By the time Li Pan rushed back to the office, the situation was already under control. Tōdō, the president from Takamagahara, and Commander Emilius of the Night Clan had both realized they had sensitive business to discuss. Seeing the crowd inside, they left their cards and asked for a proper appointment instead.
Other phone inquiries weren't urgent, and A-Qi had arranged appointments. The rest of the visitors were being entertained by stand-ins: Paradise Corporation had Kotarō, the Kōga Academy headmaster had Ashiya Shigeyoshi, and the Security Bureau had Yamazaki Ayato.
So early in the morning, the office was lively—almost starting to look like a real company. Proof, perhaps, that overtime is all smoke and mirrors: even if you work yourself to death, the boss will just replace you and the money still flows in.
The Collector's Envoy
"Oh, you must be 01044? Welcome to 0791. If you're here for the Collector, you can take them whenever you like. Anything else I can help you with?"
Li Pan entered the office, wiping his face with a handkerchief, smiling.
A woman in a business suit sat at the table. She was using an ordinary synthetic body—one of those standard human genetic shells used by off-worlders on orbital stations.
These weren't simple clones. They were reinforced humans, stored in cryo-sleep with genetic locks to prevent rebellion. Service life: seven years. At the end, mandatory disposal. If an employee handled classified work, they'd often pay to have the body destroyed before returning, just to avoid leaks.
"Hello, I'm 01044. I'm in charge of pursuing the Collector on 0791."
She rose to shake Li Pan's hand. His cybernetic eye caught the string of synthetic ID codes in the whites of her eyes.
He quickly cross-checked them with a catalogue he'd pirated from a body-mod shop.
Model: Volkskörper National Bodyworks, mass-produced Level-4 synthetic. Probably rented from a VK orbital station. Base cost: about 1.5 million, closer to two million landed.
VK was no small name: one of the great heavy-industry groups of the Multiverse, a senior Security Council member. Their synthetics ranged from Level 3 to 6, military and civilian, mass-produced in staggering numbers.
This particular body was an all-rounder: alloy bones, artificial organs made of keratin protein, subdermal armor, standard VK operating system. Solid, reliable, practical—good enough to knock over a cyber-merc with a mismatched Level-5 kit. But no frills. No "experience." In fact, sensations were muted; there was no pain, no thrill, no real pleasure. More like driving a carbon-based robot than living in a body.
01044 sat back down, turning a glass sphere in her hand.
"Manager of 0791," she said, "do you know what this is?"
"A souvenir? Looking for a little tourism? Night City doesn't have much worth seeing. If you've got the leisure, I could take you to a hot spring."
Inside the sphere, holograms displayed Night City's skyline. A tourist bauble, basically—ten credits on the station, sold for two thousand to the gullible.
01044 shook her head. Light flared from her fingers. The image inside the orb twisted.
In seconds, Night City collapsed into a nightmare: a white flash, the atmosphere tearing apart, skyscrapers crumbling like paper, red flesh erupting from the ground, acid rain and blood surging over seawalls, the city swallowed by darkness.
Then, just as abruptly, the image reset to normal.
"This," she said, "is prophecy. Just a little more—and everything would have been lost. Somehow, you pulled it back. I don't know what else to say."
She clapped, twice, slow and mocking.
Li Pan was left speechless.
"Really that bad? I mean, that 'Golden Buddha' Apostle wasn't so tough. I handled it easily enough. Even if Sky City fell, Night City has defenses. Worst case, a few suburbs flattened."
01044 gave him a look.
"An Apostle you can dispatch casually, hmm? Forget it. I'm only a field officer. Not my place to argue."
Still, she offered the sphere as a gift.
"My prophecy holds for seven days. Keep it as a reference."
Negotiations
From her suit she drew a notebook and scribbled a request, handing him a page.
"The Collector appearing here means they've established a station on this plane—a warehouse, if you will. My task is to wipe it out. For that I need to interrogate your ACA captive and requisition ritual materials. Can you provide them?"
Li Pan frowned at the messy script.
"Sorry, except for the part about a hundred temps, I can't read a word. Could you use standard script?"
They went back and forth for half an hour before reaching an agreement:
01044 would draw some assets from Monster Corp's stock.
Li Pan would assign Rama and Old Liu to assist.
