Chapter 45
When I heard the notification that I had leveled up, the first thing I did was shout, “Status window.”
Of course, nothing appeared before my eyes.
Still, just in case, I shouted it once more later at the grocery store,
only for Nova to catch me in the act and leave me suffering for several days.
The self-loathing I felt when I saw those frigid eyes (lenses)….
It was impossible to put into words.
Anyway.
The “needlessly cheerful female voice” that only I could hear had far too many flaws to be called a proper system.
It was an entity that appeared out of nowhere every day, said whatever it wanted to say, and disappeared.
Honestly, I still hadn’t figured out the exact conditions that caused the voice to appear.
It does whatever the hell it wants.
Sometimes it was a random encounter, sometimes an achievement, and sometimes some other whatever.
That was why I had stopped paying attention to it entirely, but I never expected to suddenly discover something resembling a status window now.
Since I normally fell asleep in less than thirty seconds whenever I put my head down, I truly hadn’t even imagined that a function like this might be hidden.
When I closed my eyes and concentrated, red roots like branches stretched out through the pitch-black darkness.
The roots, settled into various shapes, pulsed like living blood vessels.
Among them, I saw a single point containing an unusually bright light, like the North Star.
【Psychokinetic】
Unlike the other images, a gray heart located in a completely separate place was beating at an extremely slow pace.
In any case, thanks to the trait I had gained from leveling up, I had escaped a life-or-death crisis.
Though I did feel as if I had abandoned my pride as a man─, or something every human being ought to possess.
The world of competition was a cold one.
Fortunately or unfortunately, there was no trace of “something” on the asphalt road where my opponent had been.
Though there was a chance it had been swept down into the waterway by the heavy rain.
I finished checking that the Pac-Man mask, now with newly cut eyeholes, was still in good condition.
Then I slowly rose from the truck’s hood, where I had been lying at an angle.
On the truck’s engine, which had received me as softly as a cushion, a large human-shaped mark had been stamped in a spread-eagled position.
“This isn’t some kind of gag manga….”
Didn’t someone once say that the back could withstand seven times as much force as the front?
My back hurt less than I had expected.
My vision was gradually becoming clearer, too.
If there was a problem….
“Oof.”
I checked the condition of my ankle again.
The injury was severe enough that it wouldn’t have felt strange if the words “LiveLeak” had appeared in the upper-right corner.
Even when I first injured it, it had looked as though the bone had been completely pulverized, and then I had even kicked him with the broken foot because I was angry.
Well, what could I do?
All I could do was trust my regenerative abilities.
As I stood up on one leg, hopping, I saw a little kid running toward me from far away.
“…Hyung!!”
He came running in a hurry, then slipped on the rain-slick road and took a spectacular spill.
“Whoa!”
Though he grimaced from the pain, he quickly got back up and scampered toward me again.
Gio glanced toward the road’s guardrail and asked me,
“H-Hyung, did you take that guy down?”
“You just said that, so he just came back to life.”
“…?”
He had just brought up something that should never be said after taking down an opponent….
I limped toward the place where the guy had fallen.
Gio waved his hands beside me as if he wanted to support me, but I couldn’t lean on a kid who was barely half my size just because my leg hurt.
Kwoooosh…!!
The water in the channel was plunging down with tremendous force, like a waterfall.
Since rain was still pouring from the sky like a downpour, the water level was deep, and dozens of whirlpools spun ominously below.
I pictured the megacorp employee who had fallen while clutching his vital spot tightly,
then shook my head vigorously.
He had been a truly powerful opponent, but in the end, he was still nothing more than a living creature.
There was no way someone who fell from this height without any preparation could have survived.
Gio seemed to think the same thing, since he roughly wiped the rainwater streaming down his face with one hand and said,
“…He’s probably dead.”
“Ah.”
“As far as I know, there’s a grinder down there for processing foreign objects. And the contaminated water will flow toward the garbage dump in District 50.”
“…Mm.”
“There’s absolutely no way he could still be alive. He fell from such a great height. Even if he is a megacorp employee….”
“Enough.”
“Huh?”
How many survival flags was he going to raise, anyway?
At this rate, even someone holding a funeral would leap out of the coffin….
In the end, whether the opponent was alive or dead, I had no way to confirm it.
Of course, even if he ultimately survived, the rest of his life without his balls would be nothing but suffering….
Could this city’s technology resurrect a man after his testicles had been destroyed?
I didn’t know.
Not my problem.
When I tore my gaze away from below the waterway, I saw Gio looking up at me with sparkling eyes.
“Anyway, hyung, you were seriously awesome!!”
The young kid waved his hands around, as though trying to recreate the course of the battle.
His excitement came through completely.
“You flew like this, then slammed into the truck with a bang! Honestly, I thought it was over right there…. But I couldn’t just stand there and watch, could I? Do you remember what I said to him?”
Gio cleared his throat and performed the line in a voice less solemn─ and more like a Doraemon going through puberty.
“Hey, you corporate dumbass, you pathetic moron who goes around licking the backs of other dogs like a shitty mutt─!”
“Right.”
“Honestly, if I hadn’t drawn his attention, you couldn’t have won. Right?”
“…Tsk.”
“No, it’s true!”
I vigorously ruffled Gio’s rain-soaked hair.
The little kid’s head wobbled back and forth like a roly-poly toy.
“You should’ve just run away. Don’t act proud of doing something so dangerous, you little brat.”
“No, either way, you did get my help! Isn’t the reason he suddenly clutched his lower abdomen and staggered because your kick hit him?”
“…Uh.”
Since rain was coming down so heavily, Gio, who had been up on the waterway, apparently hadn’t heard the conversation I’d had with the man.
