Cyberpunk: From Dogville to Legend

Chapter 544 The snipe and the clam fight
Ara-zaka in Warsaw was gripped by an unprecedented atmosphere of tension.

No large company can escape the same rule: when it needs to eliminate anyone who stands in its way, it will resort to dirty tricks.

The upper echelons of street gangs in Warsaw are now receiving numerous white-glove orders from Arasaka, a move that has far-reaching consequences.

Apparently—

Lin Yue's actions have already disrupted the delicate relationship and balance at the Warsaw branch, and he has focused all his attention on Lucy. Lucy's capture by Arasaka means that Warsaw's research on the Black Wall can be completed. Although it has been many years, it can at least allow Warsaw to make further progress in the research on the Black Wall.

In fact, after Lucy's escape, Warsaw focused on extracting data from outside the Black Wall. After all, the Black Wall was a bomb that could explode at any time, and without data and relevant evidence, Takeda had the desire but not the courage to do so.

So now he's hoping every day that Him can make some progress with Lucy.

At this moment, Takeda stood with his hands behind his back, looking out the window with a rare relaxed expression. The snow outside seemed even whiter, clearly indicating that good news had arrived today…

However, this good mood did not last long, as Takeda's personal secretary appeared.

"what?"

Upon hearing his assistant's report, Takeda's expression was a mixture of disbelief and anger at having his authority challenged. "These useless bastards are good for nothing!"

Let's rewind to half a day ago—

While the citizens of Warsaw were enjoying their nightlife after the riots, the explosive barrels inside Arasaka were already on the verge of ignition and exploding, guided by a single spark.

Ivan reached into his pocket, not needing to investigate the demon or his boss, as he already knew everything about him.

Now he's the one being forced into this situation, so he has to take some tough measures that will make the other side unable to disregard him. The daring Lone Wolf naturally does things in one go.

"I need to see your boss."

Outside a shop selling hacker data and firmware, Ivan pulled out some euros with his hands in his pockets; the euros were simply decorated with some graffiti.

The woman raised her eyelids and glanced at Ivan, who stepped aside. His massive body squeezed through the low doorway. The heat from the overloaded data server inside made the room comfortable enough to get through the winter without any heating.

Any operation without hacker guidance is futile. Relying on street hackers to fight against Arasaka's hackers is clearly unrealistic, but Ivan has no choice but to find these guys he doesn't even trust...

"what's up?"

The shopkeeper looked uneasy, but Ivan had been a street urchin before, and for those who valued street relationships and trust, the patterned coins in his hand represented a promise.

Using it means our connection has come to an end...

"I need some intelligence."

Ivan looked somewhat awkward, as if he didn't dare to look his boss in the eye.

The boss scoffed. "Ivan, it's a price list. Whatever you want, our hackers will quote a price, but only if it's something that could cost you your head... We can't guarantee success."

"Let's get down to business, Ivan. At least we used to be friends."

Ivan seemed to want to explain something more.

The boss in front of him raised his hand to stop him, indicating that there was no need to say anything more. "For the sake of our families, we won't say anything."

Ivan sighed. There are always some things on the street that are hard to explain. People can't live without losing everything. It's just that everyone has a different perspective.

"I want you to help me investigate someone, especially his security record, including his itinerary, hovercar data, etc... I can afford the cost, I won't ask you for a friendly price."

As soon as these technical terms came out, the boss on the other end knew what Ivan was up to.

"Your hands are stained with blood, this is the company, so you're planning to stick it out to the end?"

No one can say it, and no one can say it.

Ivan was like a lonely traitor, ostracized by his fellow lower-class comrades, which was undoubtedly an extremely painful experience.

"Please help me."

The other party didn't say anything more, but looked at the data Ivan handed over with a somewhat serious expression.

"The driver, the mercenary, and at least three hackers have to be on guard against Arasaka's people coming to their door at all times... You've dropped a bomb on us."

Ivan suddenly thought of the super hacker who claimed to be Ron's subordinate. If he were to do these things, he would probably achieve twice the result with half the effort.

For street mercenaries and hackers, they'd be willing to blow up a company building if they were paid more.

"But success is not guaranteed."

The owner of the hacker plugin shop added a final sentence.

