[ Name: Lucy Takemura ]
[ Age: 14 ]
[ Place of Origin: Warsaw, Poland ]
[ Family Background Check: Father Takeshi Takemura (highlighted in red) is the Head of Security for Arasaka's Warsaw branch. Mother Shim (highlighted in red) is a core member of the former Polish hacker organization 'Squad 404'.
This employee was voluntarily sent to a juvenile hacker training facility for special training by her father. Due to her father's self-declared assessment to the company that she is 'unstable,' 'rebellious,' and 'does not conform to the Arasaka spirit,' she requires close observation. ]
[ Ability Assessment:
Juvenile Hacker Training Facility Score: 92 points (Excellent).
Arasaka Spirit Score: 51 (Recommendation for loyalty re-education within the facility).
Psychological Stress Resistance: 72 (Mediocre)
Comprehensive Evaluation: Exceptionally talented, but due to her personality flaws and instability of stance, she lacks the potential to undertake important responsibilities. ]
[ Training Facility's Assessment of Her Post-Graduation Placement: Meets the hacker requirements for certain high-risk projects. ]
[ Assigned to the Vancouver experimental base in July 2070 to execute the Stardust Project. ]
Mercer checked the highlighted data.
[ Takeshi Takemura: An excellent employee during the Fourth Corporate War, he outstandingly completed cleanup operations in local Polish sweeps and consistently suppressed opposition forces, demonstrating high loyalty to the company and proving trustworthy.
Specific action records are classified as Level 2 encrypted files and are forbidden from viewing without proper authorization. ]
[ Shim: This individual never joined Arasaka. Investigations indicate she fits the image of a housewife loyal to her family. She is categorized as a special record talent, involving the keyword 'Squad 404', with no information recorded in this server. ]
Mercer closed the file, deleted it, and then looked at his own file.
It was no different from his memory: mediocre evaluation, cold personality, and an orphan background, sold directly to Arasaka by his adoptive parents for fifty thousand euros.
He spent half a second thinking, then two seconds reviewing all the Little Hacker and key employee files. Mercer noted down the important information and then deleted all the data that needed to be deleted.
After confirming the server's programmed settings one last time, he quickly scanned the situation with the camera. However, he then discovered a scene that made him frown.
Sakata Yu, who had once chosen to betray them, was currently frantically knocking on the door of another Little Hacker on the basement level.
Mercer quietly watched him through the camera for a moment. After unlocking the door of the Little Hacker who had been holed up on the basement level, he simply chose to disconnect from the server and exit the Deep Dive.
Then, when he returned to reality, a sudden urge to vomit came over him as soon as he opened his eyes.
Damn it… he felt dizzy, his head throbbing, just as uncomfortable as when he had first transmigrated back.
Moreover, it wasn't just physical discomfort; he also felt a very stifling sense of emptiness mentally.
That feeling of being omnipotent when connected to the server quickly receded. He was like a god who was suddenly omnipotent, then suddenly lost all his divine power and became a mortal.
This huge disparity between his thoughts and physical sensations made his whole body feel weak.
Staggering up like a drunk man, Mercer gasped for breath and walked out unsteadily.
A robot was waiting for him at the door, holding the Kenshin Pistol specially made by Director Tano.
Mercer took the pistol, cocked it, then let the robot help him into the elevator. Leaning against the edge of the elevator, he pondered for a moment, then pressed the basement level button, all while gasping for breath and trying to recover.
Deep Dive truly is dangerous… ordinary hackers are fine; even when connected to the server in Cyberspace, they can't do much, basically only pushing their brains to their limits.
But Mercer, he was sure he had just performed far beyond his normal capabilities.
That performance definitely exceeded the current upper limit of his brain's capacity—damn it, he felt like his brain had definitely fried a bit more.
He could even smell a slight burning odor coming from his brain-computer interface.
The bio-monitoring self-check program sent him diagnostic data, which proved that after entering the server, he quickly entered a state equivalent to brain-computer overclocking.
Fortunately, excellent server-grade cooling helped him; otherwise, he probably wouldn't have lasted. Honestly, there aren't many hackers who can push themselves to this state.
