From Gotham to Night City, my infamy is known to all.

One of these is how to protect yourself from cyber hackers.

For a hacker to breach a target, they need to be on the same network as the target or connected via a mid-level machine. In other words, there must be a mid-level machine nearby for the hacker to pinpoint the target.

After a quick self-check, he discovered the most likely source of the problem: the traffic monitoring system!

His task today was patrolling, and for convenience, he connected to the traffic monitoring system in his jurisdiction. But... this is the NCPD's internal system; if it can be hacked...

He subconsciously looked up and searched, and saw a camera on the traffic light pole, which was supposed to monitor the street, "looking" at him. When their eyes met, it even nodded.

Stings broke out in a cold sweat instantly.

A hacker is watching him...

Left with no other choice, he resignedly opened the received data packet and began to examine it, his initial panic gradually turning into excitement.

They were all scavenger outposts; he'd even heard of a few of them.

Even if these despicable people have powerful backers and influential figures, they wouldn't dare to openly stand up for them and "uphold justice."

On the contrary, when news of the crackdown on the scavenger group spread, both companies and ordinary citizens applauded.

This is indeed profitable, and... it doesn't violate his moral principles.

Faced with a life-threatening situation on one hand and a promotion and raise without moral pressure on the other, the scales tipped in his mind.

As for the "price," there's no way to resist it anyway, so we'll deal with it when the time comes...

*

"It's done."

Leo hung up the phone triumphantly and put his hand on V's shoulder—she had been stripped of her driving privileges and forced to sit in the back with Leo because of her two uses of the Sinwidman.

V had already slapped his hand away several times, but he just kept putting his hand on her, and all she could do was roll her eyes.

"What's the point of doing this? You've caused such a commotion at the Rebirth Bar. Even if the NCPD intervenes, it'll only fool the public at best."

"Tsk tsk tsk, you just don't understand."

Leo made a sound that made V's fist harden.

“I’ve investigated, and the NCPD has been undergoing privatization reforms since last year. This year, the city government has further cut funding to the NCPD. They are now facing multiple difficulties, including but not limited to limited budgets, staff shortages, and internal corruption.”

However, in my opinion, this is good news...

Leo recalled various storylines related to NCPD in the game and felt deeply regretful about the organization's "purity".

"Let me put it this way, dogs are easy to understand. If you feed them well, they will treat you as their master and wag their tails at you. If you put a leash around their necks, they can even help you bite enemies."

"The same applies to the NCPD. They are short of money, while I happen to have money, so we naturally have a basis for cooperation. I will first feed them and let them know that they should wag their tails at me instead of barking and snarling."

Then I'll train a group of high-ranking officials who are loyal to me, or at least subject to my control, and put this formidable police dog on a leash.

"This is a long-term task, and we have to take it slowly. However, it is still necessary to select a few promising candidates in advance. In any case, it is better to put 'good cops' in positions of power than to put a bunch of guys who are even more corrupt than the street cleaners in positions of power."

Leo's long-winded speech plunged the car into a prolonged, deathly silence.

People generally don't like the NCPD, but to directly compare them to dogs and suggest they need to be tamed is truly shocking...

It can only be said that people's thoughts and perspectives are indeed different; they have never considered the issue from this angle.

After a long silence, V broke the silence first: "Are you sure it can work? The NCPD is actually backed by major companies. Your personal influence... well, if you can bring Comtau into it, maybe it will work."

This time it was Leo's turn to roll his eyes. How come even his own people were treating him like Kang Tao...

"Not now, but soon. I plan to start my own company and, as chairman, engage with the NCPD."

Did you know? Some powerful middlemen are already grooming mayoral candidates, so what's a little grooming of an NCPD chief?

First Glimpse of Talent: Chapter 155 Rebecca's Awakening

The guys really don't know which middleman is so powerful that they dare to try and get their hands on the "theoretical" highest leadership position in Night City.

Could it be Roger, the "Queen of the Next Life Bar"?

Seeing that they were all silent, Leo opened his personal account and glanced at the balance: 490.5 million euros.

My adorable little money will soon be saying goodbye...

The large-scale cleanup operation includes 20 small outposts, 5 medium-sized outposts, and 2 large outposts, with rewards of 8, 15, and 30 respectively, totaling 295 million.

He personally subsidized his team with 5, so that each member of the immortality team could receive a reward of 5.

That's exactly 300 million.

They also need to give Laisheng Bar a 5% cut, which is 15 yuan.

He spent a whopping 315 million euros on this mission.

It's definitely a waste of money, but the results should be pretty good too.

Open the public channel —

"L: I called the NCPD to come out and clear things up. Everyone should go home today and lay low for a while. Remember to send the deceased's photo to the administrator; I want to keep it for my enjoyment."

"L: I'm very satisfied with this commission. This deal is closed."

Transfer funds to the team leaders' personal accounts.

Transferring money to the public account of the Laisheng Bar.

Transferring money to my friends' personal accounts.

Leo watched his wallet gradually empty, only to be met with a barrage of flattery and words of thanks.

He instructed Chunbai to continue monitoring the mercenaries they had worked with, to find out their backgrounds, so that they could choose reliable candidates to cooperate with when needed in the future.

After transferring the money, he sent Mann a message, inviting them to a celebration party the next night.

The mission is now completely complete; I can go home and get some rest.

woo woo woo woo--

The sound of a siren, composed of high-frequency electronic pulses, approached from afar and then quickly faded away.

Watching the NCPD police cars pass by, Leo closed his eyes contentedly.

*

The two cars behind turned right at the next intersection and drove further and further away from the armored car carrying the criminals.

