"Hey, wake up," said a distant voice that was getting closer to the sleeping Tony.
"What do we do with him?" asked a second voice.
"I don't know, but he did take down that damn team," replied the first voice.
"So what? We know who he is, and if there's one thing I'm sure of—it's that he's dangerous," said the second voice.
"That's true, but we should still bring him in. Just look at his clothes—you can tell he's not ordinary," the first voice responded.
"Alright, but we tie him up. He managed to kill a whole team of assassins who even gave eighth-rank cultivators trouble," the second voice added.
A few hours later
Tony opened his eyes. He was lying on a mattress, his hands chained.
He had overheard the strangers talking. He knew he would be restrained.
But being chained reminded him of a time when a part of his soul had been shackled… for over two thousand years.
He tried to stay calm, just as someone entered the room.
It was a woman with black hair and piercing eyes. She wore light clothing and carried herself with confidence.
"Well, handsome, you're finally awake. You know, some people think we should just kill you right now. That assassin group you wiped out—they weren't just anyone. The only ones they feared were ninth-rank cultivators. And you—some unknown guy out of nowhere—killed them all. Alone."
But Tony wasn't focused on what she was saying. The memories of his soul being chained flooded his mind, awakening a dark anger within him.
"Listen to me carefully," he said coldly. "You'd better unchain me. Otherwise, you and all your little friends will die."
At those words, a pressure began to fill the room. The woman saw Tony's eyes turn pitch black.
"This is your last chance," said Tony, already imagining over ten thousand ways to kill her.
The woman, no longer smiling, immediately walked over and unchained him. The pressure vanished.
"I see… you've lived through something traumatic in the past," she said.
Tony looked at her and laughed.
"Traumatic, you say? If you'd spent even one more minute chained like I did, you'd be dead without even realizing it."
"So… are you willing to cooperate with us?" she asked.
"How about you tell me your name first?"
"Giving my name to someone who almost got me killed would be kind of stupid, don't you think?"
"Then I guess I'm not cooperating with you."
"...I see. Call me Simone."
"Alright, Simone. Let's go."