From American Internet Celebrity to God Among Men

14: Chapter 14: Fast, accurate, and with a touch of ”unexpected surprise”.”Neural Response and Dynamic Visual Enhancement (Primary),” 1500 Popularity Points, redeem!

Alex felt this ”purchase” was subtler than buying any other skill. There was no flood of knowledge, no update to muscle memory; it was more like pressing a few hidden ”High Definition” and ”Bullet Time” buttons on his existing sensory system.

For the first few days, the change was almost imperceptible. Until that afternoon, when he sat by the window in a cafe, replying to emails while unconsciously glancing at the street.

A delivery scooter zipped by, moving quite fast. In the past, that would have been a blur of color and noise. But now, Alex clearly ”saw” the reflective sticker patterns on the rider’s helmet, the dents at certain angles on the insulated box on the back, and even the trajectory of a small pebble kicked up by the tires as it spun and fell in the air—it was absurdly slow, allowing him to leisurely watch it ”plop” onto the edge of the sidewalk.

He blinked, and everything returned to normal. The street was bustling with traffic, moving at its usual speed.

”Interesting.” He took a sip of coffee, suppressing the novelty in his heart.

He truly realized its usefulness when he was driving. When merging, his judgment of the distance and speed of vehicles behind him became extremely easy and confident. A skateboarder suddenly darting out at an intersection seemed to have their actions predicted; his foot on the brake and his hands on the steering wheel adjusted half a beat faster. The whole process was smooth and fluid, and Mark (who was hitching a ride to downtown) didn’t even notice any sudden braking, only feeling that Alex drove ”as steadily as an autopilot.”

”Did you go to an advanced driving course recently?” Mark asked curiously, fastening his seatbelt.

”Maybe... talent awakened?” Alex joked, brushing the topic aside.

This ”one step ahead” perception quickly integrated into his daily life. In crowded hallways, he could easily avoid everyone walking toward him without even brushing a sleeve; catching a pen that accidentally rolled off a desk was a piece of cake. He even tried playing a fast-paced game and was surprised to find he could see the trajectory of the bullets—although his hand speed couldn’t keep up with his brain speed yet, his score indeed soared by a chunk.

Of course, the new skill also brought some minor awkwardness. For example, in the library, a girl opposite him raised her hand to tuck her hair, and the movement inexplicably slowed down in his eyes. He could clearly see even the curled strands of her hair and her slightly trembling eyelashes. It lasted so long that he felt a bit uncomfortable, so he had to quickly lower his head to read. Or at the gym, when others were panting while lifting weights, he could clearly see the trembling of their muscle fibers and the slow-motion rolling of sweat beads on their temples when they exerted force... This made him feel like a freak peeping at the precision instruments of the human body.

”Must learn to control attention.” He reminded himself inwardly.

Just as he was adapting to the new skill, opportunities in the real world were lining up to knock at his door.

First, the partnership agreement with the sportswear brand ”Kinetic Pulse” was officially finalized. The other party not only sent a large box of the latest training clothes, running shoes, and accessories, but the contract terms were also quite generous: a high fixed fee plus sales commission, and they gave him great creative freedom. The only requirement was to ”showcase the performance and aesthetics of the products in extreme environments.” Zoe, the brand manager in charge of coordination, did not hide her excitement in the video call: ”Alex, your video is the ’dynamic aesthetics’ we want! We don’t need stiff advertisements; we want that feeling you have of filming sports like art!”

Next was the audition invitation for the film school’s sci-fi short film ”Messenger 2077.” He hadn’t taken it too seriously at first, but the director—a quite talented graduate student—insisted on meeting him after watching his Parkour video. The audition was in a small rehearsal room at the film school. There was no complex script; the director just asked him to imagine himself as a runner delivering important information in a deserted city and then freestyle a performance of ”traversing complex terrain.”