Inevitable Gun

The Inevitable Gun was Franca Roland's former Cannon Gun after it absorbed Patient-pathway boon power from Higdon. It retained ordinary ammunition and Heavy Strike while gaining finite Sure Hit and Certain Death effects. Its power was paid for in disease: the weapon polluted a wide area, and triggering either special shot made its user gravely ill.

History

Corruption and naming

After Higdon's defeat in the special mirror world, Franca's Cannon Gun merged with part of his intercepted boon. Divination showed that it continuously spread disease and decay in a three-kilometer radius and held thirteen combined uses of Sure Hit or Certain Death. Franca renamed it Inevitable Gun and stored it in an isolated Traveler's Bag compartment so the pollution would not leak freely. (Chapters 2317–2318)

Dream-city combat

In the dream city, Franca fired ordinary and Heavy Strike rounds through mirror surfaces, then used Sure Hit and Certain Death against a reanimated Demoness. Sure Hit could still strike a decoy if Franca locked onto a mirror projection rather than the real target. Certain Death killed the already injured, Sequence-7-limited target, but Franca suffered severe illness afterward and required a healing agent. (Chapters 2348–2352)

Franca later used Certain Death to destroy Zaratulstra's dream manifestation and another proliferating target. She lent the revolver to Jenna, who used the same effect against a dangerous mirrored identity. Treatments could delay or limit the backlash, but did not erase the price. (Chapters 2412–2413, 2430, and 2460)

Further evolution

Franca placed the gun where the returning boon of a Patient-pathway Saint gathered. It restored the combined Sure Hit/Certain Death reserve to thirteen and added one use of “God's Gaze.” In the later assault on the Demoness Sect, Franca used Certain Death rounds to decay and shatter Primordial Demoness figurines. The final corpus does not record the weapon's destruction or transfer. (Chapters 2488 and 2542)

Abilities and properties

• It functioned as a brass revolver using ordinary and specialized ammunition. Its original Heavy Strike created an explosive impact and could stack with the later Sure Hit or Certain Death powers. (Chapters 2317 and 2350)
• Sure Hit made the selected bullet unavoidably reach the locked target, but it did not identify truth: a projection or pre-positioned substitute could receive the hit instead. (Chapters 2317 and 2350–2351)
• Certain Death made a successful hit fatal according to the power level available in the current environment. Against the dream city's Sequence 7 constraints it was certainly lethal only to ordinary people, yet could still kill an already severely injured Sequence 7 target. At full strength, prior descriptions indicate it critically endangers Saints and kills lower-rank targets unless a substitute intervenes. (Chapters 2302, 2351, and 2412)
• Activating Sure Hit or Certain Death inevitably caused the user to become gravely ill. Without an appropriate healer the user could die; even with treatment, illness could persist for hours to a day. (Chapters 2317, 2352, and 2413)
• It continuously spread random disease and decay within three kilometers. This environmental effect remained even after all thirteen empowered shots were spent and was expected to last about a year, making sealed storage necessary. (Chapter 2317)
• The later one-use God's Gaze could stun a locked target and decay thought even without a hit; if the bullet struck the original body, that body would inevitably decay toward death. A separated Demoness mirror-self remained outside its reach. (Chapter 2488)

Ownership and custody