The Sect Leader System

Yang Xiu’s hands trembled as the rustling drew closer. She tried to tell herself that she’d killed the last four consecutive spirit beasts she’d faced with her bow, but her self pep talk did nothing to quell her nerves.

Before, she’d been one hundred percent confident that her master wouldn’t let one of the creatures so much as make contact with her clothes. That assurance had been removed. It was her versus the beast. Solo.

A small figure emerged from the bushes. Another of the squirrels that were so plentiful in the forest.

Yang Xiu grimaced. Not her best matchup. Bigger, slower opponents were easier to hit.

She nocked her arrow, raised the bow, and set her eyes on her target. When she tried to still, though, she realized her hands were shaking.

Her technique required much more experience than she possessed to change a motion midstream. All she could do was follow through.

She charged her muscles, pulled back the string, and loosed.

Twang!

There was no point in watching the arrow fly. Any hit would have been the result of pure blind luck considering how her much her arms were vibrating.

Yang Xiu didn’t have much time remaining until the beast would be upon her. Two choices stood before her. She could shoot two more shots, or she could take a moment to steady herself, leaving her time for only one more arrow.

The latter was the only real alternative. Otherwise, she stood no chance of hitting it.

As she took a deep breath, she expelled all negative thoughts. She was a cultivator. A warrior.

She would be calm.

Arrow nocked. Bow raised. Eyes set. Stillness … achieved. Her charged muscles pulled the string back once more.

 Twang!

The tip of the arrow struck the creature right between its beady little eyes, killing it instantly.

Yes!

With her first round of core harvesting, as her master called it, over, she went back to cultivating until lunch. After eating, it was time for the second round.

Her master flushed a rat toward her, and she easily killed it on the first shot. That task was followed by finishing up her five hours of cultivation and the third and final beast round of the day. Another squirrel. That one took two arrows as it dodged her first one.

Her final task of the day was to meditate on what she’d learned. Stillness led to accuracy, which increased her chances to hit. Discarding her emotions led to stillness.

The challenge was to still her mind.

It was a simple thought, but it seemed profound to her. It resonated through the technique. A figure of her formed in her mind’s eye. It focused as a storm of enemies swirled around it. The figure shot arrow after arrow, calmly, perfectly. Each shot was a hit. Each hit was a kill.

Her qi vibrated.

She’d advanced. Not to Large Success. Not yet. But she’d taken a step.

The first round of the next day, she showed her master how much she’d improved. It only took one shot to kill a snake, and it was the most perfect form she’d ever achieved.

“That was amazing, Yang Xiu. Keep up the good work!”

Her heart nearly burst with excitement, and her confidence was sky high as she entered the second round after lunch. Another squirrel.

First shot, a miss. Her form had been perfect. The rodent had unexpectedly jumped slightly to the side to avoid a dip in the ground. The very edge of the arrow tip had pierced the creature’s skin.

So close.

Second shot. Another miss. She’d tried to sacrifice power for speed, and an errant gust of wind had shifted the arrow just far enough off course to leave a bloody streak on the squirrel’s body, but it didn’t cause nearly enough damage even to slow it down.

Time for one more shot.

She kept her mind clear, nocked her arrow, and smoothly followed all the steps of her technique.

Twang!

The squirrel jumped to the side again! The arrow missed.

She tensed.

Bad luck. It was just simple bad luck.

But there was no time to do anything about it. Before she barely had a chance to lower her bow, the beast was upon her, attacking her leg.

It scratched her.

And it … wasn’t that bad.

To be sure, it hurt. A thin line of blood marred her skin, but its claws simply weren’t all that strong. There wasn’t much it could do to hurt her, much less have a chance at killing her.

She grabbed one of her arrows and stabbed the beast. The slim shaft penetrated all the way through its body, impaling it and pinning it to the ground.

Did she actually have anything to fear from rank one spirit beasts?

---

Benton sighed. The squirrel reaching Yang Xiu was the end of his disciples’ rapid advancement. He pushed them to keep fighting solo for the next two days, but the jumps of enlightenment that each had experienced didn’t reoccur.

It was good while it had lasted.

Besides, he wouldn’t have been able to keep up with that program for long, anyway. They were nearing a territory where rank two beasts started to outnumber rank ones. Another few days at the most, and he’d have to advance them to much stronger opponents, and they had a lot of learn before then.

The next morning after breakfast, he talked to them again. “It’s time for the third stage of your hunting development. I will team with each of you to stalk a spirit beast in the woods, and we’ll kill it together as a team.”

“Are we hunting rank two beasts, Senior Brother?” Yang Xiu said.

“No.”

She and her brother shared a glance. “Rank three, Senior Brother?”

“No. We’re sticking with rank one.”

They both looked confused. Even after taking a moment to think about it, she couldn’t seem to come up with an explanation.

“But Senior Brother,” she finally said, “I don’t understand. Stages should rightfully increase in difficulty, correct?”

“Absolutely.”

“But Senior Brother, we went from killing rank one beasts with your help at stage one to killing them solo at stage two. How is killing them with your help again, even if we must stalk them first, an increase in difficulty?”

“I didn’t team with you to kill the spirit beasts before; I moved in to finish them off in the event you failed. Otherwise, I stayed out of your way,” Benton said. “This time, I’ll be fighting with you the whole time, mainly keeping the beast’s attention while you deal the killing blow. The challenge is to strike that blow on the beast, not on me.”

“Oh.”

---

Yang Xiu followed her master. They moved incredibly excruciatingly slow.

Well, she did, anyway. He could sprint through the forest and never have his foot land on a dry branch or leaf. She, on the other hand, had to place each foot carefully, searching for patches of bare dirt, rocks, or mossy ground. It was so tedious as to be painful.

Her master held up his hand and made a fist. He’d instructed both her and her brother on a few of those types of hand signals. That one meant stop, so she did.

He pointed two fingers at his eyes and then at some trees to the right, indicating for her to look at that spot. Next, he held up three fingers.

The beast was three yards away, approaching them, and would emerge from the spot he’d pointed at. She had no idea how he knew that—she couldn’t see or hear any sign of anything else in the woods besides them—but she had absolute faith in her master.

Yang Xiu quietly removed three arrows from her quiver and pressed two of them into the dirt. Experience and her master had taught her she’d rarely need more than that, and she didn’t know how long she had before the beast appeared. The final arrow, she nocked.

A rabbit hopped into view. It was headed right at her.

She raised her bow and prepared to loose.

Just before her fingers were about to release the string, her master cut in front of her, pointing his spear at the creature.

She’d almost shot her master in the back!

What was he doing? Didn’t he see her about to take the shot?

But that was the point of the training. That was why she was using crappy arrows her master had made from branches that barely approximated straightness instead of the meticulously crafted ones she had on loan. The homemade arrows with shaved points wouldn’t do much at all to hurt her master. The other ones … would.

He’d told her he would mimic the actions of a teammate who would not be paying attention, who would rush in front of her to defend her. Just like her brother surely would, the person she’d ultimately be teamed with.

“Better to shoot me than him,” her master had said.

Of course, Yang Xiu had to reserve some criticism for herself. She’d not been paying attention to her master, either. Once the rabbit had come into sight, her focus had one hundred percent been on it.

She began to understand the difficulty that legitimized teaming up to hunt as stage three.

With a sigh, she settled into wait for a clear shot.