บท 121: The Visit II
Autor: "Hey everyone, I messed up big time. I spilled some coffee on my computer, and it went straight for the graphics card. My computer's been acting up for days now, and I can't keep writing. So, the series is going on a break until I can scrape together enough cash for a new computer. It might be at least a month. At least I leave you the chapter I managed to write and translate. I hope you like It"
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"We need to get out NOW! That bastard wants to blow up the mountain and us with it!" exclaimed Sora urgently.
Unexpectedly, the Master started clapping. "Well done, Mercenary, I didn't see that coming," he added, locking eyes with Sora. "You've once again confirmed my suspicions from our encounter in the BD... But, as I mentioned before, knowing what's about to happen... is inconsequential. The outcome remains unchanged."
As if reinforcing the Master's words, the shouts and hums coming from the sole exit grew louder, forcing Morgan to retreat due to two towering "Empties," highly modified with corroded yellow Cyberware, almost resembling an old construction exoskeleton fused to their colossal bodies. These enormous foes pushed forward, blocking Morgan's smart grenades with two heavy shields made of multiple stacked metal plates.
When the two giant "Empties" reached the entrance, the room filled again with the seemingly mindless puppets of the Master, acting like true cybersycos, charging towards Sora and Morgan once more, like a wave of foes preventing their escape from the impending explosion.
Sora and Morgan exchanged glances for a moment, marking their targets before vanishing by activating their "Sandevista" simultaneously. Morgan reappeared amidst a group of normal "Empties" with two rifles on his back and, as if the Grim Reaper himself had possessed him, exclaimed, "Die!" At the same time, his arms became a blur as he drew his revolvers and fired at all the "Empties" within a 360-degree range.
On the other hand, Sora reappeared in front of one of the colossal "Empties." With one hand gripping the hilt of Getsuga and the other with a finger pulling the trigger of its sheath.
Causing "Bztzz" to vibrate before Getsuga shot out, bathed in sparks, performing a swift vertical draw cut that generated an unpleasant sound of metal scraping against metal when it struck the shield the towering "Empty" used to protect itself at the last moment, moving its arms so fast they became a blur.
Sora clicked his tongue in annoyance. When he felt the other towering "Empty" shield closing in rapidly from behind. He, with pure agility, used the shield in front of him, with a vertical cleft from the Getsuga cut, as a base to leap backward, passing over the incoming shield and the attacking Titanic Empty.
While in the air, with his head toward the ground and his eyes fixed on the titanic "Empty" that was attacking him, Sora transferred Getsuga to his left hand and drew his Silver Malorian with his cybernetic right hand. He unleashed a barrage of gunfire while soaring above it, essentially firing at point-blank range towards its face. The bullets forcefully struck the "Empty's" armor, sending metal sparks and fragments flying in all directions.
Sora, realizing that the armor welded to the exosuit could withstand even the impacts of his Malorian, as he passed over it, drove the blade of Getsuga between the joints of the giant's armor, using his katana as a point of leverage to cling to the back of his assailant and unload the rest of his Malorian's magazine into the back of the "Empty's" head.
The shots rang out with deafening power as the bullets pierced the armor and collided with the "Empty's" internal systems. Sparks and smoke rose from the back of its head, causing the cybernetic giant to stagger and kneel.
While Sora fired, he felt danger once more coming from his back. In the next instant, his body moved, jumping with agility from the back of the damaged master's juggernaut puppet, narrowly avoiding the new attack with the edge of the heavy shield from the second towering "Empty." The attack was ruthless, crushing its damaged counterpart in half and accelerating its impending destruction.
The remnants of the destroyed colossal "Empty," composed mostly of cables and metal rather than flesh and bone, scattered on the ground, staining the surface with a synthetic white blood-like hue. Sora landed gracefully, keeping his gaze fixed on the remaining towering "Empty." While, through his helmet's visor, he reviewed the scan he had performed of the armor and exoskeleton structure fused to the "Empty's" body.
