It would be 4 days until the three major nobles of Hanover Province replied to the invitations and arrived in Border City on the appointed date.
During this time, Anke hurried between the Alchemy Workshop and the Lord’s Castle, preparing for the matter of borrowing money.
Vera, following her bet with Anke, learned to use the musket proficiently while organizing a systematic training process.
Neither task was difficult for her as a Mimic Beast.
The most difficult part was getting the traditional knights to accept this rebellious alchemy weapon after assembling the new muskets in the Alchemy Workshop.
“Lady Vera, this weapon goes against the Knight’s Spirit. I will not use this thing on the battlefield even if I die!”
“Exactly! A knight should engage in an honorable duel. Using a despicable alchemy weapon will lead to being abandoned by the Knight God!”
Several knights from minor noble backgrounds were particularly resistant to the muskets.
“Then you can refrain from learning to use the musket for now. Those who are willing to take the initiative to learn, step to the front of the line.”
After Vera spoke, the twenty-three knights looked at one another. They stared at each other with wide eyes, but not a single one stepped forward.
“Stop looking at others and think for yourselves!”
Vera frowned and shouted again. This time, everyone stopped looking at their peers.
After several breaths of silence, the first person stepped out, followed by the second, third, and fourth.
Out of the twenty-three knights, only four were willing to voluntarily learn the musket, and all of them were commoner knights who had been promoted from squires.
These commoner knights lacked the opportunities and resources available to noble knights, so they were bolder when it came to accepting new things.
Vera did not repeat herself.
She directly told the men who stepped forward to take a gun from the wooden crate beside her, then take five rounds from the ammunition box before teaching them how to use the musket.
“Do you see that armor? Aim at it! When I say ‘fire,’ pull the trigger.”
Vera pointed to a suit of plate armor fixed to a wooden target 30 feet (approximately 10 meters) away.
The four musket-wielding knights nodded to Vera, then aimed their muzzles at the armor.
“Ready—fire!”
Four consecutive thunderous bangs startled every knight present.
Even the four knights firing for the first time looked at the weapons in their hands with expressions of apprehension.
However, their expressions quickly shifted to pure shock.
On that suit of plate armor, four holes had suddenly appeared—the muskets had easily pierced the strongest defense a knight possessed!
“Do not doubt the quality of the plate armor. You all personally inspected that suit before it was hung on the wooden target. You are well aware that it is not some low-quality piece from a small town, but a legitimate suit of Black Cross Kingdom Standard Armor—it is half a finger’s width thick at its densest point. At close range, it can withstand the attacks of most weapons; only powerful heavy crossbows, warhammers, and halberds can break its defense.”
Vera picked up an identical piece of plate armor and tapped it. The clang-clang sound seemed to strike the hearts of the knights.
“But now, the alchemy weapon before you, called a musket, has achieved that feat with ease! Moreover, even someone who has never touched a musket before can quickly master it.”
Vera set the armor down and looked at the four knights who had just participated in the shooting. The latter nodded in agreement.
“Next is precision. Although shooting at a 30-foot distance doesn’t show much in terms of accuracy, do not be surprised—when His Highness first demonstrated the musket’s power to me, he pierced a target 150 feet away. The effective range of this weapon is actually 1,800 feet (approximately 600 meters). Do you see that furthest target? That is the 1,800-foot mark.”
Vera knew these knights were shaken by the musket’s power, so she struck while the iron was hot to continue pushing them.
Vera picked up her own gun. Loading, aiming, and firing were repeated in a mechanical process until the wooden post supporting the target was snapped, causing the target to break and fall.
The entire process took less than 1 minute, yet Vera had fired fourteen rounds without a single miss. Both her speed and accuracy were terrifying.
“Now, is anyone else planning to learn how to use the musket? I don’t have such high requirements for you. You don’t need to be like me, hitting targets continuously, quickly, and steadily at a distance of 1,800 feet, but you must at least train until you can accurately hit a target at 900 feet.”
“Lady Vera, I want to learn!”
The knight who had previously shouted the loudest about how he would rather die than use a musket on the battlefield saw that there was one musket left in the straw-filled crate.
He quickly shoved his companion aside and was the first to shout.
“Very well. Go over and take the musket; I will teach you how to use it.”
Vera nodded in agreement.
“Bah! You bastard, Jack! Didn’t you say it went against the Knight’s Spirit and that you’d rather die than use a musket on the battlefield?”
The knight Jack had pushed aside denounced the man’s chameleon-like face and shameless behavior.
The other knights also saw the last musket in the crate, but because they were a step slower than Jack, they could only watch as he took the musket and ammunition.
He aimed at the target and fired the first shot of his life.
“Thomas, my Knight’s Spirit tells me that he wants me to accept new things. Besides, I am protecting you. You wouldn’t want to be abandoned by the Knight God, would you?”
After firing, Jack hugged the musket tightly, as if he were holding a lover.
“Shut up, you selfish weasel!”
Thomas felt both envy and jealousy toward Jack, with a hint of hatred added in. If the man hadn’t cut him off, he might have been the first to speak.
“Do not be envious. They are only the first group. The Alchemy Workshop is currently stepping up production and assembly. His Highness will ensure that every member of the Imperial Guard Knights has an assigned musket.”
Vera consoled the greedy-eyed knights.
“Hurrah! Long live His Highness Anke!”
Upon hearing that they would also own a musket, the young knights cheered Anke’s name in unison.
“Of course, you won’t just be standing around while you wait. There are some wooden models over there. You can use the models to learn how to aim and hold the gun.”
Vera pulled back a waterproof tarp, revealing a pile of various wooden sticks carved with front and rear sights.
The knights each took a wooden model and began to practice aiming under Vera’s guidance.
Their serious expressions as they held the wooden sticks appeared somewhat strangely comical to Jack and the other pioneers who held real guns.
Fortunately, most of the parts required for the muskets had already been prepared in the Royal Capital, and the stockpiles were quite sufficient.
Combined with the Alchemists in the Alchemy Workshop working overtime, everything moved quickly.
Even though Anke faced bankruptcy issues, the Alchemy Workshop successfully completed the full equipment list for Vera and the Imperial Guard Knights, with four muskets left to spare.
Every member of the Imperial Guard Knights received their assigned musket. Some, like Thomas, even gave their weapons names.
Because Anke ordered the guns and ammunition to be managed separately, every time training ended and Vera went to collect the weapons—
“Juliet, we will meet again tomorrow.”
Thomas would always kiss the barrel with deep affection, as if parting from a lover, before reluctantly handing the gun to Vera.
“Ewww—”
The other knights would look at Thomas with disgust and move away.
Vera was a Mimic Beast and lacked the rich emotions of a human, and her facial expression remained cold and distant.
However, even she found it difficult to maintain her composure when facing the “gun-obsessed” Thomas.