episode_0125

Mason, who had agreed to become R&B Risk Control’s dedicated engineer, had her long pigtails sway and jingle with her frivolous movements.

The mischievous grin blossoming all over her face seemed to say, “I’m dying to tease you,” but Luna and I, the targets of her teasing, merely looked off into the distance, ignoring her as much as possible.

Even so, it wasn’t likely this meddling auntie would stop.

“Oppa~ Did you just have some impure thoughts~?”

“I absolutely, not even one bit, did not think you were meddling, Auntie.”

Click-

I quietly declared surrender to the cold muzzle pointed at my chin.

Mason, who was laughing but had blazing eyes, pointed a finger at her own eyes, then poked my eyes, saying “I see you,” and then backed off, saying she’d let it slide just this once.

“Seriously, I was so frustrated and breathless wondering how long you two were going to play hard to get, I nearly died~ Do you know how many times I hammered the operating table watching you two every day?”

Mason, whose face looked as comfortable as if she’d taken a digestive aid for an upset stomach, circled Luna, continuing her fussing.

Naturally, Luna showed disgust, but she couldn’t stop Mason, who seemed determined to torment her as much as she’d been held back.

“Damn it. At this rate, the whole world will know.”

“This older brother already knows.”

“Ah, damn.”

JQ, who had appeared, leaning on the doorframe, pretending to be cool, though no one knew when he’d arrived.

“How do you know?”

“I went to give Luna a separate report, and that little vampire kid was blocking the door. She wouldn’t block the door if they were just talking, so I figured they were finally doing it.”

“…”

Seeing Martina, the incredibly loyal one who had even volunteered as a gatekeeper and contributed to exposing her master’s private affairs, she quickly looked away, sensing my mood.

I’ll have to confiscate her snacks for a week.

As soon as the punishment was decided, Martina looked at me with eyes like the world was crumbling, but even with that gaze, I, a professional mercenary without a drop of blood or tears, would absolutely not let her off.

“Was I not supposed to hear this?”

At the sound of another new voice, I shifted my gaze back to the door to see Spenda standing awkwardly, wearing a full-face chrome mask that gleamed silver, brighter than before, as if he’d bought a new one.

“Damn it.”

Seriously, everyone knows.

* * *

With the absorption of Wild Hunt, a certain level of highly mobile skilled personnel had been acquired.

However, the recruitment process had been costly, resulting in a total of only about fifteen members, or just over twenty even if they had been intact, which was too few to be the company’s main force.

Yes, numbers.

It’s true that a skilled individual, legendary enough to earn such an epithet, is more reliable than dozens or hundreds of mediocre ones, but…

Not all mercenaries possess such skill, nor can they.

Mid-tier mercenaries who were promising, quite skilled, and used reasonably good modifications or equipment.

The company needed a middle layer to use for such general requests.

To put it in perspective, perhaps individuals like the Shark Head of the Wasteland mercenary group and the woman who used the Cyber Scorpion Tail, whom I met at Kyojinkai when helping Yuki and Kana.

Or, if they were on the level of good old Patton and the chic Katana Girl Yujin, who accompanied me when escorting Kathleen’s son Aaron, that would be top tier.

Luna and I deeply pondered how to fill that layer.

JQ and Blake were also gathering people using their personal connections, but it was far from enough.

Normally, we would have to post an announcement, hire employees, and train them directly, but that wouldn’t allow us to immediately match the combat power of a PMC.

As I wracked my brain for a long time, my mind heating up, a good idea suddenly came to me.

Let’s absorb Hellstream!

They were the regional overlords who could contend with a coalition of all the gangs in Rossbord, and considering their strong chrome-obsessed tendencies in terms of armament, they were more than sufficient.

It would be hard to consider them proper combat chrome, but still, their modification rate was the highest among all gangs in Eclipse Point.

In a situation where I had Hiko’s backing and could draw almost unlimited capital from Ayakashi, simply replacing their old civilian chrome with old military-grade chrome would make them an immediate asset.

“Are you really going to bring in gangs?”

“Luna, you said it yourself. I need to become a renegade. If Ayakashi’s young master isn’t just supporting gangs but outright embracing them, people will tear into us from all sides, won’t they?”

Luna, who had been quite cautiously opposing me, nodded at my persuasion and arranged a meeting with Hellstream.

Actually, there was no need to arrange anything; since he was the guy who called me “friend” and constantly pestered me to come hang out, I just called him with a single phone call.

“Friend! Who would’ve thought you were Ayakashi’s distinguished young master! It hasn’t even been a few weeks since that day, and you’ve already become a celebrity!”

“It’s just a bit of a story.”

