Spring Expo

The Spring Expo is a feast for the Taotie the most diverse and abundant new products throughout the year.

It happens to take place during students' winter break, around Christmas in the West and Chinese New Year in the East, much like a toy and fireworks exhibition before the Lunar New Year. Many large companies release their flagship new products at this crucial time.

This grand event was also jointly organized by the Blue Stone and Yellow Stone Senates. Wizards obsessed with psychic research and the Lapis Lazuli Guards were responsible for security checks, while the Sunflower and the Golden Spoon supported the complicated logistics and provided payment methods for travelers from afar.

Heading towards the long street of Fools' Workshop in Balason, and then to the statue of von Hohnheim, the father of the prime material, a magnificent and splendid pavilion stands on the steep hills of Balason —this is the venue for the exhibition.

Its name is Miracle Land International Convention and Exhibition Center, taken from the Miracle Land and Promised Land in most chivalric novels and children's fairy tales.

When Jiang Xueming arrived, the garden squares on both sides of the convention center were already crowded with vendors, bustling with noise, like a large village market.

Rows of mobile food carts and shops stretch along the flowerbeds of the garden square, divided into eight lanes. Exclamations of surprise occasionally rang out from the crowded flow of people, and everywhere you looked, there were curious tourists holding their mobile phones and taking pictures.

Everywhere you look, there are people dressed in strange clothes and with all sorts of expressions. There are local students from Galahad looking for suitable sticks, and militiamen from various districts selecting mediums' tools. Paranormal events often occur in areas with a high concentration of Spirit Calamity —literally, paranormal events.

Jason Megan possesses a considerable number of spiritual items, including incense burners and spices used for spirit summoning rituals, as well as spellbooks for ritualistic spells; most of these items come from this market.

In order to maintain local security, when militia representatives encounter elusive murderers, they have to turn to spirits to persuade the victims of the murders to speak out and seek justice for themselves.

Xue Ming's destination was not the catalyst zone, nor the standard products mass-produced by the large factories in the exhibition center. He went straight to the street of firearms vendors and squeezed into the surging crowd.

The people along the street were holding a comic convention, and every now and then a hybrid of a monster and a monster would strut around with a newly acquired <Alien> weapon.

In the underground world, these hybrids are considered a vulnerable group. Compared to the population size of the Homo sapiens race, their birth rate is low, their culture is relatively niche, they are not well-regarded by mainstream society, and most importantly, they lack suitable armor and weapons.

In the underground railway's militia system, all weapons and armor issued to militia units are designed according to human physiques. Only a few craftsmen can tailor-make equipment for hybrid monsters. For example, the equipment orders for the Blood Knights Lizard Militia in the past were also custom-made.

The Firearms Alley at the exhibition was a playground for monstrous creatures.

Xue Ming occasionally spotted hybrids dressed as comic book characters. Just then, a greyhound-headed man with a golden body, wearing a magnificent and dazzling Anubis bronze armor, walked by. Behind him followed a half-bat monster with Batman's mask over its split mouth.

Looking at the street as a whole, it's filled with monsters and ghosts with very little human presence.

However, there's no need to worry about safety. Balason is practically the safest place in the underworld. These hybrid monsters can freely enter and leave the exhibition, provided they have permission from the Lapis Lazuli Guards.

As Xue Ming walked along, he looked around. The shops on both sides of the road displayed all kinds of <Alien> weapons, from primary weapons to secondary weapons, projectiles and melee weapons, as well as several hand shapes corresponding to various types of disaster beast hybrids, and toe-fired guns specially designed for primates such as monkeys and baboons with dexterous lower limbs.

His primary concern was the type of ammunition.

--The ammunition stock on the 9*39 platform is too low; he wants to see what kind of bullets these strong, muscular hybrids prefer.

Homo sapiens' arm strength is well-suited to 9x19mm pistol ammunition and 5.56x39mm rifle ammunition. This is a universal solution for light infantry. These two types of ammunition, along with the 7.62x39mm rifle ammunition used by the Aka weapon platform, are probably the most widely used weapon projectiles in the world.

He was very familiar with these munitions and hoped to find another type of bullet with greater power, a more scientifically balanced gunpowder combustion rate, and a larger stockpile, to build a new weapon system based on this type of ammunition.

