vncnus Page 21
Page 21
Jason whispered a reminder from the corner, handing over a water bottle with his right hand, which was missing two fingers: "Mexicans are paper tigers; they're even more vulnerable after being given drugs."
Victor nodded, his gaze sweeping over the Mexican man opposite him whose weight was listed as 252 pounds.
The man was frantically pounding his chest, the fresh needle marks on his neck gleaming eerily bluish-purple under the spotlight.
As the referee pretended to check both players' gloves, Victor smelled a strong chemical odor in his opponent's breath—clearly, he had just been injected with some kind of mixed stimulant.
"Round 1!"
The Mexicans charged forward like bulls enraged by a red cloth, their steps chaotic yet fueled by the brute force of drugs.
Victor's 361-pound body dodged the impact with incredible agility, his massive abdominal muscles undulating layer upon layer, neutralizing the force of the attack.
In the instant his opponent staggered, his right jab struck his opponent's biceps with pinpoint accuracy, like a viper striking.
The dull thud made the audience in the front row scream with excitement.
The Mexican man had a visibly swollen lump on his right arm, but the medication had apparently numbed his sense of pain.
Viktor seized the opportunity, throwing a left hook that arced perfectly, channeling all the kinetic energy from his 361-pound weight into his opponent's ribs.
This time he clearly heard a crisp "crack"—at least two ribs were broken.
"Damn Chinamen!"
The Mexican, spitting bloody saliva, merely swayed slightly.
The cold light flashed between his fingers as he swung his fist in a backhand strike, and Viktor's pupils shrank—it was shards of glass!
The audience erupted in even more enthusiastic cheers, but the referee pretended not to see it and turned to tie his shoelaces.
"Watch out for his right hand!"
Jason roared from the sidelines, his voice drowned out by the deafening roar of the crowd.
Viktor suddenly looked down, and shards of glass grazed his scalp, severing a few strands of hair.
This is the truth about unregulated boxing matches: no drug testing, no fairness, and not even basic safety measures.
Last week, a Russian had his eyes gouged out, and the organizers just sprinkled sawdust into the pool of blood.
When the Mexicans attacked again, Victor suddenly changed tactics.
Victor remained expressionless as his massive legs unleashed a speed disproportionate to his size, his 361-pound body surging forward like a steamroller.
A left jab feints, a right straight punch breaks the opponent's guard, and finally an uppercut from below, accurately hitting the chin.
As the Mexican man spun and flew into the air, Victor even saw the gold tooth that flew out of his mouth trace an arc under the light.
The impact of the body hitting the ground caused the foam in the beer glass to shake violently.
The Mexican man convulsed, vomiting pink foam, and then urinated, soaking his shorts.
The staff member in the red vest dragged him away by the ankle like a dead pig, while another old man casually wiped the bloodstains with a mop.
"The victor is Victor Lee!"
The host announced with a yawn, as if what had just happened was merely a boring warm-up performance.
In the lounge, Victor was applying an ice pack to his right joint.
Michael was adding vodka to his water bottle—because a small amount of alcohol can dilate blood vessels and improve cardiopulmonary function.
"The second round is Mark Horn, the runner-up in the junior division of last year's state bodybuilding competition."
Jason spat out a mouthful of phlegm. "His whole body is as white as a sheet of paper, but he's very muscular. The flesh on his arms is as thick as my thighs."
Half an hour later, when Victor stepped into the boxing ring again, an unprecedented roar suddenly erupted from the crowd in the stands.
A young white man, resembling an Apollo statue, walked in from the end of the passage. He was just over two meters tall, and his inverted triangular physique looked like a Greek sculpture under the spotlight.
His brand-new boxing gloves were printed with the sponsor's logo, and his eight-pack abs rippled with each step, causing the wealthy women in the VIP seats to stand up and scream.
"Does this yellow-skinned pig even deserve to stand here?"
Mark Horn suddenly lowered his voice as the referee read the rules, saying, "I'll make you crawl out of here in one round."
He deliberately slapped Viktor's fat belly with his boxing gloves, which drew laughter from the stands.
Viktor recalled Zhao the Boxer's words: "Four hundred pounds is not a burden, it is a weapon bestowed by God."
The sharp ringing of the bell tore through the murky air of the underground boxing ring.
In the center of the ring, a spotlight casts elongated shadows of the two boxers onto the ropes.
Mark Wellington, the blond-haired, blue-eyed exchange student, was showing off his textbook boxing starting stance—his feet perfectly spread at a 45-degree angle, his front hand slightly extended forward, and his back hand pressed tightly against his chin.
His pale, almost vampire-like skin shimmered with sweat, and his eight-pack abs rose and fell rhythmically with his breathing, making him look like a model who had stepped off the cover of a fitness magazine.
"Come on, you slum rats."
Mark grinned, revealing perfectly whitened teeth—even his dental braces couldn't hide it: "You damn Japanese!"
