Chapter 4: Half Penny (4)

Lee Do first met the broker about three months ago. The previous secondhand shop where he bought IDs had closed down, and the owner had skipped town for some reason.

It wasn’t unusual for a gang formed overnight to disband the next day, so Lee Do didn’t bother wondering why.

He simply moved on to another secondhand shop. That was his first encounter with q134.2e. After he’d sold her about thirty IDs, she suggested he work with her. She was a fixer.

“…..”

And now, she was staring at him with a rather dumbfounded expression.

“Was ours the twelfth request?”

She glanced at Lee Do, arms crossed. The battered target was secondary; the fact that he hadn’t been brought in a car or on a motorcycle, but simply carried in his grip, was the primary reason for her astonishment. Of course, she wasn’t surprised by the man’s dripping blood dirtying her shop.

Lee Do entered the secondhand shop calmly and unceremoniously dumped the man on the floor.

Then, taking out a cigarette and lighting it, he sat down on a nearby sofa and replied,

“I think it was the thirteenth.”

“…Oh, right.”

The requests so far had been limited to retrieving specific items or taking pictures of designated locations. So, she was only now realizing how… primal his methods were.

Clean jobs, dirty jobs. She had dismissed his convictions as a joke, but now the thought that they might be genuine crossed q134.2e’s mind.

“Can I go now?” Lee Do asked, looking down at the man writhing on the floor.

“…No.” The answer was clear. She drew a pistol from her hip.

“What if he suddenly goes berserk? The client is inside. Come with me.”

She was worried about him going berserk while drawing her gun. It seemed a bit odd, but Lee Do simply watched her in silence and nodded.

He dragged the man inside with q134.2e. A client in a suit was waiting.

“Ah, hello.”

He was a labor consultant from the area. He stood up abruptly from his chair and greeted them. Glancing down at the dragged-in Scavenger, he quickly explained how they were involved.

A protest organized by a labor union had sparked the incident. It was about wage theft and unfair treatment. The targeted corporation had hired a gang to deal with it swiftly. And that was where the Scavengers had come in.

“I don’t know how they found out, but they knew the corporation had hired a gang. Before the police even arrived, they took everything: ID chips, organs, NIMs (Neural Interface Modules), implants, the whole lot.”

Lee Do leaned against a pillar some distance from the table. The dim lighting didn’t quite reach him, making it look as if he was leaning against the darkness from the table’s perspective.

Exhaling smoke into the shadows, he considered the situation.

The labor consultant was on the side of the union. They had also hired a lawyer to prepare for the upcoming legal battle and were actively working to expose the corporation’s wrongdoing and the union’s plight.

The labor consultant continued,

“Actually, we heard someone on the union side had a camera NIM implanted and recorded the scene. It’s crucial evidence, but the Scavengers stole it.”

NIM referred to cybernetic chips implanted in the brain. They were commonly used by professionals and government officials for work or efficient task management, but they were also occasionally used by those who sought convenience beyond the limitations of the human body. The victim seemed to be one such case.

“And this one is definitely involved.” The labor consultant pointed to the Scavenger sprawled on the floor.

“Y-you, just for a NIM…?”

Just then, crack, the labor consultant stepped on the man’s hand.

“Aaaaagh! Ugh, aargh!”

Calmly adjusting his glasses, the consultant continued,

“So, actually, this request was also for verification.”

q134.2e raised an eyebrow.

“…What do you mean?”

“I want to make an additional request. I called you both here because I need your credibility. Actually, we were hired as well.”

“Hired?”

“By another corporation. A competitor, so to speak. I can’t disclose the name.”

He glanced at Lee Do.

“The company we’re going up against in court is Core Works. We need to stir things up, but we can’t risk them finding out.”

Lee Do flicked his cigarette butt. It landed precisely on the Scavenger’s body.

To summarize, Core Works had hired a gang to suppress the union, and their competitor had hired the labor consultants and lawyers. This was to instigate a legal battle with the union and tarnish Core Works’ image.

“So, what do you say?”

The labor consultant now looked directly at Lee Do. q134.2e did the same.

The NIM likely contained concrete evidence linking the gang to the incident. Judging by the fact that the request had come to them, the nearby surveillance cameras and drones were likely already hacked or destroyed. It was a significant incident, involving a deep network and numerous individuals.

q134.2e looked at Lee Do.

Lee Do opened his cigarette case and lit a new one.

“You weren’t the ones who put the NIM in the union member, were you?” he asked.

The labor consultant gave a strained smile, looking uncomfortable.

“…Ah, of course, we were brought in after the incident. To be precise, after the incident blew up, we caught wind of it.”

“Then it’s fine.”

Nodding, Lee Do slowly walked out of the shadows and towards the table. His face, which had been illuminated only by the faint glow of his cigarette, now came under the direct light.

“Those words better be true.”

Smoke curled from the end of his cigarette.

“Tell me, what do I need to do?” Lee Do asked.

Scavengers operated as a decentralized network. They remained scattered until a broker relayed information, then converged on the scene like hyenas, grabbing what they could and disappearing just as quickly.

They probably didn’t even know who their fellow members were. Only the greedy faces they encountered at the scene served as proof of their shared identity as Scavengers.

As such, they lacked any sense of belonging and readily confessed their true nature when caught by the police. After all, Scavengers were more like business members connected through information brokers than a proper gang. They paid membership fees and monthly dues; these were the self-proclaimed Scavs, the Scavengers.

