Chapter 72
The warehouse on Cutter Street was packed.
The ring was in the center, surrounded by rows of seats that had been added over the past four weeks.
The lights above were bright, washing out the colors, making everything look like a photograph left too long in the sun.
Henry was in the ring.
He had been fighting for three hours straight, one opponent after another, each one stepping into the ring thinking they would be the one to beat him. Each one leaving with blood on their face and a loss on their record.
The prize had increased to twenty thousand dollars. No one had claimed it.
Henry's green aura blazed around him as he dodged a punch from a man with a shaved head and a scar across his cheek.
The man was fast, experienced, his own aura a dull brown that pulsed with each strike. Beginner Knight Stage High, same as Henry. But Henry had been fighting for years. His body knew what to do before his mind caught up.
He slipped inside the man's guard and drove his elbow into the man's ribs. The impact was solid, satisfying.
The man grunted and stumbled back, his brown aura flickering. Henry followed with a punch to the jaw, then a knee to the stomach, then another punch to the same spot on the jaw.
The man's eyes rolled back. He hit the canvas hard, his body limp, his aura flickering once before going dark.
The crowd roared.
Henry stood over him, his chest rising and falling, his green aura still bright. He wasn't even breathing hard.
"Next," he said.
The crowd cheered louder.
Tristan stood near the entrance of the warehouse, his back against the wall, his purple eyes watching the ring.
His arms were crossed over his chest, his black jacket with the golden sun hanging open, the white trim visible against the dark fabric.
His body was different now than it had been a month ago.
Four weeks of the Inner Breathing technique had pushed him to his limit. His physical stats had reached their maximum—42 across the board, the highest his body could go without breaking through to the Advanced Knight Stage.
His Ki enhancement gave him 50% on top of that, pushing his effective stats to 63. He was stronger than he had ever been.
But Henry was still growing.
Henry's physical limit was higher than Tristan's being 43. He hadn't reached it yet. His green aura was brighter than it had been a week ago. His movements were faster. His punches were harder.
The gang members were scattered throughout the warehouse, thirty men and women in black jackets with the golden sun. Some were watching the fights. Others were watching the crowd, their eyes scanning for trouble, their hands never far from their weapons.
The night had been quiet so far. No trouble and no fights outside the ring. Just the usual chaos of the underground matches.
Tristan's Ki sense was spread wide, covering the warehouse and the street outside. He had learned to keep it active at all times, the same way Elijah had taught him. It was exhausting.
He felt them before he saw them.
A group of people, moving fast. Coming toward the warehouse. Their Ki was dense, controlled.
Tristan pushed off from the wall.
His hand moved in a sharp gesture—a signal to the gang members nearest him. They saw it and tensed, their hands moving to their weapons, their eyes moving to the door.
"Henry," Tristan said. His voice was calm, but it carried across the warehouse.
Henry looked up from the ring. His green eyes met Tristan's purple ones.
"Trouble," Tristan said.
Henry nodded. He climbed out of the ring, his green aura still blazing, and moved toward the door. The crowd was still cheering, still placing bets, still focused on the empty ring. They hadn't noticed the change in the air.
The gang members were moving now, positioning themselves around the warehouse, forming a defensive line between the door and the crowd. Their weapons were out—guns, knives, bats, whatever they had brought. Their auras flickered around them, weak compared to Henry and Tristan, but steady.
The door exploded inward.
The wood splintered, the hinges tore from the frame, and the door crashed to the floor in pieces.
Men poured through the gap—at least fifty of them, their faces twisted with anger, their bodies covered in dark clothing.
Their auras blazed around them in shades of red and blue and green. Most were at Beginner Knight Stage Mid, some were at High and two at Peak.
They carried weapons like guns, knives, bats wrapped in barbed wire, chains that scraped against the concrete floor.
They moved with the kind of reckless aggression that came from years of surviving in the 9th District, from fighting for every scrap of territory, from watching their influence shrink as the Azura Gang grew.
The crowd screamed.
Men and women scrambled for the exits, pushing and shoving, knocking over chairs, trampling each other in their desperation to escape.
The chaos was immediate and overwhelming, the kind of panic that spread through a room like wildfire.
Tristan moved.
His purple aura exploded around him, bright and fierce, pushing back the darkness.
His body flowed like water as he crossed the distance to the first attacker—a man with a red aura and a knife in each hand, Beginner Knight Stage High.
The man swung. Tristan's Ki sense read the trajectory, and he stepped inside the strike, his hand closing around the man's wrist.
He twisted, and the bone snapped with a sound like a branch breaking. The man screamed, his red aura flickering, and Tristan drove his palm into the man's chest.
The impact sent the man flying backward into the crowd of attackers, knocking three of them off their feet.
Henry was already in the fight.
