Chapter 134: Chapter 125: This Deal is Closed

The elder generation of Night City residents’ worst fears had come true —

Things had quickly escalated into armed riots, with company soldiers patrolling the streets under the cover of armored vehicles, shooting anyone who acted suspiciously on the spot.

The meager thieves who dared stir were met with slaughter, in the alleys, stairwells, and dark corners where the neon lights of Night City could not reach, more conflicts occurred, then faded into the sounds of gunfire.

The power outage did not last long — this was an EMP attack, after all, and company buildings, being the storage sites for confidential information, naturally had contingencies for such a not-so-uncommon attack.

Thirty minutes later, the lights in the company building came back on. Although the flickering lights indicated unstable electricity, they had indeed turned back on.

During these thirty minutes, the frequency of cyber-attacks against major companies soared, as did their success rates with the loss of most server support!

The lone wolves, hackers, intermediaries, and even the companies’ own agents who had been plotting certain schemes were all set in motion, either defending or infiltrating. The entire Night City was in chaos.

But Faraday knew that order would eventually return to the companies’ hands —

The rising floating vehicles proved that — whoever controlled the skies was destined to win.

He was now on the rooftop of his luxurious apartment, clearly seeing the continuously taking-off floating armored vehicles, and the Company Square lighting up again.

He used to enjoy watching the beauty of Night City from here, dreaming of one day climbing to the top and looking down upon Night City.

But now, he was a bit panicked —

He knew about the major power outage in Company Square.

He also knew that just a day ago, a motorcycle bomb exploded in a terrorist attack at City Hall — and that was all he knew.

For the trio from Lille, it had been a long three days, but for Faraday — it was only three days, not three months, let alone three years!

It was quite normal for the duration of commissions to extend to months, but since he had gotten the lead from Lille, from Brandon Murphy, it had only been three days.

His panic was because the announcement of martial law in the city center coincided with Man’s team’s arrival at City Hall.

Then, Man went missing — till now, not a word.

Could he have been caught by NCPD or Military Science?

Man’s team was wanted by NCPD too, and getting caught during martial law seemed quite possible — being killed was very likely as well.

But was he caught, or was he killed?

Could this implicate him?

This sort of uncertainty was most tormenting, especially unbearable for someone like Faraday who liked to control everything.

He immediately decided to back out of the deal —

However, just then, he suddenly began receiving files — passively!

[File Receiving]

[Commission Target File: Nightingale Project]

[Starting Date: March 24, 2074]

[Estimated Investment: 80-150 million Euros]

[Client: Military Technology]

[Subfile 1: Painkiller Action Mechanism Data Collection - Military Technology Document]

[Subfile 1-1: Number 1-50]

[Subfile 1-2: Number 51-101]

[Subfile 2: DNA Cutting Scheme (Experimented)]

[Subfile...]

[Device Information...]

Faraday was stunned — he screamed frantically at the bodyguard beside him, "Unplug the internet cable now!"

The bodyguard hesitated for a moment, then quickly ran towards the server room — 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

But Faraday slumped down, slack-jawed as he stared distantly at a floating vehicle heading straight this way.

Though it was very far away, he felt certain it was coming for him.

"...it’s too late, too late."

[Incoming Communication]

Burger King: The commission’s over, all the data on the Nightingale Project are here.

Faraday: ...do you know what you’ve done?!

Burger King: Of course, I know, damn it, there were monsters in the Biotechnology Building, scared the hell outta me.

Burger King: Hurry up with the payment, happy now? Hitching a ride with Arasaka’s thick legs? You’re welcome.

Faraday: Thanks for nothing...

Whew —

The floating vehicle slowly hovered above the rooftop — it was Arasaka’s people.

Faraday’s prosthetic eye popped up a series of red error messages, his body felt nauseous, and he immediately knelt on the ground.

Two agents from Arasaka, dressed in suits, emerged from the floating vehicle, one from each side.

The bodyguard, who had just run downstairs, hurried back up. Just as he was about to say something, an agent rewarded him with a bullet, striking him dead center in the forehead, brainstem shattered.

There were many more bodyguards in the residence, but no need to think — they were definitely all dead by now.

Faraday could only watch in utter terror —

From now on, his body was no longer his own, and considering it was Arasaka, his soul probably wasn’t his anymore either.

"Clear the area."

The agent reported on the reconnaissance, then the floating vehicle slowly landed on the platform, and a woman with a buzz cut emerged.

"Faraday — you’ve really screwed up big time, do you know what you’ve done?"

"I... I was just following orders to investigate biotechnology..."

Faraday attempted to bluster his way through.

"Following orders to investigate? Your people went to City Hall and slew nearly dozens of Military Soldiers, the Terrorist Mobile Team got wiped out, and they even blasted several Scorpion-tailed Lions —

Do you realize what that means?

Just look at Night City. All this chaos you see, all stemmed from those people you brought in!

I’ve checked the commissions you received from the operatives, and the commission specified ’investigate covertly.’ Which part of ’covertly’ did you not understand?!