Maybe that was how it had looked from far away.
I remembered what the man had said.
- …I didn’t know there were still psychics around who hadn’t been captured by the city government. Well, I suppose that’s possible because this is District 49.
Apparently, in this (insane) city, psychics were forcibly taken away.
I didn’t know whether they were taken elsewhere for experiments or used to create a separate special forces unit.
At any rate, it seemed there was nothing to be gained from letting anyone discover this ability.
I calmly nodded.
“Well, you could say that.”
“See?!”
Gio continued chattering noisily after that.
He must have had some weakness in his lower abdomen. Or maybe the tube of his internal-combustion cyberware really did come loose, giving me an opening. Since he fell down there, he must be dead for sure─.
“Enough. Stop talking and let’s check what’s inside the truck.”
“Oh, right…!”
Gio’s face lit up with anticipation.
Our target wasn’t the megacorp employee, but the contents of the truck he was driving.
Even though this was a waterway where people rarely passed by, there was no telling when another strange variable might occur.
Especially since he had said the goods were coming from a “megacorp.”
Rather than loitering around here for no reason, it was best to grab the goods and run.
I hopped along on one foot toward the cargo bed of the large truck.
The truck wasn’t made of any particularly special metal like a safe.
The contents were firmly concealed behind sheet-metal plates, but they weren’t locked with any separate padlock.
Considering how strong the guy who had been riding in it was, this had to be the right truck….
With an uneasy thought in mind, I slowly lifted the truck’s sheet-metal plate upward.
·
·
·
Then I closed it again.
I calmly sorted out the situation we were in.
The kid, who still hadn’t seen the contents, stood on tiptoe behind me and voiced his curiosity.
“What is it? Why did you close it? What’s inside?”
“…….”
“Huh?”
No matter how many times I thought it over, my conclusion didn’t change much.
We’re screwed.
* * *
Gio’s face turned as pale as a sheet of paper when he saw the contents of the truck.
He might have been suffering from hypothermia after getting soaked in the rain, but unfortunately, that wasn’t the reason.
“…Hyung.”
In the cargo bed of the large truck.
“What is all this…?”
There were all kinds of “weapons” loaded inside.
Really. Truly.
An enormous number of weapons.
I asked Gio with a sour expression,
“…You said there would just be something expensive inside.”
“No, that was definitely how it usually was…. Expensive works of art like paintings or statues, or rare living creatures like endangered iguanas. That was as far as it went.”
The contents were expensive.
The problem was that they weren’t the kind of goods I had expected.
Honestly, my entire body was filled with even more tension than when that megacorp employee had poked my eyeball with a little boop just moments ago.
I had to decide quickly.
I looked down at the kid, who was still standing there in a daze.
Then I handed him every bill in my pocket.
“For now, go back home.”
“…W-why are you suddenly giving me money?”
“What, are you going to take these weapons somewhere else and sell them?”
Expensive valuables would have been one thing.
But I couldn’t begin to guess how deeply the megacorp, Black Square, and the gang organizations─ might be involved with these weapons.
“Remember. Today, nothing happened to you.”
Gio gulped at my warning.
I pushed him by the back.
“I’ll come visit you when I have time, so use that money to buy the kids something tasty.”
Honestly, the amount was absurdly small for the value of the goods, but Gio must have found it satisfactory, because he slowly nodded.
As a resident of Risk City, the kid must have realized how serious this was, too.
“…You have to come visit later.”
“Yeah.”
I climbed down from the cargo bed and watched Gio’s back as he quickly ran away.
I couldn’t just leave the weapons behind and go back.
Because then there would be evidence left behind.
It was also the worst possible move I could make.
Since I had already succeeded in robbing the truck, I had to deal with the truck and its cargo somehow.
First, I took the terminal out of my pocket.
“I should tell Michael to bring another truck from the grocery store….”
But the terminal’s screen looked a little strange.
Nova’s emoticon was still there,
[😵]
but its eyes were spinning around dizzyingly.
I tapped the side of the terminal.
“Nova?”
[
Temporary connection loss detected. Hello, World. Greetings. Model Novarek─, kzzzt
. Is the user’s body all right?]
“…Uh, I’m fine.”
Apparently, it had experienced some confusion inside the terminal while I was fighting the megacorp employee.
The emoticon’s expression changed into a bright, cheerful smile when it heard me say I was fine.
[😀]
Then it quickly changed again.
[😟]
Then Nova rapidly rattled off her words like a machine gun firing.
[The user needs to be more careful with their body. What is the condition of your injuries─.]
“No, sorry, but.”
Because I didn’t have time to be scolded right now.
“More importantly, contact Michael right now and ask him to bring the truck from the grocery store here as quickly and carefully as possible, preferably while avoiding the surveillance cameras.”
[…Transmission complete.]
I had to deal with the truck and its cargo first.
Honestly, I really wanted to just push it down beneath the waterway….
A vehicle I couldn’t drive with a regular Class 2 license.
The large truck, with its autonomous-driving function completely disabled, was like a Snorlax blocking the road.
Please, let no one come looking before then.
Just as I was anxiously looking around,
I discovered a large capsule placed at the very back of the truck.
That’s….
I wiped my hand across the surface, brushing away the faded letters.
【Handle ■ with care】
【■■■■ ■■ Combat-Use Female Android】
When I saw that, I let out a small sigh.
“…Still, I did accomplish what I came here for.”
Anyway.
I had succeeded in rescuing Nova’s body.
* * *
Michael pressed a hand to his forehead as he looked at the weapons spread all over the grocery store floor.
“…Didn’t you say you were going to get an android body?”
“I, well, did.”
This time, I had nothing to say either.