Chapter 4

Super Dream Audio-Visual Hall is a store name, but the meaning of this name is obvious—it's all thanks to "Super Dream," a recently coined otherworld term from the past few decades.

Although it's a loanword, it happens to share the same translation: BrainDance.

Directly translated as "brain dance," abbreviated BD in English, this audiovisual product surpasses VR's limits—not just replacing sight and sound, but directly substituting part of brain activity, even letting you feel the participant's "emotion," so besides pure audiovisual experience, it can also serve as psychotherapy.

The reason this translation of "Super Dream" quickly covered the original meaning isn't because copyright hasn't been enforced or a same‑named Pokémon hasn't crossed over—it's because the concept of "dream" sums it up really well.

Because "dreams" always draw emotion, some people even feel devastated in their dreams, and upon waking find the aftermath inexplicable—this kind of emotional conflict is also a normal state of Super Dream experiences.

Besides insomniacs, most visitors to this shop are people who want to make themselves unable to sleep; shouting loudly is normal, which suits this kind of transmigrator like Bi Ze.

"Cyberpunk~" Bi Ze sighed while gazing at the shelves.

Compared to others shouting things like "I want xixi! Why isn't there xixi!", "Has my alien exploration flick not arrived yet?", "Boss, do you have resources for the A‑class Ascendant versus the Jiélìtíng Three‑Number Evil God showdown?"—his voice, mixed with the sounds of dangerous contraband, even seemed somewhat restrained.

But this time his sigh was something Aomo could also understand.

When Cyberpunk 2077 first launched and received praise, it also boosted the popularity of the term "Super Dream." Bringing it up, Bi Ze once flew into a rage: "Damn, they don't just copy poetry, prose, and essays—they even copy games! This isn't ordinary plagiarism; we need to strike hard!"

Aomo knew he didn't care at all about intellectual property rights for otherworldly knowledge works; he merely wanted to copy, found the path already taken, and could only angrily shout, "It can be taken and replaced!"

Can it really be taken and replaced?

Aomo knew those who copy games also put in great effort—for example, the team that copied Cyberpunk 2077 openly declared it an otherworldly game, but they refined the content, just like those who once copied World of Warcraft, giving games that were "ill‑omened in old age" or "mid‑way collapsed" a decent ending.

Doing this isn't something you can figure out by mere thinking; you at least need understanding, passion, technical skill, and perseverance. Compared to that, copying movies, animations, or novels is simpler.

In this world there are devices that can directly read memories; recreating a work would be a breeze—with that mindset, Bi Ze opened a search engine and discovered that transmigrants here are incredibly cutthroat.

No wonder it's regulated.

—referring to the laws concerning transmigrants and the portal controls of Heaven Gate City.

Heaven Gate City lies two thousand light‑years from Holy Terra, situated on the frontier world of Aron as one of its major space‑port cities, and is the most prosperous planetary city in the Aron Star Domain; Aomo longs for it.

But that's not the point; the point is that Heaven Gate City's star gate is special.

Originally designed as a large fixed‑point jump facility for faster‑than‑light travel, the star gate was meant to open a trans‑spacetime network between two gates, but due to various energy interferences, some gates transform into "Heaven Gates" linking to "otherworlds."

The "Heaven Gate" in Heaven Gate City is the key—when its Heaven Gate activates, it creates a small‑scale dimensional shock that tears sixteen stable astral rifts outside the planet. The worlds behind those astral rifts are collectively called otherworlds; most of those originating from the Heaven Gate's dimensional shock are highly abnormal, with environmental differences vastly unlike the native universe, even including tiny "round‑sky square‑earth" worlds and floating island worlds where everything drifts in the air.

The Star Alliance takes this very seriously, having dispatched official squads and corporate mercenary teams to explore, and also assigning researchers to study and regulate those sixteen stable astral rifts, with the primary goal of achieving world selection, switching, and locking—also to send certain transmigrants home.

Naturally, these measures were pushed and voted on by high‑ranking homesick transmigrants. This world isn't devoid of malice; on the surface most regimes welcome all outsiders, but in practice capturing and researching these otherworld refugees is possible—after all, there are so many otherworlds, some unseen, and some obscure civilizations eagerly crave them.

