I was already a decent way along through rifle research before, so it wasn't that difficult to pick it back up and continue. Over the course of 44 days, I've refined the design significantly to increase reliability and to allow configurations that accommodate differently sized demons. One issue with almost any standardized equipment we would want to make is that as demons evolve, they change sizes, sometimes drastically. That makes one size fits all practically impossible. So, rather than having single sized stocks, triggers, and firing mechanisms, they need to be resized to be able to be handled by goblins, hobgoblins, lesser earth demons, ogres, and trolls.

Rather than making entirely different guns for each, portions can be reused and replaced as long as I design them appropriately, which is exactly what I was working on. I've personally done testing and I've had some military volunteers test them as well. I believe we're probably ready for building out manufacturing for them. Gun safety is important, and was something that I had somewhat neglected, which resulted in an injury during testing. A hobgoblin accidentally shot a low presstige ogre with a rifle on my makeshift shooting range.

As unfortunate as the accident was, it did provide me with some valuable information on exactly how effective rifles can be. The accidental injury was inflicted to the torso of the ogre, which had me very worried initially. Analysis over time showed me that my assumptions about the amount of damage a rifle can do to a high level individual was pretty much correct.

The initial injury only did about 10% of his HP as damage, despite being a torso wound. We did have to remove the bullet, and over the course of a few hours, the ogre ended up losing an additional 50% or so of his HP before stabilizing. The ogre in question didn't have any defensive traits, nor any regenerative capabilities. No other demons have access to healing magic that I'm aware of either, and the dwarves who tried to heal him also were ineffective. This was another piece of valuable information though, and wasn't something I'd thought much about previously.

Dwarves, humans, and elves can cast healing magic on each other, though after some conversation, it seems that the healing magic is slightly less effective when going from one humanoid to another. I had thought that maybe it would similarly just be a bit ineffective on demons, but it was completely ineffective instead. Fundamentally, healing magic must be working differently than I thought.

While I spent the last 35 days working on setting up rifle manufacturing alongside rifle ammunition manufacturing, we received more updates from the mainland. A few of the valleys have been recaptured in the interior. We've also received word that two tanks were completely disabled by enemies in combat while retaking those valleys. They were damaged, and then their engine crystals were destroyed by the operating crew, as we'd trained them to do. The fluorite can be recovered later, and we can technically reform the mana crystals once their waste product is recovered.

According to the reports, the demons have started to adapt to fighting the tanks, and seem to have figured out how to attack them. Knowing how and actually doing so are different stories though, since even if you know the weak point, getting to it is difficult. From the report of that particular battle, there were extreme casualties from the demon's side. They threw a lot of cannon fodder into the battle until the tanks had run out of ammo, then they sent in the stronger individuals to fight.

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It is a losing tactic overall for them. They might disable a few tanks, but they aren't even disabling more than we produce. Further, with every bit of captured territory, the demons lose ability to replenish their numbers, meaning that tactic becomes harder and harder to execute. Though we'll have to wait to see what might be ahead of us. The fact that no real counteroffensive has occurred out of any of the valleys has me worried. There are reports of some small probing attacks that are fended off by the new defensive positions and artillery, but if the demons are capable of figuring out how to overwhelm a handful of tanks, they'll probably figure out how to break out from their current situation. I doubt it will have any long term effect on the direction the war goes, but it could lead to casualties and an extended overall duration for the war.

Construction of our port city on the dwarven continent is also proceeding alright. The way they've decided to execute on the construction is to dig out the port areas a little ways away from the large stream, with the intent of redirecting the stream into the port once it is fully constructed.

My prediction about a potential counteroffensive ended up coming true not too long after the news of the successful attacks on tanks. Eighteen days later, we received word that a large horde of demons flooded over a mountainside to reclaim a section of coastal area. They've seemingly figured out that large hordes attacking in a spread out fashion can overwhelm the staggered defensive measures They've been using thus far.

The coasts, at least, are easier for the dwarves to reclaim with the assistance of our ships. However, as I said before, it will delay the duration of the war by some amount. It may actually end up being beneficial for us to further develop mounted machine guns. This, at least, would allow fortified positions to potentially remain entrenched despite being surrounded. The main issue with the development of this tactic from the demons is that we need to keep larger stockpiles of ammunition pretty much everywhere. That means we need a lot more manufacturing of it than we currently have, which again means we'll have a longer war.

The number of casualties from the dwarven side remains low, which is a good sign. The new defensive positions with telescopes and rangefinders were capable of spotting the incoming attack from miles out, and were able to sound a claxon to alert civilians to retreat. As long as casualties remain low, then these sorts of attacks shouldn't have much of an actual impact on the direction of the war.

Zeb is still on the mainland along with some construction teams, so I've been acting as a bit of a guiding hand for the construction on our island. They were also informed about the new enemy demon tactics, and told to be ready to retreat on a moment's notice. The good news is that we're building quite a ways away from the center of the continent, so I'd expect some other areas to get attacked first. Nevertheless, they'll be ready to retreat quickly if they hear a military claxon.

I've directed our construction towards building out more primers and shells along with more bullets for the past ten days. I'm going to start trying to develop a heavier duty machine gun. The current system we utilize is a spring loaded magazine that holds 20 rounds. While a belt fed system would be nice, weaving a belt that would be reliable and durable without good synthetics would be difficult. Not impossible, but perhaps not as good of a use of our resources. Instead, I can focus on high capacity magazines that are relatively easy to swap out.

When I figure those out, it will probably be worth it to adapt the tanks to utilize the machine guns, rather than grapeshot rounds. They're more stable and more precise, meaning less waste from our end, and probably more effective removal of enemies. I had planned to keep guns to ourselves for a bit, but since the enemy demons have adapted, it's probably worth negotiating with Kao over the supply of these new weapons.

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