Kairo didn't look back.
That was a rule, one he'd learned without anyone spelling it out. On certain streets, glancing over your shoulder only made you a target. If someone behind you wanted something, they wouldn't hesitate. And if they didn't? Looking back only made you seem unsure—soft. The kind of person who wouldn't fight back when cornered.
So, he walked. Straight-backed, calm, and steady, like he belonged on that pavement. Like he'd passed through there a hundred times before. The music still thumped behind him, bassline heavy and slow, the sound bleeding from a large speaker one of them had wheeled out like a symbol. A warning or a welcome—hard to say.
They didn't follow. Not this time.
But that didn't mean it was over. Lesser Gangs had long memories, and they didn't forget faces.
What most people didn't realise—at least those who didn't grow up close to the edge—was that gangs weren't just thugs in groups, scattered randomly across cities. They were part of something bigger. Organised. Tiered. And whether people noticed or not, those layers shaped almost every part of life in places like this.
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There were five ranks, a full pyramid built from the ground up. Five layers of power and influence that spread through every city, from back alleys to government buildings. Some were loud, visible. Others never showed their faces.
At the base sat the Lesser Gangs.
They were everywhere—local, messy, and mostly made up of students, dropouts, or teenagers chasing fast respect. These were the ones people recognised on sight. Matching jackets. Tagged walls. Cheap tattoos. Some ran small schemes: errands, petty theft, sometimes surveillance for bigger crews. Others just caused chaos to gain attention.
But they all had the same goal: to be seen. To get picked. To climb.
Lesser Gangs often worked on contract, hired by those further up the food chain. Small jobs, low risk—something to test their usefulness. If they delivered, someone might remember them. If they failed, no one asked questions. There were always more waiting to take their place.
Above them came the Street Core.
Not just groups, but organisations. Structured, connected, and dangerous. They operated across blocks, districts, even neighbouring cities. Crews like East Nine, Cinder Bloods, and Iron Jaws ran entire neighbourhoods through a mix of control and reputation. They collected money from street vendors, managed underground events, even enforced silence in certain schools.
You didn't just join a Core group. You were chosen, usually after years of proving yourself in the Lesser circuits.
Then came the third tier—the Claw Rings.
At this level, gangs became syndicates. Command was centralised. Leaders moved quietly, rarely seen. They ran warehouses, weapon caches, and secret medical facilities. It was said the Claw Rings were the first rank where Mutants became common—not as accidents, but as assets. Enhanced fighters, rogue serum users, and custom-trained individuals made up their frontline units.
The Claw Rings didn't control streets. They controlled the people who did.
Above that sat the Veiled Circle.
This wasn't a name most people had heard before—not directly. They didn't operate in daylight, and they didn't wear gang colours. These were the old players. Their wealth moved through shell companies, their orders passed quietly down the chain. They were deeply embedded—owning buildings, businesses, even banks. Some held stakes in serum labs. Others had relatives in law enforcement.
If a policy changed, if a factory burned down, or if a name disappeared from public records, the Veiled Circle probably had something to do with it.
And finally, at the very top: the Crown Tier.
They were barely spoken of, and only in uncertain tones. The Crown didn't run cities. They shaped nations. Their involvement in the mutant serum industry was more than rumour. Some believed they'd been funding research since the earliest days, pushing enhancements for their own purposes, developing versions of the serum never released to the public.
No one ever saw Crown members. No one met them directly. Their presence was felt only through the orders that trickled down five levels and arrived in the hands of a teenager who'd never even heard the name.
It was a perfect hierarchy.
The Crown directed the Circle,
the Circle instructed the Claw Rings,
the Claw Rings hired the Street Core,
and the Street Core outsourced to the Lessers.
Each level protected the one above, kept hands clean, and passed blame downwards if anything went wrong.
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Kairo had grown up in this system. He'd never been part of it, but it was impossible not to notice. The way certain students got new trainers out of nowhere. How others disappeared for days, only to return with bruises and fewer words. The gangs never touched him, but not out of kindness. He wasn't useful yet.
But now… after what happened in the bathroom, after that strange message and the way his body felt—something told him that wouldn't last.
Sooner or later, someone would notice him.
And in this world, when someone noticed you—it was rarely a good thing.