Cyberpunk: Starting in 2071

Chapter 94 Company V!?
To study the Relic chip, Mercer had to use a laborious method.

He first found a universal card reader for writing and modifying programs on chips, and a microcomputer specifically for reading and modifying chip programs.

Then, Mercer retrieved a Relic chip that was kept in an insulated box in the server room, still containing the Soul Killer program.

First, I tried to read the chip data using a universal card reader, and then I tried to copy the program manually using the keyboard on a microcomputer that was not connected to the internet.

The answer is failure, and the data shows that the Soul Killer program inside the Relic chip also triggered an automatic target acquisition attack mode.

Because Mercer uses offline operation, a retro method of typing code with a keyboard, the Relic chip cannot find the enemy's consciousness data, so the automatic counterattack program is rendered useless.

Upon seeing this, Mercer knew that replication was hopeless. Just like his network access pod, even without AI, the program here was already set up to automatically activate the Soul Killer program's default setting whenever abnormal data appeared.

He dared not plug his data cable into any device related to the Soul Killer program.

Therefore, he could only use a clumsy method—reading the data inside through a card reader and then continuously activating the Soul Killer program within it.

Amidst the vast amount of data generated during chip operation, like a struggling programmer before time travel, one must visually examine line after line of data on a computer screen.

How much code is in this Soul Killer program?

Mercer looked at the 9999+ message displayed on the card reader and smiled with relief.

9999+ does not represent the number of pages of program code, but rather the display limit of this microcomputer.

Just how much garbage data did these idiots cram into the Soul Killer program?

If it were an ordinary person, they would probably have given up by now, because it's hard to know which of the countless data codes are Relic's own programs and which are the killer programs.

Because these codes are encrypted, there are no comments, and there is even a lot of fake data specifically designed to prevent theft.

Mercer also tried to use the server's computing power to automatically filter and analyze the data using a program without AI, but he quickly discovered that Relic had a special anti-theft program to prevent this. If he didn't want to burn out the chip, he had no choice but to stop.

After two busy hours, and even after Lucy and the others had returned to the base, Mercer still couldn't find a breakthrough.

Everyone had been out for several days, exposed to the elements, and even if they weren't sleepy, they were thinking about eating something good and taking a bath.

So, they all just said hello and went back to their rooms. Only Lucy stopped and walked in when she saw Mercer in the server room, looking at him with a worried expression as he stared at the Relic chip.

"what happened?"

After Lucy asked, she saw Mercer staring at the screen with a Zen-like smile, saying in a calm tone, "I'm stumped."

Is there anything else that can stump you?
She peeked at the code displayed on the screen, and then immediately showed a disgusted expression.

"You're serious about finding the real soul-killing program from this mountain of shit on your own, Mercer?"

Lucy bluntly commented: "Perhaps you need a professional hacker team of thirty people, working day and night in front of the computer for six months."

Then spend another ten years trying to combine that pile of potentially useful code; maybe that will create a true soul killer.

Of course, it's more likely that after excitedly piecing together a seemingly functional program, it automatically connected to the internet and covertly sent signal data, and then Arasaka's agents arrived the next day.

Mercer rolled his eyes: "I know."

Then, he looked thoughtful: "You mean, this Soul Killer program can also work unconditionally against ordinary AI?"

Mercer's words surprised Lucy slightly: "You mean using Morning Star?"

"To be precise, we'll have Qiming create a sub-AI first, let its sub-AI go in, see if it triggers the Soul Killer, and then see if we can lock onto its main body by observing the data changes when the Soul Killer attacks."

As Mercer spoke, he discussed with Venus the idea of ​​having it split off into a low-level sub-AI and then stuffing it into the Relic chip.

Mercer and Lucy then stared at the microcomputer connected to the chip, observing the data processing.

A few minutes later, Lucy said again, "It seems that won't work. Although this program is designed to attack AI as well, it's too difficult to find the core data from so much code this way, Mercer."

"I think so."

Mercer, however, gave a completely different answer, saying excitedly, "I can see it! When the Soul Killer program hunts this AI, I'll be able to see useful data in this mountain of crap code!"

