The city throbbed with a restless energy as night descended upon the bustling, second-tier metropolis. Traffic pulsed like a fevered vein, and the nascent nightlife pulled young souls from their stifling rooms into its liberating embrace, ready to squander their hours.
Perched on the eaves of a two-story villa, Sean felt the tendrils of night breeze, a fleeting balm against his skin. Draped in black, his wide hood swallowed his features, rendering him a shadow indistinguishable from the rooftop's inky depths. In the sweltering embrace of a summer night, such attire should have been suffocating. Yet, compared to the gnawing embers of his past, it was a trifle. For two long hours, he had been a sentinel, waiting. At an age meant for intellectual pursuits and carefree college days, Sean had, three years prior, traded textbooks for vengeance. A relentless hatred had forged him, compelling him to master a different curriculum: human anatomy, the brutal poetry of combat, and the delicate art of quick lock-picking.
The profound stillness was eventually shattered. Two hours dissolved into the night, and then, a black luxury sedan glided into the villa courtyard. The dull thrum of its engine faded, and as the door swung open, a drunken middle-aged man stumbled forth, his steps betraying a profound inebriation.
From the villa's roof, Sean retrieved the long saber at his side. It slid from its scabbard, a jet-black blade that seemed to drink the moonlight, rendering it all but invisible. He plunged from the six-meter height, a blur of motion, his agile arm snagging a villa ledge mid-descent, braking his fall. He landed with the grace of a phantom, directly before his unsuspecting enemy.
No words were exchanged. Sean's long saber, a whisper of steel through the air, carved a swift, brutal arc, severing the enemy's throat in one precise strike. A geyser of blood erupted, a crimson stain that, despite Sean's desperate evasion, clung to his cuffs and the back of his hands. The drunken man crumpled, awareness extinguished before comprehension could dawn. Death, instant and absolute, had claimed him. Sean turned, bolting towards the thin promise of solitude.
Then, a flicker at the periphery of his vision: a uniformed security guard. Though his act had been witnessed, his concealed form offered a shield against identification. Yet, in the next heart-stopping moment, a chill snaked up Sean's spine. The guard's hand went to his waist, emerging with a dark, slender pistol, unmistakably fitted with a silencer. A security guard with a gun? The question screamed in Sean's mind, but time for contemplation evaporated. The villa, a formidable expanse of at least ten meters, stretched behind him, while the security guard stood twenty meters distant. Flight meant a fatal exposure of his back, a clear target. For Sean, in the crucible of danger, instinct always dictated one path: eliminate the threat, never retreat.
He surged forward, a zigzagging phantom, desperately weaving to evade the inevitable. Puff, puff, puff… The silenced pistol whispered its lethal message, barely more than a sigh. Five meters into his dash, a sudden numbness bloomed in Sean's calf, swiftly followed by an identical shock to his chest. He knew, with a grim certainty, he had been shot. For all his vengeful mastery, this was a new, unwelcome sensation.
A crushing powerlessness washed over him, but in its wake, no fear, only a searing, bitter unwillingness. His vengeance, a life's singular pursuit, unfinished. To fall now, slain by an anonymous hand, felt like the ultimate, ignominious defeat. With a final, desperate surge of will, Sean hurled his long saber. It was a throw born of despair, a surrender to fate. Yet, fate, as if sensing the raw edges of his unfulfilled quest and the injustice of his fall, intervened. The saber spun wildly, a dark blur against the night, and then, impossibly, it found its mark, plunging deep into the chest of the gun-wielding security guard.
Sprawled on the ground, a faint smile touched Sean's lips. He had laced the blade with a potent, mixed neurotoxin; the security guard was condemned. Consciousness fractured, vision blurred. A crushing blow to his head plunged him into absolute darkness. In the dwindling ember of his awareness, a faint whisper echoed: 'Hunter, 'Reincarnation Paradise' is open for you.'
