Gearbound: Cyberpunk 2077-Chapter 213

This left V confused and panicked. What exactly had just happened? Where was everyone else?

At that moment, a massive bat suddenly burst out from the shadows. V had seen bats before, but a bat so huge its wings could wrap around a calf—she had only ever encountered something like that in braindance fantasy adventures. Never mind that by 2077, most animal species were extinct—had bats this big even existed decades ago?

These thoughts flashed through V's mind in an instant as she timed a tactical roll to the side, narrowly dodging the massive bat's fierce strike. When the bat's attack missed, it opened its jaws and let out a piercing screech, and the sound seemed to carry some kind of strange force.

Sparks shot from V's Kiroshi optics, her vision shaking and blurring.

Luckily, her quickhacking cyberware—provided by Leo—was a top-line fourth-generation model, and as an accomplished netrunner herself, V managed to reboot her optics in less than a second. But how could a bat trigger a reboot in cyberware?

What made her blood run cold was that as soon as her vision cleared, the bat's face was already right in front of hers.

She felt a sharp pain in her neck—the bat had sunk its fangs into the side of her throat. Her face twisted from the pain, but in the next instant, she channeled that pain into power, slamming her right knee hard into the bat's soft belly. As she had predicted, the bat shrieked in pain and loosened its grip, flapping its wings wildly as it retreated back onto the freezer.

V clutched her neck tightly. The bat's fangs were razor-sharp, and blood was already streaming between her fingers, soaking her palm. But strangely, even though she had stashed multiple MaxDoc Mk.3 injectors and Bounce Back Mk.3 inhalers on her, when she searched all her pockets, she came up empty.

"I'll kill you, I'll kill you, I'll kill you!!!"

The bat roared in a voice that didn't sound human at all, the sound echoing through the underground chamber and reverberating into the distance.

"Come on, you bastard, let's see if I don't rip your damn mouth open!" V snarled back. Her words seemed to completely enrage the creature, which shot toward her like an arrow.

The bat was too fast—V couldn't react in time. It slammed into her full force, and the two of them tumbled across the ground in a rolling heap. V used all her strength to pin the bat beneath her, ignoring the cuts and slashes its fangs and claws left on her body. With both hands, she squeezed its throat as hard as she could.

The bat thrashed and struggled wildly. V fought with everything she had to avoid being thrown off. Finally, the bat's frenzied struggling began to weaken. But V didn't dare let go. Blood was pouring from her neck—enough to drown her. Darkness flickered at the edges of her vision. She didn't know how much longer she could stay conscious, so she didn't loosen her grip, not until she was sure the bat was dead.

But... maybe because of the blood loss, when she blinked again, she was stunned to realize that what she was strangling wasn't some giant bat—it was Lucy.

She froze for a second, then slowly let go. Lucy immediately clutched her own neck, coughing hard.

V collapsed to the side, looking around in bewilderment, and finally noticed that none of the people who had been captured as sacrifices were dead. Lucy, Jackie, even Leo... they were all there.

Jackie was locked in a scuffle with Johnny, while Leo leaned against a freezer, still wearing his Falchion exoskeleton. At his feet was the decayed, headless corpse of an old woman, her severed head resting quietly a few meters away.

Leo pulled out a pneumatic injector and gave himself a shot. A cool sensation swept over his wounds, and the burning pain faded almost immediately. He tossed the empty injector aside and looked at the others. "You're all back to normal? How do you feel?"

Jackie and Johnny, realizing who they were grappling with, separated.

V, still shaken, asked, "Leo, what the hell just happened?"

Leo pointed at the corpse at his feet. "It was a rogue AI. It crossed through the Blackwall into the real world and possessed that 'vessel.' As soon as it showed up, it dragged you all into a hallucination."

"A hallucination?" Jackie said, his face pale. He'd been trapped in the same nightmare as V, seeing some monster charging at him—only when the illusion lifted had he realized it was Johnny.

"Think of it like a black-market braindance, except an out-of-control AI doesn't need a BD wreath or server—it can shove you straight into that nightmare on its own," Leo explained. "Honestly, if I hadn't gotten Vic to fit you all with fourth-gen netrunner cyberware and anti-detection scramblers, when that AI targeted you, you'd already be its thralls, groveling at its feet like that manager Lucy jacked into earlier, whose neural link was scrambled into pure static."

Leo silently thanked his own precautions. If he hadn't equipped the team with the best cyberware, they'd all have failed the check and been wiped out instantly when the rogue AI appeared. And if he himself hadn't refused implants and stayed fully meat, he would've been pulled into the hallucination too.

When the AI found its tricks useless on him, it had tried to breach his exosuit, freezing the Falchion system. Without maxed-out Strength, Evasion, and Block, there was no way he could've defeated the AI's vessel using only his body. novelbuddy.cσ๓

It had been a razor-thin survival. Now, at last, Leo understood why the mercs Regina had sent had vanished without a trace. Anyone augmented was completely helpless against the rogue AI—like a one-hit KO spell in a fantasy game, where no matter how high your HP or magic resistance, you were doomed.

"Let's go. We need to get out of here."

Leo let the others leave first. He dragged the bodies of the white-robed cultists and the AI's vessel into a pile, then pulled out a bio-incendiary grenade and set them all ablaze. Standing there, he watched until every trace was burned to ash, then finally turned and walked away.

...

Half an hour later, the Valentino crew finally arrived—late as always. But surprisingly, among them was Gustavo, one of the leaders of the Valentinos and Jackie's old friend, who had personally come to check things out.

After hearing the full story from Jackie, even Gustavo, hardened gang boss that he was, broke into a cold sweat. Thank God they'd arrived late. Thank God Leo and the others were here. Otherwise, if they'd rushed in alone, they would've been devoured by the rogue AI, enslaved without a chance to resist.

Gustavo greeted Leo with warmth and deep respect.