Chapter 554: Gunsmithing
With the cargo all loaded, Kian got ready to take his ship out of Agri-World 496b's system to the Mandeville point, enter the Warp, and fly to Feudal World 481 to rendezvous with Inquisitor Trasolh's fleet.
He had his own warship now, but Kian still planned to stick with Inquisitor Trasolh for a while.
He'd discovered that an Inquisitor's name was incredibly useful. Almost every human power in the galaxy was afraid of the Inquisition.
Selling things under an Inquisitor's banner made them fly off the shelves. Even if people didn't need what you were selling, they'd buy it to keep an Inquisitor happy!
So even if he and Inquisitor Trasolh parted ways someday, he'd have to find a way to take something with him so he could keep using his Inquisitor disguise!
Right now the ship had left Agri-World 496b and was heading for the Mandeville point, getting ready to enter the Warp.
Kian was in the shipboard manufactorum, watching the shipboard workers run their first production test of the voyage.
The laser weapon production line inside the ship took up two compartments and was very complete. It was semi-automated and only needed 150 skilled workers to run it.
They could produce standard power cells and standard lasrifles, and all kinds of modified weapons too.
Kian also noticed that the system's shipboard manufactorum now had a technical staff slot. Putting in different technical staff would produce different weapons and equipment.
Right now the slot held an ordinary laser weapons technical advisor that Governor Zeppelin had given him.
With that advisor slotted into the ship's manufactorum, the system showed the effect as: Lasrifle output +5% (monthly output 10,500), masterwork chance 0.01%.
The effect was pretty mediocre, but that was to be expected. He was just a run-of-the-mill advisor.
If he slotted in a different technical advisor, though, output and the masterwork chance would probably skyrocket.
Kian also discovered he could now build some weapons and equipment to his own design.
In the mobile manufactorum's data panel, he could adjust the parameters of the weapon and equipment parts he was currently able to build.
It was a bit like the gunsmith screen in Delta Force. Whatever parts you had, you could fit.
Once a part was fitted, you could drag a slider to make it lighter or heavier, which would affect the gun in different ways.
Right now Kian was holed up in his spacious quarters, lying on the bed, modding guns with the system in his head.
First he imported the standard lasrifle carried by ordinary grunts. Its stats were roughly:
Weight: 2.5 kg
Range: 800 m
Penetration: 10mm steel armour within 300 m
Power cell: 200 shots
Cost: 500 value (auto-synced to planetary market price; sale price on Agri-World 496b: 3,500)
Parts: Standard stock, standard handguard, standard action, laser focusing crystal, light focusing barrel, iron sights, 200-shot power cell.
That was a standard lasrifle. It's what every grunt carried.
It was reliable, but there was nothing special about it.
Kian was at Astartes-level physical strength now. A weapon like this was far too inefficient at killing for him.
And his heavy power armour was about on par with an ordinary Astartes's armour.
A big rig lugging a pea-shooter was way too lame. He needed a big gun!
Kian started modding. Standard stock, standard handguard, standard action.
Switching them all to heavy meant the shots would be more accurate, the gun heavier, and the laser steadier as it flew.
The weapon itself would also become something that could take a hit. Some light weapons fire wouldn't easily break it.
After switching to the heavy stock, he could fine-tune it lighter or heavier. Kian dragged it all the way to heaviest.
Then for the laser focusing crystal, Kian swapped in a light laser cannon crystal.
The crystal was the key part that drew energy from the power cell and turned it into a laser.
How much energy the crystal could handle and how powerful a laser it could gather showed most directly in the weapon's firepower.
Kian's ship manufactorum could make not only lasrifles but laser cannons too.
The biggest were the kind mounted on Chimeras.
So he simply transplanted the laser cannon crystal into the lasrifle.
The crystal had two adjustable properties. One was durability. Max it out, and the crystal would last a very long time.
The other was power. Ignore durability, and the crystal would gather energy for all it was worth and fire it out as a laser.
That kind of crystal would have a much shorter lifespan, but its firepower would increase dramatically.
Kian had deep pockets now. The weapon he used only had to last one battle. He didn't care about durability at all, so he dragged the crystal's power all the way up and its durability all the way down.
Next came the focusing barrel. Kian chose an ultra-heavy focusing barrel.
The barrel was mostly about accuracy and heat dissipation. An ordinary infantryman in an ordinary battle would rarely heat up his barrel, so a light barrel was enough.
But Kian often had to clear the map by himself, so he needed an ultra-heavy barrel. It was highly heat-resistant. He could fire several thousand shots in a row without necessarily overheating it.
With the ultra-heavy barrel chosen, he dragged the weight all the way up again.
Then for the power cell, he fitted a power conduit socket. Whatever the conduit was hooked up to, that's how much power the gun had.
Once the weapon was modded, Kian looked over what other attachments there were.
For sights, he added an electronic sensor linked to his helmet.
Whatever his helmet's lenses were looking at, point the gun that way and it would hit the target.
For attachments, there was also something called a coolant canister. It force-fed coolant into the laser focusing crystal and the barrel, the two parts most likely to overheat, cooling them down and boosting the rate of fire.
The downside was that it would cut the gun's lifespan by more than half, making it truly a disposable weapon. Kian added it.
He didn't need a stock or grip. Kian was going to use the gun mounted on the vambrace of his heavy power armour, so he simply converted it into an arm-mounted gun.
Finally he checked the numbers. The gun's stats had become:
Weight: 18 kg
Range: 3,500 m
Penetration: 80mm steel armour within 1,000 m
Power: Power conduit
Cost: 9,000 value (auto-synced to planetary market price; sale price on Agri-World 496b: 25,000)
Kian queued up production. The semi-automated manufactorum adjusted the equipment's parameters, and in under half an hour, two heavily modified heavy laser weapons were sitting in his room.
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