"Huh?" Lucy uttered a sound that was hard to tell—it was either a sigh or a sigh of helplessness. "How did you figure that out?"

"Feel?"

After Mercer finished speaking, he excitedly backed up the important data on his laptop, then put the minicomputer aside, intending to start the formal trial with his own laptop.

He had Qimingxing continuously generate sub-AI programs to simulate the signals of active AI, then transfer them through a non-internet-connected hard drive before placing them into the Relic chip.

The computer connected via a card reader monitors the code during program execution.

Then, through the human eye, traces of the Soul Killer program can be captured bit by bit from the code that washes over the eyes like a tide.

Lucy forced herself to watch for a while, about thirty seconds, before giving up on this behavior that made her feel stupid.

If it weren't Mercer, but anyone else who told her that she could find the Soul Killer program just by staring at the code on the screen, Lucy would definitely think that person was an idiot.

But if Mercer were to do that, Lucy would only feel frustrated and resigned, simply accepting that she lacked talent.

Mercer's expression was extremely focused at this moment. Even the heat sink behind him had its cover opened and began to hum. His prosthetic eye reflected the rapidly passing numbers on the screen. He was completely absorbed in the task, like an old monk sitting in meditation.

Perhaps only a handful of the thousands of lines of code that flow across the screen every minute will trigger his 'muscle jolt'.

But after half an hour, Mercer had already found hundreds of lines of code that he felt 'relevant' from the ever-emerging sea of ​​code.

He rubbed his temples, letting the laptop rest for a while.

Then he borrowed Lucy's computer, opened the programming software, and began typing, replicating the hundreds of lines of code he had memorized.

After Mercer pieced together the code by intuition, he was able to keenly sense where the program was 'incomplete' after only one glance.

It's like a blurry, pieced-together human figure, clearly lacking a left arm and a right leg.

Mercer estimated that the program he had pieced together this time was only about 2% of the part of the program he could see.

It takes half an hour to piece together 2%.
So, the project takes a total of 20 hours?

This happened much faster than Mercer had anticipated.

This discovery lifted his spirits, and he even ignored the fatigue in his head. He firmly believed that as long as he could reconstruct the part of the program he had captured, he would definitely be able to find the ladder to the Soul Killer program.

This is a Soul Killer program!

He rested for a while, or rather, he waited for the laptop and Relic chip to cool down, giving these hardware components some time to rest.

Then, he turned around and looked at Lucy beside him, who was staring blankly at the program code he was typing on the computer screen. He found her look rather cute and couldn't help but chuckle.

"What are you laughing at?" She puffed out her cheeks, a little embarrassed and annoyed, and stood up to glare at Mercer. "I'm not looking anymore. Just let me see what this famous Soul Killer program looks like after you finish writing it."

"Then you'll have to wait a while. I suspect that with this method alone, you can only capture a part of the Soul Killer program at most."

I suspect that this data is most likely the part that Soul Killer uses for capturing and attacking.

However, we don't need to rely on this method to completely restore the entire program.

Mercer said casually, "I think I just need to write out this part of the program first, then find the vulnerabilities and disable the automatic counterattack and anti-piracy program set up by Arasaka."

After that, you can copy the Soul Killer program, disable its 'predation function,' and then use AI to study and crack it, which should be much faster.

Lucy glared at him, still puffed up with anger: "Easier said than done! You'd better teach me!"

"Well, once I've grasped the principles, I'll write you some practice problems. With your talent, you might actually master quite a few," Mercer said with a smile.

Lucy looked at him and sighed, "I haven't fully grasped anything you taught me before."

"It'll happen sooner or later, I believe in you." Mercer gave her a thumbs up.

Lucy looked at him speechlessly: "Are you trying to fool me like you're apricot?"

"You two are both quite talented, I'm not talking nonsense."

After Mercer finished speaking with a smile, Lucy shook her head and changed the subject, saying, "I heard you reached a cooperation agreement with Hansen? And you even got the title of Director of Weapon and Equipment Design for the Ghost Hound?"

"Well, we've made a lot of money for free this time, and we've also gotten a weapons and equipment design center for free—I'll use this opportunity to get some good stuff for everyone."

