Chapter 11

“Aaaand Quick hack.” I said looking towards the row of vending machines. I was hanging out around the Cherry Blossom Market, basically practicing on everything electronic.

Jun was being a jerk so I left the house to give him some private time. Plus I really wanted to grind out my Netrunning.

Pinging the Vending machine let me know that it was actually connected to a small network, that according to the data I got in return, let the owners know when the vending machine was low on stock.

Made sense.

I sent a ping to the next machine.

*100 Quick Hack XP Gained.*

*100 Intelligence XP Gained*

*Intelligence Leveled up!*

I blinked. I didn’t feel any different? I checked myself over, but nothing seemed to change. When my Body leveled up it was pretty noticeable, at least at first, so why was intelligence not seeming to make any changes?

I pouted a little as I tried to think but again nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

“I’ve been scammed.” I grumbled, as I went back to my Quick Hacks.

At least now I could do more Breach training.

But first. I wanted to level Quick Hacks. I wanted that knowledge download. Bored, I looked around and noticed a guy walking along. He had cheap chrome. I could tell. So I started a Quick Hack on him. If he noticed I would just delta.

Heh Delta. Cyberpunk lingo was so fun.

I started with a scan using my optics. It… Well it took a while. I ended up having to follow him around the market a bit before the scan completed and I got his port info. I activated the program, starting the Quick Hack. It was slow, The guys security was better than a vending machine after all.
Still Slowly as he walked across the sidewalk I could see the ticker doing up and then it pinged him. Letting me know he wasn’t connecting to any networks.

*100 Quick Hacks XP Gained.*

*Quick Hacks skill level up!*

But as I expected. Since I hadn’t targeted a person until now, it gave me an immediate XP boost. Since it was something I hadn’t done before. While repeating the same thing over and over would keep giving me XP it did eventually slow drastically but doing something new would usually make it easier to gain XP again.

But my mind was a blur. Quick Hacks. Seemed simple, and in some ways it was compared to Breach Protocol. But it was still so complicated!

I smiled as I now simply knew what Quickhacks were. The programs that could be activated on the fly to do so many different things. I hummed a bit as I thought about the best way to level it, and honestly without a lot of people to hack. I was kinda doing it.

But now I had a better understanding of the equipment. I could actually swap out programs now. I knew how to do that, and I had a feeling with a few levels I could spread hacks as well. The knowledge was there tempting me.

Well. I had level 2 Intelligence. Might as well get back to grinding. I grinned as I started pinging people that walked by. Avoiding anyone with serious chrome.

—-

I ended up bored of just sitting on a bench and Quick Hacking everyone, so I started wandering. You would be amazed at how many Camera systems you can see from a sidewalk.

A quick Breach Protocol, which usually ended up meaning I had to find a place to sit as it took a minute. Then I could Quick Hack it surprisingly fast since I already had access to its system. Most of them I would learn were connected to a security system, or a few other cameras.

It wasn’t ‘interesting’ knowledge in and of itself.

But it was also solid XP.

A couple of hours of walking around pinging and Breaching everything I could find had results.

*Breach Protocol skill level up!*

*1 Perk Point Gained.*

*Quick Hacks skill level up!*

*1 Perk Point Gained.*

Level 2 Breach and Quickhacks. Nice.

The speed of my improvement from the baby deck I had before was insane. I was so happy I spent the eddies on this upgrade.

Unfortunately while I was getting Intelligence XP alerts. It wasn’t enough to push me to the next level. So I was now maxed out until I leveled Intelligence.

But I did have perks!

I started on Breach and for once I was actually pleased by the selection. Lots of options caught my eye.

Wall Breaking. Creates a backdoor in the system after a Breach. Making future access instant.

Powerful Breach. Break through systems much faster but causes an alert if security is strong enough.

Daemon Summoner. Upload a Daemon onto a network instantly after a Breach.

All of these sounded Preem.

In the end I went with Wall Breaking. I liked the idea of being able to set up stuff for later. Instead of being forced to Breach the system on the fly.

I was distracted for a bit as I suddenly learned a lot about creating backdoors into systems. Like a lot alot.

I shook it off and focused on Quick Hacks. What goodies could I find in that list?

Honestly? Some pretty good stuff. Quick Hacks were the Magic in Cyberpunk. The ability to cause someone’s brain to melt with a look if you were good enough.

The options were pretty useful.

Quicker Hack. Halves time for a Quick Hack.

Cyber Security. Massively increases time to Quick Hack or Breach your System.

