Kang Tao's Suspicion

Getting the combat footage wasn't difficult.

As long as the company was willing to allocate resources, their netrunners could tirelessly dig through cyberspace to recover data from surveillance cameras that should have been damaged.

As long as data exists, it can be restored—that's what most corporate netrunners spend their time doing.

Whether it's recovering traces on the current network or trying to restore data from the old net era.

Leo knew this day would come, and he was prepared with an answer.

He directly pulled out the Yinglong: "You mean this? It's pretty handy."

"That batch was lost in Atlanta."

Leo shrugged: "I don't care about that. If you want to buy it back, fine, but street rules apply—what's bought on the black market stays on the black market."

"Which black market did you get it from?"

"No comment."

The person in the car frowned. They had just talked about cooperation, and now this?

Leo quickly added, "But considering our good relationship, I can give you a lead—Dogtown."

"...The terms have changed. Hand over the gun; I want the data inside, or there's no deal."

"Sure—but don't try anything funny, or you'll regret it."

Leo confidently handed over the gun.

He wasn't worried at all.

All the data inside had been deleted and scrambled using a cross-dimensional data channel.

Data recovery was theoretically possible, but when parts of the data processing had been done in another dimension, there was no way to reconstruct it.

The result would be their netrunners pulling their hair out, unable to restore the data without distortions.

Leo's calmness wasn't what this person had expected, but it was possible—maybe Leo had indeed bought the gun from the black market in Dogtown.

That would be troublesome—but they'd have to research more to be sure.

The bodyguard brought the gun into the car and then returned it to Leo, with Leo's group staying completely calm throughout the process.

V, who knew the situation, fully trusted Leo and felt no sense of urgency. Jackie and Chesson were completely unaware of the Atlanta incident.

No issues—nothing at all.

"...Alright then, that's settled. Chesson, right? Tomorrow, I'll send you the pickup location."

After that, the bodyguards, like robots, simultaneously opened the doors, got into the car, and drove off.

But inside the car, the person in charge immediately made a phone call.

The call connected to netrunners working in Kang Tao's cooling pool—they were busy reconstructing the trio's movement routes in cyberspace.

But the results were...

"...It seems like the data we're reconstructing has some issues... but the earliest trace we can find for this 'Dennis Burgerking' is when he became active again at Arasaka Academy, enrolled in adult education, with dual licenses for tech specialist and cyberware doctor courses."

"Dual A-grade licenses?"

"Dual A-grade. We're still recovering other information, but..."

But it's proving difficult—something they hesitated to say out loud.

Difficult was an understatement—it was a nightmare.

For Kang Tao, a company that built its foundation on AI, encountering such obstacles in data recovery was unthinkable!

"So, you've found nothing—these anomalies only show up around them?"

"Not just them; we've observed similar issues at several nodes in Santo Domingo. There might be other areas in Night City affected as well. This has to be some new tech—that netrunner is very skilled, and it seems like he's still deep diving."

In other words, nothing concrete.

The person in the car was getting a headache but showed no outward signs. Instead, they immediately made another call.

"Sir, there's no solid evidence linking these three to the Atlanta incident."

"What else?"

"The skinny one leading them used a Yinglong. That model was part of the batch lost in Atlanta. He claims he got it from Dogtown."

"How credible is that?"

"I think the kid is smart, but he doesn't seem like the person behind the Atlanta incident. I originally thought he'd try to latch onto us as a fixer, but he didn't push for that. Instead, he wanted a smart ammo production line.

And he's not doing it himself—he brought in an arms dealer. I agreed to the terms. We can strengthen our ties with that arms dealer, but in this case, Leo himself benefits the least—he's still just a merc.

If he were the one behind Atlanta, he'd be pushing to become a fixer, keeping all the benefits for himself."

Connections are everything.

Even if Leo brokered this deal now, in a year or two, Chesson would be reaping the rewards from Kang Tao.

If a conflict of interest arose, it wasn't certain that Chesson would side with Leo.

This isn't the kind of move a smart person would make—if the Atlanta incident wasn't orchestrated by Militech, then it was done by someone incredibly shrewd.

Someone who pulled Militech into the mess and left them without a word of complaint, as if they had taken a silent loss; Someone who managed to bring out a team of expert netrunners to outplay Militech, seizing all the benefits for themselves.

And this happened in Atlanta—how many connections would you need to pull that off? How much intel would you need to orchestrate such a perfect outcome?

But all this is based on the assumption that the attack on Militech was carried out by a team of netrunners, not just one person.

"Dogtown... This is going to be a headache. I'll allocate more resources—keep an eye on this 'Burgerking.' If you can't rule out the suspicion, continue monitoring him. No issues with the Sandevistan, right?"

"All good. The data from James is a bit distorted, but the QianT 5 model's data exceeds even our engineers' theoretical values."

"Finally, some good news—at least the R&D team can make progress."

...

"We're gonna be rich, we're gonna be rich..."

In the car, Chesson was suddenly acting like a money-crazed lunatic.

The three others in the car looked at him with disdain.

Chesson just assumed they didn't get it—but then he thought Leo should understand.

