Chapter 54: Once Again


    "<em>Here Ie</em>! Here Ie!" A woman suddenly charged forward, raising her right hand toward the rampaging beasts. Her arm split open rapidly, revealing something mechanical within.


    But before she could fully activate whatever device she was deploying, Sun Jack, dodging bullets from afar, fired a shell directly at her. The explosion ended her intervention in an instant, and with her death, the freed beasts lost all semnce of control, going on a rampage and savagely attacking everything around them.


    As the 18th Street thugs started charging toward their position with weapons in hand, Sun Jack quickly sent a system message to Tapai and Father. "Go! That''s enough chaos—find where they’re keeping him!"


    Grabbing a hat off a panicked passerby, Sun Jack pulled it onto his head and dashed toward the door where Song 6PUS had been dragged earlier.


    The door led into a dim, narrow hallway in utter chaos. Gunfire and screams echoed all around. Whenever someone emerged from a room with a weapon, Sun Jack simply fired a shell without hesitation, wasting no time engaging them further.


    Following the corridor, he eventually reached arge, warehouse-sized room about half the size of a ser field. Inside, people were locked up in steel cages—clearly those ted for uing fights in the arena.


    The trio rushed into the room and began searching for Song 6PUS, but the sheer number of prisoners, some crammed into shared cages, made it an arduous task.


    "System! Facial recognition!" Sun Jackmanded mentally. Green boxes appeared over every person’s face as the system scanned them.Soon enough, a shing green box highlighted a face in a cage toward the far end—Song 6PUS had been found!


    At that exact moment, with a <em>click</em>, the pitch-ck room suddenly lit up again—power had been restored.


    "AA! Are you okay?!" Sun Jack hurriedly sent her a message.


    "I-I''m fine! Something came up, but I’ll fix it soon!" came AA''s flustered reply.


    Before Sun Jack could respond, a group of 18th Street members with "18" tattoos on their faces burst into the room from the left-side door. Shouting profanities, they opened fire wildly in their direction.


    "F***!" Sun Jack''s cybeic eye widened as he focused intently on their weapons. With a re, his systems temporarily jammed their guns. Taking advantage of the moment, Tapai opened the armor on his chest, pulled out three grenades, and hurled them at the group.


    Just as the grenades were about to detonate, three precise shots rang out, severing the pins and disabling the grenades midair. The explosions never came.


    Emerging from the smoke was the bald man, Answer.01, apanied by his massive, cybeically enhanced war dog. The mechanical beast, half-metal and bristling with weapons, was a terrifying sight as it lumbered into view.


    Tapai instinctively nced toward Father, his stance tense, but ultimately refrained from making a move.


    "Well, well. Impressive. A bunch of petty thieves daring to provoke 18th Street!" the bald man sneered, his voice dripping with disdain. "You—"


    Before he could finish his taunt, the lights went out again with a loud <em>pop</em>.


    In the darkness, Sun Jack reacted instantly. Knowing some would have night vision or infrared prosthetics, he dropped low to the ground and tossed three grenades toward their position. The deafening explosions lit up the room briefly, filling it with fire and thick smoke, creating a momentary barrier between the two sides.


    Sun Jack pulled out three vials ofbat stimnt and injected them directly into his neck. His pupils dted as his enhanced body surged with adrenaline. Kicking off the ground with explosive force, he charged headlong through the smoke and mes—straight toward the bald man.


    Running away would’ve been suicide. The odds were against them, and the best chance for survival now was to take down the leader.


    The heat was unbearable. Sun Jack''s skin burned, his hair singed, and his body ached with every step. But he refused to close his eyes, his cybeic vision locked onto the bald man ahead. As the smoke began to clear, Sun Jack swung his right arm violently, deploying his Electric Arc de. Like a beast, he pounced toward his target.


    The bald man, clearly startled by Sun Jack''s sudden appearance, flinched before breaking into a cold smile. "Mark!"


