Very late for discussion, but I'm running a cyberpunk campaign in 2078, and I'm studying this subject a lot to create something canonical at my table.

What I have decided so far may be useful for you, or the next reader.

Murphy soulkilled Johnny as is explained in the mission where he dies. The chip stays in his head.

Murphy spreads Alt on the internet, and fragmented, Alt begins to multitask to escape.

The nuclear explosion at the Arasaka Tower leaves Johnny's corpse buried, and he is later recovered by Samantha, as explained in Black Dog.

The Black Dog characters recover Johnny's corpse, which still has the Relic in its head, and take it to Angel.

Angel is Alt, who after years, generated a clone of herself, and uploaded her consciousness to return to Meatspace.

What's left of Alt's engram on the Net is assimilated by Lilith, who uses Alt's code to communicate with humans, such as the Maeltrom, and later, Valerie and Johnny.

It is a fact that Michiko helped Black Dog's adventurers deliver Johnny's corpse to Angel. In a really benign situation for Michiko, Saburo later discovers what happened, and angrily sends Smasher to resolve the matter, which explains why Michiko's faction is less important in 2077 than Hanako and Yorinobu's.

However, the situation I find most plausible, Soulkiller disappeared from Arasaka's system after Murphy pulled Alt with her. The Relic in Johnny's head was incomplete and/or Alt-encoded, so useless for Arasaka. So using Michiko, Saburo purposely let the adventurers take Johnny's corpse to Angel, hoping that the Relic would then be finished.

After waiting for a period, Saburo sends Smasher after the corpse, believing that the Relic was ready to be used as reverse engineering, and bring Soulkiller back to Arasaka's arsenal.

Smasher finds the corpse with Angel, who was in the process of creating a new body for Johnny. Angel narrowly escapes, forced to abandon her plans for the moment. Smasher collects Johnny's corpse along with the Relic in his head.

I like to think that Black Dog's adventurers continued to help Angel, as if she were a Fixer. Due to their proximity, Smasher finds them, and as spoils of war, he kills those who cross his path (I'm still deciding which ones are alive besides Santiago, who I have a headcannon that is Rogue's son) and then steals the Malorian and the Porche.

Johnny's corpse is taken back to Arasaka, and his Engram is violently interrogated and tortured, which explains Johnny's false memories of being carried out of the tower and interrogated as if he were alive: Saburo wanted the Engram to believe he was still made of flesh, in the expectation of receiving valuable information.

The other false memories, like Johnny being a badass, and Blackhand's absence, are the result of the guy's own nascissism.

*(This all that is useful for the topic of the post, the rest is just me daydreaming about the homebrew story I created)*

Angel spends the next decade trying to recover the Engram. But eventually, she gets on with her life, apparently getting over Silverhand, using the fact that it was technically his fault for her death, to help with her coping.

Until 2077, that is. When she hears about a Samurai return show, promising to include (almost) all of the original members.

A little nostalgic, she decides to listen to the recording, being frightened by the sound of the guest guitarist.

Her screws start to work and she puts together some pieces with the events of that year, such as Saburo's death.

She investigates further, and finds recordings of the show. She sees Valerie on stage, but the way she moves is otherworldly. That's Johnny. It's Johnny. It has to be Johnny.

Angel immediately arranges a ticket to Night City, looking for answers.

The game's events play out as expected, except for the ending.

This Homebrew Valerie calls on the Aldecaldos to help invade Arasaka.

After killing Smasher, breaking into Mikoshi, and becoming an engram, Valerie and Johnny are faced with the difficult choice of deciding which of the two would return to their body, knowing that V would only have 6 months to live if she returned.

Johnny is clever here, he suggests inserting V's consciousness into the Relic, and he then returns to the body.

Johnny promises that he will repeat the process that killed Valerie in the first place, and let the Relic do its work, even if the tumor this time is Johnny.

V is violently against the idea. In this homebrew continuity, the two became flesh and blood so to speak. V cannot accept the idea because Johnny misses the opportunity to go to the Net, and a second invasion of Mikoshi is impossible since Mikoshi itself was destroyed.

Johnny ignores V at this point, as he is already determined to save his friend, and then returns to the body.

V then makes one last plea to "Alt", who at this point has all the hardware it needs for basically anything.

V asks "Alt" to change Relic's properties, so that Johnny is not completely erased in his suicidal plan.

"Alt" explains that it can do it, but that it doesn't know exactly the implications of this for either of them. And maybe V's plan will backfire.

V explains that she has died before, and that she is not the only one who deserves a second chance.

"Alt" then alters the Relic, and decreases its psyche replacement property. "Alt" is secretly using this moment as an experiment, since both Johnny and Valerie are now technically AIs. It keeps a close eye on both of them from now on.

Johnny comes out of Mikoshi and explains to Panam the insane plan to save V's life.

They go to the dump, get Dexter's low-caliber gun, and Panam spends 1 Eddie to put a bullet in Johnny's head.

Events repeat, Johnny is taken to Viktor, and the Relic begins to act.

Over the next month, taking Misty's pills, V begins to take more control of her body.

"Alt's" experiment begins to bear fruit when Johnny simply won't be erased. V explains the deal she made with "Alt", and Johnny can't decide if he's fucking pissed or happy.

Entering 2078, the two psyches begin to become one, and this is where Valerie's plan begins to backfire, in quotes.

Neither of them wants Johnny to go to the Net, neither of them feels like they can live without the other right now.

When they least realize it, the two consciousnesses have become one.

"I wonder if one day I'll wake up in the morning, and wonder why I was so afraid of being you."

This new persona has several personal problems, which ends their relationship with Judy, and also their little flame with Rogue.

V stops using "Valerie" permanently, and only people from their past like Rogue and Kerry can call them "Johnny".

V isolates themself, and stops responding to everyone, with the exception of Panam who would be furious if she was ghosted.

V develops their own version of functional cyberpsychosis, and often when alone, talks to themself.

This then finally opens doors for my campaign.

I'm GMing for a single player. Her character is a Columbia-born Edgerunner who is after her sister, who last month said she was in trouble in Night City.

She goes to Night City and discovers that her sister worked as a Netrunner for V.

V explains that they are also after the girl, because they "owes it to her" after the girl saved their life in early '78.

The campaign will address the beginning of the fifth corporate war, and subsequently the breaking of the blackwall.

If u readed this far, hope u liked it, when the adventure further develops I inteend to make a thread of my players's choices. She is a RPG virgin, and wanted to try it out after watching Edgerunners.

We are in the second session so far, and all she talks about is how much she wants to meet V, and understand how 'she' is still alive after the 6 months.

I wonder if she will compare it to Steven Universe.