Upon finishing, Sora sheathed his Silver Malorian, transferred Getsuga to his cybernetic right hand, and with his tattoo left hand, drew his Black Malorian, firing indiscriminately around the titanic "Empty" after sending his scan results to the small computer under the barrel.
The smart bullets whizzed past it without making contact. Once they had passed, they performed a deadly dance in the air as all the bullets spun, converging on the same weak point Sora had found in the old exoskeleton that was soldered to the "Empty" body's spine.
The impact of all the smart bullets hitting the same weak point was devastating. The titanic "Empty" seemed to scream in pain with a roar of sparks and metallic sounds as the exoskeleton column that bore most of its armor's weight was destroyed. Consequently, the weight of its own armor began to crush it. The room was filled with the sound of metal twisting and bones breaking as the "Empty" struggled to remain standing under the weight of its impending destruction, ending up as a shapeless mass of metal, flesh, cables, and synthetic blood.
Sora quickly communicated over the open line he had been using to talk with Morgan until now via his IDn, ["Morgan... I'm almost ready,"] he reported, keeping his voice calm despite the impending explosion. "[After you, kid]," replied Morgan, his tone calm too, trusting the "plan" Sora had shared.
Sora turned to the Master and said, after completing the preparations, having altered the configuration and structure of his cybernetic right arm while fighting, "Dude... You're not the only one buying time."
Following that, Sora rolled up the right sleeve of his leather jacket even further to his elbow, deploying a series of three expensive rectangular batteries perfectly aligned that extended from the end of his forearm. Each of these batteries, designed to store an astonishing amount of terawatts of energy, hummed with small electrical discharges escaping from them, almost seeming eager to unleash the thousands of volts they stored.
When the energy from one of the batteries coursed through his cybernetic arm, it lit up with an intense blue glow. then, Sora raised his brightly lit right arm like a weapon, aiming it at the room's ceiling. He focused the tremendous energy from one of his advanced batteries through the lenses lined up in nanometric order and filled with xenon gas inside his arm.
Upon opening his hand, a powerful blue flash was released from the last lens in the palm of his hand, illuminating the dim room. Upon striking the ceiling, it generated enough heat to melt it, preventing it from collapsing onto them
Sora's cutting-edge attack was so impressive that even Morgan, with over 100 years of experience, struggled to contain his astonishment. Despite having witnessed various types of laser weapons on satellites and other environments, he had never seen anything like that in a Cyberware. His eyes widened, showing a mix of surprise and envy as they watched Sora's amazing light show.
The Master, on the other hand, couldn't help but react to the power of Sora's attack. For the first time, his arrogant and calculating expression cracked, revealing a worried look in his eyes that reflected a mixture of amazement and doubt about his future plans. That was quickly corrected by a serious and determined resolve to put an end to the threat to his plans that was the Mercenary in front of him.
As the dancing blue flames of the laser beam dwindled, and the thunder of the walls ceased. Through the newly created exit with its edges glowing bright red, the nocturnal sky of Night City came into view.
Morgan without missing a beat, drew his Grapple gun and rapidly ascended toward the makeshift exit, dropping four grenades, half of what he had, into the room filled with "Empties." While Sora, using the Grapple integrated into his arm, copied him and released four silver spheres into the crowd of foes.
The Master, with his regained cold and calculating expression, illuminated his eyes, or at least Greyson's did. When he issued orders to the "Empties" in the room to take care of the dangerous grenades. At the same time, the lifeless column of cables in the center of the room came to life, covering Greyson's body from the outside and... from within.
The "Empties" in the room rushed towards the deadly grenades, and instead of throwing them, they embraced them. The rest of the nearby "Empties" piled around, intending to shield the imminent grenade explosion with their own bodies, following the orders they had received to prevent any harm to the servers beneath their feet, which were about to complete the transfer.
As Morgan made his way out, the eight grenades detonated with a strange, distant sound as if they were hundreds of meters away, filling the room with smoke and flying fragments from the remains of the "Empties" who had covered the explosion with their bodies.
