Shaolin Palm Fist.
It was Shaolin Prosthetic Science's most basic martial art, centered on fist techniques and palm techniques.
By grade, a Tier 2 martial art.
Since the martial art's value was on the low side, a surprising number of illegal copies of Shaolin Palm Fist were circulating.
Expensive and hard to obtain, but the sort of thing you could get hold of one way or another if you tried.
Shaolin Prosthetic Science normally didn't go out of its way to crack down on illegal copies of Shaolin Palm Fist either.
At most they picked a day once every few years and dealt with the illegal copies.
Get caught wrong at that moment and you were in enormous trouble.
But none of that applied to Woojin.
Because Woojin could acquire a martial art directly as a “skill” without any martial arts implant.
Catch the Tech Junkie that used Shaolin Palm Fist, acquire the Shaolin Palm Fist “skill,” then sell off the Shaolin Palm Fist martial arts implant, and every suspicion pointing at Woojin vanished cleanly.
Even if someone suspected Woojin and reported him, there would be no evidence.
With no martial arts implant and no data left in his neural interface, what would they use to prove Woojin had stolen the martial art?
It was why the trait [Inexplicable] was broken.
Woojin asked Tall Man.
“Tell me more about this Tech Junkie that uses Shaolin Palm Fist. What does it look like? When and where was it spotted?”
“HAHAHA! I knew you'd be interested.”
Shaolin Palm Fist, after all.
There would be plenty of people interested besides Woojin.
“Its appearance is supposedly much like an ordinary Tech Junkie. Gray suit, hair as messy as a beggar's, and those out-of-its-mind eyes.”
“I can roughly picture it. When was it spotted?”
“First sighting was about 2 MONTHS ago? There have been about three credible sighting reports.”
“Three times in two months is too low a frequency. Is it really a Tech Junkie?”
A normal Tech Junkie wandered around out of its mind and got hunted by mercenaries like Cole Graves.
Which is to say, they stood out tremendously.
A Tech Junkie using Shaolin Palm Fist would have stood out all the more.
Think how many people would be after a Shaolin Palm Fist implant.
And yet it had been seen only three times in two months, like somebody's lost cat?
There was clearly some story behind it.
“BRO is quick on the uptake after all. It's probably a Tech Junkie somebody is managing. Though I've no idea why they'd stick a martial arts implant into the thing.”
“A reanimated corpse?”
A reanimated corpse.
A killing weapon made by bringing a dead body back to life.
The biggest difference from a Tech Junkie was whether someone was controlling it.
If someone was controlling it, there was a chance it wasn't a Tech Junkie but a reanimated corpse.
“MAYBE? I don't know exactly either. Far too little information has surfaced.”
“I see.”
“But BRO, if your luck is good you might just run into it. You go around District 297 every day, don't you?”
Woojin nodded.
As a sanitation civil servant, Woojin went around a designated route every day collecting garbage.
Running into the Tech Junkie in the course of that was perfectly possible.
“Thanks. I got some fairly important information for free.”
“NEVER MIND! It isn't such great information. It's just a rumor going around! I only brought it up on the off chance, since you happen to be in charge of District 297.”
“I'll watch out.”
“HAHAHA! GOOD! GOOD! Then I'll be off. Keep at it, BRO!”
With that, Tall Man vanished across the alley in an instant.
Woojin sank into thought as he hauled garbage bags.
‘A Tech Junkie that uses Shaolin Palm Fist. Can I catch it?’
Not right now, he couldn't.
He had gained [Diamond Qigong] and a submachine gun, but that alone left him short in attack power, speed, and accuracy alike.
‘But it isn't hopeless.’
Woojin had the Tier 4 martial art [Diamond Qigong].
Invest skill points and grow [Diamond Qigong], and enduring the attacks of a Tech Junkie using Shaolin Palm Fist would be perfectly possible.
Add a proper means of attack to that, and he should be able to take down the Shaolin Palm Fist Tech Junkie as well.
The question was what secret that Tech Junkie held.
A Tech Junkie whose mind was gone from electronic narcotics, yet it didn't wander just anywhere, appearing and disappearing instead?
There seemed to be some secret to it.
‘Come to think of it…… the special computer with Diamond Qigong in it came out of my district too, didn't it?’
Shaolin Palm Fist and Diamond Qigong.
Both were Shaolin Prosthetic Science martial arts.
Could there be some connection between the two?
‘Hsss. Getting Shaolin Palm Fist on top would be delicious, but there's no telling what secret is tangled up in it, so it looks a little dangerous too.’
Shaolin Palm Fist and Diamond Qigong had split off from the same root, so they matched well.
If he could obtain both, Woojin's fighting power would take one large jump upward.
But there was no telling what circumstances were tangled up in it.
High risk, high return.
‘For now let's do what I can do.’
There was no guarantee he would even meet the Tech Junkie that used Shaolin Palm Fist in the first place.
There was even a chance someone had already hunted that Tech Junkie down.
Only with good luck could he hunt the Tech Junkie.
Spending time trying to catch a Tech Junkie he might or might not meet was foolish.
Right now it seemed better to concentrate on the bet with Victor.
He would raise his performance rating a full 7 points and take that 15,000,000 credits, no matter what.
“All right. Let's finish fast today too!”
<Very good, Officer Woojin!>
Woojin, already busily hauling garbage bags, pushed his speed higher still.
