Chapter 1 Time Waits for No One

No sooner said than done.

Feng Bujue twisted his body, using a textbook heron’s turn to adjust his posture, facing the direction of the gunshot.

In that instant, a dark light flickered in his eyes, and countless precise real-time calculations were completed in a flash. Immediately afterward, his body, at the fastest possible speed and with the most appropriate amplitude… struck an extremely strange pose, barely dodging the incoming bullets.

“Hmm… a total of twelve shots, each one a special ammunition; judging from the accuracy and power, it should be a heavy weapon, but the rate of fire and magazine capacity indicate that this gun must have been modified in some demonic way…” In just two seconds, these thoughts flashed through Feng Bujue’s mind. After completing the evasive action, he didn’t forget to counter with a [Lán Jiǎo] (Storm Leg) towards the trajectory of the bullets.

But… he never expected that this kick would only raise a gust of wind… and that this wind would weaken and dissipate before it even traveled ten meters.

Obviously, this couldn't be called a [Lán Jiǎo] at all; its power was probably not even as good as a [Gǎng Jiǎo] (Hill Leg)…

“What’s going on?” Feng Bujue quickly glanced at the game menu, but found no anomalies in the skill bar.

Rat-tat-tat-tat…

Before his doubts could be answered, a second wave of gunshots rang out in the distance.

“The effect of [Lán Jiǎo] has been greatly weakened… Why is that?” While dodging with all sorts of incredible and extreme movements, Jue-ge was still calmly thinking, “First of all, I definitely haven’t been hit by any moves that could limit the power of skills… this can be confirmed through the data perspective; secondly, this is not caused by ‘system limitations’ either, because if the system were to directly impose a limitation on the player… there would definitely be a voice prompt; so, the most likely conclusion right now is…”

Thinking of this, he suddenly spun around, stomped his foot, and charged straight towards a residential building on the street.

The timing of this sudden advance was excellent. At this moment… the gunman who was ambushing him from afar had just finished the second round of “twelve shots” and was reloading.

Of course, this wasn’t a coincidence, but a calculation… While Jue-ge was thinking about the above, he didn’t forget to multitask and calculate the number of shots fired by the other party.

Although only a few seconds had passed since the first gunshot, Feng Bujue had already grasped seven or eight tenths of the weapon’s performance based on hearing and mental arithmetic… Unless the enemy had hidden some kind of trap in the attack from the beginning… such as "intentionally slowing down the rate of fire", "retaining ammunition to reload in advance", or "deliberately slowing down the reloading speed"… otherwise, it would be impossible for him to hit Jue-ge with the same weapon.

“If my guess is correct, the weakening of skill power by eighty percent is caused by the ‘barrier’ in this town…” Feng Bujue leaped, supporting himself on the wall with one hand, and flipped into the courtyard of a residential building, his mind constantly analyzing, “Currently, I've only used one [Lán Jiǎo], this skill is a C-level, half-energy attack of the Fighting specialization… which means that this barrier at least affects C-level and below, Fighting-type, externalized moves.”

Thinking of this, he tried to instantly activate [Líng Shí Jù Shēn Shù - Gǎi] (Spirit Consciousness Gathering Art - Modified), and took a step horizontally with [Yuè Bù] (Moon Step), before standing still.

“Hmm… Spirit Art specialization, self-Buff type, continuous skill, movement skill… they have all been greatly weakened as well.” Based on the experience of releasing those two skills just now, he compared them with the feeling when releasing them usually, and quickly constructed a filter table in his mind, filling in this series of adaptation items, “Ah… this kind of statistical work is really troublesome…” he muttered softly, then knelt on one knee and poked the mud under his feet with [Líng Xī Yī Zhǐ] (Numinous Rhinoceros One Finger).

Regarding his action, at the time… not a single one of the viewers watching the live broadcast could understand it.

But afterwards, someone understood it when watching the game replay, and then said something about it on the forum… and then everyone understood it.

Simply put… Feng Bujue was “experimenting”. He used an extremely short time and extremely low cost (some skills that consumed little and had no cooldown time)… to test the specific effects of the surrounding “barrier”.

