Chapter 9
For several days, I wrote down possible improvements to the Gewehr 98. They were a sort of blueprint.
Of course, calling these drawings blueprints was a little embarrassing.
I sketched the rifle roughly from the side, drew arrows in blue ink, and added notes like ‘Lower this,’ ‘Simplify this,’ and ‘Move it to the side.’
In my previous life, I would have drawn three views, added dimensions, and modeled it in CAD. If necessary, I would even have run a simple structural analysis to check stress concentrations and deformation.
But I was ten years old now.
If a ten-year-old princess suddenly drew a perfect technical blueprint, even her father, doting on his daughter as he was, would find it strange.
‘I’m still a snot-nosed kid.’
I wanted the drawings to look like a child’s clever ideas.
I drew the bolt handle bent downward, then wrote beside it in crooked handwriting:
‘Your hand doesn’t have to move as much.’
I crossed out the complicated parts of the rear sight and drew a simple tangent-style sight.
‘You can see the target quickly.’
I moved the sling swivels from underneath the stock to the side.
‘Easier to carry and run with.’
Oskar kept peeking over my shoulder while I drew.
“What’s that?”
“Improvements.”
“What does that mean?”
“Making something better.”
“You said it was already a good rifle.”
“Even good things can be made more comfortable to use.”
Oskar picked up one of the sheets of paper.
“Why bend the bolt handle?”
“Try it lying down and you’ll see.”
I handed Oskar an unloaded rifle. He lay down on the floor and worked the bolt.
His elbow lifted.
“Now imagine the handle comes down like this.”
Oskar tried moving his hand a little lower.
“I guess it does feel a little more comfortable?”
“Right?”
“Then why didn’t they make it like this from the start?”
“How should I know? Nothing’s perfect from the start. The user has to figure out what needs improving.”
Oskar nodded as if I’d said something pretty convincing.
A moment later, he began drawing something in pencil on one side of the paper.
“What are you doing?”
“Making improvements, too.”
The rifle Oskar drew had three bayonets attached: one above the muzzle and two below it.
“Why is it like this?”
“So you can stab them for sure.”
“If you turn the rifle the wrong way, you’ll stab your own arm.”
Oskar crumpled up his drawing with a disgruntled look.
“Aw, come on. Mine looks pretty good, too.”
“I don’t think you have much talent for designing things. You be an officer, and I’ll handle the design. Let’s divide up the roles.”
“Then I just have to say whether it’s good or bad?”
“Yeah. Try it out and tell me what’s uncomfortable.”
Oskar nodded, apparently pleased with that role.
Just then, Victoria came into the room.
The youngest, still little, approached the desk, curious about what her older sister and brother were doing.
“Bessie, drawing?”
“Yeah. But don’t touch it.”
To a child, telling them not to touch something was the same as telling them to touch it.
Victoria reached for the ink bottle on the paper.
“Ah.”
Blue ink spilled across the desk.
“No!”
I hurriedly lifted the papers. I managed to save half of them, but several drawings of the bolt handle were stained blue.
Victoria clapped her hands, looking as if she had no idea what she’d done.
“Blue!”
“What are you doing?!”
“Your Highness, you mustn’t scold the youngest princess.”
The nanny, who had followed her in, picked Victoria up.
I looked at the ink-stained papers in despair.
In my previous life, I’d once lost a CAD file I hadn’t saved. This was a similar kind of pain.
Oskar was beside me, laughing merrily at my misery.
“You can just draw it again.”
“Want me to spill ink on your textbook?”
He immediately shut his mouth at my threat.
In the end, I had to redraw everything by nightfall. I couldn’t help it. Vicky was too young to scold. It was my fault for leaving the drawings where she could reach them.
I tried drawing the same improvements in different ways, then moved my hand to see how much of a bend would feel comfortable.
I didn’t add precise measurements.
‘A little here.’
‘This much lower.’
‘If it’s bent too far, it might catch on something.’
I wanted them to look like a child’s notes, while still making my intentions clear to anyone with technical knowledge.
I held each sheet beside the rifle and compared it with the position of the actual parts. If the bolt handle bent too far, it could catch on the receiver or my fingers; if it didn’t bend enough, it wouldn’t make much difference.
I could have calculated the exact angle, but I deliberately didn’t write down any numbers.
