Chapter 8: Soul Gun

Hearing Lei En's words, the dwarf's smile diminished by a few degrees.

His gaze swept over Lei En, noticing that Lei En had entered empty-handed without even a single piece of luggage, and he muttered under his breath.

Scratching his scalp, the dwarf replied, "There's a shared room for two behind the inn, very affordable, only 8 copper coins a day. But I figure you wouldn't want to share with someone, so a second-floor room would suit you better—12 copper coins a day, and if you stay long-term I can give you a discount."

Lei En nodded; the dwarf had read him accurately—he indeed did not want to share a room with anyone.

"How long do I have to stay to get a discount?"

"At least half a month."

The dwarf picked up the beer on the counter and gulped down a large mouthful; the liquid and foam soaked the mustache around his mouth, and he wiped it carelessly with his hand before continuing, "If you stay half a month, I'll only charge you 150 copper coins, and I'll provide a free breakfast every day."

Lei En did not answer immediately.

When the dwarf lifted his wine cup, he inadvertently revealed something at his waist that caught his attention.

If he wasn't mistaken, this was a gun!

This world did have guns, and their power was extremely formidable; they also had a special name called "Soul Guns," and were considered quite precious weapons.

A Soul Gun's appearance was extremely similar to a handgun on Diqiu, yet there were also great differences.

The two operated on similar wounding principles, but a Soul Gun used a special kind of bullet, and the wielder had to possess soul power or other supernatural power to fire it, with each shot consuming the shooter's soul power. This meant that Soul Guns could not be used on a large scale like guns on Diqiu; put a Soul Gun in an ordinary person's hands, and it would be less useful than a dagger.

In fact, in recent years a brand-new extraordinary profession had emerged in the Empire, called "Gunner," which used the Soul Gun as its primary combat weapon, and it had become quite popular.

The dwarves had a much longer history of using Soul Guns, and the renowned "Dwarf Gunners" were known to almost everyone.

However, Lei En had never heard of a Soul Gun that an ordinary person could use.

In other words, this world did not yet have gunpowder!

Was that possible?

Lei En suppressed the doubts in his heart and did not let his gaze linger on the dwarf's Soul Gun, nodding and saying, "Then I'll stay for half a month first."

Besides the fair price, this inn had another advantage: it was not far from the Justice Church, and if there were any fallen ones to be judged, once the bell rang, he could rush over in time to absorb souls.

"Good, a deposit of two hundred copper coins—any excess will be refunded, any shortage made up."

Having closed a deal, the dwarf's mood turned cheerful, and he took another sip of beer.

In Lei En's eyes, the dwarf's soul shifted from white to pale green; he smiled inwardly and pulled two 100-copper-coin banknotes from his pocket and handed them over.

The dwarf opened a ledger on the counter, preparing to register him.

"My name is Lei En," Lei En volunteered his name, and the dwarf scribbled a few strokes and replied, "I'm Zoltan Jiu Shi, the owner here. If you need anything, you can come find me anytime, or just have a staff member pass me a message."

With that, Zoltan tossed the ledger under the counter, pulled out a set of keys, and led Lei En up the stairs nearby.

The entire second floor had over a dozen rooms, most of which already had guests.

Lei En chose a room on the street side; the furnishings were very simple, similar to the apartment he had stayed in before, and fortunately the floor's soundproofing was decent—the noise from the downstairs hall was much diminished by the time it reached here.

Zoltan handed the room key to Lei En, and before leaving suddenly asked, "Lei En, do you play cards?"

Lei En was taken aback. "No, why?"

"What a pity."

Zoltan shook his head regretfully, the rooster-comb-like hairstyle on his head swaying back and forth, and said, "Many guests at my inn come specifically to play cards; it has some reputation in the Lien District,

and we might establish a card-players' club in the future. If you want to play cards, just come to me—I have a very complete collection of cards, including many rare ones, and the prices are guaranteed to satisfy you."

Lei En understood now: this dwarf owner was a veteran card player running an inn while also doing business in cards.

"Alright, I'll think about it."

Lei En politely declined; he had no mind to play any cards right now.

Zoltan said nothing more and returned to the first-floor hall.

Lei En shut the door, lay down on the bed, and immediately opened his phone interface to examine the two icons he had just activated.

The first icon, viewed as a whole, resembled a plant, composed of several leaves and a main stem, but where a flower should have been at the top there was instead a bizarrely shaped head. This head had a twisted face, very abstract, impossible to tell whether it was a beast or some kind of demon, and it looked a bit frightening.

Lei En remembered that this app had previously seemed to be used for identifying plants—how had it turned into this?

He opened this icon and fumbled with it for a moment but found nothing useful.

Closing this thing that might be some kind of illustrated guide, Lei En then opened the second icon.

This icon looked much simpler and clearer, like a three-dimensional bullet. When Lei En opened it, a row of options immediately appeared before his eyes, each displayed as a smaller graphic.

