Four hunters held their positions when Vell looked across the bounty board, showing the factor had forbidden blood near his licensed booth. Their leader, Brask, carried a Grade 2 mark plus a suppression baton with a hooked guard.
A shock-pistol woman waited beside him while Kessler kept a rolled net launcher against his calf near the butcher lane. The fourth hunter carried a plain baton, watching the scrap-yard exit instead of Vell's hands.
They followed through the crowd with enough room to look unrelated, so Vell walked where the factor wanted him. Brask's caution showed experience, but it also meant the others would wait for his first commitment.
He entered the butcher lane where carts blocked the wider road, then stopped beside a broken delivery rack with one open end toward the scrap yard. The net man stepped into that exit as expected, turning the lane into a shallow box with too little cover.
"Four hundred credits is a poor price for a corpse," Vell said, keeping both hands visible beside his coat, "unless your buyer pays a bonus for the blame."
"Alive pays more," Brask replied, drawing the suppression baton, "the factor only wants your hands intact."
That answer gave Vell the useful part of the problem without leaving room for doubt. A merchant did not need a branded man's hands after a scale argument unless he feared what those hands had found.
The net launcher fired before Vell could ask another question, spreading weighted cable across the lane from the scrap-yard exit. He reached for the grey sliver inside his pack lining, knowing the uninstalled imprint would make an opening or become another ruined material.
[Needle-Step imprint activation available.]
[Uninstalled use will damage imprint.]
"Use it," he said, closing his hand around the sliver while the net closed over the place he had been standing.
The lane slowed around him for one hard breath, giving his legs a burst that made the cart wheels appear fixed in place. He moved through the narrowing gap before its weights hit the stones, then reached Kessler before the man could reload.
Vell cut the shoulder strap instead of Kessler's throat, letting the launcher fall while he kicked it beneath the delivery rack. The net line stayed around Brask's ankle, forcing the leader to cut himself free before using his baton.
That delay split the group exactly as Vell needed it to, leaving every hunter without expected support. The pistol woman crossed alone while the baton hunter tried reaching him around the cart's blocked side.
The first burst had left Vell's calves tight, but he still had the market cart plus net line between them. He pulled the line with both hands, dragging loose weights across the ground until they struck the woman's shin.
Her shot entered a hanging meat hook, sending blue charge through the rack before she could turn the weapon toward Vell again. Vell used the cart as cover, then struck her wrist with the truck-spring knife handle.
Her pistol fell beside the rack as the baton hunter reached across her, forcing both hunters into the same bad angle. Brask cleared the line and charged with the speed expected from a Grade 2 core.
Instead of checking his partners, Brask decided the lane still belonged to him. A hunter who needed control would keep choosing the most obvious target nearby.
Vell backed toward the delivery rack with his good shoulder close to the cart, making the narrow gap look like fear. Brask followed the invitation, raising his hooked suppression baton for an overhead strike.
Behind him, Kessler freed the launcher from its cut strap while the pistol woman reached for her fallen weapon. The fourth hunter circled the opposite end of the rack, still waiting for Brask to hold Vell still.
Four hunters were moving on four different clocks, which was better than facing one coordinated team. Vell only needed Brask's stronger attack to interrupt the other three hunters.
The hooked guard struck the cart rim when Vell shifted left, biting through wood beside his ribs. He trapped the shaft under his elbow, then drove his knife handle into Brask's fingers until the grip loosened.
Brask answered with a knee toward Vell's thigh, hitting him hard while the damaged imprint ached in Vell's palm. Vell let the impact carry him into the rack, using the bounce to pull sideways instead of fighting Grade 2 strength.
The baton shaft slipped free and swept into the fourth hunter's reaching hand, sending his weapon against the pistol woman's knee. Kessler saw both partners cross his launcher line, so he released the cable rather than firing through them.
That hesitation gave Vell the second opening the imprint could not provide. He kicked the cart lock loose, then shoved its weight into Brask's knees while the rack tipped toward Kessler.
Meat hooks dragged across the pavement while the falling rack pinned the fourth hunter's sleeve beside Kessler. The pistol woman remained trapped behind the cart, but Brask rose with his baton still raised.
Vell kept his knife low to invite one more committed strike, because Brask had not surrendered. A recorded defeat delivered by the leader himself would cost the factor more than stolen equipment.
