Cyberpunk: From Dogville to Legend

Chapter 272 Surpassing Power! [5K]

Perhaps because of the series of events that have occurred in the Watson area, the area around the company square seems to have become much quieter.

Arakasa had been operating under NID for a long time, so at this critical juncture, the once tranquil Watson Industrial Zone was filled with a somber atmosphere.

The engines of the hovercars roared past, kicking up turbid air that swirled into waves of air, gradually turning into black dots as they swooped away into the landscape!

The surrounding air echoed with the relentless consumerist traps of Night City's advertising, a battleground of relentless activity...

Lin Yue tapped his fingers on his knees, pondering who his enemy was.

[Incoming caller ID: V]

The woman's voice on the holographic screen was cold and clear, "As your 'good partner' Arasaka, this is all I can do to help you. The counterintelligence department has done all the dirty things that the residents of Night City have been talking about, forcing people to admit their crimes at gunpoint, and chasing civilians without cybernetic bodies everywhere—of course, Arasaka still thinks we are putting in the effort."

Lin Yue was somewhat puzzled.

"Didn't you get access to Jenkins?"

V shook his head. "I got it, but it's been sealed away... I think I'll hand this over to headquarters. Negligence and overstepping authority are troublesome. I trust my intuition on this point... Now you have to be careful about what happens to the middleman in Dogtown—according to my guess, it might be Kenichi Saburo who comes. Adam Hammer might still be lying in bed."

Lin Yue thought for a moment, then said knowingly, "It seems that Arasaka won't be able to repair him in a short time? But how much do you know about this 'ancient' samurai of Arasaka?"

Kenichi Saburo, whom Lin Yue had previously warned the NCPD director about, knew that a Japanese man had launched a probing attack on the Tiger Claw Gang. It seemed that Kenichi Saburo was the kind of guy who had diligently memorized and implemented the training he received as a member of the Arasaka Ninja.

That means that whenever there is an opportunity, they will take action.

But... what is Kenichi Saburo's purpose?

Lin Yue had heard about V's performance at the board meeting. As an outstanding executioner from 30 years ago and once the company's successor and security chief, if Kei hadn't died, Kenichi Saburo would probably be a veteran figure in the company.

V replied, "It's most likely Hua Zi's order. If Arasaka... Saburo wanted to interfere with the affairs of Night City, he wouldn't need to send someone to leave any evidence. Michiko, you know... she's finished."

"In short, he's not here to help Xintian, I can see that clearly—let's not talk about that for now, what's your plan? To have you and your team buy time for the middleman in Dogtown?"

V ultimately couldn't suppress the hint of anxiety in her eyes.

She is ready to provide support in Watson District at any time, but she has no intention of helping the old samurai or Hammer or anything like that. Instead, she plans to respond as quickly as possible in dangerous situations.

“V, if the counterintelligence department gets involved, you will be too suspicious. At least for now you can clean up the mess you left behind, but the more you do, the easier it is to be exposed—I can be here, so I can naturally deal with the enemies chasing us.”

V looked helpless. She didn't intend to ask Lin Yue what his trump card was. In any case, V didn't think that strange prosthetic body was disconnected.

joke!

The disconnected prosthetic body brought Adam Hammer, a lone wolf leading a team to block a squad of military technology elites, to his knees, and it was still lively and able to engage in "extracurricular" activities—it was probably insane!

V sighed, "Have your team provide cover. Our cybersecurity department is still tracking leads... Adam Hammer's information is all under control, and we have no idea if he'll be able to get out again."

Lin Yue nodded knowingly.

V gritted his teeth and couldn't help but remind them, "Be careful. If we can't clear the area completely, protect the squad."

At that moment, a lazy female voice came through the channel, "How heartless, Miss V."

Lin Yue turned his head and noticed that Emma's eyes were also shining with the light of a phone call. Lin Yue looked down and realized that in order to avoid the signal hijacking by the Arasaka network experts in Watson District, he had been using Emma's car infotainment system as a small PC for network cover...

How could Emma know this?

