Sukuna's Isekai Adventure 5

Sukuna walked through the snow-filled alleyways of Gotham with only Boris for company. The older man was as silent as an owl in flight, his seemingly large presence somehow blending into the surroundings—an act born of years of experience on these streets.

On the other hand, Sukuna would not mimic the man no matter what. Somehow, he knew that if he bothered to, he could. He knew the exact way to place his feet, widen his bare toes to distribute his weight, and shift his balance further with each step to stay poised. The unearned knowledge came easy to him. Somehow, he had experience doing this, fragmented as it was. But something even more important stopped him in his tracks from acting as such.

Pride.

Instead, he stalked through the snow like a wolf unchained. His steps left an imprint in the snow that trailed behind him, marking how far he had come. It was barely dawn, but Boris had informed him that this would be the best time to move, especially in the Narrows.

The few homeless and destitute people that filled the streets were well tucked in and hidden. Those who were awake had bigger problems than Boris and him. In the gloom of pre-dawn, he must have looked like a regular person, his heavy fur coat hanging off his growing frame and obscuring his inhumanity.

The gloom hid the rest, masking their movements.

“We’re almost out of our corner of the Narrows. From this spot on, we’re in contested territory,” the older man whispered. He turned to look at Sukuna for a moment as they stopped at the edge of another alleyway.

One that didn’t seem much different from the one they left. Boris gave him a nod and stepped into the new alleyway. It took Sukuna a few steps to realize what was so different about it.

It was just the slightest bit cleaner. The piles of discarded refuse barely hidden by the snow were fewer. And then there was the noise. Voices, were louder than the average whisper that residents of the alleyways used. Sounds that thundered as they passed.

A few more steps and they stopped at the edge of an alleyway, revealing what lay beyond. A passably clean road, cars driving through the neatly packed snow on either side. It was early but there was movement. Men, women, and children walking about.

Yet underneath the simple outlook, there was a darkness present.

The packed snow had imprints that spoke of it being done by hand. Sukuna could not imagine anyone volunteering for such a task. The road had patches the cars deftly avoided with practiced ease.

The men and women walked with guarded eyes on their neighbors, almost always with a hand in their coat or jacket pockets. The children brave enough to run about this early did so with sharp eyes. Their clothes were more tattered and worn down. Their eyes were flinty and dark and their movements jerky and suspicious.

Boris stood quiet and watched him watch them. It didn’t take long for Sukuna to come to a conclusion. This was civilization, but not as it should be. This was a twisted version of what should be.

“They’re barely any different from the people in the alleyways.”

He turned to Boris, who nodded in agreement before turning back to face the road.

“I told you earlier. This is the Narrows. While we might have the worst luck out of the bunch, it doesn’t change the fact that this island is a cesspit. A part of Gotham City, fractured and divided. Areas are controlled by whichever gang is the strongest. And bordering our little slice of hell is the Burnley Slashers. And this is their fief.” Boris finished with a wide hand gesture at the infinitely small part of the city they observed.

Sukuna remained silent as he watched them. His nose twitched as he drew in the scent of the city. The fresh air rolling in from the sea washed away the alleyways' stench—on the main roads, at least. But not enough to cleanse the filth lurking in the shadows.

He smelled perfume on those who dared to walk near. Even as oppression and unease weighed on them, there was a vitality in their steps absent in the alleyways. Plump cheeks. Clean teeth. Well-worn but well-maintained clothes. Their struggles did not reach deep enough to strip them of these things. They had comfort. They had security. They had more.

A slow exhale left him as he stood in the shadows, a decision taking root inside him—one that burned as fiercely as his desire to fight, to crush his enemies, to break and destroy until nothing remained.

For the first time since he had opened his eyes in this world, Sukuna felt greed. A perverse, bottomless hunger. Not merely to take what they had, but to deprive them of it. To rip their comforts from their hands and drown himself in the luxury they lived in so easily.

This was the life his mother deserved. And more. And yet, even this was not enough. The realization dawned on him slowly as he stretched a hand toward the street, fingers curling inward, as if closing around something just out of reach. He could see it—all of it—his to hold, his to own.

Another missing part of him clicked into place. Another piece of a puzzle solved. Another brick slotted into the monument of what he was meant to be. A binding loosened further.

