Seoul Cyberpunk Story-Chapter 25: Jinryong Technology (2)

BEEEEEEP.

Wilson’s consciousness was slowly dragged out by the sound of the alarm.

He stirred and opened his eyes.

A holographic scheduler floated in midair above him, flashing today’s agenda in red.

<Mercenary A Meeting – Last Chance – 15:00>

“Mercenary A...”

Wilson murmured the name.

A legendary mercenary known throughout the Burning Duct.

The guy with an unbelievable 100% success rate.

Of course, a lot of that success was thanks to the outstanding fixer Amber, but no one could deny the results.

He’d only been in the scene for about a year, and was still mostly known in this part of town—but give it some time, and he was bound to become a legend across the whole merc world.

Wilson was fully awake now, looking around his tiny one-room apartment.

The place was cramped and shabby.

Well, it hadn’t always been this small—but complying with company regulations left him no choice.

As a Melton Pitt employee, he had to maintain a certain professional appearance, and the equipment required for that took up nearly half the space.

His business suits were perfectly arranged inside transparent storage cases. Implant maintenance tools and various gadgets were neatly organized with surgical precision.

He never had time to clean the rest of the place, but his work gear? That got wiped down and tuned every day—so clean it felt alien compared to the rest of the room.

By habit, Wilson turned on [N O V E L I G H T] the TV.

Out of the corner of his vision, he saw a flicker from the AR marker—credits being deducted.

Of course.

Useful information was never free.

News viewing was charged by the second. And the worst part about this TV? It billed you even during the ads.

According to Babel Network, it was because the ads were “user-personalized content.”

“Guess it’s like buying information about stuff you want to buy,” he muttered.

As he listened to the droning news, he switched on the light in his windowless apartment—and again, saw a tiny deduction tick off his account.

Out here on the fringes, nobody expected “credit” to mean trust. Every single service was billed in real time.

Electricity. Water.

Washing machines, TVs, even the air purifier.

To access any of it, you needed an AI frame wired into your nervous system.

Sometimes, Wilson wondered what life would’ve been like without it.

Would he have to pop coins into everything?

“Before the Convergence, people didn’t even have AI frames...”

He mumbled to himself.

Still, he figured life now had to be better than it was back then.

Humanity was evolving. Progressing.

He’d heard rumors that people in central Babel had been alive for over a hundred years...

If he ever made it to central Babel, he wanted to ask them if it was true.

The TV was running yet another report on the Black Bio Plant.

Lately, every news channel had been flooded with that story.

But Wilson had more urgent things to deal with.

He downed a bowl of plain white porridge for breakfast.

It was the cheapest food in Babel.

It didn’t taste like much, but there was no reason not to eat it—it had just enough nutrients to survive.

After eating, Wilson stood at the sink to get ready to go out.

Even while brushing his teeth, he could see credits being deducted for water usage. The light, the hairdryer—everything cost something.

And now, the most important moment was arriving.

Wilson began to change clothes.

The process felt almost like a ritual.

The moment where Wilson the nobody became Wilson the corporate man.

He put on a shirt made from a special polymer blend.

Followed it with a pair of perfectly pressed slacks, not a single wrinkle in sight. Tied his necktie.

And finally, threw on his jacket.

The man staring back from the mirror was no longer the guy living in a shitty one-room on the Babel outskirts.

That was Wilson Bridge, Market Commerce Street Specialist of Melton Pitt.

Wilson had a dream.

A small one: to live in a place where you weren’t billed by the second.

To live like the successful corporate types, where the company co-signed your debt and you settled bills monthly.

A big one: to climb to the top of Melton Pitt. To make the company powerful enough to stand alongside the megacorps.

Even if someone said it was a stupid dream.

He straightened his tie one more time and stared into his own eyes in the mirror.

Today was important.

Wilson had to get that implant back—for his future.

Before the company realized it had even been stolen.

And if the mercenary A lived up to the rumors, he was definitely the one who could pull it off.

He finished getting ready and stood in front of the door.

The moment he opened it, the security fee would auto-deduct.

And the moment he stepped outside—his day would begin.

Everything had a price.

The air he breathed. The ground he walked on.

And Wilson was ready to pay whatever price it took to make his dream real.

****

Outer rim of the Burning Duct, Seoul Office.

Amber, Scarlet, and Victor sat across from each other at the counter.

Blue neon light filtered through the window, casting a soft glow over their faces.

Unlike the constant noise outside, the office was quiet.

A rusty ceiling fan spun slowly above, stirring the stale air.

On the plate between them sat a small bird.

Round body, long beak— a kiwi.

The bird looked up at Scarlet with bright, curious eyes.

Scarlet scowled and pointed at it with a finger.

“Ugh, you pull this thing out every time I come over. What is even the point?”