    Two blurred figures lunged at Sun Jack—one biting into his cybeic arm, the other sinking its teeth into his neck. The massive mechanical war dogs tackled him back into the thick smoke.


    But before the bald man could revel in his victory, he felt something cold press against his temple. "Call off your dogs, or I’ll blow your head off."


    It was Tapai’s voice. Naturally, as Sun Jack charged in, Tapai had followed without hesitation, exploiting the chaos to sneak up on the bald man.


    The two mechanical dogs, fully focused on Sun Jack, had left the bald man exposed, giving Tapai the perfect opportunity to strike.


    "Stop! Stop!" Answer.01’s voice trembled with fear as he hurriedlymanded the war dogs to retreat.


    The mechanical beasts reluctantly backed off, releasing a bloodied and gasping Sun Jack, who staggered to his feet, clutching his bleeding neck. Tapai leaned his head around the bald man’s shoulder and grinned. "How badass am I, huh? (??????)??"


    "Badass!" Sun Jack growled through gritted teeth.


    Tapai pressed the barrel of his gun harder against the bald man’s head. "Now tell your thugs and your dogs to back off. Try anything funny, and I’ll stter your brains all over the wall."


    Though fear flickered in the bald man’s eyes, he didn’t immediatelyply. "That’s impossible! If they back off, I’ll be at your mercy—you’ll carve me up like a b of meat!"


    As if on cue, the war dogs and the other gang members growled and snarled, closing in with murderous intent. Just as the situation seemed poised to erupt into a fight to the death, the bald man raised a hand to signal them to stop.


    "Look, there’s no point in us being stuck like this. How about we settle this the way it’s done in our world?" the bald man proposed, clearly trying to negotiate.


    "And how do you want to settle it?" Sun Jack asked, jabbing a syringe of coagnt into his neck. The bleeding quickly stopped as the medication took effect, tightening the ruptured blood vessels.


    "I know why you’re here. You want money, right? 50@, isn’t it? I’ll give you 70@!"


    "Seventy @coins—take it and leave immediately! But you can’t take Song 6PUS with you. I’ve already advertised his fight; if he’s gone, I’ll have to answer to my superiors."


    Using money to solve everything—this was a tactic Sun Jack was very familiar with. But he hadn’t expected someone to turn it back on him today.


    To be honest, Sun Jack really needed money. With this 70@, he’d be close to covering his surgery costs. Standing there, he nced at the bald man being held hostage and then at his gang members, who were all ring at him like wolves ready to pounce.


    Then, Sun Jack turned his head toward the cage where Song 6PUS was held. Inside, the battered and bruised Song 6PUS struggled to his feet, his face a mess of blood and bruises. He grinned through the pain, revealing gums where his golden teeth had all been ripped out. His prosthetics were gone, dismantledpletely, leaving him looking utterly pathetic.@@novelbin@@


    Sun Jack looked to the left, then to the right. Finally, he raised his voice, shouting across the room to Song 6PUS, “Now you tell me—what should I choose this time? The money, or you?”


    Song 6PUS wobbled unsteadily but managed to stand inside the cage, staring at the chaos beyond the ss. He couldn’t believe the same decision he had faced earlier was now being thrust upon Sun Jack.


    At first, Song 6PUS shook his head with a bitter smile. Then, stiffening his neck and straining his voice, he screamed at the top of his lungs, “You idiot! How many times do I have to tell you?! Pick the money! In this city, money is more important than anything! With money, you can even sell out your own parents! Money gives you everything!”


    Sun Jack let out a dryugh, stepping closer to Song 6PUS’s cage. With one swift motion, he swung his arm, and the sharp Electric Arc de snapped out, shing through the ss and shattering it instantly.


    Reaching into the cage, Sun Jack grabbed the trembling, red-eyed Song 6PUS and yanked him out. Then, without hesitation, Sun Jack smashed his fist into Song 6PUS’s face so hard that it looked like his features were about to be rearranged.


    “F*** you! Wrong answer!!” Sun Jack roared.