The sergeant looked at the crowd below him, all eyes filled with reverence, and felt great: it had been a long time since he felt this way.
He knew well the problems with 6th Street — when people said they were just bandits masquerading under the flag of the law, well, they weren't exactly wrong.
But just like he'd told V, he didn't have that many choices.
Everything they'd brought to the event this time, except the booze, all this synthetic meat was provided to him at low cost — otherwise, he really couldn't afford to pull off charity like this.
One can of beer down his throat, Morton smashed the empty can to the ground, raised his revolver, and fired into the sky.
Bang bang bang!
"Well then — you've eaten, you've drunk — now move your asses! Target shooting contest starts now! Rules are simple: chug a can first, then shoot. Whoever hits enough targets in 30 seconds advances.
As for the prize, this shiny new fancy gun right here! Who wants to be first?!"
With Morton's announcement, the crowd below got even more fired up: most of them could barely hold a gun steady, but as long as they joined in, they'd get another free can of beer!
And once the booze was down, they got to fire a few shots too — could anything be better? Not taking part would be an insult to life!
The drunk crowd swarmed around the shooting area. The targets were all kinds of absurd: big headshots of artillery, the deputy mayor Holt's mug, and even the flag of the Empire of Japan —
They'd have loved to use Arasaka Saburo's face or the Arasaka logo, but printing that would attract Arasaka's agents like sharks to blood.
Dizzy heads tried to aim at the bullseyes, guns wobbling wildly in trembling hands, gunshots rattled out in the night, blending with raging rock music, pushing the vibe to a boiling point.
V watched the rowdy scene, drained her last can of beer, drew her gun, and walked to the car.
"How about us three do a shooting match too?"
In Santo Domingo, the mercenary squads contracted to control 6th Street and the Santo Domingo area totaled 14 people — 8 lone wolves, the rest split between two squads.
Originally, they were supposed to attack 6th Street's properties from different directions and times, while extorting protection money from locals and pushing all sorts of goods supplied by their employer.
But now the situation had changed — they chose to go all in with one decisive blow.
For certain reasons, they all now followed the command of a single technical expert —
This expert had strapped on a high-powered telescope, operating from a high-rise in Westbrook.
In addition, he had hired 54 Night City paupers for dirt cheap to watch the outermost edges of Santo Domingo through electronic scopes, feeding him vision.
This vision was processed in real-time, forming an almost dead-angle-free surveillance web.
As for why he did this —
Through his scope, he saw all 14 mercs infiltrating from different directions, easily slipping past the outer 6th Street patrols.
But barely two blocks from Woodhaven Street, he saw a street cam swivel.
6th Street's synergy with the street cams was practically flawless.
[Masamune: 03 fall back, you're spotted. 04–07, take out the cams. 08, 09, the network node is near you — move now.]
Exactly, Mr. Masamune chose this old-school way to probe and test the gaps in the enemy's surveillance, using a gradual infiltration.
The benefit: less risk of total wipeout. These mercs might get pinned by gang bullets head-on, but their strong solo skills could gradually chip away at the security net.
The downside… once the first camera was shot out, the person managing 6th Street's security would immediately know: they were here.
This was a "non-contact" battle of computing power, and the perfect chance for mercs to show their elite individual combat skills.
The man named Masamune toyed with a finely crafted revolver while giving orders.
Pew pew!
Several cameras blew up one after another, and 6th Street members on patrol on the street started sprinting immediately.
Leo raised an eyebrow, instantly grasping the enemy's plan — if it were him, he'd just tell V and Jackie to floor it straight to Morton and smash through.
But for a team, this approach was more conservative and made the best use of everyone's combat ability.
Standard and by the book, which probably meant they lacked truly unique tactics.
The only odd thing: Leo couldn't quite tell what kind of tech support the enemy was using for such coordination.
Pure manual observation?
Not impossible, but accurately commanding this way required high computing power and algorithms.
If someone had that ability, they might as well be a company programmer, not a merc.
[Lucy: I've got data anomalies — a hacker's breached.]
[Kiwi: Same here.]
Leo was even more surprised: odds were high the enemy was using a separate info system.
As the two hackers entered the network to counter-hack, their sections would be filled with disruptive currents and commands for cyber warfare, causing unavoidable drops in device precision, unstable signals, and other issues.
But this intrusion was shallow — as soon as the girls counter-hacked, the enemy backed out.
They only wanted basic interference, not full-on digital combat.
Blow up cameras, interfere with the surveillance net — it bought the saboteurs time to vanish again.
Repeat this cycle, and if Leo stuck with heavy patrol manpower, areas without cams could become security holes.
In this situation, he could only plug the tech gaps by boosting manpower ratios in the defense zones —
Which meant compressing the defensive perimeter.
So he quickly changed the defense plan:
[Leo: 6th Street, orderly fallback.]
The fallback worked well: the distance between the enemy blowing up cameras and the nearest 6th Street patrol shrank fast — from an average of 700 meters to under 300 meters — greatly increasing the odds of catching them.
At that moment, both commanding sides shared an unspoken understanding:
Both sides were using classic tactics — from here on out, it all depended on the quality of the fighters.
Statistically speaking, the first firefight would break out very soon.
[6th Street vet Forrest: I see them! Floor it, get ready to fire!]
The music blasting from 6th Street's party could be heard from blocks away!
Both sides of the street were deserted — something was wrong with 6th Street, Santo Domingo had gone unstable, and everyone was on edge.
Vroom—
A fully armed sports coupe roared down the street, SkyQuartz paint glinting, the engine's roar rattling the windows!
The car tore down the street at breakneck speed, not slowing down even at a corner!
When the turn hit, the driver finally yanked the wheel, tires screeching long skid marks, the shriek echoing through the street —
Forrest sat in the passenger seat, stimulants flooding his body with the drift, his cyber eyes locked tight under an Mk.I Sandevistan boost.
The car nose swung past the corner, his eyes scanning the wall, the road, every possible hiding spot —
But he forgot: there was always a blind spot above his head!
Anyone watching from outside would've seen: the moment the car rounded the corner, a man vaulted from the wall, landing perfectly atop the roof right as Forrest passed underneath!
In midair, the man gripped his SMG with both hands, pulling the trigger mid-arc — bullets poured like a death rain!
Sixty rounds in the mag, he kept firing as he soared through the air, landed, and slid on the ground!
Bang!
Two loud bangs — the car's tires were blown, the drifting car lost all control, flipped sideways from the burst tire, inertia rolling over and over.
By the time the wreck stopped, the man's magazine was empty.
But the second car was already barreling down from the far end of the street — this time, there was no escape —
Inside the car, Maine, Rebecca, Pilar, and Dorio all popped their heads out the windows, each packing an SMG or shotgun — some even dual-wielding!
The man who'd just pulled off that spectacular stunt froze:
He was fast and even had an auto-aiming, bullet-dodging skill chip.
But here, in the open street, with four people wielding seven guns total — how the hell was he supposed to dodge?!
"Big guns! Woohoo!"