It was rather clear that the Jake who reincarnated me here got into a mite bit of trouble as the house he gave me was literally a cheat all of its own honestly... Probably better than the cheat of regeneration and whatever he tuned my body up with so I could use whatever chrome I wanted.
As apparently all Jake's also got their bodies tuned up so they could use whatever native magic they could get ahold of with. So it's not like he gave me anything too special.
But this house he gave me... It was an actual mansion! Ten bedrooms, a large garage that could hold a dozen trucks, a martial arts dojo, a business room, a library and that was just the mundane shit.
What made the house so valuable, besides being paid off for the next century was the fact that it had its own generator that pulled in energy from outside the universe along with the house itself being protected so no Netrunners could hack into its security system.
And then in the garage there were two fabricator units, one could make healing 'Max Docs' that could heal like they could with video game logic. And the other was a giant Fallout Themed textile machine that would put out Vault Suits that sported supernatural protection against, low-caliber ballistics, energy weapons, and radiation.
So all that was certainly a pleasant surprise. Though I would honestly say the best surprise was the fact that the 'Vault Fashion' machine was that it could also output shoes and socks so my poor ass feet didn't need to be bare after trekking across half of Night City barefoot.
'Ok... So I got a good place to live, and my pad is protected by bullshit outer god nonsense electronically speaking. So no one can trace anything I do electronically back here.' I mused as I got onto the computer that was in its own separate room.
And by getting onto the computer, I didn't mean merely logging onto it. I mean I full diving into the system as I synched up my experimental Cyberdeck I got from those fuckers that experimented on me so I could take my consciousness into the Net.
"Ok Jake... Time to break and make some money. Now who can I rob and or fuck over to make a quick buck and not have anyone important after me." I mused as I knew I probably needed to keep a low profile.
As even if Arasaka and the Militech didn't give a shit about the tech I made off with in my 'light load' of a Cyberdeck, micro rotors that replaced all my muscles and joints in my shoulders and arms, a microgenerator that absorbed my bodies natural bioelectricity, the kinetic energy of my movement and a number other things, it allowed me to violently release the stored electric energy like an electric eel.
Under the skin of my chest, stomach, head, and neck. I also had a set of experimental subdermal armor. And lastly was a Bioconductor...
Basically, the fuckers used nanomachines to eat away and replace all my nerves with far more effective nano-wire that could carry far more power to any implants I had. And allowing me to Netrun much safer while increasing my natural reflex rate.
As apparently when you had super cyber cables in your body, the electricity could flow much more violently, faster, and more powerfully. So your reaction speed just naturally got better as information got transferred from across the body and to the brain so much quicker.
But even if they didn't give a damn about the tech I had inside of myself, that didn't mean they wouldn't want to keep me quiet, and they assuredly wanted to know where Alpha went.
Either way, I surfed through the local net of Night City. And it was... Odd honestly. The Net was its own world basically honestly. I wouldn't even be surprised if it had Curses within it as well actually.
But either way, the world of the Net itself was a reflection of Night City, just kinda pixelated and I could see people. I could see people via their implants and cyberwear that were attached to the Net as they went about their lives unaware of the ghost beside themselves.
So I like the ghost that I was, I synched myself onto a bus terminal and hitched a ride to the shitty and more decrepit parts of Night City, where the digital world was seemingly falling apart besides the blaring forms of life that was people and their implants.
But there was another thing that was bright and there. Larger groups of people hanging about, and after hitching a line to Night City's police bounty board and creating a macro to scan people's identities in real-time. After like half an hour of looking I was able to find a Scav Den.
With the Scav's being a gang that focused on killing people or stealing corpses to remove their cyberwear to sell to Ripperdocs or to slot the loot into themselves.
Scanning through the people... I froze as I began reading their rap sheets. Just the crimes that they had been caught literally on camera doing and having earned them a bounty in the Night City database.
Forced sexual contact, necrophilia, murder, grand larceny, desecration of corpses, grave robbing, mass murder, grand theft auto... Literally, all of the dozen or so gangsters had a rap sheet that would have seen them lynched on the fucking streets in my previous life.
'I wish I had Deamons I could upload into them... I can't do anything like making their implants explode or whatever, but I can make them bleed for sure!" I hissed as I walked up to the guy who had the thickest 'ICE' or security which I hopefully think would be the boss of this group.
And seeing around the neck area of the dude being his Neurodock which had his identification chip and other personal shit like his bank accounts... I got to work.
I grabbed the area around the neck with one hand and then I could feel it. I could feel my inborn talent for Technomancy roaring to life as my fingers slipped into the slot containing his Neurodock chips and such.
