Chapter 75: My Worth

Chapter 75: My Worth

I never knew how extraordinary I was.

As I looked, the trees and mountains on both sides of the road flew past, leaving only flashes of light.

Chen Feng lost himself in the thrill of running, forgetting time, forgetting worries, and even forgetting why he started.

When an object gets closer to the speed of light, time slows down.

So, what if a person could get close to the speed of light?

His thoughts would seem faster than others, because his time was slower.

Chen Feng’s speed was now over three hundred kilometers per hour, way behind the speed of light, but closer than anyone else.

He entered a unique, amazing state. It came from instinct, yet went beyond it.

Each step he took was as precise as art.

Each leap he made took the breath away with its beauty.

This was the human body going beyond its limits, a form that surpassed ordinary beauty, showing the instinct inside human genes to aim higher, faster, and stronger.

“He’s too fast, really too fast.”

“The gap is shrinking! It keeps getting smaller!”

Tang Tianxin asked, “Is there any way to watch his brain waves now?”

Professor Ouyang shook his head. “No. His condition is beyond what the simulator can handle. It won’t touch the brain wave monitoring. Even the tiniest nudge might cause an error.”

“That’s trouble, then. No way to alert him. At this speed, he’ll probably…”

Meanwhile, Ou Qinglan’s voice came over the comms. “He could get second place.”

Talking certain things into existence was real.

Just after Ou Qinglan spoke, Chen Feng brought his acceleration up to 21G!

In this one race, he stretched the human limit from 20G by another 5%.

Now people weren’t just calling Chen Feng crazy.

This was unexpected, but it made perfect sense.

He was gunning for first place!

While everyone neared the finish line, his distance behind the leaders shrank even more.

From dead last early on, he surged in the second half with unmatched speed and power, wildly catching up.

“There’s just fifteen kilometers left to the finish, and he’s already caught up to the second-to-last guy!”

“That was Lu Zhun from the Qingliang River Base, already picked to join the Tai Xuan 893 escort ship.”

“Really? An escort ship in the top thousand?”

“Sure as anything! Just didn’t think Lu Zhun would be second-to-last; the ones ahead must be better.”

“But… they’re all going down.”

As they talked, Chen Feng zipped past Lu Zhun.

Lu Zhun looked up and saw a dark dot fading fast into the distance.

Too fast for hope.

“Who on earth are you?”

Lu Zhun couldn’t hold back and yelled out.

Chen Feng chuckled inside his helmet. “Who I am isn’t the point. The point is, I mean to win.”

The moment he spoke the word “win,” he overtook another racer.

The finish line was coming closer.

But nothing could slow Chen Feng now.

“Another one! He’s in seventeenth place now! Can he do it?”

“Hard to say. The top racers are only eight kilometers ahead.”

“Man, it’s a shame he sped up so late. Otherwise, he’d have won easy, and smashed the record.”

“Oh, shut it! He broke through on the spot. How much faster did you need him to go? Use your eyes and really look at that number—it had hit twenty-one… whoa, twenty-two now!”

That was right. Without noticing, Chen Feng had upped his settings again.

It wasn’t him trying to mess things up; it was faith in his gut.

He knew he could handle it. Twenty-one Gs wasn’t his end.

He could lift his limits even higher!

Everyone thought the most acceleration an Azure Dragon Armor wearer could take was twenty Gs. The armor was built to work that way.

But that was only ’cause no one before had total serum adaptability. The best was only ninety-one point three percent.

Like getting every test question right versus nearly right—almost the same, but a world apart.

Genius and average folks stood apart, and that gap was huge and unbeatable.

Crossing beyond a limit, Chen Feng’s speed and form now escaped the simulator’s perfect mimicry.

Even with the Central AI spending over fifty percent of its power over the Quantum Network to work the T800 field out, Chen Feng became just a blurry mist.

“Sigh, can’t see a thing. The system can’t picture it now. It only guesses he can pull it off based on rough data, and then takes the easiest guess that his moves work fine.”

Ou Qinglan sighed over the comms.

The Pangu Institute researcher spoke with regret too. “The data we’re seeing is like a stick figure now—crapper than the motion capture for movies a thousand years back. It’s no good!”

“Let it drop, all right? He’s about to win!”

Tang Tianxin cut the researchers off. She stood with hands clasped behind her, eyes locked on the top-down view.

The mist that was Chen Feng chased the top racer like a wild beast.

Up ahead, the finish line drew near.

Yet Chen Feng closed in by a hundred meters at a time.

Whoosh.

He turned into a blast of wind, storming past his rival.

In the simulation, the loud booms sounded like thunder, and dust kicked up wildly.

Chen Feng grabbed first place in the cross-country run, ahead of second by thirty-three point seventy-nine meters—a “small” gap.

At the finish line, he turned around, letting the simulator show him floating in mid-air, and waved at the guy behind.

Like he was saying, not bad, kid. You tried hard; falling to me was fair deal.

The training building roared with cheers.

In their minds, Chen Feng had pulled off a miracle.

He’d hit new highs at every step today.

By the rules, each event ended with a thirty-minute break for rest and food.

It was short, seemed harsh, but in a real fight, even that half-hour might not come.

Inside, Chen Feng eased off the acceleration, preparing to get out.

Tang Tianxin gave an order. “Professor Ouyang, ask the race bosses to make the break an hour instead, in my name.”

“No need. I’m good,” Chen Feng’s voice came from the simulator.

Under shocked stares, the metal door slid open, and he walked out step by step, steady as oak.

He looked calm, like nothing had happened.

The crowd was floored. They’d figured him pale and weak.

Tang Tianxin pushed. “Take more rest? Right now, the simulator can’t read you right.”

Chen Feng shook his head slowly. “Not my fault; the gear’s broke. Simulator No. 8 is shot. For what’s next, I need a new one. Plus, I feel perfect; no need for more rest.”

He didn’t want folks saying later he’d won by bending rules.

Ding Hu rushed him. “Well done, boy!”

Chen Feng broke a grin. “So, Brother Hu, how’d I do?”

Ding Hu said, “You did top! But how come you’re not pumped?”

Chen Feng thought a bit. “Taking first was a done deal. Like the sun sure rising tomorrow. Why get pumped?”

“You…”

Silence hit.

“All right then. Off for a snack.”

Chen Feng didn’t spot Tang Tianxin as a general; he wasn’t into small talk.

He wasn’t as cool as he acted.

For a flash when he won, his insides felt stirred, thrilled.

It backed up what he’d thought before.

He really was a fight prodigy.

Still didn’t see how one fighter could tip a full-on civilization war, but he guessed he just didn’t know enough.

No doubt—walking this path more, he’d really find what he was worth.