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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Simzy
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Wow, how long has it been since I’ve seen the sky?
I thought as I looked at the hazy ceiling shield of Neon City, which looked like shattered glass.
Since it felt like I was seeing the sky for the first time in a long while.
It would have been better if I could have seen a vast landscape.
Unfortunately, the sky was in a state of being occupied by countless airships.
It seemed there were more airships than clouds.
From aerial MPVs for transporting large numbers of people, to tactical helicopters equipped with propellers spinning with a loud wind noise.
But this was supposed to be a flight-restricted area.
It seemed such a trivial problem meant nothing to Monolith, a cyberpunk megacorp.
I admired the airships appearing across the dark sky.
“Is this the ending scene?”
I briefly recalled the events that had taken place underground.
The continuously appearing armed personnel.
The random vagrants and bounty hunter riffraff.
And even the mutated contaminants with their endless malice toward perfectly fine living beings.
Hmm.
Horrifying to think about again.
It felt like I had gone through every hardship imaginable, breaking through hundreds of meters of underground to escort the Chairman.
It was an incident I had never seen in the game.
But judging by the sheer volume of it, it was a size that could have easily been made into a DLC.
It’s a relief that no one was seriously injured.
I thought as I looked around.
Just then, the Chairman of Monolith, who had finished a brief conversation with the subordinate employees who had appeared on the airship, approached.
“They said they were mercenaries confident in their skills, and their work is certainly clean.”
The Chairman of Monolith praised us with an unlit cigarette in her mouth.
It was part of the request.
One cigarette after escaping to the surface.
Drek looked at her cigarette with a sad gaze from behind his sunglasses.
But anyway, the Chairman spoke to us with a confident attitude.
“Now, everyone, tell me what you want. I’m in a good mood right now, so I’ll grant everything, to a certain extent.”
…….
In order, each person said what they wanted.
“And the Mage?”
Eventually, my turn arrived.
…Hmm.
To be honest, I hadn’t thought about it much.
Should I just ask for more credits?
No, Drek already said that.
Since I couldn’t drag the time in front of the Chairman.
At the end of a very short (0.1 second) deliberation, I conveyed my thoughts to the Chairman exactly as they were.
“…Well, to be honest, I didn’t really do much. Just take better care of my other colleagues.”
“Hey…! What are you—.”
The Chairman, with her hands lightly clasped behind her back, cut off my colleagues’ words.
“Really?”
And then she continued.
“Even though this situation itself, where you make the chairman of a megacorp indebted to you, is a rare occurrence? I won’t ask a second time.”
“……Yes.”
Since she put it that way, it’s a bit awkward to say no now.
“Hoho.”
At my words, the Chairman laughed softly.
“I was thinking it all the way from the underground, but you really are a bit peculiar.”
Was it a thought to herself?
The Chairman, who didn’t wait for my answer, began to slowly approach me.
The security team members who were nearby took up positions as if to guard the Chairman and be wary of me, but at a single gesture from the Chairman, they all took a step back and cleared the way.
Why is she suddenly approaching me?
Even with my questioning look, the Chairman did not stop her steps toward me.
Finally, the Chairman of Monolith, the monarch, got right up to my nose.
“This.”
I waited for the Chairman’s words, tensed.
“Is my personal number, so if you need anything later, contact me separately.”
The Chairman, with a faint smiling-eyed expression, disappeared beyond the sky on an airship.
A beat later, I answered without conscious thought.
“…Pardon?”
The Chairman’s number remaining in my visual interface was telling me that what had just happened was not a dream.
This is more burdensome.
If I had known, I should have just asked for credits.
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At that time, when I had escorted the Chairman.
Why did I suddenly remember that past event?
I shook my head to clear my mind.
I faced the reality I wanted to avoid again.
The corporate chairman who rules cyberpunk.
The super-AI that can rule cyberpunk.
Their conversation began without any greetings.
“Ko-ozaka, why didn’t you kill him?”
“?”
At the Chairman’s question, it was me who was puzzled instead.
Why didn’t she kill him?
What is this all of a sudden?
While I was tilting my head, Eve, who was having a staring contest with the Chairman from inside the hologram screen, answered the question in her usual tone, with her usual expression.
[Because I do not know what variables may arise.]
“Hmm….”
The Chairman, who let out a short hum, slightly shook her head and disagreed with Eve’s words.
“Still, it would have been better to kill him.”
She spoke her thoughts.
“I also don’t understand why you just let him go with a simple apology. There was even a vice chairman who could have helped you according to his own interests or emotions, so it would have been right to just kill him and solve the matter cleanly.”
[But there is no guarantee that a dangerous situation would not have arisen. It would have been different if this unit were the only one there, but this unit was not the only one at that location.]
