Terrifying Reaction Speed

Gu Ding's entire body was taut with tension as he patiently waited for his opponent to strike.

This opponent was indeed a troublesome one. The arena was only four or five hundred square meters, with no cover whatsoever. Yet his opponent had vanished without a trace, leaving behind neither warning nor suspicious clues.

With Sea Emperor's help, he could have easily located his opponent. But Gu Ding felt that this battle in the arena was his own, and asking someone else for help would be unfair.

Standing on the arena now, he had no idea where his opponent was. The only thing he could do was wait. The moment the other party attacked would also be the moment he launched his counterattack.

However, professional assassins were patient. Before their opponents revealed an opening, they could lie in wait for hours. But here in the arena, he could not wait that long.

If neither side attacked for too long, the system would rule it a draw. Invisible Tenderness knew that. If he did not take the initiative to attack, no one else could attack him either. If this continued for more than half an hour, the system would declare a draw.

After waiting patiently for around ten minutes without finding an opportunity to strike, Invisible Tenderness realized that the Young Man before him, though thin and weak-looking, was as difficult to crack as a fortress. He knew that any rash move would likely bring a frenzied counterattack from his opponent. But he also knew that Gu Ding's presence was as steady as a mountain; even if he waited another twenty minutes, his opponent would not reveal any flaw. With no other choice, he finally made his move!

The cold gleam of a dagger flashed through the air, piercing Gu Ding's throat in an instant. Yet that lightning-fast killing strike suddenly met resistance.

Gu Ding had grabbed the dagger's blade with one hand. Though its tip had pierced his throat, it went less than a centimeter deep before Gu Ding stopped it.

"You lost!" Gu Ding grinned as the fist he had prepared with his other hand slammed into his opponent's waist.

In the next instant, Invisible Tenderness's entire body shattered into fragments and reformed outside the arena.

Many spectators had failed to see what had happened in that split-second exchange. Only after replaying the scene in slow motion did they finally understand.

"What terrifying reaction speed!" quite a few martial artists could not help exclaiming. Most believed that in that situation, their throats would have been pierced straight through by the dagger and they would have been killed instantly.

"His fist force is terrifying too!" other martial artists exclaimed. Gu Ding's strike had directly punched a hole through his opponent's body. Though it would not produce such an effect in the Real World, its attacking power was certainly not something an ordinary person could withstand.

"For a novice, his reaction speed is quite good." In the monitoring room, the short-haired woman nodded in satisfaction.

"Young Miss, should we continue arranging opponents for him?" asked the tall man in a black suit beside her.

"No need. I have a rough understanding of his body technique now. His Gene Level is still low, and his current performance is more or less his limit. There's no need to keep testing him." The short-haired woman shook her head and turned toward the door. "Let him compete normally."

"Yes, Young Miss. Should we record his later matches?"

"Record the ones worth watching. There's no need for the rest." The short-haired woman paused and nodded.

Without the arena arranging things behind the scenes, the challenges Gu Ding received at his current rank of around 5,000 finally returned to normal. They were basically all from people ranked below him.

There were two ranking systems in the arena: point ranking and replacement ranking.

Under normal circumstances, ordinary people took the point-ranking route, because the system would not randomly match competitors whose point totals differed too greatly.

Replacement ranking, on the other hand, meant actively challenging a higher-ranked competitor. Once you won, you gained their rank, while their rank dropped by one accordingly. However, highly ranked competitors usually found suitable opponents before entering the arena, then left immediately after their matches, giving no one else the chance to challenge them.

Gu Ding's previous matches had supposedly been randomly assigned by the system, but someone had actually manipulated things behind the scenes and deliberately arranged high-level opponents for him. Such cases were rare, but they had also raised Gu Ding's ranking to around 5,000 through replacement ranking.

And because Gu Ding had remained in the arena to accept challenges, he gave lower-ranked competitors the chance to challenge him. Seeing that Gu Ding had few points, many competitors who had not watched his matches assumed he was an easy target who had only reached such a high rank through luck, and they all pressed the challenge button.

In less than two minutes, Gu Ding received more than thirty challenges, and the number continued to rise.

"Is the system malfunctioning?" Gu Ding raised an eyebrow.

"Your rank is high, but your points are low, so many people think you only climbed up through luck and want to use you as a stepping stone. Besides, you selected the mode that openly accepts challenges, so naturally many people want to try their luck and see whether they can take you down and replace your rank." Sea Emperor's explanation made Gu Ding understand what was happening. "For you, this is a good opportunity to accumulate points. Once a challenge is issued, it cannot be withdrawn unless the challenged party refuses it. In other words, even if you display terrifying strength, those who have already challenged you cannot cancel their challenges. They can only hand over points."

While they were talking, the number of challenges had surged past fifty. Gu Ding grinned. "Not bad."

"I'll help you filter the opponents. Of those currently challenging you, the highest-ranked one is around 6,100th place. It feels like none of these people would pose much of a challenge to you." Sea Emperor found it somewhat boring.

"Then pick him. Too many challengers would be troublesome and delay my training." Gu Ding was happy enough to have people voluntarily offering him points, since one point was equivalent to one hundred Star Coins. If he won sixty matches in a row, his consecutive-win bonus would accumulate to 1,830 points, which was no small fortune. But if he spent all his time on these people, his Limitless Body Technique would improve only slightly. Only by facing truly powerful opponents could he rapidly improve through battle.

"You want to use this guy to make an example of him?" Sea Emperor guessed Gu Ding's intentions.

"If I don't, people will keep challenging me endlessly." Gu Ding wore a wicked grin. "Him it is!"

A moment later, a fat man appeared in the arena. He looked young too, just over twenty, and was not very tall. Upon seeing Gu Ding, he laughed. "So it's just a kid."

Gu Ding could only feel helpless at that reaction. Although training in the Limitless Body Technique had made him a little taller and sturdier lately, he still looked somewhat small and thin among people his age.

"Little Friend, it looks like your luck has run out. I'll try to go easy on you." As he spoke, the fat man lunged at Gu Ding, clearly intending to end the battle quickly.

Gu Ding stood where he was with a bitter smile. Once the other man closed in, he immediately unleashed the first stance of the fifth level of Steel Fist and smashed it into his opponent's fat belly...