IBACT Chapter 12

Guilty (12)

“You could have died from getting shot just now! You know?”

“Ah, thank you.”

Actually, there was no need to fear the gun. Even if it was pointed at my mouth, aiming for my uvula, I wouldn’t have flinched.

But I didn’t expect her to protect me so devotedly.

Basically, being a mercenary isn’t a profession that someone who values human life could do.

“Ouch… Maybe I shouldn’t have done that…”

“That must have hurt.”

Even with overwhelming muscle acceleration and cognitive acceleration, it doesn’t guarantee the body’s durability.

Even if a normal human runs at full speed and breaks through a glass window, it would feel like their body is being crushed.

Moreover, if she had used her body acceleration ability, she would have been running at a speed far beyond what a human could achieve.

It was no different than tying a human to the front of a vehicle running at full speed and smashing through a glass window.

But her body seemed surprisingly fine.

If the body acceleration device doesn’t guarantee body durability, that can be filled through other enhancements.

Her arms. The arms she crossed when breaking through the glass window were made of quite solid material.

“Hmm…”

This is dangerous. It was difficult to gauge how much time was left.

It’s not a proper implant, but a rough implant received without authorization.

While there were often performance issues, it was rather a vicious thing that was better that way.

Even proper implants received by healthy people eat away at human life, whether big or small.

Moreover, this is for combat. While lifestyle implants can somewhat compromise between lifespan reduction and convenience, combat implants have no limits.

It’s a world where a mercenary who modifies their entire body, leaving three months of life span, dies at the hands of a mercenary who modified their body with stronger and more potent implants, leaving only a week of life span.

“I really almost died… You too, at least pretend to dodge when someone points a gun at you!”

But she seemed fine.

When people break down from implant procedures, it’s mainly one of two ways.

Either they only see what’s right in front of them, or they only see what’s far away.

Usually, the former is overwhelmingly common. People who can’t resist and give in to the immediate pleasure of killing, sexual desire, or drug cravings.

But some who come to their senses start to see far away.

The limited remaining lifespan, subtle emotions, and everyday sensations that can’t be felt. They pursue something worth sacrificing all of this for and run toward it.

Usually, they fade away like insects burning in light.

“That’s good…”

But Doris, in front of my eyes, seemed too normal.

She’s the type that ‘sees far.’ Yet, she couldn’t stand by watching someone she just passed by get shot and used her ability.

This conversation is quite ordinary too. It doesn’t feel like talking to a severe implant addict lacking certain parts of emotion.

She gets angry when she should, while not forgetting why she moved.

A smile formed on my lips. This was fortunate.

Besides satisfying my personal interests, she must be among the top-ranked mercenaries in current Stella City in terms of skill.

Of course, there are mercenaries or mercenary groups stronger than her.

But they were either too powerful or already under intensive checks and pressure from corporations.

If I could persuade her to move according to my will, it would be no different than having forces beyond the common sense of those who were checking me.

Sometimes a single dagger that no one knows when it was brought can be more powerful than a rifle locked in a safe.

“Good thing! Uh… Are you rich? If I have to pay for the glass window, I think Luna and Ravina will try to kill me.”

“Oh no, that won’t do. Don’t worry.”

I was lucky. While those thugs might not, I thought Doris might realize I was Han Sanwoo as we continued talking.

She seemed to think such a person wouldn’t come to such a shabby street with just one companion. That was fortunate.

“Owner, please clean up the bodies here. I’ll pay for causing the disturbance.”

“…They’re dead.”

He was looking down at the dead with a gloomy face.

Without realizing it, I followed his gaze and met eyes with the head attached to the body whose neck down had been blown away.

He deserved to die. He pointed a gun at me and even fired it.

Looking at the angle of the gun, he probably wasn’t trying to kill me, but it was still true that he wanted to see me suffering with a bullet lodged somewhere in my body.

It might make more sense to worry about innocent and guiltless people who might be dying somewhere rather than being immersed in unnecessary sentiments.

But people were dead.

Not as Han Sanwoo but with my own eyes, no. Even with Han Sanwoo’s eyes, directly seeing dead people wasn’t a common occurrence.

I probably had never maintained eye contact with a corpse this long before.

It’s unnatural. The secretary’s handgun had destroyed their heads with firepower that seemed unbelievable from such a small barrel.

While adding money to guns might not make them dramatically stronger in 21st-century Earth, this world is different.

For guards protecting a member of the Hansan family, with some exaggeration, even the handguns they carried cost about as much as a small business’s revenue.

The money spent to kill people had fulfilled its duty admirably.

I thought about how expensive guns and bullets could be compared to human life, but in Stella City, that was reality.

Others had bullets in their brains, but this person had a bullet in his mouth.

Considering the impact, the pain probably didn’t last long. The bullet had blown away everything below his neck.

Maybe I should have made more of a fuss. But I didn’t think this person would have let me go even if I ran away or bowed my head.

He’s someone who noticed I was wealthy. He wouldn’t have been satisfied with just being handed a few bills.

