Cyberpunk: Nirvana of Shoko Toyokawa

"You... lied to me." Xiangzi's cheeks were stained with a faint red because of Miao Meng's actions. She panted, "You are not threatened by me at all."

"Hmm~ Do you think you're the only one who can pretend?"

Miao Meng smiled ambiguously.

"Can I be threatened by you?"

"30,000 yuan, you want to buy my life... I'm not such a cheap woman, okay?"

"If people knew I was threatened by a 3-point kitten, no one would want to do business with me anymore."

Miao Meng's hand slid to the side and knocked on the inside where Xiangzi placed the [point chip].

"!"

Xiangzi secretly said "bad" in his heart -

“——I don’t want this. There are too many people who choked to death from eating food they couldn’t finish. I want to live longer.”

The hand was pulled away.

Miao Meng didn't take the [point chip].

Her eyes refocused on Xiangzi's face.

"The rising body temperature, the state of the eyeballs, the changes in breathing and heartbeat. I wanted to extort more from you, but when the transaction was made, your body was telling you that you only had 30,000 yuan."

"Then I won't take any more. Just consider this little money as a lesson."

Miao Meng clapped his hands twice again.

"Take it out. Throw it away."

“Wait a minute—”

Without giving Xiangzi a chance to speak, two silent, burly men grabbed Xiangzi and carried her out like a real stray cat.

Chapter 16 Carrier Pigeon

Xiangzi was dragged out of the bar by two burly men and thrown roughly onto the street of Bar Street.

There was a sharp pain in his back and he felt dizzy. It took Xiangzi a long time before he could breathe again, coughing.

It was also at this time that she noticed that more and more passers-by noticed her.

Some of them wanted to come over, but...

It seems that he is not a completely good person.

Damn it.

Xiangzi didn't want to be picked up a second time.

She struggled to get up and ran out of the bar street.

……

Xiangzi's desperate gamble ultimately failed.

The woman named Miao Meng was not fooled by Xiangzi. She turned the tables on Xiangzi and swindled him out of the only 30,000 yuan he had.

"hateful……!"

The basic points are low and there is no prosthesis... Is there really nothing I can do?

Hiding in the dark alley, Xiangzi was both angry and desperate.

Of course she didn't want to be bullied like this. She wanted to scream, to hit everything she could see, to tear herself into pieces.

But any extra noise would attract nearby hyenas and vultures.

She was so powerless that she had to be careful even when expressing herself.

"—"

The chaotic emotions that had nowhere to go boiled Xiangzi's heart.

"(money.)"

Xiangzi thought.

She has to have money.

Without money, nothing can be achieved. Without money, everything that happened to Miao Meng will be repeated over and over again in her life, with no end, and even worse and much worse than that.

Xiangzi held the [point chip] still in her pocket. She held it tightly, it was her last hope.

Xiangzi's analysis is not completely useless.

She hit the nail on the head.

Miao Meng is indeed a well-known and powerful trader. She can see the danger of the [point chip]. Although she cheated Xiangzi, she did not steal this thing.

It was because she did not take it that Xiangzi was left with a glimmer of hope.

"(Gotta get it.)"

Even if it's one second faster.

There is no time to be frustrated or angry.

Xiangzi slapped his face hard to keep himself calm.

"Toyokawa Shoko."

she said to herself.

"Don't be that garbage that keeps looking at the past."

……

After quietly taking the fried noodles placed by the street vendors at the outermost edge and replenishing some energy, Xiangzi sneaked into the bar street again.

Miao Meng didn't accept the transaction, so she had to find another trader.

Xiangzi started her search again.

There are too many people in a bar, and the walls may have ears, so exclude them.

A bar with too few people may be the lair of a gray organization, so rule it out.

Traders who have too many prosthetics installed would be in great danger of being controlled, so they are excluded.

Traders who only accept remote calls...you don’t even know whether the person on the other end is a human or a dog, so exclude them.

