California. The roof of a luxury apartment building in San Francisco.
It was mid-morning. Hunter easily bypassed the electronic lock on the roof access door using his master lockpicking kit.
He stepped out onto the roof, locked the heavy alloy door behind him, and pulled a set of high-powered binoculars and an infrared laser rangefinder from his [Inventory].
He walked along the edge of the roof, scanning the skyline.
After a moment, he locked onto a specific direction and brought up the rangefinder.
"Wind: Level 2, blowing southwest."
"Distance: Approximately 2,400 meters."
Hunter opened his Inventory and pulled out his prized possession: the McMillan TAC-50 anti-materiel sniper rifle. He then retrieved a specialized magazine loaded with custom armor-piercing, explosive-tipped rounds and slapped it into the massive weapon.
He settled into a prone position, aligning the rifle's barrel with a high-rise office building over a mile and a half away.
Looking through the TAC-50's 16x high-precision scope, Hunter zeroed in on a specific office on the thirtieth floor.
According to the intelligence dossier provided by the Continental Hotel, this was the private office of one of the senior board members of Hicks Consulting.
Aside from sitting on the board of the mercenary firm, the target also owned his own legitimate tech company, which operated out of this building.
Because San Francisco was the closest major city to LA, Hunter had selected this board member as the very first target of his revenge campaign.
Without anyone noticing, September had already rolled around.
Although summer was officially over, the California sun still beat down with a lingering, dry heat.
But the 75-degree weather didn't affect Hunter in the slightest.
He lay perfectly still on the hot concrete, his eye glued to the scope, waiting patiently for his target to appear.
Fueled by a cold, burning rage, Hunter completely ignored the passage of time.
Ten minutes. Half an hour. An hour. Two hours.
Finally, a figure stepped into the crosshairs.
Hunter's brain instantly cross-referenced the man's face with the high-resolution photos from the dossier.
Target confirmed.
Hunter flicked off the safety and rested his finger against the trigger.
He waited another sixty seconds. The target walked over to his massive mahogany desk and sat down in his leather chair, totally oblivious to the reaper watching him from across the city.
Hunter exhaled softly and pulled the trigger.
BOOM!
The TAC-50 roared like a cannon, unleashing a customized .50 caliber round that tore across the skyline.
At a distance of 2,400 meters, the bullet took several seconds to reach its destination.
Hunter stayed glued to the scope, tracking the shot.
Ten. Eleven. Twelve.
Through the magnified lens, Hunter watched the reinforced, tempered glass window of the thirtieth-floor office suddenly shatter into a million pieces.
A fraction of a second later, a massive, bloody crater erupted from the center of the target's chest.
The sheer kinetic force of the anti-materiel round practically lifted the man out of his chair, violently slamming his ruined body against the back wall of the office.
"Dead."
Having visually confirmed the kill, Hunter swiftly collapsed the TAC-50, tossed it back into his Inventory, and walked toward the stairwell.
He took the elevator down to the lobby and walked out the front doors.
He didn't need to double-check. When a human torso is struck by a specialized .50 BMG round, the internal organs aren't just damaged—they are entirely liquefied and evicted from the body.
Unless the target's Christian God personally descended to the thirtieth floor, the man was beyond saving.
Two days later. An upscale restaurant in Seattle.
Hunter, wearing a flawless disguise and a waiter's uniform, stood quietly in the corner of the busy dining room.
Suddenly, the customized tactical crossbow materialized in his hands.
He aimed at a man sitting in a private booth fifteen meters away. The man—another high-ranking executive from Hicks Consulting—was dressed in a bespoke suit, laughing and chatting over dinner with a beautiful woman.
Hunter pulled the trigger.
Thwip!
The bolt crossed the dining room and struck the executive directly in the neck.
The moment the specialized broadhead impacted, its four razor-sharp blades deployed, instantly severing the man's carotid artery, jugular vein, and vocal cords.
The sheer force of the bolt shattered his cervical vertebrae.
A fountain of arterial blood sprayed across the white tablecloth and the terrified face of his date, whose screams instantly shattered the atmosphere of the restaurant.
In the ensuing panic and chaos, Hunter slipped the crossbow back into his Inventory, turned, and casually walked out the kitchen exit.
One day later. Phoenix, Arizona.
It was the dead of night.
Hunter bypassed the state-of-the-art security system of a luxury penthouse in the city center.
Pew! Pew! Pew! Pew!
Four suppressed shots made quick work of the heavily armed bodyguards patrolling the living room.
Hunter pushed open the master bedroom door.
He walked over to the king-sized bed and looked down at the middle-aged white man sleeping soundly underneath the expensive silk sheets.
His expression entirely blank, Hunter pressed the muzzle of his suppressed pistol against the man's forehead and pulled the trigger.
Pew!
The bullet scrambled the man's brain, painting the silk pillows with blood and grey matter.
Hunter slowly turned his head, staring directly into the red, blinking light of the room's security camera.
He gave it a cold, dead-eyed stare, then turned and vanished into the night.
Two days later. An underground parking garage in New York City.
The deafening roar of automatic gunfire echoed off the concrete walls.
Hunter, holding an M4A1 carbine, stood over the bodies of five heavily armed men he had just shredded with a sustained burst of fire.
He calmly walked down the line, putting a single execution round into the head of every single mercenary, ensuring no survivors.
Once the job was done, he dissolved into the shadows of the garage.
That same night. A sprawling estate in the suburbs of New York.
Covered in the blood of the outer security detail, Hunter maintained a relaxed, almost leisurely pace as he strolled through the massive mansion.
He checked room after room until he found what he was looking for: a reinforced steel door leading to a panic room.
He slapped a block of C4 onto the locking mechanism and blew it.
The explosion wasn't big enough to destroy the door, but it blew a hole through the center just large enough for a child to crawl through.
Hunter peered through the jagged, smoking hole.
Inside, huddled in the corner, was a terrified family. The patriarch—another Hicks Consulting board member—was holding a trembling pistol, his eyes wide with horror.
A warm, charming smile spread across Hunter's face.
"Good evening, gentlemen."
As he spoke, he pulled the pin on a fragmentation grenade.
He counted down in his head. Before the terrified board member could beg for his life, offer him money, or scream a threat, Hunter casually tossed the live grenade through the hole.
He turned his back and started walking down the hallway.
BOOM!
The concussive blast echoed through the mansion. Another board member, erased.
One day later. A high-end nightclub.
Hunter wiped a few drops of blood off his knuckles with a napkin.
He was genuinely surprised. Over the last week, he had waged a blitzkrieg across the country, systematically slaughtering nearly every executive and board member of Hicks Consulting.
Yet, somehow, this particular target hadn't gone into hiding.
Instead, the man was out at a club, trying to pick up women, acting as if he didn't have a care in the world.
After Hunter easily cornered and killed him in the VIP bathroom, a sudden, intense spike of danger flared in his mind.
"A trap."
He heard the heavy, synchronized thud of dozens of combat boots rushing down the hallway toward the bathroom.
But after a week of unbroken slaughter, Hunter's blood was boiling. He felt absolutely no fear or anxiety.
He calmly stepped into a blind spot outside the bathroom door.
He opened his Inventory and pulled out a weapon he had bought from the Continental Sommelier but had only ever fired on his ranch.
An M249 SAW light machine gun.
He slapped a massive 200-round box magazine into the feed tray and racked the charging handle.
Cradling the heavy machine gun, Hunter kicked the door open and charged headfirst into the kill zone.
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