Chapter 193
She certainly had the right to talk big.
The time it took Angela to clear out the inside of the Underground Clinic? I didn’t measure it, but it seemed to take about 15 minutes.
Hina and I were watching through a display connected to a closed-circuit camera, and it was nothing short of an infiltration action movie.
It would have been nice if we had some popcorn.
She crawled up onto the ceiling like Spider-Man and dropped down right on top of the corporate agent guarding the entrance.
Using gravity to slam down hard, she stepped off the limply collapsing body and skillfully searched his pockets to pull out a grenade.
Then, having roughly memorized the layout beforehand, she headed straight inside without hesitation.
Swish - she hurled an electrified shuriken and, without even looking, embedded it into the patrol drone surveilling the corridor. As the drone’s lights went out and it fell, she dashed over silently to catch it and pulled the shuriken back out.
Soon after she hid herself behind a corner, three armed reporters came running all at once.
Due to the overlapping issues of the installed drone’s status anomaly and the signal loss of their colleague guarding the inside of the main entrance, they had figured out something was wrong and were approaching in a swarm.
Glancing through the wall at the positions of the cautiously moving reporters, Angela pulled out a grenade and tossed it toward the side wall.
Ping - !
The grenade bounced off the wall, ricocheted off the ceiling, and exploded with a silent flash in midair. The colorless optical laser beam emitted from the anti-personnel grenade, which focused on lethality, instantly severed one person’s limbs and cauterized the cross-sections with heat.
She had already taken care of two, and there were exactly two left.
Angela immediately dashed forward and plunged her Silver Hook Arm into the soldier in front, who was injured by the laser but hadn’t died.
One screamed in pain, and the other abruptly fired his gun with a rat-a-tat. Angela cleverly used the soldier secured by her hook as a meat shield to block the bullets.
She seemed to wait for a moment, but seeing that he had no qualms about pumping bullets into his colleague’s body, she clicked her tongue and forcefully kicked the captured soldier away.
The last remaining corporate private soldier stepped back to keep his line of sight clear and aimed his gun, but it was already too late. Angela was so agile that such rational judgment didn’t work on her.
In an instant, she closed the distance, tripped him to the floor, tossed his rifle far away, and struck him in the head.
And just like that, it was over.
[Cleaning is finished. You can come in now. I didn’t kill a single one out of consideration for the Monk. Did I do well?]
Having lightly dispatched four corporate private soldiers as easily as eating cake, Angela sent a radio transmission in a cheerful voice, as if she had just lightly cleaned her room.
Inside, it was indeed exactly as Angela had said.
The two whom Angela had handled personally were merely unconscious but still breathing, and the corporate private soldier who acted as a meat shield hadn’t died yet thanks to wearing body armor.
The same went for the person whose limbs were sliced off by the laser. Because the wounds were cauterized, he was just writhing on the floor without worrying about dying from excessive bleeding.
Even if it was a gruesome scene like a scene from Hell, it was definitely non-lethal.
The Shaolin Monk didn’t seem entirely satisfied, but it was clear that Angela had at least done her best from her perspective.
We passed through the corridor filled with bullets, blood, and unconscious people, and entered the waiting room.
Angela was sitting with her legs crossed on a long plastic chair across from the information counter, where the patient waiting number display was turned off and the billboard was blinking.
“Oh, you’re here?”
She sexily showed off her firm thighs in her short skirt, naturally drawing the eye. Her appearance was majestic, as if boasting of her great achievement.
From what Hina and I had watched, her skills were indeed worthy of overflowing confidence.
It hit me anew that she hadn’t gone all out when she fought me. A fortunate thing, in many ways.
“I checked, and the people who originally worked at the Clinic were all kicked out, and there’s exactly one other person here besides these reporters. There’s a high chance that one person is the culprit.”
“Where are they?”
When Hina asked, Angela gestured with her chin toward a steel door deep inside the waiting room.
[Procedure Room]
That was what was written on the nameplate.
The Underground Clinic, Lead Chang’s Cyberware Procedure Room.
It was just a door, but somehow it felt gloomier than the outside, and an ominous aura seemed to hover around it.
The shoulders of Hina, who was standing next to me, trembled. Even without realizing it, I could feel her hesitation.
Looking back, I was usually the one receiving care rather than comforting others in emotionally shaky situations like this.
, whether from Sey, the Dragon President, or anyone else.
This time was different. I was an adult with more age and experience than this girl, and I had been asked to take care of her.
I placed a hand on Hina’s small shoulder.
She looked at me with her characteristic upturned eyes, a face that seemed to ask if I had something to say. It was an abrasive gaze, but in truth, she just wasn’t good at being honest.
“Everything will be just fine.”
When I spoke, shrugging, the girl’s lips trembled. Was she trying to say thank you?
“Whatever. What a sight. Did you eat something wrong? You’re doing things you never do. Let’s just go quickly.”
Hina shook off my hand and strode forward.
She kicked aside a small, cute nurse model that popped out and shouted, 'The doctor isn’t here right now! How about visiting next time?' and coolly walked past it.
…Hmm. She’s doing this because she can’t be honest, right? I don’t know. I guess I really don’t click with kids these days.
Still, as she stepped forward as if ready to kick down the Procedure Room door, her hesitation seemed to have vanished thanks to that.
