A Glitch in Reality - Chapter 0007

The tension in the room was palpable, as thick as the stifling air of the Californian night that seeped in through the half-open window. Jack Williams leaned over the coffee table, reaching out with a trembling hand to touch the package wrapped in brown paper—his fingers brushing the rough material, feeling the light weight of the object laden with potential. Kevin, on the other side, didn’t blink once. Bent over with his elbows on his knees, his whole body rigid with expectation, he followed every movement with wide eyes while the silence between them was broken only by the distant ticking of an old clock and their uneven breathing.

Jack kept his palm pressed against the package for almost a full minute. His heart pounded against his ribs in a suffocating mix of desperate hope and fear of yet another disappointment. In his head, mental commands flowed incessantly: Activate system. Switch. ChaosGacha. He even murmured the name under his breath, his lips barely moving, as if pronouncing the words could force the connection. The immobility was almost meditative—and strange, coming from someone who had spent the entire night moving, nervous, unable to stand still for more than thirty seconds.

Kevin broke the silence first, his voice hoarse with barely contained impatience.

” What’s wrong, man? Just try it already. Don’t just stand there.”

Jack opened his eyes slowly, the frustration evident in the line between his furrowed brows.

I ‘m trying.

He closed his eyes again and took a deep breath. The lingering smell of cold food still hung in the air, but Jack barely noticed it now. He focused on the central idea, simple and direct: if this package has value, it can be exchanged. Something shifted. An electric tingle rose through his palm, warm and vibrant, as if the very air around the object were responding—and then the package simply vanished.

Kevin let out a sharp, almost comically abrupt scream. He leaped off the sofa, his body slamming against the wall behind him, his hands instinctively rising as if trying to grasp what no longer existed. His face was pale in the dim light, his eyes wide open.

“What the hell was that?!” he exclaimed, his voice wavering between shock and disbelief, his finger pointing to the empty space on the table with a visible tremor. “It was in your hand, and the next second… it was gone. Completely! Jack, man, what is this? How did you do this?”

Jack opened his eyes, and before him floated a transparent holographic screen with subtle black borders, emitting an almost imperceptible ethereal glow. In the center, a twenty-sided die spun slowly, its edges reflecting impossible lights. He reached out and touched the surface—cold, solid, real. A chill ran down his spine. That was it. The system was responding.

He turned to Kevin.

Can you see?

Kevin blinked several times, cautiously approaching the table, leaning forward and waving his hand in the air where Jack was looking. Nothing.

“See what? The package that disappeared? Yes, damn it, I saw it! It vanished into thin air!” he replied, gesturing agitatedly, his chest rising and falling rapidly. “Are you crazy? How did that happen? Explain it to me properly, man. This isn’t normal!”

Jack shook his head, a nervous smile briefly appearing on his lips.

” No, no… this holographic screen right here in front of me. Black, with a twenty-sided die. You can’t see any of this?”

Kevin stopped, frowning deeply. He ran his hand over the empty space again, his face contorted in genuine confusion, a trace of real concern emerging from behind the fright.

“No… I don’t see anything, man. Just you there, staring into space like there’s a ghost in front of you.” He swallowed hard, his voice dropping slightly.

Jack nodded, understanding. He knew Kevin wanted to help, but there wasn’t time for long explanations now.

Okay. Let’s test it.

With his index finger, he touched the surface of the screen. A low, almost inaudible hum filled the air around him. The die sped up immediately, and what should have been a simple d20 revealed itself to be something far stranger: the numbers on the faces were not limited to 1 and 20. They multiplied, constantly changing, endless sequences flashing and transforming without ever repeating. It was hypnotic, almost alive. Jack watched, fascinated, his chest tight with growing anticipation, as the spin lasted a full minute—enough time for sweat to trickle down his neck and for Kevin to start pacing the room, restless, scratching his arms and murmuring softly.

The data stopped abruptly.

Number 7.

The main holographic screen disappeared with a soft crackle of air. In the exact center of the table, a simple pot materialized—ordinary in appearance, but imbued with an undeniable presence, like an object carrying memories from another world. Kevin opened his mouth to speak, his eyes widening once more, but Jack quickly raised his hand, silencing him—because a second holographic screen had appeared, filled with dense text and technical information, and every second it remained visible was precious.

