The air in the Sector 4 slums didn't just smell; it carried a weight. Thick, oily miasma of rotting synthetic trash mixed with the metallic tang of blood—the kind that clung to your lungs when the "Cleaners" were too scared to do their jobs. Sewer grates hissed and burped steam, and the faint whine of damaged neon signs buzzed overhead, threatening to snap at any moment.
Sunlight was a luxury here, filtered through layers of smog and the towering, reinforced walls of the Inner Circle, where the "Rich MFs" played at being gods. Even here, close to the city proper, the slums were no sanctuary. Every shadowed alley, every cracked pavement tile, promised violence. Rusted water pipes dripped unevenly, puddles shimmered with oily rainwater, and rats skittered across discarded tech parts like tiny metallic demons. Danger wasn't only out there beyond the walls—it thrived here too, among the desperate, the hungry, and the armed.
"Keep running, you rat! That credit-chit belongs to the Iron Teeth!" a voice roared from behind, boots thudding against rusted metal like hammers on bone.
The young man muttered under his breath, banking hard left into a narrow, lightless crevice between two collapsing tenements.
"Iron Teeth? Bold name for a bunch of guys who can't even afford a dentist. If they wanted their money back, they should've held onto it tighter."
He didn't look back. He didn't need to. He knew these alleys like the scars on his own knuckles. The stolen pouch in his pocket—the Iron Teeth's weekly extortion haul—wasn't just money; it was a month's worth of real bread and clean water.
'Bastard? Thief? Disgrace?'
A cynical smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.
'I prefer "Unlicensed Tax Collector." Thanks for the donation, boys.'
Vaulting over a pile of bio-hazard waste, he felt the sting of shredded gloves against broken glass and splintered metal. A loose cable crackled under his feet, and a faint, acrid smoke from a nearby generator made him cough. He wasn't an Awakened; he was just a survivor who had turned running away into a high art form.
He slowed to a silent crawl near a crowded marketplace. The muffled chatter of the desperate rose like smoke. A vendor shouted over a sputtering speaker, trying to sell rancid protein bars, while a child clutched a cracked holo-screen, projecting flickering propaganda for Inner Circle lotteries.
"Did you hear? The Third Expedition… they found the bodies near the Monster Mouth yesterday."
"Horrible. They said the leader was half-eaten before his own teammates finished him off just to steal the Final Strike."
"Typical. Everyone wants to be an Awakened until they realize the System rewards skill, cunning, and speed."
'Ah, there it is. The Great Awakening Delusion.'
He leaned his back against a cold, damp wall to catch his breath. The concrete was slick with mildew and sticky with someone's discarded nutrient paste.
'People really have lost their minds. Facing a Level-3 Monster with nothing but a rusty pipe and a prayer?'
He looked toward the city walls. Towering, reinforced, and merciless, they rose like jagged teeth against the gray sky. Behind those walls lay the Inner Circle's world of wealth, influence, and constant danger—hell for anyone weak enough to be noticed, paradise for those who had access to the System. Everyone else lived like commoners, scraping by day after day, surviving in filth and fear.
'Idiots.'
He sneered inwardly.
'I'll take the filth of the slums over the inside of a monster's stomach any day. At least here, I know the rules. Stay small, stay fast, and don't go hunting destiny in the jaws of a beast.'
Even the slums clinging to the walls were safer than the lands further out. Beyond the city perimeter stretched forests, overgrown fields, and undeveloped grounds where nature and scavengers combined to make survival precarious. Monster Mouth lay close, a jagged scar of collapsed buildings and twisted rock. Few ventured there, but rumors spoke of a Level-3 Beast wandering its ruins, hunting anyone foolish enough to approach.
To the world, the Final Blow was a sacred moment of ascension—the instant a commoner's soul "clicked" with the System's frequency. To him, it was just the world's most intoxicating lottery.
"Thrilling," he whispered, the word tasting like copper on his tongue. "The idea of becoming a god among men… it almost sounds better than starving in the rain."
Almost.
A self-deprecating smirk tugged at his lips.
'Just another one of my many stupid thoughts.'
He muttered to himself, forcing his focus back to the present.
'Focus. You're not a hero. You're a thief with a dinner to buy.'
He refocused on immediate danger. The Iron Teeth were still out there, and the marketplace thrummed with shifting bodies, shouted threats, and the faint hum of surveillance drones wobbling overhead.
In a world ruled by Monster Lords and Elite Clans, dying peacefully was the one luxury he couldn't afford.