Steel Empire
Developing Hand Cannon

While Berengar took advantage of the era of peace and stability he had built to carry out his agricultural and educational reforms, his enemies were on the move. In the Caernarfonshire area of Wales, a group of Knights gathered.

They were covered from head to toe with Churburg pattern plate armor and wore white and green tabards with red maltese crosses emblazoned on them. The knight was recently established as one of the new military orders of the Catholic Church. They are known as the Order of the Red Dragon.

The order of the red dragon made Caernarfonshire their home and began building a large castle near the shoreline. With almost unlimited funding by the Catholic church to increase their strength, the Red Dragon Order did not spend anything to build their fortress. 

Right now, an extremely tall man who stood over six feet and six inches stood beside a man of average height; in doing so, he seemed to dwarf him. The tall man wore armor from head to toe, in a style popular in the region. 

This man was none other than Grand Master Gwythyr Bowell, he was standing next to a relatively talented blacksmith who introduced him to the progress he had made for the task assigned to him.

The blacksmith was eager to show off what he had accomplished and lead the tall knight into his workshop, where he had two long poles, each of which had a long metal tube at the end. This tube acts as a weapon barrel.

It was a very crude and primitive firearm, but still it was a firearm. Therefore, the Grand Master took out one of the weapons and observed it for a while before asking the question in his mind.

"This is a legendary hand cannon?"

The blacksmith nodded his head with a joyous expression on his face.

"I bought one from a merchant who claimed that he got it from a group in Bohemia. After that, I reverse-engineered it and made some of it myself. Do you want to see how it works?"

The Grand Master had a stoic expression on his sturdy face and was full of scars. He simply nodded silently, showing the blacksmith to hand over his weapon. After doing so, the man took out a spare piece of iron that was the same thickness as a regular breastplate and dragged it into the courtyard.

The blacksmith placed a sheet of iron in front of a straw bale before walking ten steps, during which he began the procedure of loading a hand cannon. Hand cannon loading is similar to other muzzle-beating weapons. Although much more slender.

A person will insert the powder into a small tube at the end of the stick that acts as a barrel with their powder flask, where they will then add a projectile followed by some form of cloth wadding. After doing so, they would pack it with a stick. Yes, sticks, not ramrod, these weapons have not developed self-contained ramrod, so they use separate sticks to pack powder and projectiles. 

The firing sequence was completely different from the later designs. Similar to the flintlock and the previous firearm designs, one would put a little powder in the pot. But that's where the similarities end.

On this weapon, there are no triggers, no triggers, so what a hand shooter has to do is hold the stick under their armpits and use their free hands to ignite the powder with a slow burning match. It would then ignite the powder in the weapon and send the projectile flying.

Thus, this sequence takes a lot of time, almost a minute, to do. The projectile used was nothing more than a small stone, not tin or iron ball, therefore it did not achieve as much accuracy as a weapon could, not because of its ability. 

After firing the weapon, the projectile completely missed the target where the blacksmith began to curse softly.

"Mother fucker!"

After venting his frustration, the blacksmith started the reloading process once again, where he missed his target for the second time. Only after firing a total of three times did the stone projectile hit its target and pierced through the iron plate. The moment it happened, the blacksmith started cheering loudly.

"Ha ha!"

His reload speed was too long, his accuracy was poor, and his effective range was laughable. Therefore, he immediately interrogated the blacksmith about his worries.

"Are you sure this is a hand cannon?"

The blacksmith could tell that the Grand Master was unhappy and therefore he nodded his head with a certain expression.

"Yes, this is a hand cannon. There should have been similar designs all over Europe, but nothing too different. If you fire it in large quantities, it can be effective even in close range. The biggest problem with such tactics was acquiring weapons.Slives were needed to make gunpowder. The Byzantines could get it cheaply from India, but unless you could build a trade route all the way to the Empire, good luck maintaining the great power of hand-shooters."

Hearing this, the man was increasingly uncertain about how his enemy obtained so many of these weapons and was able to maintain the gunpowder needed to supply his troops. He had no way of knowing that most of Berengar's saltpeter supply came from his own nitrates, as the rest were now purchased from the Byzantines with the relationship he had built with the Empire.

At the behest of the Catholic Church, various military orders were required to start experiments with hand cannons but create something more effective than current technology which took years, he said, maybe even decades to reach it.

Reflecting on his orders, Gwythyr sighed in response to the information he received. Either Berengar's gun reports are inaccurate, or Berengar has a completely different firearm design. If not for the support of the Vatican, there would be no way for the Red Dragon Order to take down this primitive hand cannon, let alone something bigger.

Gwythyr coldly looked into the blacksmith's eyes and spoke in a stern tone, in doing so intimidating the man who was beginning to tremble.

"I want at least a hundred of these built as fast as you can. As for gunpowder, we will use the influence of the church to obtain it." 

The blacksmith slowly nodded his head as he responded to the Grand Master's request.

"I promise you that I'll finish it in a few months!"

If Grand Master Gwythyr knew the number of Berengar Muskets that could be produced in a few months, he would completely lose all hope of winning the upcoming Crusade that the Catholic Church had planned for the German Reformation, or the Heresy of Berengar because they continue to call it.

With that said, the Grand Master quickly returned to work to oversee the construction of their Order's first castle. As for the production of Hand Cannons, it was not only the Catholic Church that was interested in researching and developing such weapons.

After Berengar's remarkable victory against the Bavarians who invaded Austria, the whole of Europe began to spend as much resources as possible on the research and development of hand-held firearms.

Even for a more stubborn Kingdom like France, it became increasingly clear that the era of Knights was coming to an end. If they were unable to adapt to the circumstances they were facing, they would no longer maintain their strength.

Berengar has inadvertently sparked a new arms race among all European powers. The idea of who can make the best hand-held firearm and who uses it the most has begun to overwhelm the minds of the Kings of Europe and Feudal Lords as they rush to devise foolish designs anything they can develop into production in an attempt to gain the slightest advantage over their competitors.

Even if Berengar were to realize such a thing, it would be centuries before the people of this world were able to develop something similar to what his army currently deployed. Despite the fact that there were incredible geniuses in every era, Berengar's technology was too advanced to compete with the early 15th century.

Nevertheless, the rapid development of hand cannons in this timeline as a result of Berengar's intervention could prove to be some difficulties for his armed forces. At the very least, it could make the siege more difficult for Berengar to win with minimal casualties. When he finally finds out about the arms race he has been involved in, Berengar will be forced to do something about it.