Chapter 54: Under the Muzzle: The Ultimate Nightmare of the Cold Weapon Era

In the living room.

The image is advancing.

Accompanied by gloomy commentary.

A massive warship flying the Union Jack.

Slowly turned its main gun.

That black barrel, in the black-and-white footage, radiated a deathly aura of despair.

The camera began to zoom in on close-ups of certain people.

A child, barely clothed, lay prone before an empty rice jar.

A corpse on the roadside, left unburied.

These extremely oppressive, lifeless images.

And the prosperous age from half an hour ago.

Formed the most brutal contrast.

"Brother Lin Xuan..."

Xiao Sizi's voice trembled as she clutched her teddy bear, huddled in the corner of the sofa.

"Why... why don't they eat?"

Lin Xuan snatched the remote control from the coffee table, his thumb pressing the power-off button.

Just then.

The image on the Sky Screen did not go dark with it.

The smart TV's response lagged by a second.

In that second, the black-and-white footage completely faded, and the picture shifted to highly saturated restored colors.

Boom—!

A low, deep explosion echoed from the speakers.

The heavy subwoofer made the glass cups on the coffee table hum.

In the image, those several huge black monsters on the horizon suddenly spat out several bursts of bright fire from their broadsides.

Thick smoke spread out, obscuring half the masts.

Those were the British Ironclad Ship, the Nemesis.

The camera swept across an extremely tragic arc.

The brick-and-stone fortifications, which in the Tang Dynasty's perspective had seemed majestic, crumbled like piles of sandcastles knocked over by mischievous children under the concentrated fire of these steel monsters.

Heavy Explosive Shells fell precisely into the gun emplacements.

Bang!

Bricks shattered, and earth flew into the air.

The Qing soldiers guarding the emplacements did not even have time to scream.

Their bodies were hurled into the air along with the broken bricks.

Limbs, severed arms, and fragments of gray-white jackets tumbled amidst the dust and smoke.

Xiao Sizi froze entirely on the sofa.

"Brother Lin Xuan... what is that?"

She had seen the war drums of the Tang.

She had seen the Iron Armor cavalry of the Xuanjia Army.

She thought war was long spears against long spears.

Horse hooves trampling the grass.

But the scene before her eyes held only those steel tubes spitting fire tongues.

From miles away, they were recklessly reaping lives.

"Don't look."

Lin Xuan grabbed Xiao Sizi, pressing her small head into his chest.

His broad palm rested behind the little girl's ear.

Trying to block out those cruel explosions.

Above the Sky Screen.

The tragic scene of a city burning.

Severed the military dignity of every dynasty in one stroke.

In the Tang Dynasty's Taiji Palace.

Li Shimin, who had already risen, now fell heavily back onto the Dragon Throne.

This legendary general, famous since youth and never defeated.

Now stared fixedly at the Sky Screen.

In the image, a tragic cavalry charge was unfolding.

These were the Qing cavalry, who prided themselves on their skill with bow and horse. They waved their broadswords, rode their warhorses, and let out earth-shattering shouts.

They charged toward the British troops in red coats, standing in neat squares.

In Li Shimin's tactics.

Once the cavalry broke the square, the rest would be one-sided slaughter.

However.

Clatter-clatter-clatter-clatter-clatter!

In the image appeared an extremely strange multi-barreled iron device mounted on a tripod.

It was the precursor to the Maxim machine gun, or perhaps a dense formation of volley guns.

Those rows of steel tubes were jumping wildly.

Bullets merged into an invisible scythe of death.

Li Shimin saw it.

The warhorses charging at the very front had their skulls instantly pierced by bullets.

Their legs snapped, sending the riders on their backs tumbling to the ground.

Wave after wave of flesh and blood.

Hundreds of paces from the enemy.

They fell in entire rows, just like wheat being cut.

Blood flowed into the soil, staining the withered grass red.

"So this is... warfare of the future?"

Su Dingfang stepped forward.

This famous general who pacified the Tujue now had a pale face.

He looked down at the long spear in his hand.

The spearhead was sharp, yet it could not reach warships miles away.

He looked at the Shence Army outside the palace gates.

Their armor was thick.

But before those steel faces spitting fire, this armor forged from fine steel would likely not last even half a blink.

"Your Majesty," Su Dingfang's voice was dry, "such weapons require no martial valor, no battle formations, only sitting far away and flipping a switch... How can mortals... how can mortals resist?"

Inside Taiji Palace, all the generals fell silent collectively.

Their proud battle tactics, martial arts, and command abilities.

In the face of these cold industrial products, became a joke.

The Great Han Weiyang Palace.

Emperor Wu of Han, Liu Che, had originally been leaning on the railing.

Now, his fingers were almost digging into the patterns of the white marble.

Standing by his side were Wei Qing and Huo Qubing.

These three men who almost defined the peak of Huaxia cavalry.

Were now in a state of extreme mental blankness.

Huo Qubing watched the posture of those cavalrymen falling.

He could tell. Those soldiers were not weak.

They had blood and qi, they had courage.

They dared to launch a desperate charge against those unknown monsters.

But before those fire-spitting tubes.

Courage became the cheapest, most useless thing in the world.

Huo Qubing spoke, his voice somewhat hoarse: "Great General, if I lead fifty thousand elite cavalry to charge the formation, can we reach those iron ships?"

Wei Qing closed his eyes in silence.

"Qubing, it is useless."

"No matter how fast our horses are, they cannot outrun those fire-spitting iron tubes."

"We would not even be able to touch the hem of the enemy's clothes before our entire army was wiped out."

Liu Che suddenly turned around.

Looking at the empty hall. Looking at the Imperial Guard with long swords at their waists.

An extremely absurd sense of powerlessness swept over his whole body.

He built the Great Wall, fought the Xiongnu.

Thinking he was guarding a foundation for ten thousand generations.

But the Sky Screen told him.

Thousands of years later, another group of foreign tribes with golden hair and blue eyes would cross the sea.

Wielding weapons he could not understand, slaughtering his people like butchering cattle and sheep.

"The Great Wall..."

Liu Che let out a low laugh, carrying a touch of desolation.

"Before that artillery fire, is the Great Wall I built not just a decoration?"

The Great Qin Xianyang Palace.

Ying Zheng sat on the throne.

His right hand rested on a three-foot-tall bronze ding.

It was a heavy vessel symbolizing the eternal stability of the realm.

"Backwardness means getting beaten."

Lin Xuan's voice penetrated the screen, carrying a chilling coldness that traversed time and space.

Ying Zheng's pupils contracted sharply.

He recalled the numbers Lin Xuan had shown Xiao Sizi before.

Those calculations for measuring the stars.

Those precise meteorological charts.

He had once thought they were merely for improving efficiency.

Now he understood.

Those cold mathematics, those wondrous physics.

Had ultimately transformed into these weapons that killed men.

"Being behind…"

Ying Zheng murmured, repeating it, lowering his head to look at his own palm.

It was a hand accustomed to gripping the reins of power.

Boom!

Ying Zheng suddenly swung his fist, smashing it heavily against the great bronze cauldron.

The body of the cauldron gave out a muffled drone.

This punch was struck with tremendous force.

The web of Ying Zheng's thumb split open instantly.

Bright red blood slid down along the bronze patterns.

But he felt no pain.

He felt an extreme trembling called "the destruction of the nation and the extermination of the race."

This was not merely a change of dynasty.

This was the despair of an entire civilization, utterly powerless to retaliate under the mechanized slaughter of another.