Emma's dark purple light intensified, and she whispered in Lin Yue's ear, seemingly to V, "I'm the car owner, you'd better watch where you're talking to me, huh?"

V's expression never seems to change much; he simply raises a middle finger on the holographic screen and hangs up the phone.

Emma let out a soft sigh, expressing Lin Yue's dissatisfaction at not refuting her statement.

Of course, she doesn't believe in V, but she trusts Rin completely.

Lin Yue was just about to speak—

Just then, the car suddenly shook!
The animal gang driver's panicked voice came through, "Boss, the car... the car's been hacked!"

Lin Yue's prosthetic eye quickly displayed the decoding panel. In the view of the bright red command box, a bright laser line was locked onto the vehicle's infotainment system. Lin Yue lowered his head slightly and looked towards the source of the light, discovering that it was coming from the skyscrapers on both sides.

"A hovercar?"

Lin Yue placed his hand on the driver's slightly trembling hand, a blood-red light flashed in his eyes, and he quickly dismantled the tracking puppet.

Of course, the car must continue to operate; otherwise, all of this would be a waste if it didn't drive into the trap.
Emma obediently leaned back in her seat. It seems to be human nature not to wear a seatbelt in the back seat, but Emma didn't want to distract Mr. Rin, so wearing a seatbelt was her way of showing her attitude.

With a floor press of the accelerator, the car roared toward the industrial zone in the north of the city. However, at the fork in the road leading to the NID logistics subsidiary, the car chose another road, heading toward the old road under the overpass, piled high with garbage, leading to the Night City columbarium.

shhhhhh!
The three hovercraft instantly descended in altitude, and the vehicles, ignoring the NCPD air traffic control warnings inside the hovercraft, rushed towards the car like venomous wasps.

While looking in the rearview mirror, Lin Yue reached out and pulled out the long knife hidden in the compartment on the roof of the car to avoid the court weapon scanning system. As the car sped out of the city, two figures stood on the overpass above.

Rebecca, her pink and yellow prosthetic eyes fixed on the sniper rifle scope, had her cartoon smiley face next to her gorilla hand—the cat spirit she'd gotten from Lin Yue.

"My darling..."

Rebecca's finger lightly touched the trigger, her eyes flashing with malice. "I'll fucking kill you!"

The eerie blue light from the muzzle instantly coalesced, and the electromagnetically accelerated warhead, exceeding the destructive limits of the Night City Convention, was aimed directly at the engine beneath the hovercar. Then, the optical fiber disappeared above the exhaust plume—

A series of faint explosion sounds came from inside, and the hovercar's posture began to deteriorate, spinning violently like a top. It was clear that the driver inside was trying his best to control it, after all, they did not expect that someone would use a sniper rifle to cause trouble for them at such a height and speed!
"It's off course!"

Rebecca's head popped out of the scope, and she yelled through gritted teeth. Qiwei, who was squatting beside her under the concrete railing, smoking silently, mechanically reached out and pressed Rebecca's small head back down. Then—

Ding Ding Ding!
It's like someone is smashing the concrete fence with a sledgehammer, and chunks of concrete are starting to fall off. A large-caliber machine gun could easily sweep it through.

Rebecca, shielding her eyes with one hand to keep her vision clear, shouted, "Old hag! We need to stop the other hovercar!"

Qiwei stared wide-eyed, as if she were listening to some unbelievable story.

"Not a girl..."

Rebecca darted through the open car window like a nimble little monkey, while Qiwei leaped into the car amidst the sparks flashing on the ground. The car began to retreat rapidly, and the hovercar, which had already stabilized itself, approached slowly at low altitude, about to clear their high wall in the blink of an eye!

call!
Like a tiger pouncing on its prey, the hovercar appeared above the road. Its weapon aiming system did not immediately lock onto the enemy that should have been there, but only for a brief moment. It immediately spotted the vehicle attempting to spiral up the road above.

"Owl, get this over with quickly, don't scatter."

Inside the hovercar, the other crew members were frantically calling for help. However, perhaps due to the loss of an engine, although it could fly normally, its attitude was quite problematic, especially when turning, which appeared slow and clumsy.

