Most of us are die-hard fanatics of superhero movies, especially after the mainstream audience got to witness famous comic book characters come to life in Marvel and DC live-action movies. But it’s always important to keep in mind that the spectacle we see on screen is just fiction, and whatever those superhuman characters are capable of doing, a regular individual in the real world can’t do. But it seems this fellow has completely mixed up the fictional world with his reality, and it has cost him greatly.

According to Mirror, a 15-year-old kid in 2014 had apparently injected himself with mercury to gain superpowers like a character from Marvel Universe. However, things predictably went wrong for him as the teen ended up in the hospital with painful ulcers that refused to heal. The boy had reportedly wanted to emulate a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics named Mercury.

The teen also went as far as to get himself repeatedly bitten by spiders, hoping that it can give him superhuman abilities like Spider-Man. National Centre for Biotechnology Information had recorded this unusual case where the teen’s identity was kept under wraps but detailed the injuries sustained by him after willingly injecting mercury into his body, per the outlet. The case was reported in India where the boy visited a trauma center with ‘multiple non-healing ulcers on his left forearm’ after sustaining the injury from a sharp object which was used to inject mercury.

Initially, the medical experts suspected that it might be a case of substance abuse and hence a psychiatric evaluation was carried out. Soon after, the teen revealed that he had intentionally put mercury into his body three times which he collected from a thermometer. The report also details how the boy mentioned getting inspired by the film X-Men Origins: Wolverine after which he decided to get himself some superpowers by adopting illogical means.

"Interestingly, he had a past history of multiple bites by spiders to simulate Spider-Man. Surprisingly, he had no other psychiatric problems and had a normal IQ," NCBI's report read further. The doctors treating the teenager were able to carry out a toxicology test to determine the levels of mercury in his blood. Thankfully, the boy had only injected himself under the skin and not into the major blood vessels. However, the teen had to undergo surgery so the doctors could cut out the ulcer and the skin surrounding it. He also went through a split-thickness skin graft and healed well post his surgery. The doctors also kept the boy under observation to check if there were any signs of mercury poisoning or not but the subsequent tests cleared him of any such risks.

"The patient did not develop clinical signs of chronic poisoning proving that subcutaneous mercury injection has a low risk of systemic toxicity and that histopathology plays an important role in diagnosis," the report stated. Well, this serves as an example of how important it is for adults to educate kids about how to distinguish between fictional and real worlds so that they understand that it isn't worth risking their lives to gain fantastical powers like comic book characters.