Alien Knights

The projectile fired by the musket left a conical penetrating wound on the first officer's chest. Looking from this side of the body, he could even see the scenery behind him.

With a surprised expression, Jin Fang looked down at the wound on his chest, and before he could say a word, he fell down and never lived again.

Holding on to the edge of the wooden platform, Ayisha struggled to get up, raised the dagger to protect her chest, and shouted loudly: "If there are some bastards with evil intentions, I don't mind making such a hole in him!"

The rebellious pirates witnessed the death of the chief mate with their own eyes, and suddenly lost the fighting spirit to resist. They lost their backbone and were caught without a fight, and were tied to the mast by the captain's cronies.

Ten minutes later, the armed Clippers under the night returned to their former calm.

Those who died in battle were first cut open with knives, and then thrown into the sea, and their bodies were instantly buried by waves and storms.

The blood on the deck was washed away, but the strong smell of blood in the air lingered for a long time.

Instructing her cronies to keep an eye on the rebels, Aisha invited Todd and Rachel back to the captain's cabin. After entering the room, she lifted up her trouser legs without any scruples, and slowly cut the skin of the wound with a red-hot knife.

There was an inaudible hiss, a little bit of white smoke, and the faint smell of burnt meat in his nose, Todd frowned in discomfort.

Big drops of sweat rolled down her forehead, Aisha clenched her teeth tightly, gently parted the bloody wound with one hand, picked up needle-nose pliers with the other hand, clamped the tail of the crossbow bolt, and pulled it out forcefully.

The blood-stained crossbow bolt fell to the floor with a dull sound.

Taking a closer look at the bleeding wound, Aisha's pale face finally felt a little relaxed. She breathed a sigh of relief, threw the tool back on the table, and after a brief dressing, she looked at the two guests in the room: "Why do you want to help me?"

Hearing the other party's question, Todd shrugged a little incomprehensibly, and responded, "Why don't you help me?"

"I have brought a lot of "goods". They encountered problems during the voyage, but they never thought of helping them."

Todd glanced at the musket on the table and said with a smile: "If something happens to you, I don't believe that those guys will continue to fulfill the delivery agreement you promised before."

Aisha nodded, as if she accepted the answer.

Later, she noticed Todd's observation, followed his gaze to look at the musket in front of her, and asked, "Are you interested in this?"

The latter smiled and stretched out his right hand: "If I can get your permission..."

Aisha thought for a moment, picked up the musket and handed it to Todd, and said in her mouth: "Mr. Derek, be careful, don't break it!"

Nodding repeatedly, Todd picked up the musket and looked at it repeatedly.

This weapon is heavy and made of exquisite materials. It adopts the design of single-shot loading in the front and double magazines in the tail.

He leaned closer and smelled it with his nose. In addition to the smell of gunpowder, Todd also smelled a faint smell of castor oil; and then looked carefully by the light of the fire. The burned sackcloth was spread on the fire mouth, which looked like a piece of black ashes.

Ayesha watched Todd's movements, her blue and amber eyes moved slightly, and she remained silent from beginning to end.

Holding the musket, Todd sat on the spot and thought hard for a while.

When he was in college, he and boys of the same major often discussed military affairs and weapons. Although he is not a major in his job, he still knows a thing or two about firearms.

The evolutionary history of early firearms development can be roughly divided into matchlock guns, tinder percussion guns, spring wheel percussion guns and flintlock guns.

From a technical point of view, the musket from another world in his hand should be between a sparkling pistol and a flintlock; from a chronological point of view, it appeared around the end of the 15th century in Europe in the previous life.

When it comes to the history of muskets, it can be traced back to the end of the 10th century AD. The Northern Song Dynasty invented the world’s earliest matchlock gun, the bamboo musket (later evolved into a musket gun in the Southern Song Dynasty); after that, in the 1430s, medieval Europe gave birth to the earliest prototype of the western arquebus gun, the Huomen Gun.

In 1206 AD, after the rise of the Mongols, they not only destroyed Xixia, Western Liao, and Jin in a short period of time, but also went south to overthrow the Song Dynasty, causing the research and development of gunpowder weapons in the East to plummet.

