Gods, Ashes Descend

Chapter 19 Underlying Ecosystem

It wasn't until dusk that a drunken Carl returned in his dilapidated little car.

This reflects the mindset of the lower class in Night City: live for the moment, and if they have a few hundred euros to spare for emergencies, they consider themselves thrifty.

As soon as he got off the bus, he couldn't wait to knock on Li Wei's door, calling out as he knocked.

"Hey Li, I found a long-term job, at least two weeks, and the pay isn't bad. Want to do it?"

Wearing his pajamas, Li Wei opened the door, looked at Carl holding two cans of beer, and stepped aside.

"Come in."

Stepping into Li Wei's room, there was still nowhere to sit. Karl plopped down on the edge of the bed and began to complain incessantly.

"Li, we've earned quite a bit of money this month. Can you please stop being so stingy? You're so reluctant to spend money on food and clothes, and you even have to get your electricity from my house."

As he spoke, he opened the plastic bag in his hand and tossed a can of beer to Li Wei.

Li Wei reached out and caught it, opened the tab, took a sip, and plopped down in the middle of the bed.

"What, you're someone who steals electricity, and you still have to pay for it? Tell me, what job do you want?"

"There's this guy named Russell Green who just can't stand living in the city anymore and is planning to settle down in the Badlands. The moving company is hiring temporary workers."

Li Wei glanced at Karl and rejected the job without hesitation.

"You go, I'm not going."

Carl opened his can of beer, drank it all in one gulp, and threw the empty can away.

Pat your bottom and stand up.

"Li, you haven't gotten yourself listed on the payrolls of every major company, have you? Why don't you do any work that's even remotely related to companies?"

Li Wei slowly took a sip of the beer can and said calmly.

"It's for personal reasons. Didn't you say you wouldn't ask? As long as it won't cause you any trouble, it's fine."

"Nobody likes companies, but now major companies have penetrated every aspect of life. There's no escaping it. You don't have a bounty on you, so what are you afraid of? Nobody will even acknowledge you on the street."

Karl scratched the back of his head in frustration, paced back and forth a couple of times, and finally spoke to Levi as if he had made up his mind.

"Alright, you've been here for a month now. No cop would sit here and collect trash just to investigate a garbage collector like me. I'll introduce you to a proper job tomorrow."

"what?"

Carl said with a mysterious look on his face.

"Do the work a proper garbage collector should do. If I just pick up garbage, I'll starve to death long ago. You work with energy and are quick and efficient. Get a good night's sleep tonight, and come with me tomorrow."

After saying goodbye to Carl, Levi lay on the bed playing on his phone while wondering if the garbage collectors actually had any decent work to do.

The next day, we arrived in Karl's beat-up little car at a place full of trailers, surrounded by barbed wire.

There were two guards standing watch at the main gate, carrying rifles.

in the car.

"Li, I'll go first, you wait here. I'll call you and then you can come over."

Li Wei glanced around at the desert, cacti, rusty nodding donkeys, and there wasn't a soul in sight. He asked curiously.

"Wait, what on earth is this godforsaken place for?"

Carl opened the car door, got out, closed the door, leaned against the window, lit a cigarette, and said to Levi.

"There are different levels of junk collectors. You should be grateful if you meet one like me."

After saying that, he raised his hand and walked towards the gate. Li Wei saw him talk to the guard for a while, then hand the guard a roll of banknotes and wave to him.

I got out of the car and followed the security guard to a trailer.

The gatekeeper gave Li Wei a strange look and pointed his gun at the trailer door.

"We're here, Karl. This is the man you brought. Tell him not to wander off. You know the rules."

Carl immediately bowed and scraped, smiling obsequiously.

"I understand, I understand."

After saying that, he rummaged through the cabinet next to the trailer and pulled out two full-face gas masks, handed one to Li Wei, and patted Li Wei on the shoulder.

"Take this, it's time to get to work."

Wearing a mask, I pushed open the door and saw that half the room was filled with corpses, most of which had been dismantled into parts and piled up haphazardly, some of which had even begun to rot.

Upon seeing these things, Li Wei asked in surprise.

"Damn it, Carl, is this work for the scavengers?"

The cleaners, the prosthetic body specialists, and the kidney specialists all randomly select a lucky passerby or pick up a corpse on the street, not just those in the sewers, but also those who are drunk and passed out on the roadside.

Carl observed Levi and was somewhat disappointed with his performance.

"You didn't throw up? I threw up like crazy the first time I saw you."

After saying that, he took the protective suit off the wall, put it on, and pointed to the pile of corpses.

"Get to work. Just hand me any part, and I'll use my prosthetic eye to scan it and see if there's anything I can take apart."

Li Wei sighed helplessly, walked to the pile of corpses, picked up two thighs, and placed them on the flat surface.

"This is what you call 'proper work'? From dismantling wiring from scrap metal to dismantling wiring from human bodies?"

Carl stretched his limbs and picked up the knife and pliers beside him.

"Don't worry, these big shots aren't interested in us junk collectors. I'm just a brain-computer interface and a prosthetic eye. You can find a similar thing in any corpse you find in a junkyard. You're even more of an original product."

Killing us would be a waste of bullets, and we're just a link in the bottom of the food chain, helping out with the work. If you don't want to stay here, hurry up.

After removing all the wires from the corpse, the body in front of me was completely separated from its flesh and bones, which was somewhat disgusting.

Carl stood up from his seat, stretched, and then rummaged through the pile of disassembled parts, calling out to them.

"Two people are much faster. I know you're unhappy, but you're a junk collector now."

This is a legitimate job of cleaning up trash, and recycling isn't illegal. The NCPD and other police don't care. Don't overthink it. Just come have a drink with me later.

"Ah, this is high-end stuff! This prosthetic eye could sell for at least two hundred euros."

Li Wei took off his protective suit and rolled his eyes at Karl, who was stuffing a prosthetic eye into his crotch.

"Stop stuffing them in, pick out the good stuff and I'll keep it for myself."

He himself inserted a two-dimensional anus, while Karl directly inserted an anus.

Karl paused for a moment, then asked in return.

"They'll be scanned later, so the usual hiding method won't work. Would you like me to help you insert two?"

"Don't worry about how I stuff it in, as long as it won't be detected."

As he spoke, Li Wei picked up a piece of "visual cortex support" that had been removed from his head and shoved it behind him.

Carl swallowed hard, comparing it to his own anus; the palm-sized thing was gone in an instant.

"Is this magic? If I had known you were this good, why would I have brought you here? We could have just gone to the city and found everything."

Li Wei casually inserted a metabolism editor into the anime-style chrysanthemum.

"Yes, our bodies will be in the stinking ditch the next day. There are no surveillance cameras anywhere now."

Carl nodded seriously.

"That's true, but we can make a fortune now. However, we need to act quickly, or we'll be riddled with bullets if we get caught."