MTL - Heroes of Silver Moon-Chapter 668 : Armament upgrade

Clifford in the laboratory rubbed his eyes helplessly, which relieved his fatigue slightly.

He has tried thousands of combinations of materials, but he just couldn't synthesize a stable high explosive. Those products were either not powerful enough or too unstable.

In short, none of them satisfies Simon, and none of them are suitable for filling in shells.

"Forget it, let's stop here today, Pekka, and finish it off." Clifford was dejected, and began to order the apprentices to clean up the laboratory.

Because of the nature of the research, this kind of finishing work is actually quite dangerous, and several of his apprentices were killed because of it.

"Okay, teacher." The chief apprentice Pekka replied respectfully, and then told the newly recruited apprentices: "If you don't want to be blown to pieces, you'd better keep your hands and feet light."

In fact, in terms of seniority, he couldn't be Clifford's chief apprentice. The reason why he can be now is because those apprentices with more seniority were blown to pieces because they weren't careful enough.

With the lessons learned from the past, every time Pekka came into contact with these alchemy potions, he was trembling, as if walking on thin ice, for fear that he would follow in the footsteps.

Therefore, if any new apprentice was not gentle enough, or stumbled into the potion, he would inevitably be scolded by him.

After listening to Pekka's lecture, these new apprentices timidly swallowed and began to carefully sort the medicines in the laboratory.

They also know the danger of this job, and know that this job has killed many people, but Clifford's salary is very high, even comparable to that of a junior alchemist.

Moreover, there is also a pension for being killed by the bombing, and the amount is enough to make people feel excited.

Anyone who has a difficult family, wants to improve their lives, or is ambitious and wants to climb up the social ladder will not miss this opportunity.

So even though they knew the danger, they still chose to come here.

Ever since he started researching explosives, Clifford's apprentices have always changed frequently. Sophia is an apprentice who has just arrived, because he has no experience. After everyone else has chosen their work area, he realizes that the laboratory is only There is one last area left for him to choose.

Looking at the area, Pekka was silent for a moment, and ordered: "Be careful!"

The unstable explosives area, full of extremely unstable explosives, is the most dangerous place in the entire laboratory. No one wants to go there when finishing work every day.

Therefore, as soon as everyone enters work, they immediately go to other areas to finish.

Pekka knew that it would be quite irresponsible for an apprentice who had only been training for a few days to be responsible for the finishing work in the unstable explosives area.

But there was no other way, he, the chief apprentice, was just an apprentice after all, and he couldn't forcefully order other apprentices, especially in this kind of place where it was possible that one would die if he was not careful.

If the newcomer doesn't clean up, he can only clean up by himself, and he... doesn't want to die.

Sophia, who knew nothing about the danger, walked into the area of ​​unstable explosives. Looking at the dazzling array of explosives, he kept cheering himself up in his heart.

Although he has only received a few days of training, he knows how to do this job. It is very simple, that is, put everything back in its corresponding place, and if there is something missing, it must be replenished in time.

Anyone who can read and understand the labels on the quartz vials and shelves can do the job well, but only if you are careful enough.

Carefully placing all the quartz bottles where they should be placed, Sophia started the second job, replenishing the experimental materials that had bottomed out.

"Hmm...is this diatom mineral powder?" Holding a large bottle of white powder, Sophia scratched her head.

Speaking of which, it was more or less luck that he was able to become Clifford's apprentice. Even if he passed the recruitment assessment by luck, it did not mean that he was qualified for the job.

A few years ago, the kingdom began to popularize cheap books, and the church also opened basic teaching classes accordingly, mainly teaching literacy and basic arithmetic. You only need one silver coin to attend the class.

However, because there were too many applicants, the church only gave priority to recruiting the children of believers.

His parents are both devout believers, so of course they didn't miss this opportunity. As soon as they heard the good news, they quickly took out the little money left by the family and let him study in teaching classes.

Therefore, children born in the common class like him can have the opportunity to read and write, and this is an important condition for Clifford to recruit apprentices.

But it is a pity that in the teaching classes held by the church, one teacher often leads more than one hundred students, and books, pens and paper are not provided for free.

As a result, the students participating in the teaching class can only grasp part of the knowledge taught by the teacher depending on the situation.

Sophia is a typical example. He knows how to write most of the commonly used words, but he is completely at a loss for those uncommon words.

In Clifford's laboratory, there are many names of materials, all of which are uncommon words, such as the diatom mineral powder. He can understand the last mineral powder, but the first two words can only be guessed.

So of course, Sophia successfully packed the explosive mineral powder into the bottle of diatom mineral powder.

After the finishing work was over, Pekka inspected all areas of the laboratory, and after confirming that all materials had been put back in place and had been replenished, he breathed a sigh of relief.

So he didn't check carefully, and led the apprentices to leave here in a hurry.

After all, any thing here can blow up their bones, and it is impossible for anyone to like to stay in such an environment.

The next day, Clifford came to do experiments as usual. As the nitrated diatomaceous earth explosive closest to the stable state, it was naturally the object of his research.

Waking up early in the morning, maybe his brain hadn't recovered from the force. He didn't realize that something was wrong until he mixed nitroglycerin with the white powder affixed with diatom mineral powder.

What the hell... isn't diatom mineral powder taupe!

