The alley at the school's entrance was dead silent. Rhys's hand, beefy and calloused from a lifetime of petty brawls, was clamped firmly on Dev's new, broad shoulder. The entire Blackwood Crew, Rhys's personal entourage of high-school thugs, stood behind him, smirking, waiting for the new kid to be taught a lesson.
"I'm talking to you, you freak!" Rhys snarled, his grip tightening, his fingers digging in. He was trying to spin Dev around, to force him to his knees, to re-establish the hierarchy that this stranger had so blatantly ignored.
Dev's (SPI: 39) mind, a cold, analytical engine, processed the situation.
[THREAT: LEVEL 0. HOSTILE.]
[INTENT: PHYSICAL INTIMIDATION. ASSERT DOMINANCE.]
[...ANNOYING.]
This was an obstacle. A distraction from his real life, his real purpose. He needed to get to class, to sit through the agonizingly slow "day" part of his life, so he could get back to the Nexus. This... this was a waste of time.
Dev slowly turned his head.
He didn't turn his body. Just his head, a smooth, deliberate motion that made his neck crackle. His cold, (SPI: 39)-infused eyes, now 6-feet off the ground, looked down at Rhys
.
Rhys, who had been expecting fear, flinched. He had never seen eyes like that. They were not human. They were the eyes of a butcher looking at a piece of meat.
"Get your hand off me," Dev said. His voice was not a plea. It was not a warning. It was a flat, dead command.
"Or what, you bastard?" Rhys spat, his anger overriding his sudden fear. He was the king of this school. He was the Blackwood Crew. He squeezed harder.
Dev didn't sigh. He didn't tense. He just... reacted.
He raised his own hand—now larger, his fingers longer, his knuckles more defined—and calmly, almost casually, placed it over Rhys's hand, his new, (STR: 11)-infused fingers wrapping completely around Rhys's wrist and the back of his hand.
Rhys's eyes went wide. Dev's grip was... impossible. It wasn't muscle. It was a vise. A steel trap.
And then Dev squeezed.
There was no struggle. There was no contest.
Rhys's eyes bulged from his skull. A strangled, wet sound caught in his throat. He couldn't even process the pain. It was an industrial, impossible pressure. He felt the bones of his hand, the metacarpals, grind against each other. He felt the radius and ulna of his forearm bend under the inhuman force.
A sickening, wet CRUNCH and POP echoed in the silent alley.
Rhys screamed.
It was not a "tough guy" roar. It was a high-pitched, pathetic, animal shriek of pure agony. His hand was crushed. The bones were not just "broken"; they were pulverized into a bloody, pulpy mass of flesh and sharp fragments.
Dev's eyes remained locked on Rhys's, his expression utterly blank, as if he were just crushing a soda can.
And then he shoved him.
It was a one-handed, casual, (STR: 11) push to the chest.
Rhys flew.
He was launched backward as if hit by a car, his feet leaving the ground. He crashed through his own crew members, scattering them like bowling pins, and slammed onto the hard pavement ten feet away. He landed in a heap, a pathetic, broken pile. He didn't try to get up. He just lay there, sobbing, a high-pitched, hysterical wail, cradling the mangled, bloody pulp of his right hand to his chest.
The "Blackwood Crew" (Level 1) was frozen. Their leader, their king, their strongest brawler... was gone. Annihilated. Destroyed in less than two seconds, silently, by a 6-foot stranger who hadn't even broken a sweat.
Devis, at the back of the crew, turned, hunched over, and vomited onto the pavement, his body shaking with a terror so profound it was paralyzing.
In the dead, ringing silence, broken only by Rhys's pathetic sobs, Dev just adjusted the shoulder of his (now-torn) uniform shirt. He ignored the weeping gang leader on the ground. He ignored the terrified, statues-like crew. He ignored the puddle of Devis's sick.
He walked, unhurried, into the school.
The entire student body, which had been watching from the windows and the entrance, parted for him like the Red Sea. The whispers were gone, replaced by a suffocating, terrified silence. He was no longer a stranger. He was a terror.
He walked into his classroom. His desk, built for a 5'6" boy, was now comically small, like a piece of children's furniture. He sat, his knees jammed against the underside, his new 6-foot frame looking absurdly out of place.
Mina came in, late, pale, and shaking. She sat at her desk at the back, but she could not stop staring at him.
She had watched it all from the window.
She had watched him process Rhys. That's the only word her (SPI)-driven, analytical mind could find. He didn't fight him. He processed him. He identified a problem, and he terminated it with an inhuman, crushing efficiency.
Her "impostor" theory was dead. Her "monster" theory was now a fact. She was no longer a "watcher." She was a hostage to this knowledge. She was trapped in a room with a being that could crush bone like it was wet cardboard, a being that had left a handprint in solid concrete. She was terrified.
The school day was a blur. He was an alien. He sat in physics, listening to the teacher talk about 'force' and 'mass', and his (SPI: 39) mind understood it on a level the teacher couldn't. The social drama, the whispers, the teachers trying and failing to meet his new, intimidating gaze... it was all just noise. He was just waiting to go home. Waiting to get back to the real world.
He walked home. His new, long-legged stride was efficient, purposeful. His (SPI: 39) [Spatial Awareness] pinged.
He was being followed.
It wasn't a "threat." It was just... tracking. He felt no malice, just cold, professional observation.
He turned a corner, onto a familiar, empty residential street.
A deep, heavy thump-thump-thump echoed behind him. It wasn't a van. It wasn't a car.
A heavy, black Royal Enfield motorcycle, its engine idling with a low, menacing rumble, pulled up beside him, matching his pace.
The rider was older than Rhys, maybe early 20s. He wasn't in a gang "uniform." He was in an expensive, black leather jacket and dark jeans. He wasn't intimidated like Rhys. He was evaluating. This was the next level of the hierarchy.
Dev stopped walking. The rider stopped his bike, planting a heavy boot on the pavement. He didn't get off. He just looked at Dev, his eyes cold and assessing.
"You're the new kid," the rider said, his voice a low rumble over the engine's idle. "The 6-foot ghost."
Dev just looked at him. (SPI: 39) analyzed him. [THREAT: LEVEL 0 (ARMED). CONFIDENT. NOT HOSTILE (YET).]
The rider, "Veer," nodded, almost impressed. "Rhys is a bachha," he said, the Hindi word for "kid" dripping with contempt. "A loud-mouthed punk who makes a lot of noise. But... he's my punk. The Blackwood Crew is my crew. And my gang, we run this whole block for Kalu-bhai."
The name dropped with a heavy, final thud. The City-level "Badmosh." The real power.
"You just broke my property," Veer said, his voice flat. "You cost me this week's collection from that school. That annoys me."
He revved his engine, the sound a sharp CRACK in the quiet street.
"But..." he continued, a thin smile playing on his lips. "You've also shown you're not a bachha. You're a player."
Veer reached into his leather jacket and pulled out a small, cheap, plastic burner phone. He tossed it. It landed at Dev's feet.
"The real boss of Kalu's territory is gonna want to see the guy who turned Rhys's hand into keema."
The word "keema"—minced meat—was so casual, so brutal.
"Be at the address on that phone. Tonight. 10 PM. Don't be late." Veer leaned forward, his voice dropping. "And don't make me come looking for you."
Veer revved his engine one last time, a deafening roar, and sped off, leaving Dev alone on the street.
Dev looked down at the small, cheap phone. He was annoyed. This was just another distraction.