As he ascended, Sora was forced to use Getsuga with his left hand to deflect the metal and bone fragments that were heading towards him. Focused on defending himself, before he could react, several cables of varying thickness rose from the smoke and coiled around his leg, exerting enough force to uncouple the tip of his Grapple and send him back into the room.
Morgan didn't hesitate to reenter; he couldn't leave his good friend's grandson, for whom he had developed a certain fondness, despite his reluctance. However, before he could do it, Sora's shout before vanishing into the smoke, "GET OUT OF HERE, I'LL MAKE MY OWN WAY OUT!" stopped him.
Still, Morgan had doubts about whether to follow Sora or not. These doubts vanished when he saw Sora's outstretched hand with a thumbs-up, which, at the last moment before disappearing into the smoke, closed, raising only the middle finger...
"Fuking punk!" Instantly infuriating Morgan.
-
Within the dense smoke, Sora managed to cut the cables entangled around his leg before falling, allowing him to somersault upon landing and dissipate the force of the fall. Hearing the Master's voice resonating from multiple places at once, warning him, "I'll deal with the old legend later, but you're too unpredictable to let you leave here alive."
The "Empties" that had survived the explosion emerged from the smoke, launching stealthy attacks. Sora maintained a defensive stance, gripping his sword with both hands, waiting until the last moment before being struck to react, moving as little as possible to execute a quick counterattack, neutralizing his attackers with an efficient Getsuga cut.
With visibility reduced by the smoke, Sora closed his eyes and focused on the echolocation of his Nanobots. Doing so, he headed directly towards the large tangle of cables that seemed to wrap around Greyson's body. As he advanced, the shapeless mass of cables took on a strange "human" form.
Sora was surprised to be able to see the details of Greyson's new body shape through his echolocation; Thousands of cables pierced his skin, grotesquely filling his new body, while on the outside, the cables clustered in a way similar to muscle fibers around his limbs and torso.
When Sora stood before the intimidating nearly 3-meter figure of the Master, he extended his arms, launching hundreds of cables with four pointed extensions at their tips toward him, forcing him to retreat and dodge.
Greyson's head, connected to hundreds of cables like "butcher's nails," was the only visible part of his body. As he attacked, the Master laughed, reminding Sora how they were about to explode together.
The Master's laughter infuriated Sora, who, with his left hand, grasped the Getsuga blade while the tattoos on his hand moved and ran it from tip to end, causing a change in his Katana's blade. The black parts of the blade remained dark but with a matte tone, unlike the white edge of Getsuga, which took on a bright metallic blue hue. This transformation was visible for just an instant before Sora sheathed Getsuga again.
Holding the hilt and sheath firmly on his hip with both hands, Sora separated his feet and slightly bent his knees, assuming a drawing stance, with Eco Pup firmly anchored on his shoulder. The sheath began to vibrate intensely, occasionally emitting small electric sparks that crackled in the air.
Seeing this, the Master intensified his attacks, increasing the number of cables launched at Sora from all possible directions. However, at the last moment before the cables could touch him, Sora vanished, reappearing with the same stance a few meters closer to the Master.
As Sora approached, the Master's attacks became more intense and ferocious, flooding the space with a growing number of cables, even emerging from the ground. It reached the point where there was no escape route for Sora.
Just when the Master thought he had trapped Sora without an escape, a gleaming black and blue flash proved him wrong. Only the 'clink' of Sora sheathing Getsuga could be heard before he became visible again, having severed all the cables in a 360-degree radius around him with a flickering flurry of Getsuga cuts, causing them to fall lifeless to the ground.
He vanished again right after, repeating this process of reappearing and cutting the cables blocking his path until he finally reached the monstrous Master. At that moment, Sora wasted no time and squeezed the trigger.
Embedded in his cybernetic right hand, Getsuga was shot, but this time, instead of sparks, the blade emerged from its sheath bathed in violent electric discharges generated from the new blue edge of the blade. Getsuga and Sora turned into a violent black and blue storm that cleared the clouds of smoke around them as they (Sora and Getsuga) cut through everything parallel to the ground.
