Chapter 9
Sitting down at my laptop to search for suitable and needed items, I spent the next few hours actively researching while consulting instructions from a forum for electronics enthusiasts and DIYers.
I needed capacitors — not just any capacitors, but high-voltage ones, which are hard to find at a typical electronics store but can be salvaged from old CRT TVs or monitors, defibrillators, industrial lasers, or welding machines.
There were options, but CRT TVs were the most obvious.
The search turned into a digital safari.
I scrolled through dozens of pages on Craigslist, eBay, and some local forums and flea market listings.
Most were junk: single, half-dead TVs with cracked screens, selling for next to nothing.
I needed standardization and consistency, so that the parameters of each capacitor matched to within a fraction of a percent.
I read forum debates where gray-bearded amateur engineers foamed at the mouth proving the superiority of some models over others.
I memorized brands and serial numbers, building a whole database in my head.
It turned out to be genuinely tedious, painstaking work — the kind that demands patience and an eye for detail.
The key problem was that the capacitors had to be absolutely identical.
That meant the TVs had to be the same model and, ideally, from the same production batch.
Options like that existed, even in New York City.
Some TVs weren't working; others were too expensive.
But after browsing hundreds of listings, I found what seemed like a perfect deal: twelve CRT TVs from Zuun Electronics, a brand I already knew from my laptop.
All were working, all the same model, and hopefully from the same batch.
They had been used in a security room to stream footage from surveillance cameras.
The price was more than reasonable: $30 each, or $300 for all twelve.
Naturally, I couldn't pass that up.
The listing had appeared literally a couple of hours earlier, and judging by the view count, New York City had plenty of electronics enthusiasts.
"Hello, I'm calling about the listing!" I dialed immediately, and after a short conversation we agreed to meet in an hour.
I'd make it out to Brooklyn, to the Sunset Park area, and book a cargo taxi for the return trip.
The meeting spot turned out to be a small warehouse in Sunset Park's industrial stretch.
I was greeted by a heavyset man of about fifty in a greasy cap, who looked me over with open skepticism.
"You here for the TVs?" he boomed, wiping his hands on his overalls. "All twelve?"
"That's me," I nodded, trying to look confident.
"What do you need them for, kid?" He squinted. "Nostalgia? Or are you one of those artists doing an installation? Had a guy come through here once — used to buy old irons. Built a pyramid out of them."
My mind raced.
Telling the truth about high-voltage capacitors would only attract unnecessary attention.
"Something like that," I answered vaguely. "Video art. I want to make a wall of screens, each one showing the same static noise. It's conceptual. About alienation in the information society."
The video art cover story came together on the spot, stitched from scraps of articles on contemporary art I'd read somewhere and a vague memory of John, who actually attended art college.
It was pretentious and strange enough to sound plausible to someone who didn't know the field.
The trick was to speak confidently and with a slightly bored air, as if it were all perfectly obvious.
The man thought for a second, then burst out laughing.
"Kids these days! Three hundred dollars for screen noise! Back in my day you just yanked the antenna, and there you had it — free alienation. Alright, come on, I'll show you your 'conceptual art.'"
He led me deep into the warehouse, where twelve identical cubes bearing the Zuun Electronics logo sat gathering dust on a pallet.
They looked like dinosaurs from a forgotten era.
"Working, just like I wrote in the listing. You can check."
"I'll take your word for it," I said quickly, pulling out the cash I'd withdrawn earlier.
I didn't want him to catch the predatory gleam in my eyes — because I wasn't staring at the screens; I was staring at what was inside them.
After paying and calling a cargo taxi, I waited at the warehouse gate feeling like a quasi-spy who had just pulled off a covert operation: acquiring components for a superweapon under the cover of buying antiques for a bored artist.
Ha.
It was 2 PM, and I was thrilled with what felt like the deal of the century, even as the balance on my credit card kept shrinking with every purchase.
I really didn't want to end up opening a second card.
But as long as there was money, I could live without worrying and keep creating.
Ha.
Back home, I turned to hunting down the remaining essential components, which was considerably simpler.
A beat-up but functional microwave for $20, a diode, resistors, a sheet of plexiglass, several wooden boxes, lead foil, foam rubber, a soldering iron, a multimeter, dielectric tongs, high-voltage wire, and a handful of other small items.
Honestly, by 6 PM I was already exhausted from running back and forth across the city, and that was on top of burning through another few hundred dollars.
I estimated about $500 left on the card.
I already had ideas for making money, but to act on any of them, I absolutely needed to create the Potion of Intelligence first.
Fortunately, the preparatory stage was partially done, so I could get started.
Looking around the small studio, now made even smaller by my purchases, I realized the scene was genuinely surreal.
Twelve bulky CRT televisions stood like tombstones from a bygone era.
A shiny, nearly new microwave oven sat waiting to be gutted without mercy.
Coils of wire, bags of resistors and diodes, sheets of plexiglass and lead foil, a soldering iron still in its blister pack.
It all looked like props from a low-budget mad scientist film.
I sat down on the floor and took it all in.