As Ricardo, still shining his gleaming chrome, boomed out his speaker voice, his newly fitted display face, it seemed, flashed painfully bright.

Ricardo and I exchanged brief pleasantries about how we’d been, then clinked glasses filled with strong liquor.

Even though less than a month had passed since the Closing Age escort mission, and I now owned a respectable company, he showed strong signs of envy, but like a true Mexican, full of brotherhood, he didn’t reveal anything beyond that.

“Anyway, how’s life been recently?”

“Haha! Don’t even get me started! After that commotion at the harbor, the cops have been all over Rossbord, so we can’t even dream of doing proper business. Damn bastards. Why’d they have to target a megacorp’s goods?”

Ricardo grumbled as he poured liquor into a glass with an arm tattooed with a naked woman in a nun’s habit.

“We’re only holding on because we have brothers everywhere and several legal businesses set up. I’m wondering if we should do anything to get money, as long as there’s a source!”

“How many of you are there?”

“Hmm? I don’t manage the brothers directly, so I don’t know exactly, but I think it’s roughly 3,000 if we gather everyone.”

3,000.

Of course, there are differences in skill levels and many non-combatants, but considering that all of them, to varying degrees, have chrome implants, it’s an enormous number.

If we pick only the decent ones from this group, our concerns about insufficient combat power will also be resolved.

I put my arm around Ricardo’s shoulder, unsure where he was even pouring the alcohol.

“Hey, brother.”

“Hmm?”

Ricardo, who had been elevated from friend to brother, put down his drink and looked at me.

Though it was just a smooth display face.

“Want to work here?”

Thus, R&B Risk Control was launched with a total of 1,362 employees.

* * *

From various places on the street, fast-tempo pop music, roughly 120-140 bpm, flowed out, and drunken men and women mumbled incomprehensible words as they passed by.

Life at the bottom, visible everywhere, was the same, but what differentiated it from the pitiable lives of those trapped in narrow, rectangular rooms, eating tasteless kibble and awaiting a lonely death, was perhaps the fact that they had just enough money to play for the day?

‘Of course, it’s probably less about having leisure and more about not thinking about the future at all.’

According to Eclipse Point’s statistics, where the average weekly working hours reach 105, these people were acting like this during hours when they should still be diligently grinding their lives away for black companies, so they couldn’t possibly be people with a plan.

Passing by a man who had started a public masturbation show, high on electronic drugs, I stopped in front of a familiar arcade center from which arcade sounds burst forth.

The game center was bustling with people wearing fox-ear shaped headsets as if they were tickets, or having animal-ear shaped cyberware implanted, or even those who had spent some money to get bio-parts transplanted.

It was the main base of K.I.T.S.U.N.E, which had risen as a new power in Japantown, beyond AM Kabukicho, by joining hands with the vigilante group Neo Shinsengumi, and the residence of the Fox Twins.

Entering the center, where everything from new models using neural interface connections to old models controlled by arcade sticks were displayed without distinction, a familiar long-snouted figure greeted me.

“Ah! Big bro, you’ve arrived!”

“Who’s your big bro?”

Furida Yoichi.

This guy, whose name was suspicious from the start, unlike others who had merely replaced parts of their bodies, was entirely covered in fluffy fur.

It would be more accurate to call him a large, bipedal beast.

Despite that, he seemed popular; every time I saw him, he had either a man or a woman by his side…

“Where are Yuki and Kana?”

Even putting aside Furida’s appearance as a furry orange fox, he was a high-ranking executive of K.I.T.S.U.N.E, so he likely knew their whereabouts.

And he met that expectation precisely.

“Ah! Kurokana-nim has gone to look for a place to open a branch.”

“A branch?”

“Yes. The more entry points for information, the more high-quality stuff we pick up.”

Perhaps because they had taken over many gangs and cartels that had been shattered while working with Neo Shinsengumi, K.I.T.S.U.N.E, now more knowledgeable, was expanding its presence as an information broker.

They’re probably planning to create more channels.

“Shiroyuki-nim has gone to the subway!”

“Subway? Subways in Eclipse Point should have all disappeared after the elevated tubes were installed.”

“Ah! More precisely, it’s the abandoned subway station in Japantown.”

Furida lowered his head and whispered as if it were a secret.

“In the abandoned subway, there’s a black market community formed where goods that have flowed in from all over are bought and sold…! I don’t know exactly what Noona-nim is trying to do, but isn’t she looking for something to acquire?”

“Hmm…”

“Even so, both of them should be back by night. Would you like to go upstairs, Big bro?”

I shook my head, seeing him about to guide me upstairs.

Rather than that, I became interested in that black market.

Might as well take a look around while I’m at it.

Black market.