Chapter 18: Spider-Man’s World
The first major difficulty of time travel is energy—an enormous amount of it. A single trip consumes enough energy to power the entire Earth for ten years.
However, for Ian, this was actually the easiest problem to solve. His Elemental Furnace had been running continuously, accumulating enough energy for several round trips.
Next was how to accurately locate the target timeline. Without precise temporal markers, one could easily get lost in the depths of time and space.
The Ancient One had warned about this multiple times in the books. Ian had to be extremely cautious.
"Although I don't have an exact temporal marker, I am traveling to a tributary of the time stream. Using the origin of this tributary as a guide is undoubtedly the safest approach," Ian decided as he selected a strand of Peter Parker's hair.
One by one, other problems surfaced, and one by one, Ian quickly solved them.
In just three months, Ian had developed a complete time travel plan.
When the calculations were complete, Ian asked, "This trip can only take one person with me. Who wants to come?"
After three months, the people who had originally gathered out of curiosity had long since left. Only John and a few others, who had just arrived, remained in the lab.
They exchanged glances with one another before Selina finally spoke, "Let Raven go with you! Her abilities will be more useful in another world."
No one objected to Selina's suggestion. Though they were eager to experience time travel, they didn't want to be a burden to Ian, so they reluctantly chose to sit this one out.
Selina was right. Their abilities were relatively specialized, and sending just one of them wouldn't be much help to Ian.
But Raven's shapeshifting ability and combat experience would be incredibly useful.
"Alright then, Raven will come with me this time. Next time, I'll bring the rest of you if there's a chance!" Ian agreed with Selina's suggestion.
Raven wasn't present at the moment, but Ian was certain she wouldn't refuse—time travel was an irresistible temptation.
As expected, when Raven received Ian's invitation, she took only three seconds to think before agreeing.
"Gladly!" she said.
Back in New York, Ian arranged for a house to be purchased right next to Peter Parker's, using it as the departure point for their journey.
He also brought in two mutant allies—one with the ability to control sound and another who could manipulate light—to conceal any disturbances that might occur during the transition. Ian wasn't sure whether the process would create any noticeable effects.
The journey was scheduled for nighttime.
As Peter Parker's hair slowly disintegrated, its genetic information was extracted. The time stream once again appeared before Ian's eyes.
This time, it was much clearer, especially the tributary leading to Spider-Man's world, which Ian could distinctly sense.
He cast Peter Parker's genetic information into that tributary. A massive amount of energy was instantly drained from the Elemental Furnace. Immediately after, a radiant, multicolored tunnel opened before them.
"Let's go!" Ian grabbed Raven and stepped into the tunnel.
The tunnel appeared long, but in reality, it only took Ian two steps—one to enter, and one to exit.
The spatial corridor vanished, and Ian and Raven found themselves in Spider-Man's world. The entire process was seamless, with no discomfort whatsoever.
The time was still nighttime, but instead of appearing in the house they had prepared, they found themselves in an unfamiliar alley.
Ian immediately checked the equipment he had brought. The results were disappointing—anything remotely advanced had completely failed.
He wasn't sure why the devices had silently malfunctioned, but one thing was clear: the space-time corridor was not as stable as it seemed.
While Ian was deep in thought, Raven had already changed her appearance. A corpse identical to her new look lay on the ground, dressed in a way that suggested he wasn't a good person.
"This guy was a gang member. He owns a house in Queens, not far from Peter's place. We can stay there for now," Raven said, nudging the corpse with her foot.
"Sounds good," Ian replied, waving his hand. The corpse disintegrated into dust.
Since they planned to use his house, leaving the body behind was inconvenient.
Ian and Raven didn't rush into action. They spent the entire night ensuring that the time travel process hadn't caused them any negative effects.
The next day, Ian began making arrangements.
"Raven, today you'll gather information on Oscorp. I'll go check on Peter Parker."
Originally, they had planned to use electronic devices for this, but since the equipment was too complex to repair, Ian had to abandon that idea.
Manipulating atoms to synthesize molecules and then assembling complex electronic components was not only exhausting but also painfully slow.
Fortunately, when it came to intelligence gathering, Raven was a professional.
When Ian arrived near Peter Parker's home, he saw Peter heading out for school.
Two storyline projections appeared before Ian's eyes—one was relatively clear, while the other was faintly visible.
"Hmm? Two storylines?" Ian was momentarily taken aback. This was unexpected.
By the time he snapped out of it, Peter Parker had already boarded a bus.
Recalling Peter's appearance, Ian noted that he had a camera around his neck. That meant today was the day Peter would be bitten by the spider.
Ian hurried to the university where Peter's school trip was scheduled. He located the genetically modified spiders and waited for Peter and his classmates to arrive.
The spiders inside the enclosure seemed normal, except for the one that had escaped. That spider had a faint connection to the timeline.
Ian had no intention of interfering with the story, so he left the spider untouched.
From his understanding of universal inertia, even if he captured the super-spider in advance, Peter Parker's fate wouldn't change.
When Peter and his classmates arrived, Ian used his temporal vision to observe Peter Parker again.
Two storyline projections emerged, followed by a small river appearing before Ian's eyes.
Without a doubt, this was the time tributary of Spider-Man's world.
However, this river had already split into two parallel streams from the very beginning.
This meant that there were two Spider-Man worlds, and thus, two distinct storylines.
"This world should be the original Spider-Man universe, while the second storyline is likely 'The Amazing Spider-Man' universe," Ian analyzed.
"The genetic implantation technology I'm looking for should be in 'The Amazing Spider-Man' universe, but the super-spiders here still have research value!"
After ensuring that Peter was successfully bitten, Ian discreetly captured the super-spider. He also took two more spiders that hadn't yet escaped.
Not stopping there, Ian hacked into Columbia University's science lab servers and downloaded all research data related to the super-spiders.
That evening, Raven returned as planned.
"Here's the info you wanted," she said, tossing a hard drive to Ian. It contained not only general information on Oscorp but also classified data she had acquired.
To Ian's disappointment, apart from research related to the Green Goblin, Oscorp's technology was largely unimpressive—not quite living up to its reputation as a major villainous corporation.
[Ding: Infinite Money System Obtained To Activate The System Add Power Stones And
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