Chapter 1: WELCOME TO HELL'S KITCHEN
The first sensation was cold. Wet cold, seeping through fabric into skin, into bone.
The second sensation was the smell. Rotting garbage, stale piss, something that might have been vomit. New York's finest perfume.
What the—
My face was pressed against concrete. No, not concrete. Something softer. Wetter. A garbage bag. I was lying on garbage bags in what appeared to be a narrow alley between two brick buildings. The sky above—what little I could see of it—was that particular shade of orange-black that meant city night. Distant sirens wailed somewhere. Car horns. The bass thump of music from a building nearby.
I pushed myself up onto my hands and knees. My head pounded like someone had taken a hammer to it. Memories surfaced in fragments—a truck running a red light, the crunch of metal, the sensation of flying, then—
Then nothing.
I died.
The thought should have terrified me. Instead, it felt clinical. Factual. I died. And now I was here, in an alley, covered in garbage juice, very much alive.
Or... was I?
I looked down at my hands. They weren't my hands. My hands were pale, soft from years of desk work. These hands were larger, the knuckles scarred, the skin a shade darker than I remembered. I touched my face. Different bone structure. Stronger jaw.
This wasn't my body.
[SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE SYSTEM — INITIALIZING]
The words blazed across my vision in blood-red text, floating in the air like a hologram. I jerked back, nearly falling into a pile of cardboard boxes.
[WELCOME, HOST]
[TRANSMIGRATION SUCCESSFUL]
[BINDING PROCESS COMPLETE]
"What the hell," I breathed. My voice was different too. Deeper.
[THE SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE SYSTEM HAS SELECTED YOU AS ITS HOST. YOUR PURPOSE: DELIVER KARMIC RETRIBUTION TO THOSE WHO ESCAPE CONVENTIONAL JUSTICE. YOU ARE NOT A HERO. YOU ARE AN INSTRUMENT OF BALANCE.]
I blinked at the floating text. Read it again. A system. A system. Like those web novels I used to read on boring lunch breaks. Transmigration. Superpowers. Missions.
A laugh bubbled up from my chest. It came out hoarse, broken, but genuine.
"Okay," I said to the empty alley. "Okay. So I'm in a web novel now."
[THE HOST DISPLAYS REMARKABLE ACCEPTANCE. ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE NOTED. PROCEEDING WITH INITIALIZATION.]
"Yeah, well." I struggled to my feet, bracing against the damp brick wall. "Panic won't unfuck this situation, will it?"
[CORRECT. PRAGMATISM IS AN OPTIMAL HOST TRAIT.]
I took stock. I was wearing jeans, a grey hoodie, work boots. The clothes were damp but intact. My pockets held—I checked—a crumpled receipt, a few coins, and a wallet with forty-three dollars and a driver's license.
The name on the license read: MARCUS COLE.
The face in the photo matched the face I could feel under my fingertips. Square jaw. Dark eyes. Forgettable features. The kind of face that didn't stand out in a crowd.
Marcus Cole. That's me now.
[HOST BODY: ORIGINAL OCCUPANT DECEASED. CAUSE: BLUNT FORCE TRAUMA. THE SYSTEM PRESERVED THE VESSEL FOR TRANSMIGRATION. ALL BIOLOGICAL FUNCTIONS RESTORED. SOUL INTEGRATION: 100%]
So the original Marcus Cole died, and I took his place. I should probably feel worse about that. I didn't.
"What happened to him?"
[MUGGING VICTIM. ASSAILANT STRUCK HIM FROM BEHIND WITH A METAL PIPE. THE SOUL DEPARTED. THE BODY REMAINED VIABLE. YOU WERE INSERTED.]
Murdered in an alley for a few dollars. What a way to go.
"And the attacker?"
[FLED THE SCENE. NOT A VALID TARGET. PETTY CRIMINAL, NO PATTERN OF SERIOUS OFFENSE. THE SYSTEM DOES NOT WASTE RESOURCES ON MINOR TRANSGRESSORS.]
I filed that away. The System had standards. Good to know.
[GRANTING STARTER ABILITY. PLEASE STAND BY.]
Pain lanced through my skull—brief, sharp, then gone. Something shifted inside my brain. Like a new muscle I'd never known existed suddenly made itself known.
[ABILITY GRANTED: TELEKINESIS (STAGE 1)]
[DESCRIPTION: THE POWER TO MOVE OBJECTS WITH MENTAL FORCE. STAGE 1 LIMITATIONS: MAXIMUM WEIGHT 50 KG. MAXIMUM RANGE 10 METERS. PRECISION: LOW. COST: VEN PROPORTIONAL TO MASS AND DURATION.]
I stared at a crushed beer can lying three feet away. I reached for it—not with my hands, but with that new muscle in my head. The can wobbled. Scraped against the concrete. Then lifted into the air.
Six inches. Maybe eight.
