Chapter 164: The Freezer

"This is the warehouse where the meat is stored. Give me a second, I remember I put it in this freezer…"

Jed, the contact, activated his cybernetic eye, unlocking the freezer door. He then led Johnson, Karl, and Ken'ichiro into the cold storage room, where a thick mist of condensation swirled around them.

As soon as they stepped inside, Karl's eyes lit up.

Right before him stood seven three-tiered metal racks, filled with various cuts of meat.

"You've got quite a bit of stock here. Is it just pork, or do you also have lamb, beef, duck, and chicken?"

"Don't get your hopes up. Read the labels before you get excited," Jed replied. "They might look fresh and bloody, but they're all synthetic meat. If you're into earthworm-based imitation beef, well… there's plenty of that."

Karl's eager expression immediately darkened.

"Yeah, I'll pass on the synthetic crap. But what about the real stuff? Can you get the meats I just mentioned?"

"As long as the price is right, there's nothing you can't get in Night City," Jed smirked. "Well… except maybe a genuine heart, as Oliver likes to joke."

He chuckled while making small talk, all the while scanning the racks for the hidden, real pork he had carefully disguised and sectioned off.

However… as he searched each rack one by one, his expression gradually turned grim.

He couldn't find it.

The pork was gone.

Only a handful of people had access to this freezer, and even fewer knew which packages were real meat.

The worst-case scenario… had become reality.

Jed took a deep breath of the cold, lung-stinging air, then turned to Karl:

"The pork… is missing."

"So that means… the pig bones found at the crime scene likely came from this warehouse," Johnson muttered, scanning the cold room.

But something felt off.

Why did it feel like the freezer was getting colder?

Typically, commercial freezers regulate temperature through industrial refrigeration units, which use low-boiling-point liquids as coolants. These are controlled from a central system, ensuring a stable environment.

But this rapid drop in temperature was unnatural. It felt deliberate, like someone in the control room had just turned the dial all the way down.

And that's when Ken'ichiro—who had remained silent until now—finally spoke:

"My bio-monitor detects a significant drop in temperature."

"Temperature drop?"

Jed was still distracted, thinking about potential traitors within his group. But then… he saw it.

Right behind Karl, the freezer door was closing.

"The door!"

Jed's face twisted in panic. The doors of these storage units were reinforced, with 120mm-thick composite panels. Once shut, they were nearly impossible to open from the inside.

He immediately tried to override the system, using his clearance to keep the door open…

But his access was blocked.

It was like his requests weren't even being processed—as if someone had already overridden his authority.

"BANG!"

With a heavy metallic thud, the thick, insulated steel door slammed shut.

They were trapped.

"Shit… we need to call someone outside!"

That was Jed's first instinct.

But as soon as he tried to connect to his comms, he froze in place.

His connection was dead.

It was completely jammed, as if someone had activated a signal blocker, cutting them off from the outside world.

"Fuck!"

Jed's expression twisted in frustration. What the hell was happening? How had things escalated so fast?

Johnson, who had just witnessed the freezer door slamming shut, turned with a grim look and asked, "Can this door be opened from the inside?"

"The cold storage door uses a semi-mechanical lock with an integrated smart unlock system. If we lose scan authorization, then it can only be opened from the outside."

Shivering from the cold, Jed clenched his arms and added, "They were planning to upgrade it to a magnetic door, the kind you can open from both inside and out… but they decided it was too expensive, so they stuck with this old-school crap."

"Does anyone else come here?"

"I'm the only one on shift today."

Hearing Jed's increasingly shaky voice, Johnson stomped his foot in frustration. "Damn it! Walking straight into an enclosed space while investigating a case and getting locked inside—how the hell did I fall into a cliché braindance plotline?!"

He tried making a call, but—nothing.

His comms were completely jammed.

At that moment, Johnson realized the full picture.

Someone had been watching them this entire time. Otherwise, how else could they have timed it so perfectly to lock them in and jam their communication right as they entered the freezer?

His mind began racing. It was 11 AM. That meant 13 hours until midnight. But more importantly…

"When does the next shift start?"

"Six AM."

So they had to survive for 19 hours?

In these freezing conditions, would they even make it to rescue time?

Whether they could or not, he had to figure out a way for Karl to survive at the very least.

As long as Karl got out of here alive, this case wouldn't end here—Karl would hunt down whoever was behind this.

Johnson steeled his resolve. He was just about to suggest they huddle together to preserve body heat when he suddenly realized something was wrong.

Karl… was gone.

The only person left standing next to him was Ken'ichiro, whose expression was completely unchanged, his face calm as ever.

Where the hell was Karl?!

Just as that thought rushed into Johnson's head, an earth-shattering explosion suddenly roared through the freezer—

"BOOM!"

The entire freezer trembled from the shockwave.

Still shivering from the cold, Jed and Johnson turned toward the source of the sound—

And both reacted the exact same way.

They froze in place, their mouths hanging open.

"What are you guys standing around for?"

Karl stood casually in front of the collapsed freezer door, shaking off the dust from his hands.

"The door's open. Let's go—it's fucking freezing in here."

"W-WHAT?!"

Jed stared blankly at where the heavy, reinforced freezer door had once stood—now replaced by a gaping hole in the wall.

His brain short-circuited.

"Oh, my bad," Karl added casually. "I broke your freezer door. Let me know how much it costs—I'll cover it."

"T-That's not… really the issue here…"

Jed barely managed to get the words out.

But Karl, misinterpreting his concern, continued explaining:

"You should probably upgrade this freezer anyway. The door was pretty thick, but the walls? Way too flimsy. I barely put in any effort, and the whole thing collapsed."

"I… I don't think that's the problem here."

As Jed struggled to process what just happened, Ken'ichiro casually walked past him, stepping out into the open air.

Clearly, even he didn't want to stay in that freezing room any longer.

Jed and Johnson watched in stunned silence as Ken'ichiro calmly exited through the wreckage—

And only then did they realize something.

Karl and Ken'ichiro had never once looked worried.

From the moment the freezer door shut, only Jed and Johnson had been panicking about how to escape.

Karl and Ken'ichiro?

They never even considered the possibility that they wouldn't get out.

Johnson exhaled deeply, rubbing his temples.

"Guess crime-solving in this era… really just comes down to brute force."

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