Cyberpunk: Ultimate Cyborg System-Chapter 522: The Ghost is Back.
"Haaaa…" A young man's mouth gaped in an unrestrained yawn. "I think Imma hit the sack…"
His voice was barely audible through the loud music blasting his surroundings. People still noticed him put the bottle down, and when he got up, the questions started.
"Hey Marvin! Where are you going!?"
"You gotta piss or something?"
"The party is just getting started!"
"You getting something stronger?"
"Why dontcha blow some dust?"
"Oh, shut up." Marvin waved a dismissive hand. "It's almost four in the… moning…"
The urge to vomit overwhelmed him, but he managed to keep it in. Stopping by the toilet seemed like the right choice. He navigated his way through the packed dance floor, feeling his head spinning faster and faster. Maybe he drank one bottle too much. Or maybe it was his age finally getting to him. Twenty eight didn't sound too old to party, but his body was saying otherwise.
"I… sound like an old man…" he muttered, feeling a bitter aftertaste while looking down at the mess he made out of the toilet bowl.
Twenty eight wasn't old by normal standards, but for people like him, it felt like a very long time. Among his friends, he was the only one who make it this far. The idea felt like a sharp needle slowly sinking into his mind, and even the cold water he washed his face with didn't didn't make it go away.
Raising his head, he saw his reflection in the cracked bathroom mirror. He could still feel the prickle of the needles dripping ink into his skin. After twelve years, half of his face looked like a charred skull, and as he looked at it, he found himself wondering if the path he walked was the right one.
"Hm?"
Something shifted in the corner, drawing his gaze the reflection over his shoulders. He couldn't remember if the stall behind him had been open before. Though he attributed the door moving to his imagination, which was far from being under control thanks to all the booze he ingested, he still turned around to check. Feeling a little silly for reacting as if he had seen a ghost, he pulled a few paper towel from the dispenser and turned to the door. An odd sensation shot through his chest just then.
Looking down, he was met with a very off sight. Something gray was poking out of his chest. No, not poking. It was sinking into his chest. A gray piece of metal. He had subdermal armor under his skin, so seeing the red drop sliding along the piece filled him with confusion. When that drop touched the skeletal fingers wrapped around the other end of the piece, his confusion only grew.
Marvin tried to gather his strength, but the hand moved firs, pulled out the knife and stabbing it again, and again, and again. His heart gave in with one final beat, and his entire body went as stiff as a droid whose batteries ran out. A knife that could pierce through subdermal armor was a knife that could deliver neurotoxin deep within a target's body.
As he fell onto his back, blood spraying from the holes in his chest, Marvin finally got a glimpse of his assailant. Somehow, he felt a bit of relief. His eyes hadn't been playing tricks on him. The bastard was indeed invisible. Only once blood got on his cloak did its shape become clear.
[
System factory reset.
This will erase all data on this device.
>YES NO
]
A notification appeared in front of him, and before he could make sense of it, the yes option blinked. Light filled his sight the next second.
~[ ]~
Barely a day after the pseudo-Genome incident, Red Hill was shook once more. The dominant gang, Black Skull, was being attacked left and right. Some of its members had been assassinated while no one was looking. Others were killed during sudden raids by the Daggers, which signaled that the war between the two gangs had resumed.
During all of that chaos, several more Enhanced Individual incidents happened. Crimson Watch handled the situation well, but other hero teams had to be involved.
Dante was present for most of it, watching from the shadows. Thanks to the invisibility cloak Suzuka made for him, he had been able to move around undetected.
Unlike the Magic Mirror cloaks Volcan's androids were equipped with, Suzuka's creation made use of a mechanism she got from further developing the Blue Oni suit. In a way that made it a magic item. Its main function was to recreate a part of the Silent Breath sorcery used by the Shirogane clan, allowing the user to be entirely undetectable.
The magic item was a god sent. Since even Volcan had trouble sensing the sorcerers who used it, Dante was finally free from the surveillance the BEO had placed him under. He could finally put on his armors and move around without fearing that he might be detected. Ghost was back in the city, and he could wield sorcery now.
