So the Fabius Clan, poised to take the reins of the Ye Council, was quietly siding with the Collector, huh.
He'd long suspected the Collector had top-tier interplanar corporations behind her, but the Ye Clan wasn't exactly top-tier… Well—loan sharks or not, he hadn't expected even the Ye to dip their toes into the monster-trade market.
At least 01044 was courteous. She clearly intended to wipe that Collector Station, but she'd come brief the local manager first—flag the risk of offending the Ye—and give him time to brace.
After all, once she finished, she could pat the dust off and return to Earth-01. Li Pan would be the one left holding the 0791 mess.
He hesitated.
"So you mean: don't squeeze Takamagahara too hard. If Night City ends up under a single hegemon, the Ye will be… difficult to deal with later?"
01044 smiled and shook her head.
"Politics is the few ruling the many. If conditions allow, you remove as many potential threats as possible—that is how you deter the majority.
"Peace is pleaded by the weak and granted by the strong. If you want my take: when you deploy war-readiness, consider widening the strike zone.
"Whether some people choose the Collector's side or are hedging both ways—either way, they must learn that crossing the company has consequences."
Li Pan heard the subtext: when he took Takamagahara to the woodshed, give the Ye a beating too.
He opened his mouth, but the car speaker in 01044's hand chirped twice, and the shimmering halo winked out.
It had timed out? She tossed the junk aside, fished out another audio unit, rubbed it in her palms, and the network jam resumed.
Watching her practiced motions, Li Pan asked,
"One-use 'monster'? Crafted on-site? What do you call this skill—superpower?"
01044 pondered.
"You ever play the big MMOs? World of Beeps? Think of me as a mage."
Li Pan nodded.
"Oh—magic. Can you cast fireball? Which hits harder, fireball or a grenade howitzer? Can I see one—?"
01044 laughed.
"Forgive me—most places, the howitzer wins. And I'm not a battlefield caster—more of a support.
"It's just that 0791 happens to be Ye bloodline turf, crisscrossed with old elven ley-circuitry, and we've had multiple Grail procurement wars here. That's why HQ sent me.
"Oh—and that Collector, Belia—she's a master of black magic. You can think of her as a demon. A great one."
"Oh? So you counter her—are you a warlock?"
With Li Pan digging for details, 01044 chuckled and gave the short résumé.
"No. Before the company I was an Astrologer of the Lighthouse. I studied Alchemy at the Academy, and at the Library I took Demonology, ancient magic, Elvish, and occult studies. So yes—most of Belia's tricks I can handle—and, if needed, I can jack into the ancient magi-net here and set up a workshop. Projecting 'monsters' by alchemy and cracking a Station is not difficult."
Li Pan nodded again. "Alchemy, got it—Philosopher's Stone, human transmutation, equivalent exchange, right?"
01044 actually looked surprised.
"You know the Stone and human transmutation… Good. My materials are nearly ready. Next I need to make as many Philosopher's Stones as possible—which means I need temporary workers for the human transmutation. If you permit…"
Li Pan snapped his fingers.
"No problem. Night City's got no shortage of scum. Those East Castle punks tried extorting the company? They're begging for it. Use them. I'll have Rama and the others round up a batch for you."
01044 pressed a hand to her chest and bowed.
"Thank you for your authorization."
Encouraged, Li Pan pressed on.
"Back to the Ye issue—any suggestions? Do we have a war-prep monster that counters vampires? What if I want to limit the strike to the Fabius line?"
Unruffled, she asked,
"What were you planning to use?"
"No big secret: Bee Venom. I was thinking ninja delivery… By the way, how did you do it last time? And what exactly is Bee Venom? If we use it loosely… we're not going to wipe out the whole bloodline population, are we?"
01044 considered it.
"That's suitable. Don't worry—bloodline implants are still targeted gene engineering. Many abilities are family-specific—and fall within our counter matrix.
"As for Bee Venom… you've read the memo; have you heard of Earth-036?"
Li Pan shook his head. "No. Hardly heard of that plane at all."
Cross-world Earth servers needed paid routes, specialized chips, and link licenses. Li Pan's wallet had only fattened in recent months. Back then, Dreams-Plus was enough; he hadn't had cash to tour other worlds.