The laws regarding transmigrants were created precisely for this reason.

First to be implemented was naturally the Holy Terra Federation, a civilization inseparably linked to transmigrants, whose very name bears some otherworldly cultural influence.

"Everything's so expensive—why don't you try this?"

Bi Ze, scanning the shelves, raised his hand; Aomo followed his gaze and saw on the package a girl depicted with black deer fur and a white streak, the reason "black deer fur" is used to describe a horse is naturally because she has twin ears on her head and a half‑length tail protruding from behind.

"Emperor's Prize Spring Autumn Consecutive Wins, Total General Soaring Into Birth, this is the best‑viewing Super Dream," "Special Week?"

"I haven't even said it yet—you also watch horse racing?" Bi Ze, cut off, looked surprised, then realized, "Oh, you're good at history."

"Have a look yourself." Aomo shook his head.

"I haven't even installed a crystal core—you see the label says at least Level 4 cybernetic augmentation is required," Bi Ze pointed to a tiny "4" tag on the lower‑right corner of the cover, resentfully adding, "Super Dreams that rely on crystal cores are really numerous."

The grades of cybernetic augmentation: Level 4 is the shallowest, merely implanting a single crystal core into the brain's nerves.

With just one crystal core, functions are limited; it default‑manages the brain's architecture, building a certain degree of mental firewall, whereas networking and simple AI require extra payment and effort to achieve.

"After all, it was originally a tech platform." The youth who'd undergone Level 4 augmentation spoke calmly.

"There are also Super Dream platforms based on source‑energy frameworks—I could look at those; let me go find them," Bi Ze said, starting to walk, then paused, "What do you want to see? I'll browse along."

Source‑energy frameworks follow the path of magic, witchcraft, and psychic power; the experience has almost no threshold, but the price must be raised by several tens of percent.

But when you actually encounter a Super Dream you want to try, the price difference doesn't matter.

Even Aomo hesitated for a few seconds, his gaze idly sweeping a nearby shelf, then froze for a moment before reaching out.

"Never mind, I found it."

"?" Bi Ze turned at the words, stepped closer to look at the radiant figure on the package, and his eyes lit up: "The sighting log of Noah Ultraman? You like the Light Giant, huh?"

"Not exactly," Aomo shook his head, his finger sliding to the ferocious majestic beast opposite the figure, "Do you know it?"

"I don't know every transmigrant product either…" Bi Ze scratched his head, "Although I recognize Ultraman, I've hardly watched any tokusatsu, and it's hard to say whether this monster is a transmigrant thing."

As he spoke, he carefully watched Aomo's expression; seeing a hint of disappointment, he quickly added, "This world itself has monsters, doesn't it? After all, there are plenty of aliens."

Aomo nodded, scanned the shelves again, and said, "Help me look for any monster‑themed Super Dreams."

"You like monsters? Sure, I'll go look."

It's not that I can't understand... Godzilla, King Ghidorah, and the like always have fans; giant beasts fighting crickets is also a classic item. Bi Ze felt his grasp of his good brother's perspective improve a bit, turned back and ran to the opposite shelf, leaving Aomo standing where he was, again lowering his gaze at the Super Dream in his hand.

Noah Ultraman—quite a few transmigrants can recognize Him.

But according to those transmigrants' accounts, He is a character from a fictional work; His becoming real once caused considerable worry because of His god‑like abilities and the corresponding antagonists in the story, yet in fact Noah's sighting reports are only this one instance—some speculate that, since He already possesses time‑travel ability, He might return without needing a Heaven Gate, and sightings of alien beasts have never appeared.

Given the constant flow of information on the interstellar internet, this can only be considered a minor blip; only this Super Dream and the later‑born tokusatsu drama based on it prove that there was once a craze.

And that was decades ago.

The Light Giant's story didn't attract him, but the endless stream of monster works tied to it gave him occasional throbs of excitement.

Especially the monster‑themed Super Dreams.

Ferocious appearance, erupting power, brutal posture.

Those recorded works always, in a uniform manner, shape a perspective of deep fear and racing blood, trying to make the audience feel the oppression of confronting inhumanly hateful things.

But he always lacked resonance with that utmost sincere emotion; instead, from it arose a sense of longing.

As if innate.