Chapter 18: Dance under the lights (4)

The police didn’t immediately storm Max Patty.

No shots were fired, and no one died.

It was just a scene where some terrifying event might have occurred.

But no terrifying event happened, and the situation ended with the man slumped over the table.

The AVs didn’t come.

[TL note: AVs likely stands for Autonomous Vehicles—self-driving patrol cars, drones, or robotic units often used by law enforcement in sci-fi or cyberpunk settings. Here, it implies high-tech police reinforcements or surveillance that never arrived.]

Even if an investigation were to take place later, no one could incriminate them right now.

“I’m actually hungry too.”

Vivian and Lee Do were looking for a decent restaurant after leaving Max Patty.

They stopped at a small restaurant run by an Asian owner.

Vivian ordered pho, and in a not-uncomfortable silence, she expertly used her chopsticks before speaking.

“I’m a little… uneasy.”

Lee Do looked up from his Pad Thai.

[TL note: Pad Thai is a popular Thai stir-fried noodle dish, typically made with rice noodles, eggs, tofu or meat, bean sprouts, peanuts, and a tangy-sweet sauce made from tamarind, fish sauce, and sugar.]

It was Vivian’s pale face.

Subtle shadows creased her features.

She didn’t seem to show her emotions on her face, but she expressed them quite well with words.

He went back to eating his Pad Thai and said.

“Didn’t we agree to go together? On this path?”

“That’s true. But seeing it firsthand… it doesn’t feel very real.”

“Were you a coward?”

“…”

Vivian closed her mouth, unable to think of a reply.

The word “coward” in a life-or-death situation.

Who wouldn’t be scared by a threat of being dismembered?

With a scoff of disbelief, she subtly curled her lip, then idly looked down at him eating Pad Thai.

He looked unperturbed.

As nonchalant as if he were just grabbing lunch because he was hungry.

She asked.

“…You originally intended to break it off like this, right?”

“The deal?”

“Yeah.”

“Of course. Who would trust those !diots? I’d rather believe a gun misfires when pointed at my head.”

“The Blood Cult or whatever, is that part of it too?”

“That’s a given.”

Vivian, speechless at his short, matter-of-fact answer, lowered her gaze.

She had antagonized a Red Stream executive.

It was an obvious future, as clear as day, that she could be brutally killed at any moment.

But it wasn’t something she hadn’t largely anticipated.

It was because of clean and unclean jobs.

That strange conviction she had clung to before was still ingrained in her mind.

And she herself was the one who had made a deal based on it.

There was nothing to change now, and even if she could, she had no particular intention of doing so.

‘…Is that what it is, conviction?’

The difference between clean and unclean.

Seeing her lost in thought, Lee Do suddenly pointed to her bowl.

She hadn’t even eaten half of it.

Lee Do, on the other hand, had scraped his bowl clean.

“Just eat. Quickly.”

“Ah… right.”

Vivian picked up her chopsticks again.

Lee Do, unconsciously reaching for a cigarette pack in his pocket, groaned and brought a glass of water to his lips.

“What are you going to do now?”

Vivian asked, sucking on her chopsticks.

“Dig for more information.”

“If they made such a threat, they might come looking for us. I doubt we can find them in a short time.”

“There are those guys.”

“Those guys?”

“The guys at the port they kindly told us to befriend.”

“…Ah.”

Vivian’s eyes widened in realization.

“Was this your plan all along?”

Lee Do shook his head, putting a piece of pickled radish in his mouth.

“No. And you, you have to stick with me from now on.”

“What do you mean?”

“Pack up all your stuff from the secondhand shop, and if there’s anything you need to take, move it to your car.”

“What’s the reason?”

“Those b@stards didn’t seem to be just bluffing. If they were really just nobodies, the government subcontractors wouldn’t be digging into their backs.”

“…Are you saying they might come looking for us?”

Lee Do nodded.

He didn’t know if their not having come to his place so far was truly their magnanimity or if they simply lacked the capability.

It could just be a lack of ability.

But one thing was certain: they could actually be in danger now.

Killing the hound and stirring up the club had been a sufficient grace period.

Now, even their identities were exposed.

No matter how much she prepared, there was a high chance she would be in danger.

Lee Do again unconsciously reached for a cigarette pack in his pocket, then closed his eyes tightly and stood up.

“I’m going to buy cigarettes. You can keep eating.”

Vivian watched Lee Do’s retreating back as he left the shop, then quickly stood up as well.

Her stomach wasn’t full yet, but something made her want to.

“…Let’s go together. I’m done eating anyway.”

Vivian’s car was quite practical.

It was a sedan, yet spacious.

Vivian, settling into the sedan, only took her Cyberdeck.

It was an electronic device similar in appearance to a laptop.

Unlike a desktop with only a display, it had only a keyboard.

Pressing one of the buttons made a holographic display appear.

“Is that really all you need?”

“Yeah, where are you staying? Pin the location.”

Lee Do also packed a few things from the motel he usually stayed at.

It was 100,000 credits out of the 710,000 credits he had piled up in a corner of the motel, and his manuals.

And a couple of spare staves he had bought at the marketplace.

He also packed two or three sets of clothes, just in case.

When Vivian asked why he was packing clothes, the answer came back: “Who knows when I’ll be back?”