01044 nodded.
"Not surprising. Then you know TERRA HOLDINGS?"
"Oh—the money-men behind the vegetarian zealots?"
Of course he knew TERRA—famous was putting it lightly.
The marquee (and notorious) eco-extremist groups—Sambogo Earth Enviro-Cult, Alliance for Life, Health & Veganism, Pure Human Foundation, and more—all had TERRA backing.
Fronted by TERRA—and a few grain conglomerates—they pumped out ads and PSAs for environmental protection, clean energy, and Love the Earth.
Truth was, they loved business more than Earth.
TERRA's core business was Terraforming.
Even before the war, back in Earth-0's split timeline, humanity bet big on the stars. The old-guard megacorps poured resources into planetary engineering, piling up patents and tech.
TERRA was top of the field. Under government coordination, they centralized resources and tech, optimized pipelines, and took Mars as the Terra Program testbed—building a New Earth. Their raison d'être: monopolize mega-scale terraforming and build homes for interstellar humanity—a unique, monopolistic super-conglomerate.
Had humanity pushed to the stars, TERRA would've been the highest-valued empire.
Then tech took a left turn. Before a stable FTL was online, dimensional transit and poly-wormholes popped first.
Other Earths were… Earth. No terraforming needed. TERRA's stock cratered, nearly bankrupt.
"Nearly," because their tech was still real. With solar-system colonies, Europa, Mars, Luna, and geo-engineering projects, they kept profits alive. Post-war they were broken up and restructured, slid out of the top three, but still held seats on the Security Committee.
So yes—TERRA loved eco-narratives most.
Because they owned the patents. Private estates, corporate colony ships, undersea parks, vacuum factory-cities—habitat contracts across the cosmos—TERRA held the monopoly.
They climbed a ridge of trash.
"On Earth-036, corporate wars, chemical leaks, pesticide abuse—industrialization tipped the ecosystem into systemic collapse," she said. "The Committee half-sold half-gifted the world to TERRA for repair and restoration.
"TERRA made 036 a showcase. Super-projects and tech turned it around quickly—an artificial habitat springing to life. But one link failed.
"The bees."
"Bees?"
01044 glanced back.
"You know what bees are? They're probably extinct in your world."
Li Pan sweat-dropped. "I—I've seen them online…"
She nodded and climbed on.
"Bees are crucial to ecological balance. Natural pollination by bees is the most efficient, low-cost way to boost yield. In nature, three-quarters of crops depend on hives. Co-evolved with plants, they're tied to the environment's dynamic equilibrium.
"Lose the bees, and many crops and plants fail to reproduce; agriculture unravels; the ecosystem's collapse becomes irreversible.
"With current tech, humanity wouldn't go extinct—but you end up like you are now: living off synthetic industrial food."
Li Pan stared at the nutri-slurry wrappers strewn in the trash.
"To retrofit a collapsed world, bees are indispensable. But you can't release organic bees into a heavily polluted biosphere. So TERRA built the Autonomous Artificial Apoidea—AAA/3A—the Swarm.
"3A was cutting-edge micro-ADI—autonomous insectoid drones built from dense MEMS. Beyond pollination, they sensed water, air, soil; fed back data; and were coordinated by a central hive. On return, the drones networked in, updated via cloud, and in-hive custom workers and nanobots repaired, replicated, and copied. A self-maintaining ecological scaffold.
"There were ADIs for worms, ants, more—chosen per environment. It was the jewel of human tech—one of the most advanced drone systems in the multiverse."
Li Pan: "But…?"
01044 swapped to another speaker.
"But TERRA made AAA too advanced. The blueprints are still rated Level-7 military. And to crown 036 as their plane HQ, they bolted on forbidden tech.
"They added gene-targeted pollination—AAA would preferentially pollinate TERRA-brand GM crops, causing rival crops—and unedited weeds—to self-eliminate.
"To cut losses, they used the newest nano-bio materials in the hive, plus adaptive, self-evolving nanobots—so the swarm could self-diagnose, evolve to the environment, self-replicate for the production target—removing human maintenance.
