112: Mercenary Mission 1 × Sword Drawing

Time: October 19, 2075, 7:30.

Location: Night City Badlands, Buckle Family Camp's First Dining Hall.

Consumed "Healthy Living Set Meal".

Gained buff: Attack increased by 5%, Defense increased by 5%, Movement Speed increased by 5%.

Drank "Premium Tequila Secret Blend Cocktail".

Gained debuff: Mild Drunkenness (Attack increased by 10%, mild dizziness).

After finishing breakfast, Fang Yun gained a "better than nothing" strength boost.

Of course, the strength boost breakfast brought to Fang Yun wasn't truly "better than nothing".

It's just that for the enemies a rookie mercenary might face, Fang Yun's strength had long since reached an overpowered level.

So, no matter how much the boost was, in Fang Yun's eyes it was "better than nothing", while in the eyes of Fang Yun's enemies, it was the "universe at his fingertips".

Fang Yun wiped his mouth, stood up, and walked towards thunder, saying as he went:

"I'm finished eating."

"For this commission, the three of us will take my car."

Valentine and Toke, who were still struggling with their food at the dining table, mumbled a couple of replies.

Fang Yun didn't understand, after all, his hearing was just excellent, not "level 10 eating language", but he figured they must have said something like "Got it".

Actually, Valentine and Toke had said, "Neither of us drove here, we were planning on having you drive".

Fang Yun walked to thunder, opened the door, got in, sat in the driver's seat, and then shut the door with a bang.

「Let's take a look at the Battōjutsu Katana module in my free time.」

「......」

「Hmm? The Battōjutsu Katana module redeemed from the System store seems a bit different from the original version.」

「Upgrade path, sword skills, energy storage, blade repair, blade enchantment, combat rating, enemy kills, extra attached name...」

「Has Battōjutsu Katana been simplified to only these things?」

「This is good too, it's a big buff.」

「Let me see which blade looks cool, I'll craft one first to test it out.」

「...」

「This fox moon Katana - black fox looks good, and I have enough materials in my inventory, so it's this one.」

(PS: The simplified Battōjutsu Katana module makes crafting each blade much simpler than the original.)

Following the sequence of "Katana → Sharp Blade · Nameless · Ruby → fox moon Katana - black fox", Fang Yun crafted a fox moon Katana - black fox.

After crafting it, Fang Yun took several deep breaths, suppressing the urge in his heart to take the blade out and look at it.

「I can't take it out now, I'll take it out from the trunk when I encounter danger during the commission, otherwise it'll be hard to explain me pulling out a large Ōdachi out of thin air in the car.」

「...Tsk, I should have studied the Battōjutsu Katana module last night. A misstep, a misstep.」

Just as Fang Yun was feeling annoyed internally, Valentine and Toke sped up their breakfast, finished, and came to the door of thunder.

Valentine knocked on the car window, signaling Fang Yun to snap back to attention.

"Hey, Fang Yun, what are you thinking about, so absorbed. You're not thinking about my Sister, are you?"

As Valentine spoke, his expression became a little subtle.

Fang Yun lowered the car window, heard Valentine's words, and quickly explained:

"I'm not, I didn't."

"I was just spacing out after eating my fill."

"Mm, that's right, that's how it is."

Valentine looked at Fang Yun suspiciously, seeing the determined expression on his face as if he was about to join an organization, and muttered softly:

"Haki Yun is stressed?"

At this moment, Toke, who was behind Valentine, stepped forward.

"Alright, alright, stop talking nonsense."

"The middleman just sent me the general information about the commission, let's get in the car and set off, we can talk more on the way."

Hearing Toke's urging, Valentine shrugged.

"You heard him too, Fang Yun. Open the door, we should set off."

Fang Yun and Toke exchanged a look and nodded.

"Click."

The car door lock sprang open under Fang Yun's control.

Fang Yun gestured behind him with his hand.

"The car door lock is open, get in."

Toke opened the back seat door and got in, while Valentine walked around the front of the car and sat in the passenger seat.

"Buzz."

A powerful wave of sound rang out, and Fang Yun and his companions sped out of the camp in thunder.

The belated System prompt, along with the roar of the engine, faded into the morning wind and sand.

"Ding! Sufficient elements detected."

"＜Mercenary Commission: Part One · Cargo Transport＞ has been triggered."

[Mission Type]: Mercenary Commission

[Mission Name]: Part One · Cargo Transport

[Mission Requirement]: Deliver the cargo needed by the middleman intact to the designated location

[Mission Limit · Time]: 3 days

[Mission Limit · Location]: None

[Mission Limit · Other]: The faster the cargo is delivered, the more currency reward

[Mission Reward]: 10,000 - 30,000 euro, 100 System points, ＜Module: Battōjutsu Katana · Expansion Pack (Demon Slayer) 1.0＞

[Mission Penalty]: None

...

Night City, the City That Never Sleeps, the City of Neon.

Whenever night falls, the ubiquitous neon lights of Night City instantly make the city incredibly brilliant.

The colorful light, like a lighthouse attracting moths to a flame in the dark night, attracts every adventurer who longs to get a piece of the pie in this steel jungle.

Mercenaries, Hackers, assassins, politicians, gang members, ignorant young men and women, foolish megalomaniacs, countless people of all kinds rush from all over the world, plunging into this huge "corpse rice basin".

However, their endings often end in tragedy.

At this moment, on the Badlands outside the prosperous urban area of Night City, on this land forgotten by the city dwellers, a giant dragon from outside this world is rapidly heading towards Night City.

Badlands, this place is like its name suggests, most of the land is "Badlands", which is wasteland where crops cannot grow,... at least for the "stay-behind population" living here.

Dry cracked patterns spread wantonly across the wasteland, like wounds on the earth, mercilessly torn open and then buried by the dust of time.

A brand new heavy armored vehicle was speeding across the uneven wasteland, with three mercenaries sitting inside, none other than Fang Yun, Valentine, and Toke.

Outside the car window, the almost unchanging scenery rapidly receded, occasionally one could see a few withered bushes, swaying weakly in the wind, seemingly about to be uprooted at any moment.

Suddenly, a gust of wind swept up yellow sand across the sky, and a miniature sandstorm rolled in without warning.

The wind and sand were like an angry beast, howling and roaring, swallowing everything in its roar.

The sand and dust were like a yellow tide, furiously hitting the car windows, making a "crackling" sound, as if they would tear apart this fragile steel shell at any moment, but, in front of the armor of a Fifth Order heavy armored vehicle, this feeling was ultimately just an illusion.

Visibility outside the front car window was reduced to the extreme, the road ahead became blurred, leaving only a chaotic yellow world.

Fang Yun turned on the fog lights and the automatic sensing system, to prevent himself from driving the car into a ditch due to carelessness.

Amidst the crackling sound of sand and dust hitting the car windows, the sound of Fang Yun and the other two talking gradually emerged.