Quick Ram. Ram restores twice as fast.

There was a lot more, And Quick Hacks perks had a lot of pre-req options. Meaning that what I picked now would make a big difference in the future.

But the one that grabbed my attention was probably the least offensive one. Cyber Security. This wasn’t a game. If someone hacked me here? My Brain would be melting out my ears, or I would be on the ground twitching very shortly.

So protecting myself sounded like a smart play. Even if I would prefer to be a more stealth build in the future.

Can’t shoot at me if you never know I’m there.

I picked it anyways. Smiling as some knowledge slipped into my head on how to buff my security, through a bit of program editing, it was… I knew enough about Quickhacking at this point to be sure. The editing wouldn’t work like it should, and yet it did. Was there actually a… Magical component to some perks?

In the end I shrugged I had no way of knowing, and I decided to focus on the good. Anyone trying to Quick Hack me would be massively confused at how difficult it was.

I liked it.

—–

It was time. I had made some calls over the last few days. Getting some lukewarm responses, before I hit on one that actually worked. Someone selling not just what I wanted, but willing to do the alterations I needed.

Hiromi was willing to drive me so we headed out mid afternoon.

“Are you going to finally tell me what this is about?” She kept prodding me for information, but I knew I had to keep it a surprise. She had constantly bothered me about my style. She of course went for Gang Chic.

I was going for something a little different. What would they call it again? Neo-militarism? I smiled yeah that sounded about right. The little shop we were heading to was a little backalley deal. The sort of thing you had to know about, to know about.

Hiromi parked her bike on the street. It was safe enough, there were a lot of shops here, and shopping areas especially those held by gangs were usually kept as crime free as possible. Couldn’t make money on the shops if you kept robbing all the customers.

We walked down an alley instead of keeping to the main street. But that was on purpose, a place selling netrunning suit’s? It wouldn’t want to be well known, Netrunners wouldn’t trust a shop just on the street. No it had to be hidden with a lot of hacking needed to figure out the location.

Or if you were a normal person you could just ask someone in the know and save yourself some time.

The alley was dark and drippy, Hiromi was looking around like she was ready to stab someone but she still didn’t know what was going on exactly.

Finally I found it. A door with that had a weird symbol on it. It wasn’t anything I recognized, and was apparently just the symbol for the shop, as explained by the owner when I called to set my order up.

“C’mon Hiromi this is it.” I told her as I turned and knocked on the door. I waited a minute before it slid open, a man looking like a real monster opened the door, a machine gun resting in his hands as he looked me over.

“Here for an order pickup.”

“Enter.” He offered stepping back, and then Hiromi and I entered into a clothing store.

Yeah. Like I said Netrunners had issues. Funnily enough this part of the shop connected to the front of the store, so I could literally see the street as Hiromi and I walked inside. The owner was a little asian woman sitting behind a set of bars smoking from a pipe. The entire shop had a very asian feel to it. Most of her offerings seem to be older style japanese work.

Fancy.

Once inside I waved at the woman behind the bars. “I’m Motoko, here about a special order?”

“Ah. I was wondering when you would show up. You’re younger than I thought.” She said immediately looking me over and then Hiromi as well who was looking around already checking out the clothing on the racks as if she was wondering if she wanted something.

At least she had been until I mentioned a special order.

“Ooh you ordered something special?” She whispered as I smiled at her.

“You have my measurements, so I doubt you’re that surprised.” I tell the woman who chuckled a throaty noise.

“You’d be surprised, a lot of girls will chrome out to be smaller. Some guys like that. Alright come around back. Special order I want to make sure it fits.” She said gesturing to a door in the back of the shop which I walked through Hiromi following, and the guard following behind both of us.

The backroom was just that, a room obviously where the woman worked on custom orders, she even had a little area for making adjustments while the person wore whatever clothing she had made.

“Alright here it is. Changing room is there.” She mentions pointing to a small curtain over a side of the room.

Hardly private, but that was fine. I nodded and took the sealed bag she had given me as I walked over.

“Oooh what is it?” Hiromi asked as always not caring about privacy and following me right into the little area. I rolled my eyes at her as I pulled off my little jacket, and the stupid T shirt I had been wearing.

Never going to need that again, at least on a job. And then I dropped my pants which had a raised eyebrow from Hiromi.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“Don’t follow me into a changing room and act surprised.” I told her bluntly as I pulled open the bag unsealing it and pulling out something I had wanted for a while.