Chapter 38
Chapter 38
Special Meal, Gangster
***
This was an area handled with strictness by both the municipal government and the board of directors alike. It was a matter that could cause the entire social foundation to collapse. In a society where the basic income system was implemented, status itself meant budget.
The more money that leaked out, the more inevitable inflation became.
Long ago, humanity had experienced these adverse effects once through lax management.
The hyperinflation that occurred in 2246 was a representative example.
Thanks to the belated implementation of monetary tightening policies, the immediate crisis had been extinguished, but the risk factors still existed even now.
Even after entering the 2300s, prices remaining close to those of the early 2000s was because such an impact had swept through once.
Device extraction was a grave crime that even a megacorp could not escape.
However, unlike the risks that had to be borne, the gains that could be obtained were fixed, so it was a choice that even a criminal organization that had fallen to rock bottom rarely made.
That was when I felt a presence behind my back.
“So who do we have here. Isn’t this the rookie problem solver.”
I turned my head faster than the voice reached me and spoke the other party’s name.
“Gesto.”
From the moment I entered the underground, this meeting had been all but inevitable.
“You’ve seen something you shouldn’t have.”
“I already reported it to the Public Enforcement Corps.”
“Heh heh, do you really think those guys will come all the way here? Do you even know where this equipment came from?”
I had already more or less guessed that. What I said was merely a confirmation step, like probing him, to see Gesto’s reaction.
In reality, I hadn’t reported anything.
“Well, I guess it was a difficult story for a mere problem solver brat who doesn’t know anything to understand.”
No, I understood.
Wasn’t he saying that this wasn’t a level where the Public Enforcement Corps merely got involved, but a level where they were leading it?
The Pier Gang was simply a tool to project their will.
I could see clearly what kind of deal must have gone back and forth.
Not acting rashly had been the right judgment. If I made one wrong move, I would have had to fight even the corrupt Public Enforcement Corps.
Thus, while I quietly sorted out the situation, it looked different to Gesto. To him, it must have seemed as if I was flustered.
Yeah, like a startled rabbit that had stepped into an unexpected trap.
It wasn’t a coincidence that the warning he had given at the unlicensed clinic suddenly came to mind.
“I told you before, if we meet again, that’ll be the day of your ancestr—”
“What the hell are you saying, you idiot.”
As if Gesto’s bluster was laughable, I didn’t hesitate. I pulled out my pistol and fired.
A triple tap aimed at the glabella, the chest, and then the abdomen.
Even as the violent burst of fire continued, all that came out of the muzzle was a faint sound.
What I had bought yesterday at the gun shop was a masterpiece produced by a megacorp that stood shoulder to shoulder with Seven Metal, made by ‘Fundamental Lock’.
It was slightly longer in barrel length than a typical handgun, but its firepower wasn’t particularly high. Its increased size was due to a barrel design that accommodated both a flash suppressor and a silencer.
The so-called quietest handgun in the world.
The gunshot, controlled down to an astonishing level of 20 dB, was nothing more than a tickle, like the sound of a clock’s second hand.
That was why it was given the name Clock.
“Cute. You really trusted something like that?”
But even after taking a surprise gunshot, Gesto didn’t die. He was a member of a street gang notorious for its brutality even in the underworld. He had always lived under constant threat to his life.
Reinforcing vital points with Slots was nothing special.
After licking the blood flowing from his torn forehead with his tongue, Gesto pulled the trigger of his sawed-off shotgun.
Boom!
In an instant, steel pellets spread out in a fan shape as if a bomb had exploded, ripping through the interior.
As soon as I ducked behind a life-support unit for cover, gangsters rushed in, having heard the gunshot.
“Hyungnim?”
“There’s an intruder. Deal with him the way we practiced.”
A concise explanation.
At the execution order issued by Gesto, the members scattered to their respective positions.
At that very moment, the light vanished from the control room.
The perfectly controlled interior was no different from pitch-black darkness. It was impossible to tell whether my eyes were open or closed.
“There’s nowhere for you to run.”
Only Gesto’s voice rang out clearly before fading away.
It seemed he reacted immediately after confirming that I had no equipment to see through the darkroom. That way, allied casualties would be close to nonexistent, making it an appropriate tactic.
Trapped in a sealed room overflowing with hostility, I calculated in my head.
The number of people who got out of the three vans was eighteen in total. Subtracting the five who had been kidnapped left thirteen.
The magazine originally loaded into the Clock held sixteen rounds, but since I had expended three on Gesto, thirteen remained.
Both numbers matched exactly.
So—
‘I won’t even need to change the magazine.’
That was assuming I landed every shot, but that wasn’t a restriction at all.
That was when the approaching footsteps stopped.
Bang!
The moment the first shot went off without warning, the muzzle flash briefly illuminated the surroundings.
It lasted only milliseconds, but it was enough to distinguish friend from foe.
Having memorized all the gangsters’ positions, I avoided the incoming bullets and returned fire.
Click.
“Ghk.”
With the sound of a scream, the interior became hectic. They must never have imagined I’d succeed in counterattacking.
I heard sounds of them hurriedly changing cover from all directions, but it was useless. This wasn’t an open field, but a storage room where life-support units were installed in neat rows and columns.
The places to hide were limited. No matter how wide a chessboard was, the spaces where pieces could be placed were always finite.
Moreover, every time they sprayed bullets indiscriminately under the pretense of thoroughly punishing me, the surroundings lit up.