The reason for choosing the 9x39 ammunition type to build the entire Wenyu Wuhuan system was that this type of bullet can maintain extremely strong stopping power while also achieving subsonic silent combat. Galaxy helped Big Sister and Gunsmith achieve countless victories.

Jingguang's pistol was also his right-hand man. When fighting in the confined space of an indoor room, its power was no less than that of the rifle ammunition mentioned above. Its thick bullet could also be used to break down doors and unlock locks, and could easily penetrate walls to take down enemies.

The Huntress Goddess Devana and Black Immaculate are the main weapons of the Big Sister, creating an extremely strong offensive range. In the Big Sister's hands, this pure aluminum rifle based on the VSS is like a toy. It is light enough, and the bullet kinetic energy, velocity of the bullet, and sustained firepower are all excellent.

Black Immaculate can shorten the lengthy close-quarters combat to a deadly gunfight, giving this combat unit over 700 joules of kinetic energy. Galaxy's subsonic weighted bullets only have an initial velocity of about 280 meters per second, but they can still make the exaggeratedly large monsters fall to the ground in pain, and run away with their heads in their hands after being shot.

The ammunition required for this system includes SP-6UNCh training rounds, SP-5 conventional full metal jacket rounds, PAB-9 stamped cartridge cases (a cheaper alternative to the SP-6, now discontinued), SPP armor-piercing sniper rounds, and BP armor-piercing rounds.

Based on this ammunition, the gunsmith made a lot of bullets for the Big Sister.

It is a high-pressure armor-piercing bullet made of fast-burning gunpowder, used exclusively by the hunting goddess Devana, with a kinetic energy of 2,700 joules. There is also a composite bullet in the same system, which shatters upon impact with the target, releasing its kinetic energy. It is a copper powder bullet used to breach doors and subdue enemies.

Wen Yu and Wu Huan have only two flaws, and these flaws are unavoidable.

--The bulky bullets made its magazines extremely large, and the ammunition was expensive and difficult to obtain. In the battle at UB503 Hill, he ran out of bullets, which led to his being crippled, losing limbs, and going blind.

His weapon was damaged by the electronic androids of Shinto City, so Xue Ming wanted to take this opportunity to upgrade his equipment. He needed to find at least two types of ammunition with broad applicability and cartridge cases suitable for remanufacturing and reuse. Otherwise, once he got to Shambhala, he would have to turn back into a timid and cowardly boy.

Although he has always been timid and cowardly, being unarmed and having a gun are completely different things. I believe that the audience and readers here also feel the same way. A horror game changes its nature immediately once weapons are added.

After wandering around for a while, Xue Ming had a general idea of what was going on. Most of the rifles carried by these hybrid monsters used.30 Whisper Wildcat rounds, which were originally made by hunting players to deal with wild beasts.

Back in the Blackland Royal Hotel, the Big Sister also chose Wildcat bullets for her gunfight.

This type of bullet is a broad category. Wildcat bullets are not a specific type of ammunition, but rather a modified, unconventional type of ammunition. Due to their excellent performance, they became widely popular, and hunters recorded a particularly outstanding design, modifying the shape of the cartridge case according to this template. For example, they would enlarge or shrink the perforation, change the propellant charge, and alter the bullet's velocity and kinetic energy. The final design was the "Wildcat ammunition," named after its caliber and type.

Hybrid monsters with little money in their pockets like to use.30 Whisper bullets, which are widely available in the underworld. Originally a 7.62x28mm subsonic bullet manufactured by the U. S. Air Force Weapons Development Center, it was simply made by fitting a 5.56x45 cartridge case with a 7.62mm bullet, thus creating civilian-made ammunition.

This might be hard to understand, but you can imagine it as putting Megatron's lower body onto Optimus Prime's waist, and then we get a flying dump truck.

Hunters created these powerful yet quiet bullets through their own modifications and inventions, which later became a favorite type of ammunition among hunters. In the underground world, they were sought after by hybrids and have now become a trend.

However, for Xue Ming, this bullet wasn't enough. Although it was cheap and plentiful, its performance wasn't quite up to par.

"--Boss, I'd like to ask you something."

He found a large storefront and went to the gun shop counter to ask.

"Is there one that's even stronger?"

