Chapter One – The Man Who Shouldn't Exist
The rain never stopped in Liberty City.
It was the kind of rain that seeped into bones, that washed blood down the gutters and hid screams in its endless drumming. Neon lights blurred across puddles, painting the streets in sickly shades of blue and red.
Somewhere in those streets, three men begged for their lives.
The alley was silent except for their ragged breathing. One clutched a broken arm, the other spat blood, the last trembled so badly his gun slipped from his hands. They had been gang enforcers once, feared in the underworld, predators of the weak. Now they looked like children facing a nightmare.
Because standing over them was him.
A tall figure, coat soaked in rain and blood alike, face hidden beneath the shadow of a hood. His eyes—God, those eyes—burned faintly in the dark, like dying embers that refused to fade.
"You thought the city was yours," his voice rasped, low and heavy, each word like a tolling bell. "But it never was."
He stepped forward, and the last survivor screamed before shadows swallowed him whole. When silence returned, only the figure remained, standing over bodies sprawled lifeless against the brick.
The city had no name for him.
No file, no record, no past.
But whispers spread like wildfire. H.I.M.
---
Flashback – Years Ago
The man knelt in a dimly lit living room. The smell of smoke and blood filled his lungs until he could hardly breathe. His wife lay motionless across the couch, her dress stained dark. Their child—small, fragile—lay still beside her.
His tears dripped onto their faces, but they did not stir. He cradled them desperately, whispering broken prayers, choking on every word.
"No… no, no, no…"
Behind him, footsteps. Slow. Familiar.
He turned, hope flickering—only to see the face of his best friend. His partner. The man he trusted with his life.
"...Why?" His voice cracked, hoarse with grief.
The muzzle flash answered him. Pain exploded through his chest, the world tilting sideways as he fell. The last thing he saw was betrayal etched into the smile of the one man he thought he could trust.
Then, nothing.
---
The Abyss
Death was not silence.
Death was a void, endless and suffocating.
And in that void, a voice whispered.
"You hate them. You want them to pay."
The man's rage, raw and unyielding, echoed through the dark.
"I can give you that power. The power to burn them all. But remember—power is never free. It always comes with a price."
His hand—trembling, desperate—reached out. And when he opened his eyes again, they glowed faint blue, like coals kept alive in an endless storm.
The man was gone.
What rose from the grave was something else. Something the world would come to know only as: H.I.M.
---
Present – Liberty City
Word spread fast. Too fast.
By midnight, a mafia safehouse on the docks was reduced to ashes. Survivors claimed bullets disappeared into shadow before reaching him, as if swallowed by the night itself. Others swore their worst fears came alive, clawing at their minds until they begged for death.
One survivor had gouged his own eyes out, muttering over and over:
"The shadows are alive… he showed me… he showed me everything I ever feared…"
By dawn, newspapers screamed the headline:
"The Man Called H.I.M. — Devil or Justice?"
In the government's high offices, senators gathered with pale faces, whispering about how the dead man they'd erased from history had returned. In mafia boardrooms, hardened killers locked their doors and prayed the rain would wash away the footsteps that haunted them.
But deep down, they all knew the truth.
Walls meant nothing.
Guns meant nothing.
The city itself couldn't protect them.
Because H.I.M. wasn't hunting for blood alone.
He was hunting for vengeance.
And Liberty City… was only the beginning.