As Mercer spoke, Lucy said worriedly, "You have to be careful. If Hansen catches you embezzling public funds, he's not someone to be trifled with."

“Neither do I,” Mercer said with a smile. “Don’t worry, I know how to deal with these profit-driven creatures.”

As long as you still have value, and that value is high enough, he would be willing to trade his own parents for you, let alone something as trivial as taking advantage of him.

There are plenty of people in the Ghost Hound organization who are lining their own pockets; if I don't, I won't seem like one of them—sometimes, you have to deliberately give them some leverage, a weakness, for them to see you as trustworthy.

This is why Mercer still lives at the base and why everyone else continues to live there.

He didn't want to talk about these things with Lucy and the others, which would only cause them more trouble, so he changed the subject in a light tone: "How's Old Wei doing lately? I haven't contacted him for a while."

"Him? He's fine. When I went there, he was watching a boxing match. He and V even made plans to watch a live boxing match at his clinic next week. It's supposed to be some kind of championship fight for the world's top boxer. I'm not really interested."

Lucy said, then looked at Mercer and said, "He cares about you a lot. He urged you to go to his place for a check-up when you have time. It seems he's worried about the side effects of these prosthetics on you."

"Okay, I'll take a walk around there when I have some free time. I happen to have some new ideas."

Mercer said, pondering, "I'm thinking about how to improve my survival skills. Now that I've gotten into so much trouble, I have to be careful that agents don't shoot me in the back or set traps."

No matter how skilled a hacker is, if someone truly turns off all network receivers, I can only hack in by establishing a physical connection via a single-wire or data cable.

Previously, no one knew his abilities, so naturally no one took precautions. But now that his reputation is growing, we have to be careful of people making special modifications to target hackers.

If you want to send someone a quick hack, you need a network connection to establish a connection and hack into them. If the other party doesn't have the ability to receive network signals and transmit data, then Mercer is truly at a loss, essentially starting from scratch.

Like the Animal Gang, if these big guys knew they were dealing with a hacker, they might even disable their brain-computer interfaces and rely solely on their flesh and blood bodies imbued with the power of nine dragons. Mercer would truly have no way to scare them.

Lucy stopped trying to persuade him and just said with her arms crossed, "Do what you want. You don't care what I say anyway."

"Who said that?" He turned his head, looked at Lucy's small face under her white hair, and laughed, "Where did you get this temper again?"

“I’m not angry,” she said, but Mercer only thought about it thoughtfully for a moment before suddenly realizing, “Ah, it’s still Qiwei.”

Before he could finish speaking, Qiwei, who was standing at the door, suddenly stopped. She glanced at Lucy, then naturally continued walking, placing the steaming hot Mexican taco on the table next to Mercer.

“V made this. Eat it while it’s hot. She said you haven’t eaten anything all day.”

After Qiwei finished speaking, she smiled at Lucy and asked, "Would you like some coffee? Shall I get you a cup? Or would you like to go to the kitchen and get some yourself?"

"No need, I'm going out for a drink later." After Lucy finished speaking, she watched Qiwei nod and leave gracefully, without even trying to explain.

She suddenly felt a little discouraged—neither Mercer nor Qiwei seemed to have done anything, which made her seem particularly petty and calculating.

Mercer chuckled, then stuffed his taco into his mouth.

V's cooking skills are really good, and you can see a clear improvement in her skills. She is surprisingly virtuous. She diligently takes care of the cleanliness of the base and the grocery shopping and cooking for everyone. You really can't judge a book by its cover.

"What's so funny?" Lucy turned her head away, stopped acting, and looked a little sulky.

Mercer simply looked at her and said with a smile, "You're quite jealous, aren't you?"

"I didn't," she firmly denied.

"Really not?" He leaned closer, biting his taco, and looked at her with a smile.

Lucy turned her face away, pouted, and pretended to leave: "I'm going to eat."

"Since I've got nothing to do these past few days, how about I find some interesting Mewtwo to watch together? Or maybe I can continue playing with Moon Mewtwo."

Mercer suggested with a smile.

"Go find Rebecca to play with you," she said without turning her head.

