The Ranch

Carnival (2)

"Points...I see. A marketing strategy. The prizes are worth it as well." Sherlock goes into thought.

Kai held on to a specific point," It said something about rounds, right? Does that mean each game has multiple rounds?"

"I assume so, and if that's truly the case, the difficulty will increase with each round. That makes sense. They wouldn't give away such good prizes so easily."

Everyone has already noticed that there's a prize for each game booth. They're like the laser staff, but not nearly as valuable. That's not to say they aren't commodities in their own rights.

"Let's split up to cover more ground." Kai look between the other three until his eyes land on Tih. "Tih...you can go look around and have fun, okay?"

It's not that Kai doesn't believe Tih can do the work, but he doesn't think Tih can do the work. His mind tends to wander and he gets distracted very easily. Tih is the type to do what he wants, when he wants.

The other two agree and they all split into different directions. Tih wanders around, observing all the interesting new games he's never seen before.

He's attracted by a large noisy crowd surrounding a long field. He walks over to the booth displaying a bow and arrow. There's a sign that reads [Archery].

"Booooo!"

"Is it rigged?"

"Lousy!"

"How hard can it be?"

"How many does this make it?"

The crowd boo at the current contender of the game. There are sighs of disappointment hovering around. It seems this isn't the first person to fail.

"Let me try this time!" A plucky soldier slaps his ID on the booth. The worker scans it, taking five kquil, before the soldier heads to the side of the booth.

He picks a wooden bow and pulls back the string. It takes some time for him to adjust the arrow and keep it in place. He closes one eye and aims at the target twenty meters away.

He lets go of the string and the arrow flies towards the target. The crowd cheers in excitement. It hit its mark.

"Good job!" The worker smile as he gets ready to pay back the five kquil as the first round's prize.

The soldier confidently shakes his head," I'm doing the second round." He pulls out his card to pay another five kquil.

"Are you sure?" The worker asks. "There's no refunds."

"I'm sure." The soldier says almost confidently. No ones made it to round two yet, so no ones know what to expend, but the soldier is confident, maybe overly-so, about his skills.

With that, the worker presses a button in the booth and the target starts moving. It can be seen that the soldier became a little flustered, but with the crowd cheering him on, there's no was his pride would let him back out.

He pulls the string back, aims the arrow, and lets it fly. A hush falls over the onlookers as they wait to see the results.

"There goes another one."

"Sigh, at least this one made it further than the others."

"Is it really not rigged? I've already counted forty-seven people."

"Well, with the prizes they're offering up, it can't be that easy."

"That's right!"

After that, more people stepped up to the plate and failed. Tih had already gotten the gist of the bow and arrow and how it's used. He was planning to leave when he heard a familiar deep voice.

"I'll give it a try." The clack of an ID hit the booth. It was scanned and the man swaggered confidently to the side.

He picked up the bow, pulling it back a couple times to test it. Then he simple took the arrow and shot at the target.

All the previous contenders took their time aiming, but this man took less than a second. The crowd thought he was the same as the other arrogant soldiers, but then they noticed two shiny silver stars on his black military uniform, which immediately changed their perspective.

The crowd got pumped up when the arrow hit its mark. Tih sees Instructor Kane frown slightly as he mumbles," Slightly off the mark."

He then shrugs and pays for the second round. The worker also saw the two stars and didn't try to dissuade him. He pressed a button and the target started moving.

This time, Instructor Kane took a couple seconds longer to aim before shooting, still way less time that the others. As expected of Kane, the arrow hit the moving target.

The crowd cheered excitedly. Someone finally managed to pass the second round. For winning the second round, Instructor Kane is given a [5% off] coupon for any of Maddox or Sinclair's stores.

Instructor Kane holds his card between his two fingers as he hands it to the worker non-chalantly. The worker pauses before scanning it.

Instructor Kane gets his third arrow ready as he waits for the worker to increase the difficulty. In the meantime, he glances around at the surrounding stalls, but the enlarged crowd is blocking most of the view. The onlookers have only grown ever since Instructor Kane appeared.

While looking around, Kane feel a pair of familiar eyes on him. He turns in that direction to see the kid," Tih? How long have you been there?" He didn't even notice his presence.

He walks over to Tih," We're you also aiming for the gauntlets?"

The prize for this round are gauntlets, something Kane is interest in. If he wasn't, he wouldn't bother with something he's not proficient in. His silver stars are in sword fighting and martial arts.

Most of the Instructors that came to check out the carnival are well aware that the games are rigged against their favor, so they would only play something they think they can win. After all, to reputable Instructors like them, what is five kquil or coupons worth. If they play, they play to win the last and best prize.

Kane's interest was peaked by the gauntlets, which is why he decided to give it a go, but even he's not sure if he can snatch them. He notice when he first touched the bow and arrow. They were designed to be slightly off aim. They've also used an optical effect on the target to make it seem closer than it is.

"Wanna know the trick to beating this game?"  Instructor Kane smirks and leans in.

Tih tilts his head.

"Brute force." Instructor Kane leaves it at that and moves back to the shooting spot. The worker has already pressed the last button. Instructor Kane takes his time to examine what he's working with.

The target has decreased in size and they've added many more. The one he need to aim for is the only red one in a dozen or so black that are moving around at a faster speed and overlapping. After a moment, Kane notices they've also seemed to have moved back a few feet to mess with his muscle memory.

"This...isn't this impossible?!"

"Crazy!"

"Maybe that instructor has an occupation in Archery. If he's silver-ranked, then he can definitely do it!"

Instructor calms his mind and slows his breath, slowing his heartbeat along the way. He focus all his attention of the target as he starts getting serious. Time seems to slow around him as he stretches the bow taut.

Kane has already gotten the movement patterns of the target in his head. He aims for a certain empty space, waits for the right moment, and releases.