The Chairman let out a loud scoff.
“Ha, what a truly human reason.”
The Chairman’s gaze, in which laziness and sharpness coexisted, stared at the hologram screen.
“Let’s assume this, did you just let him go because he made you?”
[Absolutely negative.]
“I, for one, don’t understand this situation where the variable of Ko-ozaka was left alone.”
[As I stated earlier, because ‘Shiun’ was also at that location, there was no reason to take the risk—.]
Oh man, a fight is about to break out. I didn’t know what would happen if the top predators of cyberpunk fought each other.
I mustered up my courage with difficulty, cut into their conversation and opened my mouth.
“First of all, both of you, please don’t fight—.”
“Alright.”
[Acknowledged.]
“Huh?”
The atmosphere, which had been like a lit powder keg, disappeared in an instant. At the same time, both of their gazes turned to me.
…….
Seeing my dumbfounded expression, the Chairman spoke nonchalantly as if it were nothing.
“It wasn’t something to fight about. I wasn’t even there, so what right do I have to fight.”
[I was only receiving feedback on the said controversy, there was nothing to call a debate.]
“……”
No… well. It’s a relief if you don’t fight….
What is this empty feeling?
The Chairman, who had been looking at Eve on the hologram screen, turned her gaze to me.
“But as I said, it’s still true that ‘Ko-ozaka’ is a variable.”
Golden eyes looked at me.
“We still don’t know for what reason that old man developed the artificial intelligence called ‘Eve,’ and what his purpose is.”
“…Hmm.”
To be honest, it was a part I hadn’t even thought about.
I just nodded my head like a machine and agreed with the Chairman’s words.
“…I’ll look into this part separately as well.”
Oh.
“I’d be grateful if you would.”
I answered with a happy heart.
With a super-AI and a megacorp chairman above me, my shoulders felt very light.
“Then that’s all for the reason I called you.”
The Chairman, having wrapped up her words, looked at the hologram screen where Eve was once again.
“I am a little worried about the artificial intelligence, but thinking about the broadcast station hacking, I think it’ll be fine.”
With those words, she put down the Zippo lighter she was holding on the executive desk.
“And it doesn’t seem like you’d listen even if I told you to stay away from the artificial intelligence.”
“Well, I guess not?”
[…….]
Just because Eve was dangerous. The matter of staying away from Eve was a separate issue.
“Anyway, I’ve heard the explanation for everything that has happened so far, so my worries are a little eased.”
The Chairman stretched briefly and continued speaking.
“If I had my way, I’d like to have a meal together like last time before you go, but it seems a little difficult today. I’m a bit behind on work.”
The Chairman stood up from her luxurious chair.
Naturally, I stood up along with the Chairman.
The ‘Confucian scholar-official of a hierarchical society’ inside me forced my body to stand up.
“Ah, and what was her name, ‘Maya’?”
“…Yes.”
Since I had asked Dr. Terra to take care of Maya’s matter, there was no way the Chairman wouldn’t know about her.
“She’s a pitiful child, so go and visit her.”
“…I was planning to do that anyway.”
“Hmm.”
The Chairman nodded in agreement, as if she had expected as much.
She naturally walked toward the elevator.
So it was a relief that it ended without any particular problems.
When I had just entered the Monolith Tower following the Chief Secretary.
A future where I became a mage. And the artificial intelligence that had become Eve, was drawn.
It was a relief that, unlike typical cyberpunk, the Chairman was a person of faith.
“Oh, right.”
The Chairman called us back once more as we were about to go down the elevator.
“Since several of you are living together anyway, I’ll schedule a separate construction. How about merging that entire floor? Or there’s also the method of me buying the entire building.”
“…Pardon?”
“We just have to avoid the pillars that support the load, so it shouldn’t be a big problem. I may not look it, but I’ve worked on construction sites before.”
…….
For a moment, I didn’t understand.
“And also, I’ll get a place there later too. I’ll come visit sometimes when I have time.”
…Chair-Chairman.
What in the world does that mean?
Beyond the closing elevator doors, I saw the Chairman’s faintly smiling face.
I decided to pretend I hadn’t heard.
“Eve.”
Coming out of the Monolith Tower, the headquarters of Monolith, I stood blankly on the street and muttered to myself.
[Awaiting.]
…….
I didn’t know she was still following me around even after getting an artificial body.
I opened my mouth to say something. But I managed to hold it back.
It wasn’t just a day or two anyway. And it wasn’t anything new.
“Shall we go out for a bit before we go?”
[Where are you referring to, I ask.]
Since I was out for the first time in three days, I thought I should go and see her face once.
“The Japanese restaurant.”
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