Sora, not stopping there, activated the nanobots in his spine and back to their maximum potential. As he did, he entered a world that seemed frozen in time, with only him moving. Closing one of his eyes, he executed a vertical cut, the next one transversal, followed by another from the opposite side, and then... another one, and another one...
As the smoke cleared, Sora opened his eyes and saw how the multiple separate sections of the Master fused back into the tangle of cables that formed his grotesque body. The "human" figure vanished completely as the cables surged like a tidal wave towards Sora.
Determined to eliminate him, the Master ordered more of his "Empties" to enter the blast radius, ensuring that Sora would die with them.
Accumulating minor wounds on his limbs, and even with Eco biting a piece of one of the cables to assist as much as it could. Sora removed the section of one of them, inert, lodged in his thigh, after not being able to fully defend himself against the countless cables that attacked him point-blank.
As more "Empties" approached, Sora took a deep breath without moving. The Master felt uneasy about Sora's apparent calmness, considering he was just seconds away from death. When the "Empties" arrived and surrounded Sora, the shapeless mass of cables that had become the Master wasted no time ordering them to attack.
Sora, surrounded by "Empties" charging towards him, alongside the mass of cables that was the Master, smiled beneath his helmet as the interior of his arm lit up with an intense blue glow.
The Master continued his charge, confident of his victory despite the imminent powerful laser attack. Believing that even if Sora destroyed Greyson's body, the rest of the "Empties" would hold Sora enough before he completed the transfer and activated the explosive.
However, when he raised his shining black arm toward the Master, and the last lens in his palm illuminated, ready to fire, Sora closed his fist. Leaving four small openings between his black fingers, which divided his laser attack into five beams of blue light. These beams, like laser claws, rotated following Sora's body movement, executing a lethal 360-degree spin that sliced everything and everyone in the room into five pieces, with their sides burned so that they couldn't merge again.
The room fell into total silence, with only the sound of Sora's footsteps approaching the remains of the Master. When he arrived, he found Greyson's deformed body divided into five pieces, with the section of his head still conscious. Despite the surprise and the unexpected result, the Master maintained his confident expression, even smiling as he said, "Congratulations, Mercenary, I didn't expect that, but it's indiffe—"
The Master couldn't finish when Sora's incandescent black hand grabbed him by the face and lifted him off the ground while commanding him to "Shut up already!"
Greyson's face began to burn where it touched Sora's red-hot cybernetic hand, due to the heat he had to endure while splitting the laser into 5 beams. At the same time, fine black lines began to traverse Greyson's face from the black hand that was gripping him. When Sora was done, he casually threw the head to the ground as if it were garbage.
Rolling on the ground, maintaining his confident expression, without feeling the slightest pain as his face burned, the Master finally broke his arrogant deformed face when he noticed the change in his servers, leading him to scream, "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE MERCENARY!!"
"Heh, did you notice? Come on, go ahead, activate the explosives, and see if you have the guts to blow yourself up to kill me." Seeing doubt in Greyson's burned and lifeless face, Sora added, "That's what I thought," as he turned around and approached the exit on the roof.
Having transferred a small portion of Nanobots when he grabbed his head, to connect to the servers under his feet through the still intact "butcher's nails," Sora used the code of his Soulcode to immobilize the Master's consciousness within them, preventing him from escaping and triggering the explosives with himself still inside.
While watching defeated from the ground as Sora moved away, the Master, with a voice filled with resentment, spat his last cold and determined threat "I swear.... when I break free... I won't stop until I've killed you. Mercenary."
His threat was answered by Sora's raised middle finger, sending him to Hell without even looking at him as he used his Grapple-gun embedded in his right cybernetic arm to get out.
-
As soon as he emerged from the handmade hole, Sora was surprised when a voice greeted him. "About time, kid. I was starting to worry."
"Morgan!" replied Sora, taken aback to see Morgan sitting near the exit, waiting for him while smoking one of his cigars.
"No need to be surprised. I wouldn't be able to tell this story to your grandfather if I had left you alone," Morgan said, extending his middle finger back to Sora while asking, "How much time do we have?"