Mann slapped the steering wheel hard, a smile appearing on his lips: "Looks like we left a good impression on L. He invited us to his rented apartment for a celebration banquet tomorrow. Also, the 15 has arrived. After so long, the team is finally starting to get on track."

Dorio reached out and stroked his strong arm, her expression slightly strange: "Maybe it's because Rebecca left a good impression on him. I didn't expect her to have this ability, hooking up with the young master in just half an hour alone with him."

"Who says otherwise? If she can really hook up with someone of that caliber, then she should be the captain from now on, haha!"

“You…” Dorio hesitated for a moment before advising, “I think L is much easier to get along with than that three-eyed man. He’s also more generous. Why don’t you switch allegiance and follow him?”

"Faraday..."

The thought of that extremely powerful middleman made Mann's smile slowly fade.

That person claims to be an independent, but in reality, he works for the company. Once you get involved, it's not so easy to get rid of him.

Unless... L is involved, and the two of them are put to the test.

While he pondered, he distributed the remuneration to the team members according to the agreed-upon share.

*

In the rather dilapidated Hera family car behind, Pila received the money transfer from her boss and was so happy that she danced with joy.

"Finally, I have money—yay!"

He slapped the roof of the car with his extra-long arms, producing a series of chaotic drumbeats.

"We really made a lot of money this time, enough to keep us happy for a while!"

Rebecca, who was lying in the back seat, was startled by the noise and brought back to her senses.

"You damn idiot, shut up! You're disturbing my thinking!"

Pila held the steering wheel with her left hand and stretched her right hand behind her back, extending it with amazing flexibility to her sister's face—gesturing the middle finger!

"Are you thinking about how to get into the young master's bed? You're moving way too fast, already touching his butt... Speaking of which, weren't you not interested in men?"

Rebecca silently reached out, grasped his wrists with both hands, adjusted her posture, and pushed off with her feet against the back of the chair—

"Ouch! Ouch! Stop it! Oh my god, you're going to dislocate my shoulder!!"

Before she could actually dislocate her bastard brother's arm, Rebecca mercifully stopped the punishment of uprooting the willow tree.

"I'm just not interested in useless men, but I'm very interested in good men who are rich, powerful, and willing to help me!"

“That L…” she paused for a moment, “keep your hands firmly on the steering wheel, don’t get distracted, or you’ll cause a car accident.”

"Hiss—Ahhh—"

Pickup moved his aching right arm for a while before recovering and obediently gripped the steering wheel.

Rebecca composed herself and said softly, "L, he's willing to help us investigate Dad's disappearance."

Chi-

There was a sharp sound of brakes.

Pila was distracted for a moment, then slammed on the brakes, nearly causing a rear-end collision.

"What!?"

Rebecca sighed and lowered her hands from her ears: "Try to watch less of those risqué Mewtwo videos. You used to just have a brain problem, now your ears are acting up too?"

She raised her voice and repeated it, causing Pila's hands to tremble slightly.

"Really? Is he trying to take advantage of you? Think about it, why would he help us for no reason?"

That's somewhat sensible. Rebecca lowered her fist, which had been hovering above his head: "It wasn't that he wanted to take advantage of me; I offered myself to him. I could tell he was interested in me, so I used myself as leverage to ask him to investigate my father's death."

Pila stared blankly at the steering wheel for a long time before finally asking, "Was it worth it?"

Click!

That's the sound of the gun's safety being released.

Immediately, the large muzzle of a shotgun was pressed against his head.

"If you dare say it's not worth avenging your father, then I'll have to make a hole in your brain, which's been hollowed out by cyberboobs, and let the water out!"

Rebecca's suppressed growl came from beside his ear, her voice full of threat and intimidation.

But Pila, who is usually unreliable and full of trash talk, did not compromise this time.

"Dad would definitely want us to live a good life, not risk our lives to avenge him..."

The car fell into dead silence.

After a while, Rebecca removed the gun from his head.

“I know that if it were just the two of us investigating, we would be committing suicide. Even if we brought Mann and the others along, we would probably only be able to barely save our lives. But L is different. He is not a low-level mercenary like us. He has the ability and the channels to do things that we cannot.”

"You have no idea, when he was doing a background check on Mann's team, he even found out about our experience of being homeless and living in a junk car..."

Pikachu was speechless; he would never forget that period of hardship.

But it's a bit scary that other people know about it. Their enemies couldn't find them, so how did L find out so easily...?

Early Signs of Talent: Chapter 156 Leo: "The enemy is ashamed, I'll go take off her clothes!"

"In short, the terms have been agreed upon. He will be responsible for investigating the truth of what happened back then and avenging my father. In return, I will become his woman, and I may leave the team in the future. I'm just letting you know in advance, so don't tell the captain and the others yet."

Rebecca sat back in the back seat and looked down at her beloved gun, "Iron Gallant"—if possible, she wanted to blow the head off her father's killer herself!

Pila drove blankly, but her inner turmoil continued to churn.

When the pain reached its limit, he asked again in a trembling voice, "Is it worth it? To risk everything, even our dignity and freedom. Dad... I hope we can live a good life..."

"You bastard, how long can you keep fooling yourself..."

Rebecca leaned back in her seat, looking up at the rusty, cracked sheet metal of the roof.

"Eating junk food every day, risking their lives to complete all sorts of low-class jobs, yet only receiving a meager salary to make ends meet, unable to even afford to rent a decent apartment..."

“You call this ‘life,’ but I think it’s just existing. Even if the Edge Walker team successfully infiltrates the top circle of the Afterlife Bar, we’re just a bunch of high-level thugs who might be easily wiped out at any time. At this rate, we’ll be confused ghosts until the day we die, let alone avenge our father.”