The shopkeeper, a pig-headed man, heard Xue Ming's question, shifted his position from the gunsmith's workbench, pushed past the counter and out of the way of the cashier. "Homo sapiens, what do you want? Just say it. All my treasures are in the cabinet; you can see them at a glance."

Jiang Xueming pointed to the bustling street behind him. "I saw that most of them had orders for Wildcat ammunition, and the guns they were using were hunting rifles. Are there any hybrids of calamity beasts used as riot control weapons by the military, police, and militia?"

The pig-headed boss flapped his ears, still not understanding. "Huh?"

Xue Ming simply cut to the chase. "It's the more expensive one! And the more powerful one!"

"Oh, you should have said so earlier." The pig-man boss suddenly changed his expression, grinning, "But judging from your build, I'm afraid you might not be able to handle it."

Xue Ming: "I ordered this for a friend. He didn't have time to come to the expo, so he asked me to find some weapons for him to use for self-defense."

"Is your friend going to deal with the monsters?" The pig-man shopkeeper became interested. As a professional gunsmith, he needed to know the purpose of the bullets. "Or to subdue criminals?"

Xue Ming: "They're all useful, but I'm worried about the availability of bullets."

"If your friend isn't short of money, then I recommend 50 Beowulf." The pigman shopkeeper took out a bullet box from under the counter and pulled out a series of bright yellow plastic bullet molds from the box.

Live ammunition is not allowed in Balason. The ammunition at the exhibition is just a model. After you buy it, you have to exchange it for another item by presenting the product barcode on the ammunition box.

A large bullet stands upright in front of the cabinet. Its caliber is 12.7*42MM`RB. Xue Ming used this type of bullet before, which can be regarded as an upgraded version of the.50 flat-nosed bullet of the Desert Eagle.

Its bullet kinetic energy exceeds two thousand joules, and the shooting experience should be similar to that of Devana's high-pressure ammunition. However, its ammunition capacity is very limited. The Beowulf rifle, when loaded with a standard magazine, can only hold ten rounds, while the 5.56 magazine can hold thirty rounds.

It's like a small bullet, only more accurate than a shotgun shell.

"Emmmmm." Xue Ming was still a little disappointed. The only advantage of the 50 Beowulf was that it was plentiful and filling. The hybrid monsters of the underworld liked to use it as ammunition for their main weapons, so there shouldn't be any trouble in buying it.

"What? You're pretty disappointed?" The pig-man boss huffed and puffed, seemingly getting impatient. "Want something even more powerful? Is your friend Titan Giant? If he's so awesome, why didn't you mention a heavy machine gun?"

Xue Ming had also considered this issue. If he used machine gun ammunition for weapon design, he would be inseparable from military dogs for the rest of his life. The Hayabusa in Shinto City could carry a MiniGun and wreak havoc everywhere, but he didn't have that ability; the efficiency of marching with heavy loads was too low.

"How much of this Beowulf do you have in stock?" Xue Ming asked.

"Oh, more than 1,300," the pig-man shopkeeper replied.

That means there are indeed a lot of these bullets; the stock of just one store could arm three or four militia squads.

Looking at this street, there are nearly eighty shops, big and small, all of which should carry this popular ammunition. The underground arms manufacturers must have a lot of orders. You can buy 50 Beowulf in retail stores all over the place.

Xue Ming's biggest headache was the supply problem before arriving at the new battlefield. Often, when he captured a town, he couldn't buy VSS 9*39 ammunition. Subsequent railway supply trains would always arrive at the front line a few days late, and his powerful weapon would become nothing more than a fire poker.

"Okay, that's fine. I understand." Xue Ming smiled and prepared to leave.

Pig-man shopkeeper. "Huh?! You're not buying?"

Saying anything would be a bit impolite, so Xue Ming turned her head again and looked at the weapons in the counter.

"Oh! Oh! Give me one of these."

He casually pointed to a pistol, which was quite sophisticated and unique in the market of mixed beasts and monsters; it was something that Homo sapiens could use.

When the pig-man boss took out the little gadget, Xue Ming's eyes lit up.

"This."

Originally, Xue Ming wanted to find an excuse to buy himself a self-defense weapon, but when he got to the counter, he found that these weapons all had <Alien> handles. They were specially customized for use by hybrid monsters, and his hands couldn't grip these strange behemoths at all.

