It is said that the little Mauser and his party returned to Prussia with a new rifle, which immediately caused a sensation in the Prussian government army, and this new rifle was sought after by everyone up and down the army.

Every day, many people went to the Mauser company to ask for a test firing of new guns, and the 10,000 rounds of ammunition that Mauser Jr. brought back were quickly consumed, and the Mauser company had to suspend the open test firing activities, and at the same time mobilize technical forces to tackle key problems, seeking to be able to produce this all-metal shell bullet by itself; Of course, this "Made in Hanyang" has already been included in the production plan of Mauser.

Today, however, the test firing of the new guns of the Mauser company must be opened again, because the test shots of the new rifles were carried out by some of the most noble and powerful men of Prussia: His Majesty King Wilhelm I of Prussia, His Majesty's number one favorite, the iron-blooded Prime Minister Mr. Bismarck, and the Chief of the General Staff, General Moltke······

The Mauser Company was a little scrambling to entertain these most distinguished guests, and neither the little nor the big Mauser expected that a new gun would alarm them.

Moltke, the chief of the General Staff, was the first to test fire, and Mauser carefully explained to him the characteristics and shooting essentials of this "Made in Hanyang"; Moltke followed the three-point-one-line aiming method, aimed at the target and fired the first shot, then pulled the bolt, exited the cartridge case, loaded the second shot, and fired the third shot······ After more than ten seconds, the chief of the General Staff easily fired five bullets, and then he walked silently without saying a word, replacing Bismarck, who was waiting next to him, who was already eager to try······

In fact, Moltke's heart was already flooded with turbulent waves! As Chief of the General Staff, he knew best what changes this new rifle would bring to the war; Nowadays, the army in Europe is facing each other, and both sides use crowd tactics to shoot in a queue mode, which compares the combat will of both sides, and which side cannot withstand the pressure of casualties and collapses first, even if it fails;

But there is a prerequisite for this mode of warfare, that is, the weapons of both sides are similar; Imagine if the Prussian army was equipped with this rifle, the firing speed was five times that of the opponent, the firing range was three or four times that of the opponent, and the accuracy was two or three times that of the opponent, then it would not be a confrontation, it would be purely slaughtering the opponent!

This is a rifle that can change the layout of the battlefield and change the mode of battle! This was the conclusion in the mind of the Chief of the General Staff, Moltke.

At this time, Bismarck had already finished the test firing, and walked off the test firing table with a frightened face, and His Majesty Wilhelm I himself came to the stage to test the firing.

His Majesty quickly finished firing five rounds, and it seemed that he was not satisfied, so he asked the little Mauser next to him to bring five more rounds, played the second round, and finally reluctantly walked off the test table.

Moltke and Bismarck in the audience were already muttering something, and when they saw His Majesty Wilhelm coming over, they both stepped forward, and the three of them chattered again.

Since the victory of the Kingdom of Prussia in the Austro-Prussian War, which established Prussia's leading position in the German Confederation and paved the way for the establishment of the German Federal Empire, it was naturally hostile to France, which was bent on becoming the hegemon of Europe; Napoleon III had already made a request to Prussia to annex part of the German Confederation on the west bank of the Rhine to France as compensation for France's conservative neutrality in the Austro-Prussian War, but Bismarck categorically refused.

One is an old empire, the other is a new power, both want to dominate Europe, the hostility between Prussia and France is already unchangeable, and war is on the verge of breaking out at any time! The Chief of the General Staff, Moltke, had even drawn up a war plan for the Franco-Prussian War!

However, today, because of the test-firing of this "Hanyang-made", the chief of the general staff will make some adjustments and revisions to his battle plan. Moltke began by saying to His Majesty the King and the Prime Minister: "This is an epoch-making revolutionary rifle, and fortunately we mastered it first; Your Majesty, Prime Minister, I request that all members of our army be equipped with this new gun".

His Majesty Wilhelm nodded, but Bismarck frowned, he knew that the financial pressure would be too great if he was in charge of the finances.

His Majesty the King also spoke: "It is easy to go from thrift to luxury, and it is difficult to go from luxury to thrift; Soldiers with this new gun are reluctant to use the old rifles of the past, and the army that has not been equipped with a new gun will feel that they are being despised and will affect the morale of the army."

Bismarck reminded softly beside him: "Your Majesty, let's first understand the origin and price of this rifle."

The suggestion was good, and the other two agreed; Little Mauser was called to them, and Bismarck first asked: "Mr. Mauser, is this rifle your latest design?" ”

Originally, little Mauser still wanted to take the patent of this new gun for himself, but he didn't dare to lie in front of these big people: "Your Majesty the King, Your Excellency the Prime Minister, Your Excellency the Chief of the General Staff, the inventor of this new gun is a young man from the Great Qing Kingdom in the Far East, but our Mauser company has already bought its patent and production technology."

