Rise of the Street King

Chapter 77 — Trap & Payback

The square hadn’t emptied after the boy’s trembling accusation. His words lingered like smoke, poisoning the air long after Jayden dismissed the crowd. Malikah stormed off without asking permission, her fury a wall of fire that even the Burned Boy didn’t dare chase. But Jayden’s mind wasn’t on her not yet. Elder Kola’s name was the one that echoed most.

Kola the Thin. Nervous, twitchy, always sweating like he lived in constant fear of shadows. He had once vouched for Jayden to the Council when no one else believed in him, had even slipped him food and coin when his pockets were empty. That loyalty had once seemed unshakable. Now it looked like the mask of a man hedging bets.

Jayden couldn’t let the doubt fester. If the slums thought he was too weak to confront betrayal, the Council would eat him alive. Razor would walk through the gaps.

So he devised the parley.

Word went out through back channels: Jayden wanted to talk. Not with the whole Council, not with Big Sef or Mama Nuru, just with Elder Kola, privately, to clear the smoke. He framed it as respect, as a son reaching for the hand of the man who once gave him guidance. Kola, ever desperate to prove his value, couldn’t refuse.

The meeting was set for midnight, at an abandoned street where vendors once sold fish by the cartload. The stench still clung to the air, though now it was overlaid with rot and rust.

Jayden arrived with Malikah and the Burned Boy at his flanks. Malikah still hadn’t forgiven the suspicion thrown her way, but her loyalty was evident in her silence; she was here to see if Kola would sink himself. The Burned Boy twitched with excitement, eager for violence, eager to prove himself once more.

Kola was already waiting. Lantern light glistened on his thin, sweating face. He smiled nervously, twitching his hands in constant motion. “Jayden,” he greeted, voice crackling with false warmth. “My boy. I was glad when I heard you wanted to speak. Too much poison has been spilled lately. Lies in the air. Better to clear it between men, eh?”

Jayden studied him, expression unreadable. “That’s exactly what I came to do.”

They stood in the middle of the street, empty stalls looming like broken teeth around them. A few of Jayden’s men lingered in the shadows, silent as specters.

Jayden spoke evenly, his voice steady but carrying weight. “You’ve been named, Kola. A boy caught with my maps said you vouched for Razor’s men. That you confirmed what was true. That you gave them my doors.”

Kola flinched visibly, hands fluttering like panicked birds. “Lies! Jayden, you know me. You know what I’ve done for you. Who’s the boy? A rat under torture? You’d trust the stammering of a child over the man who kept your neck above water when the Council wanted you drowned?”

Jayden’s gaze didn’t soften. “Then explain why Razor always seems to know which corners I’ve pulled my guards from. Why the Council whispers warnings before I even move. Why my enemies act like they’ve got my blueprints in their hands.”

Kola swallowed hard, sweat beading on his temple. “Because there are snakes everywhere, Jayden! But not me. Never me. I’ve only ever tried to keep the slums alive, same as you.”

Jayden’s lips tightened, then he raised a hand. The Burned Boy stepped forward and tossed a bundle into the dirt between them. It rolled open, spilling documents maps, timetables, supply lists. The ink smeared, but the scrawled notes were visible. And the handwriting, familiar and sharp, was unmistakably Kola’s.

The elder froze, his face blanching.

“I pulled this from Razor’s captain before he died last week,” Jayden said coldly. “I held onto it until tonight. Now I see it for what it is.”

Kola’s mouth opened and closed like a fish gasping for air. “No that those were stolen, I swear! Planted!” His voice cracked, desperation spilling. “Jayden, I’ve been nothing but loyal!”

Jayden’s voice was iron. “Loyalty doesn’t sweat like that. Loyalty doesn’t sell my doors. Loyalty doesn’t write maps that burn my houses.”

The Burned Boy stepped closer, knife glinting in the lamplight. The crowd Jayden had assembled half his lieutenants, half the hungry slum-watchers curious for blood leaned forward, eyes gleaming with cruel anticipation. They wanted a spectacle, a sign of strength.

Jayden gave it to them.

He turned, raising his voice to the watching shadows. “This is what betrayal looks like. This is what it costs.”

Before Kola could speak again, Jayden grabbed him by the collar and dragged him into the open. The Burned Boy handed him a rusted chain, heavy and thick. Jayden looped it around Kola’s neck, ignoring the elder’s sobbing pleas.

“No trial. No mercy,” Jayden said, voice carrying like thunder. “The Council protects snakes. I cut their heads off.”

With a brutal jerk, he hauled Kola to the iron hook that jutted from a nearby stall. The chain clanged as Jayden fixed it. Kola kicked and flailed, voice breaking into shrieks. The crowd howled, some in horror, most in awe.

Jayden pulled the chain taut and left him dangling, choking, his feet scraping against the wood. The Burned Boy cheered, his laughter shrill and wild. Malikah turned her face slightly, unreadable.

When it was over, Jayden didn’t let the body fall. He left Kola hanging there in the square, a grotesque warning for all to see.

By morning, the slums buzzed with it. Word traveled like fire: Jayden had executed a Council elder in the open, chaining him like a thief for the rats to gnaw. Some called it justice, others madness. But none could deny the message Jayden’s grip was iron, and betrayal was death.

Yet power gained that way carried a shadow.

By noon, whispers reached him. A city politician, smooth-tongued and clean-suited, was already moving. He was calling the act barbaric, demanding order, pushing for the state to intervene in the slums “before the cancer spread further.”

Jayden sat in his den, staring at the words scrawled in Malikah’s hand. State intervention. Two words heavy enough to crush an empire.

And for the first time, he wondered if the enemy wasn’t just Razor or the Council if the true storm was coming from above, from men who didn’t care about slum blood, only about control.

The body of Elder Kola still swung in the square as Jayden whispered to himself, “Let them come.”

But even as he said it, his chest tightened. Because deep down, he knew he hadn’t scared off the wolves. He had only bled himself to draw bigger predators closer.