Braindance

"Braindance? What's that?"

After dinner, on the way to look at apartments together, Carl grew curious about the term Oliver and Jack kept mentioning.

"Is it something like Pokémon?"

"What are you talking about? What Pokémon? Braindance is Braindance."

Knowing Carl was clueless about many things, Oliver simply explained it to her. Under his crash-course explanation, Carl roughly understood what Braindance was.

Simply put, it was something like a VR experience. It digitized the recorder's personal experiences from a video recording, then, after special amplification, played them directly through the viewer's nervous system. The viewer could experience everything the recorder had felt while recording, from pain to pleasure, with every sensation stimulated through the nerves, ensuring the recorder and viewer had identical experiences.

It was the most popular form of entertainment in this era, and Braindance Headsets were found in every household, much like the status phones had held in Carl's old world.

"Sounds interesting. I want to try it."

That was Carl's attitude toward Braindance.

"Alright, then we'll find a shop selling Braindance Headsets on the way and get you one to try."

Jack and Oliver had already grown used to Carl's sheltered-young-lady level of common sense. Seeing that she was interested, they immediately changed course and drove toward a Braindance store first.

A head-mounted Braindance headset wasn't expensive. A brand-new one for personal use cost only a thousand eddies, and it came with several of the latest popular Braindance recordings on the market.

"Make My Heart Beat, Soul of Light, Sword Coast Gate. Why are they all game-related?"

Oliver wanted to help Carl pick out something good, but after looking through them, he discovered that all the popular titles included for free were games.

"I bet they throw in the game ones because they can't sell them. They may be popular, but in Night City, they're probably less exciting than taking a stroll down the street."

Jack browsed the other Braindances on the shelves. "I think The Old Man and the Sea looks pretty good."

"Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea?"

Carl's question got Jack a little excited. "You read Hemingway too?"

"Isn't it a classic?"

"A classic?"

Oliver scratched his head beside them. He seemed to be the only one among the three who had no idea what The Old Man and the Sea was about. "What's it about?"

"Simply put, it's the story of an old man fishing."

Carl's summary was concise.

"Fishing? Aren't the seas around Night City polluted to hell by now? I can't see myself getting immersed in that."

Oliver had wanted to see what this classic Braindance that both Carl and Jack knew was like, but once he heard it was about fishing, he gave up.

"The theme isn't really fishing, though."

Carl picked up the fifty-eddy The Old Man and the Sea Braindance. She really wanted to see what a Braindance adapted from a classic would be like.

Then—

"What are those?"

Carl pointed at the Braindances in the corner, their shelf marked with colors like black blood splashed across it.

"Those Braindances?"

Oliver looked at them and gave a rough explanation. "They're the ones involving gore and porn."

"How gory?"

"If they can be sold openly in a shop like this, they shouldn't be Black Braindances. Probably around the level of bullets punching through someone's chest or abdomen?"

"Through the chest and abdomen?"

Carl walked over for a closer look and found one titled My Years in Trauma Team. Reading the description, she saw that it was a series, depicting one of the recorder's missions with Trauma Team. The keywords were emergency, gunfights, and gang members.

Interesting.

She checked the price. These recordings were a little more expensive than the others, but only seventy eddies—roughly the cost of twenty meals for an ordinary person in Watson District.

Carl had over forty thousand eddies now, so she could naturally afford Braindances at this price. After looking them over, she simply bought the complete three-part series of My Years in Trauma Team, Parts One, Two, and Three. Buying the entire set at once cost only two hundred eddies, saving ten.

Besides that, Carl also picked out A Mercenary's Combat Log, Path of the Boxing King, and Samurai's End. They weren't bundled, but they were all cheaper than the previous series, totaling only one hundred and eighty eddies.

"Carl, are you really buying so many at once?"

Watching Carl buy a Braindance Headset and spend 1,430 eddies in one go without even blinking, Oliver felt that she was truly decisive when it came to spending money. In the past, he would hesitate forever before digging into his pocket to buy even one dirty Braindance, yet Carl was casually getting six stimulating ones at once.

"Didn't you say Braindance lets you completely experience the recorder's senses? There's something I want to verify."

Aside from being curious about the latest entertainment technology of 2075, Carl mostly wanted to see whether she could retain the sensations from a Braindance. If she could, then this pile of Braindances would be equivalent to one-on-one instruction. That was why she had bought Braindances involving medicine, firearms, boxing, and swordsmanship.

"Verify?"

Jack blinked, not really understanding what Carl meant, but he didn't care. Since they had finally come into some money, he picked out several Braindances he had been interested in for a while and prepared to check out as well.

Carl bought some, Jack bought some, and Oliver bought several too. For the owner of the Braindance store, it was a rare day of booming sales. But his happiness did not last long. The store's front door was suddenly kicked open, and three men wearing black hoods that concealed their faces stormed in with three Lexingtons. The moment they entered, they raised their pistols at everyone in the shop.

"Don't move! This is a robbery!"

Now this is Night City.

With guns pointed at her, Carl was confident she could blow the heads off all three people in front of her in an instant. But there was still some danger involved, and if they only intended to rob the place, she had nothing to lose. So she raised her hands, signaling that she had no intention of doing anything.

Oliver and Jack exchanged a glance, then cooperatively raised their hands as well. They clearly had no intention of getting involved in such an all-too-common robbery.

The robbery went quickly. The three robbers had no intention of hurting anyone; money was their only goal. Under the Braindance store owner's tearful gaze, he obediently handed over all the cash in the register, around seven hundred eddies.

The owner could only be grateful that he had not yet completed the transaction with Carl and the others, and that there was not much cash in the store. Otherwise, today's losses would have been disastrous.

Besides taking the money, the robbers also grabbed several game Braindances. They did not take the expensive Braindance Headsets, because those things had serial codes and required professionals to wipe them. These street punks did not have that kind of capability.

Perhaps worried that the Night City Police Department would arrive, the entire robbery proceeded quickly. It took no more than two minutes. Once they had what they wanted, the robbers hurriedly slammed through the door and left, leaving the owner aching with distress.

"Those bastards. I'm calling the Night City Police Department. I'll have every last one of them thrown in a cell."

After cursing, the owner sighed. Just as he was about to resume serving Carl and the other two customers, gunfire sounded outside. From the sound of it, it was the Lexington Carl knew all too well. The next second, the door that had just closed was smashed open again, and a mangled corpse rolled inside. Judging by the damaged hood, it was one of the robbers from earlier.

"Looks like something happened."

Night City, huh.

Carl sighed and, with perfect coordination, drew her gun at the same time as Oliver and Jack.