Cyber Era Witch
Chapter 392 - 352 - Red Letter

Chapter 392: 352 Chapter Red Letter

Xu Yang redesigned Golden Branch in a bid to make it more user-friendly, describing it as a "high-tech soil fertility enhancement device," made of aluminum alloy and glass, enclosed within a completely independent ecological packaging. An offshoot of the Golden Branch was inserted into the soil every 15 mu (approx. 1 hectare) on average, waiting for it to grow taller before increasing the intervals between them.

It was the boughs of the Golden Tree that dispersed years of pollution and improved soil fertility, making all this possible.

While Xu Yang was perusing the report from the Nestor Cooperative Company, Little Fool noticed a notification popping up on the handheld terminal beside Xu Yang and couldn’t help but poke at it with a finger, switching the page to a Cyber Specter discussion thread on an anonymous network.

There, Xu Yang discovered a highlighted alert.

"Cyber Specter," it read like a prayer, "may you reveal yourself in splendor. My disabled brother is on the brink of death, our Self Help Society is on the verge of collapse, and we live among savages and madmen. May you use your vast data and great wisdom to protect us, enabling us to transcend electronic vanity, have infinite determination, upload our consciousness to the digital Pure Land, and free ourselves from the shackles of this world."

"Quack?" Little Fool looked at Xu Yang.

A cry for help? Xu Yang pondered.

In recent months, the discussion thread had barely contained any messages of value—only today, was there truly someone seeking the help of the Cyber Specter. That meant he could not just stand by; he would have to interfere somehow.

Well... Seeking Shadow had been stationed in the Self Help Society for a long time, helping Poison Master maintain order. He should know what had happened.

Xu Yang contacted Seeking Shadow.

"What’s the situation with the Self Help Society?" Xu Yang asked. "Has anything unusual occurred?"

"A big ’unusual,’" Seeking Shadow replied. "Someone is trying to seize control from Poison Master. He’s been a complete tyrant within the society, thinking he’s above everyone. Countless times I’ve wanted to engage him in a fight to the death, but Poison Master always stops me."

"Really? Who is it?"

"Hosoda Yoshiyuki. He’s been around for a long time, but lately, he’s been particularly irritable."

The lone avenger. Xu Yang thought to himself. The man was a walking arsenal, fully strapped from head to toe, bearing firepower that towered over the masses in the Self Help Society. To them indeed he would be a hard nut to crack, and now it seemed necessary for Xu Yang to do some investigating before finding an appropriate resolution.

"Let me tap into your visual feed." Xu Yang closed his eyes and connected through Digital Mind, quickly gaining access to Seeking Shadow’s vision.

She had arrived at the central square of the Self Help Society, which was located in the middle of a forest, where many rudimentary structures covered in sheet metal had been erected.

Hosoda Yoshiyuki stood in the center of the square, looking calmer and more enigmatic than before, wrapped in a large black ultra-fiber trench coat that covered the traces of his modified body.

At that moment, he was not the boorish tyrant that rumors had painted him to be, but instead stood, head raised high, shouting at an obese young man at the top of a tree.

"Come down," Hosoda Yoshiyuki scolded angrily, "don’t be ridiculous!"

"Just let me die!" The fat man was distraught and panicked, and it was clear he was clueless about what he was saying, "...My favorite anime stopped airing! I dropped out of school! And I’m in debt for 390,000! I don’t know what to do! I want to erase myself from this damned world..."

"Do some volunteer work!" Hosoda Yoshiyuki raised his voice using the amplifier in his throat, "Some simple tasks! Help your family, make their lives better, you idiot..."

"I’ve wasted so much time..." The fat man sobbed. "I’m 25 years old and I’ve had enough. I thought the Self Help Society was a place where one could die peacefully."

"Not anymore!" Hosoda Yoshiyuki transformed his right hand into a claw gun, "I’m gonna straighten you all out—you bunch of cowardly, timid trash who flee from social realities!"

"Can’t you just leave me alone?" The fat man, standing on a wobbly branch, seemed about to fall at any moment.

"I’m not minding you, I hate you!" Hosoda Yoshiyuki aimed at the fat man’s chest, "You eat until you’re fat and happy... Look at you small-timers, with so many opportunities to study well, work well, do the things you like, but you don’t cherish them at all, isolating yourself from society to come here and play these drunken games. I’ve had enough!"

"You’re a super criminal, we are just..." The branch under the fat man’s feet cracked and wobbled. He quickly lost his balance and fell, but Hosoda Yoshiyuki took the opportunity to shoot the claw gun from his right hand, clutching the fat man’s arm with its talons. The high-tensile metal chain rattled as it rapidly reeled the fat man back to Hosoda Yoshiyuki, sparing him from a deadly fall.

Hosoda Yoshiyuki glared at the now frazzled fat man with a gloomy and resentful look, shoving him away forcefully, then turned to those scantily clad wastrel within the Self Help Society.

"All of you are fools," Hosoda Yoshiyuki mocked.

