After Harry left, Klein turned back to Peter and leaned forward on his elbows.
"So what exactly are you doing for this internship? Do you know yet?"
"Harry said I'll probably be on the on-site coordination team for the Biotech Exhibition area." Peter pushed his glasses up, and something lit up in his eyes despite himself. "Mostly logistics — guiding visitors, prepping materials, that kind of thing. Grunt work, basically. But I'll get to see the actual project displays up close, and meet people in the industry..."
Klein picked up his Coke and raised it across the table. "Then here's to a smooth internship. May you climb fast — and remember your friends on the way up."
Peter laughed and clinked his water glass against it. "I won't forget."
They went back to eating. Klein let a comfortable silence sit for a moment, then asked, without much preamble:
"What's happening with Gwen Stacy? Have you said anything to her yet?"
Peter immediately went red. "Not yet. I was thinking... after the internship, once I've saved up a little, I could get her a decent gift and then—"
"Wait until you've saved up?" Klein set his fork down on the tray with a clatter that made the students at the next table glance over. "Peter. The opportunity will be ancient history by then."
Peter startled at the reaction, went a deeper shade of red, and instinctively checked whether anyone nearby was listening. "K-Klein, keep it down — I'm not — I just feel like... someone like me isn't really..."
"Isn't really what?" Klein cut in.
Peter's mouth worked silently for a second.
"Let me ask you something," Klein said, leaning back. "Does liking a girl have anything to do with how much money's in your pocket?"
"That's not—"
"And is Gwen the type who'd care? She's smart, she comes from a good family, she could have her pick of whoever she wants. She's not sitting around waiting for someone to show up with a gift receipt." Klein pointed his fork at him. "What she's apparently doing is taking the same elective as you, which is interesting, because last I checked her major has nothing to do with macroeconomics."
Peter blinked. That clearly hadn't occurred to him.
"The early mover wins, Peter. That's just how it works." Klein picked his fork back up. "You keep hesitating, you're going to watch some other guy hold her hand while you sit in a corner wondering why you didn't just say something when you had the chance."
Peter was quiet. He stared at the remaining salad on his plate and poked at it with his fork.
"I can't even take her anywhere decent right now," he said finally, quietly.
"That's why you go now, before you've built it up into something impossible in your head." Klein leaned forward. "Just walk up to her. 'Hey Gwen, I like you, want to grab dinner sometime.' That's it. Entire script, right there. Worst case she says no and you survive it. Best case—" He spread his hands.
Peter looked up, something genuinely wavering behind his lenses. "You really think she... I mean, do you think she actually...?"
"I think a girl like Gwen doesn't let someone stay in her orbit for months without a reason," Klein said. "If you were nothing to her, you'd already know it."
Peter was quiet again, but it was a different kind of quiet — the kind where something was actually moving around inside.
Klein watched him for a second, then sat back and crossed his arms.
"I'll say one more thing and then I'll drop it." He kept his tone easy, almost casual — but he held Peter's eyes. "I've told you what I think you should do. But I'm also being honest with you as a friend: I'm not going to wait around forever either. Gwen's smart, she's interesting, and she's not invisible to me just because you got there first in your head."
Peter stared at him.
"So." Klein shrugged, the corner of his mouth pulling up. "Take your shot, or don't. But don't come back to me later acting surprised if someone else did."
There was a long pause.
Then Peter let out a short, strained laugh — the kind that was trying very hard to be normal and almost making it. "Klein, you're joking around, right..."
His voice trailed off. He dropped his gaze back to his plate, poking at a limp piece of lettuce, and didn't finish the sentence.
Klein looked at him — this genuinely good kid who was so tangled up in his own self-doubt that he couldn't see straight — and didn't push any further.
Some things you couldn't fix with words. Peter Parker, before the spider and the suit and everything that came after, was exactly this: brilliant and kind and paralyzed by the gap between who he was and who he thought he needed to be. What he lacked wasn't intelligence or heart. He just needed a moment that cracked him open enough to find his courage.
That moment wasn't today. But it was coming.
Klein stood, stacked his empty tray, and slung his backpack over one shoulder.
"Alright, I'm heading out." He dropped a hand briefly on Peter's shoulder. "Think it over. Call me if anything comes up."
He didn't wait for a response — just tossed his trash, pushed through the cafeteria doors, and walked out.
The afternoon sun hit him as he stepped outside, sharp and bright enough to make him squint.
He fell into an easy pace through the thinning foot traffic, passed back through the ivy-covered campus gate, and turned off the main road onto the quieter residential streets.
Twenty-something minutes later he was back at the apartment building. Up the creaking stairs, key in the lock, backpack dropped onto the low cabinet by the door.
He pulled a cold Coke from the fridge, dropped onto the sofa bed, and let it catch him.
He lay there with his eyes closed for a few minutes, just decompressing, letting the day settle.
Then he opened his eyes.
System. Start the draw.
[Ding!][Drawing now. Please wait...]
The pale blue screen unfolded across his vision, and the lottery compass materialized — needle spinning fast, cutting through the light in a blur. Klein watched it with the calm of someone who'd done this a couple times now. The novelty of the spinning had already started to feel routine.
The needle slowed.
Stopped.
[Ding!][The ability you have drawn is — Five Elements Talisman Crafting!]
The moment the notification faded, something entirely different happened.
It wasn't like loading the Cyclops ability or the String-String Fruit — those had been physical, felt in the body. This was a flood of information, pouring directly into his mind like a dam breaking, structured and vast and immediately, perfectly organized.
Thousands of hours of understanding, condensed and installed all at once.
The principles of the Five Elements, laid out in his mind with crystalline clarity —
Metal: unyielding, cutting, the kind of strength that holds its edge.
Wood: growing, adaptive, full of stubborn living force.
Water: flowing and relentless, wearing down anything that stands in its way.
Fire: explosive, rising, transformative heat.
Earth: immovable, patient, the foundation everything else stood on.
Each one not just as a concept but as something he could feel at the edges of his awareness now — real, distinct, accessible.
Klein lay still on the sofa bed and stared at the ceiling while an entire discipline of knowledge finished settling into place inside his head.
Okay, he thought.
That's new.
[End of Chapter 6]
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