Allen's Longbow

Allen's Longbow

"Clang... clang... clang..." The forging hammer rose and fell without pause. In less than two quarters of an hour, a massive horse-chopping saber had taken shape. Liu Da, the old master of the smithy, picked up the blade and examined its finish carefully in the sunlight. His hands gradually began to tremble, and his face reddened more and more. It had only been two quarters of an hour! In the past, forging a horse-chopping saber took at least three. After several dozen blows on red-hot iron, it had to go back into the furnace for reheating. Now, it had taken shape after being reheated only once.

"Young Lord, this horse-chopping saber is made from excellent material. Once it is quenched, it will become a superb military blade." After inspecting it closely, Liu Da handed the saber to Qin Mo with both hands, his face full of excitement. With such a divine tool, heavily armored soldiers were no longer a dream.

Qin Mo took the saber and flourished it a few times, drawing a burst of cheers. After nearly a month of combat training, he felt as though he had shed his old skin and been reborn. His whole body was now brimming with strength and confidence.

"Ximan, make a few more forging hammers, then forge me a suit of armor. Just make it ordinary, the same as everyone else's." Qin Mo assigned Ximan his tasks, intending to become a thoroughly wicked capitalist and squeeze every last drop of surplus value out of him.

Ximan muttered soundlessly as he carefully experienced the mysteries of the forging hammer. Qin Mo's talk of "all kinds of beauty" seemed to have moved him. He had developed a strong interest in this new kind of machinery—plain and unadorned, yet capable of unleashing tremendous power.

A few days later, Qin Mo looked at the suit of armor on the table and sighed. "An elf is still an elf. No matter how much you tempt him, he has principles he insists on—principles steeped into his bones."

The armor on the table had black as its base color, but countless silver pieces had been inlaid into intricate patterns. From every angle, they formed one unified style. It was gorgeous within its naturalness, neither affected nor deliberate, like a living creature that had grown into this form on its own.

"Ximan, do I have a grudge against you? Did I steal your lollipop when we were little? Or did I bully Xirui back then? Why do you hate me so much?" Qin Mo muttered helplessly at Ximan, making flames begin to rise in Ximan's eyes. That was the prelude to an outburst.

"We're going to deal with orcs this time, right? Orcs have archers, don't they? You don't want me shot into a beehive, do you?"

"The Orc Tribe doesn't have many archers. Even if they do, they're trash archers." Allen explained solemnly from the side. Qin Mo had never been on a battlefield, nor had he ever even fought an outsider. In Allen's eyes, he was a textbook rookie.

"Oh! Fine, then I'll reluctantly wear this." Qin Mo quickly put it on. In truth, the sight of the armor had nearly dazzled him blind. This was not armor at all—it was a work of art.

"Although the Orc Tribe has few archers, their javelin throwers are formidable. Within fifty zhang, every throw hits."

"Damn it!" Qin Mo nearly choked to death. Looking at the utterly serious Allen, Qin Mo truly wanted to strangle him half to death—provided he could beat this great elf born for battle.

"This armor doesn't suit me. Look, it doesn't have even a shred of imposing majesty." Qin Mo looked himself over in the mirror and found a powerful excuse. He could hardly say that he was terrified of dying. Wasn't armor this conspicuous just an arrow magnet?

The Qin Mo in the mirror was indeed... very beautiful. His build had always been slender, and his face was so "captivating." Even in armor, he had only shifted a tiny bit from beautiful toward handsome. Add those glittering patterns... and overall, he was still... beautiful.

Suppressing the urge to smash the mirror, Qin Mo removed the armor and said to Ximan, "I need a suit of armor that makes me look majestic and domineering, the kind with the spirit to hold up heaven and stand firm upon the earth."

"But you already are..." Ximan could not continue. He had wanted to say that Qin Mo already possessed the perfect appearance of an elf, so how could he want something so crude? But after glancing at Qin Mo's round ears, he fell silent. The only part of Qin Mo from head to toe that did not resemble a pure-blooded elf was that he lacked pointed ears like Allen's and his own.

"Perhaps the Heir Apparent prefers dwarven-style armor. When we go to Fusang another day, we can find a suit of dwarven armor for Ximan to study and improve, then make one for the Heir Apparent." Allen had now seen Qin Mo's concern as well. In truth, he felt Qin Mo had no need to worry. With an elven master archer like him at Qin Mo's side, how could Qin Mo be the first one struck by an arrow?

"Fine, Allen. Starting tomorrow, teach me the Elven Race's archery." Qin Mo decided to stop discussing armor and instead strive to seize the initiative on the battlefield. He had considered making firearms, but time was too tight. There was certainly no time to build a steelmaking blast furnace. Without high-quality steel, the firearms produced would be lacking in both power and weight. Without a suitable simple lathe, production speed would be despairingly slow.

Moreover, musketeers needed training too. Though it did not take as long as training heavily armored infantry or longbowmen, the combat concepts of musketeers were utterly different from cold-weapon warfare. Changing and adapting alone gave Qin Mo a headache, not to mention the preparation time needed to refine and manufacture gunpowder. What he lacked most right now was time.

More importantly, if he revealed gunpowder to the Great Xia army this time, what would the consequences be? He was too weak; he might not be able to protect the secret of gunpowder. If he brought Great Xia into the age of firearms, would he end up like the donkey slaughtered once the millstone was removed? Forget it. He would wait a few years, until he had grown stronger, and see then.

Looking at the longbow in his hands, likewise adorned with flowing patterns, Qin Mo forced himself to calm down and train methodically. Though his build was slender, his origin power was pure. He could draw a five-dan bow, pierce heavy armor from fifty zhang away, and penetrate light leather armor at over a hundred zhang. In the army, he would already be considered promising master-archer material.

Allen taught with all his strength, and Qin Mo learned with equal dedication. Before long, Qin Mo could begin shooting at moving targets. If the army's instructors saw this, they would surely be astonished beyond measure. But if they learned that Qin Mo's internal energy cultivation had already reached the Xuan Rank, they would curse up a storm: "You're already Xuan Rank at that age. You're either the child of an aristocratic family or a cultivation prodigy. What the hell are you doing in the army?"

That day, Qin Mo grew bored with practice and began stirring up trouble again. He pointed at the Elven Race's longbow, saying it lacked a rear sight that aided aiming... lacked pulleys that made drawing the bow easier... making Allen flare up again... Qin Mo was once more racking his brains to slack off.

But Ximan no longer dismissed Qin Mo's ideas with indifference. Disregarding the dignity of his future self as a great alchemist, he began discussing them carefully with Qin Mo. Whenever he did not quite understand something, he had Qin Mo draw it out so he could take it back and study it closely.

"Heir Apparent, if you find these longbows unsuitable, then use my Dusk Moon!" Seeing Qin Mo and Ximan pointing and gesturing at the elven longbows, Allen pondered for a long while before speaking solemnly to Qin Mo. Even though blades and spears had never made him frown, he now wore an expression of reluctant parting.

Every longbow of the Elven Race was a masterpiece—though the masterpieces here were all works by high elven bowmakers. Allen's Dusk Moon had been given to him by Qin Mo's mother, Luna. Even Allen could not identify its material. The bow bore two miniature magic arrays, one for storing force and one for stability, along with a unique concealed array. It was a standard epic-grade powerful bow. It could be said that this bow was half of Allen's life.