"It looks like they've stopped chasing us."
Inside the dimly lit, abandoned underground parking garage, Karl glanced back and confirmed that no footsteps followed them.
"This place really is well hidden. We've been looping around for a while now, and there isn't even a shadow in sight."
When Karl said "not even a shadow", he subconsciously glanced to the side.
In the gloom, he could still barely make out Reed's figure. If even Reed disappeared from view, that would truly be terrifying.
Reed didn't notice Karl's faintly uneasy glance.
After listening to Karl, he stopped, focused for a moment, then nodded slightly.
"Seems like they're not very familiar with this place either."
"Looks like this batch of Barghest guys isn't involved in that kind of business."
"That kind?" Karl asked.
Reed noticed Karl had stopped beside a load-bearing wall, studying something. He walked over and followed Karl's gaze—there was a symbol etched into the surface.
"This is a smuggling marker," Karl said, a faint smile appearing on his face.
"I've taken part in smuggling operations both inside and outside Night City, so I know these markings very well."
"We just ran into some good luck."
"You mean—" Reed thought for a moment, then immediately understood.
Any smuggling marker Karl recognized had to be recent.
According to FIA intelligence, Karl only arrived in Night City at the end of 2075, while the underground route map they were using dated back to before the Unification War ended in 2070.
In other words, the presence of new smuggling markings here meant one thing:
This underground passage was still active.
And what it connected to was obvious—the weapons trade between Dogtown and Night City.
Many smugglers coveted this route. Without needing to deal with Hansen directly, they could buy weapons cheaply in Dogtown and sell them in the city at a hefty profit—not to mention moving scarce city supplies back into Dogtown.
Reed quickly pieced together the entire profit chain.
Thinking further, the fact that such a smuggling route existed inside an area controlled by Barghest—specifically near the stadium—made one thing clear:
There was no way Barghest was unaware of it.
Most likely, the guards here had long been involved, taking bribes and turning a blind eye.
Which also made Karl's earlier comment easier to understand—"Looks like this batch of Barghest isn't in that line of business."
If there had been Barghest members involved in smuggling present, they would have caught up already. Karl and Reed would never have escaped this far.
"Looks like all we need to do next is follow the trail and we can—"
Reed was speaking to Karl in Chinese when a faint sound suddenly interrupted him.
Clang.
The sound of metal hitting the ground rang out sharply in the silent underground space.
The instant Reed registered it, every pore on his body seemed to flare open.
The sound had come from extremely close to them—and he hadn't sensed anything beforehand.
In a flash, Reed drew his gun and aimed at the source of the noise.
But there was nothing there.
Karl walked over, glanced at the spot, then picked up a metal fragment from the ground.
"Looks like it used to be part of something."
He examined the fragment, then looked at where it had fallen from. The original location was a wall—the fragment had been embedded in it, but the vibrations from Karl and Reed moving around had shaken an old metal baseplate nearby, causing the loosely embedded shard to fall.
"There's a lot of these scattered around."
Karl gestured to Reed, who was still on guard.
"This looks like shrapnel from some kind of device that was destroyed internally. Look—these edges are warped. That means it was subjected to a massive force."
Karl scanned the surroundings and found many similar fragments.
After a rough estimate, he frowned.
"Any idea what this is? It looks like a large mechanical construct was blown apart by grenades here—but I don't see the main body."
"Chimera."
In the darkness, Reed's expression was complicated.
"During the Unification War, to fully secure Night City, Militech developed an all-terrain urban combat robot. Thirteen were produced in total—half of them were deployed around Dogtown."
"I know Hansen keeps a few in his warehouses. I didn't expect one to have been used in this tunnel—and judging by the debris, it took serious damage."
"All-terrain urban combat robot?" Karl raised an eyebrow.
"From the fragments alone, that thing must've been huge. Impressive, Reed—you recognized it from just scraps."
"I watched Militech personally hand these over to the New United States, then to Hansen," Reed said.
"They were meant for potential large-scale urban combat."
"No wonder," Karl said thoughtfully.
"He keeps these things in storage… looks like Hansen still has ambitions to reach into the city."
He glanced again at the scattered debris.
"Not sure what it's like to face one of these head-on, but judging by the fragments, it looks pretty damn impressive. I bet V would be interested."
"V? One of your team members?"
"Yeah. He loves messing around with machines like this. Your people probably already ran his background—Nomad types usually like tinkering with hardware."
Whirr—click.
As Karl and Reed talked, another sound echoed from the distance.
This time, it wasn't an accidental metal drop—it was a sequence of mechanical operations, rapidly approaching.
"We didn't just finish talking about this thing and Hansen already sent one after us, did he?"
Karl spoke hesitantly—but his hands moved fast, already drawing Kenshin.
Thanks to his cybernetic eyes, Reed spotted the approaching object earlier than Karl.
"You can relax a bit, Karl," Reed said calmly.
"That's not a Chimera."
"It's a Hellhound."
"And that means…?" Karl asked, staring at the mechanical creature that had been rushing toward them before stopping about a hundred meters away.
Its red optical sensors locked onto them.
The three-to-four-meter-tall Hellhound somehow reminded Karl of the little flat-headed dog he "kept" at home.
"This is a pre–DataKrash relic," Reed explained, voice low and steady.
"It uses old-era technology—hydraulic joints, thermal insulation armor, reinforced special ceramics."
"Even today, none of that tech has been fully reverse-engineered."
"In the 2010s, it was considered the most advanced robot ever built."
He paused, then continued:
"Militech originally designed it as a computational support unit. It used to be a maintenance robot."
"The flat-headed one you're thinking of? That was built using the same design philosophy."
Karl never took his eyes off the slowly advancing mechanical monster. Each step was accompanied by the creak of metal joints, as if reminding them that this Hellhound was anything but friendly.
"A maintenance robot?" Karl frowned.
"So… you're saying it doesn't have much offensive capability?"
Reed shook his head, expression grim.
"I don't know about its firepower. But I have seen evaluations of its defensive capability."
"The report used four words."
"Impervious to blades and bullets."
"Impervious to blades and bullets…"
As Karl was processing the meaning of that phrase, the six-legged Hellhound suddenly deployed two rotating claws—along with a sharp terminal spike.
He immediately understood the other half of the problem.
"This thing doesn't look harmless at all," Karl muttered.
"If possible, I'd really rather not be reminded how advanced past technology used to be."
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🔥🦾 CYBERPUNK: THE RELENTLESS 🦾🔥
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