Gunpowder Plate Armor and the Magic Revolution

Lucas, already tall and strong, charged forward with all his might, like a rampaging bear, his scimitar slashing fiercely at the two assassins who had slipped past.

The leader of the assassins hurriedly parried with his sword, but the powerful blow caused his hand to split open and his sword to almost fly out of his hand. He was forced to stagger backward.

One force can overcome all techniques, and Lucas was no ordinary brute with only strength and no skill. Taking advantage of the opponent's unsteady stance and wide-open defense, he slammed his shoulder into the assassin's jaw and slashed upwards with his blade, actually cutting the curved sword into the assassin's jawbone.

Andrew followed closely behind, combining wind blades with swordsmanship, and quickly cut down the assassin in front of him with a single strike.

With the infiltrated enemy dead, Lucas and Andrew were able to provide timely support to Nozer, who was engaged in a fierce battle.

Soon, Nozer, Lucas, and Andrew formed a triangular formation. Nozer held the line in the middle to withstand the frontal attack, Lucas guarded the left side to close the gap, and Andrew controlled the right and rear flanking spaces, completely blocking the already narrow dock walkway.

Below them was the surging sea. If the assassin wanted to get around it, he either had to force his way through the defensive line formed by Noze and his two companions, or he would have to jump into the sea. There was no third way.

The assassins, who had been launching a fierce attack, suddenly stopped in their tracks. Looking at the three people blocking their way, and then at the Orentia army officers who had surrounded them, their faces instantly turned extremely ugly.

They knew in their hearts that the best time for the assassination had passed. If they continued to drag it out, and the howling soldiers surrounded them, none of them would be able to escape.

The leader of the assassins gritted his teeth and gave orders to the surrounding assassins in the obscure Edric dialect, "Spread out and break through! Every one who can escape is a chance!"

As soon as he finished speaking, the remaining seven or eight assassins scattered, some trying to use the layers of cargo containers on the dock as cover to sneak into the fleeing crowd, while others turned and ran in the opposite direction, trying to break out of the dock's encirclement in the chaos.

"Trying to run? No way!"

Lucas cursed and was about to draw his knife and give chase, but Noze grabbed his arm. "They outnumber us, don't pursue them too far."

Almost simultaneously, a clear female voice came from behind them, "No need to chase, let me handle it."

The three of them instinctively turned around to look, and the next second, they all froze on the spot.

Sophie had already put down the rectangular object that was tightly wrapped in black cloth on her back. She was now kneeling on one knee on the boardwalk, her fingertips quickly unlocking the clasp on the box.

The wooden box was opened, revealing a strangely shaped firearm lying quietly inside, lined with dark red velvet.

The gun body is covered with polished brass engravings, decorated as beautifully as an artwork reserved for royal collections, but its core structure is quite different from all the matchlock guns on the mainland at that time.

It has no matchlock tether that needs to be lit manually, nor a powder magazine that needs to be reloaded after each shot. There is a smooth metal push-pull lever on the side of the gun, and an arc-shaped sealed metal magazine under the stock. The barrel is nearly one-third shorter than that of a conventional gun, and the bore is engraved with fine helical rifling.

Sophie's aiming was incredibly fast. She raised her hand, grabbed the strange gun, and steadily supported the front of the gun with her left hand. She bent her right leg forward and pushed off with her left leg, assuming the most stable shooting posture. The dark muzzle instantly aimed at the fastest-running assassin.

"Bang!"

A crisp gunshot rang out, much more decisive than the muffled roar of a conventional matchlock gun. Not far away, the assassin leader, who was preparing to retreat, had a burst of blood erupt from his back. He staggered and collapsed to the ground, never to move again.

Before everyone could recover from the accuracy of the shot, Sophie quickly pushed and pulled the metal lever on the side of the gun with her left hand. With a crisp "click," the internal mechanism of the gun completed the entire process of loading gunpowder, loading a bullet, and resetting the hammer.

She pulled the trigger again, and another shot rang out. The second assassin, who was climbing over the railing, fell to the ground with a thud. The bullet struck him precisely in the thigh, and he screamed as he collapsed to the ground.

An eerie silence fell over the surroundings.

Firearms of this era, whether the oldest matchlock guns or experimental flintlock guns that were not yet in mass production or deployment in various countries, all had fatal flaws.

To fire a bullet, one must manually load the gunpowder and lead bullet, then compact the powder bath and ignite the fuse.

Even the most skilled veterans in the military can only fire two or three bullets per minute, and that's only in ideal conditions with no wind or rain.

But the gun in Sophie's hand can be chambered in the blink of an eye by simply pulling that inconspicuous metal lever, and can be fired again by pulling the trigger, without the need for manual reloading.

"Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!"

Gunshots rang out one after another, and every time Sophie pulled the trigger, a fleeing assassin fell to the ground; not a single shot missed.

It could be because of the close proximity, plus the fact that the assassins were on the walkway and couldn't do anything to avoid it, but in any case, Sophie's shooting skills were indeed better than the average person.

In just a few breaths, she had pulled the trigger ten times in a row, firing all ten bullets.

The seven or eight assassins who fled on the plank road were either dead or wounded; none of them managed to escape more than a hundred meters away.

The sea breeze, carrying a faint smell of gunpowder, swept by, and everyone stood frozen in place, their faces filled with disbelief and shock.

Even the officers who had just disembarked from the Gold Rush stopped in their tracks, staring blankly at Sophie kneeling on one knee and the gun in her hand that defied everyone's understanding.

Lucas stared, mouth agape, unable to close for a long time before finally managing to stammer out, "...What the hell is this thing?"

Even Andrew, who spent all his time in the library, had never seen or even heard of such a firearm.

No pre-loading is required, and no match cord is needed to ignite the gunpowder. Continuous firing can be completed with just a push-pull lever, while maintaining such amazing accuracy.

Based on his experience, Nozer quickly recognized that the gun was called the Karkhov repeating gun in his previous life, a type of flintlock musket.

The Karkhov repeating rifle's burst-fire capability is not achieved through the automatic cycle driven by gunpowder gas, as is the case with modern automatic weapons. Instead, it utilizes a highly integrated mechanical linkage mechanism that allows the musketeer to complete the entire process from ammunition loading to firing by simply performing a minimal cycle of "single trigger guard lever reciprocation and trigger pull," thus enabling continuous firing.

This design eliminates the original cumbersome loading process, reducing the reload interval for single-shot firing from over 20 seconds to 1 to 2 seconds.