A week moved faster than Leon expected. The days at the base blurred into a steady rhythm: dawn conditioning, weapons drills under Elena's unblinking scrutiny, hours on footwork and spear form, archery until his shoulders burned. He read hunter dossiers at night — layered field reports, annotated skeletons, diagrams of tendon and scale — learning where a beast was soft, where it could be pierced, and where it would tear a man apart. He slept exhausted and woke hungrier for more. His body changed in small, stubborn ways: a little more spring in his step, a fraction less gasp in his breath. Ghostshadow and Stormfury breathed through him like two currents he could switch between without thinking; one for silence, one for violence. He practiced until the movements felt less like imitation and more like arrival.
On the evening after the seventh day, while he was bandaging a raw patch on his forearm, he asked the one question that had lived in his chest since the day Liam placed the access card in his palm. "When do I go, Uncle?"
"You can go the day after tomorrow," Liam said, watching him with the cool patience of a man who had learned to weigh urgency. "But first I must take you somewhere."
They left the base before dawn. The transport cut through orbital traffic and then through the quiet outskirts of Avalon until they reached a structure that made Leon's jaw tighten with a different kind of awe — the planetary vault complex of the Imperial Bank. It was a planet-sized facility in miniature: lines of security, armored gates, and a façade of bureaucratic calm. Liam stepped forward with the ease of a man whose face and rank opened doors faster than words.
Inside, the bank president led them through layers of clearance until they stood before a smaller gate that hummed with its own authority. "Vault 109," Liam said, sliding a key card. The president's face, which had been carefully neutral, softened with a kind of reverence as he guided them into a wormhole chamber. The portal shimmered not with the pulsing alien hue Leon had seen at the base but with the wide, cold blue of interstellar transit — a StarGate for currency and secrets. They stepped through and arrived hours later on a world too large to be a mere branch: the bank's headquarters planet. The air smelled different here — a metallic, high-altitude thinness — and the scale of the building made Avalon's highest towers feel like toys.
The vault itself was cathedral-quiet. Rows upon rows of secured cubicles stretched in symmetrical order, each one a promise, each one a secret. Vault 109 was at the center, heavier than the rest. The president watched solemnly as Liam authorized them in. The door sighed open.
Gold's only small comfort in that room: it glittered, but it was not what caught Leon's breath. The vault held things that had names his world had only whispered: ingots of gleaming ores that hummed faintly under skin, crates of preserved herbs that glowed like slow fires, boxed reliquaries of mechanism-less artifacts. Swords whose edges caught light like a razor's whisper. A small, deadly dagger lay on a velvet pad — ornate, cruel, forged in a style he'd seen carved into the bones of a Genesis beast in one of the dossiers. There were legal deeds stamped with planets he had never imagined owning. Bank cards in a box, each heavy as an oath.
"This is everything your parents left," Liam said in that low voice that never rose. "They feared that if anything happened, your relatives would not protect you. They asked me to hold this until you were ready."
The words should have crushed him with relief, but what flooded through Leon was a more complex thing: the cold clarity that he had almost been given a way out he didn't want for reasons only his heart understood. Money could buy shelter, supplements, even the best physicians for Lila — but it could not buy answers about who his parents had become in that other world.
"You don't have to go," Liam added. "You can settle Lila into any life you want. Use this. Buy a planet if you wish."
Leon's jaw set. He found himself staring at the dagger as if it spoke. "I will still go," he said. "Not for wealth. For truth."
Liam's face softened in the smallest way. He reached into a tray and took out a single black premium card, its surface matte and cool. He flipped it casually to Leon. "One billion cosmic credits. For Lila's care. Spend it well." The gesture shook something inside Leon he hadn't expected. He accepted the card with both hands.
Liam then produced a small crystal the size of his thumb — dark, smooth, and strangely warm. "Your father left this," Liam said. "A talent crystal. He wanted you to use it." He pushed it toward Leon. "If you awaken any powerful talent through the Novice Trial, keep it secret. If you're questioned, show these talents instead."
Leon held the crystal. It felt like holding a sun that had been banked for later. Curiosity and calculation warred in him for one breath, a single thin moment. He thought of Lila's soft sleeping face, the smell of lemon pepper fish he'd once delivered, the house with its crooked gate. He thought of the roar he'd seen in Liam's old footage. He thought of the hunger for answers.
He pressed the crystal between his thumb and forefinger and smashed it.
A clean metallic chime entered his mind like a bell struck in a cavern.
[Ding!]You have used a Talent Crystal.Talents received: Battle Foresight, Heightened Senses, Void Storage.
[Battle Foresight: Able to see a few seconds in future, analyze all the possible scenarios and deduce the best course of action. It also provides enhanced vision, allowing the user to perceive minute details and track high-speed movements.]
