Reincarnated as Napoleon II-Chapter 41: A Week Later

"Leave us for a moment, my Marshals," Napoleon I said, and Marshal Davout and Berthier rose to their feet and beckoned their officers to leave along with them.

When the door closed, leaving behind the two of them in a room, Napoleon I then turned to Napoleon II and spoke.

"I admire the bravado you had earlier, and the way you were acting gained me confidence that the Empire will be on a safe hand."

"Father, as I promised to you, I won’t let France fall for a second time. Trust in my foresights and my scientific prowess. Sure we are lagging currently from the British but it will all change."

"I told you before that I want to see futuristic weapons, now is the time to show it, and make Britain piss herself."

"It’ll be more than that Father."

The two of them laughed.

"So Father, before I go, the standardization reforms, I want you to pass it."

"It will pass, just focus on your new job now," Napoleon I said.

"No problem."

***

A week later, in Versailles’ Palace.

Napoleon II was reading a newspaper published just now, and the headlines were something personal to him.

"Crown Prince Napoleon II is now officially engaged to Princess Elisabeth of Wittelsback. The wedding will be held on December 02, 1829, the same date as our glorious Emperor, Napoleon I’s, anniversary," Napoleon II read.

It was not the only headline, Napoleon II, read another and there was the breaking news.

"Napoleon I, will abdicate the throne in favor of the Crown Prince, Napoleon II. It will be held a week after the marriage ceremony between the Crown Prince and the Princess of Wittlesbach."

Reading both of these headlines, Napoleon II felt delighted by it. The idea of ruling a country was just something you could fantasize of in the previous life, but now in this world, it will become a reality.

He won’t be like nepo politicians like the others. He was trained, educated, and prepared for this moment. It will be the most prosperous France, more prosperous than the France he had known from his past life.

He read more articles in the newspaper, dealing with different problems, but as he was reading it, Napoleon II noticed something.

In his past life, newspapers had images on them, but here it’s just drawings. He had heard from the Minister of Science, Arts, and Technical Instructions that there’s this one guy named Daguerre about photography and also Joseph Nicéphore Niépce known also for photography and internal combustion engine.

Napoleon I had established the Ministry where its purpose is to gather the brilliant minds of France and other notable people across Europe and train them in advanced science, and use them to advance certain types of technology where he’d simply give them the recipe or a blueprint.

Just like how he did in the telegraph, typewriters, electric currents, et cetera. All were born in that Ministry.

He would love to meet them soon to advance photography as it is also vital for military and commercial use.

He folded the newspaper and focused his mind on the important task, modernizing the military.

Napoleon II recalled the events of the meeting, about how the British Empire had skipped some technologies and were able to skip the tech three. Screw-driven propulsion? They skipped the paddle steamers. It was also built on iron. As for their guns, they were using needle guns, a precursor to modern bolt-action rifles like the Mauser, Mosin-Nagant, and other similar types, and there was also an advanced development on shells fired by cannons.

Naturally, France would freak out from those developments, they had just made their forces obsolete. But fortunately, France has him and so there was no need to be scared of those advancements.

Still, he was shocked by the British ingenuity. They were truly the masters of industrialization. And that goes to say that there are a lot of geniuses in this era. The only advantage he had on them was that he knew the future of technologies.

"Now, what weapon should I replace our aging muzzle-loading muskets with?" Napoleon I murmured.

He was thinking of the legendary Mauser 98 bolt-action rifle. In his previous life, the gun had earned a reputation for strength and reliability that bordered on legend.

Napoleon II leaned back in his chair, eyes half-lidded as memory surfaced.

The Mauser 98.

He had seen one before. Not in war. In a museum. Behind thick glass. Cut open along its length, the internals exposed. A curator had guided him through it slowly, deliberately—locking lugs, bolt face, extractor, receiver walls. Why it worked. Why it survived mud, ice, sand, abuse.

Why soldiers trusted it. Because it was built like steel.

He remembered lifting a replica. The weight. The balance. The solid, reassuring resistance when the bolt locked forward. No looseness. No fragility. Everything where it should be.

Two massive locking lugs at the front.

A third safety lug at the rear.

Controlled-feed extractor that refused to let the cartridge slip.

"This," he said quietly, tapping the desk, "is the one."

Not the needle gun. Not transitional designs meant to bridge eras.

This rifle was meant to last.

More importantly—he knew how it was built.

He stood and paced slowly.

The metallurgy was within reach. France already had high-quality steel production. Precision lathes. Rolling mills. Gauge standards. What had once taken Germany decades to refine could be accelerated under centralized control.

And the cartridge? It would be a metal cartridge. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

No paper tearing. No fouling choking the chamber. No needles snapping after a few hundred shots.

And powder.

Smokeless powder.

He stopped walking.

"That’s the key," Napoleon II said.

Black powder was the bottleneck. Smoke, residue, heat. Limitations soldiers simply accepted because they had no alternative.

But he did.

Nitrocellulose. Stabilizers. Controlled burn rates. France’s chemical industry was already strong—fertilizers, dyes, industrial acids. Redirecting that knowledge was not impossible. It was inevitable.

Smokeless powder meant higher pressures.

Higher pressures meant stronger receivers.

Which the Mauser 98 was already designed to handle.

He returned to the desk and picked up a pencil.

A bolt-action rifle. Forward locking. Metal cartridge. Smokeless powder.

A rifle that would not just match Britain’s needle gun, but make it obsolete overnight.

Napoleon II began sketching it in his head. It would take him all day.