LGHTNOVELBOOK Chapter 23 - Standoff
Chapter 23 – Standoff
Mikel Drummond.
The second-in-command of Sweet Dream was extremely anxious right now.
Really, really anxious.
His thigh was trembling, he was biting his nails, and he kept glancing out the window whenever he got the chance.
“Hey, hey. Step on it. More.”
All he could do was urge his subordinate, who was already speeding.
And it was all because he was a traitor.
He had always planned to betray them at some point, but he hadn’t expected it to be today.
“Hoo—”
Mikel took a shaky breath and looked at his own hands.
The veins on the back of his hand stood out, his grip was tight enough for anyone to see, and in his grasp was a small case.
It was an ordinary case.
Of course, that was to be expected.
He had just grabbed whatever was available in a hurry.
But the item inside was a different story.
Carefully lifting the lid, Mikel’s eyes landed on a crimson ring that shimmered with an ominous glow.
He had stumbled upon it by chance.
Like always, he had kidnapped a lone homeless man, dosed him with narcotic-grade sleeping drugs, and lulled him into a sweet slumber.
Then, after slicing open his belly and gleefully extracting his organs,
he had burned the empty husk and was just about to toss the reeking clothes into the fire when—
This had fallen out.
It was far too strange to be just an ordinary trinket, with those bizarre engravings and its eerie glow.
Mikel instinctively knew that this thing was worth money.
So, he secretly accessed the dark web.
(There was a small mistake in the process.)
After scanning the ring in secret and listing its data for sale—
Wait a minute.
How many zeros is that?
Ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, million, ten million, billion?Five billion?
The number offered by the buyer, who appeared in less than a minute, made his eyes roll back into his head.
When he came to his senses, he found himself negotiating the meeting place.
Being the second-in-command of a lowly gang meant nothing to him.
He had planned to go away without regret when the time came.
And today was that day.
His decision had already been made long ago.
Now, it was time to act.
Calling upon nine subordinates who were especially loyal to him, he grabbed the stolen item and set off for the meeting point.
The problem came after that.
Now that he had done it, fear crept up his spine.
Even if it was a lowly gang, the boss was the real deal.
What if that lunatic was already on his tail?
The image of his boss taking an interest in the ring when he first found it kept flashing through his mind.
His palms grew sweaty as his nerves got the best of him, and just as he was about to yell at the driver again—
“Step on—!”
Screeeeech!
Crash!
An unbearable screeching sound, followed by something shattering, pierced his ears.
Mikel’s heart plummeted to his feet, and his face went deathly pale as he whipped his head around.
“…!”
Time seemed to slow.
Through the right-side window of the backseat where he was sitting, he saw one of his subordinates soaring through the air.
Then, as soon as he hit the pavement, his body was instantly reduced to a crumpled mess.
Mikel let out a scream.
“Shit! Is Henri already—?!”
As he uttered the name of the boss he had betrayed, the driver spoke in a trembling voice.
“H-hyungnim! It’s not the boss!”
“…What?”
“It’s not the boss!”
Mikel immediately pressed his face against the window.
And there, just beginning to mix into the chaos with his men—
A khaki-colored motorcycle and the rider atop it came into view.
His brow furrowed deeply as he shouted.
“Who the hell is that?!”
***
A sea of flashing neon signs.
Through its center, an eight-lane boulevard stretched wide as wheeled beasts tore through the night.
VROOOOOM!
The roar of an engine tore through the air, causing pedestrians to flinch or scowl as they turned their heads.
But by then, the beasts had already vanished into the distance, barely visible.
Someone clicked their tongue and spat onto the ground, muttering under their breath.
“Hope they all drop dead.”
And they had no idea how close that wish was to coming true.
***
Clang!
Sparks flew.
Jin blocked a blade aimed at his throat with the barrel of his Gravis.
Taking advantage of his opponent’s momentary loss of balance, he kicked the enemy’s bike away.
The motion, executed below the knee, lacked full force, but Jin’s superhuman strength made up for it.
The vehicle wobbled violently before losing traction altogether and crashing into a streetlight, shattering into pieces.
The rider, of course, didn’t fare any better.
His neck snapped instantly on impact—dead on the spot.
Jin confirmed the kill in his side mirror just as he prepared to accelerate and chase after the van ahead.
Shwish!
A blade sliced through the air toward him.
Two, in fact.
Jin instinctively twisted the handlebars.
He barely managed to control his swerving bike and glanced toward the source of the attack.
There, a gang member wielded twin swords with mechanical arms connected to their shoulder blades.
One hand on the handlebars—his natural one.
The other gripping twin blades—an aftermarket addition.
A true cyberpunk-style brute.
“What an ungrateful bastard.”
Jin scowled.
His opponent was already closing in, stabbing wildly with both blades.
“Die, you bastard!!”
A reckless flurry of attacks, as if hoping at least one would land.
And unfortunately, it did.
Jin wasn’t used to blocking with one hand, and his thigh was slashed deeply.
Pain flared, hot and spreading like ink in water.
He clenched his teeth.
Here he was, struggling to juggle driving, attacking, and defending—meanwhile, this bastard had it easy.
The sheer unfairness of it all pissed him off.
Without hesitation, Jin holstered his Gravis, dodged an incoming strike with a sharp tilt of his head—
—then grabbed hold of the mechanical arm.
“You… You bastard! Let go!”
The gang member’s panicked yell.
Jin’s response?
“You’re coming with me.”
VROOOOOM!!
His Manticore engine roared.
The bike surged forward like a bullet.
The sudden acceleration caught the gang member off guard.