Leo just replied disinterestedly, "Make sure you pay our share on time. If I'm dead, you can stop sending money, but as long as we're alive, you'd better remember."

"Of course—what's with you? This is Kang Tao we're talking about!"

Kang Tao, a top-tier corporation from the East, one of Night City's major players, involved in everything from robotics to small arms to cyberware—practically every aspect of society.

In fact, the company originally started with AI.

Back in the old net days, Kang Tao's CEO saw the opportunity and became the leading AI supplier of that era.

Interestingly, Kang Tao's birthplace was the same place as XMSC in the Marvel world—these two companies had a lot in common.

As Asia's leading giant, Kang Tao's CEO resisted the aggressive expansion of Arasaka in the early 21st century.

During that time, Asian companies were either crushed or absorbed by Arasaka, or pushed into irrelevant fields, or became their downstream labor force.

Until 2023, when Arasaka was defeated by Militech in the Fourth Corporate War, Kang Tao's CEO's foresight was proven—Arasaka would lose.

Unfortunately, Kang Tao's chance to replace Arasaka was ruined by a hacker named Bartmoss.

In 2022, Bartmoss triggered the collapse of the internet, and the data he released was absorbed by Kang Tao's AI, and all active AIs on the net, leading to disastrous mutations in the AI.

The rogue AIs began attacking their creators, and Kang Tao, having bet on this, took the hardest hit—

Strictly speaking, Kang Tao had nothing to do with directly taking down Bartmoss—Arasaka was behind that.

But the data collapse caused Kang Tao's stock price to plummet, and the CEO, unable to bear the pressure, chose to end his life.

Then came the silence.

Until 2046, when a former Colonel Xu of the Army took over Kang Tao, moved the company headquarters, and completed asset restructuring with government support.

Not only that, this former colonel also managed to dig up Kang Tao's old net-era research and in 2050 released the A-22B Chao Smart Pistol.

This pistol marked the end of Kang Tao's dormant years and broke Arasaka's monopoly on smart weapons.

Although rumors claimed that the smart aiming system of the Chao Pistol was entirely based on designs from when Kang Tao reverse-engineered Arasaka's smart pistol "Yukimura," the Chao's affordability and durability made it a staple in the low-end smart weapon market.

After all, gun buyers didn't care about plagiarism, and Kang Tao, backed by a massive entity, didn't care about being accused of it.

After receiving market feedback, Kang Tao quickly upgraded their products—in 2058, they released the G-58 Dian Smart SMG.

Though its appearance still bore traces of Arasaka's "Shingen" smart SMG, the Dian was more affordable, durable, and featured more advanced ergonomic designs.

The Dian even displaced other competitors to become Trauma Team's standard weapon.

Finally, as Arasaka was licking its wounds and consoling itself with a focus on the high-end smart weapon market, Kang Tao moved past their reverse-engineering history.

In 2069, they released their high-end smart weapon: the L69 Zhuo Smart Shotgun, the first smart shotgun on the market.

How good is it? Even Arasaka's pet killer, Adam Smasher, chose Kang Tao's Zhuo. The custom Ba Xing Chong was a killing machine made specifically for him under a Kang Tao contract.

And now Leo had one—not just one, but four.

As of today, in 2076, Arasaka still hasn't produced anything comparable to the Zhuo.

Kang Tao, having resurrected itself with reverse-engineering, has now defeated Arasaka in the small arms field, and along with Arasaka and Tsunami Defense Systems, is one of the "Three Royals" of small arms.

So you can imagine how ecstatic Chesson was when he realized he had latched onto this massive entity—even if it was just a single hair on that entity's leg.

And Kang Tao had a trait that, while bad for other companies, was loved by downstream players like Chesson.

That trait was Kang Tao's love for "borrowing" other companies' products, then releasing better-designed, cheaper alternatives, leaving the originals struggling to compete.

As a result, Kang Tao's large market continued to expand, providing more stability for all players in the supply chain.

Chesson was already fantasizing about the day Kang Tao would defeat all competitors— If that happened, even if he was just making bullets, he'd never have to worry about money for the rest of his life!

Watching the hyper-excited Chesson in the back seat, Leo sighed.

First Jackie, now Chesson.

Can't anyone stay calm?

Watching the ecstatic Chesson, Leo rested his head on the car window and said, "So, we're friends now—just remember to stay seated in the backseat like this, normally."

What seemed like a casual comment was actually a subtle warning from Leo.

"Don't worry—we're bros, we all came up from the streets. Otherwise, I wouldn't have gotten axed. How does that Eastern saying go? 'Friends help each other out.'"

Leo didn't respond, but thought to himself: Hope you remember that.

Maybe it was his excitement, but Chesson's Indian flair for entertainment suddenly kicked in, and he leaned in to ask Leo:

"Hey, I heard Easterners are all martial artists. Do you know any?"

Leo shot him a look, while Jackie and V gave him the kind of stare reserved for people who just asked something incredibly stupid: Idiot.

"I heard that at Indian companies, they give out free cow urine. How's the taste?"

Chesson went silent.

Now it was Leo, Jackie, and V's turn to wonder: He doesn't really drink that stuff, does he?