The two remaining archers of the four-person archer team—ones who went by the names of Clint and Meri—continued pursuing the zephyrtail swift while their teammates—Ollie and Kat—were tasked with keeping Idris busy.

  Because of how fast the zephyrtail moved, continuing their pursuit on it was an exhausting task. Not only that, every time they tried to shoot their arrows at it, the quickness of the creature would make their shots miss most of the time. And whenever they did manage to come close to landing a hit, the miniature sonic booms that the bird left behind were able to produce enough force from its shockwave to snap the arrows into splinters as soon as they got close.

  Fortunately, the swift was only able to keep up with its signature supersonic speed in short bursts, after which it would have to slow down drastically in order to rest. This meant that hunting down this bird was ultimately a test of endurance and patience. Even though they couldn’t exactly move as fast as their target, as long as they did not lose track of it and continued their pursuit, it would eventually tire itself out and thus become vulnerable enough for an arrow to land a hit.

  However, as the two continued pursuing the zephyrtail, they spotted someone approaching them at the side from the corner of their eyes. And that someone was none other than Idris, the contestant whom their other two teammates were supposed to handle.

  “You?!” Clint exclaimed as the three of them continued to leap from branch to branch, all going after the swift. “What happened to Ollie and Kat?!”

  “Sorry, but your other two friends just got eliminated by me,” Idris replied with a smug smirk.

  “You scoundrel!” Meri shouted.

  “Hey, you lads are the ones who tried to snag my prey! Don’t try to act all high and mighty here!” Idris rebuked. “Besides, I highly doubt your team can catch the zephyrtail anyway, even without me here to compete with you. You all lack the fundamentals of a true hunter. I can tell that from the way you all try to take down that bird with just a normal arrow. You seriously think you can take down a zephyrtail with just a normal arrow? One without any sort of magical enchantments whatsoever? What were you thinking?!”

  “Silence!” Clint bellowed, turning his bow towards the laidback archer and proceeded to fire a salvo of arrows at him. Meri soon did the same, also pelting Idris with a hail of arrows.

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  With acrobatic grace, Idris managed to dodge the storm of arrows fired by those two archers—jumping, swinging, and flipping in the air every which way in order to avoid those arrows by the skin of his teeth. Then, as a way to show off, he quickly snatched two of the incoming arrows out of the air before shooting it right back at his two attackers.

  One of the arrows hit Meri right through the head, instantly faux-killing her. The other arrow landed right at Clint’s thigh. That last arrow didn’t hit a fatal spot not because Idris missed but because he’d intentionally wanted to keep him alive. He wanted to make him watch—to show him how to truly take down a zephyrtail.

  With Meri vanishing into a mist of pink particles and Clint incapacitated with an arrow through his thigh, Idris quickly refocused his sights back to the zephyrtail.

  “Now, watch and learn, lad. See how a true master archer accomplishes a hunt,” Idris said to Clint, who was lying on the ground beside him—groaning in agony as he clutched his injured leg.

  Using his Bestial Senses, Idris was able to spot the zephyrtail soaring up at the sky in the far distance. Despite being so far away, it seemed to have exhausted most of its energy, meaning that it likely won’t be able to blast away with its supersonic speed for quite a while.

  As Idris kept that small bird within his line of sight, he began doing various calculations in his head. Judging from what he could see, the zephyrtail was roughly 1,000 meters away. Theoretically, he could still catch up to it if he ran fast enough. However, he’d thought of a better way—he could simply shoot the bird from here.

  With a deep breath to focus his mind, Idris started factoring in all the variables that would affect the accuracy of his next shot. The traveling path of the bird, the windage, the effects of gravity, the Coriolis effect, possible distortions of light from any and all physical or magical sources—all these variables needed to be factored in if he’s going to make the perfect shot.

  With the zephyrtail still clearly within his sight, he raised his bow and readied his arrow—a “Longshot Arrow”, magically conjured and specifically designed to travel the farthest distance possible. Unlike regular arrows, this arrow appeared in a purple, ethereal form—faint wisps of mana drifting off of it to signify its magical nature.

  Even with the assistance of magic, this was still going to be a difficult shot. Fortunately for Idris, he was just that good of an archer.

  “What?! You’re going to fire from this far away?!” Clint said, completely baffled at the laidback archer’s attempt. “That’s an impossible shot! You’ll never make it!”

  “Impossible, eh?” Idris replied with a confident smirk. “Oh, we’ll see about that.”

  After steadying his aim and pulling the bowstring back, he released the arrow from his bow—sending it flying high up in the air at an angle. While cutting through the air, the arrow curved slightly due to the effects of the wind. Then, right at its final moment, it pierced the zephyrtail swift right through the heart, landing with perfect accuracy.