"Oh, it's incredible that the backward Far East invented this new rifle!" , Moltke sighed from the side.

Bismarck raised an eyebrow: "Can you be sure that this new gun will not fall into the hands of others?" Especially in the hands of the French. ”

His Majesty the King and the Chief of the General Staff immediately felt that if this new rifle was obtained by the enemy, it would mean disaster for Prussia.

"This", little Mauser didn't dare to make this guarantee, in case the Oriental boy "accidentally" leaked the technology, no one dared to guarantee that there was none.

Everyone present was aware of the gravity of the matter, and in this tense moment, if the French had obtained this weapon, the advantage they had would have been lost; Bismarck said with a straight face: "Mr. Mauser, I need to know the whole process of your transaction, including some details".

Little Mauser did not dare to hide anything, and explained all the details and process on the spot.

The Chief of the General Staff, Moltke, then understood that this rifle also had a special matching bullet, and of course he knew the importance of the bullet, and immediately asked: "Then do you now master the production technology of bullets?" ”

"I'm sorry, Your Excellency, but the production technology of this bullet is very complicated, even more than the production technology of rifles, so far we have not been able to produce it," Mauser could only answer truthfully.

His Majesty immediately said, "You can gather outstanding talents from all over the country to see if we can tackle key problems."

Bismarck, the iron-blooded prime minister, had already figured it out at this time, and said decisively: "The top priority is to encircle the inventor of the East, and to ensure that the technology of rifles and bullets cannot be obtained by other countries, especially France; If the production technology of bullets cannot be conquered in a short time, it is necessary to place an order to order from the Far East, the industry in the Far East is relatively backward, the production of this kind of bullet must be limited, since the inventor wants to enjoy it exclusively, he will definitely not contract the production of other factories, we had better package and buy all the bullets they produce, so that even if the production technology of the rifle is leaked and obtained by the French, they have no matching bullets available, and the advantage is still on our side."

Sure enough, it's a far-sighted iron-blooded prime minister! His Majesty the King and the Chief of the General Staff agree on this good idea, so that nothing goes wrong.

So the Prussian war machine was running at high speed; The Mauser Company received a huge order from the Prussian military to produce 500,000 new rifles in one year, which was not enough for all of them, but at least enough for a large-scale war; With a stroke of his pen, Bismarck advanced 50 percent of the payment to Mauser so that Mauser would have sufficient funds to expand production and seize the time to complete the production of 500,000 new guns.

At the same time, a telegram was sent to the young master Liang in the Far East, asking for the purchase of 50 million rounds of ammunition; Bismarck wants to use this large order to test the bullet production capacity here, and if the other party's production capacity lags behind, it is estimated that this large order will not be completed within a year.

However, Master Liang's reply made him fall into deep worry, and the content of the call was to strive for delivery within half a year. This made Bismarck feel the pain of lack of financial resources, 50 million rounds of ammunition were worth a full 10 million taels of silver, but he could only contract the other party's production capacity for half a year, while he needed at least a year or even two years; It has to be said that Bismarck's sense of war is quite keen, and the Franco-Prussian War in history began in early August 1870, almost a year and a half before now.

The iron-blooded prime minister was not stumped by the financial pressure, and he immediately contacted the British, imploring them to underwrite Prussian bonds or lend them directly to Prussia; London, of course, understood the tension between the Franco-Prussian side, and the British, who were already ready to pull the strings, naturally supported the relatively weak Prussia, and immediately agreed to underwrite 30 million pounds of Prussian bonds.

thirty million pounds, equivalent to seventy-five million taels of silver; With such a huge sum of money in his hands, Bismarck was full of confidence and only waited for 500,000 new rifles to complete the army's installation; After half a year, another 50 million rounds of ammunition will be ordered from the Far East, and if the war has not broken out in another six months, another 50 million rounds will be placed to completely complete the Far East's ammunition production capacity.

In addition, the work of establishing good relations with the forces of the Liang family army in the Far East is already working; In order to show Prussia's goodwill, Bismarck telegraphed the consul general of Guangzhou to visit Master Liang, and the two sets of large equipment ordered by the other party will be doubled in delivery, that is, the actual delivery of Prussia will become two sets of 7,000-ton large hydraulic presses, two sets of large boring machines, and the price is only 1 million taels of silver, a discount of 200,000 taels of silver.

This is not counting, Liang Sibao Liang Zhuang and his son, who went to the Mauser company, were personally received by His Majesty Wilhelm I, and His Majesty the King personally promised to train more workers for them, and Liang Zhuang's study was even more taken care of, with a full-time language teacher teaching him German, and after he passed the language barrier, he could go to the best secondary school in Germany, and in the future, he could enter the best university without examination.

As for the teachers of the Polytechnic University requested by Master Liang, Bismarck personally stepped forward and soon gathered 30 outstanding teachers of various subjects to teach in the Far East.