While most of us were grinding levels on a console, Jackson Oswalt was quietly teaching himself how to fuse atoms in his family home in Memphis. One night, he realized that even being “the best” at video games meant nothing outside the screen. So he went looking for the closest thing to a real‑life game: high‑stakes experimental physics. He binged nuclear fusion videos, haunted online forums, and slowly assembled a demo fusor from scavenged parts, coaxing eerie purple plasma to life just in time for his school science fair.

It didn’t stop there. After more than a year of trial, error, and late‑night tinkering, Jackson achieved verified nuclear fusion at 12, earning a Guinness World Record the day before his 13th birthday. The FBI even swept his house for radiation, then left him “a free man.” Today, he’s traded his makeshift lab for cutting‑edge research, working on AI hardware at Midjourney—proof that one kid’s decision to put down the controller can rewrite the script for what a childhood is supposed to look like.