[Heightened Senses: Enhanced senses, reflexes, and concentration. You will have greater sense of perception.]
[Void Storage: Access to a pocket dimension for storing and retrieving items.]
Leon staggered back as the new perceptions flooded him. The room sharpened: threads of dust became visible currents of motion; distant heartbeats turned audible as soft rhythms in the chest; the table before him seemed to hold a tiny, impossible gulf — an access point that felt like a pocket folded into nothingness.
Liam watched, not surprised. "These were among the few of your father's talents," he said. "He held many more — things of legend. Void Collapse Shurikens, Thunder Armor, the Orion Eye. He walked the line between hunter and myth. He asked me to protect these until you were ready."
Silence pooled around the statement and then dissipated under practical talk. "When you arrive in HellParadise," Liam said, "you'll get a Novice Trial prompt. Accepting it could grant you rare talents… or end you. The trial is no cosmetic; it tests survival. Be careful."
They returned through the warp gate while Leviathans of trade and war blurred into starlines behind them. Back on Avalon, Liam's last instruction was practical, almost to the point of tenderness. "Go buy what you need for Lila. I'll pick you up tomorrow morning."
Leon did not need to be told twice. For the first time in his life, money bent without protest — he bought nutritious supplements no pharmacy would have given him credit for before; he bought warm clothes that were not patched at the elbow; he purchased toys that made Lila laugh until she cried. He even bought a hypercar. It was a sleek, beautiful car called Starion. It was quite popular, and many sought to buy this car. For once, it felt right to own something that moved cleanly and fast. The car's acceleration made him grin like a child, and for an hour he forgot about trials and beasts and the hollow ache of questions.
The world, however, never let him rest. He then drove the car and went to the restaurant he used to deliver food for. This time not as a delivery boy but a rich young man who can afford to enjoy food here. He ordered a lot of food this time, pasta, pizza, dumplings, lemon pepper fish and everything his sister liked to eat and drink but couldn't due to lack of money.
"Hey, Leon. You haven't shown up to deliver for days. What's going on? If you keep this up, I won't be paying you any salary," the restaurant owner scolded.
Before Leon could respond, a familiar, mocking voice interrupted. "Well, look who it is—my useless cousin, Leon," sneered Mark Hale. Leon turned to see his cousin, the same person who had always belittled him, bullied him, and reveled in his hardships. A complete scumbag.
"Still homeless, or are you and your sister living on the streets?" Mark taunted as a few boys sitting beside him laughed, their table piled with food. Another boy of the group joined Mark, "Hey, street-boy — done delivering dinners? Want us to throw you a bone?"
Leon smirked, unbothered. "Oh, Mark, how thoughtful of you to ask. No need to worry about us. Actually, we're doing quite well. I even inherited my father's inheritance. Bought myself a car—it's parked right outside. Oh, and I also bought back the family villa. So, if anyone needs to take care of themselves, it's you. Because I am now living better than you.""
The room fell silent as Leon turned to the restaurant owner. "Pack my food. This place reeks of idiots and scumbags." He pulled out a sleek black card, paid his bill, and walked out. Moments later, the roar of his luxury car echoed as he sped away. Mark's face contorted between anger and denial.
"Wait... was that a Starion?" one of Mark's friends asked, wide-eyed. "Mark, you didn't tell us your cousin was loaded!"
"Yeah, do you have a Starion too?" another chimed in.
Mark's face turned red with discomfort. He didn't own a car like that. And what did Leon mean by inheritance and living better than him? Hadn't his family taken everything from Leon?
"I... I need to go," Mark stammered, abruptly leaving the table. He needed answers—and fast. Without wasting another second, he rushed off to find his father and discuss about Leon.
At home that night, Lila pulled at his sleeve and stared at the pile of new things with joy so simple it made his throat ache. They ate together, the lemon pepper fish a small feast, and in the quiet afterward Leon called Liam.
"Uncle," he said, voice low and tired and a little lighter. "Find me a good school for Lila. Somewhere safe. A place where she can grow."
"You've already thought ahead," Liam said. "Good. Sleep. Tomorrow we leave."
He hung up, and as Leon lay awake in the dark of the villa that had been bought back for him, the new senses hummed under his skin. The taste of the fish still sparkled like a promise. He now had money. But the iron truth remained: money could buy shelter, a thousand luxuries, an army's worth of weapons — but it could not buy the history waiting within HellParadise. That history waited for him directly, and he would go meet it with the small, fierce certainty that had grown in him over seven days of sweat and instruction.
Tomorrow, he would step back through the Gate. Tomorrow, he would begin to carve out answers with his own two hands.