And, critically, they were not to be treated as disposable temps.
01044 found his managerial style odd but accepted.
The Security Bureau
Next came the Security Bureau. Yamazaki led in two bureaucrats: a balding department chief and his bespectacled aide, both stiff and dour.
"Mr. Li," said the chief. "Thanks to your help, Night City was spared disaster. Allow me to extend our gratitude."
"No need. The NCHC already blasted my name across every channel. My ears are calloused from the praise. The bounties cleared, so—what's the new business?"
The chief's smile faded.
"Our division handles the Akatenku terrorist organization. In analyzing the hacker brain-jar you seized, we found records of your direct encounter with their netrunner. Correct?"
"Damn right," Li Pan said. "They nearly cooked my brain."
The chief gestured to his aide.
"This is our technical specialist. With your permission, we'd like to investigate your chip directly, to trace their signal. I know it's invasive, but with your company's oversight present, it should be acceptable."
Translation: let us crawl through your brain. Li Pan nearly laughed. Handing over his chip meant exposing every secret—the handkerchief, the Cockroach, the jars. Even his old dictionaries!
He leaned back.
"Sorry, no. Confidential corporate data. Headquarters won't authorize it."
The chief's face hardened.
"Then I'll have to apply for a warrant."
Li Pan smiled thinly.
"Go ahead. And when you do, make sure the cafeteria has pork cutlet bowls."
Tension rose—until Yamazaki stepped in quickly.
"Manager, perhaps a compromise? You could record the memory fragments into a Dreamdrive. After HQ approves, we'll provide them to the Bureau. In the meantime, I was there myself. I'll cooperate with their report."
Li Pan gave him a sidelong glance. Clever bastard—shielding him while still feeding the Bureau something.
"Fine," he said at last. "Let Yamazaki handle it."
The chief scowled but relented. "Very well."
Paradise Corporation
Finally, the lawyer from Paradise Corporation.
Li Pan had assumed they came to fine him. To his surprise, Kotarō explained they'd come to pay.
"Paradise's key is in your hands, boss," Kotarō whispered.
Only then did Li Pan understand. Sky City falling wasn't the real issue. The real breach was deeper: Eighteen, through the Orochi system, had torn open Paradise's ICE firewall.
One crack in ICE meant infinite cracks. One backdoor meant infinite backdoors. If their source code was compromised, all of Paradise's assets across the Multiverse were potentially undefended.
And the world knew it. Worse, Eighteen had logged on under Li Pan's ID. So as far as anyone was concerned, his company now held "the Key to Paradise."
The lawyer's terms were clear:
Paradise would rebuild their ICE with a new contractor.
During the interim, Panlong Construction would sign an NDA, promise not to disclose or exploit the vulnerability.
In return, Paradise would inject 35 million into the Night City Development Fund and hire Panlong as a consultant.
Breach the contract, and Li Pan's citizenship would be revoked.
Li Pan nearly fainted.
Sign, and he'd paint a target on his head. Refuse, and Paradise's strike teams would be on his doorstep.
He called Eighteen.
"You saw the contract?"
Eighteen: "Oh."
"Just 'oh'?!"
"Sign it. Yesterday their hackers poked at us anyway. I left backdoors of my own. If push comes to shove, we burn it all. They won't risk trillions to crush a small fry like us."
Li Pan was speechless.
"Wait—yesterday?"
"Yeah. Paradise's hackers tangled with us while I was chatting with Tech Division 01. Don't worry. We torched them. Oh, and HQ's ordering me an upgrade—satellite uplink, maybe a full orbital relay. Sign the deal, boss. Better them chasing that than my mainframe."
A satellite uplink. Turning her into a true UIS-grade net ghost. A few hundred million credits, easily. HQ really was spoiling her.
Li Pan realized then: the one who'd gained most from the fall of Sky City wasn't him. It was Eighteen.
.
.
.
⚠️ 30 CHAPTERS AHEAD — I'm Not a Cyberpsycho ⚠️
The system says: Kill.Mercs obey. Corporates obey. Monsters obey.One man didn't.
🧠💀 "I'm not a cyberpsycho. I just think... differently."
💥 High-voltage cyberpunk. Urban warfare. AI paranoia.Read 30 chapters ahead, only on Patreon.
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