However, in the long history of the previous life, there was a country that was selectively forgotten by the world regarding the research and application of gunpowder weapons.

That is the Arab Empire.

Through trade and missionary work, gunpowder technology from the Northern Song Dynasty was introduced to the Arab Empire as early as the end of the 11th century.

Compared with the turbulent situation in the East and the repressed religion in the West, the relatively stable political situation of the Arab Empire, the more enlightened religious tolerance and the advanced concept of advocating science created an incomparable "golden age" for the development of gunpowder.

In the Japanese army at that time, there were some unimaginable gunpowder weapons, which are regarded as "black technology" today and left in the history books. For example, the Syrians in the 13th century created a powerful anti-ship torpedo. The famous Discovery Channel program "Mythbusters" even made a special program for this.

However, the academic circles of later generations have a negative and questionable attitude towards the gunpowder weapons of the Arab Empire, whether in the East or the West. The reason is simple. Due to years of wars and divisions, as well as man-made vandalism, there are no relics and antiques in the area. The lack of evidence has caused the history of gunpowder in the empire to gradually disappear in history.

Aisha interrupted Todd's thinking: "You don't seem to be unfamiliar with this musket."

The latter avoided the question: "Captain, can you tell me how you obtained this weapon? Of course, if it's inconvenient, just pretend I didn't say it."

Aisha raised one eyebrow: "It's not inconvenient. About a year ago, I robbed a messenger ship of the Abbasid Empire. This musket came from an officer on the ship."

"A year ago?" Todd turned the musket over and over again several times, and found a line of small words under the base of the handle.

"Only the shooting stars in the night sky can keep up with the pace of Allah"

"Aisha, I'm very interested in things in the south, can you introduce me a little bit?"

Hearing Todd's words, Aisha laughed: "Finally, there is a member of the church who is willing to prick up his ears to hear the deeds of Allah, instead of indiscriminate and wanton slander."

Aisha took back the musket, put it on the shelf and fixed it, then limped to the bedside, and said loudly: "The south you talk about is actually composed of two big empires and many small countries. These two big empires are the Abbas and Ayyub, and they have been at war since the end of last year."

"Ayyub? I heard from others that the two great empires in the south are Abbas and Fatima, aren't they?"

"The Fatimid Empire has perished... Just last year, the original prime minister of the Fatimid Empire, Saladin, overthrew its last caliph and established a new empire, Ayyub."

"So that's the case, so in your opinion, who can win this war?"

Aisha tilted her head and pondered for a moment, then said uncertainly: "I am optimistic about the Abbasid Empire. It has more soldiers, a wider territory, and more wealth... However, the Ayyub Empire has a wise caliph——Saladin..."

Todd nodded, and brought the topic back to muskets: "So, in the Southern Empire, how many such weapons are there, and how are they made?"

Aisha didn't speak, looked warily at the man in front of her, finally smiled self-deprecatingly, and said nonchalantly, "Anyway, it's okay to tell you. As far as I know, the technology of muskets has been introduced into Allah's territory as early as a hundred years ago. I don't know the exact number of firearms, but unlike your cowards who are afraid of new things, the Abbasid Empire specifically focused on gunpowder as a military research direction."

Rachel, who was sitting next to her, couldn't help interjecting, "It's just a hundred years of research, so how far can it go?"

Aisha laughed loudly: "That's why I said, the people in the north are weird! They have heard the sound of the progress of the times, but they want to bury their heads in the sand and pretend that nothing happened!"

"The Abbasid Empire has 19 provinces, each with a capital city of no less than 500,000 people, and there are no fewer than a hundred well-known universities and colleges across the country. The University of Maryam, the capital of the empire, has gathered thousands of scholars. The empire's harbor is full of hundreds of three-masted battleships of the Antora class..." Aisha turned her gaze to Todd, whose face was getting darker and darker: "Just the Caliphate Guards of the Abbasid Empire, do you know how many people there are?"

"100,000!"