Obligate of a Self-Ordained Sorcerer

It was a typical late-night for Mara, secluded in her apartment in front of a digital expanse, relentlessly mashing code into a keyboard. An introverted workaholic to her core, but this was what she wanted, what she had strived so hard to achieve. So why did she feel so lost? Her life was productive, comfortable, and satisfying. Plenty had it worse, but still she felt... Ungrateful? Stunted? The right word escaped her, but with the realization came a choice. One that would set events in motion far beyond the meager scope of a 'New Game+'. So taking an intrusive portal to god-knows-where, Mara finds a new world that offers boons and banes with equal abandon. A world that could offer all the magic and skills she could want, but laced an unforgiving difficulty throughout. She knew she was gambling when she set out, but she didn't expect to just get dropped in the middle of a fantasy forest with zero explanation. Behind the curtain, this story is a 'scientifically fictional' perspective on what magic is and why it doesn't exist, masquerading as a critique on modern isekai, and wrapped up in an onion-pretzel of time-shenanigans. It is a mystery of an isekai, which provides ample opportunity for wordplay and foreshadowing, but can only be fully appreciated in hindsight. "Cosmic problems meeting fantastical solutions."