Viktor did not answer—but he had already sentenced the man before him to death for cursing him in the most vile way!
His eyes were now narrowed into slits, gleaming with the light of aiming.
Viktor's stance wasn't standard—his lead hand was slightly lower, and his rear hand didn't fully cover his chin—but it was the stance he felt suited best for him.
The moment the referee's arm fell, Victor went into action like a killing machine that had been switched on.
The left jab struck Mark's face with lightning speed, leaving an afterimage in the air.
Mark instinctively raised his glove to block, a smug smile even playing on his lips—the feint was all too obvious.
But just as he shifted his weight to prepare for a counterattack, Victor's right straight punch, like a cannonball, pierced through Mark's hastily constructed defense and struck precisely in the center of his sternum.
The muffled sound echoed in the enclosed underground space.
Every muscle in Mark's muscular body trembled under that blow.
He staggered backward, his back hitting the rope, and for the first time, terror flashed in his eyes.
Without a layer of fat to cushion the impact, the sternum transmitted the force of the impact directly to his internal organs, and he felt as if his heart had stopped beating for a moment.
The audience erupted in wild howls.
Bets flew through the air like autumn leaves, with most of them on Viktor—nobody was stupid, and a heavyweight boxer's weight represented the majority of the bets!
The air was filled with a mixture of smells of sweat, blood, and cheap beer.
"1:1.7! Finish him off in the first round!"
A man with a face full of scars pounded on the iron cage and roared, his gold teeth gleaming in the dim light.
Victor gave Mark no chance to catch his breath.
He was like a precisely programmed killing machine, unleashing a barrage of jabs, straight punches, hooks, and uppercuts like a storm.
Each strike carries the power generated by swinging a sledgehammer—not the skill of athletic competition, but the embodiment of power.
Mark's helmet absorbed most of the facial impacts, but its effect was minimal, as his opponent was still able to keep his eyes open—Victor's fists began searching for softer targets.
An uppercut pierced through the gap in the defense and landed heavily on Mark's left ribs.
The cracking sound of bones breaking was drowned out by the cheers of the audience.
Mark doubled over in pain, only to be met with a right hook from Victor, breaking his other rib as well.
"Stop...stop..."
Mark's pleas for mercy were choked by a mouthful of blood.
His vision began to blur, and what he saw was no longer the spotlight, but the high-end boxing club his father used to take him to when he was a child, and the friendly sparring among people wearing protective gear.
This was not the glorious battle he had imagined, but a one-sided massacre.
Viktor showed no mercy—his experience in construction site fights taught him to land the second punch before the other person could even yell!
His final right straight punch pierced through Mark's faltering defense, the broken ribs stabbing into his lung like a dagger.
Mark's pupils dilated suddenly, and blood gushed from the corner of his mouth, staining his snow-white dental guards red.
The young rich kid collapsed to the ground like a felled oak tree, while the bodybuilding champion's body convulsed on the canvas floor.
When the doctor rushed in from the sidelines, Mark was already unconscious, his lips a horribly bluish-purple.
"Penetrating cardiopulmonary injury! Emergency surgery required!"
The doctor shouted into the walkie-talkie, his voice carrying a professional calm, but his fingers were trembling slightly—excitedly: "Big business! Big business!"
Victor stood in the center of the cage and slowly took off his gloves.
The cheers from the audience seemed to come from thousands of miles away.
He looked towards the private room on the second floor, where Mr. Chen, dressed in a custom-made suit, was sitting.
The old man nodded slightly, a satisfied gleam in his eyes—he had heard the word "Japanese" too, so he forgave Viktor for causing a tragedy that would prevent a large number of people from taking the field.
As the excited medical team carried the unconscious Mark away, Victor noticed an Asian man in a silk shirt smiling at him from the VIP section.
The man raised his champagne glass in a toasting gesture, the jade ring on his ring finger gleaming coldly under the light.
"Jade Dragon Lin Guohao".
Jason was delighted. "That's Franky's boss!"
Chapter 18: The Fourth Round of the Auditions - Jason's News
As the smoke of the preliminary rounds dissipated, the boxing gym was filled with the smell of sweat and rust.
After three rounds of brutal elimination, the once crowded competition area is now reduced to only twenty-two contestants, each with a flame of a different color burning in their eyes—ambition, fear, or pure thirst for battle.
Victor Lee sat on a bench, wiping the sweat from his neck with a towel.
His massive 361-pound frame cast a heavy shadow under the lights, his muscles sculpted as if by magic.
His knuckles were wrapped in brand-new white bandages, from which blood was already seeping out.
"The second round was tougher than I expected."
Victor's voice was deep and resonant, like a drumbeat: "That Latino kid almost got me completely bewildered with his 'butterfly walk'."
Jason Lee—the team’s intelligence expert and Victor’s cousin—was frowning at a 'report'.
He has typical Asian features, a lean build, and strikingly bright eyes.