Instead, I drew three different versions of the handle.
One bent a little, one bent just right, and one bent too far.
When I asked Oskar which of the three looked best, he picked the one with the biggest bend.
“That one’s easiest to grab.”
“Then it could catch on your clothes when you run.”
“Then the middle one.”
Users always changed their minds after the fact.
A few days later, dozens of sheets, both large and small, had piled up on my desk.
I was trying to pick out the better ones and organize them.
Just then, the door opened.
“Bessie.”
It was Wilhelm II.
I tried to cover the papers in surprise, but it was already too late.
Wilhelm had started to reach for my head, as he often did, but stopped when he saw the desk.
Drawings of rifles, arrows, and blue notes covered the desk.
“…What is all this?”
I picked up a sheet as if nothing were the matter.
“I was trying to make the rifle a little more comfortable to use.”
At first, Wilhelm seemed to think they were just a child’s scribbles, and he gave a little laugh.
“This time, you finished with drawings without breaking the rifle?”
“I don’t break things anymore.”
“I heard you broke the telescope last week.”
“It was already in bad shape.”
Wilhelm took the paper from me, looking unconvinced.
He was still smiling as he looked at the first sheet or two. But as he turned through the pages, his expression gradually changed.
Several improvements were immediately apparent, each with a short explanation written beside it.
‘Your hand doesn’t have to move as much.’
‘You can aim quickly.’
‘Easier to carry and run with.’
Wilhelm looked at the notes and said nothing for a while.
I stole a glance at his face.
‘Was I too specific?’
The ideas themselves were simple, but I’d drawn several versions of each one. And there was evidence that I’d actually changed my position and observed how they worked.
Wilhelm held up one of the sheets.
“Why would bending the bolt handle mean your hand has to move less?”
I answered just as I’d prepared to.
“Right now, you have to raise your hand to grab it. But if it comes down like this, you can grab it right away.”
“Did you try it yourself?”
“Yes.”
“I doubt you did it alone... Who did you try it with?”
I pointed at Oskar.
Oskar straightened up when everyone suddenly looked at him.
“I tried it, too. It seemed like it would be a little more comfortable.”
Wilhelm raised an eyebrow.
This time, he examined the drawing of the sling swivels.
“Did you try carrying this, too?”
“Yes. Since they’re underneath, the rifle keeps swinging, and the stock pokes me.”
Wilhelm silently turned through the other sheets.
I felt my heart beating a little faster.
This was the first step.
If he dismissed it as a childish prank, I’d have to find another way. But if he showed it to a military weapons engineer, things could be different.
At last, Wilhelm put the papers down.
“…Bessie.”
“Yes?”
“Did you think of all this yourself?”
I nodded, putting on the most innocent expression I could.
“Yes. I just tried using it, and it was uncomfortable.”
Wilhelm looked down at the papers again.
Then he smiled faintly.
It wasn’t the smile of a father watching his daughter play around.
It was the smile of someone who’d found something interesting.
“Good.”
He gathered the papers together.
“I’ll borrow these for a while.”
I grabbed the stack of papers before I knew it.
“You can’t lose them.”
Wilhelm looked at me in disbelief.
“Do you think the Emperor can’t keep a few drawings of his daughter safe?”
“Victoria spilled ink on them, so I had to draw them again once already.”
“She’s still very young.”
I tried to grab the papers Wilhelm had taken, but he laughed and held them high out of my reach.
“Where are you taking them?”
“There are people who’d like to see these and decide whether to laugh or take them seriously.”
Wilhelm left the room with the papers without waiting for an answer.
After the door closed, Oskar asked me,
“Who are you showing them to?”
I thought for a moment, then smiled.
“Probably the people who make guns.”
Oskar thought about it for a moment.
“What if they say your drawings are wrong?”
“That would be a shame.”
“What if they say they’re right?”
I looked toward the door.
“Then they’ll try making them for real.”
I said it calmly, but my fingertips trembled a little.
In my previous life, no matter how good an idea was, it still needed research funding and the company’s approval. It wasn’t much different now. The only difference was that this time, the Emperor himself had taken my ideas with him.
I had no way of knowing how far a ten-year-old’s scribbles could go.
Still, I’d taken the first step.
At last, I was getting the chance to meet the engineers beyond the palace.