This matter… at first glance, doesn’t seem like much, but upon closer inspection… a person is suddenly attacked by someone less than a minute after the start of the script, and he can still do this while running away… what kind of insane psychological quality and rapid thinking is needed to achieve this…

“Hmm… it can basically be confirmed that most ‘active skills’ are suppressed in this barrier.” After finishing poking the ground, Jue-ge withdrew his hand and thought, “If used well, this might be an opportunity…”

Thinking of this, he took out [Yì Dá] from his bag and picked up a stone from the ground.

“I was ambushed shortly after the opening CG ended… this can explain two points—first, my luck is not very good, and I appeared in the sight of a member of the Corpse Blade Squad One, who has very good eyesight, right at the beginning of the script; second, the person who shot me, because he decisively launched the ambush in the first place, probably hasn’t noticed the ‘barrier’ yet.” While thinking, Feng Bujue had already jumped back onto the roof of the house.

Unsurprisingly, the moment his feet stepped on the roof tiles, the continuous gunshots rang out again.

And… judging from the gunshots, the shooter's location was much closer than before.

“The only person in Corpse Blade Squad One who can find me in this dark and windy environment and immediately launch a ranged attack is…” Feng Bujue continuously somersaulted on the sloping roof, dodging bullets like a juggler, while his thoughts were also unceasing, “According to the information revealed in the game recordings… until the last rematch, that guy called [Mòrì Qiángxí] (Doomsday Strong Assault) certainly hasn't trained his Shooting specialization to S-level yet, but his Reconnaissance specialization has reached S-level… relying on a legendary-level gun weapon, he is indeed quite difficult to deal with at medium range… fortunately, the distance between us was still very far when he shot just now, and long-range precision sniping is not his forte, plus he encountered someone like me who has zero-time difference calculation, it's no wonder he didn't hit a single shot…”

While Feng Bujue was thinking about these things, Doomsday Strong Assault had already finished firing the third magazine. This time, the latter didn't bother reloading, but directly switched guns… because at this time, the distance between him and Jue-ge had shrunk from the initial three hundred meters to within a hundred meters. This distance had already entered the range of Doomsday Strong Assault’s legendary-level weapon…

[Name: The Black Market Burst Hunting Rifle]

[Type: Weapon]

[Quality: Legendary]

[Attack Power: ???]

[Attribute: None]

[Effect: The weapon's attack power increases with the player's level; increases maximum survival value by 14% and ranged attack critical hit chance by 32%; lead bullets are automatically generated inside the gun, no manual reloading required; the highest rate of fire for this gun is one shot every 2.6 seconds.]

[Equipment Condition: Having a knapsack is enough (bound upon pickup).]

[Remark: In the world of Azeroth, there is a place called Molten Core. One day, a group of greedy adventurers entered there, and as usual, went to plunder the monsters’ money and equipment. It was also on that day that a Paladin black marketed a "Burst Hunting Rifle" that should have been distributed to a Hunter. From then on, a legend began...]

Judging from the item description, this weapon doesn't seem as dazzling as other legendary equipment, but the actual effectiveness of this thing is terrifying…

Just take the "Equipment Condition" for example… this gun is essentially without any equipment conditions; the six words "Having a knapsack is enough" seem like some kind of prank by the game designer. To put it bluntly… this is a growth-type weapon that anyone can equip and can be used from level one to max level.

The 14% increase in maximum survival value and the 32% critical hit chance are both extremely excellent effects… In Thriller Paradise, a game that blurs character attributes, this type of equipment that passively adds to the upper limit is actually very rare. The reason is… because such a bonus will give players a very significant advantage.

In actual combat, as long as this [The Black Market Burst Hunting Rifle] can hit the torso… it can basically “one-shot” players of the same level. Even if it only hits the limbs, it can cause the opponent to lose more than 50% of their survival value.

This is the so-called “hard damage”… either you use legendary-level defensive equipment to compete with it, or you pray that you don’t get shot… otherwise, a shot in the knee can take your life (or turn your combat power into the level of a castle guard in some RPG game).

“Yes… that’s right…” At this time, Feng Bujue had also visually confirmed the location of Doomsday Strong Assault and clearly saw the other party change weapons, “Continue to maintain the frequency of shooting, seize the rhythm, don’t give me a chance to breathe…”

Jue-ge reappearing in the other party’s field of vision naturally had a purpose. He was intentionally selling a flaw, so that the other party would continue to use firearms to attack, thereby being unable to take care of other things… In this way, the setting that “skills have been weakened”… may very well be ignored by Doomsday Strong Assault.