At this moment, Lin Yue felt a slight itch on the tip of his nose as Ivan thought of him. He did not intend to stir up trouble and then stand idly by. Whether Ivan could handle the situation was another matter, but what he wanted to do was to make these sparks explode completely.

With Qiwei's help, Lin Yue arrived at the business stronghold that was under the special attention of the demon, which was the production line where a company's senior executives were secretly selling health products.

The idea of ​​leaving a way out for others is completely foreign to Lin Yue.

"If this continues, I'm afraid Ivan will be reduced to ashes in the end. What enemy is he to you?"

Lin Yue shook his head. "I wouldn't call them enemies, I'm just helping those with ideas."

Qiwei was silent for a while, then said, "That's really going too far."

Lin Yue didn't explain much. He simply strode forward and easily opened the heavily guarded blast door using his hacking skills. In complete silence, Lin Yue and the gang members, who had been modified to look terrifyingly, stared at each other for a few seconds.

"What the hell-"

The startled, hot-tempered member raised his gun.

Lin Yue sighed. The call signal seemed to be interfered with at this moment, so he left through the door.

"Qiwei, why are there still so many people who haven't been dealt with? Didn't we just pull the plug?"

Qiwei on the other end said, "You're already standing right in front of them, hurry up and kill them all."

So Lin Yue went back in, but this time he thoughtfully closed the door behind him.

In less than ten minutes, Lin Yue, now completely clean, stood amidst the acrid smell of burnt prosthetics and flesh, watching this sophisticated assembly line.

The group that has almost monopolized the nuclear radiation resistance drug has driven the price of this drug to an exorbitant level, enough to empty the pockets of an ordinary family in one go. It has to be said that the product analyst's position is quite ruthless, and only a company would make money like this.

"Upload the data, shift the blame to Ivan's boss, and our job will be completely done."

After all, Lin Yue was still worried that the company might have another way of handling things.

That means Ivan's boss chickened out. As long as he cuts ties with Ivan, this whole thing is over. Of the three forces, aside from dear Takeda-san... no one is innocent now.

Looking at the scene he had painstakingly created, Lin Yue tossed away the cigarette butt in his hand with satisfaction.

However, the Arasaka executives, upon learning of this, could no longer remain silent.

"Fuck Ron!"

"What does this mean?!"

Ivan looked exhausted and relieved to have survived, clearly having just gone through a round of interrogation by his boss. "If we keep running away, those guys will just think we're scared."

But now he's being blamed for something he clearly didn't do. Besides his anger towards Ron, he's mostly wary of him.

The saying goes, "When the snipe and the clam fight, the fisherman benefits." Ivan's boss seemed unwilling to take the blame for this, so he ordered Ivan to find a way to deal with the devil's boss first.

This almost perfectly matched the prior preparations Ivan had made.

"I'll have my men send you some money, find some people with the cleanest backgrounds, and then... you know what I mean."

The boss's sinister expression looked even more menacing in the dimly lit room.

Ivan honestly reported that he had already paid out of his own pocket to hire hackers, and also explained again his actions of "attacking the Demon's Money Bag," saying, "I'm sorry, that wasn't my intention, but they were bullying me too much—"

The boss gestured, indicating that no further words were needed.

"Well done. I've been putting up with that bitch for a long time. Now that we've started this war, you might as well finish it right the first time. Be careful in everything you do."

"Especially those counterintelligence people, we can't let them know about this, understand?!"

When the topic of counterintelligence came up, Ivan's expression darkened.

That was one of the departments most tightly controlled by Takeda. Now that the war has begun, even the slightest hint of counterintelligence...

"Yes."

This time, the promise came from the bottom of my heart.

The person who was most devastated at this moment was not the boss of the two families, Demon or Ivan, who had long been at odds, but Ron, who had taken the biggest blame for Lin Yue's interference.

Ron is now unable to eat or sleep.

There was no other reason than excitement.

He believed he could be the one who stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind, especially when his intelligence network on the street learned that the Demon Boss's business had been completely wiped out; he almost grinned from ear to ear.

How could Lin Yue possibly let such an unstable factor go?
Counterintelligence detected malicious activity targeting Arasaka online, and the person behind sending these data packets was V, the person in charge of vetting Warsaw operations.

