I was walking home from the gym when I suddenly got goosebumps. I felt a chill down my spine as if something bad was about to happen. Almost instinctively, I looked around. I found a few men walking towards me. They were wearing leather jackets with very very punk hairstyles and had various gang tattoos on them. Fuck. I thought to myself. These are the guys Nova warned me about. Scrappers. They kidnapped people and scraped them for cyber parts. Realizing the danger I was in, I continued to walk forward, albeit with a little more caution. My thoughts quickened as I tried to find a solution. I instantly recounted the skills and perks I had in my mind. I had the Gun Runner perk that allowed me to shoot accurately while running. I also had the Ninjutsu perk that could be used after I escaped. And I still had the crystal in my head that locks onto my targets from Lil' Betty. With that, I devised a plan. I sent Nova a message and continued walking after checking my map. I went around in a circle around a rather crowded block first to see if they were really following me. They were. So I decided to follow my plan and started walking towards the nearest subway. I walked until I reached the underground bullet subway.

As the scrappers who believed that I still hadn't discovered them approached me, I pulled out the Desert that Nova gave me. It was a huge gun with a very powerful kick. The only downside was that every time I shot it, I felt like I was going to fly. Still, beggars couldn't be choosers. I shot at the person I thought was the most threatening, the person with the most cybernetics. After one shot, I quickly pulled up another gun from my waist. It was the gun I had when I woke up in this city. I scored two more headshots as I started to run down into the subway. I heard them yelling in Russian as they chased after me. There are still four people left, I thought to myself as I gasped for breath. Even though I had prepared myself, I was unable to come to terms with the fact that I had just killed three people without blinking. I shook my head as I tried to get rid of these thoughts. It was either them or me. I jumped across the platforms. As I reached the other platforms, I could see the scrappers in my sight. My heart turned cold as I felt pain in my lower stomach. Gunshots continued to ring but luckily, the bullet subway train came past us, blocking some of their shots. I held my lower abdomen in pain as I limped to cover. Then I heard different kinds of gunshots. They aren't the same model, I realized from the sound. The gunshots that just rang across were too powerful for them to be the same. I gasped as I leaned against the cover, using it as a support. The pain was getting worse and it was getting harder for me to move. I exhaled, trying to control my breath.

Nova's voice called out, "Raven, where are you?"

I managed to spit out a response between my rapid breathing, "H-hu- Here."

She jumped over the cover I was behind and looked over me. "Thankfully, the bullet went straight through. None of your vitals are damaged. You're bleeding out though." Yeah, thanks, Miss Obvious. She tore out a piece of fabric, "Here, take this and hold it on your wound. Give it pressure." Then she took out a big ass fucking syringe and before I could protest, slammed it into me. It didn't hurt though. The pain in my abdomen was fading as I figured out that it was probably a painkiller. "Your left arm's broken too. I'll relocate it for you." Just like before, before I could protest, she did it. Fuck fuck. Bitch. I gasped in pain. Even with the painkiller, I could still feel immense pain. My left arm was broken when I used Desert to shoot. During the adrenaline-filled moment, I didn't notice although I instinctively used my right arm after that as I was right-armed.

As things calmed down for a bit, I thought back. I had just killed three people. Granted, they were trying to kill me for cybernetic parts but still, they were humans. I felt queasy as I remembered the bloody hole I left in the first guy's head. I took another deep breath. Calm down. Calm down. They tried to kill you first. If you didn't kill them, they would have killed you. I tried to convince myself. But it wasn't working. The intense sense of guilt in my heart didn't lessen even a bit. I knew they were bad people. They've probably killed many people for their parts.

I shook my head. I knew that I would have to kill, sooner or later. I wanted to delay it as much as possible. I signaled to Nova that I wanted to get up. She quickly helped me up and I leaned on her as we walked. Her gray eyes which seemed to represent an endless fog stared at me as she said, "Stay with me. I'll get you to a doc."

I replied weakly, "Alright." We were quiet for a while as she helped me get in her car. After she started driving, I asked her, "Were you nearby when I asked for your help?"

She shook her head, "No. I was about 30 minutes away." She glanced at me from the corner of her eyes, "Why'd you ask?"

I laughed and then groaned, feeling even more pain in my abdomen even with the painkiller. "No reason." I realized that she was growing on me. I, who never had a friend before, was starting to like a person. I sighed. I guess it's bound to happen given that we live together in the same house, yeah? I thought dryly.

I have to train more, I realized as the car accelerated even more. This is far too dangerous. I don't have any cybernetics other than my eyes and yet, they targeted me. Fucking bullshit. I have to try even harder. While I haven't gotten over the fact that I just killed three people, I tried not to think about it too much. It was not that I didn't care about their lives. It was that I cared about mine more.

----------------------------------------

We reached in front of a... shop that was named Skitter. Nova slowly helped me down as we walked towards the shop. Well, she walked. I limped. Either way, as soon as we got in, I heard a yelp.

I turned to look who it was. It was a girl who looked about 24 years old. She had blonde hair with partially cybernetic nose, eyes, and ears. Her eyes widened as she ran towards Nova, "Nova, what happened? Who's this?"