You were supposed to conduct a covert investigation, not assault Military Soldiers, and certainly not storm the Biotechnology Building!"

Faraday felt that he could understand every single word this woman said, but when put together, they somehow seemed strange.

His brain had stopped working — he shouldn’t have contacted them with the intent of spying on Burger King from the start!

This was just three bombs!

Just then, an Arasaka agent beside him drew his samurai sword and viciously slashed at the air beside him!

"Enemy attack!"

Almost simultaneously, another Arasaka agent moved into action, stabbing with his sword!

The optical camouflage faded, revealing a man clad in Six Street Gang attire, lifeless.

"They’ve found us — take him away!"

No sooner had the words left her mouth than sparks erupted from Faraday’s cranial interface, and he collapsed to the ground.

The agent nodded and was about to take Faraday away when a bullet burst his head open!

Sniper rifle!

The floating car slowly rose, but the driver saw a ground-to-air missile launched from a distant building heading straight for them!

Boom!

The missile exploded in mid-air, and the floating car was forced to make an emergency landing again due to engine damage!

But the shooter also revealed their position, and a rocket was fired from an Arasaka vehicle on the ground towards the rooftop!

Boom!!

What almost turned into a skirmish soon ended as the opponents quickly retreated —

However, the leading woman soon received news that other corporate military forces were approaching.

At the stairwell, a huge Arasaka soldier charged out carrying equipment Faraday had never seen before —

"Director, got everything here!"

The woman called Director saw the device, her temples throbbing silently —

Biotechnology’s notorious thieves — or perhaps the most brazen robbers Night City had seen in recent years —

had even stolen the core components of a DNA splicing device and a large number of controlled high-tech parts!

The news had just broken out, and Peizhuo Petrochemical, which had appeared compliant during this conflict, immediately mobilized the nearest army and advanced towards Night City!

This was a real army!

A few minutes later, even Su Petrochemical made a satellite call to the NCPD, offering warm wishes in Russian, and stated that if they couldn’t retrieve the items within 3 hours, they would come look for them themselves —

Monopoly enterprises are super sensitive to monopolized items, and type 2 alcohol wheat is the lifeline of energy giants.

They take their monopoly on this item seriously; machines and technology capable of producing type 2 alcohol wheat are therefore strictly controlled.

The more such machines appear on the black market, the higher the control costs and the costs to maintain the monopoly rise, so this leak shouldn’t be allowed.

Besides, who can be certain of the thief’s real intention? Are they really like the news says, because of a few Wanderers? Who would believe that?

And this was a good, reasonable excuse — an excuse to reach into Night City.

The item mentioned by Su Petrochemical is precisely what other companies do not want to see.

And they all believe Su Petrochemical has the guts and prowess — they were the victors of the second corporate wars, and their overt nation had even deployed a massive nuclear bomb in the Middle East.

Being weak in North America doesn’t mean they are paper tigers.

The priority was to return the items — as for this mess...

With the items and data all at Faraday’s, even if they deny it, they can’t completely avoid responsibility.

Sooner or later, hackers from other companies will find traces, and covering things up would only deepen suspicions; it would be better to disclose the known operation trajectories.

Who could have guessed? Just a few hours ago, Arasaka was still delightfully mocking Military Science, and now suddenly they were saddled with a scapegoat...

The good news was, this so-called Nightingale Plan could still be leveraged for some advantage.

Thinking this, the woman felt that the people doing this job were either idiots or extremely cunning conspirators —

The scapegoat was now placed on Arasaka, which was a significant loss.

But Arasaka had no choice but to accept this "gift" and try to make their competitors share some of the losses.

This confrontation would ensure the scapegoat remained firmly in place...

Either suffer in silence or drag the competitors down as well, even though this would secure the blaming.

But suffering in silence wasn’t Arasaka’s style; Ernest Abernathy was sure the company would exploit this situation —

Especially since their top leader in Night City came from the hawkish representatives of the main Arasaka family.

"This is Ernest Abernathy, headquarters, the biotechnology items have been found, incident report is uploading.

We’re under attack, requesting more support."

"Received, support troops are on their way — new orders received, Director Abernathy, continue your mission."

"Details?"

"Company Square eyewitness reportedly saw... ’Lizard Man’, intelligence department is collecting data.

Your mission is to assist the Counter-Intelligence Department in disrupting other companies’ operations, prioritize collecting related intelligence if you come across relevant clues."

Huh?

Ernest Abernathy was stunned.

And she clearly heard some hesitation in the operator’s voice, as if they were confirming the mission details again.

Collect... what kind of intelligence?

...

Outside the building, in the shadows, Lille watched the corporate dogs who had their brains scrambled, as Arasaka took away all the components.

The chaos was subsiding, and the dispersed data would fan the flames among the companies.

This, of course, wouldn’t completely dissociate the three Lilles from the center of the event, but the most the companies could obtain was a name —

a ridiculously stupid name, one that would probably make the executives sick to their stomachs just thinking about how someone having that name fooled them.

Besides, making it too flawless would appear somewhat fake.

There are so many mysteries in the world, what’s one more baffling event to be debated?

This case was concluded.