***
Woojin cleared garbage even more busily than the day before.
A sense of crisis, that today he might not earn a performance rating point, made Woojin move faster.
―[Hauling] has risen to Level 6.
―[Diamond Qigong] has risen to Level 3.
Thanks to that, his skill levels rose.
His overall work speed improved as well.
Only then could Woojin regain a little breathing room.
“Oh, fuck.”
Then Woojin's face crumpled.
It was around the time the garbage truck pulled into the next alley.
Near the garbage bin, garbage bags and loose trash were strewn about filthily.
That much he took in stride.
They were things he always cleared away.
The problem was the punk bastards leaning against the side of the garbage bin.
Black jackets made of cheap synthetic leather.
Shaved heads with lines scratched into them.
Puffing away at cigarettes with half-lidded eyes.
Submachine guns slung over their shoulders as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Four punks who looked, at a glance, like they wouldn't listen to a word anyone said were staring at the garbage truck, at Woojin.
Their eyes seemed to say, “So what, you fucking bastard. Get lost.”
“I suppose I should at least ask them to move?”
Woojin was muttering that and about to step down from the truck when Daphne's voice came.
<Officer Woojin. There is no need to bother.>
“Daphne?”
<Identity verification results indicate that all four individuals beside the garbage bin are unregistered. They are not citizens of Lemming City, so shooting them dead is perfectly acceptable.>
“Wow. That's a frightening thing to say.”
<Frightening? I am simply telling you what the law is.>
Hearing it said in that innocent voice made it more frightening.
<Besides, those people are obstructing your work, are they not, Officer Woojin? A citizen with his head screwed on straight would have cleared out the moment he saw the garbage truck so that you could do your job properly.>
“That's true.”
You could tell just from the way the punks were glaring at Woojin with those unpleasant eyes.
Friction of some kind was definitely coming.
Woojin could see it well enough himself.
In a game he would have gone straight into combat and swept the punks away.
But right now Woojin was in reality.
He was breathing with his hand resting on the truck's steering wheel, and the punks were breathing out cigarette smoke.
They weren't virtual characters; every one of them was a living, moving human being.
In which case, might some variable not arise?
“Still, I should try talking to them once.”
<You really do not need to…….>
Woojin climbed down from the garbage truck.
Then he smiled and walked up to the punks.
“Hello. I need to collect the garbage here starting now. I'd be grateful if you could move aside.”
“Don't want to.”
“…….”
Woojin gripped the handle of the submachine gun at his shoulder with his right hand.
“Ha ha ha. Come on now. I'd appreciate a little cooperation with city public service.”
“Fuck off.”
“…….”
Woojin was puzzled.
Could they not see he was holding a gun right now?
What exactly were these bastards relying on to act this arrogant?
“Fuck. You vermin bastards. If you don't want to die, clear out while I'm still asking nicely.”
“Heh heh heh. If we don't want to die?”
The punk in the middle smirked and raised his own gun.
At that, his companions beside him drew their submachine guns and aimed at Woojin.
The punk boss smirked with those half-lidded eyes.
“Funny guy. A cleaner bastard, of all things, saying 'if you don't want to die'? You clear out. If you don't want to die.”
“Hey. If I fire a gun at this distance, all of you die. Are you doing this knowing that?”
“Would only I die? You'd die too.”
“You think I can't shoot?”
“Yeah.”
The punk boss gave that short answer and snickered along with his underlings.
“Heh heh heh. Who has more to lose, you or me? Can you throw away a sanitation civil servant post you worked so hard to get, just like that?”
“You bastard……! For a punk, your head works surprisingly well.”
“Heh heh heh. Where's the idiot who doesn't know something that obvious? Now that you understand, shut up and work. And clean up around here while you're at it. Fuck, what is this? It stinks like hell.”
“…….”
Woojin quietly turned on his heel.
From behind him came the sound of cackling laughter mocking him.
“Heh heh heh. Cleaner bastards can bitch all they want.”
“Right. Killy, look how he turned right around and folded the second you came on strong.”
“If you'd told him to lick your shoes he'd have actually licked them.”
“Hey, hey. He'll hear you. Retard or not, he's a civil servant, you know.”
“Heh heh heh.”
Woojin smirked as he listened to the trash talk behind him.
He had meant to give them one chance, at least.
They had kicked it away with their own feet, so nothing to be done.
Thump.
Woojin pressed his body flat behind the garbage bin.
The garbage bin was made of thick steel and wouldn't budge under any ordinary impact.
Which meant it was suitable cover for a gunfight.
But he doubted a gunfight that fierce would break out today.
Those punk bastards looked far too stupid for it.
‘Do those bastards really think I've folded and won't do a thing?’
Ping.
Woojin took out the grenade and pulled the pin.
He counted one, two, three in his head.
And threw it over the garbage bin.
BOOM!
―You have gained experience.
―You have gained experience.
―[Stone Throwing] has risen to Level 2.
Woojin gripped his submachine gun and walked out steadily from behind the garbage bin.
In the alley, punks caught in the grenade blast lay collapsed, groaning.
“Ngggghhh…….”
“Crazy cleaner bastard…….”
Woojin looked down at the punks and shook his head.
“You're the crazy ones. Getting cocky while the state's business is being done.”
BRRRRRT—!
Woojin's submachine gun spat fire.