So Anyways, I started blasting.

What up, it's me again. Back with another chapter for y'all.

I appreciate all the support and will endeavor to keep this upload schedule, but no promises.

Anyway, I forgot to mention that each chapter will be 2,000 words at least, so expect 2-2.5k words for each upload.

Here we go with Cyberpunk food and more training.

-+=[BoG]=+-

Staring at the can of soda, he saw that it had some girl with their ass out in a black-and-white color scheme. How classy. 'Taste the love'. Marcus rolled his eyes at the horny shit.

He cracked it open and took a drink.

'...Taste the love? All I taste is cough syrup.' A grimace forms on his face and he knew he was never drinking this shit again, but he is not wasteful and he's thirsty as shit from the workout so he downs it. 'Can't even make lean with that.' He thought humorously.

The burrito was quite big and he unwrapped it while taking a bite.

'Well, it's not bad, but not good either.' Marcus was prepared for the worst but was pleasantly surprised. His expectations were in the gutter so there was only up from there.

It took him a while to finish and once he was done, he threw both the wrapper and soda can in the garbage.

His palette wasn't really refined, which wouldn't matter because of his new body, but let's just say Marcus hadn't eaten any home-cooked meals for years.

"Now it's for the moment of truth." His deep voice echoed through the apartment as he pulled the shard out of his inventory and stuck it in the slot.

His vision started fading and complete darkness enveloped him.

A moment later, his vision returned and he took a glance at his surroundings.

He is in one of those chair desks from school with a chalkboard in front of him with writing on it.

Edgerunning for Dummies 101

50% Experience up to Level 5

25% Experience up to Level 10

No further Experience gains.

'Huh, I guess that makes sense. Imagine if I could just get to Level 20 by staying in my apartment.' Marcus pondered and felt that upon hitting Level 5, it may be more worth it to go out and level up in the real world, even if it's more dangerous.

He looked around and saw quite a few doors leading out of the room.

One of the doors had Gunplay written on it so he felt he should start with that.

Walking up to the door, he noticed that the door on the right side of it had Melee Combat written on it. He'd check that out later. The left side door had Stealth on it.

He then turned around and saw the other doors he previously didn't pay much attention to.

Driving

Techie Training

Netrunning

The last door took him a second to process.

...Rockerboy?

'So a training module for learning instruments and singing probably. That'd be cool.' More entertainment and an overall hobby would be nice to have.

He's surprised that Driving was a skill, but he remembered that The Examiner made some changes.

The Netrunning door had a red X on it that said there was no cyberdeck detected, so he'll have to get one.

Marcus had 100,000 eddies so he can definitely afford one. He also had to figure out how much rent was which is likely on his computer. Perhaps he should've checked that first before focusing on the gaming tab.

Anyway, he grabbed the handle to the Gunplay door but before he could push a loading screen appeared that was transferring me to the training module.

Once it was done, his vision glitched out before he was plopped into a gun range.

Usually ranges had multiple cubicles for people to shoot but this place only had one and was quite wide and went far. There were a few buttons and a table. A clock on the wall too was helpful.

Turning around he saw a whole arsenal of firearms and quickly noticed they were sorted by type.

'I want to see how this thing fires.' He saw the Malorian and grabbed it, immediately after, magazines appeared on the table at the range.

He grabbed a mag and slotted it in while looking to his left where there were options for range, size, and shape of targets, even turning them into mannequins to shoot at.

Marcus chose the classic bullseye and a good distance away. He aimed his gun, lined up his shot, and fired. It was loud, to say the least, and he saw that he at least hit the target but not all that close to the center.

Since he wouldn't be able to use this gun for a while he chose something that he could use.

Grabbing a Unity off the wall and ammo appearing on the table, he loaded the gun reset the target, and fired.

There was nothing to do but practice now, so practice he did.

He tried all kinds of pistols. Starting with the Unity, Lexington, Liberty, Overture, DR-5 Nova, Tsunami Nue, RT-46 Burya, and the Tamayura.

The revolvers or hand cannons were the Overture, DR-5 Nova, and the RT-46 Burya. He felt like a real American firing those. The Liberty, Nue, and Tamayura had high stopping power with a slower fire rate, while the Unity and Lexington allow you to just let it rip. Both were fun options.

If he had to choose a stealth weapon then he'd either go with the Nue or Liberty with a suppressor. The other options were nice but he'd need something with some oomph. The Unity and Lexington don't cut it, and the Tamayura was a bit bulky, but the Liberty is also pretty long, so Nue it is.

Pulling up his stat screen, he heard quite a lot of notifications, as he'd been here for what felt like a few hours and it had been from reading the time.

Body 1(125/400xp)

- Athletics 1(400/400xp)

Reflexes 1(450/800xp)

- Pistols 1(400/400xp)

Technical Ability 1(325/800xp)

- Gunsmithing 1(650/800xp)

'Damn, that's pretty good. I noticed a few times that the attribute leveling was still 25xp per skill experience which the tutorial didn't affect, otherwise, it would've been 5xp for attributes which would have been painful.' He also noticed something that could be detrimental.

He had an influx of memories that allowed him to sharpen his stance while firing pistols and better handling and aiming, but that could be bad if he was in the middle of a fight. Imagine if he was shooting at people and got one of those influxes and got shot in the face for it. Could he change that?

Detected request 

Would you like to change to user-activated level-ups and notifications?

Confirm/Deny

'User activated? So I'd have to manually level up a skill or attribute instead of automatic? Sounds good to me. Confirm.' He felt a ding and nothing else. Marcus also wouldn't be getting any notifications which will help during a fight. It's not like he can't quickly check either.