“Fine, then I’ll go find her.” After Mercer finished speaking, he saw her stop at the door, glare at him angrily for a while, and finally couldn’t help but raise a middle finger.

Mercer laughed heartily, while Lucy said irritably, "Go ahead! Do you think I'd stop you?"

After saying that, she strode away.

[Morning Star: I think she's saying one thing and meaning another.]

Mercer: Isn't that obvious?

[Morning Star: So what are your plans?]

[Mercer: Just knock on her door tonight. All she wants is a gesture—she's quite patient; she's been so busy with important matters these past few days that she hasn't uttered a sound. I thought she'd calmed down.]

[Morning Star: Hmm, relationships between men and women are really complicated. I don't quite understand human possessiveness.]

[Mercury: Ha~ If you really become possessive, then I'll have an even bigger headache.]

[Morning Star: Hmm, but perhaps this is also a more anthropomorphic way of expressing affection?]

Mercer: Don't do that!

[Morning Star: Okay~]

After she finished joking, she began to give her report.

[Morning Star: Master, the ctOS system is now officially operational. I feel there's a lot of intelligence that needs your review every day, so I'd like to compile a daily briefing for you. What do you think?]

[Mercer: That's a great idea. I'll compile a list every morning and evening from now on. Who knows, some information might bring unexpected surprises.]

[Morning Star: Okay, besides this information, I have another important matter to report to you.]

Mercer: What is it?

[Morning Star: Arasaka's counterintelligence agents have your eye on you, and are currently trying to persuade Mr. Jack at the Wild Wolf Bar to lure you or Ms. V out under the guise of a commission.]

[Mercer: Switch the screen to me.]

Without wasting words, Morning Star immediately displayed the surveillance footage to Mercer's eyes.

Then, Jack and another female agent appeared in Mercer's field of vision.

According to the surveillance footage, the agent's face was obscured by a mosaic.

However, Qimingxing quickly used AI technology to reconstruct the other party's face, and soon cracked the interference program built into the other party's prosthetic eye, clearly displaying the other party's facial features.

At the same time, she zoomed in on the image and, through lip-reading analysis, added subtitles for Mercer.

[Morning Star: Sorry, the audio recording from the Wild Wolf Bar's cameras is too poor. Even with zoom in, it's impossible to clearly capture the other person's audio. We can only provide subtitles through lip reading analysis.]

Mercer: Well done. Let me see what kind of price this guy can offer Jack.

However, after Mercer looked at the female agent's face carefully for a while, he suddenly raised an eyebrow and gasped.

This agent's face looks familiar!
His extraordinary memory immediately found a matching image for him.

This guy is Company V!?
After comparing the woman before him, with her equally beautiful features, aloof demeanor, and sharp eyes, with the image from the game, Mercer was finally certain—it was her!

This woman's appearance.
It's exactly the same as the female character creation screen he had when he started playing a cyberpunk game before he time-traveled, choosing the corporate V character!
Just like how V looks the same as the character he created when he started playing Street Kid.

At this moment, Agent Arasaka in the surveillance footage, although his face was somewhat distorted after the mosaic was removed by AI, Mercer still recognized him at a glance!

There's no doubt that this woman is the company V he personally created!

[Mercer: Can you find her name?]

[Morning Star: Valerie, she has the exact same name as Ms. V, not only the name, but also the same age, but according to the NCPD's archives, her life trajectory and family background are completely different from Ms. V's.]

I judged that she and Ms. V had no social connection whatsoever, and it was probably just a coincidence of sharing the same name. But judging from your expression, you seem to know her? Am I mistaken?

Mercer: Of course I know you.

Mercer watched the video feed, where Valerie was looking at Jack with a somewhat arrogant and aggressive expression. For a moment, he was filled with many thoughts.

If V, who started out as a street kid, exists, and V, who started out as a corporate employee, also exists, does that mean that another homeless V also exists?

If all three V's exist.
Mercer's mind was suddenly filled with many thoughts.

Ironically, his first reaction upon seeing the company's "V" wasn't wariness or worry, but rather...
Oh shit
My collecting habit is kicking in!

(End of this chapter)