Marvel and Beyond

When Max regained his vision, he found himself in a familiar setting. It was a place he had seen only once in reality, but the memories ingrained in his mind made him feel at ease.

He was back in the Marvel world, in his new home or old, whatever. Two memories can sometimes make it difficult to distinguish certain things.

With a deep exhale, he relaxed into the seat in the study of the Knight Mansion and took a deep breath.

But his expression soon turned serious as he glanced at the clock, his eyes narrowed.

Not even a second had passed since he'd left. Yet, he remained on alert, waiting for anything unexpected—maybe some bald woman emerging from a golden portal or something even worse, maybe some dimensional being knocking on his door.

He placed his hands on the table, locking his fingers together, and scanned his surroundings vigilantly, prepared to draw his handgun from his space backpack at any moment while looking for anything unfamiliar or out of place.

His weapon might be useless to such foes but it offered him peace nonetheless.

But after five minutes, nothing happened. No golden sparkling portal. No secret organization agents. No dimensional beings chase after him for fun or amusement.

He was safe—or at least he believed so and let out a long, relaxing breath.

A small smile tugged at his lips, and he clenched his fists, shouting internally, 'I survived. Screw everyone. I did it!'

If he wasn't so aware of his surroundings, he might have let out his excitement then and there, but he didn't want the others in the mansion to think he had gone crazy.

He breathed deeply in and out, calming his pounding heart from the intense adrenaline rush and the hours of tension now striking him as he found a safe zone after a long while.

After several minutes, he finally relaxed, his mind steadied again. He refocused his gaze on the system icon in the corner of his vision.

The last time he'd checked, the interface had notified him that his time was up and he needed to leave. He had accepted that without much hesitation since he had finished everything in that world, but now he needed to see what had changed.

He concentrated on the icon, and it expanded, revealing a new interface glowing before him.

====

Novice Mission – Success

Main Task – Complete

Extra Tasks – Complete

Mission Reward – Choose one:

A) A big reward, abandon the chance to get missions from the Resident Evil world.

B) A smaller, sufficient reward, but the chance to get missions from the Resident Evil world again.

====

Max smiled slightly when he saw that he had completed all the tasks. But his excitement quickly faded as his expression froze.

'What the hell is this ploy?' He felt it was unfair when he noticed the choices in front of him.

He could almost sense that the system had trapped him here. He read through the two options again and sighed heavily.

No matter which option he chose, he would get something, but he'd also lose something in the process.

The first reward offered a big payoff but also locked him out of returning to the Resident Evil world, meaning he might not be able to participate in future versions of the game's lore.

Basically all the rewards special to Resident Evil would slip away from his hands.

The second reward, on the other hand, offered a smaller, more sufficient reward for his efforts, but it allowed him the chance to expand his journey into more of the lore, leaving future rewards based on his efforts—but at least he would have options.

His eyes lingered on the first reward for a while. His fingers hovered over it.

Tempting. A "big reward" sounded appealing—maybe it was something powerful, something rare, something that could give him an edge in a future world.

'What if it's a powerful weapon? Some crazy upgrade? What if I'm being too cautious?'

But then he shook his head slowly, eyes narrowing.

The decision was already clear.

The second reward was the right choice.

Resident Evil games might be an apocalyptic world, but it had never seen a full-on zombie apocalypse like the movie version, where everything was turned to ruins. 

He could simply follow the game's plot and continue his journey.

The game lore even held more potential rewards than the movie version, as each game introduced a new virus and its strain. 

If he could control any one of them, he'd be set for life.

Another reason brought a smirk to his face. 'You can't fool me.' He glanced at the interface and considered his options.

While the first reward might seem tempting, he could almost sense that whatever it was—whether greater than the smaller reward—it would ultimately be connected to Resident Evil 0.

The system wouldn't offer anything outside of what already existed or what he had encountered on his mission, so expecting something extraordinary was unrealistic.

He didn't want to lose his connection to the Resident Evil world, especially when he didn't know what other worlds he might be thrown into.

As the system had mentioned, he could forgo certain worlds entirely if he deemed them difficult, meaning some worlds might be too dangerous to handle or simply worthless.

Losing the Resident Evil world wasn't an option for him.

With that, he selected the second option without any regret. The system blinked for a moment, and a new screen appeared.

====

Mission Rewards:

-A custom variant of T-Virus used by Umbrella for commercial purposes: sample and formula.

-Experience and knowledge of John, the new lead researcher at the Arklay Institute.

====

Max held his breath when he saw the system's offer.

A sudden surge of memories hit him, and he groaned, pressing his hands to his head. But this time, rather than overwhelming him with emotions, the memories simply provided knowledge and experience.

He ran his hand through his hair, wiping the sweat that had gathered on his brow. He sighed, settling back in his chair, but a smile slowly spread across his face.

From the memories, he understood the wealth of knowledge he had gained. As the lead researcher for Umbrella, John, while new, had access to incredible information.

Max now could pass as a certified researcher, with a vast amount of study in the biotech and virology field.

However, he also noticed the downside. John, while talented, was still young—much younger than Marcus and the other founders of Umbrella, even other veterans who had accumulated vast amounts of data over the years.

Max now had the knowledge of a newbie researcher, but he still lacked the experience and time needed to fully develop his potential.

Then his eyes fell on a new section that had appeared in his space backpack interface, with his reward stored there.

'It seems I won't have a problem keeping rewards hidden in the future,' he mused to himself.

At least in the future, when he would have many items from different worlds, he wouldn't have to worry about them being exposed to others.

He focused on the reward and clicked on it. As he sifted through the formula in his memories, he noticed a glass tube containing a red liquid appearing in his hand.

He barely managed to suppress a smirk as he realized what he was holding—a precious, rare resource, one of a kind in this world; now only in his hands.

Suppressing his excitement, he delved into the formula and examined the contents of this version of the virus.

Ideas were swirling already—vague outlines of a private lab setup, possibilities for synthesis, mutation control, maybe even reverse engineering.

He leaned back slowly, eyes still locked on the red vial in his palm.

'Now I have something extraordinary with me.'

…

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