Runes • Rifles • Reincarnation

"Oh my god, Jin Shu, it's too big! Stop, stop—you'll break me!" Liu Hua screamed, her body seizing like she'd been hit with a thousand volts of electricity.

Which, to be fair, she had.

Jin Shu had successfully created the lightning element. But something had gone very wrong.

He'd followed her instructions exactly: formed the tri-elemental ring in his soul space, spun it until it felt like his eyes were going to pop out, continued for the duration of an incense stick, then stopped the moment his head felt like it might explode.

Which, apparently, was not just a metaphor. Luckily, his head had not exploded.

Unluckily… something arguably worse happened.

The moment he stopped spinning the elements, the ring collapsed inward and formed a thundercloud. At first, he'd been excited—watching the dark gray cloud flicker with electric-blue lightning, thinking This must be it! I've done it!

Then the cloud left his soul space.

Then it manifested in the sky above the mountain.

Then it grew into a three-hundred-foot-wide, very angry, very real thunderstorm.

That's when he realized: he had absolutely, spectacularly, fucked up.

Not even a heartbeat passed before the mountaintop exploded in a barrage of brilliant blue lightning bolts—dozens of them raining down like divine punishment, spears of raw energy aiming to obliterate everything beneath them.

And unfortunately, "everything" included Liu Hua and Jin Shu.

They were struck again and again in seconds, pinned under the unrelenting bombardment. Thankfully, both of them had partial immunity to lightning—but only partial.

"AHH! Jin Shu, do something!" Liu Hua screamed as three more bolts struck her at once.

Both of them were practically immobilized, their muscles convulsing with each hit, electricity coursing through their veins like fire.

"I can't! It's not responding to me!" he shouted, barely audible over the deafening crack of thunder.

"How much elemental power did you use?! If it was only a few drops, it should pass soon!"

"Uh… drops?"

"Yes!" she dodged a massive bolt, then turned to glare at him. "You did only use a few drops of elemental power… right?!"

"So, um… theoretically," he said, ducking as lightning scorched the rock above his head, "say someone used… a thread of elemental power. Just hypothetically. Maybe the size of, oh, I don't know—my forearm… How bad would that be?"

She stared at him. Blinking. Motionless. Not even bothering to dodge the crackling bolts raining down around her.

"You… you… you—" she stammered, voice rising with every syllable, "You used that much elemental power?! It was only one of the elements, right?"

"…"

He remained silent.

"RIGHT?!" she shrieked, her voice nearly louder than the thunder.

"What's going to happen if I did?" he asked, neither confirming nor denying.

She didn't answer right away. Her expression shifted—disbelief fading into something else. Something he couldn't quite place. Resolution? Determination? A strange mix of acceptance and… love?

He didn't know.

She stepped toward him, lightning crashing down all around—but none of it touched her. Somehow, miraculously, she walked through the chaos with calm, deliberate steps, untouched by the chaos in the sky.

Jin Shu tensed.

He didn't know what she was doing, but he had the sinking feeling he shouldn't let her get too close. Unfortunately, his back was literally against a wall—a jagged rock face pressed against his spine. Nowhere to run.

She reached him in just a few steps. Without warning, she lunged. Her fist sank into his stomach before he could react.

He doubled over, gasping, the air knocked clean from his lungs.

Before he could recover, she grabbed him by the collar and hauled him upright—and then her deep cherry red stained lips crashed into his.

He froze.

Somewhere between pain and pleasure, he didn't know what to do. She kissed him like she meant it, hard and hungry. For someone who not long ago didn't even understand what sex was—and had presumably never kissed anyone before—she was surprisingly good at it. He didn't even need to explain French kissing. Her tongue was already exploring like it had a map and a mission.

He had no idea what was happening, but he couldn't deny one thing: He definitely didn't hate it.

He was perfectly fine letting it continue… Until the thunderstorm decided otherwise.

Dozens of lightning bolts struck them at once.

Their bodies convulsed, sparks flying from their limbs as they collapsed in a twitching heap on the rocky ground.

"What… was that for?" Jin Shu groaned, still spasming as the electricity invaded his body even deeper than her tongue had moments ago.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

"We… are going to… die," she gasped, her body jolting beside his. "That thunderstorm is… heavenly punishment. For daring to touch the lightning element."

