Gunsoul: A Xianxia Apocalypse

The bullet burst out of the barrel with a thunderous roar.

So strong was the recoil that the chamber exploded between Yuan’s iron hands, sending red hot shrapnel flying in multiple directions. Yuan instinctively activated Elemental Infusion in the nick of time, the projectiles bouncing off his metal chest while Holster barely managed to duck to the ground behind him. A shockwave traveled through the air and shook the entire wagon to its foundations.

As for the bullet, it blazed across the Thunderlands like a crimson meteor. A trail of fire followed in its wake and set the night sky alight, its shine eclipsing that of the enemy spirit-train’s headlamp. The oni crew hastily shouted and readied their weapons for a counterattack; one that would never come.

The bullet hit the front of the spirit-train with immense strength.

The headlight-eye exploded first in a shower of blood and oil. Yuan’s projectile shattered the monstrous locomotive’s face, its impact leaving a human-wide crater in it.

And it kept on going.

The enemy locomotive let out a scream of pain and agony as the bullet pierced through its diseased flesh, powered through its gears, and ravaged its engine. Although Yuan saw his projectile vanish inside its target, explosions rocking the spirit-train along its length attested to its progress. Blazing detonations blasted the oni crew to pieces. Steel walls flew like paper sheets in the wind. A few pieces of debris were propelled so far away that some of them hit the roof of Yuan’s wagon with enough force to bend the metal.

Finally, the locomotive derailed. The explosions caused it to lose balance. The machine’s wheels veered off the lightning tracks and fell off to the side in a cataclysmic accident. The Thunderlands trembled under the weight of this falling giant, and a tide of sand covered the horizon in its wake.

“By the Wayfinders…” Yuan and Holster could only stare in disbelief at the devastation that he had caused. The pieces of his own revolver fell at his feet. “Did I… did I do that?”

Revolver’s bullets had blasted dunes apart and continued their journey across the horizon. It said something that Yuan required an entire support infrastructure’s worth of qi to match the power of his mentor’s casual bullets, and yet the results left him speechless nonetheless. Yuan had expected to slow down the enemy locomotive, or at best derail it. He never thought his projectile would annihilate an entire spirit-train and the army on its back.

That power is not yet mine, he decided. It was his hand that pulled the trigger, but the spirit-train’s strength was what propelled it forward. Their vehicle’s whistle screeched louder than ever, as if to celebrate their victory. One day though…

If Revolver could achieve the same devastation after pushing past the Fourth Coil of Infinity, then Yuan would learn to replicate it in time.

Yuan allowed himself a small breath of relief. A victory was a victory. “It’s done, Holster,” he reassured his charge, though his voice failed to cut through the spirit-train’s noise. “It’s done!”

The child trembled like a leaf, her eyes turned to the ceiling as the whistle screeched in alarm louder than ever.

Yuan froze and looked up at the ceiling. He immediately sensed a loathsome presence the moment he focused on an ambient qi, though it did its best to stay hidden; a bloated flea sucking the spirit-train dry. Heavy footsteps resonated through the metal, followed by a fetid stench of dirt and death.

Fuck.

Yuan immediately reached for his shotgun, right as a centidead larva broke through the roof.

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Holster screeched in horror as the creature reached for her. It was Yuan’s first time hearing her voice, squeaky, weak, and filled with fear. He would have preferred to discover it in more pleasant circumstances, but the current one sent his blood pumping. He instantly blasted the centidead larva in a single shot alongside most of the panoramic window. Only after killing it did he realize that it cost him ammo. Somehow, he couldn’t care less.

A shell spent protecting Holster was a shell well-spent.

“Go hide!” Yuan ordered right as two more centidead pierced through the ceiling, each roughly twice as thick as those he had previously killed on the spirit-train. He blasted them both to pieces, then quickly reloaded his shotgun. “Go to the front–”

A fourth centidead larva descended upon Yuan himself, its mandible snapping around his neck in an instant. His skin turned to metal in an instant under the effect of Elemental Infusion, sparing him a quick death by decapitation. Yet the monster refused to let go and quickly pulled him upward.