And at this moment, Doomsday Strong Assault dozens of meters away… as Jue-ge expected, had not yet discovered the existence of the barrier.

It was indeed a coincidence that two minutes ago, Doomsday Strong Assault was very lucky to be assigned to a place with a higher terrain as soon as he entered the script; as soon as he gained the ability to act, he looked around… relying on his S-level Reconnaissance specialization eyesight and the not-so-bright moonlight in the sky, he actually discovered a figure more than three hundred meters away…

Then, Doomsday Strong Assault didn't say a word and took out his gun with the longest range, observed through the scope… and saw, oh my… Feng Bujue!

At that moment, his heart was extremely excited. Because he knew very well… right now, it was an excellent opportunity to ambush! When a player first enters a script, they are often still savoring the scene of the opening CG they saw not long ago, or thinking about what to do next… At this moment, it is almost impossible for them to react to a sudden ambush.

So, Doomsday Strong Assault decisively opened fire at that time…

But he didn't expect that Feng Bujue, this oddball, could immediately make a dodging action in that situation, and dodged so cleanly, not even getting his clothes scratched…

However, since the attack had already begun, Doomsday Strong Assault had to continue it. This can be said to be an inherent mode of thinking and common sense for shooting-type players—once they open fire, they must shoot the other side to death. If the other party escapes their field of vision, then they, whose location has already been exposed… will instead fall into an extremely passive position.

Therefore, things have evolved into the current situation.

In this ultra-high-paced contest of less than two minutes, Doomsday Strong Assault really hasn’t had any opportunity to launch any active skills… at least not at the distance just now, where he didn’t have enough confidence to hit…

“Doomsday Strong Assault, is it? Doing a good job!” Seeing the other party gradually approaching to less than seventy meters away, Feng Bujue shouted loudly, “Eat my move, ‘Great Meteorite Art’!”

After shouting, he pulled open the slingshot and shot the stone in his hand.

The term “Great Meteorite Art” was obviously made up by Jue-ge, but the effect of [Yì Dá] didn’t disappoint him… the small stone, after being shot out by this legendary slingshot, gradually turned into an explosive bomb shining with orange light in mid-air, and its size quickly increased several times, looking really like a meteorite fragment…

“Humph… petty tricks.” Doomsday Strong Assault snorted coldly and raised his gun to shoot. His Shooting specialization is at least A-level, so hitting this kind of moving target with a normal speed and short distance… is not a problem.

After the gunshot, Jue-ge's “Great Meteorite Art” exploded and dissipated in mid-air.

“Feng Bujue… Shooting specialization is indeed your weakness!” After breaking Jue-ge’s attack, Doomsday Strong Assault responded triumphantly, “Your kind of half-baked ranged skill is not as powerful as a normal shot from me!”

The time he took to say this sentence was more than 2.6 seconds; by the time he finished speaking, the distance between him and Jue-ge was only thirty meters, and he had already completed the action of raising his gun and aiming, locking onto Jue-ge standing on the roof.

Bang—

Immediately afterwards, Doomsday Strong Assault confidently opened fire…

The gun sound of the Burst Hunting Rifle sounded relatively crisp, like a so-called "bird gun," but the power was not ambiguous, and it was more than enough compared to a “cannon.”

Along with the gunshot, a lead bullet flew towards Feng Bujue’s torso at an extremely high speed, and Jue-ge also knew… it was time to act!

“Ah——” In the next second, Feng Bujue screamed, made an exaggerated seven hundred and twenty-degree spin in the air, and fell from the roof.

His acting skills were quite exaggerated, and even many viewers could see that it was fake… Doomsday Strong Assault could see at a glance that Jue-ge hadn't been shot at all, but just grazed by a bullet and deliberately faked a fall.

“Tch… what kind of conspiracy is this bastard up to again…” At this moment, some unpleasant memories surfaced in Doomsday Strong Assault’s mind, “Maybe when I jump into the courtyard… there will be two grenades waiting for me at the landing point…” But he thought again, “But… I have no reason not to go in… Could it be that just because the opponent is Feng Bujue… I don’t even dare to cross a wall?”