Clifford quickly picked up the bottle and checked the remaining white powder. With his rich experience in materials science, he immediately judged that it was explosive mineral powder.

Then, his cold sweat also flowed down in a swish. With the fastest casting speed in his life, he put a layer of magic shield on himself, preparing for the next explosion.

The idea of ​​muskets has not never appeared in this world. In fact, muskets have existed in the alchemy system for a long time.

It's just that the propellant used in that kind of musket is too unstable, and the cost of producing the gun is high, so it has not been recognized and popularized.

Only a small number of alchemists can collect and research. The reason why Simon chose the alchemy department was because he saw Clifford's collection of muskets.

And the propellant used in this alchemy musket is explosive ore powder, its properties are very similar to nitroglycerin, and it will explode immediately after being subjected to violent impact and high temperature.

Originally, one material was already an extremely unstable explosive, but now that these two materials were mixed together, Clifford couldn't imagine the consequences.

The greatest possibility is that this mixture exploded immediately, and then caused a chain reaction of other unstable explosives, blowing up the entire laboratory.

Now, it depends on whether this spell shield can withstand the big explosion. If he can withstand it, then he will be seriously injured at most. If he can't, hehe...

After closing his eyes and waiting for a long time, Clifford didn't wait for the imaginary big explosion, opened his eyes secretly, and found that the two materials were blending quietly, so he was relieved immediately.

As long as it doesn't explode right away...

Just as he was about to dispose of the mixture and the apprentice who filled the wrong material bottle, he suddenly fell into deep thought.

In the past, he had never considered this aspect, mixing two extremely unstable explosives at the same time, perhaps this is just a misunderstanding.

After careful consideration, Clifford decided to give it a try.

Traditional experience could not help him to develop stable explosives. Perhaps this new idea will have unexpected effects.

After waiting anxiously for two days, when the two compounds were completely fused and turned into a paste-like mixture, Clifford immediately started the experiment.

Unexpectedly, the compatibility of this mixture is very high, and it is not like nitroglycerin explosives, which will overflow nitroglycerin from time to time.

In terms of explosive sensitivity, although it is still considered sensitive, compared to nitroglycerin and explosive mineral powder, it is already considered quite good.

In terms of explosive power, it is also far stronger than the two separate materials.

It can be said that as long as the detonation sensitivity is further weakened, the ideal stable explosive can be obtained.

Looking at the quartz bottle containing the explosive mineral powder but with the label of diatom mineral powder on it, Clifford fell into deep thought again.

Diatomite impregnated with nitroglycerin can produce a relatively stable diatomite explosive, which shows that diatomite itself is a material that can weaken the sensitivity of explosion, which is also the focus of his research.

With excitement, Clifford took a deep breath. He felt like never before that the answer was only one step away.

Once again the two materials were mixed, and diatomaceous earth was also mixed in, and a light yellow mixture that was completely integrated on the physical level appeared.

After several tests and experiments, Clifford came up with the most perfect material ratio, and he was convinced that this was the stable explosive that Simon needed!

 …

"So, what happened to the last apprentice?" In the king's study, after listening to Clifford's report, Simon's focus was obviously wrong.

Clifford was obviously taken aback, then shook his head with a wry smile: "I fired him because he was careless and misplaced the materials, but...as a reward for providing me with new ideas, I rewarded him with one hundred gold coins, And sent him to the Alchemy Department of the Magic Academy."

Simon nodded knowingly, and asked with a long breath, "So, we have solid explosives?"

"That's right, a violent impact, or even a fire, can't ignite this kind of explosive. It must be detonated with a violent explosive reaction, exactly as you described." Clifford replied excitedly.

The problem of stabilizing solid explosives has troubled him for more than a year~www.novelbuddy.com~ finally solved it.

"Double base explosives..." Simon seemed to evoke some memories and said with emotion.

He also did not expect that Clifford, who was already in trouble in his research, would suddenly wake him up, not only the stable explosive, but also the double-base explosive using two kinds of explosives as raw materials.

This kind of double-base explosive is more stable and more powerful. It was widely used in the Blue Star World War II, and it was still used by various countries even before he crossed over.

In other words, how to develop explosives next is already a blind spot of his knowledge.

The explosives developed by Clifford may not need to be further improved for decades or even hundreds of years. The Silver Moon Kingdom is already sufficient.

"Teacher, don't be in a hurry, we still have to study new types of shells and artillery."

"In addition, since the artillery has undergone such a big change, I also plan to upgrade the armament of the entire new army, and I still have to be busy."

Simon closed his eyes and began to think about the weapons suitable for the new army.

Hmm... Considering the road conditions in this world, hand grenades, mortars and other small explosive weapons that are easy to carry should be developed first to serve as the heavy firepower of the new army.

Light artillery will also be manufactured to become the decisive weapon of the new army. In addition, the hand-cranked rotary machine gun can't keep up. Maybe you can consider replacing it with a fully automatic Maxim machine gun.

Heavy artillery can be ignored for now, anyway, it is not easy to carry when it is built.

Clifford's expression suddenly turned bitter, and he still wanted to take a good rest for a while... But since it was Simon's request, he couldn't refuse it.

After all, in the entire Silvermoon Kingdom, no one could be as busy as King Simon.