Extraordinary Realm from Persuasion System

Chapter 2: Chapter 2: Rhythm Running

I’ll hold off on jump rope and squats for now. My Constitution is poor, and those two exercises are too hard on my knees.

As for HIIT and paced runs... I’ll start with paced runs!

Although the reward threshold for HIIT was very low, averaging 0.1 Ability Points for each completion, Zhang Beixing knew that type of training was incredibly draining.

Even Lao Dong, the fittest guy in our dorm, pants like a dog after two HIIT sessions. My fitness is far worse than his. I probably couldn’t even last one round before I’d end up flat on the ground, sprawled out like a corpse. Instead of making such a futile effort, I might as well try a paced run.

With this decided, Zhang Beixing announced, ”I’m off for a run,” and left the dorm for the sports field.

Watching his departing figure, the three people in the room were stunned for a moment. Then, they sent Zhang Beixing a message on WeChat asking him to bring back some food when he returned, put on their headphones, and started their journey to climb the ranks in reverse.

Paced running, also known as aerobic threshold running or lactate threshold running, is a training method used to improve stamina and running speed. Unlike usual leisurely jogging or full-out sprinting, paced running falls between the two and is usually used to break through the boundary between aerobic and anaerobic exercise. Its core lies in maintaining a pace where the speed of lactate accumulation and dissipation is equal. Simply put, it means controlling your running intensity to just hit the maximum threshold your body can handle.

Generally, people who enter this state feel a ’comfortable pain’ when running. But as long as they can keep it up, the improvement gained is unparalleled by ordinary running.

After looking up information about paced running on his phone, Zhang Beixing had an epiphany. He warmed up, took a few deep breaths to lift his spirits, then set off running.

The track at Shi University’s sports field was a standard four-hundred-meter track. To complete the paced running task, Zhang Beixing needed to run twelve and a half laps. However, since he had just started and was not yet proficient in paced running, the final result was bound to be more than the expected twelve and a half laps.

For the first lap, Zhang Beixing ran at a normal pace to test things out, and the System’s progress remained unchanged. For the second lap, he began trying various running rhythms. By the end of the lap, he was gasping for breath and covered in a light sweat, but the progress on the System’s panel had changed from 0M to 50M.

This change greatly encouraged Zhang Beixing; he saw hope. So, he continued to run, searching for the right rhythm and state.

Third lap...

Fourth lap...

He kept running until the fifth lap. Zhang Beixing was gasping like an ox, feeling that ’comfortable pain’, and the urge to give up involuntarily welled up inside him. But looking at the continually increasing progress on the System’s panel and remembering the inhuman pain he had suffered from illness in his past life, he gritted his teeth and kept on running.

And that run lasted twenty minutes!

When his physical strength was completely drained, Zhang Beixing, who had been maintaining his paced run, finally couldn’t hold on any longer and slowed his steps. He looked as if he had just emerged from water; every inch of his body was drenched in sweat. His face was flushed, his legs were shaking, his mouth and throat were parched, and his head was spinning. Zhang Beixing felt like he had lost half his life.

Yet even so, his task was still incomplete.

[Suggestion: Paced Running. Difficulty: D. Reward: 0.5 Ability Points for every 5 kilometers. Current Progress: 4.13KM/5.0KM]

He was less than eight hundred meters away, just about two laps. Zhang Beixing wanted to push through and keep running to earn the System’s reward, but his feeble body did not allow him to do so. With no other choice, he had to rest and wait until his strength recovered before continuing to run.

”Want some water, Lao Zhang?”

As Zhang Beixing was walking slowly around the track to ease his muscles and heart rate, a crisp voice sounded from beside him. Zhang Beixing was startled and looked over. He hadn’t noticed her approach. A girl with skin as white as snow was standing beside a small pushcart, holding a bottle of mineral water beaded with condensation.

”Lin Siqi?” Zhang Beixing said, his eyebrows arching slightly as he recognized her.

Even though he had been reborn into his past, he barely remembered any of his university classmates. But Lin Siqi was an exception; he remembered her quite vividly. It wasn’t that he had developed feelings for her; Lin Siqi was just too distinctive.

As a pure and cute girl from the south, her image from the first glance was that of a delicate and gentle young lady whose hands had never touched hardship. Yet it was this kind of girl who, starting from her freshman year, began pushing a small pushcart around the track and setting up a stall!

While other girls were busy learning how to apply makeup, Lin Siqi would travel miles every day to fetch her merchandise. When other girls were sweetly spending time with their boyfriends, Lin Siqi was working hard to sell her wares. Spring, summer, autumn, or winter, as long as it wasn’t raining, her petite figure could always be found on the track. Ice cream, drinks, snacks, general goods—that little pushcart was like a bottomless pit; whatever you wanted, she could probably find it for you!

But for some reason, she suddenly stopped running her stall. The campus lost such a charming sight, which was quite a pity.

Pulling his thoughts back to the present, Zhang Beixing looked at Lin Siqi and said, ”I’ll take a sports drink.”

Lin Siqi is interesting, sure, he thought. But that’s as far as it goes. Right now, my priority is to complete the System’s task and see if these Ability Points work as I expect.

”Sports drink? Sure, that will be six yuan. Paying by WeChat or Alipay?” Listening to Zhang Beixing, Lin Siqi smiled, pulled out a sports drink from the pushcart, handed it to him, and then skillfully presented a payment QR code.

Seeing that a bottle that cost only five yuan in a supermarket was one yuan more expensive here, Zhang Beixing couldn’t help but mutter, ”What a rip-off.” He then took out his phone, found Lin Siqi on WeChat, and sent her a red packet.

Lin Siqi didn’t mind his comment at all. She accepted the red packet quickly and then looked at Zhang Beixing, asking, ”By the way, Lao Zhang, why have you suddenly started running? Did what happened a few days ago get to you?”

Zhang Beixing took a sip of the drink, a little lost for words. He knew very well what Lin Siqi was referring to. ”No,” he replied, ”it was just a break-up. It’s not something I’d dwell on. I just want to lose weight and get fit, that’s all.”

”Oh, I see. Well, that’s good then. I was afraid you were really down about it... But if you want to get fit and lose weight by running, you should adjust your breathing. Your breathing is too erratic; you’ll tire out quickly.”