformed into a steamship, even in the most primitive paddle steamers, as a complex and massive mechanical system.

Rather than renovating it yourself, it is better to buy a two-masted galleon directly, and rely on Wendy's wind control ability to quickly transport the militia and artillery behind the Duke's troops, forming a flank with the frontal team, so as to encircle and annihilate the Duke's living force in the fortress.