“Grab a notebook and a pencil from my room, quick!” Jack said, his voice urgent, without taking his eyes off the screen. “Now!”

Kevin hesitated for a second, still processing the jar that had appeared out of nowhere, but the seriousness in his friend’s tone made him react. He ran down the narrow hallway, his steps echoing heavily, and returned soon after, breathless, handing over the old notebook and the chewed pencil with a slightly trembling hand.

Jack, his fingers still trembling with adrenaline, wrote furiously in the worn notebook, the pen scratching the paper at an almost desperate speed. Each line was an anchor—an attempt to transform the impossible into something tangible, controllable, before the screen disappeared. The floating text on the interface described the item in clinical and cold detail, almost unreal in its precision: Maomao’s Beauty Cream. Origin: The Apothecary Diaries. Type: Utility Magic Item. Rarity: Common.

He paused for a second, his heart pounding against his lean ribs, feeling the surreal weight of that information settle upon him. A jar of medicinal cream from a universe of palace intrigues, capable of infinitely regenerating itself at sunrise. It wasn’t a weapon. It wasn’t a combat suit, nor a power that would make him untouchable in that brutal world of supers and corporations like Vought. It was… skincare. Jack almost laughed aloud at the irony, but the sound died in his throat before escaping. He continued writing, capturing each effect listed on the screen: the progressive removal of acne, blackheads, and oiliness; the evening out of skin tone after a week of use; the elimination of superficial scars and premature wrinkles after a month. The soft aroma of fresh herbs, dried flowers, and refined oils that was already beginning to fill the room, subtle but persistent, like a promise of normalcy amidst the chaos.

When the last word was written down, the holographic box blinked once—a final, almost reluctant glimmer—and disappeared completely, leaving only the visual echo on the retina. The silence that followed was dense, heavy. Jack blinked several times, as if waking from a trance, and lowered his eyes to the now solid object in his hands: a small white porcelain container, delicate to the touch, with an ornate lid that seemed to have come from an ancient imperial museum. The weight was light, almost comforting, and the scent that escaped through the cracks was undeniably real—fresh, earthy, with a floral touch that contrasted violently with the stench of mold and old food that permeated the rest of the room.

He turned slowly, extending the notebook to Kevin, who waited seated on the edge of the sofa with alert eyes and a body as tense as a spring. Kevin took the notebook cautiously, as if the object might explode, and flipped through the pages quickly, absorbing the detailed notes. His face, normally impassive even amidst the madness of ChaosGacha, contorted into an expression of clear disappointment—furrowed brows, lips pressed into a thin line, a long, almost exhausted sigh escaping before the words came.

“Disappointing,” Kevin murmured, his voice low and hoarse, heavy with genuine frustration. He slammed the notebook shut, handing it back to Jack as if trying to escape the weight of that reality. “After everything we risked… a jar of cream? Seriously, man?”

Jack didn’t answer immediately. With a deliberate, almost ceremonious gesture, he opened the jar. The lid came off with a soft click, revealing a creamy, white, flawless mass, glistening slightly in the dim light of the lamp. The aroma intensified—fresh herbs mingled with something floral and slightly sweet, like a hidden garden amidst the worn concrete of San Diego. He dipped a finger into the cream, feeling its silky, cool, almost living texture. It wasn’t an illusion. It was real, as real as the suit he was still wearing, as real as the die that had spun and landed on the number 7.

A slow, genuine smile spread across his pale face. His eyes, normally clouded by chronic insecurity, shone with a spark of determination that surprised even himself. He lifted the jar slightly, as if displaying a trophy whose true value only he understood.

“But this is just the beginning,” Jack said, his voice firm despite the residual tremor in his hands. His heart raced, not from fear, but from a contained, almost feverish excitement. “Until now, part of me still thought all this was false, unreal. A dream I would wake up from at any moment, sweating cold on my rotten mattress. But each roll, each item… is proving to be reality. This cream may not be superhuman strength or an invisibility suit, but it proves the system works. That it responds to what we offer. And look”—he pointed to the notebook, to the dense notes he had hastily made—”it’s not just anything. It regenerates every morning. Infinitely. In a month, our skin will be unrecognizable. Healthy, clean. Without the marks we’ve accumulated over the years. In a life where any visible weakness is exploited, this has real strategic value.”