Her red hair shimmered with flashes of neon as she moved.

Amber, calmly polishing a glass behind the counter, replied with an indifferent tone.

“Believe it or not, this kiwi bird is packed with high-grade tech.”

She set the glass down and picked up the kiwi.

The bird settled calmly into Amber’s palm.

“This is actually tech that originated from MK Corporation. A piece of lost technology—something even today’s megacorps can’t replicate.”

Amber’s voice was grandiose, like she was reciting a myth.

“The only place in Babel where you can still get a kiwi bird like this is the old pre-Convergence MK Corp automated farm in New Zealand.”

She added, matter-of-factly, “The farm's original owners are long gone—Black Bio controls it now.”

Victor, the merc who had been summoned for a job, watched the conversation with a slightly puzzled expression.

He didn’t get why Amber was making such a big deal out of it—or why Scarlet looked so disgusted.

To him, it just looked like a small, cute bird.

Updat𝓮d from freewēbnoveℓ.com.

Sure, he knew pets were rare in Babel—but still, this much fuss?

The kiwi waddled around on the plate.

After a moment’s hesitation, Victor gently picked it up and placed it in his palm.

Its feathers were incredibly soft. Surprisingly warm to the touch.

He slowly stroked the bird’s back.

The kiwi nudged its head into his hand, then let out a clear, high-pitched chirp.

‘Okay... yeah, kinda cute, I guess.’

Just as Victor was starting to enjoy petting it, Amber reached out and yanked the kiwi from his hand.

Then, without hesitation, she pulled a small knife from beneath the counter—

And sliced the kiwi clean in half.

“What the hell?!”

Victor jumped to his feet in shock.

Scarlet smirked like she’d seen it coming.

Victor was about to yell at Amber—ask what the hell she thought she was doing—but he froze.

Because even after being cut in half, the kiwi was still waddling around the plate.

And the sliced-open cross-section looked... weirdly familiar.

“No... no way...”

Amber nodded at him.

“That’s right. The stuff they put in kiwi cans? It’s all chopped-up kiwi birds. The real kiwi fruit went extinct during the Convergence.”

Victor collapsed back into his seat in shock.

His mind was assaulted with visions of all the canned kiwi he’d eaten in the past.

Scarlet snorted a laugh at his reaction.

“I had the same look the first time I found out. There’s a lot of shit like that in Babel.”

She tapped her implant lightly with a finger.

“That’s why I try not to eat anything new. You never know what the hell it actually is.”

Victor’s expression turned pale.

Amber, completely ignoring his horror, kept slicing the kiwi into smaller chunks and started placing pieces on each of their plates.

“Alright—time to get to business.”

She popped a slice of kiwi into her mouth as she spoke.

It was time to talk about the shady cult group that had started moving near the Burning Duct.

****

I was headed to the quarry where Query Witches were believed to be hiding out—just like the client wanted.

There was only one strange thing.

Wilson insisted on coming along.

Usually, that only happened when the client didn’t trust the merc.

Happened a lot before I got my rep in the Burning Duct.

Normally, I would’ve told him to stay the hell behind. Too dangerous.

But this time, I let it slide.

Because the gang in question was made up of Netwitches.

In a cyberpunk world like this, Netwitches were no joke.

The kind of threat that came from AI frames with remote comms—and cyber-punk-maniacs who jammed that crap into their nervous systems at birth.

They could hijack someone’s nervous system just by seeing them.

And that “sight” didn’t have to be in person. Real-time video was enough for the hack to go through.

Still don’t get how it works.

I once asked if photos would work too—and Aria looked at me like I was an idiot. Hurt a little.

I mean... isn’t a photo and a video basically the same thing?

Anyway, because Netwitches were that dangerous, there were tons of countermeasures.

Firewalls, viruses, support from allied Netwitches, all that.

And those countermeasures made them pretty damn weak in a straight fight.

Remote hacking took at least a full minute...

Any decent merc would either slice the Netwitch’s throat before then—or duck out of every line of sight, including cams.

Of course, the truly terrifying Netwitches... the ones that could freeze a nervous system in the blink of an eye?

Never met one.

Anyway, I wasn’t scared of Netwitches at all.

With those thoughts bouncing around my head, I led Wilson and his bodyguard to the quarry north of the Burning Duct.

And wouldn’t you know it—it looked exactly like a Netwitch nest.

The place was plastered with surveillance cameras.

[This is Query Witches territory. Unless you want your brain to get cooked, piss off now!]

As soon as we entered, a loud voice blared through speakers mounted all around the quarry.

I waved to one of the cameras and shouted back.

“Yo! Got the pizza ready?”

[IT’S THE PIZZA FREAK!!]

The speaker screeched, followed by crashing noises and panicked shouting.