Chapter 23:
Mark was pumped. Linking Book in hand, he was ready to head to the Marvel world. He couldn't wait to track down Nick Fury and wave a gold bar in his face. "Join me," he'd say, "or go find Tony Stark and his radioactive shenanigans."
If Tony still had that palladium poisoning thing going on, Mark was tempted to try an experiment. Maybe dump a bucket of milk down his throat and see if that did anything.
But first, he needed to get ready. Last time he'd been in the Marvel world, he'd just gotten Steve, his Stand, and got yanked into the place with practically nothing but a few gold ingots.
Luckily, he'd managed to draw the Ender's Hand, which let him take down weaklings like Abomination.
This time, he wasn't taking any chances. He wanted to see what other Minecraft stuff would do in the real world. The Ender's Hand was super useful, so he gathered a whole bunch of items to test out.
Thank goodness for the Alchemical Bag, or he'd never be able to carry it all.
It took a while to get everything sorted, but by nightfall, he was ready. He told Steve to grab the "Mrvl Cmcs" book and right-clicked to open it.
Black mist billowed out, engulfing them both. Another wave of weightlessness, and then everything was still. Mark opened his eyes, and a blast of wind threw sand in his face.
"Huh? A desert?"
He looked around.
Sand dunes stretched out as far as he could see, with a few scraggly yellow plants struggling to survive. It was dark, but he could make out a faint light in the distance, like a campfire or something.
"Am I back in Afghanistan?"
Mark groaned. "Come on, I don't want to fight terrorists again. Can't I spawn somewhere nicer?"
He had a theory about this. In the game, the Book of Ages always took you to the same coordinates, like a spawn point in your main world. Mark figured his spawn point must be in that cave, which meant every time he entered the Marvel world, he'd start in Afghanistan.
As he was thinking this over, something caught his eye in the night sky. A bright light, blinking in the darkness.
"What's that?"
He looked up. It was hard to tell what it was, but it was leaving a long trail as it streaked across the sky, heading straight towards him.
"Oh, crap-"
It looked like a meteor. Mark instinctively activated his teleportation, vanishing in a flash of purple light.
A moment later, the object slammed into the ground with a deafening boom. The earth shook, sand dunes rippled like waves, and a huge cloud of dust filled the air.
Mark reappeared a safe distance away, just as the sandstorm hit.
"Well, that was a close one," he muttered.
He stared at the newly formed crater. "Hey, system, how about unlocking a meteor module for me?"
A notification sound surprised him.
[System Prompt: New module feature detected. Research it to gain download permission.]
"Whoa, it actually worked?" Mark was shocked.
He teleported to the crater, eager to unlock this new module.
But when he got there, something was wrong.
There were no meteor fragments. Instead, a red-hot hammer was embedded in the rock at the center of the crater, still glowing from the impact.
"A... hammer?" Mark recognized it instantly. Thor's hammer. The timeline in this Minecraft world must be different from the Marvel movies. He must have missed the events of Iron Man 2.
Tony Stark would have already fixed his palladium problem, gotten help from his dad and S.H.I.E.L.D., and invented that new element.
As he was processing this, another system notification popped up.
[System Prompt: New module feature detected. Research it to gain download permission.]
Mark was confused.
That wasn't a meteor. Why was the system still offering him a new module? What kind of module could he unlock here? A hammer mod?
He shrugged and reached out to touch Thor's hammer.
Another notification sound.
[System Prompt: The internal structure of 'Godly Metal - Uru' has been comprehended. You have gained 30% download permission for a new module.]
Finally, it dawned on him. This new module wasn't about the hammer itself. It was probably something about expanding his blacksmithing options, adding new alloys or something.
Only 30% downloaded. He probably needed to study other metals, like vibranium, or maybe some meteorite iron.
He pulled out his phone and dialed Nick Fury.
"Mark?" Fury sounded surprised. "When did you get back?"
"I'm giving you half an hour to bring me Captain America's shield so I can touch it," Mark said. "After that, I'll give you twenty tons of gold to research the Tesseract."