How To Live as a Cyberpunk Solver

112. Research

Leonard and Max visited the 25th-9th Street sewers.

After visiting three times, it seemed to be a regular shop, if not as good as his own. Even if the only thing on display is mice and rat-like sewer beasts.

“Oh, I’m not talking about that.”

The mouse-like King Shultz lowered his deep eyes. Leonard and Max said, ‘Is that really 16?’ I doubted it, but I knew the manners and didn’t say it out of my mouth. It wasn’t even the atmosphere.

“Does she want to meet me?”

King’s expression was still hard to read. It was both angry and moved. Still, the answer was clear.

“I can’t.”

If you were going to meet easily, there was no way you wouldn’t have known the news for over 10 years. Leonard cleared his throat and tried to convince me in an adult manner.

“I’m not the kind of person who talks about other people’s family affairs, but I have something similar to friendship with you, so I’d like to give you some advice.”

But persuasion was not a hacker’s specialty. King shook his head before hearing the story.

“I was thinking of visiting one day, but not now. Actually, I hoped you didn’t even know I existed, but it’s my fault for not explaining in detail, so I won’t blame Mr. Leonard.”

Leonard and Max looked at each other. ‘Are you shy?’, ‘No? It’s a shame’, ‘…that’s what it means’ Then the decision came out.

“If you plan to meet anyway, how about now?”

“You mean now…?”

“That’s White Town. You can’t get there with just one blanket on. Wouldn’t you know that and ask for help?”

In order for the mutant scavenger to visit White Town, he needed A-044 citizenship, a personal vehicle owner who would not be suspected by public security, and a cognitively impaired hacker who could fool cameras and implanted eyes. No matter how many people there are in Junk Town, there will be no more than ten people who meet the conditions.

King was conflicted whether Leonard’s logic worked.

“I wonder if I’m causing too much trouble to Mr. Leonard…”

“I’ve done a favor many times, so it’s okay to bother me once.”

Those words were decisive. King Schultz made up his mind after much deliberation.

“Then I will be indebted to you with a grateful heart. Please be prepared.”

@Leonard and Max felt good.

As Max hums the latest Shining Star song, Leonard plays it over BlueB’s audio. Because of this album and its rock-ballad concept, even Leonard, who has an old-fashioned taste, liked it to some extent. I never liked it because I was a good customer who introduced me once and once through direct transactions.

On the other hand, King, who was less fashionable than Leonard, made an awkward expression because he couldn’t keep up with the lyrics. Packed up in the cramped back seat, his beard hung down, and somehow he looked pathetic.

“Is it like this?”

“originally?”

“You’re working, but you’re not nervous at all.”

I knew long ago that he had a serious personality, but more than that, he was a picky old man. How does that mean a teenager?

‘No. I can do that if I’m nervous.’

Seeing your family after 10 years, you might want to be a little more serious. Leonard turned off the song and pressed the crown of Max’s head in protest.

“Don’t be nervous. Because it will work out.”

“Are you sure?”

“I don’t get along too well, but that’s how it is with a family. Seeing it after a few days is as good as seeing it for the first time in years, seeing it after several years is familiar as if seeing it a few days ago…”

As Leonard comforted him, King’s expression turned strange.

“Leonard, by any chance you’re thinking…”

I don’t know what I’m thinking right now, but I’m sure it was wrong. It proved terrifying to get out of the 25-9th Street dump.

thud-!

Leonard and his party’s bodies leaned heavily to the left. It wasn’t Leonard’s inexperienced driving, or the new car’s poor maintenance. If you dare to look for the cause inside, you will be careless.

“These bastards?!”

An SUV with a steel plated bumper and black-tinted windows shouting ‘I’m suspicious’ tried to ram the body from the right side of BlueBee. It wasn’t a joke, it wasn’t a joke. If I didn’t, I could have been pushed out of the lane.

When Blueby didn’t get pushed away at once, he widened his distance and tried again. But he wasn’t nice enough to be beaten twice. Leonard slammed on the brakes, sending off an attack from an SUV that didn’t know how to look like a classic car – albeit a fake one.

“What is that? What happened all of a sudden?”

“damn! Blast? Tiger Claw? Wildkid remnants? Is it the Liberation Front?”

There are so many places to pick up, I couldn’t guess. Still, I knew how to respond. Leonard operated a few switches on the steering wheel and let them go. Max freaked out and said, ‘Oooo!’ It shouted, but the advanced auto-drive system maintained its speed and direction.

“Whoever you are, you have to pay for the repairs!”

Leonard left the driving to an artificial intelligence and pulled out a revolver. The unknown SUV that missed the target panicked and evaded left and right, but a 2.5-ton vehicle could not be more agile than a bullet. Bang! bang! bang-!

There was a hole in the rear window and it shattered just like that. Leonard smiled contemptuously. The plan was to overthrow the driver or passenger by controlling it with hacking if it was seen. But things didn’t go as planned.

“Careful!”

It seems that they decided to use the broken windows as guns. The occupant of the SUV, with his head bleeding, engaged the Schneider submachine gun with a long magazine and turned the muzzle backwards. Now it was Blue Bee who had to dodge the bullets.

“This is a new car!”

Since it was a new car, I wasn’t begging to see it. It was an ambassador boasting about the auto drive system of the new car. Blue Bee sensed a crisis and immediately changed lanes. The scattered bullets, which were faster than people, scratched the empty asphalt.