Then, a detached, almost clinical sequence unfolded in the void: [Body transmitting...] [10%, 50%, 100%, transmission complete, detected hunter's body suffered severe damage, awaiting repair...] [Hunter's consciousness not yet awakened, repair command delayed, currently maintaining minimum survival state, duration ten minutes...] [Beep..., detected hunter's talent is a growth talent, survival time extended by two hours.] In the absolute darkness, rows of faint, luminous light blue text shimmered, like ancient runes etched into the void.
Beneath these enigmatic glowing lines, Sean lay, a figure steeped in blood, suspended in the void. A tremor in his fingers, and then, slowly, he awakened. A fleeting disorientation gave way to the sharp memory of a gun's dark muzzle. He tried to rise, but an agonizing pain ripped through him, threatening to drag him back into oblivion. With a monumental effort, he pushed himself to a sitting position. The darkness was absolute, broken only by the faint glow of the blue text.
A new line of text shimmered into existence before him: ['Hunter, welcome to 'Reincarnation Paradise']. Sean ignored it. His focus was not on ethereal greetings but on the grim reality of his own body. His calf was a ruin, pierced clean through, flesh torn and twisted, a gape wide enough to admit a finger. Yet, at this gruesome sight, Sean merely frowned, no other emotion stirring him. He had witnessed, and inflicted, horrors ten times more visceral. The chest wound, though graver still, was likewise silent, no longer weeping blood. 'I'm not dead?' A hand pressed to his sternum, he felt the vigorous thrum of his own heart.
The text reappeared, more direct now: ['Hunter, you are not dead. Are you willing to join 'Reincarnation Paradise'? Here, you can find everything you desire.'] Sean had consciously sidestepped these strange pronouncements, his inherent wariness of the unknown holding him back. But this new reality was too profound to ignore: fatal wounds, miraculously survived, and now, a line of blood-red numbers pulsed ominously before him, ticking down.
['1:35:10'], ['1:35:9']... A grim countdown: one hour, thirty-five minutes, nine seconds. Sean felt it in his bones—an ominous premonition that zero would herald his ultimate demise. The text confirmed his chilling suspicion: ['Hunter, please communicate with the 'Paradise' as soon as possible to sign the contract, otherwise you will die after '1 hour 35 minutes']. His profound injuries had long demanded death; this was merely a temporary reprieve, now hourglass-bound.
'My saber?' The 'contract,' the 'Paradise'—they were abstractions. Only his saber, the sole relic of his lost parents, mattered. A military officer's blade, captured by his great-grandfather, passed down through the generations to him. He demanded it from the void. ['Most real-world items cannot be brought into the 'Paradise', please sign the contract as soon as possible.'] Sean's silence stretched, the faint blue text shimmering, perhaps in bewildered surprise at such an unconventional 'Hunter'.
'Contract?' Sean's voice was a rasp, cutting through the silence. 'Tell me, what is the cost, and what is the reward?' The relentless countdown afforded him little luxury for hesitation. He recognized the impossible—a 'supernatural' event, a tremor in the fabric of his reality. And with it, a desperate hope. He craved power for his revenge. 'Supernatural' might bring immense risk, but it also promised extraordinary strength.
The answer unfolded in a rush of light blue script: ['Upon signing the contract, you will travel through various 'derivative planes' to complete tasks issued by 'Reincarnation Paradise', obtaining 'World Origin', and ultimately the amount of 'World Origin' will determine the richness of your rewards.'] And then, a bold, chilling declaration: ['Reincarnation Paradise' is omnipotent.'] Sean absorbed the deluge of information, a single, desperate question forming on his lips. 'Omnipotent?' he whispered into the void. 'Can it resurrect the deceased?' The shimmering blue text froze, then, as if recoiling from the question, vanished completely. A final, stark line appeared: ['Given your identity as a Hunter, no.']
Sean's journey through this mysterious "Reincarnation Paradise" is like a digital reincarnation, where his very being is uploaded and transformed, much like a fragmented hard drive being pieced back together in a new operating system.