Hundreds of dollars drained from my credit card lay before me as a pile of old junk mixed with new.
Doubt gripped me for a moment.
What if it doesn't work?
What if I burn out the capacitors, or the transformer fails?
What if this whole undertaking is just an expensive fool's errand, inspired by some strange glitch in my head that I call the System?
But then I glanced at my laptop, where the Marx Generator schematic was still open, and the doubts dissolved.
The fear of failure was still there, but the hunger to create — the raw desire to build this complex, dangerous machine with my own hands — was stronger.
This was a challenge.
Not just to the System, but to myself.
A test of strength, intelligence, and precision.
I stood up, cracked my knuckles, and got to work.
Enough reflecting.
It was time to turn this chaos into a functioning device.
Before building the generator itself, I needed to sort out a power source.
I needed a high-voltage DC source to charge the capacitors.
Oddly enough, the best garage-workshop option for that is a modified microwave oven transformer, which is exactly why I bought the microwave.
After taking apart the metal casing, I pulled out the transformer — the component that steps household voltage of 110 to 220 volts AC up to around 2,000 volts.
The catch was that I needed DC, not AC, but the microwave happened to include a high-voltage diode I could simply wire to one of the transformer's outputs.
It would only pass current in one direction, converting the AC into pulsating DC.
That was more than enough to charge the generator.
Taking apart the microwave felt like an act of deliberate vandalism.
I wasn't fixing it; I was breaking it, but with a clear purpose.
With every screw I loosened and every panel I pulled away, I felt like a surgeon dissecting a body to reach a vital organ.
And there it was — the transformer.
Heavy, dense, its thick copper windings coiled tight around the core; it looked like the heart of the machine, and in a way, it was.
I looked at it and saw not just iron and copper, but a key — one that would let me raise ordinary household voltage to lethal levels.
This was my first real step from theory and procurement into practice.
With the power supply figured out, the next task was to desolder the capacitors from the TVs.
I worked through each one carefully, checking every capacitor with a multimeter for capacitance and the absence of breakdown.
I got lucky: the TVs were indeed from the same production batch, and every capacitor tested clean.
I then took a sheet of plexiglass and marked out a ladder — the positions for twelve capacitors arranged in two rows of six — which would serve as the generator chassis.
The next step was mounting the components.
I fastened the capacitors, high-voltage resistors, and homemade spark gap arresters to the base of the plexiglass sheet.
Each arrester was two round-head screws driven into a piece of plexiglass about 3 to 5 mm apart.
Wiring was the most critical step.
Using high-voltage wire, I connected all the capacitors in parallel through resistors, running back to my power source — the microwave transformer and its diode.
The positive side of the power source connected through resistors to the positive terminal of every capacitor, and the negative side connected to all the negative terminals.
This ensured every stage charged slowly and simultaneously.
Then I connected the capacitors in series through the spark gaps: the positive terminal of the first capacitor connected to the negative terminal of the second through a spark gap, the positive terminal of the second connected to the negative terminal of the third through the next spark gap, and so on down the ladder.
After all that, the bulk of the work was done.
I installed two output electrodes at one end of the ladder — simple polished metal balls on insulated stands, separated by just a few centimeters, with the final discharge arc set to jump between them.
Beneath those balls I placed a resonator cage to excite the quartz crystals.
The generator was ready, and the System apparently agreed.
[Created a simple electrical construct, the "Marx Generator." Difficulty: Low. Gained +50 OP!]
That was genuinely satisfying.
A System confirmation was the best possible guarantee that everything was built correctly and the device wouldn't kill me — provided I observed basic safety precautions, of course.
The one-hand rule is the single most important principle for anyone working with high voltage.
When working with a live or potentially live circuit, one hand must always be kept behind the back.
This prevents current from finding a path through the chest and heart in the event of accidental contact.
Beyond that: insulation, a clean workspace with all wires securely fastened, and the generator switched on remotely via a remote switch.
I worked in sneakers, standing on linoleum.
Good enough.
Before charging the crystals, I prepared storage boxes for them.
A charged crystal would be unstable and sensitive to external fields, so I needed something like an energy thermos.
I took small wooden boxes, lined the insides with thin lead foil, and then added a layer of foam rubber.
The plan was to place a charged crystal inside, then stow the whole box in my inventory.
Without overthinking it, I placed a dielectric ceramic stand beneath the output electrodes, set the first crystal on it, stepped back, and switched on the contraption.
I felt like a proper mad scientist.
Within microseconds the capacitors formed a series circuit, and the combined output voltage hit 60,000 volts — twelve capacitors at 5,000 volts each.
The discharge lasted only a few millionths of a second, but that was more than enough to shake the quartz crystal lattice sitting at the epicenter.
A sharp, clean smell of ozone hit my nose, just like the air after a severe thunderstorm.
Even though it was all over in a split second, in that moment I felt the raw, primal power of the elements concentrated inside my apartment.
Tens of thousands of volts, unleashed with a single flick of a switch.
It was terrifying and exhilarating in equal measure.
Real, man-made lightning.
I forced myself to calm down and waited for the residual charge in the capacitors to bleed off.