But it still wouldn’t be enough.

There had to be more. There had to be better. And he would have it. He would take it all.

And there was only one way to do it.

By beating its owner to death and devouring it straight from their corpse.

He turned, feeling eyes on him. Boris watched in silence, his expression unreadable. Then, after a moment, the old man gave a slow nod.

Without a word, Boris turned from the main street and stepped back into the depths of the alleyway.

He was not sure why the man brought him here first. Yet he turned all the same and followed after his broad shoulders.

They continued their journey, but unlike before, they were not going into the depths of the Narrows. They skirted around civilization. There was always a block of dilapidated buildings or wrecked and empty warehouses in the way, separating them from the heart of the city. They were structures that were hardly any good for housing, but better than anything, they had deeper in the Narrows.

“Why don’t we move here? Closer to the rest of the city.” Sukuna questioned as he observed the wrecks they passed.

“No band of the homeless or vagrants would live this close to the main city. They can come close enough to beg or steal. But to stay here is to draw the attention of powers beyond your control. The corrupt police force. Rival gangs looking to cause problems. Even resident gang members looking to press anyone they can into service after losing forces in one of their many fights. For people like me, to live here is to dine with death.”

Boris’s attention remained forward as he spoke. But Sukuna was a good listener, and he picked up on what the older man said and didn’t say. Boris had personalized it when he said people like him—not people like Sukuna.

They continued to move. Boris skulked while Sukuna prowled. They wandered along snow-covered paths, their feet taking them along a meandering path yet once again never too far from the main roads and more civilized parts.

Now that he knew what to listen for, he could pick it up faintly. The hum and buzz of civilization. A city slowly waking up. But the more they walked, the harder it was—because not just the city was waking up.

The alleyways roused at a pace to match the city.

More homeless and destitute men and women could be seen. They shuffled and turned away from him, and he knew it was not just because of his uncanny form. It was his posture. Straight-backed and unbent. The way he walked. Right in the middle of the alleyway instead of slinking like a rat in the shadows.

Even diminished as he somewhat knew he was, he was still more than the vagrants that skulked around, and they recognized it.

“We’re here.” Boris called out, still partially hidden in the shadows—not that it mattered much. The sun had begun to creep into the sky. It was still pre-dawn, but only barely. He estimated they had about thirty minutes left before the sun would shine bright enough. And this far from the depths of the Narrows, it would be enough to fully illuminate his figure.  

They stopped at the edge of another alley and looked beyond. Four crimson eyes roved in their sockets, taking in the building in front of them.  

It was a house that looked at odds with its surroundings. A detached, single-story building, a structure of stone and plaster. Its white walls had faded and flaked with the passing seasons. Its windows were blown out, boarded over, or barely hanging onto rusted hinges.  

A decade ago, it would’ve been a beautiful villa. But now, now it was just one more building forgotten to the vagaries of time and nature. Uncared for and discarded like the rest of the things that filled the Narrows.  

“What am I looking at?”  

“The Burnley Slashers’ base,” Boris replied in a low tone. The older man’s eyes were flinty things that searched the darkness, his attention on everything but Sukuna.  

“It looks better than anything else here,” Sukuna noted. And it was the truth. Dilapidated and beaten down as the building was, it was still a head above every other structure he had seen in the depths of the Narrows. A muddied, cracked, and broken diamond in the midst of stone—yet a diamond it remained.  

“That’s because it is. A long time ago, the building belonged to the Crowne family.”  

Sukuna looked down at the older man with folded arms. His stare was enough to make Boris focus on him again, discarding his worried glances for a few seconds.  

“They’re an old family. At their peak, they owned a major part of the Narrows before it became what it is. Tried to turn this part of Gotham into something respectable.”  

Sukuna shifted his attention, giving his surroundings a once-over before refocusing on the man with a raised brow.  

Boris replied to his expression with a brown, tobacco-tinged smile. “It’s clear that didn’t work out, da?”  

Once again, Sukuna noted a hint of that accent. Boris continued, his eyes roving once more. “They’re basically extinct at this point, but that doesn’t matter. At least, not now. What matters is where the building is located.”  

Sukuna nodded in understanding as he shifted his attention again. The building was perched on a very curious spot. It sat on an unofficial boundary—half a step into the slums and half a step into civilization.  

