In practice, the Chinese traditional weapons have mtipersonnel power only in close combat or within the iistance of about three meters. If you stand more than :hree meters away, it is hard to get close enough to your opponent to gain victory. So in ancient times, people :reated various kinds of hidden weapons to overcome :his problem. These hidden weapons included rope-iart, dart, flying sabre, flying fork, flying pike, flying sword, thrown arrow, arrow hidden in sleeve, flying Droken stones, iron toad, coin-shaped dart, wolf-fanged-lammer, Thunder God drill, ruyi bead, plum blossom icedle, lasso, crossbow arrow, longxu hook, fleam, Emei pricks, acupoint-hitting needle, iron fleabane, swallow iart, sleeve gun and thread crossbow arrow. You could use hidden weapons to force the enemy rto retreat and turn defeat into victory, when you were in a disadvan-taged position or hopelessly outnumbered.
The hidden weapons are for throwing so they are easy to carry, hide, throw and hit the enemy at a long distance. Usually these weapons are of two types-short and small ones and soft and rope ones.
The short, small ones include the dart, Arhat coin, sleeve arrow, broken stones, throwing,arrow, flying sword, flying sabre, dart sabre, sleeve ring^flying needle, flying pricks, ruyi ball, iron-birds, iron brush, weight hidden in palm, Emei pricks, acupoint-hitting needle.
The soft ones include rope-talon, rope-ring, rope-dart, longxu hook, fleam, flying hammer, iron fleabane, wolf-fang hammer, and rope-hammer.
Short and hidden weapons are easy to use but required accuracy and superb techniques.
Traditionally, the use of hidden weapons in combat was regarded with some contempt, and due to the emergence of firearms their use ceased. However, for interest's sake we have selected some typical weapons which we will discuss below:
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