He would have searched my wallet or tried to find card chips embedded somewhere in my body.

That was unacceptable. While giving a few coins to thugs was one thing, if my identity was exposed, the plan would become too distorted.

It wouldn’t have ended there. If word spread that a member of the Hansan Group was extorted by street thugs, Hansan’s private army would have killed them in the most painful and miserable way possible by whatever means necessary.

Compared to that, this was rather a humane death. They were hit by tools meant simply for killing and died in the blink of an eye.

But the cafe manager, who had just been threatened by them, was hanging his head with a gloomy face.

There couldn’t be innocent people in this city to begin with. Innocent and pure people? Such people would have left this city long ago by whatever means possible.

Whether by car or plane, or lead bullets. They’re people who cannot survive in this city.

Those who remain are people whose family or friends have reached into crime, if not themselves. People who maintain their own purity while getting others’ hands bloody.

The majority are people who have accepted crime as part of daily life to survive. The corporations are the subjects that drove people into crime to make money.

I didn’t want to regret killing them. I didn’t think to blame the secretary either. She had faithfully done her job after all.

I had no choice either. No matter how many times I thought about it, there was no way to resolve this moderately without revealing my identity.

But it should be fine to have this brief moment of silence. Before becoming more tainted by this city.

The broken glass windows sparkled in the sunlight. Some of them were stuck in the dead bodies, reflecting light.

I took in that sight.

***

“Are you crazy?”

Luna hit Doris on the back. Though Doris’s enhanced body didn’t feel much, she pretended it hurt.

“Ow… Well, anyway, it worked out well, right? Though that young master looks a bit naive, he’s quite generous. You’ll think differently when you know how much I earned?”

“Money isn’t the issue. Don’t you really know that nothing good comes from getting involved with corporate people?”

“Right. That bastard, his eyes looking at our Doris, were lecherous!”

“Really? Am I that attractive?”

Doris shrugged her shoulders.

“Well, even I think I was pretty cool, right? The moment the trigger sound was heard, instantly breaking through the glass window and appearing…”

“Actually, he seemed pretty thoughtless.”

“A rich young master with sense wouldn’t come to a place like this in the first place.”

Luna and Ravina, who usually bickered with each other, were in agreement this time.

“Most of your illegal implants came from corporations, you know. If that man had tried to repay the favor by catching you, you should have run away without looking back.”

“Well, whatever. He was a clean person, right? Thank you, I’m indebted to you; this is my small token of gratitude. Bye-bye. Really… if Stella City was full of people like him, we could have made a better city.”

Since she was young, Doris had a tendency to rush in without thinking things through.

But experience had left many scars on her.

Most people she saved usually ran away in fear rather than expressing gratitude. Maybe they were reluctant to pay the reward money they should have.

“He said he’ll testify about the police matter too.”

“Is the body acceleration device a joke? You’ve been meeting only big shots, so you don’t know its value, but the thing you’re wearing is something corporations would search for with burning eyes.”

“Come to think of it… hmm, something felt different. A bit strange.”

Far from listening to Luna’s words, Doris was recalling the moment she ran to him.

He was quite handsome. Though his face was covered with a mask, there were no traces of implants visible.

The moment the trigger was pulled on the gun aimed at his side, she immediately activated her ability and ran toward him.

“Somehow, it felt like his gaze was following me…”

“Must be your imagination. You couldn’t even see because of the sunglasses anyway.”

“When you put it that way, that’s true…”

“Be careful. That person who looked like a secretary used a body acceleration device too.”

“…Really?”

“Seemed a bit late, though. Looked like they reacted to the gunshot… killed five people with one shot. It wasn’t normal handgun power; it might really be someone high up in a corporation.”

“That’s a bit sad.”

It felt like finding out the person she saved romantically was from a war criminal family.

Maybe it was natural. He was obviously wealthy, and there were virtually no people in this city who earned money honestly.

“We made money, so let’s get back to the request.”

“Since you used it once today… don’t use it during work. Got it?”

“Ah, I’ll handle it. Am I a kid?”

“You are.”

Ravina cut in and stopped Doris. Doris closed her mouth, but couldn’t find words to refute.

“We’re here. This is the factory where the incident happened.”

Though security was a bit disorganized, it didn’t seem like there was anyy gap to squeeze through.

“So, what do I need to do?”

“I’ll start hacking from this vehicle. It’s simple. Ravina will protect me, and you find the access point.”

Finding the CCTV footage from the day of the incident and computer access records managing the machinery wasn’t a difficult task for skilled mercenaries like them.

“Even if things go wrong, avoid shooting. They said the contract is usually void if someone dies. You prepared the suppression rounds, right?”

“Of course.”

Night was slowly falling. The mercenary group was lurking around, waiting for the moment the guards changed shifts.

“Now. I’ve stopped the CCTV; just be careful not to get caught directly.”

“Okay. I’ll be back!”

Doris jumped over the factory wall. Soon, the street became quiet as if nothing had happened.