The Scale of Time

The group chat was still buzzing.

Everyone was talking about it. This was a hero.

The young women working around here really had it hard. They were a vulnerable group, bullied by Old Six Liu, who ran illegal high-interest loans. He was part of the criminal forces entrenched in our college district, so someone had stepped forward!

Not me.

I didn't.

Zhu Zhengwei felt helpless.

He really had just been an ordinary customer.

How could he have conveniently formed some Xin Fu Gang, gone door to door to win them over, stepped forward, and united those young women against that Old Six Liu?

"Wait."

He seemed to have figured something out as well.

This was not a coincidence at all.

The older aunties had probably been troubled by this before, while the young women nearby subconsciously wished someone would save them. What they thought about by day, they dreamed of by night, and so they dreamed of a hero descending from the heavens.

What was happening now was the result of all sorts of factors influencing one another in reality. It was no surprise that such a dream had appeared.

Before I even entered the martial world, my legend was already being told there.

Meanwhile, in the group chat.

Everyone was fired up, as if they had been injected with adrenaline.

What student didn't yearn for brotherhood and righteousness in the martial world?

What student hadn't read novels with plots like this?

A heroic swordsman roamed the martial world, holding a courtesan in one arm while killing enemies and building his name with their heads in the other, then laughing and drinking with his friends, settling grudges and repaying kindness to his heart's content!

And it had happened right near their college district.

It had happened to the young women who dressed so glamorously around them, the very women most ordinary students did not dare approach or support.

The story even had an obvious Hong Kong comic style to it. It was simply satisfying on top of satisfying.

They kept discussing it and even began writing the next chapter of the story.

"This is only about that KTV. There are plenty of other places."

"For example, Dajiao Alley on Yunhua Road is unlike ordinary shops!"

"It looks like a mahjong parlor inside, but its backing is enormous, and danger lurks everywhere! That big shot had just endured countless hardships the previous night without stopping to rest, and tonight, he was charging straight into the dragon's den again!"

Hearing this, Zhu Zhengwei began to question his life.

The dream was bizarre and fantastical, yet far more exciting than reality.

One shop, one dream. Every one of you dreamed that you were evenly matched with me, narrowly escaped death, fought battles of wits and courage in some Hong Kong gangster movie plot, and in the end I subdued all of you until you willingly submitted?

Couldn't you have a little ambition?

Why was every one of you the submissive one? Couldn't you dream about defeating me for once?

Honestly.

Zhu Zhengwei had thought he was already being discreet enough.

He had calculated everything carefully, planned rigorously, and accounted for every step. He had considered himself a modern-day Little Zhuge.

To keep anyone from noticing his actions, he had specifically sought out the line of work most suitable for him: young women like them. He had only found a mere three hundred people, yet what happened?

The entire college district knew who he was now.

At this rate.

He might as well have walked into any café, restaurant, or library, found someone to hypnotize, and hypnotized three hundred people at once until they slumped over their tables. The commotion might not even have been as great as this.

This was awful.

Reality simply refused to follow his script.

"By the way, what does this big shot look like?"

"No one knows his exact appearance. He wore a mask."

"But apparently, he had a powerful build, perfect proportions, and a pair of beautiful, deep black gemstone-like eyes. There was a tear mole at the corner of his eye."

"Holy crap, he's handsome too? Is there any justice in the world?"

After hearing that, everyone felt their imaginations run wild.

Zhu Zhengwei took a sip of tea.

He was an exemplary student. Every day, he merely worked part-time with a few guys from his dorm and earned a little money. He had never imagined he would come into contact with underground criminal forces of this level.

But thinking about it, that made sense.

Ordinary shops were one thing, but some establishments of that sort were special, with terrifying backing. Those shady industries were far from simple. High-interest loans, gambling, and the like ran far too deep.

He really had been too reckless. He had clearly just been sleeping with people everywhere, yet somehow it had turned into a rumor that he was going around challenging establishments.

Of course, his actions might indeed have touched certain people's interests. He really had gone around smashing their turf.

"But I've figured it out. This 'hypnosis' ability actually has an effect like this? It seems like a way to save my life. If someone comes looking for trouble in the future and wants to fight me one-on-one or get into a brawl, I can just make him sleep. The random plot can continue in the dream while I run away in reality." Zhu Zhengwei took a deep breath and could no longer be bothered to listen to the two animals beside him.

They were excitedly saying that they were already heading to stake out the entrance of the establishment and secretly become his disciples.

But he knew their cowardly personalities. They were just talking big.

