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Having finally managed to scare off the two unwelcome visitors who had come knocking, Sun Cheng locked the door behind them and immediately felt his legs go weak, collapsing onto the floor.

The fact that he had dared to confront those two loan sharks of unknown origin head-on had truly been driven by a burst of anger, some quick thinking, and a little acting.

Fortunately, they were the sort who bullied the weak and feared the strong. They had failed to react in time and had been bluffed by him. Otherwise, if nothing else, he certainly would have taken a beating.

"Are the guards at Nanjing University of Technology all eating shit? This is the country's top engineering university, yet any stray cat or dog can just walk through the gates!"

After sitting on the floor and gasping for breath for a while, Sun Cheng could not help grumbling to himself.

Still, he knew the guards could not really be blamed. Nanjing University of Technology had the best campus facilities in the area. Not to mention that, after work, many young people and nearby elderly residents liked entering through the side gates to stroll around the sports field—even at the main gate, there was only an extra registration procedure. It simply could not keep people out.

Sun Cheng remained slumped there for quite some time before finally regaining enough strength to stand.

After all, he was only a young man in his early twenties. A week ago, how could he ever have imagined that the world could be so ugly and filthy?

Returning to his computer, Sun Cheng no longer felt like tinkering with it. The confrontation just now had drained too much of his energy.

However, he was a cautious person. Especially after his experiences in that other world, Sun Cheng had become even more distrustful of everything except himself.

Though he had only casually mentioned showing Xiao Hong and the others the progress of his startup project tomorrow, in case that guy really came by, he could not be completely unprepared.

So Sun Cheng created a new document. As he recalled his original startup proposal, he summarized the lessons he had learned, refined and revised it, and got busy at the computer.

He worked for more than two hours. Only when the dorm lights suddenly went out, and the abrupt discomfort in his eyes snapped him back to his senses, did he instinctively glance at the time in the lower-right corner of his screen and realize it was lights-out.

"Lights-out already? Fine, I should get some rest first. Tomorrow, I'll find time to visit the library and look for some programming textbooks."

Although his laptop had an external battery and could last another two hours even after the school power was cut, Sun Cheng stopped working and prepared to rest.

He had finished the new project proposal over an hour earlier. After that, he had been trying to use the computer skills that had suddenly surged within him to redesign and create an emulator all by himself.

But the result dealt him a harsh blow.

After trying for nearly an hour, Sun Cheng discovered that he had no idea where to begin.

It was not that writing an emulator was more difficult than streamlining and improving an operating system. If the workload and difficulty of the two were compared, they were clearly not even on the same scale. Streamlining and improving an operating system was far more difficult.

Yet during the day, once he had an idea, he had managed to complete the nearly impossible task of improving Windows XP all on his own in just a few hours.

Now, however, when he tried to develop an emulator by himself, he found that he had absolutely no clue where to start.

How should he put it? It was as if there simply was no concept of an emulator in his mind.

"As expected, the sudden surge in my computer skills was only an illusion. Those skills were not truly mine—they were merely the result of being influenced by Frenzy's memory data..."

Though somewhat disappointed, Sun Cheng had not been entirely unprepared for it. In fact, he had suspected it from the beginning; it had merely been confirmed now.

In the other world, he had once used Frenzy's body to invade the global Internet. At the time, Microsoft's Windows XP was the most widely used operating system in that world. Perhaps because of that, Frenzy's core had inadvertently completely cracked the operating system, and through shared memories, affected him after he returned to the real world.

Now that Sun Cheng wanted to develop an emulator, there was no concept of emulators in the memories he had gained from Frenzy. And as a human, he clearly did not have a miraculous artifact like a Decepticon's [Core] in his head. He could only rely on his own original abilities, which was why he found himself completely unable to begin.

He went to the washroom across from the dormitory, finished washing up in the dark within a few minutes, then returned to the room. After shutting down his computer, he climbed into bed.

He had barely closed his eyes when drowsiness came over him. His thoughts grew hazy, and at the same time, he once again sensed a faint, elusive pull coming from some unknown corner of his body.

"Wait, could this be...?"

His heart stirred. Sun Cheng forced himself to stay alert and instinctively probed toward the source of that pull.

The next instant, he felt as though his consciousness had encountered a vortex. In the blink of an eye, he found himself back in that azure spherical space.

Although this was not his first time here, Sun Cheng still found it unbelievable to return.

It was too marvelous.

Such a wondrous space could actually allow him to travel back and forth between two worlds.

He looked around and confirmed once more that there was nothing within the azure spherical space except the two light screens at its center. He could not help feeling somewhat disappointed.

The less information he had, the less able he was to determine what this place was, why it possessed the ability to send people through worlds, and why he himself could enter it.

