Starting from Night City

The gunshot from the "Cat Mat" tech sniper rifle finally echoed through the air.

Almost everyone in the room was shocked.

I say "almost" because the moment the Sixth Street Gang member was sent flying, Su Xiao and Jack suddenly sprung into action.

Su Xiao kicked the person behind him in the calf, forcing them to kneel.

Then he drove his knee upwards, smashing into their face.

While the man howled, clutching his face, Su Xiao pulled the pistol from his holster and sent him to his grave with two quick shots.

Meanwhile, Jack also made his move.

He elbowed another Sixth Street Gang member in the head, and while the man was dazed, he grabbed his head with both hands and twisted.

A crisp crack of bone breaking rang out.

Malmer reacted quickly.

He raised his gun, aiming at Su Xiao.

But before he could pull the trigger, V's support fire arrived first.

A spray of blood bloomed on his palm.

Blood, flesh, and shattered gun parts flew everywhere.

Su Xiao lunged like a leopard.

His Power Gauntlet slammed into Malmer's chest.

He was sent flying backward.

Malmer's chest bones were likely shattered.

But he was a veteran, implanted with military-grade cybernetics, making him far more durable than an ordinary person.

An ordinary person wouldn't survive a punch from the Power Gauntlet, yet he managed to get back up and attempt to resist.

Bang bang bang!

Su Xiao crossed his arms in front of him, lowering his head as he charged.

Bullets sparked against the Power Gauntlet.

Without his dominant hand, Malmer's aim was severely compromised.

Su Xiao stepped forward and kicked Malmer's pistol away.

Then, his Power Gauntlet grabbed Malmer's head and lifted him off the ground.

He slammed him against the wall, then forcefully pulled sideways.

A deep groove was gouged into the wall, filled with gruesome bloodstains.

Su Xiao released his grip.

Malmer's corpse slid down the wall to the ground, lifeless.

The Sixth Street Gang reinforcements stationed near the motel also heard the gunshots.

But they hadn't had time to act.

Suddenly, dense gunfire transformed into a torrent of metal, tearing through the walls and sweeping in from all directions.

The Sixth Street Gang was caught completely off guard.

When Su Xiao and Jack went to the motel earlier, they used their Tactical Goggles to scan the Sixth Street Gang's personnel deployment and shared the footage with the Priest's subordinates.

The Priest's subordinates had quietly ambushed the area.

As V provided cover fire for Su Xiao and Jack, they also launched their attack simultaneously.

When the Priest received the Tech Weapons from Su Xiao, he released most of them onto the market, keeping a small portion to upgrade his own subordinates.

They had all switched to Tech Weapons or Smart Weapons purchased at high prices from the major Corporations.

Tech Weapons could easily penetrate obstacles like walls.

While Smart Weapons couldn't penetrate walls, they had an automatic tracking function.

With the advantage of the scan footage provided by Su Xiao, countless bullets instantly overwhelmed the Sixth Street Gang's squad.

With careful planning against an unprepared enemy, the Sixth Street Gang suffered heavy casualties and descended into chaos.

Malmer had once said that the Sixth Street Gang was composed of retired veterans, disillusioned former NCPD officers, expelled corporate security, and civilians who had undergone rapid combat training.

In reality, the first three groups were small in number; the latter group formed the bulk of their forces.

Otherwise, the Sixth Street Gang would have already dominated Night City and wouldn't have struggled to take even the Entertainment District.

These civilians, who had only received combat training, were like the Minutemen during the American Revolutionary War.

They lasted only about a minute under the hail of bullets before their morale collapsed, leading to a complete rout.

Except for a very small number of lucky survivors, the rest were all killed.

Miraculously, none of the Priest's subordinates were killed; only a few were grazed by stray bullets.

It was an epic victory.

With the fighting outside over, Su Xiao and Jack also finished off Malmer's remaining men.

The two found Fidel, still alive, upstairs in the dingy hotel.

They provided emergency treatment.

Then Jack carried him out of the dingy hotel.

They rendezvoused with the Priest's subordinates and handed Fidel over to them.

After expressing their thanks, they left with Fidel.

Su Xiao, V, and Jack, meanwhile, headed to the Wolf Bar together.

To celebrate properly and relieve the day's exhaustion.

The next day, Su Xiao received the Priest's gratitude:

--He, V, and Jack each received twenty thousand Eurodollars.

It wasn't long after this battle ended.

The fleeing Sixth Street Gang spread the details of the entire battle.

At first, no one paid much attention.

Street fights were commonplace in Night City; why should anyone care?

Soon, they realized they were wrong.

Because this fight between the Sixth Street Gang and the Priest's subordinates was no ordinary one.

Of the eighty-odd members of the Sixth Street Gang, only a few escaped.

The rest were all accounted for.

And not a single one of the Priest's subordinates was lost.

According to an anonymous source, the Priest's subordinates had such formidable combat power because they had updated their weapons.

And all of this was thanks to a collaboration between the Priest and a gunsmith.

Within just a few days, this rumor spread like wildfire throughout Night City.

It made all the major gangs in the city envious.

They all began plotting to get their hands on the rumored gunsmith.

But soon, all these ideas were extinguished.

Because when the Priest returned the bodies of the Sixth Street Gang to them, a busybody recorded it as a Super-Memory and disseminated it.

Among them, the corpse of Malmer, a Sixth Street Gang executive, was horribly disfigured, his head looking like it had been ground into the dirt.

Even more terrifying was that this wasn't done by the Priest's subordinates.

It was done by the gunsmith.

The rumor was that the gunsmith hadn't even lost a single hair.

The major gangs that had been plotting immediately fell silent.

They were scared.

Of course, those Corp Dogs who had betrayed the Priest's subordinates also met a grim end.

One morning, a cleaner suddenly discovered that they had been stuffed into sacks and thrown into the trash.

By the time they were found, their bodies were already cold.

Chapter 44: Lucy

The next day.

Through the window of the speeding sky-rail train, one could see a torrential rain falling outside.

The world was a hazy gray.

On the roads below, both vehicle and pedestrian traffic had significantly decreased.

"It was the right choice to take the sky-rail."

When Su Xiao woke up that morning, he saw the sky looked ominous.

He didn't choose to drive himself to the Wolf Bar.

Instead, he took the sky-rail.

As soon as the sky-rail train started, a downpour began to fall.

Bringing a cleansing to Night City.

The Night City sky-rail train cars weren't many, only three cars.

People of all sorts of appearances were present, because compared to taxis, the sky-rail was much cheaper.

However, most of the people taking the sky-rail at this hour were Corp Dogs rushing to work.

Out of professional mercenary habit, he instinctively scanned his surroundings.

Just as he withdrew his gaze, he suddenly, by sheer coincidence, spotted an acquaintance on the sky-rail train.

Lucy stood behind a man in a suit who was holding the handrail and facing the window.

She naturally tucked her hair behind her ear.

And took the opportunity to grab the chip that popped out from behind the suit man's neck.

A successful strike.

Next, Lucy set her sights on another target.

It was a Corp Dog standing by the door of the car that was about to disembark.

He carried a briefcase in one hand and held his phone in the other.

It was unclear what was on his phone that had him so engrossed.

He didn't notice Lucy approaching from behind at all.

Lucy walked up beside him.

Pretending to look at the sky-rail route map on the smart display.

Then, as if by chance, she brushed past the Corp Dog.

Employing the same trick, she swiftly grabbed the chip that popped out.

Just like that, Lucy used the same method, stealing from the last car, the third car, all the way to the first car at the front.