WCN's leadership room is loud and frayed. Everyone knows the stakes.
Given Ascension Technology's alliance with Arasaka, declaring war on Ascension is basically declaring war on Arasaka. Their analysts also agree on one thing: Ascension Network didn't grow in a vacuum. Arasaka almost certainly helped.
Recent intel says Arasaka has migrated its internal systems to Ascension Network. To WCN, abandoning a private net for Ascension's stack all but proves the network is an Arasaka-backed project.
"Arasaka's a headache, sure," one executive says, "but they don't own global telecom. Their appetite is too big. They just crawled out of a civil war, and now they want to expand? This new chairman, Yorinobu Arasaka, is being foolish."
Telecom is a tangle. WCN sits near the top, but it's not the only player. Each city has its own providers with deep ties to local governments. Poaching those markets means fighting city halls everywhere.
Security vendors are part of that ecosystem, too. Typically, a new network doesn't threaten their business. Ascension Network is different: it's too secure, it refuses outside "network monitoring," and it enforces its own supervisory rules. In practice, NetWatch can't police inside it.
If Ascension Network really goes global, NetWatch's authority and revenue take a hit. That's the last thing NetWatch wants.
So this one move from Ascension threatens local carriers, WCN, and NetWatch at the same time.
"NetWatch, regional ISPs and governments, plus Militech, which has never stopped eyeing Arasaka," another exec summarizes. "Arasaka grew fast this year, but it bled during its internal war. Challenging all of us at once is suicide."
"Contact Militech and NetWatch. Prepare to act," the chair orders.
Ascension just reached into the world's telecom throat. That's a provocation and, to WCN, an invitation to a new corporate war.
They aren't rattled. Even with Arasaka behind Ascension, WCN's financial depth makes it simple to hire Militech to fight. Militech, for its part, would love to hit Arasaka while it's still bruised.
Talks move quickly.
WCN closes a deal with Militech's senior brass.
Militech doesn't really want to trigger another corporate war. The map isn't a clean two-superpower board anymore. Under Arasaka and Militech, companies like Kang Tao wait to profit if both giants get cut.
But WCN's offer is rich, and the chance to check Arasaka is hard to refuse. There's another angle too: Ascension is rooted in Night City, a Free City the New United States of America failed to fold during the Unification War. If Militech wins fast, Night City could be dragged back under NUSA control.
After weighing the board, Militech accepts WCN's war commission.
Two world-shaking names, Arasaka and Militech, look ready to clash again. It feels like the Fourth Corporate War all over. Only this time, the sparks aren't CINO and OTEC fighting over an oceanic merger. They're Ascension Technology and WCN fighting over the backbone of the world.
The difference is scale. In the old war, CINO and OTEC were peers. Ascension and WCN aren't.
WCN also reaches out to NetWatch. On paper, NetWatch should be eager to help crush a network it can't police. If Ascension Network rises, NetWatch risks becoming obsolete.
What WCN doesn't expect is NetWatch's answer.
NetWatch is interested, sure, but help isn't coming. They're underwater with something worse.
The Blackwall is leaking.
NetWatch Headquarters.
Blackwall Administration.
This department handles everything about the Blackwall and what lurks beyond it. Right as Ascension Network opens to the world, Blackwall starts failing. A barrier that used to split cyberspace cleanly now sprouts holes. Rogue AIs from the far side slip through with increasing frequency.
NetWatch is still containing incidents, finding breaches, and burning the straws. But the trend is alarming. If it continues, the Blackwall will collapse, and a flood of rogue AIs will spill into the open Net.
In that scenario, all hands must keep the wall standing. NetWatch has no spare bandwidth for Ascension.
WCN loses the ally it most wanted.
…
Night City, Arasaka Tower.
Rocky comes here as usual to align plans with Yorinobu Arasaka.
Ascension's original headquarters building on Earth was emptied long ago; the real HQ moved to Black Star. Strictly speaking, Ascension has no primary base on Earth right now. The new Night City tower is going up across the corporate plaza, but a superstructure like that takes time.
Rocky doesn't fuss about offices. He uses Yorinobu's as his temporary base on Earth.
"The rollout is complete," he says. "Reactions landed as expected. WCN won't sit still. They'll link up with Militech, then take swings at Ascension and Arasaka."
Lissandra's probes already confirmed the WCN–Militech contact.
Which is precisely what Rocky and Yorinobu want.
They'll let the Fifth Corporate War fire the first shot in a larger campaign: a declaration of war against every corporation and capital bloc on the planet.