She signaled with her head, "My friend. Is Skitter in?"

The girl blinked for a second and nodded, "Yeah, he's in." Then she looked at me, "Come on, let's help you in." I must have looked so terrible, huh? Well, I had a hole in my abdomen so...

I shook my head as we went through the back. The back was completely different from the front. In the front, it had a unique bland between corporate and punk style. In the back though, it was entirely mechanical. I saw a man sitting in front of his table, head nearly inside his node. Nova tsked, "Skitter, help me out here."

Skitter turned around to look at us in surprise and asked with a grin lopsided on his face, "Oh, Nova, back so soon? What's the matter?" Then he saw my wound. His face hardened, "Who is she? Doesn't matter. Get her on the chair. She's gonna bleed out in an hour with the way you tried to stop it."

This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

Nova barked back as she helped me to the chair, "Tsk, I had to make do with what I had." Skitter waved her out as he looked over my wound, "From the look of it, you have a gunshot wound. Lucky shot, went right through. Arm was broken too but forcefully relocated. Not the best but no need to fix that. Now let's fix your wound."

He slowly did his work. He first gave me a shot of painkillers before he started operating his machine. Various medical tubes were injected into me. I didn't feel any different but I trusted Nova. Since she didn't say anything, that meant she trusted Skitter. Although I've only been with Nova for about a week, I trusted her enough.

----------------------------------------

Two days passed since the incident. I've been feeling a little bit better but it was still hard to come to terms. However, I found that I could distract myself by grinding my skills. I've reached Body - 3 and Mind - 4. And I somehow grinded my stat Interface to level 2. It turned out that it was related to technology. More specifically, related to software. I've had one skill under it, which was Web Weaving. It was interesting. Since it has also reached level 2 along with Interface, I gained a lot of new knowledge along with it. I now knew how to web weave. It was very intriguing. It was like a whole new world was opened to me. It was like hacking, but way more intuitive. The way the data flowed and the way they can be manipulated to reach your goals seemed so natural to me. Although I've gotten a new perk, I haven't picked it up yet. The perks I got were interesting, to say the least.

Perk Names Perk Descriptions Data Ghost Moves through networks like a ghost, leaving behind little to no trace Interceptor You gain knowledge on how to intercept and decrypt communication lines Virus Engineer You are an expert at engineering all kinds of software and hardware viruses AI Infiltrator You can create Artificial Intelligence that are tailored towards infiltrating advanced security, exploiting and expanding vulnerabilities, and terminating or subduing enemy AI systems Backdoor Builder Once you've entered a system, it can never protect itself from you

All of them seemed really good. Especially Data Ghost, Virus Engineer, and AI Infiltrator. And these were all just Tier 1 perks! I shuddered from thinking about how overpowered Tier 2 and 3 would be. I took a deep breath and analyzed the pros of each of these perks. Data Ghost was very stealth focused and it seemed to be built towards that. Intercepter was more of like a data broker, learning all kinds of information just by tapping into communication lines. As for Virus Engineer, I felt like it was a little more brute force. But I guessed it was also very versatile since it said ALL kinds of viruses. And then, there was AI Infiltrator. It had a long ass fucking description and it looked pretty good. As for Backdoor Builder, I thought it was fine, but it wasn't as good as the others.

I made a decision. I would choose AI Infiltrator for now. When I can pick the next perk, Data Ghost and then Virus Engineer. After that, I would decide when the time comes.

You've gained the perk, AI Infiltrator.

Knowledge rushed into my brain. To my surprise, this AI creation process didn't require any knowledge of programming. Instead, it would be created in the datadeck and would be uploaded when web weaving. The datadeck was located behind my neck. It was like a little slot with multiple slots for CPUs. To be honest, I felt that it would be pretty hard. I glanced at the lock that was malfunctioning again. I could try it...

I breached the lock with Breach and started creating a relatively simple AI system. I made it so that it would search for the unique data flow from my datadeck. And whenever I said the word "Unlock", it would unlock and whenever I said the word "Lock", it would lock immediately. I also made it so that it didn't directly connect to my datadeck as I knew that if someone got control of the AI, they would be able to connect to my datadeck and mess with my head. I had to be within a few feet for the voice command to work. After I've given all the commands and created it, I uploaded it to the lock. The blue lines of code seemed to glitch out for a moment before it became stable again. I grinned as I commanded, "Unlock." I heard the door unlocking. Then I commanded, "Lock." It locked.

After that, I went to the corner of the room to be as far away from the door as possible and said, "Unlock." It didn't work. Then, I walked back towards it, and with my node, I opened an audio file of a stranger saying unlock. It unlocked.

I frowned as it was quite a loophole. I quickly retracted the AI to make a few modifications. I made it so that it would track the distance between it and the datadeck. Whenever it received a command, it would record the sound, run a sound distance measuring algorithm, and if it matched, it would run the command. I felt that it was quite a complicated method compared to just simply recognizing my voice but I had no knowledge on how to include a sound bank in the AI yet. It would come at a later date... Patience, patience, I thought to myself. Everything requires effort, time, and some luck. It appears that I can receive greater benefits with less effort compared to others. That doesn't give me an excuse to slack off. Fucking scrappers.