Even if it felt a bit awkward, the goal was a success.
As I smacked my lips and followed behind, the Shaolin Monk patted my shoulder.
[Cheer up, Patron. Dealing with children is inherently not an easy task. Even when the Buddha resolved to attend and left home, leaving behind his nursing son…]
What is this derelict monk talking about now? Is he seriously saying this as a form of comfort?
Somehow feeling annoyed, I did to the Shaolin Monk exactly what was done to me.
“Whatever. Be quiet and let’s go quickly.”
[…]
Now it was really time to see the end.
* * *
The inside of the Procedure Room was enclosed in plexiglass.
The inside couldn’t be seen from the outside, and only a red-green display showing the internal patient’s status - such as blood pressure, body temperature, and pulse - was floating on the exterior.
Perhaps because there was no patient at that moment, it was all blank.
As I entered, a unit chair covered in a green cloth reminiscent of a dentist’s office came into view. The pale white lighting shining down made my eyes sting.
Attached to the chair were various connecting wires, medical monitors packed closely together, a mechanical arm for procedures, a bioprinter, and so on. As someone who had never been to an underground clinic like this, it was quite an unfamiliar sight.
Of course, what drew the most attention was something else.
It was a man sitting in the procedure unit chair with his limbs bound.
The prime suspect currently seemed most likely to be the culprit.
As if something bad had happened, his body was slumped over, and the gown he wore had blood splattered all over it.
His face couldn’t be seen. It was because a cloth similar to the green face cover often used at the dentist’s office was covering his face like a paper bag worn over the head.
“He’s not dead, is he?”
“No, he’s alive.”
Angela said that and unhesitatingly whipped off the cloth covering his face.
The appearance that was soon revealed was…
“Huh?”
Who are you?
First of all, it was a face I didn’t know. I knew what Nigel and Felix looked like from seeing them at the company dinner, but it was neither of them.
A man. He had some age to him. He was at least middle-aged. He had a neat but wrinkled face, unique to an East Asian. He had shadows around his eyes, as if he had suffered quite a bit lately.
“I don’t know who you are, but thank you for saving me. Thank you so much! I won’t forget this favor. Really!”
The man repeatedly shouted his thanks in City Speak with a faint Tokyo Accent showing through.
“Dr. Chang?”
“Yes. I am Lead Chang. I’m the clinic owner here, but those bastards suddenly barged in and…”
The illegal procedure specialist, Dr. Lead Chang. Instead of the culprit, this person was in the seat. Had we missed him again?
While Hina and I put on dejected expressions, Angela was concentrating on the doctor, perhaps still trying to chase down a clue.
She quickly cut off the doctor as he rambled on, explaining the unfortunate circumstances he had experienced.
“Dr. Chang, you know me, right? You did the procedure for my arm a few years ago.”
Angela’s Hook Arm? This person attached that for her?
But Dr. Chang’s reaction was subtle. The way he rolled his eyes, it seemed he didn’t know how to answer.
“I-Is that so? I do over a dozen procedures a day, so I don’t remember well, but…”
As if that could be true.
That Silver Hook Arm, Angela’s naturally radiant appearance, and her overwhelming chest, no matter how many procedures he did, wouldn’t be easy to forget.
“Hm? You don’t remember even looking at this arm? Really?”
Even as Angela intimidatingly shoved her arm, which had turned into a Silver Hook, toward him, Lead Chang only shook his head in terror.
“I, I really don’t remember. I don’t know. Didn’t you entrust it to someone other than me? If I did something wrong, I apologize.”
It didn’t seem like a lie. Unless Lead Chang had caught amnesia or something, forgetting it didn’t make sense either.
Was Angela deliberately finding fault and yelling at him to test the waters?
Amidst the confusing situation, Angela took a step back.
“Hmm, is that so? Maybe I was confused. I’m sorry, Doctor. Still, it’s a fact that I saved you, so I can expect some service if I visit later, right? My arm has been creaking a bit lately.”
In the relaxing atmosphere, Dr. Lead Chang spoke with a sigh of relief.
“Of course, Young Lady. From additional modification to parts repair, I’ll do anything as a free procedure. I can naturally offer that much as a service to the benefactor who rescued me from a ruffian. Haha.”
As if responding to the doctor’s awkward laugh, Angela smiled brightly.
And she slammed her Hook Arm down onto the doctor’s shoulder.
CRACK - !
“GAAAAAAH! Why!”
“Your acting is clumsy. Oh, I’ll praise you for not falling for my testing you with the arm. It’s true I didn’t get the procedure from Dr. Chang. So I was a bit unsure… but the last part was decisive.”
She kindly explained it to the screaming man.
“Dr. Chang’s clinic is quite famous among dealer/traders, you know? I’ve been there once or twice myself. The common consensus is… that the owner is an incredibly money-grubbing stingy person and a Miser.”
Whether you save his life or not, even if a knife is at his throat, he’s someone who absolutely cannot tolerate giving free service. I heard he doesn’t give a single penny discount even to a 10-year regular customer. But a free procedure? You’re not Dr. Chang. If you were the Doctor, there’s no way you’d do that. Hahaha!”
The man let out a painful groan, then completely changed his expression and said.
“Ah… my Acting was a bit too much, wasn’t it? So I got caught. What a shame.”