If it weren’t for the fact that Panam never stops talking, he wouldn’t even want to tell anyone else.
"Why are you acting like a coward, Sol?" Panam slapped his thigh.
"If you ask me, we should storm the News 54 building right now, grab their broadcast, and let everyone know about this."
The two were arguing heatedly; it’s imaginable how long they’ve been at it even before coming to Lin Miao’s place.
"Calm down, both of you."
Lin Miao’s ears felt as if thousands of ducks were quacking loudly.
"It’s too early to be discussing this matter; the AI there won’t be causing problems for Night City in the short term, at least not for the next few years."
Blue Eyes considered Night City their territory and warned Lin Miao, so there’s no way other AI groups would interfere, and from his tone, it was clear that he wasn’t allied with the AIs in Silicon Valley, Kowloon, or Busan.
If it came to a fight, Blue Eyes would probably be more anxious than Lin Miao and Adcardo. The fact that he hasn’t reacted yet shows the issue isn’t too severe.
Panam frowned, clearly not convinced. "How do you know?"
"Private information channels."
Lin Miao didn’t want to elaborate further on this topic.
"Besides, News 54 has a background in military technology. Even if you storm the building and capture the broadcast, it won’t help; they’ll just cut the power and block the signal, ensuring you can’t utter a word. Doing so would only cause unnecessary sacrifices among your people."
"So we’re just going to sit here like a bunch of idiots watching?"
"Of course not." Lin Miao stood up from his chair, patted the California map on the wall. Only a few northern California cities were still operational: San Francisco, Night City, Sacramento... He calmly analyzed.
"The city closest to Monterey isn’t Night City but San Francisco. If anyone’s going to be nervous, it should be them first. You saw their military tech hovercraft shot down, indicating that they’ve been keeping an eye on these AI movements for a while. We at least need to understand what stance these companies take before deciding the next course of action."
"What if they don’t care?"
"Then we fight on our own, and whatever we capture belongs to us." Lin Miao had already planned to introduce AI as content for the players back when discussing with Sol; it was just a matter of time.
"But not now. We don’t have the strength yet, and we don’t have money. No money means no arms."
"Speaking of money, have you found a suitable water source?"
All water sources near Night City had been bought up as private property; even the polluted river to the south was no exception. As soon as Lin Miao showed interest, they’d definitely raise the prices sky-high to rip him off.
"Not sure if it’s suitable."
Sol got up and walked closer to the map, pointing at it.
"The pace of environmental degradation in California is faster than we imagined; it’s all deserts and chemically polluted Evil Land."
"We stayed in Big Sur for a while, found a few water sources, but they’re heavily polluted and undrinkable. We have to keep going north to search. We haven’t found a suitable place all the way to Monterey."
California is by the sea, so theoretically, it shouldn’t lack water sources. Originally, city locations should have suitable rivers nearby.
Like Big Sur; although it’s full of mountains and cliffs, not ideal for city development, there’s also the Big Sur River estuary, a well-known natural tourist area in California, although that’s the other side of the story.
But alas, earthquakes plus wars destroyed everything, and with no one managing, everywhere turned into a mess. Rivers changing course or drying up is common.
Lin Miao nodded at the places Sol pointed out on the map.
"That’s good. Pollution isn’t a problem. Did you bring any water samples back?"
"All stacked by the door."
Panam pointed to the water tanks by the door.
"You better not be tampering with the water, or I’ll blow up your water plant."
Her tone was odd; everyone knew corporations behaved badly, but she never expected to become a "helper" of a corporate dog, engaging in the water business with them.
"Rest assured, I’ll drink the water myself first before selling it, and I’ll make sure everyone has water to drink."
"If it’s not the same, go ahead and blow up the water plant, set off fireworks; I won’t stop you."
If Lin Miao dared to run a shady business, Panam wouldn’t need to act; the players would be the first to blow up the water plant.
Lin Miao could openly calculate the money in players’ hands and do whatever shameless things he wanted but couldn’t violate public morals; otherwise, people would refuse to play.
The player’s faction could be dirty, could have its own schemes, but the player must be clean.
[Mongolian Toplaner: Bro, I’m dead. I suspect there’s a BUG in the game!]
[Resident: Isn’t dying a routine for you?]
The Resident remembered this guy died five or six times in the activity at the end of the last version, and even the last time, he only made it to the hospital with a broken hand.
[Expert: Suggest training more; when your Mewtwo time runs out, practice skills at the shooting range and arena.]
[Mongolian Toplaner: What’s the use of high skills? I barely poked my head out with the voucher and got caught by the dungeon guards, turned into a sieve. Too bad for my new gear. Should’ve bought insurance. Damn the Netherworld Dog, @Kurt Hansen, when is your mom gonna die?]
[Brother Ni: You went to Dogtown?]
[Mongolian Toplaner: Didn’t the version preview say Night City map is fully open? We thought we’d explore it, check-in, complete the server’s first check-in achievement. Who knew Westbrook and Watson District were fine, but when we reached Taiping Continent and tried to enter Dogtown, we got screwed by the Netherworld Dog.]