Most hackers only experience this when passively receiving too much data, but he was purely manipulating too much data too intensely, pushing his brain too hard.
And in that cold yet strangely euphoric state in Cyberspace, he wouldn't have considered such minor injuries worth noting. In fact, he could still walk, still think, it was just… uncomfortable.
The elevator quickly reached the basement level. When the elevator doors opened, what appeared before him was Sakata Yu, who had nervously drawn his monomolecular wire and was staring intently at him.
"You… what exactly did you do! Why are all the rooms locked? Where are Lucy and the others? You're trying to escape… aren't you! You're trying to escape!?"
Sakata Yu's hand trembled, and finally, he cried out in a high-pitched, tearful voice: "Why didn't you take me with you… If you were sure you could escape… why didn't you tell me beforehand!"
"And wait for you to betray me? Save it, kid, please move. I'm not here for you.
Security is gone now. If you want to run, just run.
Arasaka's people will definitely be chasing us primarily. Wherever you run, you might survive."
Mercer said weakly. Sakata Yu saw that Mercer even needed a weaponless robot to support him, unable to even hold the gun steadily… This made Sakata Yu's breathing suddenly become heavy.
In just a brief blink of an eye, Sakata Yu had already made a decision in his heart. Escape? And then wait for Arasaka's pursuit? No, he wanted to climb to the top of Arasaka, no matter the cost!
As long as he could catch Mercer, he would definitely—he tried to swing the monomolecular wire in his hand violently, but the monomolecular wire felt heavy as a thousand pounds.
He suddenly widened his eyes, and the red alerts in his cybernetic eye almost drowned out his entire vision.
"No… no!"
He only stammered out two sounds, like gasps of surprise or screams of agony, and then stiffened and collapsed to the ground.
By the time Mercer passed by his kneeling body, his brain was already ablaze, like a human torch kneeling on the ground.
"I gave you a chance, more than once, kid."
Mercer's voice made him let out a desperate shriek in his final moments.
Mercer, however, simply walked to the room of the last Little Hacker, the young girl who was still inside.
He clearly remembered her name from his memory, and he also recalled her resume from the files he had scavenged from the server.
"Liyi, do you want to leave? Let's go together."
After a brief silence in the room, the child's voice sounded.
"Where can we go?" Her voice trembled in the room.
"No matter where we go, as long as we keep moving forward, we are heading towards freedom," Mercer's voice was gentle.
"Does freedom still exist in this world?" Liyi's voice carried a faint sob.
"Freedom isn't in this world, but in your heart, child." Mercer's tone grew even softer: "Come on, the outside world is vast, and everyone can find their own place."
"...Freedom."
Liyi's voice inexplicably calmed down. Then, a gasp was heard from inside the room: "Mercer, thank you… truly, thank you."
And then, there was a sudden, faint, fragmented sound of a monomolecular wire being drawn out from inside.
Mercer frowned slightly, instinctively placing his hand on the doorknob. He had already unlocked the door in the server.
In fact, he could have opened it with just a little force, but after hesitating for a moment, he chose to wait quietly.
A few seconds later, the door opened, and on a fair, small hand lay a tiny wind chime.
"Send it into the winds of freedom. This was Shadow Bear's dream… As for my dream, my freedom…"
Mercer took the wind chime from her hand.
Then, there was a sound of something cutting inside the room, followed by the thud of a heavy object falling to the ground. Something hit the door, accompanied by a gurgling sound like water, and the girl's indistinct murmur, accompanied by a gasping sound.
"I finally… feel… free."
Her faint voice was finally drowned out by the seemingly endless, annoying ventilation fan in the room.
"May your soul rest in peace."
Mercer clutched the wind chime in his hand, then turned and left. The robot helped him into the elevator, and he simply pressed the first-floor button with a calm expression.
In this desperate world, the right to choose how to die is also an expression of one's freedom.
Perhaps he could have saved her, perhaps he could have guided her, but would that not also be depriving her of the freedom to choose?
To encourage her to overcome all these difficulties, to endure all this torment, how was that not interfering with someone else's life with his own ideas, a self-satisfying act of benevolence?
