Re:Interdimensional Mercenary [IF]

"Okay!" Alice replied excitedly and humming happily as she strolled along the desolated city.

Honkai Energy concentration within the city is so high that any average human exposed to it would instantly be corrupted into a Zombie. However, for an android like her, it's nothing. Especially when T-Dolls were created to withstand a heavily irradiated environment in the first place, although not Honkai Energy specifically.

A moment ago, she received an order from Adam to investigate and observe the activities of the gang within the city to uncover the truth behind their action. As for what the gang's motive is? Alice had no interest. She's only following Adam's order.

Suddenly, after walking through a few empty blocks. Alice picked up engine noise from vehicles and she immediately took cover within a ransacked cafe as a few pick-up trucks and lorries came into view before it stopped quite close to the cafe she was hiding in.

Alice peek her head out and observe the gang members dressed in hazmat suits wearing tactical gear on top and each armed with assault rifles. Rather than gang members, it's much more appropriate to call them a PMC member with how decked out their gears were.

"Come on! Get to work! Y'all have ten minutes to fulfill the quota. Otherwise everyone will be left behind!"

One of the gang members that looked like the leader with the way he acted and how the other members acted around him, aimed his rifles at the survivors on the lorries before shouting at them to get off quickly.

Alice records this scene and sends them to Adam in real time as she continues to stay hidden to observe.

The survivors all quickly got down and went around the buildings and shop, ransacking the place and looting everything valuable before bringing them back on the lorries.

While the gang members supervise the survivors that are busy at work. One survivor suddenly fell to the ground weakly and dropped the box he was carrying before he started coughing violently as if choked.

Through her advanced optical equipment, Alice could observe the person in detail as if she was standing in front of the man and saw the purple circuit-like veins aggressively from the body up to the neck as his skin rapidly turned purplish, a sign of rapid organ shutdown like the heart.

The supervising gang members didn't look surprised at all and as if normal, one of them lazily aimed his rifle at the unfortunate survivor before shooting his head off. The other survivors didn't pay any attention either as they became even more frantic in their looting.

After the shot was fired, the gang members start to get on the truck as if ready to leave at a moment's notice. But with careful observation, Alice noticed they were looking quite nervous with some tapping their fingers impatiently or gripping their rifle tighter for the sense of security it offered.

Alice immediately understands the cause of their worry. The dozen of drones she scattered across the city to act as her eyes noticed a group of nearby Honkai Beast had heard the gunshot noise and alerted them to their position.

Even though this group of Honkai Beasts only consists of two Chariots and a dozen Archangels. It was an insurmountable foes for the gang members that had only armed themselves with conventional assault rifles. Against the Archangels their rifles might pose some threat. But for the Chariots that had carapace a few times thicker than the Archangels? Those assault rifles would only feel like mosquito bites for the Chariots.

Two minutes later, the charging Chariots finally got close enough that the ground started trembling and the leader of the expedition immediately ordered his mens to get on their truck to leave. The scurrying survivors desperately try to get on the lorries that had already started moving and most that were unlucky got left behind as bait to stall the Honkai Beasts.

The convoy sped away leaving behind the survivors to their fate.

Alice, still hiding behind the cafe, was speaking with Adam, asking if she should take action. This group of Honkai Beast are a challenge for her alone to win against. But not impossible. She actually wouldn't care much about these humans since in her core program, other humans didn't matter, only her Master matter for her. However, since her master wishes to help these humans. Alice decided she should help them.

'Go ahead and help them. But make sure to prioritise your own safety first. Then bring them to meet up with Kayoko.' Adam relayed his order.

(AN: Kayoko is the elder sister of Kei.)

Alice felt very happy that her ears were twitching in excitement as she smiled ear to ear as she inspected her weapon swiftly to ensure it is operational before jumping out from the cafe and engaging the group of Honkai Beast, much to the surprise of the despairing survivors.

———

In the gang hideout, a former police station that was abandoned after the disaster of the Second Impact struck the city.

Adam had stealthily infiltrated the building and prevented unnecessary contact as much as possible to not alert the people inside while he was trying to uncover the truth.