Vivian’s eyes widened. She returned to the secondhand shop and packed a few sets of her own clothes as well.

“Let’s go straight there. To the location.”

Lee Do said to Vivian, who was back in the car.

She nodded slightly and pressed a point below her ear.

She seemed to be checking the information the executive had sent.

The late afternoon light clung to the car window she had turned to look out of.

Particles of an unknown color, perhaps orange or white, floated around.

Beyond the front window, tall buildings clustered on either side of the Metro Hub.

As such, there were many pedestrians and cars passing by.

Vivian’s car was one of them.

After setting the navigation, she gripped the steering wheel with one hand.

Her other arm rested on the center console, and she glanced at the side mirror before pressing the pedal.

The vroom- of the exhaust sound reverberated up from under the seats.

The car soon passed the Metro Hub.

It quickly ascended the elevated highway.

The city came into view beyond the bridge railing.

While a subway train whizzed by to the side, the sun was setting over the road that stretched to the horizon.

Was that the source of the light streaks?

Although the car sped past the city and the bridge railing, the light streaks remained.

It was, so to speak, a dense pattern that nothing could imitate.

Being natural amidst the artificial, it was overwhelmingly clear.

Was it clean?

Or, was it distinct?

“Iron Bay, do you know it?”

Vivian asked while driving.

Lee Do, who was looking out the window, answered curtly.

“Heard it’s a port city.”

“Have you been there?”

“No.”

“A lot of Revenants from this area come from there, especially. Because of all the illegal immigration.”

The port the executive had mentioned was not in Sector 11-A.

If you went straight on, opposite the suburban area where they had wiped out the Scavs, you could reach Iron Bay after crossing a fairly long river.

This was why deserters dispatched to other regions and illegal immigrants flocked to Sector 11-A.

In the first place, maritime security was poor, and like the rest of the area around Sector 11-A, it was corrupt and rotten.

This was because the manufacturing and production companies of Iron Bay, and the organizations associated with them, had a tight grip on it.

Ultimately, it was for smuggling with foreign countries.

The fishermen would never dream that the weapons of the pirates who occasionally disrupted trade routes and plundered fishing boats were supplied by them.

“In that sense, something seems strange.”

Vivian said.

Originally, Red Stream’s territory was Sector 11-A.

Their influence reaching Iron Bay wasn’t small, but the fact that those digging into their backs were there now was enough to arouse suspicion.

She continued her words with a question.

“Do you have any guesses?”

“I don’t know.”

“Hmm, maybe they’ve been rebuilding in a different area from the start, not Sector 11-A.”

“That’s plausible. Could their main base be in another region?”

“We can’t rule it out. They might have even colluded with another organization.”

If they were people who rejoiced in dismemberment and red lights, fanatical reasons couldn’t be ruled out.

Lee Do nodded moderately.

Outside the car window he was looking at, the incredibly tall city streets were still speeding by.

It was a street of gentle colors, gradually tinged with the sunset.

Below the suffocating elevated highway, they were just overwhelmingly tall things.

It was a place shaded in one step, and a place where sunlight faintly shone through a gap in another.

On the contrary, from the elevated highway they had ascended, the world was brightly lit like this.

Rather, because the buildings were lined up only on either side as if strictly observing order, it seemed as if the sun itself was welcoming the cars on the elevated highway.

“Can I smoke?”

Vivian turned her head slightly at Lee Do’s question as he rummaged in his pocket.

She immediately looked back to the front.

The corner of her mouth, as she replied, rose imperceptibly as if she found it funny.

“What. You smoked in restaurants and on the street, and now you’re asking for permission?”

“It’s your car.”

“…Well, that’s true. Because of that?”

“If you don’t want me to, I don’t have to smoke.”

“No… Well, go ahead and smoke.”

Vivian made a reluctant face, as if it were an unexpected answer.

Lee Do silently opened the window and put a cigarette to his lips.

The wind brushed past, from the tip of the cigarette to his lips holding it, to the corner of his mouth and his cheek.

When he exhaled smoke, it scattered and disappeared behind him.

Even if he tried exhaling again out of a strange stubbornness, it was the same.

It just vanished meaninglessly behind him.

“…”

Lee Do stared at the gradually setting sun.

He watched it set, continue to descend, and then, in the quiet silence, gradually turn pink.

And then purple.

In a silence that was neither awkward nor pleasant.

Before long, the car was driving on the bridge leading to Iron Bay.

It would be somewhere between Sector 11-A and the industrial zone of Iron Bay.

Between the countless industrial zones belching smoke, the river scattered water scales.

Pitch black.

Whether due to the rough waves or simply a dislike for the smoke, their movements were quite fierce.

In cyberpunk terms, it was a place where you could dump a body unnoticed. In Jianghu terms… what would it be like?

To put it in modern terms.

A question suddenly came to mind.

Lee Do flicked the cigarette butt out the window.

The window closed with a whirring sound.

“The wind, it was nice.”

Although Vivian opened it again because she said so, he didn’t put another cigarette to his lips.

Instead, Lee Do took in the sight of the gradually approaching murky gray industrial zones, one by one.

Iron Bay.

And Red Stream.

Those Blood Cult f*cking b@stards.

It wouldn’t be long until he dealt with them.

That was all there was to it.