Chapter 23

Flying iron shells shuttle between air currents, looking down on the city below.

In the Gate Zone, the number of hovercars is strictly limited, so hovertaxi fares are higher than in other cities, to the point of being considered expensive.

Thus, Aomo found such vehicles quite unfamiliar, and the aerial view they provided also felt fresh to him.

This is a country bumpkin... he sighed inwardly.

There is a kind of world change that begins with vision: when you stand on the ground, what your sight reaches and your steps can go to is the world's boundary.

And such a world can obviously be larger.

Before, he tried to memorize the whole Gate Zone's appearance, but when looking at the aerial view of the Gate Zone, he was forced to recognize the world's strangeness.

Land covered with buildings spreads out wildly; the boundary is mountains, inland seas, and more unfamiliar neighboring urban areas.

Thus, the world in his eyes is obviously more expansive.

And now, he directly passed over the Earth where the Holy Terra Federation resides, arriving at Heaven's Gate City, a magnificent metropolis where a single city occupies half a planet.

Gazing at those towering skyscrapers, huge screens, massive projections, and bustling markets, the cityscape utterly different from the Gate Zone is fully revealed before him from a bird's‑eye view, far more vivid, detailed, and strange than what he saw in travel magazines.

He can roughly infer part of a person from their traces; if given a little more time to observe, even to interact, he will gain a more complete picture of that person's appearance.

He also gazes at these scenes of Heaven's Gate City; the view from above covers such a vast area, yet that can only be considered a trace of Heaven's Gate City.

Through those corners, he tries to perceive the subtle signs, to know the whole from a leaf, to understand the city, and then naturally—feels a wave of dizziness.

"Guest, are you alright?"

The taxi's driver‑monitoring alarm hasn't sounded, but the passenger‑monitoring alarm has beeped slightly due to rising body temperature, drawing the driver's concern.

"Just a bit dizzy; a short rest will do."

"Ah, okay, if you need motion‑sickness medicine it's in the rear seat box." The driver reminded him and then continued driving confidently, also because Aomo had scanned his health code before boarding, so his recent itinerary appeared at Heaven's Gate Airport, having passed its thorough security check.

They check for illegal possession of weapons, viruses, alien pathogens, etc.; in Heaven's Gate City, where transmigrator culture is especially strong, these must be strictly confirmed.

Also needing strict confirmation is Aomo's declared fourth‑grade cybernetic enhancement—namely the brain crystal—verifying that the basic function package includes mental and spiritual protection before clearance.

Like Morrison, who refuses enhancement as an energy ascendant, they instead confirm possession of a mental‑system cultivation certificate.

This is also a requirement tied to transmigrator culture, because not all otherworldly visitors come in the flesh.

Rather, the highest proportion of recorded cases is actually soul‑transmigration.

And soul‑transmigration incidents are also the most conflict‑prone.

It embarrasses both the visitor and the original body's owner, easily leading to disputes, more easily turning into a fight to the death, and sometimes one party is not benevolent, seizing the body and at once embarking on a kingly conquest—this has many past cases.

Please note, that is 'the past'.

Since the Transmigrator Act was promulgated, mental protection has become a basic popularization focus; soul‑transmigration case rates have plummeted off a cliff, now less than one percent of the past.

After all, everyone's souls have been reinforced and locked, making them not so easily possessed by wandering spirits.

At this point, either they negotiate properly, or they wait for an unwilling soul to dissipate naturally, or else the other's soul happens to be vicious and capable of fighting, adding a case to soul‑transmigration criminal investigations and being pursued by the Two Worlds transmigrators.

"…" Aomo frowned, unconsciously thinking of the case Morrison had taken over in cooperation.

As for Heaven's Gate City, if you ask what its feature is, besides the twenty‑plus star gates, it's those dozen or so otherworldly grand stages that refuse to close.

Sixteen subspace rifts, sixteen otherworldly gates.

The meaning behind them is the transmigrators.

Here, new transmigrators appear almost daily, thanks to the continual exploration of the civilizational frontier; some knowledge from other worlds can also ease resource pressure, and over the past century there have been breakthroughs in fixed Heaven's Gate transmission, able to send a small number of transmigrators home.

Otherwise a population crisis would have erupted long ago.

Of course this isn't important; what matters is that Heaven's Gate City's most numerous cases also involve transmigrators committing crimes.

These otherworldly visitors always manage to give the locals a big show; although the Two Worlds Safety Bureau's database already holds a large amount of alien information, the richness of otherworldly possibilities means there will always be something not in the database that shows up, after which they start causing trouble.

And if mishandled, the incident will expand, the case will worsen, making the Two Worlds Safety Bureau extremely difficult to operate, taking the harshest blows and receiving the most criticism; they may even have to study Jidong's mental practices.

—one by one they rise at 90°, begin a great transformation, presenting the standard artisan format of the private red‑bean masquerade.

It is precisely because the pressure is so great that they don't mind cooperating with private security firms and mercenaries.

"If you can solve the problem, why all the nonsense?" — words of the inaugural director of the Two Worlds Safety Bureau.

Think back a few decades: even netizens thought Noah Ultraman's mere existence was laughable, a threat, trying to stir up a trend to make the local Two Worlds Safety Bureau of the nearby star sector handle it—you say, for that bureau director suddenly cued, would his thoughts then be close to some Golden Sword?

Then he surely even had the thought of begging the Heart of Terra to open that box of the internet simpleton.

— Aomo, when he first saw that director's solemn assurance at a press conference, had once guessed the director's true thoughts in this way.

Of course, cannot guarantee precision... Aomo pondered these odds and ends, his gaze on the driver also turning back to the window.

Mainly also because the driver looks rather frightening; his hands and head have clearly divided labor, his eyes on the onboard video while his hands keep steady driving.

And the video he is watching is also the only thing Aomo feels familiar with in this city.

It is a variety show that pulls in several highly popular celebrity guests to point and comment on a certain recent match.

The girls on the racecourse are like lightning, like flying arrows; holding their own beliefs, they burn at the same moment, akin to a flaming roulette wheel spun by friction, turning without cease; the twin ears on their heads and the long tails behind them also flutter in the wind thanks to that shining will.

And the splendid race logo on it is clearly visible.

April 612, the Satsuki Sho; he had seen that footage once before, and in the end the Eastern Emperor took that honor.

Heaven's Gate City's racetrack bears several major events of the Umamusume total schedule, and the influence of Umamusume naturally extends to cover it.

Naturally, he does not consider going to check out this place's Trisen branch.

On the contrary, as someone who has deeply studied those races, Aomo felt a flicker of pride as an 'insider' at that moment, thus having some desire to talk, and unconsciously wanting to give the driver who watches the Umamusume variety some 'instruction'.

But his longstanding reason gave no room for that emotion to expand; he ruthlessly suppressed it and wiped away the urge to speak.

After that, he again stared blankly.

To him, a mere 'insider' guidance impulse would not exist; such a shallow motive could not spark a thought, whereas a sufficiently solid motive ought to be called another concept:

Professional confidence.

He had thought that such professional confidence would at least only arise after several years of work, but now he realizes he has actually poured too much effort into this path, leading to this unconscious identification.

What is this?

You've long been ground by life into the shape of a trainer?

It's really awful, awful in every sense.