Lowwater had learned a new rhythm.
Hook Street rose with bread and rumor; the Docks tied lightning-knots into rope for luck; the Foundry's furnaces hissed like they were jealous of the sparks that laced the skyline; and the Towers tolled slower, as if each bell was trying to match a runner's heartbeat.
At the center of that rhythm stood Evan Sharp—black-and-white suit cut clean against the soot, violet lightning crawling over his shoulders and wrists like living ink. Every blink flashed tiny storms inside his eyes. People called him Ghost, Domain Strider, Silver, Lightning Crown. They hung the names on doorframes like charms.
But farther west—past shuttered stalls and busted gutters—there was a place the names did not travel.
The Slums.
Evan had claimed them yesterday, but a claim is not trust. The Slums listened with their teeth clenched, waiting to see if the new king could bleed.
He slipped along the roofline, the five domain threads humming in his bones: Hook Street (strong), Docks (minor), Foundry (moderate), Towers (minor), Slums (minor). Domain Strider III wove them together so the city felt like one long track. Still, as he crossed the Slums' edge, the hum trembled—like a note held too long.
Status — Evan Sharp Level: 10 Speed: 920 Tier: 2 — Silver (Lightning Stepper)Techniques: Thunderstep (D+), Vector Break (D), Vector Veil (E), Velocity Veil+ (E), Speed Sense (E) Titles: [Uncatchable II], [Domain Strider III] Domains: Hook Street (Strong), Docks (Minor), Old Foundry (Moderate), Towers (Minor), Slums (Minor) Overflow: 15%
Speed Sense pricked his skin—thin white ghost-lines mapping alleys, loose boards, the swing of a door two streets away. Then, underneath, something heavier: arcs that didn't flow, they pressed—like footsteps that refused to fit a city's rhythm.
He stopped above a lane where oil barrels burned blue, and cut his breath quiet. Voices drifted up.
"…three boys, gone," an old woman whispered. "Doors weren't even broken. Just… gone.""Claws on the wall," a man said. "Higher than a man's head.""Don't say his name," another spit. "He hears it."
Say whose? Evan thought. The Slums had a thousand monsters but fear this fresh meant a new one.
The lane below coughed firelight against brick. Someone had scored the mortar with gouges that bit deep, four parallel furrows climbing to a window like a ladder for the cruel. Evan crouched, pressed gloved fingers into one groove. The crumble was fresh.
Black grit stained his fingertips. Not soot. Not slag. Something oily that didn't want to let go. His violet arcs popped across it; the grit smoked and curled like it remembered being alive.
Speed Sense flexed again—heavy arcs converging, then fading, like a hunter testing where a snare should sit.
He didn't need the panel to know it, but it spoke anyway.
[DING] Advisory: Unknown hostile pattern active within Slums.Class: Uncatalogued.Note: Fear resonance detected (civilian morale down).
Fear resonance. Not just wounds—weight. A presence that made people's knees choose the ground. Evan's jaw tightened. Domain Strider pushed warmth down through the cobbles; the lane's shoulders squared a fraction. He stood and slid into shadow, following the heavy arcs toward the heart of the rumor.
Across the city, the Registry stopped pretending to blink.
Slates painted Evan's five domains in lines of violet, pulsing like veins. Alarm text stacked into walls. In a long hall hung with banners and law, four Silvers stood with Aelira.
"Five," Aelira said, voice level. "In days."
A swordsman with polished silver-steel tilted his head. "His path?"
"Velocity, Tier Two. Lightning variant. Violet signature," said the frost-breather, mist curling from every word.
The heavy-armed brute snorted. "Then we hit him together and stop telling slates ghost stories."
Aelira's eyes stayed on the map. "He breaks nets. He turns Bronze to shame. He steals bell towers like they're toys. We hit him together because we respect the ground."
Silence, then a flat voice from the corner: "We hit him together because you already tried alone."
All eyes slid to Cairn—Registry Velocity, Silver-class. Yellow arcs burned in his irises, faint but constant, like warning lights that never slept. He didn't smile.
Aelira didn't bristle. "Containment requires coordination."
Cairn's gaze tracked the violet veins on the slate. "Coordination or not, the first man at his throat will be me."
"Then be first," Aelira said, braid coiled like wire. "But be right."
Back in the Slums, Evan dropped into a courtyard that used to be a market before rain learned to fall only where roofs were broken. A single oil drum burned a small, fixed flame; shadows bobbed like heads around it. People looked up when his violet arcs crawled over brick. Some flinched. Some straightened. All went quiet.
"I heard you've got a different kind of trouble," Evan said. His voice didn't try to be larger than the lane. It fit. "Tell me."
No one spoke. Not until a boy with cracked lips blurted, "He takes 'em in the quiet. My brother—door was closed, latch still on—"
His mother yanked him back, whispering a name she shouldn't whisper. She stared at Evan like bravery had rented space behind her eyes and was late on the payment. "Don't chase him. He doesn't run. He walks. And when he walks past, your knees go dumb, and your lungs forget."
"What's he called?" Evan asked.
The woman's lips moved like the name tasted of rust. "…Cross."
The flame in the oil barrel guttered low. And then the courtyard air bent.
Heavy footsteps pressed against Speed Sense like nails across glass. Arcs jagged, wrong, shoving every other line aside.
A shadow uncoiled at the far end of the lane.
He was massive, shoulders bent under scars, chest marked with a crude X that looked branded more than carved. His mask-face grinned jagged, mouth torn wide, and two black X's burned where eyes should be.
The murmurs died. Children sobbed into sleeves. Even Evan's Domain hum shivered.
The monster tilted his head, the sound of bone grinding stone. When he spoke, his voice was like gravel dragged under water.
"Ghost Sharp."
Evan's fists clenched, violet lightning crackling across his suit. "So you do talk."
Cross's claws unfolded with a wet rasp. "They sent me. Sent me to kill you." His X-shaped eyes glowed faintly, like tar catching fire. "Your city sings too loud. Time to cross it out."
He moved—not at Evan, not yet. At a man frozen near the oil drum, too slow to run. Cross's claws sank through ribs like cloth. One wrench, one scream cut short, and the body crumpled smoking at his feet.
The crowd wailed.
Evan's eyes burned with stormlight. His violet arcs spat fury across the courtyard stone.
"Then you'll try me first," he said.
Cross's jagged mouth stretched wider. "Good. I like when they run."
The Slums' whisper had walked into the firelight.
The legend was real.