No matter how much they moved, if they kept giving away clues like this, it wasn’t something I couldn’t infer.
Having tracked the gangsters’ positions in real time, I pulled the trigger before they could move again.
Now that the existence of Meta-humans was known, I should refrain from abusing the advantage of not dying like before. If I moved rashly, I’d leave a trail.
If a situation could be hidden, then I would hide it.
That became the new policy I set for myself.
In any case, it wasn’t a situation that required extraordinary countermeasures. The gangsters sprawled across the floor hadn’t managed to inflict any meaningful damage on me until the very end.
Coincidentally, I had one bullet left.
And there was only one person remaining.
Thud.
As if announcing its presence, a heavy vibration swept across the entire storage room. An overwhelming heat surged from the front, so intense that I could feel it without even looking.
Instead of hiding, I stepped forward and sneered.
“Is this all the show you prepared for me? No, judging by how it’s neither interesting nor fun, was it not even a show?”
“You bastard…….”
When buckshot was fired once more, I leaped high. Throwing my body beyond the sparks that spread like an explosion of light, my muzzle swung back toward Gesto.
Click.
It was a single shot aimed at the neck, but to Gesto, that moment was clearly visible.
The average time it took for a human to respond to external stimuli was 0.3 seconds. The more one trained, the more that record could be reduced, but only down to 0.1 seconds.
Anything below that was a realm a human being couldn’t reach.
But Gesto had broken through that limit by offering up his own body as a sacrifice. He had forcibly implanted an illegally modified device, pushing its performance to the extreme.
Slot, Face Up.
The chip embedded in his brain stimulated even the nerve endings, shattering the 0.1-second wall.
That was why, upon seeing me approach, he judged it was too late to use the sawed-off shotgun and discarded it.
The moment Gesto clenched his fist, the unit clinging to his trapezius like carapace, Rage, writhed violently.
Pssshhk.
At the same time a cylindrical flask embedded deep within his body surged upward, the muscles across his entire body swelled to the point of tearing apart.
Mental amplification and pain cutoff. And muscle stimulation.
The functions built into Rage were prepared for one purpose only: to annihilate the enemy right in front of him.
Having gained monstrous strength capable of smashing even a concrete wall with bare hands, Gesto swung his arm without hesitation.
With no proper protective equipment to speak of, this should have been the end.
Crunch.
But contrary to that expectation, when the sound of rupture that should have burst from his opponent instead erupted from his own arm, Gesto couldn’t hide his shock.
“Elbow?”
Just as he said, what crushed the fist was my elbow, fired off in an instant. It was an unanticipated counterattack, but Gesto paid it no mind and swung his opposite arm like a whip.
A combination flowing from one-two to a hook, then a straight.
The boxing techniques he had learned while scraping by on the streets were poured out without restraint, but once the scale had tilted, it showed no sign of returning.
If anything, the gap only widened as time passed.
Come to think of it, his reaction speed was already a step beyond that of an ordinary person. And yet, the fact that I was still responding meant—
“Kugh.”
Gesto’s train of thought didn’t continue. I closed the distance in a single breath, leaped up, and smashed my knee into his chin.
It was only natural that he toppled backward in a sorry heap.
There shouldn’t have been any pain at all, and yet the shock that reverberated down to his bones left him utterly unable to regain his senses.
It wasn’t as if Gesto had never encountered those called problem solvers. But most of them were little more than human scraps, to the point it was hard to tell who the criminal really was.
Only a handful among them could be called the roots that supported the industry, capable of standing toe-to-toe even with talents walking the elite track within megacorps.
To Gesto’s eyes, I belonged to that very category.
“What exactly do you find lacking that you’re prowling the backstreets?”
“That trash like you still exists in this world.”
Gesto struggled to push me away as I stood with my foot planted on his chest, but for some reason, his body wouldn’t respond the way he wanted.
There was no need to ponder it. The jaw that had been moving just fine until moments ago had gone slack with a dull drop.
“Be happy. I just realized I’d chambered a round as well.”
The bullets I had loaded beforehand weren’t sixteen, but seventeen. One more than the listed specifications.
Where to use it was perfectly clear.
“Special meal, gangster.”
Forcing the muzzle into Gesto’s mouth, I—
Click.
Expended the final round.
***
After leaving the storage room, I immediately began searching. Now that I knew they were extracting devices, there was no time to waste.
Fortunately, perhaps because they had wanted to minimize movement routes from the design stage, the operating room was located close by.
Pushing open the sliding door and stepping inside, I saw a man lying flat on the operating table. It seemed they had only just begun, as his device appeared intact.
“Is it Gesto?”
That was when an irritated voice rang out. An old man who looked like a doctor clicked his tongue without even turning around.
His posture was slovenly beyond belief. Not just his manner of speech, but his very attitude. He wasn’t wearing a mask, nor latex gloves.
A halfwit who lacked even the most basic qualifications of a doctor.
“I told you not to barge in during surgery, didn’t I? Is what I say that funny? There’s no one else who’d join hands with punks like you except me, is there?”
Yet despite that, his arrogance rivaled that of any hospital director. You could tell just by the way he stubbornly held his ground even as a disturbance broke out.
Of course, that kind of nerve became poison now. The one who had entered wasn’t an assistant, but an unwelcome guest.
“You… ugh.”
The old man noticing me late and his eyes going wide happened almost simultaneously with blood splattering across the wall.
Click.
There was no need for conversation in that sequence of events.