The operation went more smoothly than expected.
Asa agreed to V's proposal to tie up the loose ends.
Earlier, he had already used magic to probe the mole's memory; what the mole knew about the defected netrunner was pitifully little.
The mole only knew such a person existed, but didn't know her whereabouts, and even her appearance was only a vague description.
Black hair, oval face.
This clue was completely useless.
However, one of the clues caught Asa attention.
Not long ago, this netrunner had a conflict with the Wraiths in the Badlands.
She dealt with two pursuers, leaving a mess behind, and then vanished without a trace.
According to existing intelligence calculations, she was likely still hiding in some corner of the Badlands, just outside Night City.
As for the Wraiths, they were the most dangerous violent gang in the Badlands, even more chaotic and crazed than the Wraiths.
If the Wraiths were a group of mobsters, then the Wraiths were a gang of psychopaths and outlaws.
They dared to do anything, regardless of good or bad or profit, only caring about the moment; moreover, they had no leader to communicate with, fighting individually, making communication impossible.
Clumped together they're a pile of shit, scattered they're like stars across the sky.
Whether it was the Wraiths, Nomad families, or ordinary passers-by crossing the Badlands alone, all would become their targets.
Lucy's luck was bad, having provoked this group, but fortunately, Asa had not heard any news of Lucy meeting with misfortune.
Back to the topic, the remaining value of this mole had been squeezed dry; leaving him alive was naturally meaningless, better for him to die early and reduce the burden.
A moment later, V returned to the rooftop.
Everyone began to organize their gear, casting their gazes toward the gradually approaching Militech agents, checking the weapons in their hands one last time.
In terms of weaponry alone, Arasaka's R&D investment was by no means comparable to Militech's.
The Arasaka smart rifle in V's hand was proof, capable of automatically locking onto targets, combining high precision with range.
A smart pistol, the Yukimura.
Her arm was clearly installed with some melee Cyberware, a metallic luster faintly showing beneath her sleeve.
Mantis Blades?
The mercenaries' equipment could also be called sophisticated.
Maine held a DB-2 Satara shotgun; his arms had undergone deep modification, and Gorilla Arms Cyberware allowed him to easily handle the Satara's recoil. According to him, he was also equipped with a projectile launcher.
Dorio was also equipped with Gorilla Arms, but her role leaned more towards long-range firepower, holding an Arasaka Masamune kinetic assault rifle.
As for Sasha, she was a hacker.
To everyone's surprise, Asa, being a Wizard, also revealed his own piece—a rugged-looking revolver. Its coarse industrial style instantly attracted everyone's attention.
Asa casually spun the gun and introduced it:
"Comrades Hammer, got it in Atlanta."
"Wi... Wizards use guns too?"
Jackie scratched his head; the Witcher novels didn't have this setting.
Asa pushed the black-rimmed glasses on the bridge of his nose, his tone matter-of-fact:
"As a learned Wizard, mastering some modern combat techniques is also quite reasonable."
The gazes of those present involuntarily fell on his lenses. For some reason, when Asa wore those glasses, any ridiculous words coming out of his mouth seemed exceptionally convincing.
He seemed like a knowledgeable person, rather than the type who just wanted to stir up trouble at every turn.
...
On the other side, the closer Gabri got to the abandoned power station, the more a faint unease grew in his heart, intensifying with the distance.
It wasn't some sixth sense perceiving danger in advance, but rather he suddenly felt he had been too reckless.
Bringing everyone into an ambush point just like that—who knew if it was a fishing trap deliberately set by Arasaka?
I must have lost my mind; I need to find someone to scout the way first.
Gabri's gaze scanned the team, finally landing on an agent with a slightly silent expression—the very guy who had taken it upon himself to look for trouble with civilians.
Although Gabri didn't care about killing an ordinary person, Night City was, after all, one of the territories the NUSA longed to reclaim. Once such an action was exposed, it would only seriously damage the company's public image.
How could this make him love America?
"You, go take a look ahead."
Gabri ordered coldly.
The agent said nothing, nodded, and walked straight toward the abandoned power station. A moment later, he returned and shook his head:
"There's nothing inside."
Gabri's hanging heart finally settled down.
On the rooftop, Asa couldn't help but sigh: Of all people to pick, he just had to choose the only mole in the team.
It seems you were destined to face this calamity.
"Team leader, the power station is just ahead."