"I’ll fight you!"

"Idiots!" The Self Help Society had no shortage of individuals eager to prove their courage. Hearing Hosoda Yoshiyuki’s direct insults, they grabbed pipes, branches, and bricks and charged at him furiously.

Hosoda Yoshiyuki sneered with fulminating rage in his heart.

He raised the firearm in his left hand, opened the missile silo in his chest, ready to slaughter them all. He had thought his armed appearance would sufficiently intimidate these so-called Self-Helpers, but it wasn’t enough. He intended to bring a new doctrine of metal and blood.

"Stop!" Seeking Shadow suddenly leaped out, brandishing Shadow Kill, "Don’t move!"

"You think you can stop me?" Hosoda Yoshiyuki fixed his gaze on Seeking Shadow, "All I have to do is pull the trigger—"

In an instant, Hosoda Yoshiyuki realized his neural implants had been hacked, his network module had been attacked by a Trojan horse at some point, and his information processing panel was flooded with blank information. The company’s hackers! Hosoda Yoshiyuki immediately knew the predicament he was in; this was also why he lingered in the Self-Help Society and didn’t continue seeking revenge.

Five years! He had wasted five years in prison; his network firewall was severely outdated. He could kill an entire security team from the company, but a professional hacker could make him wish for death. Suddenly losing control of his body, he crashed heavily to the ground.

"Ah ah—"

"It must be..."

"Cyber Specter!" The Self-Helpers, seeing Hosoda Yoshiyuki’s transformation, were suddenly reminded of the legend of old. Where Seeking Shadow was, the Cyber Specter would also intervene.

Without a single strike, Seeking Shadow had subdued Hosoda Yoshiyuki, exhilarating the onlookers even more.

Fantastic!

Lately, their greatest pain had been Hosoda Yoshiyuki. Before his capture, he had constantly taken the offensive, continually attacking the company, showing disdain for these passively resisting Self-Helpers, creating deep animosity between them.

And yet he still had to hide out here; he seemed to have a tacit agreement with the company that they wouldn’t bother hunting him down as long as he stayed in the lawless lands. If the cost of killing him was too high, it wouldn’t be worth it.

Now, at last, Hosoda Yoshiyuki had been taken down by the Cyber Specter, to the great relief of the Self-Helpers. They had tried using electromagnetic grenades, but Hosoda Yoshiyuki had dodged them; he was like a superman of enhancements.

"Nice!"

"Beat him!"

"Such arrogance!"

"Come on! Kill him!" The people who were eager before were now even more energized as they rushed up with their crude weapons, slamming Hosoda Yoshiyuki with a clanging din.

Hosoda Yoshiyuki tried to raise his hand to block, but his visual panel kept throwing up errors; the bionic circuits on his spine stopped powering up, leaving him as powerless as a person stripped of their spine, just lying there taking the beating.

"Enough," Seeking Shadow ordered, dispersing the Self-Helpers. Hosoda Yoshiyuki’s body had been self-modified to be as tough as metal and bone; he wouldn’t be harmed by a beating—it just made it convenient for them to vent.

Breathing heavily on the ground, he attempted to cleanse his system of the Trojan with his pre-installed antivirus, but it was futile. Even firing up the powerful antivirus mode was useless; the software suggested he upgrade to a yearly membership and offered a 5-minute trial.

Wishing on a miracle, Hosoda Yoshiyuki opted for the trial service, and the antivirus began to scan his brain, prompting the detection of anti-company sentiments, which scared him into halting the scan.

Finished.

Now, as long as that Trojan in Hosoda Yoshiyuki acted up, he would be immobilized again. That was the downside of synthetic parts.

"You’ve lost," Seeking Shadow said. "The people here have been tolerating you."

"These people are all cowards," Hosoda Yoshiyuki overcame the numbness on his body, struggling to his feet. His neural implants still contained that entrenched Trojan file, which he couldn’t eliminate, making him feel very odd. But thinking of the mysterious and unfathomable Cyber Specter, a sense of invisible reverence surged in his heart, something that went beyond his understanding.

"I’ve killed 120 unjust men," Seeking Shadow said coldly. "The bounty on me isn’t less than yours, and the Bounty Hunters fear me."

"It’s different," Hosoda Yoshiyuki took a deep breath. "Forget it, I just find it all absurd. I spent five years in jail, living like a non-human animal, and when I came out to see Anjiu City, no, the Northern Archipelago, it’s still full of worthless sheep. I thought about running around and shouting, hoping to awaken them."

"You can only take care of yourself," Seeking Shadow turned to leave.

"Who is the Cyber Specter?" Hosoda Yoshiyuki followed. "Is it strong? Can it upgrade my network module? Is the Trojan in my brain planted by it?"

"The current problem isn’t you," Seeking Shadow observed the surroundings. "The problem is there’s someone who sincerely believes in the power of the Cyber Specter. I must find her now, and bring her a gift. With her unwavering belief that the Cyber Specter can change her fate, how can we let her down?"