Kevin tilted his head, still frowning, but something in his posture relaxed slightly. He rubbed his chin, processing the words with that deliberate slowness that Jack had learned to respect—Kevin rarely spoke before thinking, and when he did, he usually had arrived somewhere.

“This is very frightening,” Kevin finally admitted, his voice low, almost a whisper. His eyes darted to the jar, then back to Jack. There was conflict there: the initial disappointment giving way to pragmatic caution, like someone beginning to understand the rules of a game they didn’t choose to play.

Jack carefully closed the jar, feeling the cold material against his palm. The smile didn’t disappear—on the contrary, it deepened, filled with a resilience born of years of family trauma, beatings from older brothers, parental neglect, and the desperate escape from Huntington to San Diego with practically nothing.

“Yes, it is,” he agreed, nodding slowly, his voice deepening as he recorded the notes he had just taken. “But at the same time, it’s incredible. Gacha is like that—a roulette wheel. We offer low value now because it’s what we have, and it returns something ordinary. But imagine when we have something big. A kilo of gold. Millions in stolen technology or valuable information for the black market. The suit proved that the system can transform someone fragile into something lethal. The cream proves that the road will be long, full of disappointments and small victories before the big ones. But it’s our path. In this universe where the GDA and Vought hunt anomalies, where the Seven control the public narrative, and where any one of us can become disposable overnight, each item is a tool for survival. For building control.”

Kevin rested his chin on his hand, his elbow on his knee, absorbing the words with complete attention. There was a spark of agreement in his gaze, mixed with the practical concern that always accompanied him—that side inherited from a family wealthy enough to have learned that money didn’t eliminate danger, it only redirected it. He flipped through the notebook again, rereading the descriptions more calmly this time, noting the details Jack had captured: the aroma, the regeneration, the cumulative effects, the rarity indicated as Common —which logically implied that there were rarities far above that.

“Man, but it could have been something more interesting,” he grumbled, though his tone was now less cutting, more reflective, like someone recalibrating expectations instead of simply complaining. “Like, I don’t know, an analysis gadget or a basic weapon. Something that would give an immediate advantage.”

Jack chuckled softly—a rare and genuine sound that broke some of the tension in the air, light and unassuming.

” It’s a gacha, man. There’s a chance you’ll get something really good with cheap items, like what happened now. It’s extremely difficult, but it happens. And the higher the value of what we exchange, the greater the chance of a worthy reward. It’s not a vending machine ”. It’s a system that measures what you’re willing to risk.

Kevin was silent for a moment. His head was tilted, his eyes fixed on an indeterminate point between the jar on the table and the open notebook in his lap, as if he were internally calculating something he hadn’t yet verbalized. Then he straightened up on the sofa, his shoulders assuming the posture of someone who has made a decision knowing it will cost them, but who accepts the cost nonetheless.

“We’re going to have to take more risks,” Kevin said, his voice gaining determination, the fear still latent in the lines around his eyes but covered by a spark of ambition that Jack recognized—it was the same spark that had been in his own eyes when he thought about ChaosGacha during the darkest hours in the apartment.

“Yes, it will,” Jack replied, closing his eyes for a moment and inhaling the subtle scent of the cream, letting the sensation settle. A wave of emotion washed over him: relief mixed with fear, excitement tempered by caution. The suit pulsed subtly against his skin, the Neural Synergy monitoring his emotional state with that discreet presence he was beginning to recognize as his own, not external. The cream in the white porcelain jar was small. Ordinary. Common, as the screen itself had described it. But it was real, it had arrived from another universe in response to the value he had offered, and each real item was accumulated proof that the system was neither a dream nor a hallucination—it was a tool, with its own rules and a potential that had barely scratched the surface.

The two remained silent for a long moment, the room filled only by the distant sounds of the city and the lingering aroma of the cream that had imperceptibly replaced the smell of mold and cold food. Jack opened the jar once more and offered it to his friend. Kevin hesitated, then dipped a finger in, testing the texture with an expression somewhere between skepticism and curiosity, the beginning of something neither of them had precise words to name yet—but which existed, concrete and irrevocable, like everything that had happened that night.