Chapter 226 - 208: Little Head, Big Question Mark

Extortion is a skill.

The second-in-command, having a circle of unclear confidants, whispers the first-in-command’s rumors, finds more money than expected in the bag, and can’t help but wonder.

But the sergeant can’t do it himself, otherwise, he wouldn’t have had to throw the cannon over—though the knife is a bit difficult to borrow.

Lille had experienced it personally, easily collaborating with the gang’s second-in-command to set up a mafia-style purge.

Although it’s not very honorable to dig up the past and set him up with the company...

But honor is a concern for the living.

When money can solve the problem, who would gamble on it?

"But there’s still something I don’t understand."

"Go on."

V rubbed his head, filled with question marks after hearing how Lille made the money.

"Why didn’t he realize it at first?"

"He must have used a mobile to take the call. It’s hard to spot an issue with your ears through a mobile."

"Then why did he use a mobile?"

Lille looked at V helplessly: large eyes filled with confusion and even a slight tilt of the head, with a kind of intense beauty.

Infinite signals are sent out, then received by devices, modulated, and converted into electrical signals, which in turn are converted into text, audio, and pictures.

In the Cyber Era, this signal-receiving and modulating process itself is a hackable channel.

Of course, this requires high technical skills from a hacker, but those who manage to become a gang leader—who would always consider themselves safe?

The cheapest means of protection is to have a phone ready. Hack it if you must—it’s just a crappy phone.

So even by 2076, mobile phones still haven’t become obsolete.

In the Cyber Era, those who dare to answer calls from unknown sources usually don’t end well—

V is one of those who never uses a mobile.

Forget mobiles, she looks like the type who would dare to pick up and wear a Super Dream headband found on the street.

"...Little V, you’re different from others, don’t waste your time on these useless techniques."

Having said that, Lille prepared the stimulant for Tina and gave her an injection.

After hearing Lille’s words, V proudly lifted her head: "Indeed, how can fiddling with gadgets compare to well-honed combat skills?"

After speaking, she swung her fists in the air, making a whooshing sound, and Jack took interest as well. The two traded blows next to each other, exchanging experiences.

The pharmaceutical flowed through Tina’s arteries to her heart, then limbs, and finally her head.

She opened her eyes—

Due to a visual disparity, she saw two fierce-looking people beating a corpse!

"Don’t scream!" Lille put up a finger to Tina’s lips, her bionic chin hanging by a thread, cracked open.

Lille reached out to fix her chin back in place.

"Are you in Biotechnology? Still employed?"

Tina nodded desperately: "Number 3 Biological Farm, Biomass Chemical Operation Specialist, employee number..."

"Stop, stop, stop, I don’t care about your company role. Are you from Saint Domingo?"

"Yes, I got my license just the year before last, please spare me, big brother, I’m just a nobody, you can take it all!"

What does taking it all mean?

Enjoying 12 hours of work by day, becoming a free slave at night.

This girl was indeed scared stupid.

"I’m not here to collect protection money—but you do need someone to protect you. Know the Old Captain?"

"Uh...sounds like a middleman?"

Lille moved closer to the computer: "Right, you talk to him yourself. What’s the access key?"

"DinaF_$322548+60."

[Authentication Passed]

[Welcome to Biotechnology Software.Ver2056.14.1]

[Subnet Connected Devices: Biomass Synthesizer, Petri Dish, Centrifugal Precipitator, Biochemical Analyzer...]

Equipment in the storeroom lit up—Tina was indeed talented.

This small workshop had everything you could want, with clone cell media against the walls. The cultured protein tissues moved along a conveyer into the next piece of processing equipment.

Centrifuges, chromatography columns, liquid chromatography, electrophoresis... and other purification devices separated proteins and tissue cells of different densities, delivering them in batches to the mixing area.

Then Tina would mix these raw materials with food additives, wheat flour, and other ingredients according to the optimal chicken meat flavor ratio, then carry out surface beautification and adjustments.

After synthesis, it moved to the vacuum-sealing machine.

The upper level of the room had an automatic track, hanging bags filled with fresh synthetic meat, sealed in vacuum packaging, awaiting distribution.

