My daily life with the Shiina sisters

The individual competition of Kyudo is very simple. Different from the qualifying round, each contestant shoots 4 arrows, and those who hit more than half of the targets will be qualified. And in the semi-finals, each contestant shoots arrows, and the top six with the most hits will be selected. If the number of hits is the same, one more arrow will be shot to determine the winner. If more than six contestants hit all four arrows, all of them will advance to the finals.

The ranking of the finals is decided by the shooting competition method. (Everyone shoots together, and the person who hits the target last wins.) The reserve arrows are used starting from the fifth arrow of the shooting competition.

There were a total of six participants in this final, but no more than six people hit all four arrows.

Even though the distance is only 28 meters and the number of rings does not count, you just need to hit the target.

However, it is still a bit difficult to hit such a small target with a 2.2-meter-long bow.

The men's competition ended quite quickly, with the winner decided after only 10 arrows.

It was not until Mahiru and others came on the court that Imagawa Kaede began to watch the game seriously.

"Xiao Feng, who do you think is most likely to win among these six girls?"

During the ceremony, Mrs. Imagawa suddenly asked.

In response to this, Imagawa Kaede still chose his previous statement.

In response, Mrs. Imagawa smiled and said to Longzhu Tao beside her: "See, he is just a fool."

Imagawa Kaede looked at Longzhutao and blinked, as if he remembered what Imagawa Kaede had said before, and Longzhutao's face became even redder.

Returning our attention to the competition, the first arrow was shot by Shinomiya Kaguya. With a crisp "clang" sound, the 10cm arrow shot from the standard 90kg Japanese bow hit the center of the bull's eye.

She was immediately responded by applause and shouts of "よい (good)" from the audience.

There are strict regulations regarding celebrations, cheering and cheering during Kyudo competitions, and spectators are not allowed to use other grand or noisy ways of celebration.

Unlike sports such as Kyudo and Kendo, baseball and football, the slightest movement of the arms, fingers or even the body can cause the target to be missed.

Of course, the degree of importance is also different. Compared to the Koshien expedition, the brass band was present to cheer and the cheerleaders accompanied to cheer.

Kyudo seems more elegant or more niche.

The second arrow was shot by Shiina Mahiru. There were only two of them from Shuchiin participating in the women's individual competition.

She slowly stood up, exhaled slightly, took a step forward, corrected her posture, and then prepared the bow, raised the bow, pulled the bow, and aimed in one go.

When the arrow was finally released, it flew out with a "swoosh" sound, and then hit the target with a "pop" sound.

The shooting posture used in the Kyudo competition is the Mongolian posture. After all, Kyudo is derived from the Chinese archery ceremony, which is understandable. The deerskin gloves used in Kyudo actually have a ring sewn inside.

Shiina Mahiru's "Eight Sections of Archery" or posture is not as standard as Shinomiya Kaguya's textbook posture, which is particularly obvious in Zanshin (the movement after shooting the arrow).

Of course, after a few rounds, this shortcoming is also reflected in the position where the arrow lands on the target.

Compared to the relative concentration of Shinomiya Kaguya, Shiina Mahiru's seems very scattered. Of course, in kyudo competitions, the number of rings is not counted, as long as you hit the target, but the difference in their levels can be easily judged.

After five arrows, one of the girls from Sakura Mirin stepped aside with red eyes.

She was the third person, and listening to the sounds of Shinomiya Kaguya and Shiina Mahiru hitting the target again and again, she was under a lot of pressure.

She was naturally a little panicked as she had already lost the team competition, and eventually made a mistake. The arrow missed the target and landed in the dirt nearby.

Mentality plays a very important role in Kyudo, and this is even more obvious in team competitions.

Generally speaking, the first and fourth shooters among the four people in a team competition are particularly important, and are usually the strongest of the four.

In his previous life, Imagawa Kaede watched an anime called "String Sound", but after experiencing it personally, he still felt that string sound might be a bit mysterious, but the "pop" sound of the arrow hitting the target was particularly important.

After hearing the sound of the first person hitting the target, the next person will naturally feel less pressure, while the last person will have his or her usual archery training rhythm disrupted by the two people in front of him or her. After all, in a real competition, how can one necessarily follow the rhythm expected during training in order to hit the target?

In the previous team competition, Kaguya Shinomiya was in first place and Mahiru Shiina was in last place, but this was not meant to put more pressure on Mahiru.

But Shinomiya Kaguya is a terrifyingly stable person, so terrifying that even the sound of an arrow hitting the target is almost the same.

Considering the two people in the middle, Mahiru was placed last.

As more and more arrows hit the target, only Shiina Mahiru and Shinomiya Kaguya were left in the women's individual competition.

It seems that the strength level of the women's individual competition is indeed much higher than that of the men's.

It was rare to see a short halftime break in the individual competition. The reason was that there were too many arrows on the target and the staff needed to change them.

At this moment, although everyone in the audience was silent, they were also extremely excited.

Sakura Mirin's Kyudo Club also seemed to have gotten rid of their frustration. Originally, they were upset about their players' mistakes, but now when the gap in strength was truly revealed, they no longer had that kind of mood, and even felt less upset about the failure of the team competition in the morning.

The staff seemed to understand the audience's emotions and quickly replaced the targets with new ones.

Following the referee's signal, the match continued. As for whether the two had adjusted their condition well, would their arms be tired after pulling the bow so many times?

Sorry, these messy martial arts of the island country are all about human willpower. Your arms are tired? Then use your willpower to overcome it.

After shooting two arrows, Kaguya Shinomiya looked at Mahiru, whose movements had become somewhat distorted, and slightly curled the corners of her mouth.

Then, after adjusting her state, she pulled the string and closed her eyes slightly, searching for the state she would be in when she shot the ideal arrow that day.

With a "swoosh" sound, the arrow broke through the wind and flew across the field, hitting the bull's eye. The next one was still the beautiful Zanshin, which was impeccable.

Not long after, Mahiru's arrow also successfully hit the target.

When it was Kaguya's turn again, she repeated the previous action, and the arrow flew out, drawing the same graceful line in the air.

But this time, what responded to everyone was not the crisp sound of an arrow hitting the target as in the past.

This time it was the sound of an arrow shaft being violently broken, yes, that was the sound.

The people in the audience looked at the target with abandon. Even though they had received professional training, they could not help but contribute their part to global warming.

Then came a series of particularly loud “Yoi.”

That’s right, although it was a bit magical, this arrow shot by Kaguya Shinomiya did successfully hit her previous arrow.

The original arrow broke and the new arrow hit the target.

She, Kaguya Shinomiya's archery is not simply about "hitting the target with a straight shot". She just accidentally shot an arrow that she thought was ideal one day, and she has been repeating that arrow ever since.

PS: The author is not making this up, in the original novel, Kaguya Shinomiya really did this kind of thing. I won't go into details about how difficult it was, you can experience it for yourself.

For example, people in ancient times often said "shooting the willow tree from a hundred paces away", which means hitting the leaves of a poplar tree from a hundred paces away.

Although Kaguya Shinomiya's target is 28 meters away, even if the step is half a meter, there are more than fifty steps. The cross-section of a poplar leaf is much larger than that of an arrow, right?

So this kind of thing is possible in theory but basically impossible in practice can only be said to be very scientific. So it is the fault of old thief Akasaka and has nothing to do with me.