Seeing the miniature graphics, Lei En nearly jumped off the bed.

Because these graphics were all too familiar to him.

It turned out this was a firearm structure disassembly game that Lei En had downloaded!

This was a foreign mobile game with very few players, extremely niche. The reason Lei En played it was because he had studied mechanical engineering in university. Although he hadn't worked in a related field after graduating, he had always been very interested in machinery and had played many machinery-themed games—this was one of them.

The gameplay was very simple.

It provided three-dimensional diagrams of hundreds of firearms; players disassembled them in the correct sequence into a pile of parts, then reassembled them, timing the entire process, and then competed against other players for speed.

The variety of firearms in the game was very complete—handguns, rifles, submachine guns were all there, and it even included several types of heavy artillery.

Lei En opened the top option, and sure enough, a three-dimensional structural diagram of a handgun appeared.

As his gaze moved, the handgun slowly rotated, then rapidly disassembled, becoming a pile of parts in less than half a minute. He did not reassemble it immediately, but instead carefully examined the parts, magnifying them in his vision to display their parameters and materials.

As long as Lei En wished, he could keep the parts in their disassembled state and use them as reference models to manufacture real parts.

Lei En counted and found there were only a little over twenty firearm structures in total.

"They're all firearms I've played in the game."

He hadn't been playing this game for long and hadn't managed to unlock all the firearms' 3D diagrams—probably less than a tenth of the total—which was truly a shame.

But it was already enough.

Lei En didn't know whether this world had gunpowder, whether gunpowder could be used, or whether bullets could be manufactured. If not, then all of this would be in vain; even ten thousand firearm structural diagrams would be useless.

Furthermore, he believed that even if firearms could be built, they could only serve as transitional weapons.

The world of Ai Lun E Si had supernatural powers; firearms had an upper limit to their power, and they were external objects, far inferior to returning great power to oneself—he ultimately still had to pursue possessing his own strength!

However, if he could make a gun, that would be enough to take revenge on Ramqi and Aisiboge.

Ramqi was an ordinary person—one shot would bring him down.

Aisiboge might be a bit more trouble, but he was only a low-level transcendent; firearms could still deal him a fatal wound. As long as he found the right moment to fire from the shadows, Lei En didn't believe the man could withstand it.

He immediately got up, went out, and headed downstairs. Zuoertan was sitting behind the counter, counting a stack of cards in his hands.

"Boss, give me a cup of Rongyanbao black beer."

Lei En sat down in front of the counter, fished out a copper liso, and ordered the cheapest drink.

Zuoertan carefully put away the cards, twisted open the valve of the barrel behind him, filled a large cup with black beer, set it in front of Lei En, and casually pocketed the copper coin.

The cool beer going down his throat, Lei En's spirits lifted, and he let out a comfortable belch.

"This beer's not bad. Is it really brewed from Rongyanbao rye?" Rongyanbao was a famous dwarf fortress located within the Shi Jie Shan Mai, very far from the Empire.

Zuoertan gave a dry laugh and did not answer.

Lei En tactfully asked no further, drinking while casually chatting with the dwarf.

After a while, Lei En found the conversation going nowhere—there was simply no common ground between them.

Zuoertan barely went three sentences without mentioning the Wanling cards, almost to the point of obsession. Aside from showing off his card skills, he kept urging Lei En to play, preferably buying a starter deck from him, even offering a discount.

"Cards, cards..." Lei En ranted inwardly: "Cards my ass!"

He quickly downed the last mouthful of beer and asked bluntly, "Zuoertan, do you know where I can buy alchemy materials nearby? Ideally a well-stocked place—I want to buy a few things."

"Young man, are you an alchemist, or an alchemy apprentice?" Zuoertan gave Lei En a suspicious glance.

Alchemist was not a transcendent profession—ordinary people could do it—but it was a very mysterious trade. Alchemy had broad applications: making weapons and equipment, brewing potions, enchanting, and so on. Many formal alchemists were themselves transcendent, and had joined the Alchemy Association.

And the Alchemy Association was the top-tier faction in the Empire—almost no one dared to cross it.

"Neither. I just want to buy some materials for my own use."

Lei En didn't know the first thing about alchemy. He had wanted to learn it back at the academy, but couldn't even pass the most basic entrance exam, and never earned the qualification of alchemy apprentice.

Zuoertan thought for a moment, then said in a low voice, "Just tell me what materials you need. I guarantee it'll be cheaper than the Alchemy Association's goods, but you can't let word get out."

Lei En was somewhat taken aback.

Judging by those words, Zuoertan was very likely an alchemist—and running an underground business to boot.

"There are many kinds of materials I need—some I can't even name. Could you let me take a look first?" Lei En knew how to make gunpowder and which raw materials it required, but he didn't know what those materials were called in Ai Lun E Si; he could only match them up once he had them in hand.

"Alright." Zuoertan called over a waiter, gave him a few instructions, and said to Lei En, "Follow me."