His green aura blazed as he met the first wave of attackers head-on.
His fist connected with a man's jaw, and the man's head snapped to the side so hard that his neck cracked. He fell, his blue aura going dark.
Another man came at Henry with a bat wrapped in barbed wire. Henry caught the bat with his bare hand, the barbs digging into his palm and drawing blood. He didn't flinch.
He pulled the bat from the man's grip, reversed it, and drove the end into the man's stomach. The man folded, gasping, and Henry brought the bat down on his back.
The man hit the floor and didn't move.
The gang members were fighting too.
Thirty men and women in black jackets with the golden sun, their auras flickering around them, their weapons raised. They were outnumbered—the attackers had brought at least fifty people—but they had something the attackers didn't have.
They had the Dark Amber Breathing technique.
Thirty percent Ki enhancement. More than most of the attackers, whose cheap techniques gave them ten or fifteen percent at best.
The ones in Elijah's inner circle had the Inner Breathing technique, fifty percent enhancement, and they moved through the attackers like ghosts.
The gang members held the line.
A woman with a red aura and a knife lunged at one of Elijah's men. He sidestepped, his Ki sense reading her movement, and drove his own knife into her shoulder. She screamed and fell, and he moved to the next attacker.
A man with a chain swung it at another gang member. She ducked, the chain passing over her head, and drove her fist into his throat. He choked and dropped the chain, and she kicked his legs out from under him.
But the attackers kept coming.
They were desperate. That was the difference. The Azura gang was fighting to protect what they had built. The attackers were fighting because they were losing everything.
The 9th District had always been a place of small gangs, constantly fighting and dying and being replaced. No one ever rose above the chaos. No one ever stayed in power long enough to matter.
Then the Azura gang appeared.
A bar that brought in customers from other districts. A gambling den that turned a profit every night. Underground fights that drew crowds from across the city. A strip club that was actually making money. And proper breathing techniques—that made their fighters stronger every single day.
The other gangs in the 9th District had watched the Azura gang grow, and they had grown afraid.
Because if the Azura gang kept rising, there would be no room for anyone else.
So they had decided to strike.
Two of the attackers broke through the line, heading for the crowd. Tristan saw them and moved, his purple aura trailing behind him like a cloak. He caught the first one by the back of the neck and slammed him into the concrete floor. The man's face hit the ground with a wet crack, and he didn't move.
The second one turned, his eyes wide, his weapon—a pistol—coming up. Tristan's Ki sense read the trajectory before the man's finger pulled the trigger.
He stepped to the side, the bullet passing through the space where his chest had been, and drove his elbow into the man's temple.
The man collapsed.
Two more attackers appeared in front of Tristan. Both at Beginner Knight Stage High. Both with guns.
They fired.
Tristan moved like water, his Ki sense showing him the path of each bullet. He twisted and turned and stepped around them, the rounds passing so close that he felt the heat of them on his skin.
He crossed the distance in two strides, his hands closing around both men's throats.
He squeezed.
Their eyes bulged. Their guns clattered to the floor. Their auras flickered and died. He held them for a moment longer, then threw them aside like garbage.
Henry was still fighting.
He had taken down at least a dozen men by now, his green aura still blazing, his body still moving. But he was slowing. His punches were still powerful, but they came a fraction of a second slower than they had at the start of the fight. His blocks were still solid, but he was taking hits now—hits that he would have dodged an hour ago.
A man with a silver aura—Beginner Knight Stage Peak—stepped in front of Henry.
He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a mask that covered his entire face. His eyes were black and cold, showing no emotion at all. In his hands were two short swords, the blades dark and curved.
His jacket had no symbol that Henry recognized, but the quality of the fabric suggested he was the leader of whatever gang had launched this attack.
Henry raised his fists.
The man circled slowly, his silver aura pulsing with each step. "You think you can push us out and we'll just let you?"
"I don't think about you at all," Henry said.
The man's eyes narrowed. He attacked.
His blades moved in a blur, slashing and stabbing from angles that were hard to predict.
Henry's Ki sense screamed at him, and he dodged and twisted and blocked with his forearms when he couldn't dodge.
The blades cut his arms, his shoulders, his chest—shallow wounds, but they added up.
Henry was losing.
He was strong, but this man was stronger. His physical stats were higher, his technique cleaner, his experience greater.
The man's blade came at Henry's throat. Henry leaned back, the edge passing close enough to draw a thin line of blood across his skin.
He threw a punch at the man's face, but the man was already moving, already inside his guard.
The hilt of the man's sword drove into Henry's stomach. The air left his lungs in a rush, and he stumbled back, his green aura flickering.
The man followed.
His blade came down, aimed at Henry's head.
A purple blur intercepted it.