When the counterintelligence agents walked into the office, Ron hadn't even finished his celebratory drink. Leading the way was David, who had been pushed out by the Warsaw branch to take the bullets.

It must be said that the Warsaw branch was quite clever. Knowing that the shareholders below might have some counterattack tactics, they simply let the hothead from outside take the hit. If they could deal with Ron, everyone would be happy. If they couldn't handle him, Takeda might be able to cry poor and play the victim to Yorihiro.

David, however, already knew the ins and outs of this game and had a thorough understanding of Ron.

Before Ron's men could retaliate, David, who was prepared, captured Ron after losing two of his own men.

With things having come to this point, Arasaka was in complete chaos.

After Takeda, who was only thinking about mediation, took remedial measures with the counterintelligence department, he thought he could suppress the two bosses, Majin and Ivan, to stop. However, he did not expect that the news of Majin's boss's death would reach his ears the next day at noon.

Enraged, Takeda lost all patience and, knowing the Warsaw branch was about to be injured, decided to deal with both groups.

Lin Yue left no trace throughout the entire incident, only leaving the two forces with an irreconcilable feud.

House seemingly endless rain.

Takeda has to face more than just these issues.

The Free Front uprising, which had been repeatedly and bloodily suppressed in Northern Europe, has returned for the second time, catching Takeda off guard.

Seeing that the heavy hammer that had just been sent out had not yet finished dealing with the matter at hand, he had no choice but to personally deploy Arasaka's forces in Poland to defend first.

"A bunch of ants that can't be wiped out."

Takeda's face was gloomy; with everything going wrong, he felt that recent events were full of strangeness.

But I can't quite put my finger on it...

Before long, news of Hanako's failure in the North American region was finally delivered to him by Michiko. Hanako's failure to seize Relic made Takeda feel that his future was bleak, and he even began to doubt whether he was born at the wrong time - perhaps he never expected that the crux of the problem would lie precisely with Hammer.

He had countless instances of letting Arasaka's rivals escape, a fact recorded in Arasaka's personnel evaluation records. After all, the only person Jutsu Hammer was ever afraid of was Arasaka Saburo; the others were people who had already died, such as Kenichi.

Just when Takeda felt he was about to fall into a passive situation if he couldn't make any effective progress, three days later, Him brought very good news.

It's unclear how Him managed to get Lucy to hand over the treasure she had hidden on her person during her escape.

After obtaining the key to the Black Wall, Takeda pondered for a long time. Under Him's quiet gaze, he said, "Reboot the port. Arasaka hasn't made much progress in the Black Wall over the years, and is starting to be suppressed by military technology in cyber weapons... We need to hurry."

Him paused.

"Should we test the waters first, letting Lucy get closer to the port?"

Perhaps Him knew in his heart that there were still some doubts about Lucy's change in attitude.

Takeda didn't mention the matter again, but slowly walked to Shim's side and wrapped his arms around her waist under her wide kimono. "Thank you for your hard work, Lucy."

Him leaned his head against Takeda's chest. "Lucy is too far away from us. She understands our good intentions for some things—but we have to deceive her now."

Takeda grunted through his nose.

"It is an honor that she was able to give everything for this."

Love is poison.

Him gave up his career for Takeda, and this poison numbed Him for more than twenty years.

After a moment of tenderness between husband and wife, Him murmured to himself beside Takeda, seemingly pondering how to get Lucy to approach the so-called port under control.

"The Black Wall is still reacting to Lucy."

"Over the years, the manifestation of the Black Wall personality has become increasingly obvious."

Takeda looked thoughtful after hearing this.

As if remembering something, Him stood up and gently kissed Takeda's cheek—

"Leave this to me. I'll personally take Lucy to the port. Trust me?"

Takeda looked extremely troubled.

"You said you wouldn't touch anything online after you were with me... but all these years, you've been the one helping me..."

Sim remained silent, but his smile was sweet.

"Because it's you, darling, nothing else matters."

"I'll let Lucy bring the data spores close to the Black Wall. Isn't 'when two birds fight, a third party benefits' a phrase you often use?"

……

……

(End of this chapter)