Takemura had never seen such a fast blade in his life!
Meanwhile, Vâs mind was filled with the image of Takemura holding Lilleâs headâ
"You bastard!"
Takemura Goro, Arasaka Groupâs most formidable, most loyal ninja.
Combining the old-school ninjaâs rich combat experience and ideology with new-school ninjaâs robust Arasaka technology in him was seamless, paired with his fanaticism, he was nearly invincibleâ
As powerful as the Arasaka Group itself.
The Si Anweisitan in his body, custom full-body prosthetics, and mono-molecular forged Samurai Sword moved instantly to meet V:
Carrying the expectations of San Lang, how could he lose!
And V, an unknown street kid, had no so-called secret training, no powerful corporate backing, only the battle experience and instincts gained from life and death encounters and weapons and gear custom-made for her by another equally unknown young guy...
As well as the feelings she had long been unable, and didnât know why she couldnât expressâ
Sometimes she herself felt they were like other legends in Night City now lying in graves, maybe one day theyâd be overwhelmed.
But she always felt she would be the first to step ahead.
"Die!"
Both partiesâ blades traced three trajectories each, one hidden in shadow, cutting through light, with a cold gleam hidden within its edge;
The other two, shining brightly, almost cutting through the darkness!
The defeated oneâs blade will break!
Ping!
In the darkness, a few fragments flew out, Takemura was delighted: because those fragments glowed with bright orange-red light, extremely dazzling!
Arasaka Groupâs blades, the best in the world!
The blades briefly bounced off each other and charged towards the opponent againâ
But what Takemura didnât notice was that his own cold blade also suffered some fragmentation, only those fragments were overshadowed by Vâs blade light in the darkness.
The Samurai Sword latched onto the center line, parrying a Mantis Blade, Takemura dodged another Mantis Blade with a very peculiar diving angle...
However, it was just that small nick on the Samurai Sword, in this engagement calculated in seconds, that caused a slight tactile change at the moment when the blades met.
Screechâ
Two blades made punishing sounds in the darkness, intense heat slipping over the blade at a speed beyond Takemuraâs imagination, ultimately resulting in his dive being slightly off.
The Mantis Blade, continuing to fragment in contact, scraped his neck with terrifying high temperatures, while the Samurai Sword, at a very tricky angle, pierced into Vâs defense area, straight into her shoulder!
Both parties drew blood!
The misjudgmentâs resulting surprise stunned Takemura, and in that moment of surprise, he released Lilleâs head and was forced back a step, allowing Lilleâs head to fall into Vâs hands!
"Iâm still alive!"
Lilleâs voice came from the head, it was a bizarre electronic vibrating sound, barely recognizable as speech.
However, V quickly reacted, her mood stabilizing as if on a rollercoaster, warily watching Takemuraâ
This Arasaka ninja, after stepping back, blended into the shadows, V kept her eyes on him but could barely tell when he completely vanished!
"No way, Lille, youâre still alive?!"
"Enough blabbering, quickly plug me into that robotâoh, and connect your personal link to my head first!"
"Plug into you? You donât have a socket here..."
"Stop with the bullshit! The back of the neck, just tear open the seam on the synthetic skin!"
"Alright... tearing open the seam...!"
The Samurai Sword attacked from the darkness, V barely avoided this attack!
She jumped back holding Lilleâs head but was still slashed on the arm by the Samurai Swordâ
But just as Takemura was about to continue attacking, Riddleâs voice interrupted the duel:
"Quite a spectacle, Arasaka Agent... I knew it."
This black man looked rather disheveled, his clothes clearly blown up and burned, and slashed multiple times, examining the wounds on his face, you could even see the cheekbone from the cuts.
He held two guns in his hands, his prosthetic eye shimmering with a faint light.
Obviously, he had a way to roughly discern Takemuraâs position.
And at this distance, being aimed at by a New American Agent with a gun, even V and Takemura couldnât avoid the bullets, at most just ensuring their heads wouldnât be blown off in one shot.
V silently connected her personal link to Lilleâs head.
[Lille: You didnât take him out?]
[V: This old black guy fights like a fox, he said there are still people of theirs here, of course I had to rush over and save you, this weakling!]
Lille glanced at the scene: a classic pincer maneuver.
Riddle only had one chance to shoot, but it could threaten two people.
Yet in this three-person performance, there was still someone lying on the ground...
Connecting to Vâs brain, Lille began using the energy of her prosthetics to give his own head a "brainstorm".
With ordinary communication signals, Vâs wireless cyber decoder signal was weak, almost certain to be interfered with by the chaotic radio waves here.
So...
Lille looked at the grounded and confused Lark, beginning to "grind" his Qilusi Eye with visual nerves.
The Qilusi Eye was advanced, not only equipped with ultra-precise circuitry that perfectly simulated visual nerves but also had a very complex chip system for imaging.
Theoretically, these chip systems are not meant to be moved, a move could easily blind them, or cause irreversible damage to the user.
But Lille didnât care about that: he could overload the circuitry in the prosthetic eye.
The circuitry was overloaded, generating controllable thermal energy, which gathered via adjusted chips into directed thermal energyâ
The transmission range wasnât long, just enough to pass it into the eyes of the downed Lark.
Slight biological changes would be overlooked by humans, but an AI would pay attention to every detail, especially these details transmitting information.
The thermal change communicated information through simple incremental and decremental changes, and the method of encoding the information...
Was simple Morse code.
The schizophrenic Lark and the AI in her were one: what she knew, AI Lark knew, but vice versa as well.
[You help me, I help you.]
This message was decoded by the AI Lark.
The brilliance of this message lied here:
If seen by Lark, he would associate it with what Lille said before, that is, Lille could help him, and very convincingly so: this is a man suspected of controlling an AI.
If seen by the AI Lark, it would think:
Shit, weâre fellow wandering AIs, with similar predicaments!
The AIâs first rule: satisfy survival needs.
New America just wanted to control it, this fellow kindred is also suffering the same plight: too many want to control it, surrounded by Black Wall signals.
So a completely rational and objective entity would certainly make the same choice at this moment: collaborate!
Thus, before Lark made a decision, the AI Lark had already helped her make one:
Her axed prosthetics conveniently malfunctioned, the circuitry overloaded, ejecting the jointsâ
She moved just a bit, enough for the overloaded part to brush against the Hellhound.
Current surged into the robot designated for AI carriage, seizing control as naturally as breathingâ
As long as no more powerful AI contested it.
Intense electric current poured out from Larkâs shredded body, almost burning her alive!
"Ughhhhhââ!"
The Hellhound suddenly surged, sweeping across, a space considered spacious for humans was cramped in the presence of this massive robot!
Two enormous engineering legs completely covered Riddle and Takemuraâs evasive space, smashing them hard into the wall!