"Not much," Sora replied, with a serious tone, estimating the range of the imminent blast due to the amount of explosives buried in the garbage mountain's base and aware of how the Master's attempts to free himself were beginning to bear fruit.
"Well, then, lucky I found this beauty. Throw all the explosives you have inside," Morgan said, getting up and approaching an old, sturdy safe he had partially unearthed while waiting on the garbage mountain.
Suspecting what Morgan was planning with the safe when he requested all his explosives, Sora asked to confirm, "Morgan, are you serious?" reluctantly and with no other option, he tossed the three silver spherical grenades he had left into the safe, as Morgan threw three of his grenades as well while adjusting the timer on the fourth one.
"Just what you're imagining, kid! Ever put firecrackers in a metal pan when you were a kid and watched it go flying?" in the absence of Sora's response, Morgan added, "Tch, what a crappy childhood... We'll use the safe to get out of here, or at least out of the blast range," As he finished setting the timer on his last grenade, he released it with a confident gesture.
As the timer started its countdown, Sora and Morgan quickly moved to shift the heavy safe. They placed the opening with the door open against the mountain's ground, at a 45-degree angle so that the opposite end pointed away from the garbage mountain. Sweat ran down their foreheads as they used all the metal plates and beams they found to stack them on top of the safe, trying to concentrate the impending explosion in the opposite direction.
Once they were finished and at a safe distance, with their two Grapple Guns already attached to the safe, Sora, still connected to the nanobots within the "Butcher's Nails," could feel the Master finally freeing himself from his Soulcode at the moment the grenades... exploded.
The concentrated shockwave inside the safe burst out of the weaker side of the opening, sending the safe into the sky like a cube cannonball. Morgan, as the two ropes of his Grapple Guns followed the safe into the air, joked/warned with some excitement in his voice, "I hope you've got your arm securely attached to your body. The first time I tried this method... I landed with one arm le-."
Morgan couldn't finish his sentence when he was in front of Sora one moment, and suddenly the next, he was left without a rope chasing the safe, being the one sent flying. Sora, after witnessing Morgan's "takeoff," could only close his eyes with resignation about what was about to happen to him, before he too "takeoff," being pulled into the air, stupidly attached to the safe.
Within seconds, Sora felt a new shockwave from behind. The garbage mountain they had just "launched" was engulfed in a massive fireball, sending the trash that composed it flying like incandescent meteors that crossed the landfill and seemed to chase Sora and Morgan in the sky.
-
When the colossal explosion behind them finally subsided, the mountain from which it originated ceased to exist, leaving behind a smoldering, smoking crater.
Having narrowly escaped and with the safe box beginning to plummet, Sora and Morgan disconnected their Grapple Guns from it before it crashed to the ground, landing on one of the trash mounds in the landfill. However, due to their alarming speed and the hazardous nature of the surface they were about to "land" on, both had to take measures to avoid the rusty metal beams, sharp shards of glass, and other dangerous debris that awaited them.
Morgan was fortunate to aim for a protruding metal plate on the mound, thinking it could serve as cover for his "landing" amid the other trash remnants. However, before they could reach it, Sora reactivated his Grapple Gun, hooking onto the plate and propelling himself towards it, outpacing Morgan.
Sora landed gracefully on the metal plate, using it as an improvised board to slide down the trash heap, shielding himself from the hazardous remnants. Meanwhile, Morgan had no choice but to pull a beige grenade from beneath his coat, which he tossed just before "landing" on the mound, becoming enveloped in the stinking foam the grenade generated upon impact.
Covered in foam, Morgan started descending the trash heap like a jointless doll. Although his descent might have seemed somewhat embarrassing, at least he was protected from any danger thanks to the sturdy crust the foam formed upon contact with the oxygen, safeguarding and immobilizing him.
Upon reaching the bottom of the slope, Sora slowed down, shifting the weight of his body onto the tips of his feet, and executed a tight frontside turn on his makeshift board. Meanwhile, Morgan repeated an "Ouch" with each impact his foam shell suffered during his "graceful" descent.
