Shiranui Kiri kept an apartment in the bustling streets of Kabukichō, in the Old Capital District. Back in the day, this area was the heart of the city, and even now—despite Night City's new districts taking the spotlight—the inner rings remained vibrant and expensive. A flat the same size as Li Pan's place in the suburbs would cost at least forty thousand a month here, well out of reach for any average corporate wage slave.
But one had to admit, Skyline Apartments had that pure cyberpunk vibe—thousands of floors piercing the sky, with floating car parking decks every hundred floors. From the giant glass windows, one could look down on a sea of neon-lit communities, drones darting like raindrops, vehicles and pedestrians like ants. It carried that intoxicating sense of power—being high above the masses.
With Kiri's visitor pass and password, Li Pan swaggered into the building, took the private elevator straight to her unit, and found the hidden door she'd built into the second-floor bathroom. It was her armory and workshop. Costumes, props, firearms, ammunition, shinobi gear—lined up neatly. Several safes held piles of black-gold comm cards.
Unwashed blood money. Clearly the spoils from missions—assassinations, infiltrations, "forty-eight techniques"… as a veteran of the Onmyō Ninja Corps, she had taken countless lives. But laundering money was a slow, tedious process. Channels were constantly frozen by the Tax Bureau. It wasn't surprising she had a mountain of cards lying around, useless.
Just one of those safes held cards worth at least eight and a half million. Kiri simply tossed them out as ransom, no change needed. Still, Li Pan hesitated.
Was it really worth it? He couldn't launder it either. To move it, he'd have to dump it on Eighteen again—who would just gamble it all in the market.
Eighteen: "Boss! Trust me! It'll bounce back, I swear!"
Bounce back my ass. She still hadn't dared admit how much was left of that ten million. Who could trust her?
Li Pan mulled it over. But in the end—out in this line of work—your word was your lifeline. Start killing clients after payment, and no one would ever pay ransom again.
So he scooped up a survival pack stuffed with comm cards, grabbed some clothes, and headed down to the parking deck. In the shuttle, he broke Kiri free from the rubber seal, tossed her some clothes.
"Alright, you're free. But next time you fall into my hands…"
"Ohhh ohhh ohhh!"
The moment she was released, Kiri howled, naked, and bolted. Li Pan froze. He'd already let her go—why the hell was she running like that? Not even taking the clothes?
Then he understood.
Ahem. After being sealed for a day and night, well… nature called.
But dammit, this was a monitored parking deck! Could she not see the cleaning drones watching her? Anyone looking at this would think he was into some sick German über-dream kinks.
He decided not to humiliate her further with recordings. Eventually she slunk back from the corner, embarrassed, and he tossed her a spare nightgown.
"You—or your daughter, or your lovers, whoever—if anyone comes at me again, the ransom doubles. Twelve million."
In this world, killing and screwing were ephemeral. Money was the only thing that mattered. Li Pan now pinned his hopes on getting rich through ransoms.
Kiri, pulling the gown tight over herself, glared at him.
"Could you… could you give me back the Demon Eye of the Evil God?"
"That thing? Forget it. I need to turn in that sample to clear the mission. And the Hakone one? Off-limits—you're banned from Saitō Inn."
He tapped the vase, then eyed her body still stained with clinging filth, black sludge dripping from her thighs.
"Look at you. Still dreaming of worshipping an evil god and cultivating cursed arts? So the moment the Onmyō Corps disbanded, you went running for the Evil God's power? Been what, twenty years? And this is all you've got? Please. I took you down with two slaps. That 'Demon Eye' is worthless. You'd be better off with cybernetic implants.
Anyway, not my problem. But if I catch you again—it's twelve million. Cash."
Li Pan wasn't into grotesque fetishes. He turned his back, ready to file his report.
"Wait! If… if I pay you twelve million, will you give me the Eye?"
Hopeless.
"I'll think about it."
Back at the office, he counted. In actual value, the comm cards he'd seized came to about 8.5 million. But since it was unlaundered blood money from obscure borderworld currencies, it felt like a loss.
He dumped the lot on Eighteen to flip. She'd earned her cut this time anyway—helping connect with Gokurō Academy. Even though the mission had collapsed, he handed her a million for face. As for poor Yamazaki—ten grand for his climbing efforts. That'd have to do.
Then came the report.
Drawing on his dream, Li Pan wrote a full essay: background, procedures, samples. Hakone volcano, the elf clan, the Evil God's Demon Eye, the sealing jar—everything, clearly documented. He figured the job was perfect. Surely worth at least two Silver Keys as reward.
But the fax machine stalled. No response.
Strange. Mission shouldn't have complications. Then the phone rang.
"Hello?"
"Manager of 0791? This is the manager of 0113."
"Oh? What's up?"
"I read your report. Can you confirm you've captured Taisui?"
"Taisui?"
"The Flesh-Eye. The meat lingzhi. What you called the Evil God's Demon Eye. You have a sample, yet no lab report from your tech division? Our tech intranet has preserved data on Taisui. A simple comparison would confirm it."
"Oh. My tech division's dead."
"..."
A pause.
"0791, I want to request transfer of monster custody. Do you agree?"
So they wanted him to ship this Taisui over to 0113. Honestly, he'd be glad to get rid of it—disgusting, parasitic, stinking. Hakone's jar was just someone else's universe dumping toxic garbage anyway.
But… he'd already promised Saitō.
He hesitated. The voice pressed:
"I understand—it must've cost you dearly to capture this. I'm willing to personally compensate your losses. Name your price."
Ha. So it was valuable. But probably just another path to corruption like Kiri's. Whatever.