"Oh shit--"

"I'm here! Let's attack from both sides!"

The hovercar, which should have been driving away, suddenly turned around, like a falling leaf. Propelled by its vector engine, it hurtled along the road, skimming past a scrambled civilian vehicles, spraying large amounts of toxic gas evenly onto the road surface...

The hovercar, relentlessly pursuing Rebecca, underestimated the cyberpunks' familiarity with Night City's roads. It quickly began to outrun them on the winding, obstacle-filled city streets.

Therefore.

The hovercar, which had almost been thrown off the ramp several times, became very impatient under pressure from its teammates and quickly climbed the height in an attempt to predict the level at which the vehicle would spiral upwards!

First bend… second…

The hovercraft driver's helmet was shifting speed, his thumb resting on the still-overheating machine gun—

This guy was silently counting down the days until he was about to kill this idiot, just when he thought he was about to corner him!
He found the bend above was completely empty... What's going on?
Just as it was about to lower the front of the vehicle to search downwards, a roar of an engine, audible even through the vehicle, came from the road. The driver looked up sharply and discovered that the vehicle was rushing toward the vehicle at a crazy speed on a section of road without any concrete guardrails!
The subconscious mind is the hardest thing to correct.

The hovercraft suddenly slammed down!
The moment Qiwei and Rebecca's car tires lifted off the ground, the driver saw a pink-haired woman staring wide-eyed at the window, and a brightly colored little girl with a large bunch of dark things in her hand perched on the sunroof of the back seat...?!
Rebecca's ears were filled with the whistling sound as she looked down at the hovercar. "Eat shit!"

The mass-produced "unsafe bombs" of Pira were completely dependent on luck to detonate and had a crude ammunition load. They just exploded right on top of the hovercar!

Flames and heat swept over in an instant!

Rebecca, with her exceptionally strong gorilla arms, held the cat tightly. Seeing another hovercar coming to meet her ahead, she only had a few breaths left.

This outstanding "little lady" from Night City had only one thing on her mind!

That is—I'm going to pretend to be S.A.S.S.!
call…

Rebecca's expression was unusually calm. The gravity of the fall, the scorching flames behind her, the pain of the shards hitting her back... none of that mattered anymore.

At a certain moment, the sniper scope connected the two engines of the hovercraft in a single line!
It's now!

Buzz~Bang!
The cat's second shot was more powerful than the first!
The bullets pierced through both engines in quick succession, exploding at an extremely high speed. Rebecca saw a flash of light in her eyes, but before she could even get excited, she quickly shut her mouth and clenched her teeth. Sure enough, the car suddenly plummeted, which prevented her from biting her tongue.

boom!
Whether it was the car crashing to the ground or the airship's engine exploding, Rebecca turned her head and found that what was originally just an attempt to attract attention had resulted in both airships being rendered wrecked. She didn't even realize that her heart was pounding at its limit...

"Hey, did you see Qiwei?!"

Qi Wei was covered in sweat. The moment she landed, she felt like her back was about to break. The fact that this car could still move was a testament to its excellent quality.

Glancing at the billowing smoke in the rearview mirror, Qi Wei's eyes shifted from fear and astonishment to surprise, and then she said in a deep voice, "Awesome."

……

Lin Yue breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that only one of the three hovercars behind him was still chasing him. His first task was to get Emma, ​​who had no fighting skills, to move first, so that he could then use his fists to give Arasaka's pursuers a head-on blow. He had set up a little surprise outside.

But his strategy remains unchanged: make those who can cause him trouble suffer, thus giving himself room to grow.

Lai Xuan's performance was too grand. He completely shifted the pressure of opposition from within Arasaka onto Lin Yue. If Lin Yue doesn't want Arasaka to cause trouble every day, he must retaliate!
"Hey?"

"can you hear?"

Lin Yue, whose human-machine interface cable was plugged into the vehicle's network equipment, tentatively inquired.