Although the process hinges on machinery, it also demands a solid knowledge base from the operator—

Firstly, this system uses a eukaryotic expression system to cultivate cells. Though the goal is chicken meat, there are no simple cell types in any creature.

Having selected proper host cells, you still need to construct the expression vector, transfect the host cells, and then comes the cultivation.

If anything goes wrong in cultivation, the synthesized protein might even carry lethal toxicity. After synthesis, protein purification is required to obtain the target protein.

Even if the protein was correctly synthesized, figuring out how to balance real meat with auxiliaries was also a technical matter...

Lille had copied a set of data into the biological laboratory—believing that Professor Connors would plunge into self-doubt again when he saw these data after getting up tomorrow morning.

"...Your techniques... they’re pretty good, do they teach these at the bio-farm?"

Lille was very emotionally stable, so when V and Jack were clearly just exchanging boxing and combat experience, Tina wasn’t so scared anymore.

She rubbed her hands together and said with embarrassment, "I have a good relationship with my supervisor. I learned it from him."

"Did you formulate the cell agents for cultivation yourself? There doesn’t seem to be any cutting equipment here?"

"That’s not the case. Sometimes the farm deals with some cell agents that aren’t quite up to standard—usually they’re problematic shipments that have been damaged or spoiled.

But the proteins I sell always go through strict verification to ensure there are no food safety issues!"

Tina patted her chest, looking somewhat proud.

She had the right to be proud; she had sold quite a lot of this meat and so far, no problems had been reported.

Moreover, Lille had checked Tina’s email: it seemed she had been providing synthetic meat to food stores in Saint Domingo at low prices.

These synthetic meats might not compare with big brand products, but their affordability was undeniable, and the local restaurants were quite happy with them.

Who would pass up meat to eat?

The business was gradually picking up. It was a win-win situation.

She’d even throw some of the less palatable off-cuts to the orphanage or street urchins. It seemed her act of accumulating good deeds got the Old Captain’s attention, and the Old Captain, in turn, could look after her a bit.

"So, you’re a conscientious businesswoman, where did you get these facilities from?"

Tina scratched her head: "All bought with loans, and it took pulling a lot of strings to get them. I still owe over two hundred thousand, but given the current situation, I reckon it’ll take another seven or eight years to almost clear it."

Seven or eight years...

People have different senses of time.

For mercenaries like Man, a year is a threshold, two and a half years another, there are obstacles everywhere—

But if you honestly work at a company, even though life might be harder, there wouldn’t be many changes in ten years.

Unless the company plans to wage war again, or some legend seeks enlightenment.

"I took the equipment information and technical specifications as commission, you handle the store matters on your own."

Lille gestured with his hand, and the trio got into the McGinnis and left—

Watching the retreating figure of the McGinnis, the Mizutani sports car, once a fallen dream’s idol, was smashed aside by the massive figure of the McGinnis drifiting.

"Damn, that McGinnis... really cool, huh."

The camera at the intersection flickered with red light, recording everything.

...

Cyberspace—

This was a virtual world composed of data.

A raven flew back from the area symbolizing Saint Domingo, traversing the complex Night City domains, returning to its master—

And it brought back a recording.

In the video, a McGinnis appeared, along with three people.

The raven’s master wore the most traditional human form but had a mask on; the mask displayed his identity:

[Network Surveillance]

[Raven#0236]

He watched the scene of the McGinnis drifting and shooting bullets, especially those smart bullets, over and over again.

[Smart Bullet Trajectory Analysis Completed]

[Miss Rate: 0%]

His eyebrows furrowed deeply.

He watched the entire process again and again, especially the scene where V and Jack started to fight...

His deeply furrowed eyebrows relaxed.

After watching, he began writing his report.

[.....]

[Summary Report: No signs of Cyberspace intrusion detected, Magic Doll cross-verification complete, program redundancy high but effective, logical consistency with humans high]

[.....]

[Target: King (V), VIP]

[Conclusion: Unlikely to be a Hacker]

[.....]

[Target: Burger King]

[Rogue AI Association Probability: Low]

[Note: There’s a high likelihood of being an individual with extreme cognitive potential.]

[Suggestion: Target has extensive combat experience, consider issuing tasks for further observation]

[Network access permit number uploaded.]