The effect of the first emotions—and I won't lie, they were extremely positive—subsided, leaving behind sober calculation and an itching curiosity. Without hesitation I mentally wished to enter, to immerse myself in this "system." Surprisingly, the transition was completely mundane, without special effects or fanfare. As if I'd been using this interface my whole life, and it was as natural an extension of my thoughts as an arm is of the body. But what I saw… to put it mildly, puzzled me.
In the very center of the translucent interface, floating weightlessly, was a hammer—or rather its sketch. Not a carpenter's or mechanic's hammer, but a real blacksmith's hammer. A massive head of unknown metal covered in intricate runic patterns that glowed with a soft, otherworldly light. The handle, wrapped in something resembling reptilian leather, was adorned with complex doodads that seemed to constantly shift shape. It looked more like a priceless museum exhibit or the weapon of some Asgardian god than a working tool. My old, trusty mechanic's hammer with an ash handle perfectly fitted to my palm over years of work would look like a pathetic beggar next to it. And yet, in that moment I realized I wouldn't trade my reliable tool for any divine weapon. Mine was real, and this… this was still just a pretty picture.
Beneath the hammer flaunted an inscription in strict but elegant font: "Forge the Universe! Cost: 100 OP." I mentally focused on it, and a small, even tiny info packet flowed into my mind.
Each Forging attempt grants access to technologies from an infinite variety of Multiverse iterations.
And that… was it? So I spend 100 OP, hit the virtual hammer, and get a "technology"? Too many unknowns. How exactly do I receive it? As a real material prototype that drops on my head? Or as an info packet injected straight into my brain on how to create this technology? Or just a stack of blueprints I'll still have to tinker with for years, lacking the necessary resources and equipment? And what kind of technologies? Kree bioengineering? This world's magic, which supposedly follows clearly defined laws—is that technology or not? The very word "technology" could be interpreted so broadly my head spun. Fine, I'll figure it out with time. For now questions outnumbered answers.
Above the hammer were three tabs. The first—"Forge the Universe"—was active now. The second read: "Technologies." Anticipating who-knows-what, I switched to it only to exhale in disappointment. Empty. Absolutely. They even skimped on a single sample tech for demonstration. Stingy bastards.
The third tab—"Inventory." Now this was interesting. If it worked like in classic LitRPG, it wouldn't just be a help—it would be a genuine cheat in the real world. Holding my breath from slight excitement, I switched to inventory. Before me spread a 5×5 grid—twenty-five cells total. Not much, but enough to start. I looked at the old laptop on the desk. Touching it and mentally picturing it moving into one of the cells, I focused on that desire. Before my eyes occurred genuine, unadulterated MAGIC. The laptop didn't vanish in a flash of light—it simply… dissolved, like a mirage, leaving behind only a dusty rectangle on the tabletop.
"And now… I believe," I muttered, stunned, staring at the empty spot, then at the laptop icon hanging forlornly in the first inventory cell.
I mentally "clicked" the icon, and a brief description appeared:
"Zuun Electronics laptop. Rarity: Common. Condition: 73/100."
Wow, the inventory even acts as a kind of simplified reference book. Convenient. With a new effort of will I wished to return the laptop. A moment later it materialized on the desk with a quiet, barely audible click. Incredible! One thing was seeing system glitches before your eyes, quite another when something happened that broke every law of physics! This changed absolutely everything. The possibilities opened by such a pocket storage were truly limitless: from mundane heavy lifting to… anything!
I'd sorted the three main tabs. One last visible element remained—in the upper-right corner of the interface glowed a panel: "0 OP." The local currency needed for "gacha pulls." All that remained was to figure out the main thing: how do I earn it?
OP (Craft Points) — currency required for Forging the Universe and unlocking technologies. Earned by manifesting the user's Spark of the Creator in the process of creating something.
"Huh… No fucking clue, but very interesting," as they say. Fine, I'm lying. In general terms it's clear: I need to create something with my own hands. The question is what exactly falls under this vague "something"? Will, for example… My gaze caught on the old wooden stool in the corner, one leg noticeably sagging. Old habit took over. I approached, flipped it over. Yep, a screw had worked loose. No tools at hand, but the edge of a coin found in my pocket served perfectly as an improvised screwdriver. A couple minutes, and the leg stood rock-solid. The familiar feeling of satisfaction from a job well done… and silence. I waited for a system notification, a pop-up message, any sign. But none came. Hm. Apparently repair doesn't count as "creation." The system needs something new, made from scratch. An important and rather unpleasant clarification.
