Chapter 252: Yorinobu Arasaka
The fires of destruction lit by Margaret and Maria on the shores of Tokyo Bay were reflected on the main control screen of the Badlands laboratory, thousands of kilometers away in Night City.
Joric's crimson optical lenses watched the processed battlefield footage broadcast in real-time by the "Administrator." Data streams calmly evaluated the combat efficiency of the Knight suits and the collapse rate of the Arasaka defense system. Everything was within calculation; there were no surprises.
Just then, a Servo-skull emitted a soft notification tone, projecting a communication request—from the Militech senior liaison officer in Night City.
"Speak," Joric opened the channel.
"Lord Sage," the liaison's voice carried the relief of a completed mission, along with a trace of imperceptible awe. "Per your instructions, during the search and rescue operation to clear the wreckage of the Arasaka fleet, we secured a 'special harvest.'
"Identity verification confirms it is Yorinobu Arasaka himself. He sustained some injuries, but his vital signs are stable. He has been delivered to the peripheral reception area of your laboratory."
Joric's processor instantly retrieved all known data regarding Yorinobu Arasaka.
In past records, this nominal heir to the Arasaka Empire had always played the role of a rebel and insurgent.
A man dedicated to destroying the empire built by his own family. In Joric's view, his internal drive and thought patterns held more research value than those of simple power seekers.
"Bring him to the Observation Room," Joric issued the command, then temporarily moved the monitoring of the Tokyo battlefield to run in the background.
The Observation Room was located on the edge of the laboratory complex. The style was minimalist; the walls were smooth metal composite materials. Aside from an alloy chair fixed to the floor in the center and a monitoring probe in the corner of the ceiling, the room was empty. The faint smell of disinfectant permeated the air.
Yorinobu Arasaka was brought in on a hovering stretcher by two Militech soldiers.
He looked quite bedraggled, wearing standard patient garb. Multiple burns and suture marks were visible on his exposed skin; one arm was in a cast, and his face bore abrasions from explosions.
But his eyes were unusually clear, even carrying an indescribable sense of... relief.
The soldiers carefully placed him on the alloy chair, then retreated silently. The heavy airlock door slid shut soundlessly.
The light in the observation room remained constant. A subtle ripple appeared in the air, and a beam of ghostly blue light lit up from nowhere, rapidly condensing into a holographic image of an Eastern youth with black hair and black eyes.
His face was calm, his posture upright, dressed in simple dark clothing. Without any superfluous gestures or expressions, he simply stood quietly a few meters in front of Yorinobu, his gaze focused on this heavily injured "prisoner."
Yorinobu raised his head, looking at this sudden projection. There was no fear on his face; instead, the corners of his mouth pulled into a smile mixing pain and mockery.
"Heh... looks like my 'great' father, and everything he cherished, has finally reached the end." His voice was somewhat hoarse, but the tone carried a sense of pleasure. "You did it, right? that 'magic' that made the fleet self-destruct, and... the commotion over in Tokyo."
Joric's synthesized voice rang out steadily. He did not answer, but asked instead, "You do not seem angry about Arasaka's destruction, Yorinobu."
"Angry? No, why should I be angry?" Yorinobu looked as if he had heard a joke, though he coughed twice from pulling at his wounds. "I dreamed of this day!
"Dreaming that this blood-sucking empire, this monster that alienates people into tools and drags the world into the abyss, would thoroughly collapse! I only regret..."
His eyes dimmed for an instant. "Regret that the fire destroying it wasn't lit by my own hands. And regret... that only the Arasaka family fell."
His gaze went past Joric, seemingly penetrating the walls to look into the distance. "Militech, Kang Tao, Biotechnica, Petrochem... they still stand, just changing methods to continue the same exploitation. This deformed system has not changed."
"So, your goal is to destroy all mega-corporations," Joric stated. The focus of his optical lenses adjusted slightly, capturing the minutest muscle tremors and physiological signals on Yorinobu's face. "To this end, you lurked within Arasaka for decades, even going so far as to trigger large-scale conflicts, attempting to drag other companies into the vortex of war to perish together."
"It's the fastest, and the most thorough method!" A trace of fanaticism flashed in Yorinobu's eyes. "Only by letting them tear at each other and burn out together in the fires of war can the foundation be cleared for a new order!
"Otherwise, just toppling one Arasaka... soon another 'Arasaka' will be reborn from the ruins!"
"Then, what is the new order?" Joric's question was direct and cold, cutting to the core like a scalpel. "In the future world without corporations you envision, how is the power structure built? How are resources allocated? How does society run? Who creates and maintains the new rules?
"Or perhaps, you only plan to destroy everything, and then expect some spontaneous, ideal 'goodness' to grow naturally on its own?"
The string of questions caused the excited look on Yorinobu's face to freeze.
He opened his mouth, seeming to want to say something, but the words stuck in his throat.
He frowned tight, falling into a brief silence, a trace of imperceptible confusion flashing in his eyes.
"I... I haven't thought that far." It was a long time before he answered in a low voice, his tone no longer as certain as before. "Just thinking about how to pry loose this behemoth Arasaka, how to find its weakness, how to ignite that war sufficient to sweep away everything... has already exhausted all my energy.
"For fifty years, every moment I was thinking about how to 'topple,' how to 'destroy'... as for what comes after..."
He shook his head, revealing a trace of bitterness. "That needs to be left for those who come after to build. I believe that as long as this shackle is broken, humanity can always find a better way out."
Joric's projection stood still. Deep in his black eyes, a ripple extremely hard to detect seemed to pass through.
He stared at Yorinobu. Fragments of certain memories were triggered.
Those "idealistic revolutionaries" who had emerged in the river of history—they embraced the fervor to change the world, yet often due to a lack of sufficient ideological depth and foresight beyond the present, failed to transform that blazing ideal into a clear, feasible blueprint. Ultimately, they appeared powerless before the complexity of reality.
Yorinobu's expression and posture at this moment faintly overlapped with certain characteristics of those figures in his memory.
His gaze seemed to fall on Yorinobu, yet also seemed to pierce through him, scrutinizing those "idealistic revolutionaries" across time and space.
A brief silence permeated the observation room. Finally, based on these cross-dimensional observations and memory comparisons, Joric reached a judgment.
(End of Chapter)