Fortunately, Sun Cheng quickly adjusted his mindset. He controlled his ghostlike body and drifted around the spherical space for a while. Growing bored, he decided to leave and immediately flew toward the light screen that led back to reality.

Whoosh!

The light screen lit up at once. Though it was late at night in reality, it clearly displayed his own body lying quietly in bed asleep.

After estimating in his mind roughly how much time had passed between waking up that morning and falling asleep just now, he looked at the lower-right corner of the light screen. Comparing it with the constantly changing numbers behind the red star, he nodded to himself.

"No mistake—the string of numbers behind the red star represents time. But what exactly does it mean? What will change in the spherical space after thirty days? Or will it be the real world?"

Because he had far too little information, Sun Cheng had no clue at all. After frowning in frustration for more than ten seconds, he steadied himself and stopped dwelling on what they represented.

Just as he was about to return to reality, he inadvertently caught sight of a change in the data behind the blue star above the red star, and his attention suddenly sharpened.

"Huh? Why has the data behind the blue star changed to 237/1000? I remember it being 437/1000 the last time I came in, didn't I?"

After carefully thinking back, Sun Cheng quickly confirmed that he had not remembered incorrectly. He was certain that the number he had previously seen was 437/1000.

Remembering that the other light screen appeared to display the same set of data, he drifted over to it at once. As soon as the screen lit up, he looked toward its lower-right corner and discovered that the numbers behind the blue star had indeed changed from 437/1000 to 237/1000.

"I wasn't mistaken. This data really has changed—and it decreased. What does that mean?"

He made a scratching gesture. It was what Sun Cheng liked doing most whenever he was troubled, but unfortunately, he was currently in ghost form. Still, his worries had not diminished in the slightest just because his body had temporarily vanished.

If anything, Sun Cheng felt even more troubled now. His head was crammed with questions that demanded so much thought he felt like scratching through his scalp.

For instance, why had the number after Blue Star suddenly decreased again?

Unable to help himself, Sun Cheng began to think back. He remembered that when he had still been at Starscream Base, replenishing Frenzy's body with energy in the [Supply Room], he had detected the fluctuations of the spherical space just like he had tonight, allowing him to enter this place again. Back then, the number displayed after Blue Star had still been 437/1000.

"Wait..." A flash of insight crossed Sun Cheng's mind. "It was after that that I returned from the Decepticon world, and the number after Blue Star decreased by two hundred as well? Does that mean the number after Blue Star represents some kind of energy that lets me freely travel back and forth between the two worlds?"

With that thought, he suddenly understood. That explained everything. All that remained was to verify it after his next crossing.

Looking back at the light screen, Sun Cheng soon made another discovery. When his gaze casually swept over the White Star below, he saw that the data behind it had changed as well, from the original 2/1 to the current 1/1.

He was not overly troubled by the change in White Star's data, because Sun Cheng had already formed a few guesses about it. He felt that this set of data most likely represented the things he could bring between the two worlds.

For example, the iPhone 5 he had brought from reality to the other world last time, or the Level 2 core he had brought back from the other world to reality this time.

However, just like Blue Star, the meaning represented by White Star still required more experiments before he could verify whether his guess was correct.

Feeling that his understanding of the spherical space had deepened somewhat, Sun Cheng's mood immediately improved. Even the irritation and unease Xiao Hong and the others had caused by coming to his door to demand repayment faded considerably.

Just as he was about to return to the real world, Sun Cheng casually glanced at Frenzy's body displayed on the light screen before him and suddenly stopped with a frown.

His previous two crossings had both happened passively, yet he had gained quite a lot from each of them.

The first time, he discovered that he could share Frenzy's memory data in the real world. The second time, not only had he found a way to repay his debts, but he had also brought a Level 2 core from the Decepticon Corps back to reality. That thing was dangerous, but if he could fully master it, the benefits would be obvious.

Both passive crossings had brought Sun Cheng considerable benefits from the other world, and that deeply affected him.

Then he thought of what had happened to him in reality. Not only had his startup failed, but he had also been set up and saddled with usurious debts. He had announced the dissolution of his startup team only that morning, yet Xiao Hong and the others had immediately jumped out that very night. They had even come to his door to threaten and intimidate him. No matter how he looked at it, they did not seem like the sort who would let him off easily.

This paradise called reality was no longer safe. The danger might even descend upon his family.

And clever as Sun Cheng was, he had realized that his only way to break the deadlock lay not in reality, but in the other world—in Frenzy's body, the one he had possessed through crossing over.

That discovery stirred up new turmoil in the heart of the man who had already resolved never to return to that dangerous other world.

Now that he stood before the door leading to the other world, Sun Cheng could not help but hesitate. His gaze shifted repeatedly between the two light screens representing reality and the other world. Only after several rounds did he finally make up his mind, grit his teeth, and charge headlong into the light screen before him that could send him to the other world.