“They don’t have the guts to do anything big, but they want easy money.”

Lee Do sat quietly in the passenger seat of the van.

“And they even try to pretend they’re a gang. Cowardly.”

The person grumbling sarcastically from the driver’s seat was a man wearing an Oni mask.

The hand gripping the steering wheel and pistol was a mechanical one, covered in chrome parts, but his other hand, resting on the windowsill, had only a few lines etched onto it. Both hands were implanted, marking him as a veteran. He was an additional operative provided by the labor consultant.

“What do you think, friend?” the man asked Lee Do, glancing at him while looking out the dark window.

Lee Do adjusted his cigarette and replied,

“Do Scavengers usually kill people?”

It was more of a question than an answer.

It was so far off the mark that the Oni mask was momentarily taken aback before nodding slowly.

“Right? There might be survivors at the scene, so the first one to kill gets a bonus.”

“From the broker?”

“Yeah, you know what’s up. Especially since the one who gives the orders monitors the scene with nearby drones. The moment a survivor is spotted? Bang! Bullets fly from all directions.”

Lee Do nodded slowly.

“They’re bad people.”

“Well, they probably don’t care. The nearby surveillance cameras are all hacked anyway. The broker picks out those kinds of scenes specifically before giving the orders.”

“They don’t care because they can’t be caught?”

“Isn’t that obvious?”

The answer was as simple as it was clear.

As Lee Do exhaled cigarette smoke, a blurry figure appeared outside the front window. Under a flickering streetlight.

Two or three more figures emerged from the darkness, and a man in a black hood approached them.

“Huh.”

The Oni mask reacted.

“Looks like it’s them.”

All the spoils collected at the scene belonged to the Scavengers. That meant the Scavengers had to dispose of the loot, and this was typically such a scene.

This was why the fixer’s role, like q134.2e’s, was as crucial as the solo’s.

Without hesitation, Lee Do reached for the door handle, but the Oni mask quickly stopped him.

“Hey hey, what are you doing?”

He grabbed Lee Do’s shoulder and handed him a pistol.

“You’re going in there empty-handed, just your bare body? Planning to beat them to death with that stick of yours or something?”

Although his expression was hidden by the mask, his tone conveyed it clearly enough.

This was a crucial matter; if they failed to catch them, word would reach the other Scavengers, and the competing corporation might get wind of it. Lee Do considered this. Such a reckless move was almost… trolling.

“Let’s be relaxed about this, okay? Relaxed.”

However, contrary to his appearance, the Oni mask demonstrated a rather considerate and helpful demeanor.

“Okay, thanks.”

Lee Do accepted the pistol, pondering the man’s intentions.

They had requested an additional task, but instead of relying solely on the fixer and the solo, they had sent another operative. q134.2e seemed knowledgeable about the underworld, but she was a fixer who specialized in identity laundering. That also meant she was out of her depth.

Then the Oni mask added,

“Oh, you know you’re not supposed to kill them, right? We need to catch them and extract information. Shoot them in the leg or something.”

The labor consultant had entrusted the task to a solo who seemed naive enough not to know that.

“Of course.”

The reason corporations could rival the government was that they pursued self-interest even more meticulously than the government itself.

Scavengers were a decentralized network, making them nearly impossible to catch.

The company, supposedly Core Works’ competitor, had likely stirred up the area, commissioning various fixers and solos. A flood to counter a flood. But that meant their competitor might also find out. Especially if a Scavenger survived and was caught.

However, it wouldn’t matter if the solo was skilled enough to ensure no Scavengers survived. But a solo with no modules, just his bare body, and seemingly naive?

‘There’s a reason they sent a veteran.’

The Oni mask.

That meant they didn’t care if the mission failed. In the end, the death of a disposable solo meant nothing to them.

Lee Do took a drag of his cigarette.

He opened the door and stepped out.

“Hey hey, wait… We’re supposed to go together…!”

The Oni mask, just about to follow, paused to look out the window.

It was Lee Do. His back as he walked away, a cigarette in one hand and a pistol in the other. Exhaling smoke, he walked calmly towards them, stopped in front of the questioning figures.

He reversed his grip on the pistol.

He struck one Scavenger on the head with the butt of the gun and immediately threw it at another. Thwack. As the struck Scavenger groaned and collapsed, he calmly walked over and picked up the dropped pistol. Then, a Scavenger drew a gun from his pants. He walked towards him and struck him in the same manner. Thwack. The man crumpled to the ground.

It was over.

All three Scavengers were unconscious in an instant.

Standing amidst them, Lee Do watched the black hood flee as he smoked his cigarette. He’d been smoking it since before the encounter, yet the scene was cleared before it had burned down.

In the martial arts world, he would subdue assassins before tea got cold, but this was cyberpunk. Before the cigarette burned down.

Lee Do flicked the butt and returned to the van. He tapped on the window, and it rolled down.

“I’ll take care of everything. Scavengers or whatever.”

The Oni mask looked at Lee Do with a perplexed expression. Or rather, the Oni’s mouth was already fixed in a frown.

Being so meticulous in pursuing self-interest meant that they welcomed competence.

“So, tell them to pay more. Those bastards.”

That was the cyberpunk Lee Do had learned in two years of hardship.