As he got closer, he discovered that the CZ-75 he had acquired was full of surprises.

Its grip has been polished, its barrel has been replaced with a heavy-duty one, and the iron sights, except for the red dot sight used in competitions, have also been retained.

Its trigger design is very special; it's not a standard product on the market, but rather one cut out by a machining center, complete with tool marks. It looks like the work of a professional gunsmith. The strangest features are its feeding mechanism and slide.

If we were to use a metaphor from a fantasy cultivation novel, it would be like you stumbled upon a monster weapon shop filled with hooks, rakes, canes, and harpoons used by ghosts and demons, and suddenly discovered a flying sword used by humans, and one that was actually quite good in appearance.

"Did you make this, boss?"

The pig-man pursed his lips, sweat pouring down his back. "No."

The slide and barrel are so strange—that's what Xue Ming was interested in about the gun's feeding mechanism and firing device.

It looks like a pistol, like a CZ-75, and appears to use 9mm pistol ammunition, but the heavy barrel and magazine are completely wrong; it's not what you'd expect at all.

Its slide and barrel are welded to the grip, it's not a traditional Browning recoil mechanism at all, it doesn't even have a recoil lever. It has no loading action, absolutely none—

Xue Ming fiddled with it for a long time but still couldn't figure out what kind of bullet it was firing. He wondered if this second brother of a pig was trying to pull off some kind of blunder to swindle money from this honest doctor.

But after looking at it from all angles, the ergonomics of the firearm didn't seem like a fake. Would a gunsmith really need to make the model so exquisite?

"Interesting! Quite interesting!" Xue Ming exclaimed excitedly. "Boss, who made this?"

The pig-man boss was initially hesitant, thinking the kid was just trying to sell the junk in the display case because he didn't know its value. But eventually, he told the truth.

"He's one of my long-time employees. He spent a lot of money on his daughter's medical treatment and asked me to advance him some of my salary, so he gave me this old cigarette as payment. Uh... I don't know what this guy was thinking. Sir, would you like to get a different one?"

"No, no, no, this one. Are you sure it can fire bullets?" Xue Ming removed the magazine and looked inside the gun through the muzzle. This CZ-75 had no ejection port and no concept of spent cartridge cases, which was very strange.

Its slide and heavy barrel are almost integrated into one piece. The slide is hollowed out from both sides of the front end, and the barrel is also cut with an inverted V-shaped fish scale pattern. If this thing can actually fire bullets, the bullet's kinetic energy will dissipate quickly, and the gunpowder gas will rush out from these holes. The silencer works on the same principle, reducing the supersonic gas at the muzzle to subsonic speed.

He didn't understand, he didn't understand at all, the purpose of this design—if this thing were used to fire traditional bullets, it could only fire one shot, eject the spent cartridge from the chamber, change the magazine, and fire another shot.

This is really strange. According to the concept of weapons in cultivation novels, this flying sword can only be used once, and after it is used up, it must be recharged with spiritual energy.

You can see the firing pin of the mechanism through the parts of the slide and barrel that let in light; this thing can actually fire bullets, it's not a model.

"Uh, I don't know either." The pig-man boss was sweating even more.

Xue Ming was so concerned about this strange weapon because the barrel size was also incorrect.

The CZ-75 fires 9mm bullets, but this heavy-duty barrel uses 15mm bullets. The large bullet makes the entire barrel sleeve bulge out, like a standard punch-marked tungsten steel tube with a deep hole. It's so round and neat, exuding a rugged industrial beauty. It's as if they didn't have any machining tools at home, so they just grabbed a punch for positioning and started machining on a lathe. The manufacturing process of this tube is very simple.

If you figure out its bullet type, Fragrant Dream could definitely make it by hand. Its cat paws cover the outer armor, which is shaped like a 14mm cylinder. This big cat could make bullet casings by poking copper sheets with its paws.

Jiang Xueming immediately asked, "Where is this gunsmith now?"

The CZ-75 uses an extended magazine, and the follower is also a 15mm semi-circular size, indicating that this is indeed how the gun was designed.

The pig-headed man pointed towards the exhibition hall. "In the main venue, his name is Jamie! He's in his fifties, has patches of baldness, and red hair—easy to spot. He's a birdman! A vulture man!"

