[Connors: When the density of these lizard-mixed cells reaches a certain level, the user will begin to transform toward becoming one of the Lizard People.]
[Connors: We can keep this density very low, so the cells will instead transform toward becoming human, and eventually die off after a long time.]
[Connors: On a broader scale, this happens when the cyberware's power is about four times its own strength, though the effect is very slight.]
[Connors: If the strength is kept at 1.3 to 1.7 times the norm, the user will only need maintenance once every 30 years to keep the cells functioning normally.]
[Connors: Without maintenance, there won't be any mutation either. The cells will simply deteriorate and die off faster, regressing to First-Generation Cyberware with only basic functions within a year.]
The maintenance in question meant visiting the International Gene Cooperation Corporation and using Lizard Serum to restore the cells and increase their activity.
From a business standpoint, this limitation was even better than Lier had imagined!
[Michael: Once the energy problem is solved, the next issue is structural strength. Our cyberware strategy forgoes strengthening bone cells in order to achieve greater muscle output and biochemical safety.
What Michael had brought up was exactly the challenge of transitioning from Second-Generation Cyberware to Third-Generation Cyberware:
Although artificial muscles had replaced the power system, the structural system still contained a great deal of outdated metal.
Technological progress in the Marvel Universe was slow because the Ethics Committee was holding it back, but the Cyberpunk World had no such restrictions.
In other words, they were only one successful experiment away from nearly catching up, industrially, with the technology gap separating them from the megacorporations in the major markets.
As he spoke, Doctor Otto showed Lier a forearm designed using Octopus Arms material--