Consider the Avtomat Kalashnikova model 1947, a beast made for sound and fury:

Anyone with a nominally decent grasp of the action movie genre would know it as the AK-47, or possibly as the Kalashnikov. Fully automatic, it spits out 7.62 millimeters of pure death at a rate of 600 rounds per minute and with a maximum effective range of about 400 meters. The M67 projectile that erupts from the its barrel was designed to blossom in human flesh at 13 centimeters from the point of entry, causing massive tissue trauma, substantial organ damage, and a particularly nasty exit wound. Due to its unsurpassed durability and reliability, it quickly became the standard infantry rifle of the Red Army and is still currently used by most of the member states of the former Warsaw Pact. It is the favored thunderstick of irascible mujahideen, genocidal warmongers, Third World hordes, European extremists, and communist firebrands. It was this implement of destruction, this potent totem of human wrath in the blood-encrusted fists of an angry and desperate peasant that turned a ragtag band of barefoot farm yokels into a formidable army that succeeded in driving the American war machine out of Vietnam. Truly, this primitive-looking union of wood and steel is one of the most terrifying instruments of warfare ever invented.

Nevertheless, awesome as the AK-47 may be, no one in his right mind would deign it fit to be used as a farming tool. Against flesh and bone it is undoubtedly the stuff of nightmares, but against the earth it is the dullest spade imaginable. Tools, like the men who make them, have their own natures. A thing that goes against its nature is liable to break. A plough taken into the battlefield will shatter beneath the hail of bullets. A rifle tied to a beast and dragged across rice paddies will rot in the mud.

A storysmith compelled to tell tales for which he cares little will lose his soul.

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