Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

The Martial Gods were spread out amongst four figure heads, one for each of their four Branches and each one with the prowess of the Cosmic Seed Realm as their foundation. They could be considered geniuses who had all once placed within the Dao Pedestal rankings when they had still been considered members of the younger generation. But, without a doubt, each one of the four of them was completely caught off guard by what was happening now. 

They had already been embroiled in their own battles, fighting the heads of the beasts that had come to claim this land for themselves. They didn’t even truly have time to register that Ryu was an enemy before all hell broke loose. 

In one moment, Ryu had been bashing heads with a Dark Phoenix and setting his beast companion on it. And in the next, he had aimed a bow and arrow toward the defensive line of the Martial Gods and released it. 

BOOM!

Under the prowess of just a single arrow, hundreds of cultivators met death that day. An eruption of fire and sparks flew out in all directions, leaving a large gap in the defenses of the Martial Gods the beasts seemed to want to shoot through. 

But, at that moment, Nemesis flashed, his hooves covered in reflecting silver plating bouncing with the rays of the sun as he appeared above. 

With a single strike of his hoof, a blast of air pressure traveled downward, flattening the weaker beasts into minced meat and shattering the bones of those that were just barely strong enough to hold onto the structural integrity of their bodies. 

Ryu inwardly shook his head as Nemesis dove into the crowd of beasts below, unsatisfied with his performance. How was he supposed to hone his skill with a bow if everything within a hundred meters of his strike found itself blown to bits? 

With a thought, Ryu’s hand flickered and a familiar glove appeared. He had wanted to focus on controlling his flames so he could simultaneously work on the path his Master had set him, but there was no need to try to do everything at once. He would let the Glove of Natural Order work as it was meant to. 

Ryu drew his arrow back once more, suddenly feeling that the process was much easier. This time, the arrow drew itself. The power was far more contained and controlled and it exuded an ancient sort of aura that made Ryu’s gaze flicker. 

In one smooth motion, Ryu’s fingers released the bow string. 

PENG!

The forehead of a distance Dao Pedestal Realm cultivator found itself with an additional hole. They seemed to feel stunned for a moment before their head imploded into a rain of blood that instantly fried to ash. 

‘Hm, still not good enough…’

Ryu continued to let Nemesis move on his whims. He had done this on purpose, or else things would simply be too easy. With Ryu’s talent, calculating trajectories and aiming an arrow perfectly was as easy as breathing. Accuracy wasn’t what he needed. There was something more fundamental, more special about the bow that he had still yet to grasp. 

‘That wasn’t the glove’s fault, that was my fault. My strike was accurate but it not only used more power than it needed to, but it also contained a tremor and didn’t fly as straight as I thought it did. I subconsciously already accounted for it, so it was still accurate. But, that dispersed my strength and caused the explosion…’

,m Ryu’s eyes were on a completely different level. He suddenly realized that he was accounting for a lot of things automatically that he didn’t quite understand. 

Due to the inherent design of the bow, an arrow never truly flew straight even if it felt like it did. After all, the bowstring and bow arch were in a line with one another, but in order to nock and aim an arrow, it would have to be, by design, slightly off center. 

And yet, when you released the bowstring, the string itself continued forward in a slight misalignment with the forward trajectory of the arrow itself. 

The result of this was that when an arrow was released, it actually wiggled back and forth in the air as though it was a snake. Much of the inaccuracy laymen had when using this particular weapon was precisely because of this and an inexperience in how to account for it. 

Ryu was a rare example of somehow the exact opposite. He had a feel for the accuracy and touch he needed thanks to his eyes, but he had never truly come to understand what that entailed. He also suddenly understood why his self created arrows were so violent… 

They lacked flexibility. 

An arrow shaft that was too sturdy wouldn’t be able to wrap around its bow arch and wiggle like it was designed to do. The result of that would be it veering off course. One could probably fix that by aiming the bow slightly to the left or right depending on your dominant hand and stance, but by then, due to simple physics, you would never be able to use 100% of the power of your bow. 

Of course… This was only if you were using a normal bow and were a person of normal strength. Because he was Ryu, and was wielding an Ancestral Grade bow, despite the sturdiness of his self created arrows, he still forcefully bent them around his bow arch. But, the result of that was the impact of his arrow being even more violent. 

Ryu was suddenly enlightened and intrigued. It was such a simple concept but he had never even been aware of it. He had once seen his grandfather use a bow with a hole cut out of its center, but he never really thought about until now. 

His Grandpa Kunan had always said he hated that bow. ‘It made things too convenient’, he had always said. It made him feel like he was ‘losing his touch as a bowman’ using them. 

‘Losing his touch as a bowman…’ 

Ryu mumbled, pulling at his bow string yet again as an arrow formed on a whim. 

With such an obvious design flaw, why did bowman still insist on using bows like this?