Lucy and Nishimura Anko were followed by a tall teenager with similarly tanned skin who also walked in. Once the door closed, Mercer lazily sat up: "Sit down, I think there are some instant tea bags under the coffee table. It looks like the other drinks were finished ages ago."
"Thank you." Lucy nodded slightly, while her bright eyes cautiously scrutinized him.
Mercer was equally focused in observing her, but unlike her purpose, he was purely fanboying, watching the real-life form of his two-dimensional waifu.
Her rainbow-colored short hair shimmered with complex hues under the light, as if silver was mixed with pink; the faint pink eyeshadow beneath her bright eyes seemed to be a permanent tattoo—Cyberpunk style.
Like the teenager next to her, Mercer remembered his name was Tetsuya Daichi, sporting a green Mohawk and a 'fashionable face' composed of a metallic painted chin implant, utterly...
This group of precarious kids had quite the trendy look.
Speaking of which, Mercer suddenly thought about himself...more precisely, his image, and found himself wordless.
Nowadays, purely by appearance, he was surprisingly similar to his pre-transmigration self, perhaps even a high-spec version. Not only had his facial features become more profound, but his skin improved somewhat, and due to modifications, even his eyes looked bigger and brighter.
Except...
He had bright red hair, cut short, pierced with a black earring in his left ear, and even the port behind his ear was styled, featuring a red sakura petal in true Arasaka fashion.
Like a tattoo, his face bore noticeable neuro-circuit tattoos on the sides of both eyes, which glowed blue when connected to the network...
How should he put it... after staring at it for a while, he found this very individualistic, providing a bit of a thrill to someone like Mercer who had never experimented with quirky attire.
As a child, he suggested to his family about dyeing his hair red, but he almost got beaten up and quickly dropped the idea.
"Leon will also come over in a while."
Lucy seemed to have sized him up enough and after a pause said, "Anko mentioned you had something to say?"
"Yeah, there seems to be changes in the company's project."
As soon as Mercer finished talking, the eyes of the trio before him lit up, with Anko excitedly unable to contain herself, directly asking, "Really!? Does this mean we don't have to dig data from the old net!?"
"Yeah, probably."
Before Anko's smile could fully blossom, Mercer chuckled and said, "No need to worry about getting caught by AI while mining in the old net, because our new project is very likely direct interaction with AI."
As soon as he finished, even Lucy couldn't help but show a terrified expression.
Anko's eyes turned red, on the brink of tears: "Huh?"
Taller than Mercer, Tetsuya Daichi clenched his fists: "Han Jun, is what you're saying true? Is the info confirmed?"
"Call me Mercer, Han Jun sounds worse than just Han."
After saying that, Mercer continued with a relaxed tone:
"Not certain, just a guess based on the new director's tone and attitude.
Think about it, because of this incident, the original project director got booted, but I remained unscathed, even the interrogation seemed rather perfunctory, while the new director gave me full smiles...
The only possible reason might be related to my encounter with AI and the fact that Anko witnessed it.
However, before discussing these things... let's first talk about your matters."
Mercer spoke while observing their expressions, finally deciding to selectively disclose some information.
Anko is quite innocent and cute, but in this world, under these circumstances, innocence and cuteness are not beneficial. Mercer needs someone to lend him a hand while preparing for the escape, and choosing trustworthy partners is crucial.
Lucy... her survival instinct is strong, but sometimes being overly eager can backfire. Mercer needs to carefully assess before selectively revealing information to them, lest they rush off and jeopardize his plans.
At this point, Mercer believes he has completed about 60% of his escape preparations independently, these young hackers are largely there to draw fire and provide some muscle during the escape.
Hacking skills?
Truth be told, he's feeling somewhat flushed with confidence, he can take on ten like Lucy... well, three at least.
After Lucy paused in silence, a prompt suddenly appeared in Mercer's vision.
[Lucy is sending you a file transfer request, accept?]
Mercer didn't immediately accept; instead, he manually activated his personal ICE, used the network receiver to construct a virtual disk, and connected the software to the virtual disk.
If necessary, he could directly format the virtual disk, with the only loss being the RAM used while the virtual disk existed.
Once the file was received, Mercer's eyes emitted a faint golden light, analyzing the swiftly streaming blue data in his view, quickly understanding the purpose of the program.
Without saying a word, he pulled out the data cable from his wrist.
"Hold on."
Lucy silently nodded at him with a focused gaze.
He sat by the computer, first connecting the data cable from his wrist, uploading a 'Free Assassin V0.1' to the computer for a targeted sweep.