“Wha— H-Hey! AAAAAAHHH!”
His body lifted off the ground, helpless in Jin’s grip—before gravity reclaimed him.
A scream echoed as he slammed into the pavement.
Jin paid it no mind and kept going.
When the screams finally faded, he glanced at his hand.
Only a severed mechanical arm remained, ripped clean from the gang member’s shoulder.
Sparks crackled along thick, severed wires, eerily resembling exposed veins.
Jin, however, felt nothing about it.
To him, it was just a convenient blunt weapon.
And so, he swung it with all his might at the surrounding gang members closing in.
***
Mikel watched the entire spectacle unfold.
“Shit! What the hell is that bastard?! Why is he still chasing us?!”
His eyes stayed locked on the rear window as he shook the driver’s headrest furiously.
“Step on it! Go faster, goddamn it!!”
The driver, already sweating from barely keeping the van steady on the chaotic road, bit his tongue to hold back a retort.
But he couldn’t deny reality.
He had eyes.
And those eyes saw his comrades dying one by one.
His voice trembled.
“B-Boss! Are you sure about this? Should we really keep heading to the meetup point?”
“What?”
“This… This is already fucked! Shouldn’t we lose that bastard and hide somewhere?”
Mikel blinked, momentarily speechless.
Then he roared.
“You dumbass! You wanna ditch the plan after all this?!”
Unthinkable.
5 billion.
That was more than enough to start over.
Of course, I wasn’t talking about rehabilitation.
I meant setting up my own gang in another district in the 40s.
Without that lunatic, Henri.
“We’re almost there. Just a little more, and we’ll reach the meeting point. Once we get there, we finish the deal cleanly and hit the highway. Doesn’t matter if it’s District 46 or 45—we just get the hell out, got it?!”
“…Yes, understood.”
“Let’s not screw this up, alright?”
Mikel finally saw his subordinate nod and gave him a light slap on the cheek before turning around.
Luckily, their pursuer was nowhere in sight.
The problem was that the rest of his men had vanished along with them.
“…Was he working solo? Damn it. How did word get out?”
Could it have been that one slip-up on the dark web?
It had taken less than ten seconds to activate the privacy tool…
Things were just going south.
In those few seconds, it looked like he’d been caught by a top-tier hacker.
Gritting his lower lip, Mikel glanced out the window as they entered a tunnel.
Almost there.
Once they got out of this tunnel, they’d be at the meeting spot.
He just had to make it there.
Somehow.
Mikel repeated that to himself, trying to calm his nerves.
Ding!
A holographic screen appeared before his eyes.
Someone was calling him through a video line.
[Henri]
Mikel swallowed instinctively when he saw the caller’s name.
But he hesitated for only a moment.
Then, in the most casual tone he could muster, he answered the call.
“Yes, boss.”
[Boss? Didn’t expect you to still call me that.]
“I don’t follow.”
[Drop the act. You’re dead. No, actually, since you’re dying anyway, might as well act shameless, huh?]
“What…?”
[I know everything, you bastard. You backstabbed me. One of the guys you left with spilled everything. What was that? A fresh start? Promising them executive positions? Idiot. Did you really think that’d work?]
“…”
[Knew you’d pull something sooner or later.]
“…Turn around.”
Mikel spoke toward the driver’s seat.
“Huh? What was that, boss?”
“I said turn the damn car around! We’re screwed!”
“But we’re still in the tunnel—shouldn’t we at least get—”
At that moment, they emerged from the tunnel.
[Anyway. Goodbye, traitor.]
As if waiting for that exact moment, a massive fireball came crashing into the van.
***
Damn.
Lost them.
Jin furrowed his brows.
The last four guys had fought like madmen, clinging onto Manticore in a desperate struggle.
In the process of shaking them off, he’d taken a wrong turn.
And because of that, he let the van slip away, even though it was practically in his grasp.
They always chase people down so easily in movies, but I can’t even do that?
Feeling a bit embarrassed, Jin scratched the back of his head.
Still, it wasn’t a complete loss.
They had a tracker.
Right, Khalifa?
Muttering to himself, knowing full well the intended listener wouldn’t hear him, Jin flicked the blood-soaked mechanical arm off his shoulder and picked up speed again.
No more obstacles in his way now.
Following the directions on his terminal, he weaved through lanes, closing in on the target.
After passing through a long tunnel, he finally reached the scene.
He slowed down, tracing a broad arc, and narrowed his eyes.
…What the hell is this?
A van lay on its back, engulfed in flames.
The fire roared so fiercely that the entire area was bathed in an orange glow.
Jin’s gaze swept past the corpse gripping the steering wheel, landing on a man sprawled on the ground.
“Hah…! Hah…!”
The man was clutching something tightly to his chest.
Jin didn’t even need to check to know—it was the artifact Khalifa mentioned.
Even so, he didn’t rush in.
Because of the strangers standing off against each other, with the fallen man in between.
One of them, a scarred man, broke the silence.
“It’s not for sale. This thing was mine to begin with. So back off while I’m still being nice.”
His masked opponent responded coolly.
“That’s unfortunate. I came here as a buyer. Are you planning to waste my time?”
Jin, sensing the odd tension, slowly removed his helmet and hooked it onto the bike’s handlebar.
Immediately, all three men turned their gazes toward him.
“…Who the hell are you?”
“…Who’s this guy?”
“…You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Caught off guard, Jin blurted out the first thing that came to mind.
“…I… am probably a thief?”
And so.
-A traitor.
-The one hunting the traitor.
-The buyer.
-And the guy who had no idea what was going on.
All stood there, staring at each other.