“Ouch! This crazy car!”

The car was fine, but the people in it were mentally rolling. Leonard opened the cylinder of his revolver, changed the bullets, and dropped a handful. It was a mistake not to prepare the speedloader in advance.

“Shall we evacuate to White Town?”

If you go to Whitetown, the police will be dispatched. I don’t know if it’s a gang, a bandit, or a terrorist, but I’m not fighting the public security, so I’m safe.

“No… wait a minute.”

Leonard looked at King in the rearview mirror. Leonard and Max, who had citizenship, could at most cost a few hundred credits in fines, but King was likely to be arrested or banished from the city. No, it would be better if he was banished. Because you can sneak in later. The worst had to be assumed.

“Let’s get rid of it and go.”

“As expected, it’s savage!”

Leonard sat down and shut down Auto Drive. No matter how good the reaction speed of artificial intelligence is, it could not reflect the owner’s will 100%. Just in time, the SUV gunman inserted a fresh magazine and set the gun.

“Are you in a position to pursue?”

Leonard bent the steering wheel and hit the brakes again. It was also a new car, so the braking was excellent. It leaned to the left leaving dark skid marks. The enemy SUV also stopped abruptly, spraying bullets into the air.

Leonard confirmed that his opponent had stopped, shifted gears, and stepped on the accelerator again. The back alley of Junk Town, the so-called Mole Hole, was right in front. If you shake off this place, you won’t find Leonard again. As if they knew that, they urgently made a U-turn and pursued. Leonard raised an eyebrow slightly.

“I said I would get rid of it, I didn’t say I would run away.”

I couldn’t have heard that, but there was nothing wrong with not hearing this.

Leonard and Max parked at the beginning of the alley and fired bullets at the SUV, which had just turned a corner and entered the molehill. As a professional solver, each shot was a large-caliber armor-piercing bullet. It pierced itself, pierced the driver, and hacked through the passenger in the back seat.

The SUV with the steering wheel bent slightly brushed the back of Blue Bee and hit its head on the wall of the alley. Since about 20 shots were fired while changing guns, neither man nor machine will be fine.

“I have to pay for the repairs…”

Leonard opened the cylinder of his revolver ‘Air Force’, brushed off the bullet, and carefully inserted a new bullet. Max drew his semi-automatic pistol and cautiously approached the smoking engine.

“Ugh…”

“Mmmah!”

When the car door opened and a skinless mechanical hand came out, I was startled and fired three shots. In the meantime, he trained well and landed two shots to the body and one shot to the head. Even the last groan was gone.

“I have to pay for repairs.”

Leonard flicked his revolver sideways to close the cylinder and followed Max. The inside of the car was horrible. Blood and grease splattered everywhere and fragments of broken implants rolled around.

“Who is alive?”

“Is there?”

Looking at it, I didn’t even need to scan it. Leonard put his revolver in his holster and pulled the bodies out one by one. I fumbled under my ear just in case, but there was no memory chip. Looking at the weapons and clothes, it seemed that they were not taken out because they were poor, but for security reasons.

“Not a gang.”

“Ehh… I should have made an accident.”

“What does that mean?”

“He’s a hit man who was very determined and sent. How long have you been living your grudge?”

Leonard frowned and searched for his past grudge. Even if it wasn’t a gang, there were quite a few. The owner of the scrap factory, Mrs. Alice in White Town, the funny-named drone master, and so on.

“Not Mr. Leonard.”

King groaned out of the Blue Bee’s cramped back seat. Its basic size is that of a heavy cyborg, but with fur covering its entire body and a thick blanket to cover it, it was as huge as the yeti in the legend. However, his expression was far from that of a monster.

“It is me.”

“Mr. King?”

Perhaps because it was on the ground where the sun rose, Leonard looked at King’s pupils through his puffy eyelids. It was a living eye, not an implant lens replaced with inorganic substances in air pollution, industrial alcohol, and dazzling cyber synapses. The emotions contained in that warmth were so intuitive and naked that the viewer was ashamed.

“Yes. These are the people who are targeting me.”

“Could it be… a hitman sent by Mr. Jamie Bolt?”

What was inside was not anger. The emotions that were clearer than hacking were sadness and pity.

@Leonard and Max took only a handful of usable weapons and ammunition and left the rest behind. I didn’t have to worry about post-processing. This is the mole den with the most scavengers in Junk Town, so it should be cleaned up in 30 minutes.

“You deserve the name.”

It wasn’t about scavengers. Unlike the streets, my mind was not easily organized. Going to 3-7 Avenue was also put on hold for a while.

“Didn’t you say mom?”

“I made that claim.”

Leonard and Max glanced at King. It’s embarrassing to ask directly, so I wanted you to explain yourself. King had his eyes on it.

“You don’t have to have maternal love to raise a child.”

“Then you raised me right?”

“Because I was a guinea pig from Airhorse.”

I shouldn’t have laughed, but I laughed. Leonard and Max cleared their lungs as best they could. King nodded in understanding.

“Yes. As the name suggests, it is a laboratory rat. Was it a ‘artificial collective consciousness expression study’? Experiments were conducted on me to control mutant beasts, and my mother, Jamie Bolt, was…”

The laughter has subsided now. I expected it, but it came out unwelcome.

“I was the head of the experiment.”