Gun-ota ga Mahou Sekai ni Tensei Shitara, Gendai Heiki de Guntai Harem o Tsukucchaimashita!? Volume 5 Chapter 70
The next day, I immediately checked out the barrier stone in the High elfâs castle â Woodcastle, and its surroundings in the presence of Lyss. Of course Snow, Chrisse, Meiya, and Shia accompanied me, too. The barrier stone looked exactly like a pyramid, tall enough that I had to look up. Probably as tall as a five~six story building.
I looked around it but there was no entrance. Its texture was close to marble. So smooth that you wouldnât think itâs been here for thousands of years.
Its position was about 10km away from the High elfâs castle â Woodcastle. It looked out onto a garden with great view, not an obstacle in sight. The castle itself was originally made to monitor the barrier stone, or so Lyss explained.
The barrier stone was surrounded by high ramparts.
There were fully armed soldiers stationed on top of the ramparts fully armed soldiers are stationed, elves and Black elves that served High elves, just like Shia. There were about 50 soldiers.
Once you passed through the ramparts, you would find a lake.
As I was done with the check, I recalled the characteristic of the monsters I heard about from Lyss last night.
If the barrier stone was destroyed, only the monsters called âbasiliskâ and âdragoonâ would appear from here, it seemed.
âBasiliskâ was a monster with lizard head and body, bird wings, and dragon tail. Among researchers it was said to be a subspecies of dragon, or something close. Because of that, it had hard scales covered all over its body. Another troublesome trait was its magic eyes. Basilisk eyes possessed the ability to petrify. It was different for each individual but the effective range was about 500 meters. Once you were caught by its magic eyes, there was no way to recover from being petrified.
Whereas âdragoonâ, much less magic eyes, it doesnât even have magic, and had low intelligence. But this one also inherited dragonâs blood, so its physique ccould reach up to two meters. Like dragons, it had scales cover its body, though not as hard, and it possessed superhuman strength that didnât lose to an orc or even an orge. Its weapons were primitive weapons like stone spears, axes, or clubs made from bone but it had high strength and defense, that kind of monster. The troublesome thing was that they attacked in groups.
If the record book was true, then after the barrier stone was destroyed, there wouldnât just be thousands of monsters flowing, but ten of thousands it seems.
With that much of war potential, the country can certainly be destroyed in a single night.
I took the factors of geography, the enemy war potential, and our force into the equation, then answered.
âIf we prepare carefully, then we may be able to fight.â âIs it true, Hero-sama !?â
Somehow Lyss was calling me âHero-samaâ. Being called that in front of other people sure was embarrassing.
âYes. But of course, preparation in advance is necessary.â
The enemies were strong and numerous. If just the adventurers and soldiers in the castle were to deal with it, the damage would be pretty harsh.
The first trouble was the âbasiliskâ. It could fly, and had hard scales comparable to a dragon. It also had magic eyes that petrified anything it saw. The effective range was about 500 meters radius wide. But, we had Chrisse.
The max shooting range of the M700P was 900m, so she could just blow its head off from the inside by shooting [7.62x51mm explosive magic stone round] though the eye sockets before entering the magic eyesâ effective range.
The dragoon also had high attack and defense, albeit low intelligence, and their numbers could reach tens of thousands. But if I made use of the internal mechanisms of the current AK47 and changed it a bit to make a general-purpose machine gun, then it should be enough to deal with them.
General-purpose machine gun is â a machine gun.
Well then, what exactly is a machine gun ? A machine gun is basically a full automatic rifle, and it could continuously shoot at the speed of more than 100 rounds per second, had the function to swap the barrel, and due to the powerful cartridge its range was long (about 1~2km).
It was feared as the Devilâs weapon that could annihilate hundreds, or even thousands of enemies with just a few soldiers. Hiram Maxim, the inventor of the first machine gun called it âkilling machineâ.
In fact, machine gun had claimed the lives of many, enough to change the face of war at the time.
In WW1, before the machine gun was introduced, infantry corps would stand from a few hundred to 1000 meters apart and spread out into ranks and shoot each other with bolt action rifles, while assault infantry and cavalry would charge to the sound of trumpets. But when the machine gun entered the stage, they were all easily shot down.
