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Chapter 21: Stress Response Like a Show-Off
A stress response, literally understood, refers to the non-specific reaction an individual has when a stimulus appears. Simply put, it’s the body’s defense and coping mechanism.
Anyone who’s raised cats or dogs knows that if you suddenly strike at the back of a pet—like tapping their rear end or grabbing their hind legs—they will often jump up in reflex, and in extreme cases, they might even bite instinctively. This is a stress response.
In contrast to conditioned reflexes, which can be trained and changed over time, stress responses are ingrained in our genes, completely beyond our control. For example, in The Bodyguard From Beijing, Jet Li's character can block a bullet to protect someone, while ordinary untrained people would struggle to do the same. This is because, in such situations, the body relies on conditioned reflexes, not just willpower.
A stress response is more like a natural talent—it cannot be altered because it’s triggered by a stimulus that causes abnormal emotional reactions in the body. However, if a person undergoes training over years, the original stimulus may eventually lose its power to provoke a strong reaction.
Think about the final scene of the movie, where two protagonists face gunmen: one dodges instinctively, while Jet Li’s character rushes to protect the female lead. People who understand this know that comparing these actions is unfair. One is a stress response, the other a conditioned reflex—totally different, not comparable at all.
If Gu Lang were chased by lions a few more times, his reaction might not be as intense. Habituation is one factor, but the likelihood of him going mad seems much higher.
Under stress, humans experience activation of the sympathetic nervous system and a surge in adrenaline, which can cause heart rate instability and put tremendous strain on the body. At this moment, Gu Lang’s actions were all reflexive, driven by both physiological and psychological stress, which was why he looked so swift. But if one touched his body at this moment, one’d find that his muscles were trembling uncontrollably.
But Wang Ping had to admit, if he didn’t look at his face, Gu Lang’s performance was quite cool—it totally stunned Wang Ping.
Just as the lioness lunged, Gu Lang turned, got in the car, released the handbrake, shifted gears, lifted the clutch, and floored the gas pedal—all in one smooth motion, done in less than two seconds. The lioness didn’t even get a chance to touch the car door before being left far behind. It was so cool that it was beyond words.
Wang Ping had only ever seen something like this in a movie, which is why he believed Gu Lang’s stress response was different from others.
For most ordinary people, just getting back in the car would be difficult enough; let alone starting the car and evading an attack.
As a veteran, Wang Ping subconsciously thought, "It’s a shame this guy didn’t become a soldier."
But if he observed Gu Lang’s expression at this moment, he'd see that while his actions were impressive, the reality was far from it. The goof was still the same goof, and he wasn’t going to change his "goofy" nature just because something happened suddenly.
Unfortunately, since Wang Ping had broken the live-streaming equipment, the viewers wouldn’t see this all-too-familiar scene: his mouth slightly agape, breaths heavy, drool escaping without restraint. His unfocused eyes stared blankly ahead, fixed on nothing in particular, while beads of sweat layered his forehead, streaming down in rivulets.
This expression was identical to those of young girls in a theater who get scared by a horror movie. Wang Ping even doubted that Gu Lang was aware of his smooth actions earlier—they were purely unconscious reflexes.
What Wang Ping didn’t know was that before meeting him, Gu Lang had been chased by a lion pride and had a similar experience. Although he eventually recovered, it caused him to veer off course, and then he encountered Wang Ping.
This time, under the pressure of nearly losing his life to the lions, Gu Lang’s reaction was much more intense than before.
If Wang Ping had known this earlier, his first move would have been to snap Gu Lang out of it, because last time, Gu Lang had driven under this condition, and the result wasn’t pretty.
But right now, he was too distracted by the lioness chasing them to pay much attention to Gu Lang.
"Tsk, this feeling is almost like a scam," Wang Ping thought uneasily. Though Gu Lang was a goof, he had prevented the lion cub from getting hit by stopping the car just in time.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t reason with animals. Otherwise, Wang Ping would have grabbed the lioness by the scruff of the neck and asked, "What the hell, you top predator of the African food chain, trying to scam me using your kid? Have you no shame?"
Suppressing the inexplicable urge to fight, Wang Ping thought about a strategy.
At that moment, he missed the days working with his teammates in Team Three. Every time there was a mission, Luke and Jacob would discuss a general plan, then go over it with the team and assign roles.
Those were the good old days! Just do his part, and trust his teammates to handle the rest. Unlike now, dealing with an animal that couldn’t communicate and a human who dared not engage deeply, everything had to be thought through carefully, and there were always unexpected complications.
Wang Ping felt exhausted and just wanted to lie down with Anna under the stars.
Uh…. Anna?
The woman’s image popped into his mind, and Wang Ping instinctively lost focus.
Anna was also a member of the WAP security team, from the same team as Wang Ping. Apart from Luke and Jacob, Anna was his closest teammate. The others even joked that the two of them might be more than just friends.
It was probably because of Anna’s looks.
Anna was Eurasian, but aside from her golden hair and brown eyes, her other features were completely Asian. She had wheat-colored skin, modest features, a petite figure, and a reserved personality. Most of the other team members thought Anna wasn’t conventionally attractive, calling her plain, but to Wang Ping, she was like an angel.
So, Wang Ping enjoyed chatting with Anna, and Anna was the only teammate who didn’t "dislike" him.
Originally, Wang Ping considered, since they were so close, maybe he could trick her into becoming his wife. But before he could make a move, he had ended up in this situation.
"Ah! The world is a strange place!" he sighed.
Before he could finish his lament, Rosette’s sudden movement snapped him back to attention.
Rosette, who had been growling at the lioness behind them from the back seat, suddenly stood up and perked up its ears. Wang Ping, lost in thought with one paw around Rosette’s neck, was unexpectedly thrown off balance and fell onto the seat.
The lioness, which had been relentlessly pursuing the car, suddenly stopped and turned its head toward something.
Wang Ping climbed back to lean against the backseat and looked out the rear window. He saw the lioness seemed to have been distracted by something behind, momentarily abandoning its pursuit.
From a distance, Wang Ping could faintly hear the roar of a lion pride.
"What’s happening?" Wang Ping’s curiosity was piqued, but this wasn’t the time for distractions.
In the past, while on field missions monitoring protected animals, Wang Ping had often seen amusing, strange events unfold through binoculars.
Animal arguments were sometimes even more interesting than human drama. Like the mother monkey who got slapped by her husband after mistaking another child for hers, or the male antelopes that got stuck together by their horns while fighting for mating rights, or the baboon chased far away by his mother for trying to take over the clan leadership from his father.
Watching and discussing these animal dramas was one of the few pleasures during dull field surveillance.
Now, just out of Wang Ping's sight, a group of hyenas was facing off against a lion pride led by a male lion.
If African animals were given a survey asking which animals they hated the most, lions would certainly list the buzz-cut bro (aka honey badger) first, and second on the list—without a doubt—would be hyenas.
Lions, when hunting, would often abandon their prey just to kill a hyena first. Sometimes, they would even tear the hyena’s body apart out of sheer disdain.
Hyenas, who silently tail lions during a hunt, waiting to steal their kill, were considered the scum of the savannah by lions, a nuisance in the animal kingdom.
Now, these loathed creatures were actually coming together in a confrontation?
"Roar!" Suddenly, an intense roar shattered the peaceful grassland air.
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