Mercer felt as if he had thought for a long time in that instant, and for the first time, he felt lost as to whether what he had done was right or wrong.
But when the elevator reached the first floor, Mercer immediately stepped out and sent a program to make the robots that were originally in Director Tano's and Secretary Inoue's rooms return to their original positions.
Then he had all the security equipment in Director Tano's room automatically execute an electromagnetic short-circuit program.
He wanted to create the illusion that Secretary Inoue had dealt with the robot security, killed Director Tano, and then escaped.
Once again, he heard the concerned greetings from the Little Hackers. He simply sent a group reply saying he was on his way, then immediately headed towards the cargo workshop where the aerocar was parked.
However, the bodies he saw along the way once again made him feel a little nauseous.
Especially that burnt smell… for a while, he probably wouldn't be able to eat grilled meat.
In Cyberspace, seeing these corpses was as irrelevant to him as NPCs in a game; killing was just like tapping on a keyboard.
But back in reality, looking at the bodies on the ground, a certain sense of guilt and horror uncontrollably surfaced in his heart.
He laughed self-deprecatingly. Earlier, seeing Xing Zi and Lucy's pale faces, he thought it was a bit exaggerated, but when it was his turn… honestly, he was almost throwing up.
What kind of ruthless people were those decisive protagonists in novels? He considered himself to be someone with extremely strong adaptability, very thick-skinned, and a free-spirited personality.
But now he realized that he probably still had a long way to go before fully adapting to the cyberpunk world.
Regarding life and death, justice, and the path he needed to take… he actually needed a period of calm to properly digest, reflect, and then find answers.
However, for now, he still had to endure all of this and try his best to stand up for these kids. A big brother had to act like a big brother.
"Mercer… Mercer!?"
Lucy, who had been standing by the aerocar in the distance, holding a Kenshin Pistol with both hands in a vigilant stance, saw Mercer's swaying figure approaching from afar.
Her expression immediately became tense, and she ran over without even thinking.
Daichi Tetsuya held back Leon and Xing Zi, who also intended to go over, giving them a look that said, 'Be sensible,' but his gaze towards Mercer was equally worried.
Lucy instinctively supported Mercer, looking at his pale face: "Are you alright?"
"My brain's a bit scrambled… get me a Relic Chip. I haven't told you yet, but I've already managed to crack the program inside.
I'll flash your systems later. After that, this chip can stay plugged in. It can actively initiate neural repair, and it can also passively activate after the host's death to save their life."
Mercer smiled, not refusing her actions. With her help, he walked a bit faster.
Honestly, she was quite small, but her strength wasn't bad at all.
"Don't talk about it, we can flash systems later, you rest first…"
Lucy finished speaking, but Mercer shook his head.
"No, I still have to drive. It's fine, I'm just a little uncomfortable, but not so much that I'm an invalid. I'll be refreshed after a couple of days."
Mercer said, refusing Lucy's suggestion for him to rest in the back. He took the chip that the quick-witted Xing Zi had immediately opened the box for and handed to him after hearing him speak.
He then directly inserted the chip into his head, quickly clearing the Soulkiller inside using the program given by Alt.
Afterward, he activated the chip's built-in neural repair function, opened the aerocar's cockpit door, and crawled inside, inserting his personal connection into the car's system.
Only then did he let out a long breath, leaning back in the seat, watching as the entire car passed authentication.
"Hurry back and sit down, we're about to depart. Remember to watch our guest carefully; don't let him wake up halfway. He needs to sleep all the way to the final destination."
Lucy pressed her lips together, looking at him, but ultimately nodded firmly and returned to the passenger cabin.
After closing the door, she also conveniently kicked Secretary Inoue, who was lying unconscious on the ground and somewhat in the way, a little further.
Then, the sound of the aerocar's engine starting up filled the air.
Due to the aerocar's design, passengers in the cabin could only see each other, two by two. The cockpit was concealed by metal, so they could only hear Mercer's voice from the in-car audio.
"Don't look so glum… This is the taste of freedom that so many people dream of! Get ready, buckle up! We're departing now!"
"Departing for Night City!"
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