Chapter 3: The Devil's Price
The rain had not stopped for three days.
It fell over Liberty City like an endless curtain, drenching neon lights and choking gutters with filth. The streets were rivers of grime, carrying away paper, cigarette butts, and blood alike. The towers downtown rose like tombstones, their windows glowing faintly in the mist, as if the city itself had become a graveyard of glass and steel.
But what frightened the people wasn't the rain. It was the silence.
Criminals who once ruled the alleys were gone. Politicians who strutted like gods had vanished. The city was not bleeding from war — it was bleeding from something unseen. Something whispered.
A name.
H.I.M.
---
The Memory
He woke in the dark again. His chest heaving, the sheets drenched. The dream always came the same way. A cruel circle.
His wife's scream. His child's laughter turned to terror. Their hands reaching.
And then his best friend's shadow above him, the betrayal sharper than the knife that pierced his ribs.
He remembered the blood pooling. The cold. The feeling of the world narrowing to nothing but hate.
And then — the voice.
"You want vengeance? Then bleed for me."
He had bled. He had died. Yet something had brought him back. Something that dragged him out of death's embrace and poured shadows into his veins.
Now, every night, the voice returned. Not a whisper, but a chain.
"Every gift demands a price. And yours has only begun."
---
The Newspaper
By morning, Liberty City trembled.
"Cartel Safehouse Annihilated."
"Ten Men Slaughtered. No Survivors."
"Is Liberty Haunted?"
The front page showed only blackened walls and faces carved in horror. Men had been strung up on wires, their shadows burned into concrete as though they had been seared by something darker than fire. Not a bullet. Not a blade. Something unseen had devoured them.
The police called it terrorism. The gangs called it a curse.
But the people had already chosen a name.
The Man Called H.I.M.
---
The Mayor's Fear
Inside City Hall, Mayor Grimson was pacing, his face ashen, his cigar trembling between his fingers. His usually booming voice cracked like broken glass.
"Every day this…this thing kills another one of them. Senators. Businessmen. Gang bosses. My city is burning and you stand here giving me theories?"
Across from him, Commissioner Edward Scotts sat with his hands folded tightly, his eyes rimmed with red from sleepless nights. He had seen criminals, murderers, terrorists. He had never seen men vanish into nothingness.
"It's not a ghost, Mr. Mayor," Edward said quietly. "It's a man. A man with a vendetta."
"A vendetta doesn't turn men into shadows!" Grimson snapped, slamming his fist on the desk.
Edward said nothing. He couldn't deny it. He'd seen the corpses himself — drained, twisted, as though fear itself had devoured them.
Grimson finally slumped into his chair, his voice falling to a whisper.
"Find him. Or Liberty will drown in fear."
---
The Commissioner's Choice
That night, Edward Scotts sat alone in his private office. His hands trembled as he lit a cigarette, the smoke curling against the dim lamp. Outside, rain battered the windows.
He knew the mayor was right. The city wasn't crumbling because of corruption or crime. Those had always existed. No — Liberty was crumbling because something beyond human was pulling its strings loose.
And Edward knew fear wasn't enough. He needed a weapon.
He pulled a file from the locked drawer. It was thin, but every page dripped with blood.
One name.
Gina Moretti.
Ex-military. Assassin-for-hire. No loyalty, no morals. Her body count rivaled small wars. She had vanished from records years ago, but Edward had kept her file hidden — for a day like this.
When the clock struck midnight, the door creaked open without a knock. A woman in a black coat stepped in, her presence as sharp as a blade.
"You called," she said, her voice smooth, dangerous.
Edward slid the file across the desk. "H.I.M. Find him. Kill him. No matter what he is."
Her lips curled into a faint smile. She picked up the file, flipped through it, and closed it with a snap.
"Consider it done."
---
The Church
Elsewhere, beneath the city's belly, H.I.M knelt in the ruins of an abandoned church. The stained glass was shattered, the altar cracked, but the air was heavy with a presence that did not belong. His blood dripped onto the stone, seeping into the cracks like offerings.
And then — the voice again.
"Do you think vengeance comes free? Every soul you take, the closer you come to me."
The shadows on the walls writhed, clawing, almost alive. For a moment, he saw his wife's face. Her hand reaching for him, her lips trembling with words unsaid.
He almost reached back.
But it dissolved, replaced with laughter — low, mocking, eternal.
H.I.M's teeth clenched, his hands shaking. His rage burned hotter, but beneath it, a sickness grew. A fear. How much of him was still human? How much had already been taken?
He pressed his hand to the altar, whispering, "They took everything from me. I'll take everything from them."
The shadows stirred, like beasts waiting to be unleashed.
---
The Price
Later, as midnight swallowed the city, another name was scratched off his list.
A senator — known for trafficking children and covering crimes for the government elite.
His body was found dangling from the bridge, his chest carved with a single word:
"DEBT."
But the strangest part wasn't the body. It was the missing shadow.
On the news, the camera lingered on the empty space where light should have cast his shape. As if even his existence had been erased.
---
The World Watches
By dawn, Liberty was no longer alone in its fear. Foreign agencies whispered. Underground forums filled with speculation. Some called him a demon. Others, a revolutionary. A ghost sent to punish the corrupt.
But one truth echoed above all others.
The Man Called H.I.M. was not done.
And the price of his vengeance…
had only begun to be paid.
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