The metallic clatter of the copper sack hitting the grimy pavement echoed sharply through the narrow, enclosed alleyway.
Pip scrambled backward on his heels, his breath coming in ragged, terrified gasps as he stared at the unconscious form of his boss, the burly scavenger with the glowing red cybernetic eye.
The big man was completely out cold, a dark bruise already blooming across his forehead where Deku had introduced him to the iron-reinforced wall.
Deku Kwanoh didn’t blink.
He stood tall amidst the reeking filth, his posture unnaturally straight, the ruined remnants of his school uniform caked in gray sludge.
Yet, despite looking like he had just crawled out of a septic tank, the aura radiating from him was that of an absolute aristocrat surveying his newly conquered estate.
He slowly turned his dark, piercing gaze toward Pip.
The scrawny scavenger froze, his entire body trembling as if caught in the grip of a winter gale.
He wanted to run, to scream for help, but his legs felt like wet lead.
In the lawless sprawl of Sector 9, violence was a daily currency, but this… this was different.
There was no rage in the teenager’s eyes, no sloppy desperation.
It was cold, calculated, and terrifyingly precise.
”Y-You…” Pip stuttered, pressing his back so hard against the damp corrugated steel wall that it groaned in protest.
“What… what kind of freak are you? Are you a spacer? A low-tier mutation enforcer?”
Deku didn’t answer immediately.
He took a slow, measured step forward, the squelch of his ruined leather shoes sounding like ticking clock hands in the quiet alley.
Inside his mind, the system interface hummed softly, a warm current of energy flowing through his veins, repairing minor strains and knitting his muscle fibers tighter than before.
The reward from his recent subjugation had settled deep into his physical core.
He could feel it—a faint, subtle warping of the air pressure around his knuckles, as if space itself was slightly bending to accommodate his presence.
So this is what real power feels like, Deku thought, a faint, dark smirk playing at the corner of his lips.
Not just high school dominance.
Actual, fundamental control.
”I asked you a question earlier, Pip,” Deku said softly, his voice cutting through the hum of distant industrial generators.
“Or is your name the only thing small about you?”
”I-I’m sorry!” Pip squeaked, throwing his hands up defensively over his face.
“Take the copper! Take the scavenged gear! Just—don’t snap my neck like you did to old man Jaxx!”
Deku stopped a foot away from the terrified scavenger.
He looked down at the sack of copper wires spilling onto the filthy ground.
In this dystopian future, where humanity fought endless wars against extraterrestrial threats and traded in divine tree fruits, scraps like these were the lifeblood of the slums.
”I don’t need your garbage,” Deku said coldly, his tone leaving no room for argument.
“I need information. And right now, you’re going to provide it.”
Pip swallowed hard, bobbing his head up and down so fast it looked like it might snap off.
“A-Anything! Ask me anything, boss! I know everything about Sector 9, the syndicates, the corporate checkpoints—all of it!”
”Good,” Deku replied, folding his arms across his slime-stained chest.
“Start with the local power structure. Who runs this dump, and where do people like you go when they want to survive?”
As Pip began to stammer out nervous, frantic details about the local gangs, corporate scrap patrols, and the towering walls separating the slums from the affluent upper districts, Deku listened with rapt attention.
His mind cataloged every name, every faction, and every vulnerability.
The world had changed.
The rules had been rewritten by aliens and magic.
But as Deku stared down at the trembling scavenger beneath him, one fundamental truth remained unchanged: the weak existed to serve the strong.
And Deku Kwanoh had every intention of reaching the very top.