Regardless of whether Ultraman helps or not, he needs to inform him in advance. In reality, he's prepared to have this largest entity in cyberspace back him up. Either he dies and his plan falls apart, or if he's in trouble, Ultraman has to help him like he did last time...

Despite having made thorough plans, Lin Yue still lacked confidence in dealing with Kenichi Saburo, a samurai who had experienced corporate warfare, and Arasaka's rage.

To his surprise, Ultraman responded instantly.

"exist."

Otto Cunningham's hollow voice echoed in Lin Yue's head, and the system detected an upward trend in brain-computer interface temperature.

Lin Yue was about to tell Ultraman his "rogue" request, but Ultraman cut to the chase, "Do you need me to help you improve your computing power so you can crush them like last time?"

"..."

Sincerity is the ultimate weapon.

Lin Yue was at a loss for words.

"It might be Kenichi Saburo, the old samurai from Arakawa."

Otto's urgent questioning made Lin Yue sense something unusual...

"Where is Adam Hammer?"

Lin Yue's expression was strange. "Maybe... he's still lying there?"

A humane question?
It shouldn't have appeared on Ultraman...

"Well, the current situation is that I need to make Arasaka think twice before making a move next time, so I don't need you to give me that kind of computing power that can burn my brain dry right now, in case I can't retreat in time... you know, a backup plan or something?"

Lin Yue wasn't ashamed to say that.

Anyway, that's how I am. With a business as strong as yours, you have to pay me first if you want me to do something.

did not expect--

The woman who created the world's most terrifying software killer murmured softly, "Why should I cover it up? I can help you make this outdated code disappear completely... Is there something you're worried about?"

Lin Yue admitted that he was somewhat embarrassed by an AI's answer for the first time.

"Yes, but—"

Ott replied quickly, “I need your help. When I ask you to take action, you must do your utmost. In return, I will do my best to ensure your safety before the [anchor point] appears—this is not contradictory; it’s all about equivalent exchange, an economic concept.”

Damn... this AI is insane.

"Of course, I can't deny that I still have preferences. After all, I really hate that piece of code called Adam Hammer, but its firewall level is too high. Arasaka has taken it offline, and it's very risky to enter Arasaka's subnet—I'm sorry I can't grant such a request."

Lin Yue pursed his lips. "Alright, then?"

Ultraman's image rapidly materialized within the cyberspace constructed from cyberspace. "I suggest using Blackwall technology to gradually enhance your prosthetic abilities, allowing it to carry more technological capabilities, much like your kind of self-improvement that I can't comprehend..."

Lin Yue was about to say "wait" when he realized that Ultraman had already finished speaking.

"I will stabilize the computing power and do it at the perfect time when you need it, without making you pay the price."

In the instant that time seemed to stand still, a bullet the size of a thumb suddenly pierced through the rear windshield of the car!

Lin Yue only saw a flash before his eyes, but the upper body of the animal gang security guard seemed to explode!
Arasaka went straight for anti-materiel weapons, which are capable of penetrating armor and exploding inside vehicles. Only the company in Night City would dare to use such things.

The vehicle quickly went out of control.

Emma reached out, instinctively trying to grab the man's hand, when the car door beside her suddenly opened. Emma's body went light, and she clung tightly to Lin Yue. Lin Yue fell backward, landing in the car. As the prosthetic body behind him rubbed against the rough road, sparks flew everywhere. Lin Yue looked down at the woman in his arms, her hair flying wildly.

Those eyes…

Emma saw the unobstructed Blood Calamity Eye that appeared when half of the Azure Sky Building was in sight, while the other blue, shimmering eye seemed to be scrutinizing her like a stranger, leaving her momentarily stunned.

"you…"

"careful!"

Emma noticed something rushing towards her from above the hovercar, but Lin Yue, whose prosthetic body should have broken down, suddenly reached out and, as his speed decreased, he was holding the tip of the enemy's knife.

Beneath the Japanese man's aged skin, his eyes held a terrifying expression...

"How can it be?!"

However, Rin, who was being attacked, watched him quietly.

"Hello, old-fashioned."

……

……

(End of this chapter)