Cyberpunk: 2075

"Covered in blood again, huh?"

Wiping away the splattered blood on his face with the back of his hand, Karl sighed. "When will humans evolve to the point where getting shot in the head doesn't spray blood everywhere?"

"This..."

The middle-aged cop, who had stepped out from behind cover earlier to prevent Karl from getting himself killed, now stood about seven or eight meters away, dumbfounded. He could hardly believe what he had just witnessed.

The cyberpsycho that NCPD had no way of handling... had just been taken down by this young man?

And in a single exchange?!

The sheer shock of this reality was so overwhelming that when Karl finished wiping the blood off his face and looked over, the officer blurted out instinctively, "Are... are you okay?"

"Of course I'm fine."

Retracting his monowire and securing his Kenshin back at his waist, Karl glanced at the middle-aged cop before crouching down to start searching the cyberpsycho's pockets.

"What... what are you doing?"

Noticing Karl fiddling with something, the officer stepped closer, curiosity piqued.

"Searching for money. What else?"

Had this NCPD cop never looted a corpse before?

Skillfully going through the dead man's belongings, Karl was surprised to find that the cyberpsycho was dirt poor—not a single euro to his name.

"Hmm?"

Feeling something thin and rigid between his fingers, Karl pulled it out of the corpse's inner pocket—an encrypted chip.

A chip?

With a subtle motion, Karl deftly slipped the chip into his sleeve without making it obvious. Then, standing up, he turned toward the officer, pointing at the corpse as he asked,

"How much was his bounty? I remember seeing an NCPD warrant on him yesterday. I just took care of the problem, so let's settle this job."

"Uh..."

The middle-aged officer had noticed Karl's slight hand movement but didn't dwell on it. Instead, after signaling to the other NCPD officers to stand down—confirming that Karl wasn't a threat—he pulled up the bounty records.

"Patrick Bell. Bounty: 10,000 eurodollars, dead or alive."

"Only 10,000?"

Hearing Karl's dissatisfied tone, the officer now fully realized—this kid was definitely a merc.

Only a merc would be this fixated on money, completely unconcerned with anything else.

It was rare to encounter a merc who looked so young and approachable, and given that this kid had just saved his life in some way, the middle-aged officer actually took the time to explain:

"It's because his bounty was only recently issued, and this is just the first bounty notice since he went on the run. If we had waited a few more days, the reward probably would have gone up."

"And by how much?"

"Based on my past experience..."

The officer thought for a moment. A cyberpsycho equipped with a Dynalar Sandevistan Mk.1, Mantis Blades, and significant subdermal cyberware—if he had escaped again before MAX-TAC arrived and continued his rampage—

"It could've reached over 100,000 eurodollars, maybe more."

"That much?"

Karl glanced regretfully at the corpse lying on the ground. "Sounds like his value appreciated faster than the euro itself."

"Just the Dynalar Sandevistan Mk.1 alone costs 75,000 eurodollars when brand new, not to mention the Mantis Blades and the various cyberware implants that could be salvaged."

Hearing this, Karl refocused his gaze on the corpse. "So... would it be possible for me to..."

"The body has to be turned over to the NCPD," the officer said, cutting him off with a sigh. "This guy was an Arasaka security officer, and according to the contract he signed before his death, everything he owned—including his cyberware and personal funds—automatically reverts to Arasaka."

"A contract that extends even beyond death... That's some real corpo bullshit."

Karl wasn't surprised to hear that an Arasaka security officer was using cyberware from another company. The reason was simple—Arasaka didn't have its own Sandevistan models, at least not officially. Maybe they were developing them in secret, but for now, nothing had hit the market.

It was just another reminder that Sandevistan tech wasn't something ordinary people could afford. Most who used it had likely signed away their posthumous rights just like this cyberpsycho had.

"Well, looks like there's nothing left for me to do here."

Watching as more NCPD officers moved in, setting up holo-barriers around the scene, Karl turned back to the middle-aged officer. "What's your name? Let's exchange contact info."

"You want it for the bounty transfer, right? Don't worry, it'll be in your account by this afternoon at the latest."

The officer quickly sent Karl his account details along with a note. When Karl received the message, he saw the name attached to it.

"Johnson. Classic American name."

"Alright, I'll be on my way then, Mr. Johnson. If anything like this comes up again, feel free to contact me—I'm more than happy to help the NCPD deal with these situations... as long as the pay is right."

Karl had kept an eye on Johnson during the fight. He'd noticed the officer had tried to rush in and help him, whether out of duty or conscience. Either way, Karl remembered the gesture, and so he gave him a rare sign of respect—adding "Mister" to his name.

"Hah. It's been a long time since someone called me that with any respect."

It wasn't something you heard often on the streets of Night City.

As Karl waved goodbye and walked off, Johnson watched his retreating figure and, for the first time in a long while, smiled.

"Maybe this city still has a few things worth believing in."

"Sergeant Johnson, we need your signature on the incident report."

"Right, I'm on it."

Ten minutes later, at Arasaka Corporation's Special Task Force Division—

"So... Patrick is dead?"

A man reviewed the report on Patrick's demise.

But after skimming through it, he tossed it aside, uninterested.

"I was hoping that, since you and I both came from the Tyger Claws, you'd have been a useful subordinate. Looks like I overestimated you."

The man leaned back in his chair, letting the disappointment fade as he accessed another file in his neural database.

"So, the next batch of volunteers for our experimental in-house Sandevistan project..."