The street was supposed to be his end. Henry Doomstar saw the truck—the classic, rusted Isuzu of Isekai legend—screeching toward him. He closed his eyes, bracing for the impact that would send him to a world of magic and high-fantasy adventure.
He heard a swerve. A crash. Silence.
He opened one eye. The truck had smashed into a lamppost ten feet away. Henry exhaled, a shaky, hysterical laugh bubbling in his chest. "Not today, Truck-kun! I'm staying right here in the land of high-speed internet and—"
SIREN WAIL.
The ambulance speeding to the truck's rescue didn't see him. CRUNCH.
Henry's last thought was a bitter, mental middle finger to the universe as his consciousness faded into a black void. Died by the healer's ride. What a cosmic joke.
******
Darkness didn't last. The smell of wet dog and open sewer hit him first. Henry opened his eyes to a canopy of twisted, grey trees and a sky the color of a bruised plum.
"Ugh... my head feels like a hangover in a blender," he groaned. He sat up, and the ground cracked under his palm.
A gurgle echoed to his left. Three Drowners, their skin a sickly, waterlogged blue, crawled from a nearby pond. To his right, a Ghoul let out a bone-chilling screech, its claws digging into the dirt.
Henry stared. He looked at the monsters, then at his own bare, soft-looking human hands. He facepalmed so hard the impact sounded like a gunshot. "The Witcher world? Really? I'm the 'no-silver-sword' guy? I'm literally a snack."
The lead Drowner lunged, its jagged teeth aiming for his throat. Henry didn't think. He just swung a desperate, panicked right hook.
KRA-TA-BOOM.
The Drowner's head didn't just snap; it vaporized. The headless torso was launched fifty feet into the woods, snapping three birch trees like toothpicks before vanishing into the brush.
Henry froze, staring at his knuckles. "What the...?"
The Ghoul hissed and leaped. Henry caught it mid-air by the neck. It felt like holding a kitten. He squeezed, and the monster's spine shattered like dry kindling. He dropped the carcass, scratching his head in genuine confusion. "Am I... made of vibranium?"
Suddenly, a heavy, distorted guitar riff—the kind that makes you want to punch a hole through a mountain—vibrated in the marrow of his bones. A neon-green HUD flickered over his vision.
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[ SYSTEM BOUND: THE DOOMSTAR PROTOCOL ]
[ STATUS: UNCHAINED PREDATOR ]
[ COSMIC ERROR DETECTED: UNIVERSAL SENTINEL SATURATION... 100% ]
[ NOTIFICATION: THE UNIVERSE IS NOW A BATTERY. HARNESSING REQUIRED. ]
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"A system?" Henry whispered. His voice came out as a low, gravelly rumble. "Doom system? Oh... oh, this is going to be fun."
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[ REWARD UNLOCKED: THE FORTRESS OF DOOM ]
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A pillar of blinding blue light erupted from the center of the clearing. The ground groaned as a massive tower of white marble and hell-forged steel tore through the earth, rising hundreds of feet into the air. It was gothic, brutal, and completely out of place in the muddy North.
Henry stepped through the massive obsidian gates, which hissed open as if recognizing their master. Inside the main atrium, a pedestal rose from the floor. Encased in a shimmering energy field was the Praetor Suit, redesigned for this world—forged from dark, rune-etched iron and heavy leather. Beside it sat the Super Shotgun.
As he touched the pedestal, the Sentinel Energy saturated in the very air of the universe reacted. Blue sparks jumped from the walls, flowing into the suit like a circuit being completed.
"I get it," Henry muttered, his hands trembling as the armor pieces locked onto his body with mechanical precision. "The energy is everywhere... but the suit is the engine. The fortress is the reactor."
He looked at the consoles humming with blue light. The Sentinel Energy wasn't just magic; it was a universal fuel source. With the right tech, he could power anything—or destroy it.
Deep in the woods, miles away, the Aen Seidhe and the Dwarves looked toward the North. They didn't see Henry yet, but they saw the pillar of blue light that touched the stars. They felt a shift in the air, a hum in their bones that whispered of a new, terrifying protector.
Henry gripped his shotgun, the HUD glowing with his first task. "Time to see what's in the basement."
******
Henry stepped out of the Fortress of Doom, and the world felt small.
The Praetor Suit was a masterpiece of "Witcher-meets-Sentinel" engineering. It retained the brutal, industrial silhouette of the 2016 model, but the green plating was now reinforced with dark, rune-etched iron and heavy, treated leather that hummed with a low, blue light. Every movement felt like he was a coiled spring made of hydraulic steel.
In his hands, he gripped the Super Shotgun. It was a twin-barreled engine of destruction, its break-action mechanism snapping shut with a sound like a guillotine.
"Let's see if the 'Unlimited Sentinel' boost actually does anything," Henry rumbled. His voice, modulated by the helmet, sounded like a grinding tectonic plate.
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[ SYSTEM TASK: BIOMASS CLEARANCE ]
[ REWARD: 500 SYSTEM POINTS ]
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He didn't have to wait long. A pack of Nekkers and a massive Leshen—a forest spirit made of wood and bone—emerged from the treeline, drawn by the fortress's arrival.
Henry didn't roll. He didn't parry. He Dashed.
A blue blur of kinetic energy slammed into the center of the pack. Henry pulled the trigger.
BOOM.
The Super Shotgun didn't just fire lead; it fired shells supercharged by the universal Sentinel saturation. The blast didn't just kill the lead Nekker—it turned the creature into a fine, red mist that coated the nearby trees. The shockwave snapped the Leshen's wooden limbs like dry twigs.
Henry was laughing now. It was a raw, exhilarated sound. He grabbed a wounded Nekker by the leg, swung it like a club into another, and then performed his first Glory Kill. He stepped on the creature's chest and pulled its head clean off with a sickening squelch.
"Oh, I am definitely liking this hunt!" he shouted, punching through the Leshen's chest cavity and ripping out its glowing heart.
******
In the shadows of the granite boulders, a squad of Aen Seidhe scouts stood frozen.
Iorveth's younger scouts, who had seen the horrors of the Cintra Massacre, were now witnessing something that defied their understanding of war. They held their hands over their mouths, some gagging, others simply unable to breathe.
"Is... is it a Golem?" one whispered, his voice trembling so hard he nearly dropped his bow.
"No," the Elder scout replied, his eyes wide as he watched Henry reload. The blue shells clicked into the shotgun with a mechanical rhythm that sounded like a death knell. "It is a man. But he moves like the wind and hits with the weight of a mountain. Look at the monsters... they aren't just dying. They are being erased."
They watched as Henry caught a flying Garkain by the wing, slammed it into the dirt, and crushed its skull with a single, heavy boot stomp. The "Doom Music" radiating from Henry's armor—a low, thumping industrial beat—made the very ground beneath the elves' feet vibrate.
To the Elves, the monsters were a constant, terrifying threat. To Henry, they were a "Daily Task."
"We stay hidden," the Elder commanded. "If that... thing... sees us, there won't be enough of us left to bury in the forest."
Henry, blissfully unaware of his audience, wiped a glob of monster ichor off his visor. "System, how many points for that Leshen? I need to see what's in the 'Furniture' section of the shop."
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[ REWARD CALCULATING... TOTAL CARNAGE BONUS APPLIED. ]