Riiiing.
Of course the desk phone had to ring now.
"Yeah?"
President Ōkubo's voice came through.
"Manager Li, I received your notice. Heh. We stepped in out of good will to help your company smooth things over with the East Castle Society, turn steel into silk. But judging from your ultimatum, there seems to be some misunderstanding."
"Oh? Good will, huh? Turning steel into silk, huh? A misunderstanding, huh."
Li Pan glanced at the gangsters outside the lobby—howling "ora ora ora," "baka baka baka," "temee, temee!" as they punched and kicked at the light-barrier on the door.
"How about this then, President Ōkubo: first release my company's people. Next, pull your vermin away from my front gate. Then, pay me—oh—just a teensy bit for emotional damages. After that, we can talk about goodwill and 'misunderstandings,' okay?"
Ōkubo sighed.
"Manager Li, that's what I mean—you've misunderstood. But I can relate. Your résumé looks a lot like mine."
"My résumé?"
Ōkubo said,
"Don't sell yourself short. People like us—dealt a bad hand, humiliated, kicked down—who still grit our teeth and climb from the bottom? We're rare.
"But don't let that mislead you into thinking your present success came purely from your personal effort.
"Don't mistake your current position and authority as something only you could have earned. Don't think you are indispensable to your company.
"No. They promoted you, they favored you, they let you flip your fate for one reason: they found you… hmm…
Interesting."
"'Interesting'?"
Frowning, Li Pan watched the mob outside suddenly stop and open a ring. A middle-aged swordsman in a kimono stepped to the front, palm on his tachi, exhaling in frosty huffs—"sshhh—hoo—sshhh—hoo"—gearing up to draw-cut the light-wall.
Ōkubo continued, "Yes—interesting. Because your hard-knock life—your pain and grit—have made you far more engaging than those gods of Takamagahara who lounge on high and stare down at the world.
"The blood-and-tears will to control your own fate—that's something those born with everything can't understand, and no ultra-dream can reproduce.
"So at first, they'll think you're fascinating. They'll appreciate you, promote you, treat you warmly…
"But that novelty fades. It always fades. When they wake from the dream—bored again—you'll remember who the real masters are."
A cold flash! The swordsman drew and cut—blade to the light wall—heaven-splitting frost—
…and the blade snapped, bounced back, and lodged in the swordsman's skull.
The gangsters faltered for a beat, then bustled forward again, dragging the body away as they kept shadow-boxing the air.
Old man Yagyū still lurked in the crowd, eyes mean and narrow, glued to Li Pan's eye.
Li Pan rolled his eyes.
"President Ōkubo, are we even having the same conversation? Do you really think this situation today is because I, Li Pan, have lost sight of my place?
"It's you who misread the room. Your self-positioning is… just a little off. Why don't you hand me a Tokugawa who can actually decide things?"
Outside, the mob opened another ring, and out lumbered a fully cyber-augmented gorilla—
Well, a man augmented to look like a gorilla. He ripped his shirt, revealing full-body shura tattoos. He raised an arm thick as a column; the elbow snapped open to reveal a cannon barrel—a walking tank.
Ōkubo chuckled.
"Heh, Manager Li, you made enemies of the East Castle Society; you offended Takamagahara. Did you think a fiery memo would let you hide behind tiger skin, pitting corporations against each other from the shadows?
"Don't you see? Your status maxes out at my level.
"You're young. Societies run when class lines are strict and clear. Everyone doing their own duty—that's order.
"Act beyond your station—challenge across your class—and you show the greatest disrespect to the established order.
"You might get lucky once or twice. But not every time. And certainly not enough to claw your way to the top.
"To those above, managers like us—no matter how capable, no matter our numbers—are just strays picked up from below. Replaceable. Expendable pieces.
"Do you think your company would risk conflict with peer-level Takamagahara just over your personal wins and losses? Are you worth that?
"Or do you think your blood-knight mistress will save you? Heh, let's not even discuss how much weight a mere knight carries in the Ye conglomerate…
"You, I imagine, are not the sort to hide under a woman's skirt. Otherwise you'd have apologized already, no?"
The gorilla roared and fired.
BOOM. KRAKOOM!
In Li Pan's dynamic vision, the cannon's HE shell tore the air, smashed into the light-wall, and bounced straight back—pulverizing the ape-man, then scything through the packed hallway—flattening skulls and limbs, before the orange fire-gust bloomed into sky-blue plasma. In the tight corridor, high-pressure shock and firestorm turned the crowd into spray and chunks. Shattered bone and charred flesh painted the passage.
Damn—must've hot-rodded that shell. But hey, the "ora ora ora" noise finally stopped for a moment…
Li Pan made the tired face of an old man reading the news on the subway.
"J—freaking—C…"
Ōkubo must've heard the blast; he was still chuckling.
"Heh, don't be angry, young man. While things can still be salvaged, my sincere advice is: face reality and bow your head. Admitting fault is part of growing up.
