Ruan Xian and Sandra slowly finished their coffee on the sofa, letting their emotions settle.
Finally snapping out of the tale he had spun, Ruan Xian spoke up.
“I’ve saved a bit of money since coming to Night City, though I’m not sure if it’s enough for netrunning lessons.
If it isn’t, I’ll figure something out.
I’m pretty handy in a fight, and this hellhole is crawling with gangs, Scavengers, and shitty corps.
I know how to hit them for cash.”
“No need.
Save what little you have for yourself.
I swap tech with other netrunners from time to time, so I have plenty of netrunning skill shards on hand.
You don’t look like you have a neural port—concealed design, I take it?
Can you use skill shards?” From her scan in cyberspace, Sandra could only see the shell Ruan Xian wore; on the outside, he appeared entirely meat, without a speck of cyberware.
“Yeah.
A new design my buddy snagged from Kang Tao.
Undetectable on the surface, anti-theft, anti-intrusion—mostly anti-theft.” Ruan Xian pretended to scratch the back of his head.
Naturally, he didn’t have one there anyway; his neural interface was in the Spirit World.
“All right then.
I’ll give you some beginner stuff first.
Do you have braindance gear?” Sandra wasn’t surprised.
Neural interface designs were a dime a dozen these days: rich folks used custom gear, corp suits used lockable anti-theft ports, and broke gonks slapped electrical tape over theirs.
Otherwise, you risked losing your stuff anywhere you went.
“Got some.
Jacked it from the Scavengers, along with a few PCs.
Editing BDs is out of the question, but playback should be fine.
Want to come over sometime, Teacher?
My place is just a bit higher up, pretty close by.” Ruan Xian recalled that the Scavenger hideout had some gear and a few BD wreaths.
He could head back later to inspect them—purely for critical evaluation, of course.
“Alright.
I have specialized instructional BDs, so I’ll start you off with the basics.
Don’t be impatient—learn the fundamentals first.
Giving you quickhacks straight off is faster, but then you’d just be a combat netrunner with zero room for growth.
If you want to learn, learn properly.
That’s the only way you can live on carrying your buddy’s ideal.
To put it accurately, by Night City standards, she was practically a saint.
She genuinely wanted to guide Ruan Xian through the threshold of netrunning, rather than turn him into just another corporate disposable who did nothing but upload quickhacks and run pre-packaged scripts.
“Don’t worry, I’ve made up my mind.
To realize that vision, mindlessly spamming quickhacks isn’t going to cut it.” Ever since he planted his totem, Ruan Xian had harbored an incredible idea.
Breaking the information monopoly of governments and megacorps was something that had been achieved in the real world before.
But in cyberspace, only Ruan Xian possessed the confidence to tackle that massive problem—the one even the megacorps couldn’t solve.
“As for coming over, I’ll pass.
Netrunners rarely leave their sanctuaries—it’s too dangerous.
Once you’ve learned enough, you’ll naturally find my BBS.
We can communicate over that secret line then,” Sandra said.
*So you do know better than to wander around randomly,* Ruan Xian thought, thoroughly amazed.
*Then how the hell did you get snatched by Scavengers and almost lose a kidney?* In the game, this girl had left a truly unforgettable impression.
Those who knew, knew; those who didn’t would soon find out.
“There’s one more piece of payment.
Mr.
Screwllum granted admin privileges to a Data Fortress in Watson.
He said if I had someone I could trust who was willing, I could grant them access to the fortress—though I can only offer permissions below my own, and I don’t even know how to operate it yet.” To ensure he learned genuine technical skills, Ruan Xian added another layer of insurance.
After all, this was Night City.
“Next time, lead with something that important!” Sandra was stunned.
Back in 2020, every runner who made a name for themselves built their own Data Fortress to protect their ops in the Deep Net.
It aided offensive strikes against rivals while warding off counter-attacks.
But ever since the crash of the old Net, only a few megacorps—like NetWatch, Militech, Arasaka, SovOil, and Kang Tao—still maintained their own Data Fortresses.
Apart from the corps, rumor had it that the Voodoo Boys had their own system called Poseidon.
Those guys dumped every eddy earned from cyber-scams and hit jobs into it, and even then they felt it wasn’t enough—not to mention NetWatch was definitely keeping tabs on them.
“Besides basic netrunning theory, I’ll give you everything I have on Data Fortresses too.
But listen to me: don’t look at them right away.
Learn the basics first.
A Data Fortress is immensely powerful, but extremely dangerous.
If you jump straight in, you could easily get lost inside, turned into wetware to supply processing power, never to return.” Sandra spoke with utmost gravity.
“Mr.
Screwllum is a netrunner vastly superior to me, and he must have had his reasons for giving you admin access.
But you can’t be stupid about it.
Riding the coat-tails of a powerhouse gets you ahead the fastest and pays the best, but it’s also the easiest way to get killed.” Sandra genuinely wanted to help Ruan Xian.
His backstory was touching, and with a big shot backing him, not helping him earnestly could end up being dangerous for her as well. New chapters come out on novelping.com first.
“I understand.
I’ll be careful.
Once I learn the ropes, I can grant you access to the fortress too, if you want.” Ruan Xian knew his Data Fortress was ridiculously overpowered.
In its recent applications, that had become blindingly obvious: as long as he was within the range of his Lotus Leaf Fortress totem, he was practically invincible.
Even Alt would have to call him daddy if she walked in.
And he really did need someone to help manage the Data Fortress.
Under current circumstances, relying solely on Ruan Xian meant he couldn’t unleash the true potential of the totem fortress at all.
“I’ll think about it.
For a netrunner, entering someone else’s Data Fortress is basically handing over your life.
Especially since this belongs to Mr.
Screwllum—even if he isn’t running it personally, it’s still extremely dangerous.” Sandra hesitated.
A top-tier runner’s fortress was obviously formidable, and getting access would boost her capabilities immensely, but the danger was just as high.
Entering meant placing her life in someone else’s hands at any moment.
It was not an easy decision to make.
“Mm-hmm.
Fair enough.
Take your time, Teacher.
Call me whenever you need something.
I’ll be hanging around Watson for quite a while, and I’m plenty confident in my combat abilities.” Ruan Xian didn’t mind either way.
He truly had no intention of rigging the fortress.
Whether he tampered with it or not, if they ever turned hostile, killing her would be quick enough regardless.
As long as he remained within the range of the Watson totem, unless heavy armor was deployed—like a Chimera, a Basilisk, or combat mechs—he didn’t fear standard infantry weapons in the slightest.
In a couple of days, he’d order a second heart from Biotechnica, and then he’d be totally unstoppable.
An urban warfare god in Night City!
“Heh, pretty cocky, aren’t you?
Fine then.
I’ll introduce a fixer to you.
When you get tired of studying and want to stretch your legs, go test your skills.
I’ll call you if I really need you.
Hang tight for a bit while I go pack up your stuff.” Sandra raised an eyebrow.
Seeing how confident the kid was, she decided to hand over Regina’s contact info.
She’d let him experience the intensity of Night City combat for himself; under Kang Tao’s rule, guns certainly weren’t floating around in these quantities.
“Sounds like a plan.” Seeing Sandra head into the bedroom to gather the materials, Ruan Xian knew better than to follow her inside.
Instead, he brewed himself another cup of coffee, preparing to pull an all-nighter and study till kingdom come.