He was born screaming — not into comfort, but into cold.
It was the hardest in the beginning. When he first woke, he expected a warm bed. Instead, reality greeted him with smog-choked air and streets that reeked of desperation.
Bari didn't have parents. Not anymore. His mother died giving birth, and the man who was supposed to be his father vanished weeks later chasing a rumor of Ascension. He grew up in the gutters, surrounded by other forgotten children — scavengers, thieves, outcasts.
That was also the day he recognised where he was, in the outskirts of Northern Quadrant Siege Capital (NQSC), specifically, "Shadow Slave", the novel. This terrified me, not that I'd admit it, because I knew how fucked up I was.
While others gave in to cruelty or despair on the outskirts, Bari endured. Even as a child, his eyes were calm. Tired, yes — but calm. He protected the younger ones when he could. He took beatings in their place. He scavenged smarter, not harder. He read whatever scraps and ruined books he could find, sharpening his mind like a blade.
The little street rates called him Big Brother — half a joke, half truth.
No one knew why he moved like a fighter, or how exactly he knew how to fight.
"I've had everything," he once murmured, lying bloody in the rain after a gang stripped him of what little he had. "So I know what's worth fighting for."
As he grew, so did the fire inside him. The world had taken everything — and still, he stood. No blessings. No sponsors. No resources.
Just discipline. And utter will