My hands were shaking. Not from fear. From effort. The mental strain was like trying to hold a sneeze in. I let the can drop. It clattered against the ground.
"Holy shit."
[VEN: 95/100]
[COST: 5 VEN FOR 8 SECONDS OF LEVITATION (0.3 KG OBJECT)]
The resource management made sense. I couldn't move skyscrapers. Not yet anyway. But a beer can was a start.
A car alarm went off somewhere nearby. The sound jolted me back to reality. I was standing in an alley in what was clearly a rough neighborhood, covered in garbage, in a body that wasn't mine, with a magic system that wanted me to be some kind of cosmic avenger.
One problem at a time.
First: figure out where I was. I walked toward the mouth of the alley, stepping over broken bottles and suspicious stains. The street beyond was familiar—brownstones, fire escapes, neon signs flickering in windows. BAIL BONDS. LIQUOR. PAWN. The distant glow of Manhattan's skyline to the south.
Hell's Kitchen.
The name surfaced with a shock of recognition. I knew this place. Not from life—from fiction. Daredevil's stomping grounds. The Punisher's hunting ground. Jessica Jones's neighborhood.
Marvel.
I was in the Marvel universe.
A bus rumbled past. On its side, an advertisement: STARK EXPO 2010 — FIVE YEARS LATER, THE FUTURE IS STILL HERE.
Early 2015, if the timeline matched what I remembered.
Daredevil was probably already operating. Wilson Fisk was building his empire. Somewhere out there, Frank Castle's family was still alive—for now. Jessica Jones was drinking herself numb, haunted by Kilgrave.
I know things. I know who's going to die. Who's going to kill them. I know where the bodies are buried before they're even cold.
"System."
[YES, HOST?]
"What exactly do you want from me?"
[THE SYSTEM GENERATES VENGEANCE MISSIONS BASED ON KARMIC DEBT. INDIVIDUALS WHO HAVE CAUSED SUFFERING AND ESCAPED JUSTICE BECOME VALID TARGETS. YOU WILL RECEIVE MISSION ASSIGNMENTS. YOU WILL INVESTIGATE. YOU WILL DELIVER RETRIBUTION. IN EXCHANGE, YOU WILL GAIN POWER. EXPERIENCE. RESOURCES. THE RELATIONSHIP IS SYMBIOTIC.]
"And if I refuse?"
[MISSIONS HAVE DEADLINES. EXTENDED PERIODS OF INACTIVITY (30+ DAYS) WILL RESULT IN AUTO-ASSIGNED MISSIONS. ABANDONMENT INCURS PENALTIES. THE SYSTEM DOES NOT PERMIT PARASITISM. HOWEVER, THE SYSTEM DOES NOT FORCE ACTION. HOW YOU COMPLETE MISSIONS IS YOUR CHOICE. THE SYSTEM MERELY ENSURES DEBTS ARE PAID.]
So I had flexibility. I wasn't a puppet. Just... highly incentivized.
I could live with that.
The cold was starting to bite deeper. January in New York—probably twenty degrees with wind chill. I needed shelter. Food. A plan.
I walked. Past shuttered storefronts and homeless encampments, past corner bodegas and bars spilling drunk patrons onto sidewalks. Nobody paid attention to one more rough-looking guy in dirty clothes. Hell's Kitchen had plenty of those.
Three blocks north, I found what I was looking for: a building undergoing renovation. Chain-link fence. Warning signs. Basement windows with boards that didn't quite fit.
I crouched by one of the windows, glanced around to make sure nobody was watching, then pushed. The board groaned, resisted, then popped inward. I squeezed through into darkness.
[VEN: 87/100]
The basement smelled like dust and old concrete. Emergency exit lights provided just enough glow to navigate. Pipes ran along the ceiling. Construction materials stacked in corners. No security. No squatters—yet.
I found a corner behind some drywall sheets, piled up drop cloths into something resembling a nest, and sat down.
My body hurt. The original Marcus Cole had taken a hell of a beating before dying. Bruises I hadn't noticed throbbed along my ribs. My head still pounded.
But I was alive. In a new world. With superpowers.
I started laughing.
Not hysteria—just the pure absurdity of it all. Yesterday I was a thirty-four-year-old accountant whose biggest adventure was arguing with the IRS over a client's depreciation schedule. Now I was a supernatural vigilante with telekinesis in a world full of superheroes, secret ninjas, and purple-skinned mind controllers.
"Could be worse," I said to the darkness. "Could be raining."
On cue, the distant rumble of thunder rolled across the sky. Rain began to patter against the basement windows.
I laughed harder.
[FIRST MISSION AVAILABLE IN 24 HOURS. PREPARE YOURSELF, HOST.]
Marcus Cole cracked his knuckles, felt the strange new tingle of telekinetic potential humming beneath his skin, and smiled.
"Alright, universe. Let's see what you've got."
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