"I bought it." Xue Ming tossed down the HC card. This new identity had some savings, about 40,000 yuan. "How much?"

"Five hundred yuan is fine. Anyway, I don't know what kind of bullets it can fire. If you like it, feel free to take it and play with it." The pig-man shopkeeper finally breathed a sigh of relief, as if he had escaped a disaster. He didn't expect this kid to know his stuff. Luckily, he didn't complain to Qingjin. If the exhibition organizers had investigated, his shop would have been out of business.

Xue Ming rushed to the main venue of the exhibition and found Jamie in the Military History Museum.

--He was a middle-aged man who looked haggard and had a solemn expression.

He wore a waterproof and oil-proof apron, with bright red bird feathers covering his limbs, and a pair of work jeans. His lower body was somewhat deformed, a characteristic of bestiality caused by blood transfusion, but his upper body was unusually tall, similar to the deformed physique in comics.

The old gunsmith had a small head; some vulture genes made his neck longer, but his head was only about the size of two adult fists put together. His slender, bird-like pupils were watery as he stared at the artifacts on the display stand.

Gunsmiths are very familiar with this artifact.

The items displayed in the counter were the remains of Wen Yu and Wu Huan.

After the battle of Shinto City, Devana was left with only half a grip, the Milky Way was destroyed, and along with a makeshift copper-iron wire Flash Butterfly Armor and the hilt of the Dragon Slayer Sword, she was sent back to the Arcane Library.

These tattered weapons, along with the name of the gunsmith, became history.

"Mr. Jamie?" Jiang Xueming moved closer to the vulture and greeted it softly, "Mr. Jamie."

Jamie looked up at the gunsmith's belongings, not responding, seemingly lost in grief. He was almost two meters tall, with a neck a foot and a half long, and a pair of wrinkled hands crossed in front of his chest, each with only four fingers and sharp claws.

Xue Ming shouted loudly, "Mr. Jamie!"

At this moment, Jamie finally came to his senses. "Oh! Oh oh oh! Oh! Damn it! Oh! What are you yelling about! There are hero's relics here! I'm admiring the gunsmith's work!"

After seeing Xue Ming's appearance clearly, Jamie became even angrier. "Oh! Another gunsmith imitator! How shameless can you be to parade around with his face like that! Frivolous! Shameless! You're a complete bastard!"

"My face is a gift from my parents, there's no way to change it." Xue Ming shrugged helplessly.

Jamie, also a man of fiery temper, was about to make a move and grabbed Xue Ming's face.

"Still dare to spout nonsense! I'll expose your lies!"

As a result, the sharp bird claws left several scars on Xue Ming's face, almost twisted his nose, and caused blood to spurt from Xue Ming cheeks.

Mr. Jamie was terrified, finally realizing that the young man in front of him wasn't a fake—he was all-natural.

"Oh! Oh, oh, oh, oh! I'm sorry!"

Xue Ming didn't resist either, his face covered in blood as he looked at the hot-tempered old gunsmith with a wry smile.

"My Zhang Congfeng. I bought this gun from Red Pepper Weapon Shop. Is it your work?"

He showed off the CZ-75.

"--I want to know, what exactly does it shoot?"

As the old vulture pulled out Universal Elixir from his pocket, he replied, "It's my work, my God! That bastard actually sold it! That shameless bitch, I promised to redeem it once I'd raised enough money!"

"No, no, no," Xue Ming didn't care much about the scar on his face and quickly returned the Universal Elixir: "I heard from the boss that you have a sick daughter at home, Brother Jamie, is that right? Even the Universal Elixir can't cure her?"

"Ah," Jamie said, his mouth twisting, his beak-shaped carapace trembling. "Ever since the gunsmith died, she hasn't gotten better—not because of her physical constitution."

"What a coincidence." Xue Ming pulled out his medical license. "I'm a psychologist. Take me to see your daughter, and this gun too."

Before Xue Ming could finish asking, Jamie gave an unexpected answer.

"That's not how it's used; it doesn't fire bullets. It's a rocket launcher."

Xue Ming paused for a moment, then said, "Oh!"

Then I started to have doubts.

"Huh? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait."

"Rocket launcher?"

After glancing at the size of the CZ-75, I was certain that it was a pistol no bigger than two palms.

"Rocket?"