"Oh…"

"If you'd only used a tiny bit of elemental power—like I said—it would've summoned a small, manageable storm," she continued, her voice rising with each word. "One that tempers your body slowly. But nooo, you had to go and use three forearm-sized threads of power!"

"Can't we just… escape?"

"If only it were that easy…" she muttered. "It's heavenly punishment. It's locked onto our souls. It'll follow us anywhere in the world until it runs out of energy."

He blinked. "Well… I mean, it wasn't that much energy. So… it shouldn't last too long, right?"

She stared at him. Completely, utterly speechless.

"It wasn't that much?!" she screamed, her voice going shrill with disbelief. "Three drops of elemental power can sustain a thunderstorm for an hour! Do you have any idea how many drops are in a forearm-sized thread?!"

Jin Shu glanced down at his forearm.

"…A lot?"

"Yes," she said, utterly defeated. "A lot. As in—a lot more than we can possibly survive."

Both of their bodies stopped convulsing at the same moment.

Liu Hua turned onto her stomach and began crawling toward him.

"You may want to deploy the Minor Deity Formation—if you want to live to see tomorrow," Long Jinshu advised from within his soul space. "The improvised version should be enough to absorb most of the lightning. Enough to make it survivable… or at least… somewhat."

Jin Shu was about to reply when Liu Hua reached him, climbed atop his body, and began fumbling at his robes with trembling fingers.

"What are you doing?"

She looked up at him, eyes fierce despite the tears streaking her cheeks. "If I'm going to die here… I want to try it once."

"You're not going to die here," he said with a sigh. "Alright—get off. I need to do something, and I can't with you pinning my arms."

"No!" she cried, shaking her head. Tears spilled faster. "I couldn't even avenge my sister. So at least… let me have this. Please."

He didn't have time for this.

The lightning above had briefly stopped—but that was not a good sign. It was gathering. Condensing. He could already see it—thick bolts forming in the clouds, wide as buckets and vibrating with lethal energy. Bolts that looked like they could pierce through the entire mountain.

With no choice, he summoned what little strength his twitching body had left and tossed Liu Hua to the side.

"No!! Please! Don't let me die like this!!" she screamed, collapsing to the ground, tears streaming in rivers.

"You won't die!" he shouted back. "Now shut up and let me concentrate!"

She choked back a sob, her breath hitching. Her eyes were red and puffy, her cheeks glistening with tears—but she went silent.

"W-what are you going to do?" she asked quietly.

"Just watch."

He didn't have much time.

He shut his eyes, forcing the world away, and began to trace glowing runes into the air, using his fingertip coated with qi. Each stroke had to be precise—any mistake would collapse the entire formation.

And that meant going slow. Painfully, torturously slow.

Seconds passed. Then minutes. By the time an hour had gone, he was soaked in cold sweat, his entire body trembling with strain. The air itself thrummed with electrical tension. The lightning could fall any second.

And he was still missing the final rune.

Just a few more seconds. Just a few—

Cracking his eyes open, he risked a glance upward.

The clouds had turned from dark gray to pitch black, the sky streaked with jagged tongues of lightning. They churned above him like a living thing—angry, ancient, divine.

He prayed the heavens would grant him one more moment. One breath. That was all he needed.

But the heavens were never kind.

The instant he began the final line of the last rune, the sky opened and a massive, radiant blue bolt shot straight down toward him. A beam of holy reckoning.

Shit… This is it. I hope I'm reborn in this world again…

The beam tore toward him like divine judgment.

And then… a hand touched his back.

His body was shoved just enough to the side to avoid the brunt of the strike.

But in his place… Liu Hua stood.

Smiling. Brilliantly. A smile brighter than the lightning itself.

Then the bolt struck her.

The light consumed her body.

Jin Shu screamed inside—too stunned for sound, too full of fury for tears.

Rage, hotter than anything he'd ever felt, welled up inside him as he stared into the black sky. The heavens had taken her. And it was his fault.

But it would be their punishment.

He slammed his fingertip onto the center of the formation—completing the final rune.

A pulse of power rippled outward.

And in the next instant, his body surged with divine energy—morphing into the form of the Minor Lightning Deity.