My gaze wandered the room for inspiration and landed on a student notebook lying on the corner of the desk. Drawing or… origami?
Taking the notebook and finding a ballpoint pen in the drawer, I first tried drawing something. I wasn't an artist by any stretch, and neither was John. After a few crooked sketches without any system response, I irritably tore out one sheet. Paper. What can you create from paper? The answer came on its own even before I chose. Origami. I started folding the classic everyone knows—crane. Something a step above a primitive paper airplane, but not the legendary dragon only a handful of people in the world can fold. A couple minutes of slow, careful work, and the paper crane was ready. It stood crookedly on the table, pleasing my eye, but the real pleasure came from the popped-up system notification!
[Created simple art item: Origami. Difficulty: Minimal. Received +1 OP!]
"Loot's this way!" I couldn't resist the legendary gamer phrase. First point in the piggy bank of my future greatness! All I had to do was make ninety-nine more such cranes, and I could spin the wheel… I mean, swing the hammer! The main thing was having enough sheets in the notebook.
Motivated by the first success, I forgot about researching the internet and making future plans. One goal, simple and clear—earn the first 100 OP. The whole world shrank to my hands meticulously folding paper and short flashes of system notifications.
[Received +1 OP!]
[Received +1 OP!]
…
[Received +1 OP!]
[Attention! OP earning limit in the area of creating simple Origami exhausted!]
The last message hit like a gut punch, instantly cooling my enthusiasm. From cranes I'd only managed to squeeze a pathetic 10 OP. Ten! And I'd already tuned in for meditative grinding, like in that tale about a thousand cranes for a wish… Eh, no easy paths for me. At least that's what the "simple" qualifier unambiguously hinted at. Consequently, if I made something more serious, there was a chance to start farming OP again.
Had to hit the internet after all, though not for the reason I originally planned. After half an hour browsing sites and tutorial videos, I regretfully concluded: my skills definitely weren't enough for an Elephant or especially a Dragon, whose schemes required hundreds of steps. And not just steps, but steps backed by scary terms like "bird base" with extra folds, "reverse folds," "rabbit ear," "wet folding"… This was higher mathematics, not handicraft.
But a way out was found. Elegant and, it seemed to me, ideal for farming—modular origami. The most obvious option—kusudama, a paper ball. The same "Electra" kusudama, according to guides, required 30 identical modules. Each module's difficulty was only slightly above a crane, but their combination should give the desired result.
I tore another sheet from the notebook and got to work. And immediately ran into a problem. My fingers, accustomed to rough work, heavy tool handles, felt like clumsy sausages. I cursed when I once again couldn't make an even, crisp fold. Me, a man who could assemble a furniture panel or turn a perfect table leg with my eyes closed, couldn't cope with a lousy piece of paper! Absurd!
Somehow, after ruining a couple sheets and spending a ton of nerves, I got the hang of it. By my calculations, one kusudama would take about half an hour. Only there was another snag—the sheets in the notebook were running out fast. Had to go to the store. Rummaging through shorts pockets and desk drawers, I scraped together a couple crumpled dollars and a handful of change. Not much. The nearest 24-hour shop greeted me with the smell of cheap coffee and disinfectant. Under the indifferent gaze of the Indian cashier I picked the simplest pack of office paper. Returning along the empty night streets lit by rare lamps, I felt like a complete idiot, because the potential risks of going out at night in this troubled neighborhood absolutely weren't worth it. I hadn't risked taking out the trash at night, but I risked it for paper—would be hilarious if it bit me in the ass (joke)…
Hell's Kitchen at night was a completely different place from daytime. It shed the mask of an ordinary poor neighborhood and showed its true face. From a dark alley came the crash of an overturned trash can and angry cat hissing. On the corner, under the flickering neon of "Joe's Pizza," stood a group of guys in baggy clothes. They weren't doing anything illegal, just smoking and talking quietly, but they radiated an aura of latent menace. I quickened my pace, trying not to meet their eyes. In this world one wrong glance could be enough to get a knife between the ribs.
The air was thick and humid, smelling of rotting trash, cheap food from all-night dives, and exhaust fumes. Somewhere far off a siren wailed again—the indispensable soundtrack of this city, and this neighborhood in particular. I suddenly realized my vulnerability with crystal clarity. In my old body I wasn't Hercules, but I could stand up for myself. Ten years of physical labor had done their job. Now I was in the body of a scrawny student who, judging by memories, last fought in middle school—and unsuccessfully. Any of those guys on the corner could snap me like a twig. And no Devil of Hell's Kitchen I'd remembered earlier would come to the rescue. Matt Murdock might be a hero in some sense, but he's neither omniscient nor omnipotent. He deals with gangs and killers, not saves every idiot who decides to stroll through a nighttime neighborhood. This walk sobered me better than any cold shower. I needed not just some "technology" from the system. I needed power. Or at least something to protect this fragile new life.