"Besides, you killed my free-range dog. An apology is only right.
"All my master wants is the most basic thing: respect…"
"Oh, you want respect too…"
Li Pan was done. If we're talking interests, we can bargain. If we're talking respect, there's nothing to discuss.
"President Ōkubo, since you kindly called to counsel me, here's my advice in return:
Resign. Take the half-loss."
Li Pan hung up, frowning as he studied the mountain of corpses at the door.
Another stir in the gore—an old man in a once-white kimono now dyed reddish-brown clawed upright, howling like a demon.
"Come ooout—! Come face me—AOOO!"
The Yagyū boss hadn't been dumb enough to die to a reflected shell. He'd been skulking behind his men—with a wall of little brothers to absorb the blast.
A few other East Castle execs staggered up, rushing to shield him and retreat.
The broke foot-soldiers without decent aug-armor were now pasted to the walls. The remaining execs, though—grade-5 Muramasa bodies all—could tank one HE round.
They still looked like hell—dust-gray and ragged, missing arms and legs.
"Boss, I brought the Yellow Zone monsters too—uh, what happened here? Should I call the police?" A-Qi spilled out of the freight elevator, arms full of bags and cases.
"It's fine. Run those to the pad. Give me a sec."
Li Pan grabbed a few monsters for personal carry, then dropped the light-wall and stepped into the corridor.
Two steps in, squelch. He froze, looked at what stuck to his sole… Was that the prostate or—
"Tch—my shoes… Hey, you losers—can't even pass the first door. I can't bear to watch. Fine, fine—you want war, then—"
"Korossee!" the Yagyū boss roared.
"Temee!"
The "Loyalty"/"Righteousness" brute launched another Superman punch—
Li Pan popped his Black Kite and took the top off the man's skull.
Silence.
"Damn it, let me finish a sentence."
Three more calm shots turned "Temee" into temee-paste. Li Pan beckoned with a finger.
"Old man—if you want vengeance for your boy, fine. I'll grant you a man-to-man duel. Stop hiding behind your juniors. Come yourself. I promise not to shoot you dead."
From the base of the tower came a crisp tat-tat-tat, boom-boom-boom—like firecrackers.
Li Pan holstered the Black Kite right in front of them.
"Don't say I never give chances. You opened up with military HE at my front door—shattered planters, stained carpeting. Per our lease with the building, CSI has unlocked kill permissions. So—are we fighting, or am I walking out?"
"Stand aside!"
At the boss's roar, his men heard the gunfire and screams downstairs, and fell back to the stairwell, leaving him the floor.
"Yagyū Tajima! Live blade! Entering match!"
The boss ripped his kimono, bare-chested—ropey muscles crisscrossed by old scars. Blood-qi boiled; his spine straightened; he grew a head taller—like a seventy-year-old rolling back to his thirty-year prime.
In his hand gleamed a Miike Odenta of the same line—its blood-aura thinner than the one Li Pan had confiscated earlier, but still a Yagyū-favored blade—murderous under the miasma, demonic intent wafting.
"Yagyū Shinkage-ryū! Mirror-Flower Moon-Water! Zen-Blade No-Mind! Floating Boat—Moon-Cleave!"
He finished calling his dishes and charged, howling, blade whistling for Li Pan's skull—
A strike so savage, so steeped in life's work, that it kicked up a storm of blood-wind and flesh-rain—blade-qi rearing into a blood fiend.
Expressionless, Li Pan slipped a meteor rope from his waist and flicked it.
The rope neatly snared his legs. He tripped.
And because the Odenta was too long, with too much belly, when the boss face-planted, the blade rebounded off the aug-metal flooring and speared back into him—shearing his belly open and half-severing his neck. Arterial blood fountained.
The onlooking yakuza: "…"
Yagyū: "Y-you base… cur…"
A throwing axe split his brow. Yagyū Tajima—dead.
Li Pan shrugged.
"Apologies—my to-do list today is long. No time to play. The rest of you—come together."
"C-Chairman—aaah!"
Finally they snapped, charging in despair. Li Pan flicked four shuriken—which bloomed midair, their edges biting into the walls and detonating into a dense nano blade-web, stretching a death line across the corridor.
Anyone crossing it was sliced into even cubes, cuts glass-smooth. Some still had time to scream before they expired—but it was a kinder death than the HE mush downstairs.
"Hidden weapons!"
The ones in back tried to brake, but Li Pan had already reloaded; pop-pop-pop-pop, clean headshots in a row.
Past seven steps, the gun is faster. Inside seven steps, it's faster and more accurate. What year is this—who shows up unarmed? Maybe they really did come to negotiate…
With the corridor cleared, Li Pan reeled in the meteor rope and axe, cut off the boss's head, and phoned janitorial to mop up. Then he rode the elevator straight to the roof pad.
A-Qi and Spider-18 were loading a company skimmer with gear—guns, kit, monster tools—big and small.