The man violently twitched but my hand around his neck seemingly paralyzed the nerves around his neck and then my consciousness dipped deeper as I crushed his ICE and with a wrenching motion I shredded his bank account with his Eurodollars falling into a burner account that was made in my home so it was untraceable.
And seeing his synthetic eyes glowing as he seemingly saw my electronic form I grinned before I hissed. "I am the ghost that will haunt your kind." And from the security system of the gang hideout I hacked into. I could faintly hear him scream as I shoved my thumbs into his synthetic eyes.
Until I felt his false machine eyes crack and I pulled back with a sense of satisfaction at what I had done.
I turned towards the backing away figures as they realized something was terribly wrong and I idly noted that time itself passed far faster for me inside the NET due to how I percified the world being so much faster than reality itself functioned which meant everyone else was just reacting after I spent a whole minute breaking through the leaders ICE and draining his account.
So at first glance, there was a time difference of at least forty-five seconds in the NET compared to real life probably.
As with a calm walking motion, I approached another collection of floating implants and digital signatures to the net and I began the same process but even more brutally as I began punching people directly into their implants which seemed to do them harm even if I couldn't break them like I could the leader's synthetic eyes.
And before ten IRL seconds, and about five minutes in the NET I had robbed all the fuckers of their bank accounts. Then after downloading all their contact histories along their recent calls and messages. I logged out of the Net as that was enough excitement for one day.
-
"Holy fuck that was trippy," I muttered with a groan as I sat up and blinked as I saw that I had a grand total of four thousand Eurodollars from my hacking spree. As the gangsters just didn't have shit for money. Meaning they were likely just goons who were blowing their money on drugs and joy toys probably.
Either way, with a bit of liquid funds in my pocket that opened up some avenues for me. First getting myself a good gun. As I was already planning on diving face-first into being an Edgerunner if not a Netrunner for hire.
As I needed to get the big bucks in getting good implants from a good Ripper Doc, along with getting the information on how to use Cursed Energy.
"Though on the other hand..." I mused as I frowned while looking at the nondescript golden band around my ring finger that could open up a portal to the world of RWBY.
A part of me was thinking that getting Dust from RWBY to deal with curses would be a smart idea as I had zero fucking clue how to use Cursed Energy in the slightest. Let alone where in the hell I would go to learn how to use it.
'Hmm... Actually this house is shielded. Let's poke the sleeping bear in trying to learn how to use cursed energy.' I mused as I got on the Net again but not a deep dive and began searching for that information.
And low and fucking behold the information was clear as fucking day... Which wasn't surprising due to how Curses could be seen by the majority of the population and the rest could see them with an implant even then.
[Common citizens are not allowed to be trained in the usage of Cursed Energy. Usage of Cursed Energy seemingly aggravates the Cursed Energy in the environment encouraging the faster birth of more Curses. Those found training others in Cursed Energy without a license will be fined 500,000 Eurodollars and confined at home for up to six months.]
Several similar articles filled my view as I began looking over the laws and after a bit I snorted as I summed it all up. A Jujutsu Sorcerer had to 'pay' a fine basically to announce themselves as a Sorcerer.
And then once they had proven themself, Night City will start sending them bounties for curses that pop up on the security feeds across the city along with Fixer's and other people of note sending them dangerous bounties for rouge sorcerers and curses.
But the thing was... Actually learning Cursed Energy was apparently something most people from outside of Japan had to do on their own. There wasn't a dedicated Jujutsu Sorcerery school anywhere in North or South America, though there was several in Asia, Africa, and a couple in Europe.
Basically, the point was that none of the old families who had inherited techniques and long lineages that figured out Cursed Energy never came over here to North and South America in any numbers to form any actual groups that would naturally encourage the growth of its members.
Hence I was shit out of luck in terms of getting lessons on Cursed Energy. I was going to have to raw dog it and figure it out. Or basically sell myself as a slave to the fucking Arasaka's and clans of Japan that had the Jujutsu World in a cock ring.
"Nah... I need to get myself a gun, and go to the world of RWBY to get my aura unlocked at least first." I muttered to myself with a frown as I realized that I could figure out Cursed Energy a bit with the previous knowledge I had with how much negative energy was supposed to be in this world. I just needed the safety blanket that Aura was before I got into trying to force myself into learning Cursed Energy.
So I got back onto the Net and looking into the local gun stores, I fucking Doordashed myself an automatic pistol with several mags and a couple of boxes of ammo.
Because food delivery apps for some reason also counted gun stores as 'living essentials' here in this world.