A bulwark marking the passage between the two parts of town. Two horrible yet distinct sides of the Narrows. One that still had the barest veneer of civilization and another that spoke to the truest depths of Gotham. The dark putrid heart of the city.  

“I wanted us to come here early. If we were any later, we would’ve been stopped before we got this close. While the Burnley Slashers are a small gang. At one point, they used to be bigger, but they’ve had too many run-ins with powers beyond them. Bigger gangs pushing into the Narrows from the mainland. The Mafia trying to stick their hands into the pie. The Bratva trying to maintain their hold—”  

He cut himself short, emotion thick in his voice, then continued with a grunt and a spit to the side.  

“Even the Triads have shown some interest. Little as these interests are, considering how poor this part of Gotham is, it’s still profitable enough if any of them ever got full control. Anyway, it leaves the smaller gangs like the ever-retreating Burnley Slashers holding onto the last of what they have with their fingertips.”  

“What would it take?” Sukuna asked as his eyes roved over the building. It was a step above what he had. The tent that he and his mother had occupied ever since he had disposed of the former leader of their band of vagrants.  

He turned to a confused Boris and explained. “To take the building.”  

Boris smiled. A smile that barely reached his eyes, accompanied by an encouraging nod.  

“Like I said, the Burnley Slashers are a small gang, but they’re still big enough to put up a fight. They’ve survived this long because they have weapons. Not just homemade shanks and bats. I reckon they have a gun or two in there. Probably an automatic gun even. It wouldn’t make them a big problem on the mainland, or even in the center of the Narrows, but in the slums here, and this deep? They are kings.”  

Boris looked back at the building.  

“You asked what it would take to take over the building, da? A squad of well-trained and armored Spetsnaz, after light recon to determine their numbers as well as entry and exit points, would slaughter the lot of them with ease.”  Boris spoke with a certainty born of experience.

Sukuna remained silent as he looked at the building. A side door opened and along came four men. They were better dressed than the rest of the homeless that filled the alleyways. They closed the door behind them and took a few steps away before stopping to light a cigarette.  

The moment they came out, Boris retreated into the shadows, tugging vainly at Sukuna’s coat to get him to follow. But Sukuna did not budge. His interest had shifted from the building to the men—their comfortable clothes and solid boots that allowed them to trample upon snow.  

“You see what you have to aim for now, da? This should be your goal. Wait and prepare. Recruit some of the stronger vagrants in the alleys. Grow strong, and in a couple of years, we can take it from them. Now we must return. These four are but the first batch of men that will patrol around the building. Then they will spread further, both into the slums and into the city itself. If they catch us this close, we won’t get off easily.”  

Boris spoke in hushed tones, yet the worry in his voice was clear, as was the urgency behind it. His words turned broken and heavily accented, slipping into something rougher, more instinctive.  

But Sukuna barely heard him.  

Understanding flickered like a lighter sparked to life. Now he understood why Boris had shown him a glimpse of the true heart of the city minutes ago. Even now, he saw the lesson Boris wanted to impart—the slow crawl upward, the patience of a starving beast waiting for the perfect moment to strike.  

But patience was for men.  

And Sukuna was something else entirely.  

Boris underestimated him. Underestimated his newfound greed and avarice.

The hunger inside him gnawed, coiled tight like a serpent in his belly, demanding more than just promises of the future. He didn’t just want that house—he needed it. Needed the warmth of thick walls, the weight of good boots on his feet, the security of power, and the knowledge that others would bow when he walked by.

The men outside that house had what he should have. They dressed in sturdy clothes while he roamed in rags. They smoked in comfort while he scavenged for scraps. They stood upon his foundation, lived inside his home, and breathed his air.  

His fingers twitched at the thought.  

His arm batted away Boris’s grip, the older man’s fingers slipping uselessly from his coat. Sukuna turned, his diagonal, slanted eyes rolling lazily in their sockets to settle on him.  

“You don’t get it,” he murmured, his voice low and rough.  

Then his lips split—once, twice.  

His second mouth grinned, showing jagged teeth too sharp for a boy, too monstrous for a man.  

“Forget about your special squad, I'll be enough.”  

And then, without another word, he stepped forward, out of the shadows, into the light and toward what was already his.