For example, in the Russo-Japanese war, the Russian army annihilated 200 Japanese soldiers with just Maxims (heavy machine gun)2 .
In a certain colony, 28 British troops and 20 foreign troops, for a total of 48, died, but the âcasualtiesâ from the enemy natives was over 11000 people.
It is said that about 80 percent of the casualties of the First World War (9.92 million dead, 21.2 million wounded) were victims of the machine gun.
One battalion (about 1000 people) could be swept clean with one machine gun in just three minutes. It was only natural that it came to be called the Devilâs weapon.
The machine gun then evolved and split into the heavy machine gun and the light machine gun, each serving a different purpose.
The heavy machine gun took at least three people to operate, was set up in encampments, trenches and fortifications and was used for defense.
The light machine gun could be used by one or two people and was an attack weapon, used to assault enemy trenches.
As the age advanced into the Second World War, heavy machine guns, while having the portability of light machine guns, that came attached as anti-aircraft machine guns or vehicle-mounted machine guns entered the stage. This was the general-purpose machine gun.
The general-purpose machine gun Iâm making was a PKM, a machine gun based on the well-proven mechanism of the AK47. It was a general-purpose machine gun currently used by the Russian military.
These were the specs: Caliber: 7.62Ă54mmR Total Length: 1173 mm Barrel Length: 658 mm Weight: 8.99 kg Ammunition capacity: Belt link ammunition feed (200 rounds)
Iâve already made several AKs, so the internal structure and gun body shouldnât be much of a problem. The problem lied in the ammunition (cartridge).
Could I make the case for 7.62x54mmR cartridge, find the right amount of powder, and mass produce it three months from now?
Originally I should have made a general-purpose machine gun that used the M700Pâs 7.62x51mm NATO roundâŠ. Heavy machine gun or light machine gun or whatever, if I made one that used the same ammo as the infantryâs standard ammunition it would be more convenient to supply. But I didnât have the confidence to make general-purpose machine guns that used 7.62x51mm NATO rounds, for example, the M60, or the M240, in just 3 months.
Because of that, it was faster to make 7.62x54mmR cartridges with the experience I had accumulated up until now.
Or rather, soon Chrisse may ask to replace her M700P for a semi-automatic sniper rifle that uses 7.62x54mmR cartridge like the SVD (Dragunov sniper rifle).
If itâs in Chrisseâs hands then even the less accurate SVD probably wouldnât be a problem.
When it comes to that, I will need to have a âbriefing sessionâ with Chrisse.
But in the end, it was still a race against time. Itâs probably better to make some insurance.
I omitted the parts I couldnât tell everyone about and wrapped up the explanation of the general-purpose machine gun.
Meiyaâs eyes sparkled while she took notes, as usual. Snowâs group listened with uninterested faces as usual, while, Lyss showed great interest. Thereâs no way she wouldnât be interested in a weapon that can save her country now, is there?
Then a new character appeared.
âHee~, so youâre the Hero-sama that oneechan brought along.â â!?â
I turned to the voice, and there was a three, no, four meters large wolf. Its body hair was completely white, while from its mouth, sharp teeth like those of a Sabre tiger were sprouting out.
Riding on that wolfâs back was a little girl.
The soldiers guarding the barrier stone were kneeling toward her.
Her height was about the same as Chrisseâs, and her physique was also close. She had long blonde hair tied in twintails, and was a beautiful girl, but she seemed to have this cheeky air about her.
She continued talking without getting off from the wolfâs back.
âIâm Lyss oneechanâs little sister, Luna. This one is a sabre wolf called Lexy. My favorite thing is the hero story picture book. Thatâs why when Iâm in a pinch, please save me like the princess in picture book ne~âȘâ âHey, Luna! Why are you giving greetings from Lexyâs back!? Get off right now and give a proper greetings! Iâm sorry Hero-sama, my little sister is still a kid who isnât even 100 years old yet, so she still doesnât understand etiquette properly.â
No no no, sheâs more than old enough. She likes picture books â hero stories even! Looks like she would get along with Chrisse. Their physiques are similar, their blonde hair too.
