Solo [The Stained Pelt] Rapid Fire

[Rinya]

Day 5, Season Winter, 513 AV

The last season had been quite the season of change for Rinya. It had seemed so full of personal growth and effort that as things wound down for winter, she realized just how little training she had done over the past season. Sure there had been the occasional training session with Jorin, or the chance to use her bow against the wild dogs… but in terms of her coming to the range with the intent of practice had been non-existent. Rinya had been raised by her father that nothing was more important that the training of the physical body. Everything personal was supposed to come second.

However that was not the case for fall. Everything in her life had been personal first and looking back on it—she did not regret anything. Sure there was the occasional choice that she wished she had thought better of—like blocking the bond—but things may not have worked out the way they did. Therefore as bad as it had seemed at the time… there was no regret. It was refreshing to be able to look at it for once without a completely pessimistic attitude. That bad habit of hers would never fully go away, but for once she did not worry.

That was probably an effect of Jorin. He was the optimistic one and his attitude tended to affect her more than she was willing to admit. She wasn’t sure if it was being bonded to him, or if it was her love for him. Either way, it was his influence that had her out here—in the cold. It was time to fix her—slight—errors from the past season, starting with a practice session of archery. Rinya could remember a time when archery was the only thing in her life that could make her happy—calm.

It still had that effect on her honestly, just different than Jorin. In fact Rinya had specific plans for today. She wanted to try a new technique that was hard to learn and even harder to master. She could hit a bull’s-eye from a stationary target, or even a moving one. Granted she couldn’t always hit the bull’s-eye on a moving target, but she could hit it and that was all that mattered. No, Rinya was ready for something different and she had the motivation to do just that. She had paid her fee for the season of winter the moment she arrived and made her way to the range.

It was a difficult decision, trying to decide if she should start with a moving target or a stationary one. Aim was not something to take lightly. There was no point in learning a new technique if she couldn’t even hit the target. It was the deciding factor that she should start stationary and work her way up. No point in overdoing it and becoming more frustrated than necessary. With a sigh Rinya pulled her bow overhead and examined the string closely on both sides to ensure she had strung it correctly before she left the house.

Bow maintenance was one of the things Rinya was extremely careful of. A bow that was misused or not taken proper care of was likely to snap—and as luck would have it, at the worst times. Taking a firm hold of the string with her left hand, Rinya pulled the string back to her mouth, testing the strength of the string itself before she slowly relaxed the bow back to its normal state. The bow itself only made the slightest creak of bending wood, but no signs of weakness across the bow itself.

Content the bow would not simply snap under the weight of the string, Rinya pulled her quiver off her back and made her way to a basic stationary target—something that was terribly familiar from her early days of archery, or even now as she had been teaching Jorin as of late. The target itself would be easy to hit… if she planned on taking her time. The technique she planned on attempting to learn on her own wasn’t easy by far, but it could be useful in a dire situation. Perfecting a technique for rapid firing however was something of personal taste--she had seen several different techniques in the past from just simple observance… now it was a matter of learning and feeling the technique out on it’s own.

[Rinya]

Day 5, Season Winter, 513 AV

10th Bell

Rinya was tempted to take a practice shot really. The shot would be easy, probably a bull’s-eye or near in the very least, but deep down she knew it wasn’t a practice shot she was aiming for. No, she was trying to put off the idea of figuring out which technique to try first. While the past season had been all about change—Rinya wasn’t sure if she was quite ready for change in her archery style. It was her over thinking everything, but in the long run she never made a decision that she didn’t follow through with. Leaning her quiver against a nearby stump, Rinya withdrew two arrows at once.

The first technique Rinya had ever observed other than the slow and careful aim she usually pulled, was the string hand holding more than one arrow at a time. The man she had watched as a youngster had been able to hold three arrows at once—one knocked in the bow itself, and in the hand pulling the string back—between the fingers—lined two more arrows. At the time Rinya had no idea how he had held so many arrows at once, but the man had managed to seamlessly fire one arrow, shift the next from between his fingers and nock it—repeating the process over and over.

As it was Rinya wasn’t even going to begin trying with more than one spare arrow between her fingers. One alone would shift her grip on string and that alone could affect her aim. She wasn’t sure if she should try and get used to the feeling of holding more than one arrow at once, or just try to hit the target straight off the bat. Grumbling to herself under her breath, Rinya slowly adjusted her stance, stretching her feet to be shoulder length apart and toes pointing to the imaginary line she drew with her mind that would have met with the center of the target.

Gripping her bow in her left hand – flexing it a few times to make sure it was comfortable, Rinya carefully adjusted one arrow to nock into her bow. She for once actually used her eyes to make sure the fletching lined up and that she had a decent hold on the string as well as the arrow before attempting to shift the second arrow – fletching first – into place between her middle and fourth finger. The arrow itself normally did not feel heavy, but the added weight made all the difference in the world.