Once he came to a stop and knowing that Sora would be nearby, Morgan, with his voice muffled within the foam shell, said, "Since you've robbed me right under my nose, could you at least help me get out of here?"
"Are you sure? I think your current look suits you, Morgan!" Sora responded, genuinely finding it amusing that Morgan was trapped inside their cream-colored featureless gingerbread-man-like foam shell.
"Ha, ha, ha... Very funny! Now, could you get me out of this fucking thing? Stinks!" Morgan replied, their patience wearing thin.
"What's the magic word?" Sora teased, taking the liberty to play around a bit, now that they had escaped the danger.
"Kid... I swear that..." Morgan couldn't finish. When Sora, having heard those same words not long ago, said, "Here we go... another one."
"PLEASE! Could you get me the hell out of HERE?" Morgan yelled, giving in to the terrorist's demands.
Responded with a quick "I don't like it. It didn't sound sincere at all!" from the terrorist who hadn't quite finished to "terrorize," eliciting a muffled expletive from the gingerbread-man: "MOTHERF**KER!"
While Morgan vented the contents of his irritated heart, Sora sat on top of him, removed his helmet, revealing his sweaty, disheveled black hair. Tapping where Morgan's head should be, Sora asked, "Tell me, Morgan... who won our fight?"
Morgan, knowing exactly what Sora wanted and correctly suspecting his response would be recorded, "....." remained silent.
Feigning surprise, Sora added, "Don't you want to say it, huh? Maybe, you're more comfortable in there that how it's smell"
Approaching a moment of newfound enlightenment from being confined and having to endure Sora's nonsense, Morgan, with his patience partially restored, asked to confirm, "Kid, if I answer, you'll let me out?"
"Who knows, this is fun! But if you don't say it, then certainly not," Sora replied, sitting on top of Morgan lighting a cigarette and beginning to smoke, while listening to Morgan's muffled shouts of "BASSSTAAAARD!!!!!" from inside the foam shell.
-
A few minutes after Sora freed Morgan from his shell, the two walked in silence along one of the dirt paths that surrounded Landfield. Due to how Morgan ignored the presence of Sora and Eco, who had also joined his human in the teasing when Morgan was trapped.
Sora seized the opportunity to share with "Morgan Tightlips" the conversation he had with his grandfather Musashi about Tashin. This astonishing account made Morgan forget his anger and bombard Sora with questions about Tashin, showing mixed emotions of nostalgia and sadness upon learning the current state of the boy he once knew.
While they spoke, Sora and Morgan felt a brief tremor in the ground. They grew concerned when they saw from a distance how ten columns of smoke rose from different points in the skyline Night City, as if ten buildings had collapsed.
When Morgan attempted to contact Night Corp, the vibrant neon lights and advertising holograms that illuminated the city started flickering and malfunctioning, plunging the metropolis into almost complete darkness and severely hindering communications. Ongoing calls, including Morgan's, were disrupted due to signal intermittency.
The sudden blackout filled the city with a gloomy and unsettling atmosphere, prompting Sora and Morgan to start running anxiously. A few seconds later, something fell from the sky and landed cheerfully on Sora's other free shoulder. Shortly after Fool found Sora and Morgan, a pair of headlights from a vehicle approached them.
When the car stopped beside them and the window rolled down, they could see Mathew driving the car without touching the steering wheel, thanks to the helmet he was wearing, connected by a cable to one of the outlets on the car's dashboard. Seeing this, Morgan exclaimed, "Kid, how the heck did you hack into the car's system?"
He lifted the visor of the helmet covering his eyes and nervously replied, "Fool helped me, but that doesn't matter now. We need to get out of here immediately! The Cybersycos that were chasing me stopped moving when the explosion happened, but when the city lights went out, they started chasing me again! I think I left them behind, but-"
Mathew stopped talking when, while connected to the car and its cameras, he saw several "Empties" approaching them. Sora and Morgan, upon seeing them, stared at each other until Morgan, even activating his Sandervista, hurried to the last free seat on the copilot side, urging Mathew to start. Sora had no choice but to activate his boots, magnetically attaching himself to the car as Mathew accelerated.
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