Tristan's blade—a long knife he had pulled from somewhere—blocked the strike, the impact ringing through the warehouse. Tristan stood between Henry and the man, his purple aura blazing, his purple eyes cold.
"Go help the others," Tristan said. His voice was calm. "I'll handle this one."
Henry wanted to argue but,
He nodded and turned away.
Tristan faced the man with the silver aura.
Their blades met again and again and again.
Sparks flew.
The sound of metal on metal rang through the warehouse. Tristan's Ki sense was working overtime, feeding him information faster than it ever had before.
He could see the man's attacks before he threw them, could feel the trajectory and the speed and the force.
But the man was fast. Almost as fast as Tristan.
They circled each other, trading strikes, testing each other's defenses. The man's silver aura pulsed against Tristan's purple one, and the concrete floor cracked beneath their feet.
He pressed forward, his blade moving in a pattern he had learned years ago, a pattern that had saved his life more than once. The man blocked the first strike and dodged the second, but the third slipped through his guard and cut across his chest.
The man grunted, his silver aura flickering. He stepped back, his hand pressing against the wound, blood seeping between his fingers.
Tristan didn't give him time to recover.
He lunged, his blade aimed at the man's throat. The man parried, but Tristan was already spinning, his other hand coming up with a second knife—where had he gotten it?—and driving it into the man's side.
The man screamed. His silver aura flickered wildly, threatening to die. He tried to swing his blade, but his arm was slow, his movements clumsy.
Tristan stepped inside his guard and drove his forehead into the man's face.
Cartilage crunched. Blood sprayed. The man's eyes rolled back, and he fell, his body hitting the concrete floor hard. His silver aura flickered once, twice, and went dark.
Tristan stood over him, his chest heaving, his purple aura flickering. His arms were covered in cuts, his jacket was torn, his knuckles were raw. But he was standing.
He looked around the warehouse.
Henry was fighting another Peak fighter—a woman with dark hair and a blue aura, her movements fast and precise. Henry was bleeding from a dozen wounds, his green aura flickering.
The gang members were holding their own. The attackers had brought fifty people, but at least twenty of them were down now, their bodies scattered across the warehouse floor.
The remaining attackers were losing momentum, their coordination breaking down, their confidence fading.
They had expected an easy victory against a gang that had only existed for a month. They had not expected to find fighters who could match them blow for blow.
One of the attackers—a man with a red aura and a shotgun—tried to rally the others. "Hold the line!" he shouted. "Don't let them—"
A knife appeared in his throat.
He dropped the shotgun, his hands going to his neck, his eyes wide with disbelief. He fell to his knees, then to the floor, his red aura flickering and dying.
One of the gang members—a young woman with short black hair and cold eyes—pulled another knife from her belt and moved to the next attacker.
The fight was turning.
The attackers who had been so confident when they smashed through the door were retreating now, backing toward the broken entrance, their weapons raised but their hearts no longer in the fight. Their leaders were down. Their numbers were dwindling.
Tristan moved to help Henry.
The woman with the blue aura was good.
She saw the fight slipping away. She saw her men retreating, her leaders defeated, her chance at victory disappearing.
She turned to run.
Henry caught her arm.
She spun, her blade flashing toward his throat. Henry's Ki sense screamed, and he leaned back, the edge passing close enough to cut a thin line across his chin. His hand shot out and grabbed her wrist, and he squeezed until he felt the bones grind together.
She screamed and dropped the blade.
Henry pulled her close and drove his forehead into her face.
Her eyes rolled back. She went limp in his arms, and he let her fall to the floor.
The warehouse was chaos—bodies on the floor, blood on the walls, the smell of smoke and metal and fear hanging in the air.
The last of the attackers fled through the broken door, their weapons abandoned, their wounded left behind. The gang members chased them for a block, then stopped, their orders clear: protect the territory, don't pursue.
Henry stood in the middle of the warehouse, his green aura gone, his body covered in blood. His arms hung at his sides, his chest heaved with every breath, his legs shook with exhaustion.
Tristan walked over to him.
"You look terrible," Tristan said.
Henry laughed. It was a weak sound, rough in his throat. "Feel terrible too."
They stood there for a moment, looking at the destruction around them. The ring was destroyed, the ropes torn down, the canvas stained with blood. The seats were overturned, the lights were shattered, the walls were scarred with bullet holes and knife marks.
But the warehouse was still standing. The Azura gang was still standing.
Tristan looked at the broken door, at the dark street beyond, at the bodies of the attackers who hadn't been able to run.
"Seems like what we offered them didn't work," Tristan said.
Henry nodded. "Yeah, they saw if we had started doing business in their territory. We would have taken over financially."
"What should we do now," Tristan said.
Henry looked at him. "We need to tell Elijah."
Tristan nodded and pulled out his phone.