IBACT Chapter 7

Guilty (7)

“Wake up, wake up, wake up! Get up now!”

A girl with steel rabbit ears on her head got on the bed and woke up the brown-haired woman.

“Ah, what is it again… There’s no work today.”

“No work, but there’s an appointment! Get up quickly. Did you forget we have an appointment with the broker today?”

“Ugh… That person is so pushy. Why can’t we just do this over the phone…?”

“You’ve gotten cocky after a few successful jobs. Stop complaining and just get up. Luna prepared breakfast.”

“Aah…”

The brown-haired woman pulled the blanket over her head but was forcibly dragged out of bed by the superhuman strength of the girl who had climbed on top of her.

[Where have you been, and what have you been doing to arrive just now?]

[I’ve been waiting for you. Here, the whole time.]

The TV that had been turned on without permission was showing video. The brown-haired woman rubbed her eyes and looked at the handsome man on the TV.

“What is this? Is it commercial time?”

“It’s a drama advertisement. It turned on automatically when it was time for you to wake up.”

“Well, at least this is better. One thing I like about changing apartments.”

Rather than being merely suggestive, watching people in bizarre, barely-there outfits advertising “please visit such-and-such establishment” was steadily eating away at the brown-haired woman’s mental fortitude.

Besides, it didn’t even feel particularly special. In the slum apartment where she used to live, women dressed like that were a common sight.

Just riding the elevator made her think, “This person is going to sell their body,” or get the feeling that “This person is on drugs.”

No, it would actually be fortunate if they were just dressed provocatively. In the elevator at dawn, there were couples openly having sex.

People who stopped their activities and hurriedly put on clothes when she entered were relatively decent in comparison.

“That’s true. But is this really the time for you to be watching TV commercials? If you have nothing to do, either help Luna or just watch the commercials.”

“I should wash up first…”

“Just wash your face and come, Doris!”

“Yes, yes. I got it…”

Though Doris was the leader of this mercenary group, that only applied to important matters or combat-related issues.

The mercenary group wasn’t strict enough with its regulations to assert authority inside the apartment.

“Alright. I’m doing it, doing it.”

In some ways, it could be seen as a kind of group project team. The three women in the mercenary group were all around the age where they would have gone to college in a normal society.

But Stella City wasn’t such an easy or kind place. They had to earn money, and risking their lives in the process wasn’t something extraordinary.

“Commercials… I have to watch them. Damn, can’t we just buy a computer with our own money?”

“It’s all going toward your implant costs. Since you’d die without them, I can’t really complain… but be careful. Try to use good ones if possible.”

“If high-performance, side-effect-free products were circulating in the black market, it wouldn’t be the black market but a department store. Well, I don’t care about side effects as long as they don’t kill me tomorrow.”

Doris turned on the computer. Slowly, the circular loading icon spun around.

Soon the computer turned on, but what appeared before her eyes wasn’t the desktop but a loud and lewd video.

[Do you want to feel a different kind of pleasure? Tired of the same women, the same videos?]

[Call the number below right now, and we’ll rent you an augmented reality recognizer and unreleased videos for just $30 a month!]

[If you’re watching this ad carefully, please click the moving “Awesome!” button in the bottom left corner!]

This was a kind of labor.

The inevitable price to pay for using a cheap internet plan.

Since both electricity and internet fees were outrageously expensive, this wasn’t an amount that Doris’s mercenary group could afford, despite earning good money, as it was being reinvested in implants.

For about 15 minutes every day, they had no choice but to watch these unfunny ads whenever they turned on the computer.

“Damn, this again.”

“You have to keep watching without getting distracted!”

“I know… I said I know.”

As she had expected, the next advertisement was for drugs.

[Don’t you find that decent products are so rare these days? Aren’t you tired of drugs that are disgustingly expensive but ineffective?]

[For those people, we recommend this. A new world, a new drug! New-Jet version 4.25!]

[A drug that works directly on the brain, so no worries about side effects! The best drug that doesn’t fall under drug regulations!]

[When you’re depressed, sad, need something fun, spending time alone, partying, or want to cause trouble! Use it anytime!]

[Just by adjusting the settings a little, you can have anything from marijuana-like downer drugs to methamphetamine-like hot and sexy drugs! Call now!]

“Damn it all…”

This time, there was no voice guidance, but a message saying “If you’re watching the ad carefully, please click this button” floated around somewhere on the screen.

After clicking it, Doris sank into a daze.

Doris’s daily life—which had been quite ordinary until recently, attending a regular school and assuming she would go to college—had been shattered in Stella City.

After her mother died, turning to crime was a natural progression. Thanks to the mechanical enhancements applied to her body, she could earn enough money as a mercenary to avoid starvation.

But this was dangerous. Even Doris could tell that this wouldn’t last forever.

For now, she was happy. She had people beside her who needed her, who felt that she was necessary.

“Ugh…”

Carefully, so others wouldn’t hear, Doris stroked her chest.

It’s difficult to adapt to a peaceful life. As if an uneventful daily routine was abnormal, her heart was racing madly.