[Type 9-5 is capable of recreating any sorcery I have analyzed before.] Volcan said, taking Dante out of his thought.
'But we can't really use it along with other armors, right?' he thought aloud. 'And its module doesn't really work with my current body.'
For some reason, his resident AI had been a bit upset about them being forced to use the cloak, though he kept denying it. Dante didn't understand what might have led to that, since the AI never had problems with them using other tools and weapons. Now wasn't really the time for that, so he decided to banish it to a corner of his mind, seeing as he had problems of his own right now.
Dante sat on the ledge of a certain building, hiding behind a number of bright neon signs. He had been watching the entrance to a certain establishment on the other side. On the surface, it was a high-class bar called Heavenly Bliss serving the more affluent population of Red Hill, but that was only on the surface.
Knowing what he knows, Dante was having trouble restraining himself. Since he arrived a couple of hours ago, he had considered storming the place to kill everyone inside, no less than a hundred times. That had to wait, however. He was going to do it, but not now.
'Still nothing…'
As he continued to watch, a number of Black Skulls showed up in a fancy car and then went inside. Most were sergeants, but Dante spotted one whose tattoo covered three-quarters of his face.
'A lieutenant…'
Dante remembered the last lieutenant they met. Considering what they had done with the last one, it felt wrong to see another one walk around like normal.
'Trying to keep up appearances… hm?'
As the gangsters swarmed the entrance, another fancy car parker nearby followed by two less conspicuous vehicles. Dante watched for the rich bastard who was about to make his appearance, but he didn't expect to see a familiar face exit that car.
'Is that… is that who I think he is?'
A red line appeared on the zoomed-in screenshot of the individual in question before moving down as if to scan them. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮
[The facial structure is almost identical.] Volcan said. [There is an 80% chance they are the same person.]
'Damn… I knew I would get to it sooner or later, but… not this soon…'
Standing up, Dante gave the command to equip Type 5-3.
[
Name: Dante
Species: Human
Threat Level: 4
Baseline Retention: Ascended (38%)
Stats:
Strength: 130 (+20)
Durability: 115 (+30)
Agility: 50 (+50)
Dexterity: 84 (+20)
Computing Power: 50 (+30)
Energy: 110/110 (+300/300)
Implants:
Kinetic Absorption Protective Sub-Layer Generation 15 (C)
RespiraCore Series VI (C)
Overmind Cortical Interface Module (A)
Overmind Neural Response Enhancer (A)
Ares Iron Cage (A)
Ares Iron Fiber (A)
Ares IronPulse Engine (A)
NephroCore Series XI (C)
NutrimaCore Complete Series XI (C)
Voxcore Series XI (B)
Eroscore Series V (C)
Suzuka's Modular Bionic Interface (Arms) (SS)
Suzuka's Skull Guard (S)
Modules:
Right arm: Type 4-3
Left arm: Type 4-3
Abilities:
Force Amplification
Impact Amplification
Armor: Type 5-3
Abilities:
Instant Acceleration
Friction Resistance
Inertia Reduction
Velocity Retention
Kinetic Charge
]
'Let's get going.'
Dante jumped down a coupe dozen meters then landed without making a sound. He then used instant acceleration to reach the target he spotted earlier. Even as he moved to stand among the crowd, no one detected his presence.
"James! Maboi!" A woman in a dress that barely covered anything walked over with her hands held out. "You finally came to visit!"
She was quite the looker, but one could guess the number of surgeries she went through just by looking. It didn't help that she was trying a bit too hard to stand out, a likely result of her advancing age.
"Good evening, madam," The man, James Cartmen, accepted the friendly embrace. "It has been a while."
"A while doesn't even begin to describe it! But that doesn't mean you have to act so distance now. Just call me Courtney like you used to!" The women wrapped her arms around his then pulled him along. "Come, no need to be shy! Let me show you all the improvements I added to this place since your last visit!"
As they made their way inside, Dante silently followed after them.