"Oh—18, the Security Bureau called. They've temporarily handed us public safety control. Check all squads' status!"
Spider-18's eyes spun. "Aye, boss—…whoa! Boss, whoa!"
"What, casualties already? It's been thirty minutes. Who is it?"
"Not that—look!"
She threw up a projection: near the Big Serpent 18 mainframe's warehouse, radar plus public feeds showed a swarm of unknown mercs approaching on military skimmers and wheeled IFVs—dozens of vehicles, with heavy kit and EW rigs—easily a combined-arms battalion.
And they weren't street punks. They seized high ground, built positions, cut intersections, and seized comms nodes and power hubs.
All masked, IDs scrubbed, kit all black-market—top-tier Muramasa SBS/SMS. Hacker support hammered the public network, trying to erase vehicles and bodies from radar and feeds.
Obviously Tokugawa's private mercs. Smart plan: in a cybernetic age, you hit the hacker brain first.
Knock out the Big Serpent servers and the monster company goes blind, deaf, and dumb.
"Launch," Li Pan snapped. "A-Qi, we go support 18—"
"No need," Spider-18 pointed. "Look."
On the feed, the outer ring of Tokugawa skimmers began popping one after another—blue plasma blossoms in clear sky. Ground IFVs screeched, piled into walls and overpasses, and winked off the net. No one was shooting at them. They weren't even in any defense envelope.
Li Pan narrowed his cyber-eye and still couldn't catch it. "…What's killing them?"
"Mercury," Spider-18 said. "Hold on—let me get a close-up."
A new camera angle: a humanoid of liquid silver, body flowing like metal, held a "lens" toward itself, tilted to a selfie V-sign—framing a ripped-open IFV and minced SBS troopers behind.
Not a lens. In Mercury's mirrored skin, it was clear: the "camera" was a merc's head, a mercury spike rammed through the skull, hijacking his optic feed.
"That's not Tianhan's—"
"Mm-hmm," Spider-18 hummed. "Sister Lin lent me a private demo to try. So badass—watch this."
Mercury-18 flashed skyward, shedding a string of silver beads—then gathered lightning in her palm. The beads snapped away like silent bolts—vanishing.
On radar, Tokugawa vehicles went dark—one after another. Those grade-5 IFVs might as well have been paper. A silver pin through armor—and everybody inside was just dead.
About ten minutes later, the battalion was gone—before it even finished forming.
Bugs.
"Waaah—so fast!" Spider-18 squealed. "Feels like this body could hit escape velocity anytime!"
"Well, it's two-hundred-million's worth of combat power…"
A silver flash; Mercury-18 floated down to the roof.
Li Pan squinted up at the liquid-metal figure glittering in sunlight, scalp prickling. He swallowed.
"Say, 18—can you use that to snatch every Tokugawa we need?"
"Nope. It's a TSC showpiece. Sister Lin only lent it to us for one day. It can't leave Night City, and it can't attack any target the security net classifies as a lawful citizen."
"Phew—could've said so earlier." Li Pan wiped cold sweat as gunfire crackled below in the CSI Tech Park. "Alright—go clean up the bugs downstairs. Don't hurt our flowers."
"Okayyy~"
Mercury-18 flashed—gone.
The gunfire dwindled. A few waves of ragged, terrified screams—and then silence.
Bugs…
Before Li Pan could sigh twice, Spider-18 piped up:
"Boss—hackers pinged us. Sounds like they want a ceasefire."
Li Pan flicked through the Logistics monster ledger, rolling his eyes.
"I haven't even started, and now they want to stop? Where were they ten minutes ago? No. Hit them—until they learn what respect means."
Spider-18 switched to 0113012's voice:
"Authorization confirmed. First Fleet, ready. Beacon Xi-Guard-1, WARP-500 jump—ETA 60 sec…
"Arrived. System auth—twin-linked high-energy baryon lances armed. Linking to 0791 Public Safety Network.
"Space scan complete. Star chart built. Targets locked. Coordinates uploaded. Authorization confirmed. Task complete.
"Shifting fire. Beacon Ren-Guard-2. WARP-500 jump—ETA 74 sec…"
"…Hold up," Li Pan said. "Shifting fire? Did you already shoot?"
0113012 replied,
"Battle report: full-system salvo. Four broadsides. Air-space cleared. Takamagahara-flag cargo ships downed: 296."
"…012, I thought we agreed on two hours to arm."
"Correct. The Horus-class dreadnought is charging the entropy cannon's baryon stacks. Also: insufficient nuclear warheads for orbital mines in Callisto stock. We've tasked orbital OPA to produce more. Current load: one set, 1,440 units. Estimated 1h12m to complete full fleet arm and depart."
Then, in the same flat tone:
"Second Fleet—ready. Beacon Bird-Guard-1. WARP-500 jump—"
.
.
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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."
💥 High-voltage cyberpunk. Urban warfare. AI paranoia.Read 30 chapters ahead, only on Patreon.
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