"And since TERRA also owned weapon firms, they repurposed ADI modules into weaponized variants—toxin injectors, micro-radar, IR/gravitic/sonar, optical stealth, EM hardening…"
Li Pan pictured a fly-sized, fully kitted Level-7 ninja. "Holy—"
"And they still weren't done. Top-tier competition is brutal—the top market is finite. So they upgraded the swarm's compute.
"To escape ChaosTech's network controls, they built an independent TERRA net, unplugged from the QVN safety backbone without approval, and injected Gestalt logic modules…
"Net result: the Swarm went out of control. Earth-036 suffered a mass extinction."
They reached the peak of trash. Night City blazed in the distance.
"Peak population was 14 billion," she said softly. "That disaster wiped even our local branch. If the monsters of that plane were also folded into the Swarm's purification…
"In any case, access to 036 is locked by the Security Committee. The QVN is sealed off. At least ten Titan-class grand fleets sit in LEO there, shooting down anything that tries to climb out of atmosphere."
Li Pan shook his head. "All that and you didn't just nuke it?"
She shook hers.
"The surface has already been strategically nuked and gamma-swept. The hive-core dug into the mantle, turning the planet into a nest. The standard Sanction Protocols don't work.
"To destroy the planet you either deliver bombs to the core, or build Colossus-class impactors in orbit.
"But 036 is drained—no local industry. Hulls and systems must be imported interplanar—astronomical cost. And blowing up a planet needs a lot of paperwork. The Committee is still arguing; the hulls aren't even laid."
He stared at the steel-hive city lights, a little dazed.
"But," she went on, "war with AAA taught us things. The Swarm evolved interesting tech; every corporation studies it. Bee Venom Extract, for instance—originally a TERRA chemical weapon, but AAA's evolution pushed it to an edge we call proto-Level-9.
"The base is synthetic apitoxin peptides—a 26-residue polypeptide. It can be tuned as a powerful anti-inflammatory with steroid-like action without side effects; antibacterial, anti-radiation, antiviral; selectively destroying viruses or pathological tissues without harming normal cells.
"After gene-editing, we reverse it—Bee Venom becomes a vector attacking cells that carry the target gene fragment. In simple terms, you can poison anyone, and they'll only feel pain—no death. But upon contact with the target, it annihilates them at the genetic level.
"Our Tech Division further improved it: added specific toxins so that, after the op, a single temp worker sacrificed will degrade the compound in the ecosystem—erasing all traces and evidence. No one can prove what you used."
Li Pan took a long minute to absorb that. 01044 enjoyed the city's nightscape and let him catch up.
"If it's just a warning, the Fabius line has no special system. No need to drop the whole plane offline or genocide the bloodline.
"I can raise a barrier over Night City and seal bloodline-implant powers for thirty minutes. You inject Bee Venom into the Fabius hive during that window. For the first jab, pick a pure-blood knight or elder. In one night, Night City's Fabius blood will be empty."
"So easy…"
Li Pan thought, then asked,
"Do you have a ninja-focused barrier? Their power should be a variant of ancient elven arts. My company just archived a batch of their training manuals—you can reference them."
"As long as it runs on magical principles, no problem. But I have a condition."
She pointed at the handkerchief at Li Pan's chest.
"That monster—would you lend it to me to study?"
Li Pan blinked and handed it over.
"You've seen something like this… monster?"
"Thank you."
Her eyes burned over the sigils on the cloth. She nodded, then shook her head.
"Looks like ancient seal-script, but I've never seen magic like this. How are the rules etched onto the strings…
"Would you be willing to sell it? Name your price—I'll add seven keys."
"Nope. A mere seven silver keys—I can grind those out before lunch."
With a flick, the handkerchief snapped back to his hand—soul-bound. They were colleagues, after all; Li Pan didn't pull the old trick of selling the dog and waiting for it to run home.
01044 looked regretful, but let it go.
"Alright. I'm personally fascinated by otherworldly runes, but with this body I can't see the principles. Could you copy the three spells inscribed on the monster and fax them to me? Don't make mistakes—I'll pay one key per glyph."
Li Pan looked at the nine sigils, then at 01044.
"Deal."
.
.
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⚠️ 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."
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