Bloodsteel Gangster
Episode 1 – The Resurrection of Kuro
The first thing Kuro felt was cold steel pressed against his bare back. His eyelids fluttered, the weight of forty years of death pressing down like lead. The silence around him was broken only by the hiss of machines and the echo of muffled voices beyond a glass wall.
When his vision cleared, the white lights above stabbed his eyes, sterile and cruel. His body felt weak—scrawny, skin stretched over bone. He raised a hand to his face and felt skin that shouldn't exist. He was alive again.
A low chuckle slipped from his lips. So they actually did it.
On the other side of the chamber, a group of men and women in white coats scribbled on holographic tablets. One of them, a tall man with a government badge pinned to his chest, leaned forward into the microphone.
"Subject 1173," the voice boomed through hidden speakers, "Kuro Veynar. Former age eighteen, deceased forty years ago in a gang-related shooting. Now revived by Project Lazarus. Welcome back to life."
Kuro sat up slowly, expression blank, his red eyes glowing faintly under the lights. So they knew exactly who I was.
The man continued. "You may feel disoriented. Be aware: resurrection alters the body permanently. Every subject awakens with unique abilities. Some… trivial. Some… catastrophic. We don't yet know yours."
Kuro slid off the table, his bare feet touching the icy floor. He didn't respond. His expression was calm, detached—like the whole thing bored him.
The chamber door slid open, and four armored guards entered, rifles raised. One tossed a folded uniform at his feet.
"Put that on," the guard sneered.
Kuro looked at the uniform. Black boots, standard government-issue trousers, shirt. His lip curled faintly. Cheap fabric, weak threads. Not mine.
Instead, his skin rippled. Black metal spread across his chest like liquid, hardening into a trench coat that hung from his shoulders, wide open, its inside shimmering like steel flesh. His legs were wrapped in jogger-like armor, and his hands flexed as the transformation sealed.
The guards stiffened. "What the—"
From Kuro's right arm, the metal shifted, elongating. With a sickening grind, it formed into a sleek black pistol, its body steaming with heat, the barrel glowing faintly red. He raised it slowly, calm as ever.
The guards shouted. "Drop it! Drop—"
Bang.
The first bullet ripped through the speaker's helmet, blowing out the back of his skull in a spray of red mist. The sound echoed like thunder.
The scientists behind the glass gasped. Someone screamed.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Three more fell before they could even pull the trigger, their rifles clattering uselessly against the floor.
The last one stood trembling, eyes wide, piss soaking his boots. "P-please… I have a family—"
Kuro tilted his head. "So did the man I shot forty years ago. Didn't stop him from dying."
He raised the pistol. Bang.
Silence. The room smelled of blood and gunpowder. Kuro lowered his weapon, expression blank, calm, like he'd just swatted flies.
He turned his gaze to the mirrored glass. He knew they were watching. Slowly, he lifted his left hand. The flesh split open, metal spilling out like mercury, shaping into a curved, razor-sharp blade. It pulsed with life, a part of him.
The scientists whispered frantically behind the wall.
"His power—liquid steel!"
"And… immortality. Look at the regeneration!"
"Shut it down, shut it all down before—"
Kuro smirked faintly. Immortal? Guess I got lucky.
As he stepped forward, he felt something shift inside him. A pulse. A voice, digital yet primal, whispered in his skull.
LEVEL UP.
Current Level: 2.
Balance: $1000.
Kuro froze, then chuckled under his breath. So that's how it works. One kill, one level. One kill, a thousand dollars.
His physique already felt sharper. Muscles tightened, bones harder. He flexed his fingers, admiring the way the steel pistoned beneath his skin.
Behind the glass, alarms blared. Red lights washed the chamber. The man with the government badge shouted, "Contain him! He's unstable!"
Kuro raised the pistol again. "Unstable?" He aimed at the glass. "Nah. Just awake."
Bang.
The bullet tore through the reinforced mirror like butter, glass exploding into shards. Scientists screamed as Kuro stepped through, coat swaying like a shadow. The trench seemed alive, part of him.
One scientist tried to run. Kuro's blade pierced his back, ripping out through his chest. He tossed the body aside.
LEVEL UP.
Current Level: 3.
Balance: $2000.
Another screamed, and Kuro shot him in the face.
LEVEL UP.
Level 4.
Balance: $3000.
He didn't stop smiling as he walked. Calm, steady, like none of it mattered. The more they died, the stronger he felt.
By the time the alarms summoned reinforcements, the floor was drenched in crimson, corpses piled like trash. Kuro stood in the center, trench dripping with blood, his demonic red eyes glowing brighter.
A squad of soldiers stormed in, weapons raised. Kuro twirled the blade once, then pointed his pistol at them.
"Round two."
The firefight was chaos—bullets screamed across the chamber, sparks lighting up walls. But Kuro didn't dodge. Bullets punched through his chest, his arms, his neck—then the wounds sealed instantly, metal and flesh knitting together. He fired back with precision, every shot splitting helmets and tearing flesh.
By the end, thirty more bodies lay at his feet.
LEVEL UP.
Current Level: 34.
Balance: $33,000.
Kuro cracked his neck, stretching. His scrawny frame was gone, replaced with toned muscle, his veins glowing faintly steel-blue. He looked like a predator now, every part of him built for violence.
He walked casually out of the factory, stepping over corpses, alarms still screaming. Outside, the city stretched endlessly—neon lights, gangs patrolling streets, hovercars blazing past. The smell of smoke and sin hit him instantly.
A world of hunters, demons, witches, gangsters, cops, angels—all fighting for power.
Kuro lit a cigarette from a fallen soldier's pocket, placed it between his lips, and looked up at the towering skyline.
"Forty years dead," he muttered, smoke curling from his mouth. "Guess it's time to make up for lost time."
He turned toward the streets, his pistol dissolving back into his arm, his blade retracting with a hiss.
Somewhere in the city, gangs laughed, heroes plotted, demons feasted, and hunters hunted. But they didn't know what had just been unleashed.
A gangster reborn. Immortal. Limitless. Unstoppable.
Kuro. The Bloodsteel Gangster.
And he didn't give a fuck.