Late at night in Brooklyn, a sprawling luxury villa glowed softly under the city lights.
On the second floor, Brown Roderick—a thickset man in his forties with dark brown hair—lounged comfortably on a leather sofa.
He looked completely relaxed.
A blonde woman knelt in front of him, attending to him with practiced enthusiasm.
But despite the intimate setting, the room was far from private.
Four heavily armed bodyguards stood nearby, positioned around the room like statues.
As the leader of the Counterstrike Gang, Brown had fought his way to the top through years of violence and betrayal. He had no intention of dying before enjoying the rewards of that climb.
Even during moments like this, he never let his guard down.
The men protecting him were all former military—expensive hires with impressive physical strength and combat training. Each wore body armor and carried a handgun.
No one was getting near him without a fight.
Standing respectfully nearby was Brown's lieutenant, a heavyset man with a scarred face.
"Any updates on the AK crew?" Brown asked lazily, barely glancing up.
The lieutenant nodded.
"They've been causing problems lately. Business conflicts, mostly. They've been cutting into our territory."
His expression darkened.
"A few of our guys ended up in the hospital."
Brown snorted.
"Those bastards."
His voice hardened.
"We agreed to expand the underground drug market together. Now they're getting greedy."
He leaned back.
"Looks like it's time to remind them who they're dealing with."
Before he could say more, one of the bodyguards suddenly stepped in front of him.
Brown frowned.
"What's wrong with you?"
Then he heard it.
Heavy footsteps.
Slow.
Steady.
Someone was climbing the stairs.
Brown's pulse quickened.
Where are the guards downstairs?
Why didn't they stop him?
The blonde woman quickly scrambled away and clutched at Brown in fear.
The bodyguards raised their pistols, aiming toward the staircase.
The footsteps grew louder.
Step.
Step.
Step.
Then a head slowly rose into view above the staircase railing.
Brown felt his stomach drop.
The man's face was horrifying.
It looked as if it had been burned by fire—scarred and twisted beyond recognition. There was no hair left on his scalp, and nearly every inch of skin was damaged.
It was impossible to tell what he originally looked like.
Only his eyes remained clear.
Dark.
Cold.
Like something crawling out of hell.
The blonde woman screamed.
The moment the scream rang out, the bodyguards opened fire.
BANG!
BANG!
BANG!
Four guns fired almost simultaneously.
Bullets screamed toward the intruder's head—
And stopped.
A massive slab of metal blocked their path.
Brown's eyes widened.
His stainless-steel security door—the nearly one-ton reinforced blast door protecting the second floor—had somehow been ripped off its hinges.
The intruder held it like a shield.
No wonder the footsteps sounded so heavy…
Still carrying the door in front of him, the man continued climbing the stairs.
The bodyguards fired repeatedly, but the bullets bounced harmlessly off the thick steel.
Brown shoved the terrified blonde woman aside and backed away.
"Wait!" he shouted.
"We can talk about this!"
The intruder didn't answer.
Instead, he lifted the massive door overhead—
And threw it.
The steel slab flew across the room like a launched missile.
BOOM.
Two bodyguards were crushed instantly.
The door slammed into them and continued forward with unstoppable force.
A moment later, it slammed into Brown himself.
Three men died in the same impact.
At the same time—
Brown's lieutenant and the remaining two bodyguards collapsed silently.
Each had a fruit knife buried deep in their foreheads, the blades driven clean through their skulls.
The knives had come from Brown's own kitchen.
From the moment the intruder appeared to the moment six men lay dead—
Less than five seconds had passed.
The blonde woman trembled in the corner, too terrified to make a sound.
The intruder finally spoke.
His voice was hoarse.
"Relax."
"I don't kill unarmed civilians."
He gestured toward the door.
"Leave."
The woman slowly lifted her head.
What she saw next made her shiver.
The man dipped his fingers into the blood pooling on the floor.
Then he drew a massive S-shaped symbol across the marble floor.
It looked disturbingly similar to something from a ritual.
Once he finished, he stood up and walked away.
Just as silently as he had arrived.
The villa returned to stillness.
Several blocks away, Noah Vale stepped out into the cold night air.
A faint interface flickered in his mind.
Name: Noah ValeAge: 18Estimated Lifespan: 500 years
Strength: 1.8Condition: 1.8Mental Processing: 1.6Charisma: 0.3
Unassigned Attribute Points: 0.2
Another notification appeared.
His overall attributes had crossed a new threshold, activating a passive talent that slightly increased his available attribute points.
But the real change was more obvious.
Noah reached up and scratched the ruined skin on his face.
It burned.
Hours earlier, he had poured concentrated sulfuric acid over his own face and hands.
The acid had destroyed his skin completely.
The itching now came from the regeneration process.
Three hours.
That was how long the system predicted it would take for his body to fully repair the damage.
By morning, his face would return to normal.
His hair would grow back.
Even his fingerprints would regenerate.
When Noah's physical resilience surpassed a certain level, his body had crossed a strange biological threshold.
It wasn't quite immortality.
But it was close.
As long as he didn't die instantly, his body could slowly rebuild itself through nutrients and time.
Even catastrophic injuries might eventually heal.
That discovery had come from a series of… extremely unpleasant experiments.
But tonight's disfigurement served a specific purpose.
Noah smiled faintly.
Step one of his plan had just been completed.
Tonight's massacre wasn't just revenge.
It was a performance.
He was creating a legend.
A mysterious killer with a ruined face.
Someone who clearly hated the criminal underworld.
Someone entirely unrelated to Noah Vale, the young man currently dominating the headlines.
From this moment forward, the city would begin whispering about a new figure.
A ruthless avenger targeting organized crime.
And Victor Kane would soon become the next piece of that story.