In the vast, unforgiving sky over Afghanistan, the day had started like any other—crystal clear, with the sun beating down mercilessly on the rugged landscape below.
The air was dry and still, carrying the faint scent of dust and distant smoke from scattered camps.
But then, without warning, something impossible began to unfold.
The serene blue expanse started to fracture, as if the very fabric of reality was giving way.
A single, razor-straight black line appeared first, slicing across the heavens like a scar.
It didn’t take long for that line to branch out, spiderwebbing in every direction, mimicking the chaotic cracks of a shattered mirror.
People on the ground—soldiers, locals, and wanderers in the nearby rocky mountains—paused whatever they were doing, shielding their eyes against the glare.
Whispers turned to shouts as the anomaly grew.
The cracks deepened, glowing with an eerie, otherworldly light at their edges.
Then, the true horror set in.
Pieces of the sky began to break away, not like clouds or illusions, but like literal fragments of existence peeling off.
Shards of this “reality” tumbled downward, vanishing into nothingness before they could hit the earth.
It was as if the world itself was disintegrating, chunk by chunk.
The rift widened steadily, expanding until it formed a gaping void large enough for a person to pass through.
The hole was pitch black, an abyss so profound it seemed to devour the light around it.
Winds picked up, swirling chaotically as the darkness sucked in everything nearby—rays of sunlight, loose dust particles, even the faint echoes of distant voices.
For a moment, everything hung in suspended tension.
Then, from the heart of that void, a figure was violently ejected.
A teenager, no older than seventeen or eighteen, hurtled out like a ragdoll tossed by some cosmic hand.
Eric William didn’t have time to scream or process what was happening.
He plummeted toward the ground at terrifying speed, accelerating faster than any natural fall should allow.
The wind roared in his ears, whipping at his clothes and hair as the rocky terrain below rushed up to meet him.
Jagged mountains dotted the horizon, their slopes dotted with makeshift camps—tents huddled together, figures moving like ants in the distance.
He tore through the air like a bullet from a high-caliber rifle.
The impact with the massive rock formation was cataclysmic in potential but strangely precise.
His body punched straight through the stone at incredible velocity, carving a clean, human-sized tunnel without so much as a tremor spreading outward.
No cracks radiated from the entry point; the mountain didn’t have a second to react or absorb the kinetic force.
It was as if physics had taken a coffee break.
Eric’s descent continued unabated, the ground looming closer with every heartbeat.
But just inches—mere three feet—before what should have been a planet-shattering collision, his eyes snapped open.
Instinct took over before his groggy mind could catch up.
His body, honed by who-knows-how-many battles in another world, reacted on pure muscle memory.
Like a bird flaring its wings mid-dive, he halted abruptly in midair.
The momentum that could have leveled entire continents, or at least turned Asia into a smoking crater, simply…
evaporated.
No shockwave.
No gust of wind.
No explosion of energy that would have wiped out the camps and everyone in them.
It all vanished into thin air, leaving only a faint shimmer around his form.
Floating there, suspended above the dusty ground, Eric blinked slowly, rubbing at his eyes with the back of his hand.
The motion felt familiar, almost routine—like waking up in his old bed after a long night of gaming or scrolling through endless feeds.
A yawn nearly escaped him before the memories flooded back.
This wasn’t his room.
This wasn’t even his original world anymore.
He had returned.
The realization hit like a warm wave, chasing away the disorientation.
He drifted downward gently until his feet touched solid earth with a soft crunch of gravel.
Dust puffed up around his sneakers.
Eric stood there for a long moment, heart pounding with a mix of adrenaline and cautious hope.
His gaze swept over the unfamiliar yet eerily reminiscent landscape.
Rugged mountains framed the scene, their peaks sharp against the now-mending sky.
The rift above was already sealing itself, cracks fading as if they’d never existed.
Scattered camps lay nearby—makeshift shelters pieced together from tarps and scrap, with people staring in stunned silence at the spectacle they’d just witnessed.
His eyes finally locked onto a figure standing not too far away, partially hidden by the shadow of a large boulder.
A middle-aged man, looking every bit like he’d been through hell and back.
His clothes were ragged, more beggar than anything else—tattered cloak draped over a threadbare shirt, pants patched in more places than Eric could count.
Messy hair and a wild beard framed a face gaunt from exhaustion, streaked with dirt that hadn’t seen water in what looked like months.
The man’s grip was tight on a heavy hammer, raised mid-swing as if he’d been working on some repair, but now frozen in place.
His eyes were bloodshot, wide with a cocktail of disbelief and bone-deep fatigue.
Eric’s pulse quickened.
Was this real?
Then he spotted it—the faint blue glow emanating from the man’s chest, pulsing steadily like a tiny star trapped beneath the skin.
An arc reactor.
No way.
It had to be him.
The famous Tony Stark from his old world, the one he’d grown up reading about in news paper.
But this version looked broken, worn down to the core.
Sleepless nights?
Battles that had stripped him of everything?
Eric couldn’t tell, but the sight sent a rush of nostalgia and relief through him.
His racing heart began to steady.
A small, genuine sigh slipped from his lips.
“I’m back, baby,” he muttered at first, the words tasting like victory.
Then, unable to contain it, he shouted it out loud, his voice echoing through the small ravine and bouncing off the nearby rocks.
“I am back, baby!”
The shout draw more stares from the 2 man, but Eric didn’t care.
He was home—or at least, back in the Marvel 616 universe he’d left behind.
The air felt different here, charged with that familiar undercurrent of chaos and heroism.
No more grinding through shadowy dungeons or leveling up against monstrous threats in a system-driven world.
This was where the real stories unfolded, with gods, mutants, and tech geniuses clashing on a daily basis.
Still buzzing with excitement, Eric closed his eyes briefly and focused inward.
System, show me my status window, he called out silently in his mind, the command as natural as breathing after all this time.
A familiar translucent blue panel materialized in his vision, hovering like a holographic display only he could see.
The details popped up cleanly:
Name: Eric William
World of Origin: Marvel 616
Traveled Worlds: Solo Leveling
Energy Level: 2C [Low Multiverse]
Intelligence: Gifted
Current World: Marvel 616
Inventory: Exchange Card x2
[Here Sun jinn woo power would be from the novel, so mc power is stronger than the manhwa and anime.]