Gearbound: Cyberpunk 2077-Chapter 175

Ken flew like a kite with its string cut, crashing heavily to the ground before rolling several meters until she finally slammed into a wall and stopped. She tried to brace herself against the floor, wanting to stand, but coughed up a spray of blood mixed with shredded bits of her organs. If she'd never received any cyberware implants, that single punch would have killed her outright. As it was, she could barely stand, her combat ability all but gone.

Even more terrifying was the fact that her enemy had reduced her to this state with just one punch.

"W-wait... please, wait..." Ken pleaded, choking the words out. She dragged herself upright and raised both hands, placing them behind her head. It was a calculated gesture of surrender. If a woman—especially a stunning one, dressed only in a black tank top—lifted her arms behind her head, it both emphasized her figure and carried a deeply suggestive undertone.

That was when she finally got a clear look at the figure who had attacked her. His entire body was encased in a sleek, silver-white exoskeleton armor. Dim red lights glowed faintly through the seams, radiating a cold and overpowering sense of force.

"What kind of cyberware is this...?" Ken mumbled, thinking of the "Big Three" (Kang Tao, Arasaka, and Militech) who made powered armor. She'd never seen anything like this and assumed it had to be some new type of full-body cybernetic shell. Such a design—armor that enveloped the entire human form—was beyond her experience.

Still, she was a merc, used to dancing on the edge of life and death. She forced herself to calm down and manage a shaky smile. "I don't know who you are or what you want, but how about this: I pretend I never saw you, and you let me walk away... okay?"

She flashed a friendly grin, but beneath her tongue, a hidden gun barrel emerged. A piercing round fired straight at the armored figure. Without checking if it landed, Ken flipped her arms forward from behind her head, tossing several grenades with the pins already pulled.

The intruder sidestepped and crossed both arms, shielding himself as the explosions boomed one after another. Thick smoke billowed through the room. Yet almost instantly, a silhouette rushed out of the swirling dust. It closed in with terrifying speed, grabbing Ken by the throat and hoisting her off the ground.

Her face twisted with rage. She pulled a combat knife from her belt, swinging it at the intruder's visor in a desperate final strike—until a crisp crack echoed, and Ken's expression dimmed. Her arm fell limp, blade tumbling from her grasp.

...

A few minutes later, several Tyger Claws rushed into the room. They froze at the sight of Ken sprawled out and unmoving on the floor. Alarmed, they hurried over to check on her. The moment they turned Ken's body, a sharp click rang out—like a trap trigger being released.

Boom!

A deafening explosion blasted from beneath her corpse, shooting flame and debris out the windows of the worship hall. Outside in the courtyard, the armored man never even glanced back. Wielding a pair of kinetic guns he'd picked up off fallen enemies, he unleashed relentless bursts of fire. Any Tyger Claw who came into view was shredded on the spot.

He advanced from the worship hall to the courtyard, mowing down dozens of gang members. The survivors cowered in buildings, too terrified to show themselves. By now, they'd surely called for backup. Rather than waste time on those last petrified few, he ran to a nearby bike shed and pulled out a Kusanagi CT-3X. Mounting it, he sped away from the shrine.

Only after he left did the surviving Tyger Claws creep out from their hiding places. They gazed at the smoldering devastation—what remained of their Shinto shrine base—and stared at one another in terrified silence.

...

A column of Kusanagi CT-3Xs and two red muscle cars adorned with Tyger Claw emblems drove along the only route from Japantown to the shrine. They were the first wave of reinforcements from the nearest Tyger Claw stronghold. They had no real idea what had happened at the shrine, just that it was under attack and had suffered heavy casualties. As for the attacker, the Tyger Claws at the shrine barely knew, either—only that there had been explosions, fire, smoke, and gunshots everywhere. It was almost certainly a gang fight, maybe the start of an all-out gang war. Possibly Maelstrom, or someone disguised as Maelstrom.

"Wait, there's a bike up ahead!"

They saw a lone rider headed straight for them—a silver-armored figure on a Kusanagi CT-3X. That matched the description from the panicked shrine reports. freёnovelkiss.com

Before the Tyger Claw leader could issue an order to open fire, the rider raised both arms. From the elbows of the armor, two launch tubes extended. Whoosh, whoosh—two anti-armor micro-missiles streaked into the muscle car's hood and exploded in a searing fireball. The blast wave hit the rest of the riders, sending bikes careening in all directions.

The silver figure swapped to a kinetic SMG, finishing off any Tyger Claws still moving on the ground. When the last one was dead, he swerved the bike sharply, vaulted over the roadside guardrail, and vanished down the slope into the dark.

...

By the next day, news of another Tyger Claw hideout being assaulted grabbed headlines across the city. A few months earlier, they'd been ambushed at the Phoenix Casino in Kabuki, where one of their key members, Jotaro Shobo, had been killed. This time, no top officer had died, but the body count was even higher: about a hundred corpses littered the Shinto shrine, plus thirty more who had died en route.

Rumors spread fast, with a dozen different conspiracy theories:

Some said it signaled a full-blown gang war—Maelstrom might soon invade Tyger Claw territory. Others suspected Militech interference. Everyone knew Arasaka used the Tyger Claws as its hidden hand, so weakening the gang was as good as weakening Arasaka. And maybe Militech's allies in the 6th Street gang wanted Tyger Claw turf.

A wilder rumor suggested it had nothing to do with gang warfare or Militech. It claimed everything was the work of a lone merc hired by a fixer, targeting someone hiding in the shrine, with the rest of the Tyger Claws just casualties in the crossfire. Ten out of ten people scoffed at such a notion: "Why slaughter so many just for that one target? Have you been drinking?"

...

At her pachinko parlor in Japantown, Wakako Okada listened to the gossip. "Maelstrom, Militech... all nonsense," she muttered, then let out a long sigh. She had many sons, but it seemed none had inherited her cunning.

"But, Mother..." came a confused voice from the phone.

"Some things can't be explained if you lack the wits. Go tell your brothers to calm down, keep their subordinates in line. Tyger Claw's biggest threat doesn't come from outside; it's lurking inside. If they can avoid causing internal chaos, they'll be fortunate."

After hanging up, Wakako removed her glasses and set them on the table, leaning back in her chair with a weary look.