In the end, however, Pietro chose an improved version of the M12 and M/45 submachine guns, rather than the slightly crazy Kalashnikov blueprints, which were as hard to swallow as Russia's most powerful vodka.

And the famous Belgian designer Tulio. Mangony is emotionally more inclined to Kalashnikov's design, this bold innovation he admires very much, but intellectually does not support Kalashnikov's AKS submachine gun, after all, the contest with FN is related to Beretta's reputation, and more seriously, it is related to the private contest of small arms between Belgium and Italy.

Kalashnikov saw that Pietro did not choose his own design, and he showed neither anger nor regret, the 25-year-old had lived and died too much, from war to the design of firearms. His expression was as flat as the bottomless Baikal Lake, but he bowed slightly to Pietro and said, "I'm sorry to disappoint Mr. Pietro." ”

Kalashnikov's family was not in a very good condition, and during the Bryansk tank battle in the fall of 1941, his tank was hit by a shell, seriously wounded in the left shoulder and chest, and was sent back to the rear hospital for treatment. In addition, two of his siblings were killed in the Great Patriotic War, and one was disabled. Coming to Italy from Kazakhstan, his desire was simple, he just wanted to make his life better.

"Comrade Kalashnikov, go back and rest first, don't worry, I will pay you a lot of your salary." Piertro patted Kalashnikov on the shoulder and said in relief.

Kalashnikov did not nod or veto, but silently put away his drawings, and left alone with the gloating or mocking expressions of the other three designers. Feeling sorry for him alone, Mangoni quietly asked Pietro, "Just give up his design?" ”

Little did Pitro know that he had lost one of the most famous firearms in history, and as the helmsman of Beretta for more than forty years, caution was his life credo.

"To be honest, I was too surprised to see the design, after all, this declaration of war is not only about Beretta's European market, but also about Beretta's reputation, and if it loses, the consequences will be unimaginable. Presumably, even Carl Gustaf Arsenal and SIG Industries were keenly aware of the hint of danger, so they agreed to join forces to deal with FN Company. ”

Tulio Marngoni lamented with pity, "It's a pity that the design is too unrealistic. What if small-caliber rifle cartridges really become the trend of mainstream firearms in the future? ”

"So I'm going to come back to Mr. Kalashnikov's design after this storm is over, and if it's really good, I'll buy the ownership of it and try it on a small scale." Pietro suddenly felt a sense of powerlessness, he had long since lost the ambition of the wolf child, wanted to eat any delicious firearm design, and now only wanted to protect the glory of the Beretta family, in this era of gunsmith genius.

Tulio Mangoni, who was half of Pietro's confidant, patted Pietro and stood silently beside him.

At the same time, FN, Albert and Sever began to discuss the feasibility of developing an SVD.

"Your Highness Albert, with all due respect, is this really a sniper rifle you designed?" Seifer pushed his glasses with a look of disbelief, to be honest, he had seen the precision design of the Mauser 98K, but he had never seen such a simple and crude construction of the SVD sniper rifle.

"Yes, this is an improvement from the design of the AKM rifle." Albert said that since the last time he won the bet with those designers, the designers of FN company saw him walk around, like seeing a ghost, after all, he lost a whole month's salary, and it was distressing to change anyone, so only Seifer had a good relationship with him.

"Improved from AKM rifles?" Seifer was a little puzzled, "Isn't the accuracy of the AKM rifle always bad?" To improve a firearm with poor accuracy to a sniper rifle is simply an incredible idea. ”

Albert had to explain to him slowly, "The air piston of the SVD is different from the AKM, the piston of the AKM is integrated with the bolt frame, while the SVD adopts the design of a short-stroke piston, the air piston is located separately in the piston barrel, and moves backwards under the pressure of gunpowder gas, hitting the frame to make it recoil, which can reduce the center of gravity offset caused by the movement of the piston and the piston connecting rod, thereby improving the shooting accuracy." ”

"And the SVD has a flap-shaped flame suppressor at the nose end of the barrel with a length of 70mm, it has 5 slots, 3 of which are located in the upper part and 2 in the bottom. In this way, more gas is discharged from the upper part of the extinguisher than from the bottom, and the actual effect is to press the muzzle down to reduce the muzzle jump to a certain extent. In addition, the front end of the flame suppressor is tapered, forming an inclined plane, which blocks a part of the gunpowder gas and causes it to be retracted to reduce the recoil of the gun. ”

"As for the scope, I plan to use the Soviet PU scope, after all, my NORINCO company does not have enough capacity to develop a special scope for SVD, so I hope to improve the PU scope a little and install it on the dovetail slot of the SVD sniper rifle."

"Why did His Highness Albert hand over this gun to our FN company to design, instead of His Majesty's North Industries Company to handle it himself?" Seifer asked curiously, in fact, he was very concerned about the sales of AKM and FAL rifles, and he always regretted not taking the patent rights.

"Because of strength." Albert also honestly admitted, "Mr. Sever, you can also see that my company is a small business, and it has neither strong technical strength nor designers who can support the façade, and it is really impossible to study something that requires a lot of effort and effort like a sniper rifle." ”

"Then His Highness Albert is not worried about our FN company's lion opening his mouth? And His Royal Highness Albert is still reluctant to tell us openly and honestly what style of submachine gun you want to design, it's been two months, and there is no news at all. Your company's R&D department has done a really good job of keeping it secret. Seifer sneered, "To be honest, we're really interested in the sales of AKM and FAL rifles, it's only been less than two months, and it's almost close to more than ten countries that have purchased these two firearms." ”

"Submachine guns, this kind of accuracy is not as scary as a sniper rifle, forget it, leave it to our NORINCO to take care of it." Albert stood up and said goodbye, "The drawings and parameters are left here, please let me know as soon as Your Excellency Sever develops a sample gun." ”

"How many more days will His Highness Albert stay?" Seeing that Albert was not going to let go, Seifer was not reluctant, he got up and planned to send off the hottest designer in the European light weapons industry, and when the two walked out, Seifer asked intentionally or unintentionally, "The guns developed by His Royal Highness Albert seem to be biased towards the Soviet style, could it be that these designed guns are all prepared for the Soviet Union?" ”

Albert turned his head and stared at Seifer with a smile, and when he saw the latter, he quickly waved his hand to show that he didn't mean anything else.

However, Albert finally said slowly, "Your Excellency really thinks too much, the Soviet Union's gun design bureau and arsenal have a lot of talents, so they look down on me for this little cleverness." ”

Belgium is already covered in snow in December, and while the temperate maritime climate doesn't make Belgium as cold as the Siberian winter, it still feels bitterly cold. After sending Albert out of the door, Seifer looked at the snow on the ground and said with emotion, "I'm afraid it's unfair to the guns themselves to test guns in this kind of weather." ”

Albert replied without looking back, "A firearm that can be fired normally in this extreme environment of frost and snow is the best, and Belgium needs the best firearm, not a fair one." ”