As they approached the abandoned power station, an agent whispered.
Hearing this, Gabri was suddenly stunned. This sentence, he seemed to have heard or seen it somewhere before.
However, before he could think further, a dark muzzle appeared out of thin air above the abandoned power station, like a rift between two worlds had suddenly torn open. The gun barrel poked out from the rift—only the front half, with the back half eerily hidden in the air.
"What the hell is that? A texture bug?"
Thermal imaging, ultrasonic, and optical scans were all activated simultaneously—the rooftop was empty.
Gabri instinctively performed a tactical dodge and scan, but within seven meters, the gun was both accurate and fast.
Before he could make any reaction, the explosive sound of gunfire suddenly rang out.
Gabri's head was smashed like a ripe watermelon by a heavy hammer, blood and bone fragments splattering everywhere.
His remaining consciousness flashed one last time in the darkness, and he finally remembered that familiar sentence.
"Marshal, Huanggutun is just ahead."
So it was this sentence.
Caught off guard, the leader of the Militech intelligence team thus perished.
Before the remaining agents could recover from the chaos of the broken chain of command, even more intense firepower poured down.
Reality never follows the game setting where a health bar hits zero before falling; one blast of buckshot and a person becomes a sieve. Even if the agents relied on gear and armor to withstand the first wave, but...
EMP grenades, cutting rays, and incendiary bombs were thrown down from the rooftop one after another, pinning the entire squad firmly behind cover, leaving them no chance to even lift their heads.
Since the agents had abandoned their vehicles to approach the power station on foot, the flat plains of the Badlands offered nowhere to hide.
Occasionally someone poked out a muzzle to return fire, but they couldn't hit any target. The bullets went in, but no one was there—where did they hit?
This must be Arasaka's latest camouflage equipment, damn it!
Asa wasn't idle either.
The Comrades Hammer in his hand had long since switched to armor-piercing mode. Each shot could only take one round, but every time the gun fired, it accurately took the life of an enemy.
The team had no more than a dozen people in total, and more than half were picked off by him alone.
The remaining people marveled at his marksmanship, unable to help but look sideways.
Especially Maine. At this moment, only regret remained in his heart—regret that he hadn't directly stopped Sasha back then.
When Sasha recounted the events, Maine thought she had been fooled by some charlatan, that it was just a matter of information asymmetry.
It wasn't until he saw Asa wave his hand to set up that invisible barrier with his own eyes that he realized Sasha had been too conservative in her description.
A natural person over two hundred years old, with a body still so robust, and a genuine Wizard to boot, reportedly from another world.
What kind of waves would such an existence stir up in a world built by the powerful and the ambitious?
Even worse, this mission had dragged them into the shadow war between Militech and Arasaka.
When he realized the situation, Maine's vision went dark; the future really looked like a bleak Monday morning.
But at this point, backing out halfway would only offend everyone completely; he could only bite the bullet and accompany Asa to finish this ambush.
A moment later, the Militech agents were completely wiped out.
Asa glanced at the system prompt.
Ten agents, one hundred experience points gained. He stretched and said in a light tone:
"Next is the pleasant battlefield cleanup time."
Before the battle started, the few of them had already discussed the distribution plan.
V wasn't very interested in the gear and Cyberware on the Militech agents; all she wanted was for this group of people to disappear completely.
In Night City, disappearing is itself equivalent to death; no one would look into it deeply.
It fits the saying: status unknown means dead.
Weaponry, ammunition, and the cash on them would be split equally among Maine, Dorio, and Jackie.
To avoid tracking, these agents didn't carry Militech standard-issue weapons while on the mission; only the bulletproof vests and internal Cyberware bore the Militech logo.
Therefore, recovering the weapons wouldn't leave any trail; Maine and the others could use them with peace of mind.
Finally, there were the corpses.
Asa five fingers spread slightly, and he gave a light lift.
Under everyone's varied gazes, the corpses scattered about seemed to be pulled by invisible threads, slowly rising from the ground and gathering in an empty space.
With another wave of his hand, all the corpses vanished at once, leaving only a patch of bloodstains.
"Brother, that move of yours is amazing."
Jackie gave a thumb up, his tone full of sincere admiration.
Could a Witcher's magic do that too?
Maine and Dorio exchanged a look, their legs feeling a bit weak. Knowing so many secrets, could they still stay out of it?