The baton came down toward Vell's old shoulder, but he stepped inside the swing and drove his forehead into Brask's nose. Its hooked guard bit into the cart, leaving Brask's wrist exposed before he could wrench it free.
"You are faster than the notice said," Brask said, blood running down his mouth as he grabbed for a backup knife.
"The notice is eight months old," he replied, cutting the belt that held the knife before it reached the man's hand.
Brask tried shouldering him backward, but the rack blocked the movement while Vell kept his footing. He put the spring blade beside the man's cheek, then watched the other three stop reaching for weapons.
"Report the mistake," Vell said, taking the suppression baton before he stepped away.
Brask opened both hands before telling his people the fight was finished, making the surrender genuine. Then he looked at the cracked grey sliver lying across Vell's open palm.
"What was that step?" Brask asked.
"Expensive," Vell said.
He kicked the fallen shock pistol beneath the rack, leaving it for the Association to find with the market camera record. The imprint in his palm had cracked from end to end, turning grey dust across his fingers as the burst drained out of his legs.
[Needle-Step imprint damaged.]
[Temper increased: 7%.]
His right thigh tightened where Brask's Grade 2 knee had landed, while his old shoulder protested every deeper breath. The imprint had broken their formation, but it had not made the stronger core harmless.
Vell used a fallen length of netting to bind the swelling before the crowd moved closer. Every minute spent limping in public would teach the next bounty crew where to aim.
The delivery camera above the lane kept recording while several scavengers raised their phones from behind the butcher carts. Vell copied the attack onto two cheap tags before any assistant could reach the public port.
One copy entered his shirt while the other went into the nearby Association kiosk, forcing its system to keep the same record. The upload showed Kessler firing first, the illegal pistol discharging, plus Vell leaving all four hunters alive.
[First public combat recording secured.]
Brask's Grade 2 mark remained visible throughout the recording, preventing the factor from calling this an easy attack on weak collectors. The camera also caught Vell waiting for a real surrender before lowering his blade.
The kiosk cross-checked his new core before accepting the footage, then painted an unlicensed-awakening notice across its screen. People who had watched Brask lose began offering Vell food or short credit without making him ask.
"You think he will pay us after this?" Kessler asked, looking toward Brask instead of Vell.
"He paid before," Brask said, pressing one hand to his broken nose, "that is all he promised."
The answer confirmed they knew nothing about the factor's interest in Vell's hands. He left their ignorance intact because frightened employees carried warnings faster than broken bodies.
Kessler cut the pinned hunter's sleeve instead of reaching for another weapon, which proved the order had held. Vell walked away only after the pistol woman pushed her unloaded weapon toward the kiosk guard.
The factor's booth had closed by the time Vell crossed pawn row, leaving assistants to guard its altered scale. Another fight today would only make the man's story easier to sell.
Vell paid three credits for a seller to check the preserve prefix from the boar collar against transport stamps. The seller refused twice before Vell showed him a second credit, then searched once the third touched his palm.
The prefix belonged to Marshline, a beast carrier operating from the western yards. That gave Vell a company plus a district instead of another number waiting in his memory.
"They buy broken collars cheap, then sell them blessed with shiny paper," the seller said, covering his stamp book with one hand.
Clean wraps, lamp alcohol, plus two hot meals cost another eleven credits before Vell left the market. Those ordinary expenses reduced his remaining cash from one hundred eighty-four credits to exactly one hundred seventy.
He took his food, kept the copied tag inside his shirt, then followed the drainage channel back toward the pump house. The cracked imprint went beneath the stove beside the six credits, leaving it useful only as proof that the Forge could turn a monster talent into a temporary advantage.
The empty golden shell on the wash basin repeated the kiosk notice when he finished binding the scrape across his forearm. It had no concern for the bounty fight, only the signal his new core had sent through the city.
[External network notice: unregistered awakened signature detected.]
[Association review pending. License application available: fee 480 credits.]
The requested fee exceeded his best three scavenger months combined, but the notice changed when an eastern emergency siren crossed the belt. A monster call could give an unlicensed volunteer legal combat status until dawn.
{Station Seven emergency. Legal engagement authorized.}
Vell left the cracked imprint under the stove, took his new knife, then headed east before the Association found a quieter answer.