Li Pan smirked. "Alright. I'm short on cash. Thirty-five million."
"Done."
"…Wait—no dirty money!"
"Of course. Still, you're asking for three years' salary. Does that mean you spent three years of life catching this? For a rookie, that's impressive. I'll approve the deal."
What? So thirty-five million was… three years of lifespan? So that's how these guys measured it?
Truth be told, he'd only thrown two slaps and… well, most of his "output" had been waist-driven, sustained thrusting, so to speak.
0113 continued:
"I'll submit the request. Send me your sample for testing. Once tech confirms, you'll get your payment."
Li Pan winced. "Thirty-five million… the tax penalties would wreck me. I'll be ruined by fines."
0113, patient:
"There are many tax shields. First, we run it through corporate channels. You list the assets you need, and I purchase them for you under the company's name. Easiest.
Second, a private trust fund in an offshore bank. I invest the sum, and your broker handles disbursement. But you need absolute trust in your partner.
Third, I invest in a frontier-world native faction under your name. Five to ten million upfront, then at least a million a month. In return, you get a tax-exempt account outside Bureau oversight. Issue local crypto, flip supplies, launder black-gold forever. Until the war ends, of course—when the Security Bureau reclassifies the world, the loophole closes."
Li Pan whistled. The people he knew fumbled with laundering scraps. But a real corporate manager laid out three fully-fledged schemes at once.
This was professionalism.
"Decide yourself. Taisui exists in every world, though rare. I simply need it now. Mission orders have been sent. Agree, and just forward me the shipping number."
"Alright. I'll think on it."
After hanging up, Li Pan rushed online to look up Taisui, Flesh-Eye, Lingzhi.
Apparently a bizarre underground lifeform—fusion of mold, bacteria, fungus. Rare, origin unknown, almost impossible to study.
In 0791, there was nothing useful—too many mass extinctions had wiped the ecosystem. Without Hakone's preserve, this specimen would already be dead.
And yet… this disgusting lump could fetch thirty-five million.
Since negotiations with 0113 weren't finalized, Saitō Inn's "monster procurement" deal was still pending.
Checking the clock, Li Pan decided to leave Yamazaki's pickup to Ah Qi, and clocked out.
Thirty-five million was no joke. He had to make sure it turned into usable power. Step one: confirm Taisui's real value.
Which meant… finding someone who knew.
And who better than Kotaro, the Sealing Shinobi?
If Taisui—or the Evil God's Demon Eye—was the Onmyō Corps' designated seal target, if Kiri would pay twelve million for it, and if Principal Kōga had cut her off the instant she heard… then the Corps definitely held secret intel. Maybe even arts for channeling the demon's power.
Kotaro would know.
And, unlike Li Pan, he'd actually seen thirty-five million. He could tell if the deal was worth it.
So, armed with the address of Kinyō Academy, Li Pan grabbed a company scrying crystal, hopped the metro, and set off to "Rescue Kotaro 3."
(How the hell did such a trash franchise make it to a third sequel…?)
Kinyō Academy sat outside the city—a private enclave, built on a solar-sea island, ringed by tower-array power stations, shielded by colony-fortress domes. A natural reserve, a sanctuary.
Only heiresses studied there. Security was absolute—private police, dedicated transit lines, mercenary patrols in the wilderness, automated turrets scouring scavengers. From afar, the place looked like a carrier-class colony ship, green hills and lakes inside a bubble dome. A fairyland fortress.
Cyberpunk slums on one side. Industrial wastelands on another. And there, a utopia. The contrast was unreal.
Li Pan could only gawk from the perimeter.
Kotaro had managed to sneak into that fortress before vanishing. The boy wasn't entirely useless, then. But those girls—how the hell had they escaped such a fortress, only to throw themselves under a train…?
Too far for his scrying crystal. Eighteen flatly refused to hack the security net: "I can't, my lord."
He wasn't about to storm the place. Not when the solar-sea rails looked like satellite-mounted coilguns straight from a Titan-class engine test. For all he knew, the Academy was Takamagahara's fourth Titan prototype.
Maybe it was. New Tokyo had tried thirteen times already to reach Titan production. Takamagahara was one of the few corps capable of building them from scratch.
Still—even four Titans was nothing. Starhan at TSC could churn out four hundred if someone paid. And no one wanted an empire anymore. This was a business, not a crusade.
So Li Pan left. For now.
Because just then, everything changed.
Breaking news: Takamagahara Civil War.
Hashiba and Tokugawa forces clashing near Kiyosu.
Both sides limited the fight to keep the Security Bureau off their backs—no starships, no orbitals. Just ninjas, corporate PMCs, mercs.
And shockingly, despite outnumbering Tokugawa four-to-one, Hashiba lost.
Not just lost—were humiliated. The biggest disgrace in 0791's recent history.
The intel spread instantly. Night Corporation's media pushed it first, Eighteen scraping deep-web dossiers to confirm.
The story: after Kiyosu Conference, Hashiba swallowed Oda assets, recruited allies, cornered Tokugawa. Victory was only a matter of time. But instead of grinding them down, they gambled everything on a blitz. Special detachments to raid Tokugawa's bases. A decisive strike.
Tokugawa's Iga ninja sniffed it out. Ambushed the raiders, wiped them out, and evaded Hashiba's main force entirely. Surgical precision. Hashiba's entire elite division—gone. Tokugawa re-supplied, regrouped, and forced a stalemate.
Hashiba's advantage—shattered.
The war ground to a halt. A war of attrition now.
High Heaven (Takamagahara) had descended into a drawn-out civil war.
.
.
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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."
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