CHAPTER 02 . ENGINES OF EVIL
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Konoko immediately heads from the "Syndicate Warehouse" to the Musashi Manufacturing Plant to follow the lead from Chung's datapad.
Summary
The lead on Musashi being connected to the Syndicate is soon proven when Syndicate goons attack her team in the lobby. However, after exploring some of the building, Konoko intuits that the resistance she is facing is merely a delaying tactic while the Syndicate makes another move. Griffin tells her that until they know that for a fact, she should continue gathering evidence against Musashi. Konoko's suspicions are confirmed with word that a nearby research facility is under attack by the Syndicate. Before she can head there, Konoko has to stop a Deadly Brain which, before being shut down, attempts to hack its way onto the Internet, and then tries to self-destruct. Its Xiox destruct mechanism is powerful, and Konoko rushes to shut it down before it vaporizes the surrounding city block.
Added Value
- We get our first glimpse of both Muro and Barabas in the chapter opening. We don't yet know how significant Muro is, but he's clearly Barabas' boss, and anyone who can boss that guy around must be dangerous indeed. Just looking at Barabas, he's clearly not normal. Pale skin, a superfluous horn and malformed skull, and strange veins and a messed-up eye are what set him aside from ordinary humans. We'll see what he's physically capable of in the next chapter.
- Konoko shows an almost preternatural intuition here, when she randomly decides halfway through her battles within Musashi that it's "a wild goose chase".
- The Deadly Brain at the end of the chapter seems at first like a big time-waster when you're trying to quickly exit the level so you can get to where the Syndicate really is. But we'll be revisiting the concept of the Deadly Brain again later. And the Xiox bomb that will nearly kill Konoko is first introduced here so it doesn't seem completely out of the blue when it becomes more important in Chapter 8.
- Those playing with subtitles will note that, while the Deadly Brain may only seem to be grunting, it actually has a lot to say. The transcript of his monologues is here for your edification.