Cyberpunk: I'm Not a Scavenger - Chapter 88: The Flesh Tank (Patreon)

Pantheon wasn't sure what to make of it. Fortunately, his increased Cool made him less susceptible to either influence.

Besides, it wasn’t like they could actually attack him.

Pantheon continued forward and arrived at the shrine’s main hall.

After all those trials, he'd finally cleared out the regular mobs and elite enemies. Now he'd reached the boss arena.

The shrine’s main hall had a distinctly eerie atmosphere. Pale lanterns hung high from the ceiling, a mournful melody lingered in the air, and the stale air was thick with the mingled scents of incense and blood.

Nomiyama had finished having his cyberware installed and sat cross-legged in the middle of the hall. He was completely naked, wearing only a loincloth to cover his private parts, his body a repulsive mass of white, flabby flesh piled layer upon layer.

Ugly rows of stitches split his once-continuous tattoos. Dark red blood seeped from wounds that hadn't been completely closed, trickling down his grotesquely swollen flesh.

“So you’re King? Your aura doesn’t look half bad.”

Nomiyama grinned, flashing a smile that could make a child burst into tears.

Pantheon sized him up from head to toe, but Nomiyama’s appearance was truly hard to admire.

“Was your surgeon an intern? Or did he hate your guts and do that on purpose?”

Far from getting angry, Nomiyama burst into laughter, his flab jiggling wildly.

“King! You really are different from those ordinary people!”

“Don't worry. I don't care about corporate schemes. Arasaka gives me cyberware, and I do their dirty work. We both get what we want.”

He slowly rose to his feet, and the entire hall seemed to tremble slightly. Enhanced by a series of experimental implants, Nomiyama now weighed almost a metric ton. His mountainlike body radiated overwhelming pressure.

He rolled his neck, his bones cracking like popcorn, a fanatical light burning in his eyes.

“I'm Nomiyama, a simple brute of a warrior! I came to Night City to fight!”

“Today, either you kill me or I kill you! Hahahahaha!”

Laughing, Nomiyama settled into a fighting stance. His thighs were thicker than barrels, and the lanterns overhead swayed as he planted his feet.

Pantheon paused in surprise. It had been a long time since he'd heard such a straightforward declaration.

Not to be outdone, he made his Chainsword roar.

“Then bring it on!”

“Woo-oh-oh-oh-oh!”

Nomiyama let out a wild scream as he charged at Pantheon, shattering the wooden planks beneath his feet in an instant. Despite his enormous bulk, he moved with terrifying speed, like a heavy tank gone out of control.

[Edgerunner]!

As the skill activated, the blood in Pantheon’s veins seemed to boil, and strength surged through him.

Facing Nomiyama's fist, as big as a cooking pot, Pantheon advanced instead of retreating and caught it on his Chainsword.

“Clang!”

The impact sounded like a shell exploding beside his ear. Fist and blade locked together in midair. The immense strength granted by Nomiyama’s experimental Arasaka cyberware surged relentlessly along the blade.

“Damn! This is getting interesting!”

Pantheon clenched his teeth, the muscles in his arms tensed to the limit.

But in the end, his organic body simply couldn’t withstand the mechanical force.

After a brief standoff, Pantheon had already carved two deep grooves into the floor.

So he took the opportunity to step back, creating some distance.

Although Pantheon had backed away first, Nomiyama only grew more excited, like a lecher spotting a beautiful woman. He thrust his legs forward with all his might and lunged at Pantheon.

A mountain of flesh weighing nearly a metric ton crashed down, and Pantheon’s eye twitched uncontrollably.

“Damn it!”

Pantheon sidestepped, narrowly missing Nomiyama.

Before he could catch his breath, Nomiyama spun around and delivered another sumo-style shove.

Pantheon darted around one of the hall's massive pillars. Nomiyama’s palm struck the pillar, and the thick wooden column snapped in two instantly, sending wood shavings flying everywhere.

Like a tireless monster, he kept charging and grappling, smashing the hall to pieces. Pantheon had considered counterattacking, but Nomiyama’s fan-like palms made it impossible for him to get close.

He could only keep dodging, looking for an opening.

Nomiyama’s relentless assault caused the wounds on his body to reopen, and his movements suddenly faltered for a brief moment.

Pantheon seized the opportunity instantly, drawing his Wingman from his waist with a backhand motion.

[Dead Eye]!

Without hesitation, he pulled the trigger, firing three bullets in rapid succession at Nomiyama’s eyes.

“Clink, clink, clink!”

Nomiyama closed his eyes just in time. The bullets pierced his eyelids, only to ricochet off the optical shields protecting his cybernetic eyes.

Although the optical shield blocked the bullets, their immense kinetic energy still left Nomiyama temporarily blinded.

“Hmph!”

Nomiyama groaned in pain. His head spun and his body swayed.

Now’s the time!

Pantheon seized the opportunity to close in. The Chainsword’s motor roared as he slashed viciously at Nomiyama’s chest.

“Hiss!”

Flesh and blood flew. For a moment, it looked as though he'd landed a decisive blow.

But soon, Pantheon felt a strong resistance from the blade.

Nomiyama was simply enormous. His muscles and fat were absurdly thick, and the subdermal armor Arasaka had made for him was just as formidable.

Once the Chainsword tore through the outer flesh, its teeth could barely gouge a few scratches in the thick alloy armor beneath.

“Is that all you’ve got?! You’re pathetic!”

Nomiyama recovered from his brief moment of blindness. Feeling the stabbing pain in his chest, he burst into a wild, unrestrained laugh.

In reality, he wasn’t as reckless as he appeared.

He'd learned his lesson. Rather than attacking with the same wild, sweeping movements, he hunched slightly and kept one huge hand in front of his face, following Pantheon through the gaps between his fingers and with his peripheral vision.

The situation had entered a lull. Both sides were carefully observing each other, waiting for the right moment to strike.

Pantheon, holding his Wingman, kept testing the waters.

“Bang! Bang! Bang!”

Three large-caliber sniper rounds flew toward vital points in Nomiyama’s lower body.

Nomiyama had neither the time nor the inclination to block them. The bullets vanished into layer upon layer of fat like stones dropped into a bottomless swamp, barely causing a ripple.

Enhanced by Arasaka's new cyberware, those layers of excess fat were like stacked tank armor.

The projectiles lodged in the flesh, unable to inflict any effective damage.

“Fuck! How is that even possible?”

Pantheon couldn’t help but let out a curse.

Defense of this caliber was practically invincible in small-scale street fighting.

The only question was how effective Incendiary Rounds would be against him.

As if sensing his frustration, Nomiyama patted his enormous belly, sending waves through the rolls of fat.

“I don't understand it myself, but Arasaka says their nanomachines can stop bullets, fire, and even poison.”

“That kind of mumbo jumbo won’t work on me!”

Pantheon fell silent as he reloaded his Wingman.

If he couldn't penetrate anywhere else, he'd have to keep aiming for the face.

“Hey! Fatso, you’ve seen bullets that can change direction, right?”

Nomiyama’s expression shifted slightly as the bullets traced several different arcs through the air, closing in on him from all directions.