Before Yuan knew what hit him, he was now outside the train, facing a giant while his feet dangled above the steely roof.

The rad-hag smirked at him.

She might have been hauntingly beautiful a long time ago, as all caretaker spirits were bound to be, but the figure standing before Yuan was a daunting sight now. Her hulking, hunchback form towered over him the same way he loomed over Holster. Her greasy skin was a sick, corpse-like shade of blue riddled with tumors and bulging black veins. Her oversized hands were coated in rusted steel, and her face and shoulders were covered under a hood under which Yuan could only see her flashing teeth. The stench of rot coming from her was almost unbearable.

Four centidead larvae emerged from her diseased back like extensions of herself. Three had become bloody stumps thanks to Yuan’s efforts, while the fourth coiled around his neck like a tentacle holding its prey.

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“You don’t find me pretty, cultivator?” the rad-hag taunted him, her lips twisted into a ghastly sneer. Sick green smoke oozed from her mouth. “I have one of you to thank for–”

Yuan shot her in the face with a qi-charged shotgun shell mid-sentence.

He had seen his projectiles blast open cabins and tear bodies apart in an instant, yet this shell failed to make the rad-hag flinch. The blow did blast off her hood and caused her head to snap back from the recoil. For a fleeting instant, Yuan thought he might have inflicted a fatal blow.

Then the rad-hag slowly pulled back her head into place; revealing an eyeless, noseless mass of tumors for a face. Her mouth sported an eerily familiar and despicable grin.

The same smug smile that Slash sported right before he executed Yuan.

“Idiot,” the rad-hag said.

Then she threw him off the spirit-train.

Her centidead tentacle violently tossed Yuan off the wagon with the same contempt given to dust being swept off one’s cloth. The wind blew on his face as he found himself facing the sand-riddled ground and phantom tracks.

Reacting quickly, Yuan coated his free hand in metal and activated the Recoil Fist. A shockwave spread from his arm and pushed him back onto the spirit-train right in front of the surprised rad-hag. He shot her in the chest before she could react, only to watch his qi-enhanced shell fail to pierce her greasy skin.

The rad-hag’s last centidead tentacle lunged at him in midair in an attempt to intercept him. Yuan reflexively shot it, his attack blasting it to pieces, and using the Recoil Fist to put some distance between his pursuer and himself. He landed a bit farther ahead on the wagon’s roof.

The rad-hag didn’t appear in a hurry to chase him down. Her centidead stumps retracted inside her flesh, while her enormous hand dismissively swept the shotgun pellets off her thick skin.

“What was that supposed to do?” the rad-hag taunted Yuan. The smugness in her tone infuriated him. She looked down on him the same way Sect Elders sneered at Scraps.

Unfortunately, her confidence was perfectly justified. None of Yuan’s attacks dented her main body yet, and the overwhelming qi emanating from her did leave him unsettled.

Her skin is Third Coil tier, head and chest included, Yuan observed as he reloaded his shotgun, much to his distaste. Bulletproof. Even a qi-charged shotgun can’t pierce through it. Not without help at least.

Yuan quickly counted what shells he had left. Having started with twelve, used four against the centidead in the cabin wagon, three to blow off her tentacles, and three in that last bout, he only had two projectiles left.

He had to make each of them count.

“You would have been better off surrendering the child,” the rad-hag rasped between her grinning teeth. She lazily stepped over the holes her centidead tentacles had left in the roof and strolled toward Yuan without a care in the world. “Once I’ve consumed the Hitobashira, I can finally heal my lands. It’s her… destiny.”

My destiny is your death, Yuan thought as he charged at her in utter silence. Words were wasted breath in battle. Your arrogance will be your downfall.

