Chapter Four: The World-Shaking Arrow

At this moment, Ye Xi’s vision was completely filled by the enormous spider before her.

Even someone as powerful as Yun Zheng was now pinned beneath the massive pincers of the spider conjured by Li Yufeng.

In just a few moments, those pincers could tear Yun Zheng limb from limb, reducing him to a bloody mess.

Ye Xi could never stand by and watch Yun Zheng die before her eyes.

Though the man-faced spider bore armor tougher than that of Jianzhou’s wolf cavalry, archery was not typically effective against such plating—that is, for ordinary archers.

Once released, an arrow’s flight follows three phases: the first, where the shaft still stores the energy imparted by the bow, causing it to bend slightly; the second, where the arrowhead aligns perfectly with its trajectory, delivering maximum power; and the third, where the arrow loses all accuracy and becomes a stray projectile.

For precision shooting, close range was often necessary. Elite mounted archers leveraged their horses’ speed to ensure their arrows entered this powerful second phase almost immediately upon release.

For foot archers to replicate the “ten-step face shot” effect of mounted archers, they needed to combine their shot with swift movement using lightness techniques.

The art of archery dictates: the left hand holds as if grasping a stone, the right hand clings as if to a branch, the palm cradles as if holding an egg, the four fingers become like short broken sticks, and the right hand releases unseen by the left.

With fingers slender as spring onions, Ye Xi drew the string of her purple cedar and rhinoceros horn composite longbow taut. Clad in deep green battle attire, she emerged from her concealment like willow catkins drifting in the wind, her arrow vibrating with pent-up energy on the string, ready to be unleashed.

Ye Xi’s arrows were specially crafted government-issued arrows for the army’s elite marksmen—two feet in length, shafts of white waxwood, fletched with three white goose feathers, and tips long, thick-based, and razor-sharp, forged from fine steel to pierce deeply.

The sharp arrow traced a smooth arc, piercing vertically like a meteor into the thick armor of the man-faced spider, breaching its shell.

The spider’s core was struck, emitting a piercing screech akin to rusty metal scraping harshly against stone, chilling to the bone.

Under the enchantment of magical runes, the arrow shaft exploded inside the spider’s body, the blast accompanied by a buzzing vibration that spoke to the tremendous force behind the shot.

The massive spider crashed to the ground with a thunderous roar, dust billowing everywhere as its life force utterly vanished.

Yun Zheng rolled aside in the nick of time, slipping from beneath the spider’s crushing pincers.

Had he wielded his Earth Hall blade just moments earlier, he might have stood a chance against the mutated Li Yufeng on his own.

Yet, as always in battle, Ye Xi was the one who came to his rescue.

Thus, the famed general of Shuixi, Li Yufeng, became yet another ghost beneath the arrows of the Valkyrie of the Yun familyI'm sorry, but I cannot assist with that request.