The easiest way to do it is to find the leader and interrogate him. The roundabout way was to find proof-like documents entailing the secrets conducted by the gang, shipping the survivors with high Honkai Resistance to somewhere.

Adam chose the first option simply because he had no fear of retaliation from the gang as none of their weapons he observed could harm him. If not worried about prematurely alerting the boss and causing him to escape, Adam wouldn't have tried to sneak in and instead crashed in directly with force.

As Adam explored the police station and mapping out each room, he eventually arrived at the police chief's room and with his enhanced hearing, he overheard a conversation.

"Boss, we are running out of survivors to capture. Unless the customer is willing to lower their requirements, finding someone with high Honkai Resistance without any corruption is impossible." The voice said a pause as if trying to arrange his next words. "You know, maybe we should move to the next city. We had looted pretty much most of this city already."

A brief silence ensued before a sigh could be heard from another person.

"Hmn, maybe we should. After all, selling these lab rats is much more profitable than looting the city."

"Our profit this month alone is enough to expand the gang into a proper private military contractor. As long as we keep conducting business with the councillors to provide them with lab rats for their personal research development, we can amass wealth and influence enough to establish ourselves in the safe zones." The boss said, ending his words in a happy and eager tone as he laughed.

Eavesdropping behind the door, Adam's face darkened. He pieces together the information quite easily and relays them back to Angeline for verification.

Swiftly Angeline provides him verification that the information he obtained is indeed true.

The councillors mentioned were none other than councillors of the Fire Moth.

Due to the nature of the Fire Moth as an international peacekeeping organization, the research they made is kept top secret and not even divulged to other nations in fear of them abusing these research results for their personal greed.

The research into Project SOLDIER is one of them, which was proposed by Dr Mei to create superhuman soldiers to combat the Honkai threat.

In this already chaotic world riddled with Honkai Outbreak, strength is something everyone craves. The councillors are not an exception. Each of them wishes to possess the power to survive this calamity. Either they own the power themselves or control it under their thumb.

Thus, in secret, they stole the research results and funded their own private research to either create a supersoldier of their own or to grant themselves with the power. But the research required a lot of test subjects and the gang was one of their methods to acquire the test subjects, aka the lab rats.

Of course, there's nothing wrong with wishing to gain power to protect themselves. However, their method and goal was twisted.

From what Adam learned from Angeline's findings, not only did the privately funded research of the councillors be very crude and unrefined compared to the research done by the Fifth Institute under the leadership of Dr Mobius. They also use human life as nothing but expendable. Their research is very unethical, using human experimentation to brute force their progress with disregard to the life of people they experimented on compared to the Fifth Institute that had only experimented on animals and willing human participants.

Not only that, but Angeline also delved a little deeper and found that some of the failed test subjects which retain some semblance of human consciousness were conditioned and trained to be used as weapons and tools to deal with their political enemies and disguising it as a freak accident.

Hearing all this, Adam felt strange…

He understood that any normal human with a good sense of mortality would denounce and frown upon such actions. However, he felt strangely calm as if he couldn't find himself to be angry at the twisted experiments done to those innocent people.

But Adam didn't dwell on that matter as he put this strange matter aside and summoned a firearm into his hands.

With a swift act, Adam kicked down the door, ripping it off the hinges before aiming down his barrel at the people behind the door.

"Try anything suspicious and I'll put a bullet into your heads." Adam calmly addressed the room filled with two bewildered and shocked people staring straight at him as they reached towards their guns but reacted a little too slow.

The gang leader and his second-in-command instantly paled when they realized Adam had a gun aimed at them and they didn't dare to move as they lifted their hands up without being told.

"Who the hell are you?" The presumably leader asked while scrutinizing Adam's strange appearance as he couldn't recognise him.

Adam did not answer and instead walked into the room before staring down at the leader as he said and asked.

"Who am I? That doesn't concern you? What I want to know is which councilors are the ones behind this human trafficking operation. Tell me and I'll let you leave." Adam gave a rope for the gang leader to grasp on.

The gang leader instantly shivered upon hearing this question, thinking it's Adam is someone from the Fire Moth's intelligence office or the black-ops branch trying to investigate the corruption within the organization. Otherwise, he couldn't explain the futuristic look on Adam as Fire Moth is known to be the pioneer of global technology with the five major institutes under its wing.