Quickly checking the flow of ambient qi, Yuan quickly positioned himself in its path. The ambient energy was nowhere near as focused as it was inside the spirit-train—since it traveled from the engine to the last wagon—but the locomotive behind him still released some in the air like steam. He charged the bullet with his qi and then steadied his aim for maximum impact.

The rad-hag dismissively waved her hand and choked the air of life.

The ambient qi in the air turned dry the moment Yuan pulled his shotgun’s trigger. His own energy charged the shell, but the current he hoped to strengthen it with vanished in an instant. His shot was a bust, his weakened projectile failing to dent the rad-hag’s skin.

What? Yuan’s thoughts came to an abrupt stop as he focused on the ambient qi. A bubble of nothingness surrounded him and the rad-hag, the only energy in the area being those produced by their own flesh and soul. How?

“Fool… I am this land… The flow of qi answers to me.” The rad-hag pointed at Yuan with her left index finger. “Feel it for yourself.”

A torrent of lightning poured out of her hand and struck Yuan in the chest.

There were no words that could describe the pain of electricity coursing through one’s body. It was as if all of Yuan’s nerves were peeled back by a blade all at once. His skin was set ablaze and his blood boiled in his veins. He had to bite his tongue until it bled so as not to scream in agony.

Had he not been a Gunsoul with a bullet in his head for a core, the bolt would have fried his organs and killed him on the spot. Instead, it left a gaping scorched mark on his chest.

“Still alive?” the rad-hag cackled as she raised both of her arms to finish him off. “I guess I will have to use both hands then.”

Yuan looked up at the golden lightning gathering in her hands; magic made thunder. The sheer amount of qi she generated filled him with dread. She was packing as much energy as the entire spirit-train. A direct hit would vaporize him the same way he had destroyed the rad-hag’s own mobile fortress.

Wait… A devious plan formed in Yuan’s mind. As much qi as the spirit-train…

Magical or otherwise, lightning remained lightning. Qi.

Yuan activated Elemental Infusion and coated his skin from one arm to the other in metal. He purposefully avoided affecting his head where his bullet-core was located, instead forming an uninterrupted line of steel moving from his free hand and traveling through his shoulders all the way to his shotgun.

He couldn’t botch the timing on this one.

The rad-hag arrogantly fired a thunderstorm's worth of golden lightning at Yuan. Her mighty spell illuminated the night sky in a bright flash of light. Yet Yuan didn’t recoil nor try to dodge. He quickly raised his metal-coated hand at the flow of energy.

He caught the lightning between his fingers.

His iron hand acted like a lightning rod and guided the current through his metal skin. So great was the output that he had to use his qi to reinforce the steel pathways coursing through his body to prevent some of the electricity from escaping them and spreading to his flesh. He had to quickly push it out of his body before the pipeline burst.

The current heated up Yuan's skin, but it still followed the path set for it. The enchanted electricity traveled all the way to the shotgun’s qi-charged shell. The barrel shuddered under the strain of it all and threatened to explode.

Yuan pulled the trigger and shot the rad-hag with her own power.

She did more than flinch this time.

The golden blast snapped the shotgun’s barrel in half and tossed the rad-hag back across the wagon’s entire length. Her chest’s skin burned brighter than the sun, and her hideous stench was overwhelmed by the smell of cooked meat. Yuan watched her stumble back with satisfaction, though it remained short-lived. The rad-hag caught herself before she could fall off the spirit-train.

She wasn’t dead. Not yet.

She looked much like Yuan now, with a gaping scorched wound in the middle of her chest. Her own scars went deeper than his own though. Her centidead-infested flesh lay exposed to the air alongside her ribs. Steaming glowing green blood dripped down onto the spirit-train, slightly corroding its metal.

“You dare… you dare?!” The rad-hag covered her wounded chest with her hands, her teeth clenching in fury. Gone was her previous arrogance. Only murderous anger fueled her now. “I will tear you limb from limb!”

Yuan tossed his destroyed shotgun off the spirit-train, coated his upper body in his Elemental Infusion, and then adopted a fighting stance.

He would punch his way to her heart if he had to.