"Twenty seconds?"
Tang Yeye stared at the targets drifting above the floor. Without talisman sheets and their wide blast radius, there was almost no way she could clear them all in time.
"Do you have a problem?"
Bai Fanxian raised an eyebrow.
Her lady wasn't joking. Tang Yeye swallowed and said nothing.
She went straight to the shelves. Bai Fanxian watched her little disciple, curious. Whatever Tang Yeye chose would shape how she fought from here on.
"A bow...?"
Tang Yeye murmured and pulled one down, nearly as tall as she was. For a cultivator, an image like this was perfectly normal. For anyone else her size, lifting it would have been out of the question.
"I don't know these well myself. But I'll share what I can..."
Bai Fanxian stepped over and adjusted Tang Yeye's posture with a hand on the girl's shoulder.
"Feet a little wider... weight centered between them. Turn the shoulder holding the bow toward the target."
She spoke softly, teaching patiently. At first Tang Yeye still looked a little awkward. But once she felt the correct posture, she relaxed and settled into it.
"Index finger hooks the top of the string. Middle and ring fingers take the bottom."
She reached for an arrow. Tang Yeye set her stance and raised the bow. Left hand pushing forward, right hand drawing back to full draw. The bow trembled with tension.
Bai Fanxian felt something shift in her little disciple.
Something cold settled over Tang Yeye without her noticing. Her eyes locked onto the target that had just risen. Every bit of her focus narrowed to a single point. For just a moment, Bai Fanxian thought she saw the girl's right eye glow.
*WHOOSH!*
The fully drawn arrow released — no different from a beast escaping its cage. Bai Fanxian heard it slice through the air in a long arc before it struck the moving target dead center!
It punched clean through the target. Then the one behind it, leaving a wide hole. Then buried itself in the wall on the other side of the room — stopped only because there was nothing left to pierce.
"..."
Huang Zihuan stared. He had watched this girl grow up, and still couldn't quite believe what he had just seen. First try, and she'd shot like that!
"That works..."
Bai Fanxian nodded with satisfaction. She looked at her little disciple, who seemed unable to believe her own eyes — that she had actually hit a moving target at that distance.
"Do you like the bow?"
Bai Fanxian was already thinking about archery texts she might have somewhere, and techniques she could pass on.
Tang Yeye didn't answer right away. She looked at the bow, hesitating. Her eyes drifted to the other weapons on the shelf, still untouched.
"Or do you want to try something else first?"
Bai Fanxian asked. Sometimes even she couldn't follow where this girl's mind was going.
"Yes!"
Tang Yeye set the bow down and moved to the next weapon.
"Crossbow?... This weapon is quite similar to a bow. But the method of use is different..."
Bai Fanxian explained as Tang Yeye picked it up.
*WHOOSH!*
*THUNK!*
Just the first test shot — the arrow penetrated straight through the target's center! The destructive power on display wasn't a step behind the bow at all!
"..."
But Tang Yeye's expression said she still wasn't satisfied. She reached for the next thing.
"Throwing knives rely on flicking force from the body. For martial artists, they should be a bit easier to train with..."
*THUNK!*
"Hidden weapons are different. Speed and accuracy are key. Surprise attacks before the target realizes — that's the whole point..."
*THUNK!*
*THUNK!*
*THUNK!*
And so it went. Each time Tang Yeye picked something up, Bai Fanxian explained the basics without steering her toward any particular choice. The choice had to be hers.
But what was shocking was that even with weapons she'd only just seen for the first time, Tang Yeye could send every one of them shooting straight into the target's center.
It wasn't just about suitability anymore. This was true talent!
In the corner, Huang Zihuan kept nodding to himself. Tang Tianjie was going to be enormously proud of this granddaughter.
"Have you made up your mind?"
Bai Fanxian asked, watching Tang Yeye set down the last weapon.
Tang Yeye furrowed her brow. She looked at the shelf of long-range weapons with an unsettled feeling.
Her lady was waiting for an answer.
But even though she could use all of them smoothly, she didn't especially like any of them!
Something was off. None of these weapons were what she was looking for.
"Mm..."
Tang Yeye pondered. Then she turned and saw the elderly butler take out a cell phone from his chest pocket. Her eyes sparkled.
*Yes... there's still "that thing" she once thought she'd like to try!*
"Uncle Huang! Can I borrow your phone?"
She shot forward like a rocket and grabbed it from the old man's hand.
"Want to contact someone?"
Huang Zihuan let her take it without resistance, but he asked because he was genuinely surprised.
"...Someone who should have the weapon I need."