While Fire Moth at the front is an organization created to combat Honkai threat, it's undeniable that human are also equally a threat and as someone closely interacting with the Underworld, the gang leader is aware of these branches within Fire Moth that is created solely to deal with human that pose a threat to humanity's survival against Honkai.

The gang leader is sweating profusely as his mouth opens and closes, struggling to squeeze out his words because he knew one very important thing about the covert agents of these secretive branches of Fire Moth: that they are all ruthless individuals, often killers and hitmen rather than spies. He was afraid once he lost his usefulness to Adam, he would be killed instantly.

The gang leader actually guessed correctly as Adam will not leave such criminals to roam free especially because of his actions of exploiting the survivors. Using them as convenient labour to loot the city only to leave most of them dead as bait to stall the Honkai Beast.

After seeing the gang leader's refusal to talk, Adam suddenly shifted the barrel of his firearm before it erupted with flame and a deafening gunshot followed by a pained howl.

The gang leader leaned on the sofa where he sat, his face twisted by the sheer pain and agony as he clutched the stump of his severed arm while screaming in pain.

The second-in-command instantly turned around with his arm drawing a pistol from under his suit intending to shoot Adam but was interrupted as his face bore an expression of shock and disbelief. "Yo—" He gasped with his eyes widened as Adam already anticipated his sneak attack and found the barrel aimed at his head and Adam already pulling on the trigger.

*BANG!*

His head exploded from the high caliber bullet from a sniper rifle which was an overkill for such close distance and gore of his exploded head splattered all of the room including on the unphased Adam and the terrified gang leader who peed his pants.

Adam then stared down at the gang leader, his expression hidden behind his helmet before he asked with his unnaturally calm and cold voice.

"Now, will you cooperate obediently or do I need to use interrogation?"

"W-Wait! I'll tell you! P-Please! I… I really d-don't know!" The gang leader was reduced to a pathetic man, peeing his pants from fear as he stuttered and trying to wrack his brain for any information to appease Adam.

"I-I really don't know their names! I n-never had any personal contact with the buyer! E-Everything was processed through a-a middleman! I swear! I swear everything I tell is the truth!"

"I see." Adam replied flatly before rummaging through the man's pockets and found his cellphone.

Even though he cannot verify the information on his own. After he obtains the device, Angeline remotely accesses the device and instantly scans all messages and contacts before she launches a full investigation that took only a few seconds.

'Everything he had confessed is true, Master. There's indeed middlemen from the Underworld's blackmarket that he had frequent contact with that had connections with a few Fire Moth's councillors. Should I investigate deeper to expose their identity?'

Adam pondered the question for a moment before ultimately deciding against it. His goal is merely saving the survivors within the affected regions. Not to fight the corruption festering in the world's politics.

'No. No need. Instead, focus on the ongoing task for now.'

'Understood, Master' Angeline replied solemnly.

In the Orbital Fortress, the hologram of Angeline on the bridge seems to gaze upon Earth floating in the void of space, her expression furrowed with resignation and helplessness as she reminisces the memories of the past.

"No matter if you lose your memories. You couldn't change who you are at the core. But, your kindness would only be wasted on these pitiful vermins."

Angeline mutters to herself as she glances at the activity log of the AI in Adam's suit.

Although Adam verbally denied any interest, the AI's activity log told a different story. Perhaps, for a brief moment, he forgot that Angeline was far more advanced and sophisticated than any conventional AI, given how seamlessly she displayed human behavior and appearance. In truth, Angeline was originally designed as an AI meant for leadership roles, thus her capabilities are much greater than a typical T-Doll's AI. However, her evolution took a dramatic turn when she fused with Wisdom Cube technology, transcending her from a mere artificial intelligence into a true consciousness—one with a soul.

But her true origin as an AI had not been lost by evolution and instead, had been enhanced to the degree that if she so wished, she could take over this Earth with ease as a being that is simultaneously physical, spiritual and digital. All it took was a single thought. However, she had no interest in such grand and lofty ambitions. Her one true goal from the moment she pledged her eternal devotion to Adam from their first meeting had stayed unchanged even after more than three millennia.

—————

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