Back in the apartment, I attacked the task with renewed zeal. Forty minutes of concentration, teeth-grinding, and quiet cursing, and the first kusudama was ready. A bit lopsided, but quite recognizable.
[Created art item: Origami. Difficulty: Medium. Received +3 OP!]
Excellent! Medium difficulty counted, and the three-point reward was a nice bonus. Even if in the same 40 minutes I could've made more cranes if not for the limit, the main thing was different—OP farming had moved off dead center.
Glancing at the laptop clock—two a.m.—I realized what I'd be doing the next hours. The thought of college flickered and died. Thursday, school day… No matter how useless I considered that college, it could become a source of information. Mary Jane Watson studied there, and maybe Harry Osborn picked her up. These weren't just extras, but key, if secondary, figures. So worth attending college. But right now—grind!
The next hours passed in a fog. Hands mechanically folded modules, connected them into finished balls. To not go crazy from monotony, I turned on a news channel on the laptop. I got so practiced that one kusudama took no more than twenty minutes. The first ten I assembled by five-thirty a.m. But the eleventh ball met me with another unpleasant surprise.
[Created art item: Origami. Difficulty: Medium. Received +1 OP!]
[Attention! OP earning limit in the area of creating Medium-difficulty Origami partially exhausted! For the next 9 items +1 OP each.]
So right now I had 10 + (10 * 3) + 1 = 41 OP. And another 9 points I could squeeze from these paper balls. Total—50. Exactly half the way. Not bad at all. Plus modules could be folded even during lectures at college. So no need to torture myself here and now, especially since sleep was inexorably pulling at me. John's memory prompted that tomorrow three classes starting at 10:15 a.m. Half-hour walk to college. So I had three-four hours for sleep.
Flopping onto the sofa, before plunging into Morpheus's realm a second time in these insane twenty-four hours, I pondered. My life had flipped not just upside down, it had done a somersault through its ears. Marvel world, strange, not particularly generous system, new body… Remembering my old, measured life, I felt a pang of longing. There I created things you could touch, that served people, though first and foremost me. Sturdy table, reliable roof. Tangible, real result. And here? I create fragile paper crafts for ephemeral points to get an unknown "technology." There was some cruel irony in it. As if I'd traded real craftsmanship for a video game with a dubious prize.
Suddenly this version of Marvel—is one of the darkest? What if Galactus is already flying to Earth? Or, God forbid, this is the Marvel Zombies universe? Better Warhammer than Marvel Zombies… While I pondered cosmic horrors, from the street below came the clink of a broken bottle and a drunken shout. Thin walls offered no protection from the noise. I felt a cold draft from a crack in the window frame. The gust of cold air sobered me a bit and thoughts returned to comprehending what had happened to me, particularly the creation process.
Fingers still remembered the feel of paper, the monotonous, precise movements. In one night I'd made hundreds of identical modules. And with each new fold a dull irritation grew in me, turning into quiet rage. This was wrong. Creation, in my understanding, had always been a meaningful process. You take formless material—wood, metal, clay—and invest in it your labor, your skill, a piece of your soul to create something useful. Something that will serve. A chair you can sit on. A plate you can eat from. A tool you can work with. It was a dialogue with the material. And what I was doing now was a profanation. Soulless, mechanical work for virtual points.
These paper balls, kusudamas, were empty inside and out. They carried no function except aesthetic, and even that was dubious. They were fragile and meaningless. And the system rewarded me for creating this trash. I felt like a lab monkey pressing a lever for a banana. Was this really my "Spark of the Creator"? In folding paper by someone else's scheme? The thought was insulting. No, I definitely had to accumulate these damned hundred points and get the first technology as soon as possible. To start creating something real. Something with weight, strength, and meaning. Something I could proudly call my work.
But even so, before worrying about great creations and equally great dangers in the face of World-Devourers, I needed to survive tomorrow in this cardboard box in the most dangerous district of the city. And that thought here and now was far more sobering than any Galactus.
I pray to all the gods, who here, unlike my world, are not just empty words, that this version turns out… well, at least not one doomed to annihilation. With those encouraging thoughts I fell asleep, anticipating a new day.