Chapter 2: The Trigger and the Hunt
---
When Tian's eyes opened again, the world was nothing but pain and stillness.
His body ached in ways that didn't feel poetic. Every breath dragged across his cracked ribs. His mouth was dry. His back was soaked. The mud beneath him was cold, clinging to his skin like wet cement. His vision blurred in and out, and even as he tried to remember where he was, a single word echoed in his skull louder than all the rest:
Alive.
He was alive.
That, more than anything, surprised him. Tang San had tried to kill him. He remembered it clearly. The fake kindness. The invitation to "talk." The fists. The darkness. The river. Then… silence.
Tian coughed violently, blood splattering onto his arm, black and sticky.
"Shit…"
The curse came out barely audible. His voice was hoarse, almost childlike, which only made it worse. His memories were still intact, and that made this all real. No fever dream. No delusion. He was truly in Soul Land. He had truly been betrayed by a thirteen-year-old protagonist with god-tier potential. And he had survived, somehow, by clawing back up the banks of a river like a rat.
It was a familiar position.
He had been beaten by life before. This world was just more honest about it.
---
He didn't move for hours. Just laid still, feeling his own breath. Letting his body knit itself together, however slowly. A stray thought tickled the edge of his mind — one from Earth: if he was a transmigrator, where the hell was his golden finger?
He had none.
Or so he thought.
Until that heat returned — a warmth that started in his chest and pulsed outward, like the hum of an engine beneath his ribcage. His body was breaking down, but something inside was starting to click.
He closed his eyes and reached inward.
At first, he felt nothing. But then, faintly, like an echo through water, a presence. Not divine. Not sentient. Mechanical. Cold. And powerful.
His martial soul.
He focused on it, and in his mind's eye, something formed. Not a sword. Not a tool. Not a hammer or dagger or flame.
A component.
Steel. Precision. Blackened metal with engraved serial numbers. A barrel.
And the moment he recognized it — truly recognized it — a soft sound echoed through his soul, like a click.
> [Component Recognized: SIG MCX Spear (M7)]
[Assembly Progress: 1%]
[Spirit Power Increased: 0.2 → 0.4]
Tian's eyes snapped open.
It was real.
Not a hallucination. Not a delusion.
His martial soul wasn't scrap iron — it was a disassembled modular firearm. And with each part he re-identified, his spirit power rose.
Excitement surged through his cracked ribs. He focused again.
The bolt assembly. The chamber. The upper receiver. The rails. The grip.
Every time he acknowledged a piece — even faintly remembered what it did — the mental blueprint sharpened. More data appeared in his thoughts like a file unpacking itself.
> [Component Recognized: Upper Receiver]
[Assembly Progress: 5%]
[Spirit Power: 0.8]
> [Component Recognized: Fire Control Group]
[Assembly Progress: 12%]
[Spirit Power: 1.2]
It continued. Over days.
---
Tian spent the next week recovering in a mossy cave just past the riverbank. Food was scarce. He ate bitter roots, some moldy fruits, even a dead squirrel. He dug up insects. Used stripped vines to trap frogs. The hunger pangs kept him lucid. Pain kept him grounded.
During this time, he never stopped meditating. Not in the cultivator way — but in the way of someone building a machine in their mind.
He mapped out the weapon from memory. Recalled each part's role. From trigger assembly to gas system. Scope, silencer, stock.
Each time he understood a function, the assembly % climbed.
And with it, so did his spirit power.
> [Assembly Progress: 34%]
[Spirit Power: 3.1]
By the fourth night, he understood something crucial: the gun was bound to his soul, but its combat capacity would only unlock at 100% assembly.
Until then? He could see pieces. Touch blueprints. Maybe summon fragments during meditation. But not use it.
Once he hit 100%, something changed.
---
The moment came under moonlight, after he mentally assembled the final attachment: a high-capacity hybrid magazine.
> [Assembly Complete: 100%]
[Martial Soul Fully Materialized]
[Spirit Power Increased: 10.0]
[Status: Spirit Master - Rank 10]
The gun materialized in his hand.
It was beautiful.
A sleek matte-black rifle, modern in design, deadly in appearance. The SIG MCX Spear (M7). It hummed faintly, waiting for its master's input. The lines were clean. The weight was perfect.
And more importantly: it was ready.
Tian stared at it, hands trembling.
He summoned the internal stat readout with a thought.
> [Base Firearm Power Level: Equivalent to Rank 30–49 Spirit Master]
[Active Duration: 55 minutes per summon]
[Summons Per Day: 4]
[Ammo Capacity: 55]
[Current Spirit Rings: 0]
[Accessories Active: Scope (T1), Silencer (T1), Stability Grip (T1)]
[Accessory Limits: Effective against spirit beasts <5000 years or spirit masters [Note: Accessories will upgrade based on total spirit ring age accumulation]
Tian exhaled.
So it begins.
---
But even this power came with a catch.
When the gun was unsummoned, he was nothing.
Just a 6-year-old child with base-level physique, not even trained.
He tested it.
Without the gun: he could barely jog. Couldn't lift a rock larger than a melon.
With the gun: his body pulsed with reinforcement. The AVATAR effect kicked in — he became more than human. But only during summon time.
The catch? The boost scaled with spirit ring ages. Right now? With no ring attached, he was just an empty cannon. Stronger than a base-level spirit master, but nowhere near a threat to real cultivators.
He understood now.
This was the balance of his martial soul.
Terrifying when active. Helpless when not.
His next step was obvious.
---
Tian sat in meditation and planned.
If his AVATAR form scaled with ring age total, then he needed to build wisely.
Not just any spirit beast.
No cannon-fodder with bland abilities.
He needed spirit beasts with effects that mattered.
He wanted curse, corruption, and catastrophe.
He wanted to infuse his bullets with decay, madness, and annihilation.
His plan crystallized:
Attach 1st spirit ring with an effect worth using.
Let the age be high — the gun absorbs energy, not him. He could push limits.
Use the scope and silencer — already T1 — to hunt safely.
Build bullet types: status, utility, control, chaos.
Upgrade accessories with each ring.
Build his "bullet tree" as a custom skill system.
He would start with beasts under 2500 years old. Maybe 2,300–2,400 range. Not enough to destroy the gun if it failed, but high enough to test his limit.
> Note to self: Never forget — spirit beast = age. Spirit master = rank. Always separate the two.
And one final thought:
He would never again rely on anyone.
No Tang San.
No sect.
No god.
Only the trigger in his own hand.
---
[To Be Continued in Chapter 3: "To the Great Star Dou Forest"]