"But I really shouldn't show myself lately."

In the dream, Zhujing Village. A farmhouse.

Zhu Zhengwei sat before his desk with a calm expression. Holding the pencil that had pierced the corner of his eye back then, he organized his thoughts again while writing down his future goals.

For now, he had two small goals.

1. Expand the number of Servers.

2. Develop the civilization of the Dream World.

Frankly speaking, it was easy enough to expand the number of Servers and develop a "Campus Network" on campus.

After all, everyone in the dormitories basically went to sleep at fixed times, and he was among them. Every bubble meant another Miner.

These young people let him take whatever he wanted.

But students were ultimately too uniform.

Their fixed sleep schedules meant the Rational World only opened at night.

"I originally wanted to develop day-shift rotations, so I went off campus to look for outdoor Servers. Instead, I caused such a huge fuss. I need to learn from this."

He wrote calmly, sorting out his logic and plans.

"Still, despite the huge commotion, I somehow connected to a strange line and created the beginnings of an intelligence network. The customers of those young women come from all walks of life, so the intelligence network speaks for itself. Perhaps I can use it in the future?"

"But danger and opportunity coexist."

He knew himself well.

These were real people of society, involved in criminal and shady industries. As a student, he could not handle them yet, and he had no real combat power.

He had lived another twenty years, but he had spent all that time using Time to train his body. His experience was still lacking. There was no need to get entangled with them. He could simply wait a little longer.

"In short, I'll keep a low profile for now. The rumors may be huge, but this round of Server harvesting is already enough! Because of their work, most of them sleep during the day and open for business at night, making up for my lack of Mining Machines during the day."

His gains were considerable now. He had officially formed Servers that were online twenty-four hours a day.

He thought to himself.

"It can finally get on the right track."

"A world constructed from human dreams has finally been completely built."

"It will now continue day and night, cycling and operating on its own. What brilliant flowers will it bloom into?"

Zhu Zhengwei had read countless science fiction books, even books from centuries in the future that depicted grand and magnificent human civilizations. They truly filled him with longing.

Yet compared to the scale of civilization's history, a human's brief lifetime was like a drop in the ocean.

Even Einstein and Tesla, those great giants of their eras, had died with regrets after a short span of time, eventually becoming nothing but bones beneath yellow earth.

That was reality.

An old professor Zhu Zhengwei knew often said, "I work out not to live longer, but because I want to see how wonderful the next few decades will become."

The universe was far too vast, while humanity's scale was far too small.

That was fate. No matter how brilliant the future world became, what did it have to do with you? You would merely witness one tiny ripple within it.

But things were different now. He had used Servers, Mining Machines, and the Brain Blockchain to construct a "world," mining the entire map of civilization.

There, Time flew by. A single dream could span a lifetime, enough to simulate civilization's future thousands of years from now.

Zhu Zhengwei reached out and tapped.

Snap.

Snap.

Snap.

The bubbles he had gathered from around the campus were officially opened one by one.

"I've already cast Dream Anchors for each of them. It's time to reel those fish who have gone through a few twists and turns into my world."

Zhu Zhengwei's expression calmed. Facing the sunlight, he took a copy of Stephen Hawking's 1988 A Brief History of Time from the bookshelf and began reading it patiently, his expression gentle.

"The scale of Time?"

Time passed rapidly in this world, but he could basically confirm that he could live forever here and spend one long era after another.

How would the civilization of the Dream World's Local Area Network develop?

"Second Brother, there are some books I can't understand. I came to ask you about them," Third Brother suddenly said from outside the door.

"Coming." Zhu Zhengwei slowly rose to his feet, but an invisible sound seemed to ring beside his ear, like a splash falling onto water.

Ding!

"Welcome to Mortal World"

"Closed Beta Version 0.1"

"Current expansion: Miner's Birth."

"Current players online: 309."

This Dream Anchor was still necessary.

It was the essential medium for pulling people into dreams.

As for the third batch of Servers, those young women who did not like playing games?

They would also need unified Dream Anchors.

Things had to be standardized.

With daily brainwashing, the Anchor's effect would grow stronger and gradually synchronize them with everyone else.

At this moment, a large number of the third batch of Servers entered. These babies were born into this world, bringing thriving vitality to it.

Zhu Zhengwei did not interfere with the births of these baby girls.

No matter who they were, how lowly their reality was, or whether their nature was good or evil, everyone had the right to live One Lifetime anew. All things in the world were balanced and equal. No one could deprive another person of their innate Right to Mine.