Chapter 52 Joy Ride.
Chapter 52 Joy Ride.
Eventually he finished his preparations after a week. During that week, he received a follow-up from the villain league about the investigation into Red Dreams illegal conduct.
They had found her guilty on many accounts, including murder and theft. Apparently, only five villains out of the almost hundred that she hired survived.
She had used the ones that decided to protect her base to defend against the men that the Blue Crystal gang sent to warn her. Then she had killed them.
Those men from the Blue Crystal gang came looking to warn her. They wanted to pressure her to back off. If everything went well, they would ask her to give up two of her subordinates for the deaths of three gang members, whom her assassin killed. But they got a fight on their hands instead.
Red Dream killed them and then turned on her helpers. Only two of them escaped. That made for a total of five. All those five were rewarded with 2 million dollars for what they went through.
This money was taken out of the hefty fine that the villain league billed her. They didn't try to kill her at all. They asked her to pay the fine or be turned into a drug mule like Blue Crystal, or be turned into a prisoner used to mine resources outside of the city.
So Kelvin received another credit of $1 million, which put him in a good mood for the rest of the week. When he was ready for his mission, he went down to the garage below the skyscraper where he lives to pick up his new vehicle.
It is a black bike currently resting on its flat bottom. It looks like a normal bike, except it doesn't have wheels. Where there should be wheels are to horizontal plates, which it uses to hover.
He got on top of it and started it. It started with a low hum that vibrated through his thighs. Then it became calm and silent.
He drove it out of the garage and into the street. It didn't draw any attention because he was wearing normal civilian clothes, so he looked like an ordinary teenager going on a joy ride.
It felt like a joy ride too. The sights of the city flashed by him, and it was pleasant enough to make him believe it was a joy ride.
The roads in the city are multilayered. They are stacked on top of each other to make full use of the small space between the skyscrapers everywhere.
There were flashing screens on the sides of the buildings displaying one advertisement or the other. Some of the drivers on the road could be seen with different types of cybernetic implants. It identified them as either weapon supers or mechanical augment enthusiasts.
If they were the latter, he would know because they always drove expensive vehicles. Mechanical augmentation is not a cheap procedure. Not only are the parts expensive, even the surgery to use and maintain them is expensive. So a normal person is unlikely to use a mechanical augment even if it was given to them for free.
Above all of these high in the sky are the flying vehicles. They are usually used by the richest of society. Not only are these types of vehicles expensive, their fuel is more expensive than it, and the permit to use them in the city is more expensive than the vehicle itself.
Only supers who are rich, the well-renown crime bosses, and corpo morguls can afford that kind of privilege in New London. As for hard-working grunt men like him, they have to slum through traffic on the ground with their hoverbikes.
This sight finally made him admit to Wrath, "You're right. I am not rich."
Wrath snorted and said, "Of course I'm right. What are the odds that I would be wrong about anything, especially your financial status?"
He smiled. Admitting that he wasn't rich didn't spoil his mood. Maybe it was because he grew up with practically nothing. The "little money" he has, as Wrath calls it, and the freedom to spend it however he likes, are enough to make him happy.
Besides, this has only given him more things to look forward to. He liked the idea of owning a hovering armored tank. It brought a smile to his face just imagining driving one and blowing up enemies with it.
So the drive was still fun. The ammunition he bought was picked up without any issue, which put him in a better mood until he reached the wilds.
He felt the difference as soon as he left the city behind. It was not like the difference between District 666 and the rest of the city. The gap between District 666 and the rest of the city is urban desolation. It is still part of the city. But beyond the walls is just wildness.
He veered off the patchy road immediately he left the city because not only will driving on it make him visible, but because driving on it will be difficult thanks to the hoard of incursion zombies that have made it their home.
He would need an armored vehicle to traverse the road, but a hoverbike is far from being able to protect him. So he took the cautious route. Besides, a straight line to his destination across the wilds should be faster.
He let GPS guide him to his destination across the ruins of a previous civilization being reclaimed by the forest. Incursion zombies chased after him, but they couldn't catch him.
His hoverbike could reach 200 kmph, and he was silent, so many of them didn't notice him until it was too late to do anything. He drove like a ghost in the wilds.
If not for the color of the hoverbike which formed a stark difference to his environment, he would be less noticeable. Unfortunately, nothing could be done about that. His hoverbike doesn't have the ability to camouflage itself. He didn't buy one that could because it was too expensive.