Tang Yeye smiled sheepishly, then quickly ran out of the room to call someone.
.
.
.
And about half an hour later, a man traveled to the private island by "flying," a wooden crate bigger than himself held above his head with one hand.
"My lady... what do you need these for?"
None other than General Liu Yianfei!
And what he brought was a crate packed full of military weapons!
The moment his feet touched ground, he asked in confusion. Tang Yeye came out to receive him and opened the crate, eyes sparkling — not a single round was loaded.
The call had come from Tang Yeye, claiming her lady needed them. Curious, he had come out from the command base and brought them himself — he wanted to know what someone like Bai Fanxian would do with firearms.
"This child..."
Bai Fanxian sighed and fixed Tang Yeye with one stern look until the girl jumped. She laughed dryly and quickly pretended to be very interested in the crate's contents.
"You're interested in these?"
Bai Fanxian walked over, raised an eyebrow, and asked. When she saw the girl nod vigorously, her small mouth already launching into an explanation before her lady could refuse —
"I do like bows..." Tang Yeye scratched her head awkwardly and continued, "...But I kept thinking, why not just use guns instead?"
Bai Fanxian froze for a moment. She looked at the pistol — completely disproportionate to Tang Yeye's size, yet the girl lifted it with one hand easily. Moreover, there were rifles too, up to sniper rifles, packed neatly in that box.
...It might be true for this child.
The weapons she had prepared didn't include any of these. The reason was simple — Bai Fanxian herself had forgotten! This wasn't the era of ten thousand years ago. Entire categories of weapons had been invented since then. If Tang Yeye felt more drawn to these, that wasn't strange at all.
"I can't teach you to use these, though..."
Bai Fanxian sighed faintly. Liu Yianfei, who had heard the story from Huang Zihuan, interrupted first.
"Though I normally use a sword... your lady has a General of the Army standing right here."
He spoke with a smile. He picked up a pistol and disassembled it with impressive speed, then reassembled it just as fast — making clear just how proficient he was.
"Then I'll leave it to you..."
"Don't worry. Just teach Yeye to shoot guns, right?"
Liu Yianfei laughed and patted Tang Yeye's head gently. One of his dreams in the past had been teaching these things to his own daughter. But since that story had passed, getting to do something like this was like fulfilling one of those old wishes.
"I'll show you I'm pretty accurate too..."
*BANG!*
*BANG!*
*BANG!*
But just three seconds after he finished teaching Tang Yeye about positioning and aiming, the General's jaw dropped as he watched flying targets get blown to pieces until the magazine ran out. That basic instruction alone had been enough for her to shoot down target after target with incredible accuracy.
"Whew... this is easier than I thought."
Tang Yeye blew breath from her mouth. She held the gun grip with both hands, circulating qi to reinforce her power constantly until she almost didn't feel the impact from each round.
"..."
Liu Yianfei was speechless. If Marshal Zhang Xianyuan ever saw this, he'd surely want to drag this child into the army too!
"But just this destructive power isn't enough to fight cultivators... you know that, right?"
Bai Fanxian, who had been standing watching for a while, spoke up to warn. Tang Yeye lowered her head glumly. Would she have to go back to using bows or those hidden weapons instead?
"Let me try..."
Bai Fanxian walked over and picked up another pistol from the crate. She loaded it skillfully with the same posture Liu Yianfei had shown. Once ready, she commanded the tower to send several flying targets up again.
"If what I guessed isn't wrong..."
Bai Fanxian turned the gun barrel toward those targets. The posture of a beautiful woman cocking a gun with one hand could captivate anyone. Qi flowed out from her entire body until the air around her trembled faintly. But in just a split second, it disappeared without a trace.
No... should say it was "absorbed" into that gun barrel!
*BANG*
*BOOM!!*
The gunshot sound was softened by the explosion that followed. Liu Yianfei, who saw the event most clearly, was stunned, jaw dropped. When his lady pulled the trigger, the qi compressed in that bullet exploded in a straight line, swallowing the entire area ahead!
Moreover, its destructive power didn't stop easily... because it penetrated through the Training Tower's wall, making a hole straight through to outside!
The faint breeze blowing in could bring people to their senses. The training area ahead looked like it had been shot through by a laser gun from a cartoon. Liu Yianfei gulped and looked at the silver pistol in his lady's hand — the barrel had twisted and deformed, unable to withstand that tremendous power. It slowly crumbled to the floor as debris, leaving only the gun grip in Bai Fanxian's hand, who didn't say a word.
"..."
"...As I thought. These modern weapons are all too fragile."