Melissa Rory

Melissa Rory is a NCPD lieutenant of the MaxTac division. Originally a cyberpsycho herself, after MaxTac aprehended Melissa alive, she was forced to join them, becoming one of its most prominent members.

Biography
Sometime before 2069, Melissa had herself implanted with the Higurashi 20-13 Mantis Blades, recognized to be of high quality, though with a certain flaw: they interfaced poorly with neural processors and a certain section of the prefrontal cortex. The Higurashi 20-13 line was discontinued in 2069 because of that flaw. On January 10, 2077, Rory was likely driven to cyberpsychosis from her implant, and killed 14 people. She was a rare case of MaxTac apprehending a cyberpsycho alive, and after being reconditioned, she was forced to join their ranks. Melisa kept her Higurashis as a reminder of her actions.

Melissa met a mercenary by the name of V later in 2077, by which time she had already risen to the rank of lieutenant, and hold a senior status in MaxTac. Rory's squad arrived at a Jinguji store in Downtown Night City just moments after V defeated, or during the fighting with a cyberpsycho who had burst into the store earlier, killing its two guards.

After taking the survivors' statements - V and the owner of the shop, Zane Jagger - she commented to V if they had also felt the life of the psycho leaving his body. The merc asked instead if there wasn't a better way than just killing them, like taking them alive, to which Rory responded it only happened in extremely rare cases. V could also recognize her discontinued mantis blades, commenting that MaxTac preferred the Arasaka model instead. For Melisa though, those blades reminded her of the things she had done. Trying to rail back the aforementioned topic, Melisa asked V once again if they liked it when the cyberpsycho was killed, though the merc commented they were not as eager as her. After stating that she and V were not that different, Melisa tried to recruit them to MaxTac, though V politely refused, mentioning they would think about it.

NPCD Labs computer message
A message regarding Melisa can be found while looking through the computers in the NCPD lab during the quest The Hunt.

2013 Teaser Trailer
Melissa Rory is a direct reference to the female cyberpsycho who appeared in the original 2013 teaser trailer for Cyberpunk 2077.

Despite being the same character there are a few differences. The blades she uses in 2077 are very long, whilst in the trailer they are of a standard size; despite being both the same blades she's always carried. Another one is the date; Zane's message to V says the date when cyberpsycho was aprehended was January 14, while the N54 part of the video shows January 10. This might be an oversight considering she killed 14 people during that event, meaning the numbers could've been mixed.

Associated quests

 * Bullets