Everything inside me was cheering.
It worked.
I hadn't thrown together some gimmick; I had built a functioning high-voltage pulse generator.
The System had awarded me points, but the real satisfaction wasn't the OP — it was the success itself.
I had done it.
I had taken a complex technical project from the initial idea, through the hunt for components, all the way to a working result.
The quartz crystal resting on the stand looked subtly different now.
It seemed to have absorbed something of that energy, its internal structure humming softly at a frequency too low for the ear but real to whatever sense the System had awakened in me.
Finally, I approached the stand carefully and opened the storage box with one hand while picking up the crystal with dielectric ceramic-tipped pliers in the other.
I lifted it, felt the faint buzzing through the insulated handles, and placed it into the box, which I then stowed in my inventory.
One down, four to go — and then I could begin alchemy.
After repeating the crystal charging process four more times and switching off the generator, I turned to preparing the workspace for the full-scale creation of the Potion of Intelligence.
Even though I planned to brew it at night, getting everything ready in advance was the smarter move.
According to the notes on the Phantasmine extraction stage, that step had to be performed in complete darkness — though red light, like in a photography darkroom, was acceptable.
That meant another errand: a quick run to a specialty store and ten more dollars for a red bulb.
The step also required slow, even heating to 40 degrees Celsius, which sent me scrambling online for practical solutions.
I landed on the obvious and simplest one: a dry heating block.
Compact, temperature-adjustable, and relatively inexpensive if bought used, of course.
Another $200 gone, but now I was genuinely ready.
It was 6 PM, and there was still time before nightfall, so I decided to tackle the last thing I'd been putting off amid everything else: Leatherworking.
I wasn't expecting to earn the 200 OP needed to unlock it, especially with only 55 OP currently banked, but it seemed worth understanding what the skill actually was and how it worked.
I opened my beginner leatherworking kit, laid out a couple of leather scraps, and pulled up a few guides on crafting a simple cardholder with two card slots.
It looked straightforward enough.
I placed a 20-by-20-centimeter piece of leather on a cutting mat and began cutting, first marking out the template for the cardholder body at 10 by 7 centimeters, then two 10-by-4-centimeter rectangles for the pockets, leaving a 5-millimeter seam allowance on each piece.
I sanded the edges of the cut pieces smooth, then marked the stitch line with a ruler about 4 millimeters from the edge, and punched holes with an awl at 4-millimeter intervals.
After that, I applied glue to the edges of both pocket pieces and glued them to the main body — one pocket at the top, one at the bottom — creating two separate card compartments.
I let the glue set, then stitched the body and pockets together with waxed thread using two saddle-stitch needles.
I sanded and waxed the edges, then burnished them smooth with a wooden slicker.
The final touch was a coat of protective leather cream for durability, and after about an hour and a half of careful, meticulous work, I got the notification I'd been waiting for.
[Crafted a simple leather item. Difficulty: Low. Gained +20 OP!]
The cardholder had been too simple and too generic for the System to reward generously, so the OP haul was modest, but I'd picked up solid foundational experience and genuinely enjoyed the process.
My total now sat at 75 OP, and there was still enough scrap leather for a few more simple items: a passport cover, a key fob, a leather bracelet, maybe another cardholder with three compartments instead of two.
Either way, there were still over four hours until midnight, and extra OP was always worth having, so I got back to work.
After the stress and ozone-sharp smell of high-voltage discharges, working with leather was like a balm for the soul.
There was no risk of instant death from a single wrong move.
Just the material, the tools, and your hands.
I breathed in the rich, earthy smell of genuine leather, and something in me settled.
The process was slow and almost meditative.
The smooth draw of the knife along a ruler, producing a clean, perfect edge.
The steady tap of the awl, punching even holes for the seam.
The precise, unhurried movement of two needles, weaving waxed thread into a saddle stitch that was both beautiful and brutally strong.
There was a magic to it, entirely unlike what I had chased the night before.
Not the magic of bending the finer rules of reality, but the magic of pure craft.
Transforming a shapeless scrap of hide into something elegant and functional.
If building the Marx Generator had been an act of brute, primal force — taming the elements — then leatherworking was a dialogue with the material.
You had to feel its thickness, its give, understand how it would behave under thread tension or when treated with wax.
And I realized I was enjoying more than just the System notification when OP rolled in.
I enjoyed the process itself.
I loved watching something beautiful and useful take shape under my hands.
Maybe that was the key.
To build complex, world-changing technologies, you had to stay grounded in things like this — simple, tangible, real.
One gave power; the other gave focus and a quiet mind.
As it turned out, I needed both.
I spent the next few hours in what could only be called a leather frenzy.
The last items I finished were a few simple leather bracelets, each worth only 5 OP.
When the scrap leather ran out, I tallied it up: 70 OP earned from my leatherwork, bringing my total balance to 145 OP.
With no real path to earning another 55 OP in the next few hours, I made the call to begin crafting the Potion of Intelligence.
The recipe itself wasn't complicated, but the preparation had demanded far more effort and money than anticipated.
Alright.
Time to clear my head and begin.
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