Cyberpunk: Ultimate Cyborg System-Chapter 566: The Next Step.

As the white smoke flowed past him and the waves slammed into his feet, Ahab kept his sight on the point of impact, his breathing growing labored. His mind was about to give in, and he was barely able to hold on to consciousness. Those were signs of mana exhaustion, the irrefutable proof that he had reached his limit.

It had been some time since he was forced to go all out, but what choice did he have? His ship was destroyed, and half of his crew was dead. The dock was the last of his concerns at this point, so he had no qualms about completely destroying it.

Looking up, he found himself wondering why none of the heroes had shown up until now. The world’s strongest was in the city, so it wouldn’t have taken him more than a second to reach the dock. Ahab realized that the barrier surrounding it was likely to blame. If it were able to block the commotion from being heard, then it would be nearly impossible for anyone to notice, especially with the cliff and the wall surrounding the city hiding the dock from sight. Who knew that the feature that had made it perfect for illegal activities would be the reason no one would find out about their demise until long after?

"GUHH!!!"

Though he wanted the dignity of having accepted his fate, he was only human in the end. When a spear pierces his flesh, going through his body and exiting on the other side, a groan would inevitably escape him, especially when another three followed right after. The wounds he had sealed were once again open, and new ones left him bleeding like a cracked barrel.

He had been watching the entire time, so of course, he had caught it. A moment before the impact, his armored opponent created a barrier around himself. This wasn’t Ahab’s first time seeing an ability that uses water to create barriers and shields, but none could have withstood a blow from his White Whale. His opponent must have known that much as well, which is why he layered several round barriers on top of each other, adding more to ward off the blow.

Though the dock looked like it had been struck by a meteor, the monstrosity that rose from the depths was left unscathed, for the most part. Though its armor had a few cracks here and there, those amounted to nothing, seeing how they didn’t impair its abilities or movements.

As it walked toward him, the old seafarer struggled to raise his hand, snapping his fingers and creating a spark that fell into his pipe. A wisp of smoke rose from it soon after, but try as he might, his lungs couldn’t draw it in, and he no longer bothered to try.

~[ ]~ 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂

Though his spears had impaled every vital organ in the old man’s body, and though Volcan confirmed that he was already dead, Dante was left far from satisfied, and so he decided to cut his head just in case. Even then, it was only once he had the bastard in his inventory that he was finally able to calm down.

The white whale was a devastating attack that sank half of the dock. Hundreds of tons of concrete sank into the nearby waters, making it so the place wouldn’t see use any time soon. It would be very difficult to explain why a dock that hadn’t been used in decades needs rebuilding.

With one of the night’s objectives completed, Dante changed into 5-3 and started cleaning up. First, he hunted every last member of the White Whale clan and finished them off. The pseudo-Genomes were next. A few somehow survived everything that happened, but that was the end of the line for them.

Only a single enemy was left, but Dante didn’t plan on killing that one. Krueger had tried to use the chaos to escape, but between the crashed ship and the barrier surrounding the dock, he never had the chance to make it out. His subordinates were dead, the White Whale clan was no more, and there was no escape. All he could do was hide and hope for the best, but the best in his case was being thrown in dark pocket dimension and hoping Dante wouldn’t forget about him, leaving him to starve.

With that out of the way, Dante moved on to his own subordinates. Though he had warned them about something of this scale happening, they were still left stunned. He quickly portaled them into the replica of the Red Oni Club, then into its basement, into the real world. Of course, he made sure to temporarily blind them first.

Even if he wanted to hint at his presence, Dante felt the need to keep Ghost as mysterious as possible. The members of Inferno would get to learn that their gang had a powerful backer without letting it get to their heads. That would prevent them from getting any ideas in the future while strengthening their loyalty to the organization.

Returning to his office so he could receive the report they were likely to rush to him with, Dante waited some time before donning his armor and going to Hollowstreet. Before he could get a proper rest, he first had to move the children they saved into the shelter in Blue Moon and bring Finn and Jake back as well.

A hundred. After everything he did, the Black Skull bastards still attempted to continue their sick business. They didn’t even bother to come up with something to counter him, knowing full well that they couldn’t proceed with him adamant on ruining things for them.

This was it, however. Without Krueger and his contacts, Black Skull will have a very difficult time procuring more victims for their sick clients. The next step would be learning who those clients are so they could rid the world of their filth, and to do so, they would have to capture Rose’s target for revenge.