In a last moment decision, she thought it might be best to simply attempt to fire the arrow first and move the second arrow into position as fast as possible. Rinya drew the string back in a smooth practiced move – or it would have been if the weight of the second arrow didn’t slightly throw her off. The length of the arrow tugged at her fingers ever so slightly and Rinya sighed internally. Already she had the feeling this version of rapid fire wasn’t going to work for her, but she was already half way there to begin with. With a little extra effort, the fletching of the firing arrow touched the corner of her mouth.

While normally the target would have been easy to hit, the problem – and practice – of rapid fire was simply to learn better aim without nearly as much time to do it. It would be difficult to work herself out of this particular habit, and be able to do both with ease. So against her more natural inclination, Rinya did her best to aim while drawing the string back, so that the moment the fletching did touch her mouth her fingers could release the arrow.

Two things happened as she released the arrow, one right after the other. First, the spare arrow lightly clenched between her fingers came free easily and tumbled to the ground before she could even react enough to catch it, much less nock it into the string. The second was that the arrow that had flown missed the target terribly and landed in the cold ground off to the left instead. Rinya barely had time to actually register them both too, one hand scrambling for the falling arrow as she tried to watch the flying one to see if it even landed the target.

"Lovely..." She muttered under her breath. She knew this wasn’t going to be easy, but it was slightly annoying none the less.

[Rinya]

Rinya glared downwards at the arrow that had fallen from her grasp. She had little doubt that she was going to fail the first time, but she hadn’t guessed so badly. She had figured if nothing else she could have hit the target and fumble with the arrow as she tried to transfer it in her hand, but she hadn’t even gotten that far. She was correct in the fact that this particular technique wasn’t going to work for her. Perhaps if she wasted enough time on attempting to make it work it eventually would, but honestly Rinya had seriously disliked the weight difference in her string hand. Technically it should have not affected her bow arm - and it didn’t - but it was just so incredibly awkward of a hold.

In the very least she wasn’t giving up entirely on the endeavor. There was still two very different techniques she could try and one of them was bound to work for her. Honestly she didn’t even feel to bad about giving up so easily on the first attempt. Rinya had tried the first technique she figured would be the hardest to rule it out quickly - though the other two weren’t exactly easy either. But she wanted uncomplicated if she was going to use rapid firing in the future. If she had to over think about how her fingers were going to hold the spare arrows, she would never get the chance to actually focus on firing correctly in the first place. Leaning forward she snagged the arrow off the ground before stepping towards the target to fetch the other arrow from the ground as well.

Rinya pursed her lips slightly in thought, before carefully shoving the arrow back into her quiver and lifting the quiver up and around her back again. Really she had no idea why she had removed it the first time - probably because she normally taught Jorin when they came to the Stained Pelt and she didn’t need it on all the time. Regardless the next technique she was planning on trying was going to require the quiver none the less. Lining herself up with the target, Rinya took a moment and a deep breath as she stared straight down at the target again. Lifting her bow arm, she took the time to simply adjust her aim as if she held an arrow already within the bow.

The thing about archery was that aim was of course crucial. If she was going to be using rapid fire, it was going to have to be assumed she had at least a moment to lock onto a target and aim even just slightly. It would be much harder with a moving target, but she was nowhere near ready for something like that. Reaching back up behind her head to the quiver across her back, Rinya did her best to mentally prepare herself for the next actions. The target just seemed to loom in the distance, taunting her to actually hit it this time. In a smooth movement, Rinya grasped an arrow from her quiver and pulled it upwards over her head to bring it to the front of her bow.

That movement was simple - even the instinctual feeling of the lead fletching without looking down at the arrow was simple. Her thumb finding the notch where the string would fall while her index finger searched out for the white fletching she couldn’t actually see, but feel line up with her index finger. A slight twist of her fingers rotated the feather between her fingers, so that by the time the arrow could actually line up with the string, the notch fit along the string as if she had drawn the arrow perfectly to begin with. None of this was new for her, it was once again pulling the string taunt back to her face, the fletching brushing against her cheek as her muscles did their best to protest the familiar movement.

It was releasing the arrow that was difficult part. Rinya was just so used to taking her time to aim, she almost forget that she was doing this training for a purpose. Her fingers reluctantly released the arrow, and Rinya watched as the arrow sailed across the field. Instead of waiting for the result however, she reached back behind her head again to pull yet another arrow. There was the barest sound of her arrow hitting something - she wasn’t even sure it was the target despite staring straight at it. Her eyes had narrowed on the bull’s-eye itself and the arrow had obviously not landed there. Quickly as she could she pulled the arrow to her front and twisted the arrow between her fingertips again. Her bow arm remained stiff throughout the whole process, trying to prepare for another arrow. The second arrow fit into place and Rinya used the strength of her muscles across her chest and abdomen to draw the string back a second time, releasing the arrow just before the fletching made it back to her mouth.