With the King's grudging approval secured, the National Armaments Committee moved with a speed that was utterly alien to the Danish government. Christian abandoned the political arena of Copenhagen's salons for the industrial battleground of its workshops. Baron Fievé, true to his word, had cleared out a large warehouse near the docks, a cavernous space that soon echoed with the sounds of construction and the shouts of engineers.
This became Christian's new home. He worked alongside the men, his fine nobleman's coat replaced with a leather apron, his hands smudged with grease and metal filings. He brought Stig the blacksmith from Eskildsgård, whose initial skepticism had been forged into fierce loyalty by the success of the new plow. The old craftsman was now paired with Fievé's top engineers, creating a unique team: Stig, with his intuitive, hands-on mastery of steel; the engineers, with their formal knowledge of textbooks and tolerances; and Christian, the visionary from the future, pushing both groups beyond the limits of their 19th-century knowledge.
Their single, obsessive focus was bringing the rifle conversion to life.
The rifle's mechanism was only half the problem. "A lock is useless without a key," Christian declared, turning a corner of the workshop into a makeshift laboratory to develop the ammunition. For days, he meticulously experimented with ratios of saltpeter and charcoal, carefully wrapping measured powder charges and lead bullets in nitrated paper. A sharp crack and a flash of fire one afternoon, when a stray spark from a nearby forge ignited a loose primer, singed his eyebrows and earned him a stern lecture from a terrified Lars. The incident only sharpened his focus.
Meanwhile, Stig wrestled the new English steel into the shape Christian had designed. The first two breechblocks he forged cracked during the quenching process, unable to withstand the complex stresses. The engineers argued for a thicker, heavier block, but Christian held firm, insisting the issue was the cooling rate, not the design. On the twentieth day of work, guided by Christian's seemingly mad instructions to use lukewarm oil instead of cold water, Stig pulled the third breechblock from the forge. It cooled perfectly, ringing with a clear, true note when tapped. It was strong, light, and flawless.
The master blacksmith held it up, not with a simple grin, but with the exhausted reverence of a man who had just surpassed his own limits. "My lord," Stig said, his voice rough with fatigue and awe, as he passed the finished piece to the engineers for milling. "Your key now has its lock."
One week later, all the pieces were ready. In the center of the workshop, they took a standard M1848 infantry rifle and clamped it into a vise. With a fine-toothed saw, a machinist carefully cut off the rear of the barrel. It felt like a moment of sacrilege. Then, with painstaking precision, they began to fit the new mechanism. There was a tense moment when a hinge seemed misaligned, but with a final, solid click, the Eskildsen Conversion slotted perfectly into place. The old, familiar musket now had a hinged, modern-looking breech.
The prototype was complete.
The test was conducted at a military firing range just outside the city, which Løvenskiold had secured for their private use. On a gray, windswept afternoon, Christian stood at the firing line, flanked by a deeply anxious Fievé and a stoic, unreadable Admiral Løvenskiold. Stig and the engineers stood a respectful distance behind them.
Christian took one of his paper cartridges, slid it into the open breech, and snapped the block shut. The action was smooth and solid. He raised the rifle to his shoulder. For a moment, the world narrowed to the front sight and the distant target. He controlled his breathing, squeezed the trigger.
The crack of the rifle was sharp and loud. The weapon kicked back against his shoulder, but it held. There was no explosion, no failure. A puff of smoke appeared near the target downrange. The breech had contained the pressure perfectly.
He lowered the rifle, flipped open the breech, and ejected the spent base of the paper cartridge with a flick of his wrist. A slow breath of relief went through the onlookers.
But the real demonstration was yet to come.
"Admiral," Christian said. "Time me."
He snapped the weapon back to his shoulder. He loaded, fired, ejected, reloaded, and fired again. His movements were a fluid, efficient dance. The rifle barked again and again. In less than thirty seconds, he had fired five rounds—the work of nearly two minutes for a soldier with a standard muzzle-loader. And he had done it all from a stable kneeling position.
The small crowd was silent. Fievé stared, his mind no doubt calculating production times and cost-per-unit. Stig had a broad, proud grin on his face.
But it was the Admiral's reaction that mattered most. Løvenskiold walked forward and took the rifle from Christian's hands. He examined the still-warm breech mechanism, his face a mask of profound, world-altering comprehension. He was a man who had seen friends die because of slow, clumsy reloading. He was looking at a solution, an answer to a prayer he didn't even know how to make.
He looked up from the rifle, his eyes locking with Christian's. The old admiral's face was grim, but it was alight with a new, fierce, and desperate fire.
"It works," he said, his voice rough with emotion. He then turned to Fievé, his tone shifting to that of a commander on the eve of battle. "Baron. How many of these can your factories produce? And how fast?"
The successful test was not an end. It was the firing of the starting pistol for a frantic, desperate race against time.