Lyss was apologizing for her sisterâs impolite attitude. The little sister Luna, even though she was scolded by her big sister, didnât seem to care and nimbly jumped down from the sabre wolf Lexy.
âWhy did you come here in the first place?â âOf course, to see the Hero-sama that oneechan brought along.â âYou came here just for that?â âItâs okay isnât it? Anyway itâs not just me you know.â
We didnât realize because the big sabre wolf was in the way, but a man with servants following him stood behind it. Lyss was shocked by the appearance of the man.
Lyssâ father â in other words, the king of High elf kingdom Enol !?
He was about 180cm tall, but had a slender figure with long blonde hair. While itâs obvious as he is a High elf, he looked so young that you wouldnât think he already had three daughters, he looked like he was in his late 20s or early 30s.
The king slowly walked forward. He waved his hand down and the guarding soldiers quietly left the scene. He cleared everyone out.
He then took a glance at us and rebuked us with a calm voice.
âIâd like you to not thoughtlessly approach the barrier stone. Itâs a very sacred thing to us High elves.â
At her fatherâs words, Lyss steps forward and covered for us.
âFather, these guests are the heroes I have asked to come here. How can you say that?â âLyss, you are still believing in the nonsense that Lara left âŠâŠ?â
He replied to his daughterâs reprimand with disappointment.
âPlease stop with such thoughtless words like she had not only âClairvoyanceâ but also âProphetic dreamerâ. That was just her messing around. Even the demon king canât destroy the barrier stone. So Enol being ruined in one night is impossible. Please stop reminding me of Lara.â
The king believed in the absolute defense of the barrier stone that had been continuously protected by the High elvesâ ancestors, but at the same time he, as the parent, did not want to be reminded of the eldest daughter, Laraâs disappearance.
However, Lyss didnât think it was her sisterâs mischief. She had successfully brought us to this country by following the record book. So of course, she objected.
âBut Hero-sama came to us because I followed what the record book says!â âItâs just a coincidence. To begin with, I donât think they have the power to stop them if the barrier stone broke and monsters came pouring out of it.â âThatâs too rude, even for Father!â âBut itâs the truth, theyâre still children. How can I believe that they can save us from a never before seen crisis. If they do have that kind of strength, Iâd like them to show me.â
The conversation was going in a weird direction. Under the circumstances, he had to investigate us.
ââŠâŠ. you mean to say?â âIf they have that kind of power, then I want them to defeat the Giant scorpion that lives in the forest nearby.â
The Giant scorpion was a 7-8 meters large scorpion monster, and it had a hard outer shell that made blades completely useless. It had three tails from where it launched countless stingers, a rather annoying monster. If it were a request from the Adventurersâ Guild, it wouldâve been a level V quest.
Lyss gritted her teeth, unable to answer right away. She believed in her sister, but the Giant scorpion was an extremely dangerous monster. To add to that, she had never seen our strength herself so she couldnât reply.
The King said that because he understood. If I refused, he would use that as a reason to kick me out. If I accepted and could really defeat the Giant scorpion, then allâs well that ends well.
Either way, he stood to benefit from it.
As expected from the King of a country. âŠ. but I donât like it.
I answered in Lyssâ place.
ââŠâŠ I understand. Iâll bring down the Giant scorpion.â
Lyss stared wide eyed at me when I gave my consent. I continued the negotiations.
âIn return, when Iâve safely defeated the Giant scorpion, Iâd like you to listen to what Lyss-sama has to say. And if, for example, the problem doesnât occur as predicted in the record book, then all the better.â âHero-samaâŠ.â
Lyss heard my request and gripped both of her hands tightly to her chest. The King silently looked at me for a while, judging my expression.
ââŠâŠ. All right. You have my word. Iâll listen to what Lyss has to say a bit if you defeat the Giant scorpion.â âThank you very much.â
I gave him a salute I learned in the Vlad house â right hand on my chest, left hand behind my back, and bowed.
The King saw my salute then turned his back, and returned to the castle.
And we hurriedly went on our way to defeat the Giant scorpion.
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