Although Doris hated drug addicts, she wasn’t much different.

It was unavoidable for fighting. She was a mercenary, after all.

If Doris had been even slightly weaker, she might already have a bullet in her head.

What frightened her more was the thought of someone behind her dying. For that reason, she couldn’t give up anything.

Even more frightening than drugs was the implant squeezing her heart. Arms, legs, back, organs. There wasn’t a single part that hadn’t been modified for combat.

It was necessary. Even an experienced and talented fighter couldn’t win against implants that combined human technology and science.

Just as a human with a rifle can’t defeat a tank, it was the natural order of this world.

To become stronger, to maintain this meager victory, to continue this time, she had to keep getting stronger.

“Doris, food’s ready! Come if you’re finished!”

“Really?”

Hearing Ravina’s voice, Doris’s gloomy mood flared up again.

“What’s for lunch today…”

That pure feeling was immediately covered by the irritation she felt upon looking at the monitor.

She hadn’t been watching the ad. And that meant she would have to watch this 15-minute ad “attentively” again to use the computer.

“…Were you thinking about something else?”

“Ah, well…”

“Ugh… This is unbearable. Let’s eat first. We’ll try turning on the computer later, let’s have our meal first.”

“Is that okay?”

“You’ll have to turn the computer back on later. For now, let’s eat quickly and go! If we’re even a little late, the broker will be waiting.”

Doris ran to the dining table with a bright smile.

Even so, her heart was still pounding fiercely.

***

The connection between corporations and gangs was an open secret.

It wasn’t as if gang bosses openly pledged allegiance to corporations or corporations publicly sanctioned their crimes.

No matter how much of a crime city this was, they had to maintain at least minimal appearances. Rather than caring about the citizens’ perceptions, it was more about keeping up appearances for other corporations.

But this was already a city where the police were half-militarized by corporations. This was due to the privatization of police under the name of “security efficiency.”

Corporations fought each other like they were trying to kill each other. No, more accurately, they fought while killing each other.

However, they couldn’t deploy proper private soldiers for such disputes. In this world, when corporations fought each other in earnest, it was a more serious problem than a typical civil war.

It might actually cause less damage if countries fought each other. At least when countries fought, they were mindful of their citizens and mostly fought where their territories met.

But corporations had spread throughout the world. When Hansan and other corporate alliances started a war, gunfire and the smell of gunpowder echoed everywhere in the world.

“Won’t moving like this harm the company?”

“This is an opportunity. One of the few opportunities to improve Hansan’s image in Stella City.”

The secretary in the driver’s seat asked me with a worried expression.

“Even if we take some losses, we need to put this out there so we can use it later.”

After taking a big loss once and understanding each other’s strengths through rather rough methods, the corporate executives regained peace.

So, they tried to avoid direct confrontation. But corporate executives who had tasted violence once didn’t want to go back to the “fair fight with money against money” that they used to have.

If they placed short positions on rival companies and succeeded in a terrorist attack, they could make enormous amounts of money. They could assassinate famous engineers from rival companies or hack and trample their competitiveness.

In such circumstances, earning money through normal methods didn’t even register.

So they used gangs. At least, that’s how it was in Stella City.

And when those gangs stole assets from other companies, they received help from the police.

But even that had its limits. In such a lawless city, no matter how corrupt the police were, it was difficult for them to receive better treatment than gangs.

When used, corporate weapons flowed to the gangs through covert channels; police officers who maintained their armaments with citizens’ taxes fell like autumn leaves.

So, corporations extended their reach to the police as well. It was killing two birds with one stone—they could hide their crimes and also check rival gangs.

The police officers who immediately got salary increases and new equipment were happy. But it was a devil’s temptation.

Even if gangs roamed the streets in broad daylight, police couldn’t easily arrest them.

Advisory teams from corporations made them overlook the gangs, citing numerous reasons.

Through papers and theories created by scholars living on research funds from corporations, they were made to turn a blind eye to gangs connected to corporations.

Eventually, the police lost trust, and the police chief of Stella City was attacked from all sides. A new police chief was appointed after every incident, and eventually, they too failed to prevent accidents.

As citizen trust fell, the support given to them also decreased. In the end, the police became even more dependent on corporations.

“We have arrived.”

And I needed to get involved.

“Give me the item.”

“Here it is.”

The standard rifle hadn’t changed surprisingly much.

Of course, it looked different from the K2 I used in the military, but its fundamental shape and principle remained unchanged.

Using gunpowder to fire small bullets and piercing human bodies to kill people.

This would be enough to fight against ordinary gangs, unless one was dealing with body modifiers who had wrapped their skin in steel.

“Looks good. Let’s go in.”

“I’ll escort you right away.”

The police headquarters of Stella City was right in front of me. I took a deep breath and slowly recalled what I needed to do.

I need to pressure them enough and then cause confusion. I shouldn’t go too far and make them see me as an enemy, nor should I be too weak and make them afraid to stand against Hansan.

“Let’s go.”

Carefully stepping down from the automatically opened car door, I went straight into the building.