The fault tolerance rate is too low.

Xiangzi cannot expect that if he fails again next time he can get away with only losing 30,000 yuan like last time.

With the most cautious perspective, she eliminated one bar after another, one trader after another, and then contacted those traders who gave her a "try-worthy" evaluation in her inner assessment.

But the situation is even more difficult than before.

The thirty thousand yuan was all swindled away by Miao Meng. Xiangzi didn't have a penny.

Without this start-up capital, she couldn't even afford the alcohol, let alone the agency fee.

Xiangzi didn't dare to approach a trader who loved to take risks, and a steady trader wouldn't trade with someone who couldn't afford a dime.

Xiangzi walked from one family to another, from early morning to noon, and from noon to dusk.

We walked along the entire bar street.

Xiangzi was unable to find any trader willing to trade with her.

After a round of discussions, it turned out that the one who negotiated the best deal was Miao Meng.

There was also a timid old man who was okay, at least he entered the "take a look" stage. But when Xiangzi took out the [point chip], the old man was so scared that he waved his hands repeatedly, saying that he dared not accept such a thing that had been registered with a code.

"..."

Xiangzi once again returned to the streets of Bar Street, this time from the opposite direction of the way he came.

"(No way. Ask again?)"

Even if we have to keep pestering him, we have to find a way out here...!

Just as Xiangzi was thinking this and preparing to contact the few traders who were relatively easy to talk to again, she suddenly saw a black business car not far away slowly slowing down and approaching the roadside.

It was a very expensive Chevrolet Thracian V7R.

Even in wealthy areas, not everyone can afford this kind of car.

...This car looks familiar to Xiangzi.

She hid.

Soon, with the assistance of the automatic driving system, the business sedan stopped steadily on the side of the road.

The door slowly opened and a young girl got out of the car.

"..."

Light golden green hair, slender hands and feet, and fair skin.

Always an expressionless face.

The girl who got off the car was someone Xiangzi knew.

...I realized that I couldn't recognize it anymore.

"(Harmony.)"

Wakaba Mutsu.

The daughter of Las Vegas artist Wakaba and actress Mori Minami, who are close friends of the Toyokawa family.

Xiangzi had known her since he was very young.

In the shadow of the street, Xiangzi watched Mu slowly walk into the bar street.

"(Mu is not the kind of person who would come to a place like this.)"

The Mu that Xiangzi knew had always lived like a puppet. She did whatever her parents arranged for her to do. She only went to places where celebrities and politicians would go, or stayed on campus, taking one course after another that was scheduled for next year.

Mu would appear here, and what he was going to do... was obvious.

"(Looking for me?)"

Mu was the only person in Xiangzi's social circle who knew what happened to Xiangzi. Xiangzi also told her not to come to him. Since moving to Morfonica's territory, Xiangzi has cut off contact with Mu.

But Xiangzi's cutting off of contact does not mean that Mu can't find Xiangzi.

Mu is a technical expert, which is also due to the training of the Wakaba family.

Xiangzi can think of several ways to find people, such as retrieving the open source surveillance of the City of Joy and performing AI comparison...

She believed Mu could think of more.

Xiangzi knew Mu too well.

Mu is not the kind of person who will come to him after being told “don’t come to me”.

She will come, maybe...

"(I think Nagasaki Suyo asked me to do that.)"

Xiangzi thought.

Nagasaki Motoyo. The bassist of his previous band crychic.

This girl took the band very seriously. After Xiangzi quit the team, she tried to contact him again and again, hoping to get him back.

One of Xiangzi’s previous moves was also due to her.

Although he left Tsuki no Mori, Mutsu and Sushi are still Tsuki no Mori's classmates.

"(Su Shi couldn't find me, so she started asking Mu for help again...)"

Xiangzi smiled.

"(Mu, you clearly know what my situation is, but you still act as Su Shi's messenger pigeon?)"

"(You've come all the way to this place for this... You're not asking me to talk to her, are you?)"