Now with that liability fixed, Marcus wanted to try to level up his body, so he went over to the back wall for some assault rifles and shotguns.

This test was much shorter since he was starting to feel tired. His mental fatigue is building up.

The assault rifles he tried out were the HJSH-18 Masamune, Nawaki which was just a previous-gen version of the Masamune and he didn't stick with that one for long, Umbra, Ajax, D5 Copperhead, and the Kyubi.

Marcus felt the best with the Kyubi, Ajax, and Copperhead. The Masamune felt alright, but too bulky for his tastes. He'd use the Umbra if he had to but would choose the others if he had the chance.

The shotguns were hella fun. He tried the Carnage pump-action, Tactician pump-action, Crusher fully automatic, Testera double-barrel, Igla double-barrel, and Pozhar automatic.

He had high hopes for the Carnage because Rebecca had a modified one in the show, but it felt like shit and the kick was insane. The weight felt off and he probably won't use it. The Tactician felt nice and far better than the Carnage, so no problems with this one. The Crusher was fucking awesome and something he'd see himself using. The Tesera was also a fun gun but the Igla was worse. Pozhar was another automatic shotgun but he far prefers the Carnage.

Marcus pulled up his stat screen.

Body 1(400/400xp)

- Athletics 1(400/400xp)

- Shotguns 1(400/400xp)

Reflexes 1(725/800xp)

- Pistols 1(400/400xp)

- Assault Rifles 1(400/400xp)

Technical Ability 1(625/800xp)

- Gunsmithing 1(800/800xp)

'Assault Rifles is not under Body? Damn, it's been a while since I played the game, but Body is ready to level up and so will Athletics. It also seems that the experience won't overflow and be stuck at the max, so I'll have to keep an eye on it so I'm not wasting XP.' Marcus pondered a bit. Oh, and his Gunsmithing is maxed from reloading a lot, so I can level that up without even meaning to, but he has a sneaking feeling that level 2 would involve actual Gunsmithing.

He decided that he'd stay a bit more so he can level up Reflexes and also wants to do the level-ups in real life to feel the difference in Athletics and Body.

After a bit more grinding, he finally hit the max and exited the training shard.

Marcus immediately felt hungry and thirsty so he went up to the machine and got another Burrito but this time he got a Cirrus Cola Classic.

The art on the drink practically screamed America.

He cracked it open and took a swig.

'It's not like the coke from my last life, but this is far better than NiCola.' Marcus smiled a bit as he found his soda of choice, but he should eventually try RealWater since his body can't just survive off of sugar or whatever synthetic name it's called.

After eating the massive burrito and throwing the can and wrapper in the garbage. He gave a mental command to level up Body and Athletics.

He immediately regretted it as unlike the tingling from before, there was now what felt like sharp needles piercing his skin, muscles, and even bones. It even felt like his organs were getting stabbed to death as it was difficult to breathe.

Once the agonizing acupuncture from hell was over, he felt around his body and there was now a bit of firmness as his muscles were more powerful and bigger. There was now a hint of abs as he pressed around his torso.

His memory influx also included some running forms, lifting techniques, and a bit of parkour. Nice to have.

The description also said he'd have more stamina now which is always a big help.

Next, he leveled up Reflexes, Pistols, Shotguns, and Assault rifles.

Hell started once more, it was as if his nerves were getting plucked and prodded. Now this was worse as his nerves kept firing all across his body and up his spine. He would probably be flailing around the ground from his neurons firing off randomly if he wasn't rooted in place.

Once hell was over...again, he got an influx of memories of different stances and further muscle memory as if he was quite familiar with holding and firing them. He felt this would be a recurring theme with weapons as he instinctively knew he could aim better now.

'Man, I'm beat.' Marcus felt pooped and decided to call it quits for the day.

There is no reason to overtrain as it has its drawbacks. Rest was very important and not something to ignore or push through.

Now it was time to game. He wanted to play Stardew Valley as he wanted to just chill and have a fun little farm. It's relaxing as he didn't feel like playing a competitive game since they were the opposite of chill.

He walked over to the computer and sat down while going over his files first.

A message noting he paid rent this month. Thanks, Examiner. He saw that it was 3,000eddies a month which was nice, but the food was pretty expensive. The burrito he just ate was 12 eddies and the soda was 10, so he spent 44 eddies on two meals. Insane.

Marcus looked at the next message. It was from Gloria. She seemed to check in on me every month, but this one was different. She found out that he quit his job and demanded that I explain why.

'My backstory is getting me into some shit. I could ignore it, but where's the decency in that? She's already working herself to death for David and still has time to check in on me. She likely called my previous workplace to see how I was doing and found out that way.' He felt contemplative.

From the shard, the last time I even saw Gloria, was when I was invited over to celebrate David getting into Arasaka Academy which was years ago. She's a good person, even if a little naive that David would have a better life at Arasaka, but being an edgerunner was probably worse in her eyes. Not that he can blame her. Mercs die every day and Arasaka looks like a way out.

Marcus replied that he was going to be an edgerunner and left it at that. Would he get an angry call at some point? Probably, but that doesn't change anything. Her approval ultimately doesn't matter. Harsh to say, but he wants to be one even without the test looming over him.

'Now, let's make a farm.' He loaded up Stardew Valley.

-+=[BoG]=+-

We slide for Gloria. A breath of fresh air from the degeneracy of Night City, so naturally the MC won't blow her off. They are related, so along with Rogue and David, they're the only family he has here.

Thanks for the continued support and I'll see you all in the next chapter!

Later!