25 National Trials 4

"Haha, Qiu Anguo, your nephew is on the field. I heard that he has passed the 660 points mark. He's still so young, he is the future of the nations archery team." The group had just debuted, but Lai Yongxing had already begun praising Qiu Anguo.

"There is still room for improvement, especially mentality. Fortunately, the strength of this group is average, it should be an easy round." Qiu Anguo smiled and said.

However, when Qiu Anguo said this, Song Feng and Zhang Feng's brows wrinkled up. The aces of their two teams were all in this group, but they were just 'average' in the eyes of Qiu Anguo.

At this time, Song Feng tightened his fists and looked at the field with excitement. Pan Yu had performed well in the team's selection and given him hope.

His only hope at this time was that Pan Yu could perform exceptionally.

The players in the third group were ready, and after the referee signal, the round began.

Tang Yan put all his attention on his potential opponent. Others may be familiar with him, but he still knew nothing.

Qiu Tian looked to be only about 20 years old. He had sharp features, and his looks could be compared to a models. His hair flowed slightly onto his forehead. His handsome features attracted a bunch of cheers and whistles from the female audiences when he appeared.

The group of 12 archers shot their first arrows.

Li Haoze - 9 points, Pan Yu - 9 points: the score of both were very good.

However, at this moment, the scene was lit up with the cheers of the female audience.

Qiu Tian's had shot a 10 pointer!

After Qiu Tian finished shooting, he glanced at the number of points, revealed a smile which drew another round of cheers.

"This guy really is enviable." Tang Yan said with a small smile.

After the first group of shooting, the scores were as following:

Li Haoze and Pan Yu performed well with scores of 53 points and 54 points respectively.

However, Qiu Tian outperformed them, scoring 57 points after one round!

If he could retain this form for the next rounds, his score would be a top tier score of 680 points.

Qiu Anguo, seeing all this was filled with excitement that couldn't be controlled.

Zhang Feng and Song Feng were looking at the venue with nervous gazes.

...

The performance of Qiu Tian was quite stable, but his accuracy fell short somewhat; therefore, his score settled on 658 points.

This achievement, even though it fell slightly short of expectations at the beginning, the results still earned a round of applause from the judges, and several coaches could not help but applaud as well.

This was the highest recorded score of the year so far in China. This level was already at the top of the country, and he was only 20 years old.

What an exciting time it was for Chinese Archers!

The laughter on Qiu Anguo's face couldn't be hidden.

Zhang Feng helplessly smiled, Li Haoze's score was 632 points which was a decent score but not enough to compete against Qiu Tian.

Zhang Feng could still smile, but Song Feng's face at this time was completely bland. Qiu Anguo's smile was like a burst of ridicule in his eyes.

Pan Yu had only scored 618 points...

In the first round, his score was still in the top three of the group, but he didn't know if it was because of the pressure from Qiu Tian, but his score had began to deteriorate after the first round.

His final score was subpar, to say the least. It wasn't even comparable to his usual score.

Qiu Anguo and Lai Yongxing were all immersed in gloating over Qiu Tian's outstanding score.

After the third group, the audience and the judges paid less attention to the competition. The archers after them were average and performed just so and so, with the best result being 624 points.

It wasn't until the 12th group that the audience and the judges focused their gazes back onto the field.

Both Tang Yan and Ding Ran appeared in this group, but the focus of the audience obviously wasn't on them. They were drawn in because Cao Yan was also in this group.

Because last year's runner-up, a veteran archer was absent due to injury, Cao Yan and Han Tianfu were amongst the strongest archers present after Qiu Tian.

The appearance of Cao Yan attracted a burst of cheers from the audience.

Qiu Anguo upon seeing Cao Yan going up turned his head to Song Feng said: "Old Song, you really are unlucky this time. Pan Yu performed abnormally in the first round, and now your two newcomers have encountered Cao Yan. It seems this isn't your year... hahaha... How unfortunate!"

"Hey, Qiu Anguo, this isn't the case. Maybe there will be a miracle?" Lai Yongxing said with a smile.

"That's true, haha... but it's got to be a hell of a miracle~," Qiu Anguo ridiculed laughing. Everyone could see that they were mocking Song Feng.

Song Feng coldly snorted and turned away.

Pan Yu's poor performance had stomped on his hopes for this championship. His opponent's performance was excellent. In his mind, If an experienced archer like Pan Yu couldn't keep up what could newbies like Tang Yan and Ding Ran do?

Even though Tang Yan had performed well in the trials, Pan Yu's performance had proved that there was no connection between the two.

"You two give Song Feng some face." At this moment, Tian Zhenzhe who had been sitting in the middle suddenly spoke up.

As the head coach of the national team had spoken, Qiu Anguo and Lai Yongxing stopped their mocking and kept their teasing smiles.

Tang Yan walked up to the venue, and before he reached his booth, he found out that there was a small problem there. It turned out that an archer named Liu Ping had gotten a sprain and had retired in advance.

It wasn't that big of a deal, but Liu Ping's departure meant that Tang Yan would be directly on the left side of Cao Yan.

Although there was a gap, this was the most direct confrontation in the archery competition.