Chapter 69: A Street Gang
The entire group continued walking through the abandoned auto garage. All around them were the rusted skeletons of old cars, stripped down to their frames and left to decay.
They followed the noise ahead, a loud, rowdy group just beyond the shop.
Steven and Joe twitched at every sound, constantly looking over their shoulders like someone might jump out at them at any second.
"Ha! Doesn’t matter anyway," Steven said, trying to hype himself up. "Even if they do rob me, I’m already in minus money, so it’s not like they can take anything else!"
"Man... I hope I don’t end up like you when I’m older," Joe said, side-eying Steven’s oddly proud expression.
"What the heck did you just say? And you’re proud of being a bully! At least I’m not like you, Green."
"And now you’re bullying me! " Joe snapped back.
But the moment their voices got loud, both of them fell silent.
They had just rounded the corner, and now the front of the shop came into view.
The first thing they noticed was the makeshift furniture scattered around the area, chairs and tables slapped together from tires, crates, and broken parts.
A beat-up stereo system sat in the corner, blaring music from an old speaker that looked like it was powered by a hacked-up generator barely holding on.
There were about twelve people in total, both male and female dressed in their own chaotic, individualized styles. Just like Max had said, most of them looked to be on the younger side.
Barely in their twenties, the group lounged around, drinking and joking loudly, but among them, one person stood out.
Toward the back, slouched in a beaten-up sofa, sat a young man dressed in a black tracksuit. He didn’t look particularly muscular or athletic, but his sharp, narrow eyes stared straight ahead, unblinking. His lightly orange-colored hair might have been what people noticed first, but what really made him stand out was the cold, unreadable look in his eyes.
As Max’s group stepped further into the open space, every single person turned to look.
Except him.
The man on the sofa didn’t so much as flinch.
The loud music blaring from the speaker was quickly shut off by one of the gang members, and nearly all of them bent down to grab something off the ground.
Some picked up bricks. Others rusted iron pipes. A few simply stuck out their tongues and grinned in twisted amusement.
"Look at this group of wannabes," one of the guys laughed, pointing his iron pipe at them. "Where’d you all meet, a costume shop? You couldn’t look more mismatched if you tried!"
Max had to admit... the guy wasn’t wrong.
Both he and Joe were still wearing their school uniforms, meant to make them seem less threatening.
Steven was dressed in his signature red tracksuit. Meanwhile, Aron stood tall in a full black suit like he’d just walked out of a corporate boardroom.
It wasn’t just their clothes either, it was their whole vibe . Each one of them looked like they’d come from a completely different world.
Unlike the group standing in front of them, Max’s crew clearly looked like an odd mismatch.
"I’m here to talk to the leader of The Pit," Max said in a loud, confident voice. "I have some business."
The man with the orange hair slowly raised his hand, then made a subtle gesture for them to come forward.
Max obeyed, stepping ahead with Aron walking at his side, never falling more than a pace behind.
As they moved closer, they stopped when they were around three meters from the man.
The rest of the gang had now circled around behind them, boxing them in. Two more stood at the leader’s sides.
They were surrounded.
And yet, Max had to admit, compared to the atmosphere back at school, this situation didn’t feel quite as tense. The fear he’d felt there... it still lingered stronger than here.
"A school kid wants to do business with us, The Pit ?" the leader said with a mocking tone. "You do realize, we’re not just some low-tier crew who works for anyone ... especially a bunch of lemons like you. "
His voice was steady, cold, and laced with sharp amusement.
"How’d you even know about this place? How’d you find our hideout?"
It wasn’t like someone could just Google The Pit Gang and find directions to their base.
In the underworld, making contact wasn’t easy. Usually, the gang found you , not the other way around. And even then, it was always through someone who knew someone who knew someone, followed by vague arrangements through burner phones or coded messages.
But for someone to know exactly where their hideout was, the entire Pit gang was on edge because of it.
"You don’t need to ask any questions," Max said firmly. "That’s not your job. I’ll give you a proposal, and you just need to decide whether you’re willing to take it or not."
"What is with this guy?" one of the girls from the gang scoffed from behind. She took a step forward, but the leader raised his hand to stop her.
"But Wolf! " she protested. "He’s acting like he’s on equal footing with you! He should’ve come with a gift, or been begging. The fact that we haven’t broken their legs just for showing up—"
"Just tell me the proposal," said Wolf, the leader of The Pit.
"100,000," Max said plainly, dropping the number first. "To be shared among all of you."
That got their attention.
Immediately, the entire gang’s mood shifted. Even the angry girl fell quiet, realizing this wasn’t just some punk playing tough, this was a serious offer.
"I can give you 10,000 now," Max continued, "and the remaining 90,000 when the job is done. For you guys, it should be easy."
He paused, then explained just enough.
"The school we go to... they’ve formed a large group. I’ve been marked as a target. I want your help, not to take over, not to cause chaos, I just need your help to get to my target."
Max was choosing his words carefully, trying his best not to make the job sound beneath them. After all, they were a gang. There was pride in that.
Going up against high schoolers wasn’t exactly good for a gang’s reputation. It sounded petty, weak, even.
But money was money.
And the amount Max was offering for what sounded like one day’s work... it was tempting for anyone .
"Hey, wait," Joe whispered. "Are they getting paid more than us?"
"Well, there are more of them," Steven replied. "So I guess that’s fair..."
Wolf leaned forward slightly, a smirk playing on his face.
"You know," he said, "there is another way I could get that money."
The group stiffened.
"How about I just beat you down, take your phone, and force you to transfer it over?"
The Pit members around them chuckled darkly. A few were already stepping closer, their eyes gleaming with anticipation.
They were smiling, but not the kind of smiles you wanted to see. These were the grins of people who enjoyed the prelude to violence.
Max didn’t flinch.
Instead, he leaned slightly toward the others and whispered calmly.
"Remember what I said. I brought you here to be my bodyguards... so you might want to start earning that money."