Ch.314Side Story. Cyberpunk 2088 (4)

In front of David’s Prosthetic Workshop. Four people who seem out of place on the concrete-covered slum streets stand together.

They are wearing Ananas Technology’s “wearable” powered suits, all painted in white—specifically, high-end models from their “wearable” line.

These powered suits protect the entire body with composite plasteel armor and feature built-in defensive force fields, making them capable of withstanding direct hits from anti-tank missiles in terms of personal protection.

On the back of these powered suits is a gray emblem in the shape of a pineapple with a bite taken out of it—the mark proving they belong to Ananas Technology.

They are the so-called Ananas Crickets, Ananas Technology’s direct “hounds” and special forces unit.

As befitting a megacorp’s direct special forces, they have high-grade implants worth hundreds of millions installed throughout their bodies, and naturally, their equipment is just as extraordinary as these implants.

The weapons they hold are Ananas company’s IP-80S composite rifles, famous for each costing more than a car, and they have multi-purpose bit weapons known as “Mac-Pads” floating around them.

The reason these four individuals—each capable of easily wiping out hundreds of random gang members single-handedly—have gathered here is because one of Ananas Technology’s directors noticed the value of a dagger owned by the shop’s proprietor and wanted to retrieve it.

A dagger that could turn even an ordinary factory worker into a killing machine just by holding it—considering the technology contained within, its value was immeasurable.

There was good reason why the director, even abusing their authority, dispatched as many as four of Ananas Technology’s hounds after determining this item must be acquired.

Thus, the four Ananas Crickets agents dispatched for this reason were aiming their gun barrels inside while chatting through their implant-connected internal communications network.

[…Is he dead?]

[Come on, 03. Don’t they usually die? How could someone living in a dump like this possibly survive…]

[04. Don’t let your guard down. The target is a cyberware craftsman and has that unidentified ‘dagger.’ We don’t know what might happen.]

Code name 01, the team leader of this Ananas Crickets team, tried to restrain 04 with those words, but they didn’t really resonate with the inexperienced 04.

[But, 01. We just fired a missile, didn’t we? Are you saying someone skilled enough to survive that is here?]

And to be fair, 04’s words weren’t completely wrong.

The missile they had just fired was a 20mm anti-personnel guided missile from the grenade launcher attached to the underside of the IP-80S composite rifle, a specialized weapon calibrated to cause devastating damage to organic matter.

In fact, pieces of flesh from the body hit by 04’s missile had splattered outside the building, so it was reasonable to assume that any significant threats had been eliminated.

[I agree with 04, 01. Request permission to begin search operation.]

[Understood. Everyone, approach in Formation C!]

So at 02’s request, 01 ordered them to move in Formation C, a four-directional security formation. As they entered the partially destroyed workshop according to their commander’s orders—

—Ratatatatatatatatata!!!!

David’s pre-installed security turrets activated, unleashing two 7.62mm machine guns, but mere machine guns were insufficient against their protective force fields when even autocannons would struggle to penetrate them.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Crash…!!

Thanks to this, 03 easily destroyed the turret with just three shots, and they were able to use their scanning devices to identify a safe room hidden behind the smoke and dust.

[01, shall I blow it open?]

[Yes, do it, 04.]

Rather than entering the safe room without knowing what might be inside, they decided to destroy the wall to check the interior first—04 aimed the IP-80S and fired several concussion rounds.

As the wall instantly collapsed, bullets began flying from within the fallen debris.

Ratatatatatatatatata—!!!!

Of course, mere rifle bullets from a machine gun couldn’t penetrate their protective force fields, so the hounds inwardly mocked whoever was inside as they unleashed their IP-80S rounds.

[Return fire!]

The 10mm high-velocity armor-piercing rounds spewing from their barrels easily tore through the homemade safe room protected by steel plates, turning the surroundings into a chaotic mess of dust and swirling smoke.

Even in this disastrous scene, thanks to their powered suit helmets’ infrared detection capabilities, they moved calmly, searching for David—or more precisely, the dagger—when suddenly—

—Crack!

Startled by the sudden crushing sound from the right, they hurriedly turned their gun barrels and heads to see 02 being grabbed by a blood-covered humanoid figure that was driving a dagger into 02’s neck and applying pressure.

While Ananas Crickets agents couldn’t die from moderate injuries thanks to their high-grade implants, the blood-covered figure had instantly severed 02’s spine with the dagger, giving 02 no chance to demonstrate their tenacious vitality before instant death.

[W-what the hell?!! What is that?!]

Reflexively activating her thought acceleration device, 01 was shocked by the appearance of the entity that had killed 02 in what seemed like an almost frozen world.

First, it had somehow penetrated the protective force field they all constantly maintained and stealthily killed 02.

Second, despite having skin completely flayed off and abdomen torn open with intestines spilling out, it was moving perfectly fine.

And finally third… not even the slightest life sign was being detected from the entity before her.

What shocked 01 most was the third observation. Their enhanced vision and hearing, amplified by high-grade implants, couldn’t detect the entity before them, and simultaneously, every function built into their powered suits was identifying the moving entity as a corpse.

With its heart physically half-ground away, naturally no heartbeat could be detected, and with no body heat, it was essentially just a piece of meat. Yet the corpse before them was moving perfectly as if alive—

[—Hit it with heavy firepower!!!]

01 decided to shower it with bullets, believing that eventually they would kill it if they kept firing.

The IP-80S composite rifle has three barrels. One is a machine gun section firing 10mm rifle rounds commonly used in Ananas Technology products, another is a 20mm grenade launcher for firing grenades or small missiles.

And the last one was the weapon that maximized this rifle’s value—a plasma gun section deemed impossible for mass production, the strongest infantry weapon of this era.

This weapon, which encased plasma masses created using liquefied hydrogen and a reactor in a force field, was rifle-sized but had power and penetration comparable to tank guns from the old Third World War era.

Thus, the three plasma masses fired without any sound directly hit the target and instantly erased the corpse without a trace—no, that’s not what happened!

[—?!!]

The entity moved its body at transcendental speed before the high-pressure plasma was even fired, disappearing somewhere, causing the plasma masses to only create enormous holes in the floor.

—Crack!!

And during that moment, 04’s neck was instantly broken and torn off, causing them to collapse in an instant…

‘I couldn’t react!’

Shocked by the corpse that moved faster than her implants and powered suit’s tracking vision could follow, 01 hurriedly discarded her useless gun and drew the monomolecular blade dagger from her waist to respond to the next attack—

‘—Ah.’

At that very moment, as her thought acceleration device automatically activated in the face of mortal danger, 01 could see two major things.

One was 03, who had just died with their skull—where the brain was located—split in half, and the other was a dagger that had approached right in front of 01’s face. It appeared to be the dagger they were targeting.

Since the thought acceleration device only amplified thinking speed, 01 could do nothing—

In real time it was about 0.4 seconds, but to 01’s perception it felt like almost an hour as she stopped breathing while experiencing the pain of her head being slowly sliced off.

And in the midst of these four dead Ananas Crickets, he—David, who had been little more than a mass of blood and flesh in human form—was able to instantly regenerate his body.

‘…Blood.’

Suddenly, feeling the sensation of fangs that had somehow grown longer after regeneration, David felt the desire to drink blood.