Great master, we're just a group of mercenaries living on the edge, we just want to make money, not get involved in the ambitions of the powerful.
Suddenly, why does getting married and having kids seem like a good idea?
Sasha and V's gazes were different.
In Sasha's eyes was a longing for that kind of effortless composure Asa showed.
V's gaze was more direct—pure envy.
Moving over a dozen corpses in one go—doesn't that mean this magic could easily pick up an armored vehicle?
How awesome would it be to use this skill for work?
Cleanup finished, Asa clapped his hands.
"Work's done. V, time to go back and claim your credit. As for you guys,"
He looked at Maine and Sasha,
"The hiring fee will arrive tonight."
"Also, Sasha, if you want revenge, you know what to do."
The second half was said in the private chat channel; Asa made a '6' gesture by his ear.
Sasha chewed her bubblegum, her bob-cut head tilting slightly. In the private chat channel, the cat avatar shook once.
Cat_nodding.jpg.
"I only hope not to get mixed up in your operations again,"
Maine's words were heartfelt. If it weren't for Sasha, they probably would have started a firefight when they met.
As for now, uh, he hoped the other party would be merciful and stop coaxing the hacker girl.
For Asa to give up was, of course, impossible.
Sasha hadn't dropped any 'gold coins' for him yet; the days ahead were still long.
Asa turned around. The night wind blew from the Badlands' wilderness. Over a dozen Militech agents had vanished, Arasaka's Counter-Intelligence department had lost a thorn, and V's path to promotion and a raise had officially begun.
Everything was developing for the better; except for the dozen dead Militech agents, no one else suffered any loss.
Oh, right.
And that brat who liked to go find his parents.
There are no health bars in reality.
The few of them said their goodbyes one by one. Asa didn't stay long either; after everyone left, he used a teleportation spell to return to the Divination Shop.
...
(In the game timeline, the Aldecaldos came to Night City in 2076. Here the setting is slightly changed: the Aldecaldos migrated to Night City for the first time, then left, and only when they migrated to Night City again did they find themselves stranded.)
In the Badlands, on this saline-alkali land polluted by radiation and toxic chemicals, water sources were dried up and rocks were everywhere, making even farming impossible. But besides the Wraiths and the Wraiths, there were still ordinary people living here.
The Aldecaldos, one of the many Nomad families in the Badlands.
Its main personnel were veterans left homeless after the Central American War—that was over seventy years ago, during the First Central American War.
Developing to the present day, the Aldecaldos have become one of the largest Nomad families in the United States.
On the Badlands of Night City, it was a small branch of the Aldecaldos, led by Saul.
The wind and sand of the Badlands couldn't mask the sounds of gunfire and explosions from the exchange; such intense sounds of fighting could carry far across the open wilderness.
At night, Panam Palmer woke up startled from a dream.
The tent flap was thrown open, and Panam poked her head out. Looking closely, quite a few people had also appeared from the other tents.
Everyone had been woken up by the gunfire.
For people who made a living on the wilderness year-round, even faint gunfire was enough to make them instantly alert.
A person walked down from the top of the slope; it was Mitch with binoculars.
"Gunfire five kilometers away, not looking for us. Everyone disperse!"
He motioned for people to go back. Seeing Panam, he gave a greeting:
"Panam, go back and rest first. We'll go take a look tomorrow."
Nomad families had their own survival wisdom; going over at this time would only result in running into one of the fighting parties. It would be safer to wait until dawn.
They might even scavenge some junk that others didn't want.
Nomads and scavengers were often synonymous.
"Got it, Mitch. You just keep your watch."
Panam replied, her gaze looking toward the distant lights of Night City.
The glow of holographic projections was clearly visible even in the Badlands far from the city.
Wandering across the American continent, this was the first time Panam had seen this city rumored to hold freedom and dreams, Night City.
Panam scoffed at this. Freedom and dreams? For a Nomad, being able to shit anywhere is called freedom, and having a full stomach is called a dream.
The neon lights are fine, but it's not my home.
But...
The environment of the Badlands was becoming increasingly unsuitable for Nomads to live in; they could only speed up their migration across the land.
In two months, the family would set out on another wandering journey in a different direction; the road would be even more dangerous.
Maybe... go to Night City to find some work?
Her tight, faded jeans outlined the curves of her hips as the dark-skinned girl gazed at the distant Night City.
Modded versions of Panam, Judy, and Mercedes, for appreciation only.