Hikari Shin

The Green Phosphorous Needle is a concealed poisoned weapon associated with A'Zi and her training under Ding Chunqiu. Its appearances turn a seemingly small object into an immediate threat: the needles are easy to hide and launch at close range, while their poison is described as capable of killing almost at once. The weapon also reveals A'Zi’s readiness to use lethal means even when she has no established grievance against her target.

Appearance and Use

A'Zi first uses the needles while bending beside a fisherman to loosen the net around him. She raises her left hand within her sleeve, and a dark-green flash shoots toward the middle-aged man. The close distance makes the attack seem difficult to evade, but he sweeps it aside with a sleeve, sending the needles into the mud beside the lake.

The man recognizes that the needles have been coated with an extremely potent poison. As described in the encounter, once it enters a victim’s blood, it blocks the throat and causes death almost immediately. The weapon’s small size and concealed launch make it dangerous not only because of the poison, but because an attack can follow a gesture that appears to have an ordinary purpose.

The Attempt at Xiao Feng

The needles recur when A'Zi meets Xiao Feng. After he strikes her and takes hold of her wrist, he turns her palm outward to show the others what she is hiding: a green needle held between her fingers. She had pretended to reach for his shoulder as if she needed his support, intending instead to stick the needle into him. Xiao Feng notices the deception in time, and the attempt fails.

The reveal gives the weapon a second method of use. In the first encounter, A'Zi launches a cluster from her sleeve; in the later one, she keeps an individual needle concealed in her hand and uses an apparent appeal for help as cover. The difference underscores how the threat depends on concealment as much as on the poison itself.

Poison and Association with Ding Chunqiu

A'Zi says that the Green Phosphorous Needle is not her most frightening weapon and that she has many other missiles she has not yet used. When Xiao Feng names several of them and identifies Ding Chunqiu as her master, her astonishment confirms that he has recognized her connection to the Xingxiu School. The needle therefore belongs to a broader arsenal associated in the scene with her training, rather than standing alone as an isolated device.

The weapon also helps establish the stakes of Xiao Feng’s intervention. He calls attention to A'Zi’s use of intensely poisonous missiles against others, while the onlookers react to the name of Ding Chunqiu, known for his vicious methods and for the Energy-Dissolving Great Technique. In this context, the needle is both a practical instrument of attack and visible evidence of the dangerous martial world in which A'Zi has been trained.

Narrative Significance

The two encounters make concealment the needle’s defining narrative feature. At the lake, an apparently compliant act—freeing the fisherman—ends in a sudden attempt to attack the man who has released A'Zi. Later, a gesture that looks like seeking Xiao Feng’s support hides another attempt to strike. In both cases, the object turns the gap between appearance and intention into immediate peril.

The needle’s green color makes it recognizable once exposed, but recognition comes only after A'Zi has brought it into play. The scenes thus use a small weapon to disclose character and affiliation at once: its poison establishes the danger of her methods, while Xiao Feng’s identification of her master situates those methods within Ding Chunqiu’s school. The failed attacks leave the needle intact as a threat, but they also bring A'Zi’s concealed intent into view.