It had been a busy day for Austin. His day at work had been long and hard, tiring him out like nothing had in a long time. Fortunately, he'd made it through, and he was now back at his apartment. Plus, he had the day off tomorrow, so that was an opportunity to recover till the next work day.

While Austin was making himself a dinner of Ramen noodles, his friend and roommate Ken came home. "Hey Austin," said Ken. "Long day at work?"

"Don't get me started," Austin groaned.

Ken read Austin's pained expression and nodded. "I'll take that as a yes," he said.

"How about your visit with your cousin? How was that?"

"It was great," said Ken. He sat down on the couch and pulled out his phone. "He just got engaged to his girlfriend, so she was over for the day."

"Wow. Good for him."

Austin continued to cook his Ramen noodles until they were ready to eat. He poured them into a bowl and took the bowl into the apartment's living room where Ken was sitting.

"This is it," Ken muttered as he looked at his phone.

"What?"

"I'm about to make a huge purchase."

"Really? What are you gonna buy?"

"An NFT."

These words took Austin by surprise. "A what?"

"You know, an NFT. A Non-Fungible Token," said Ken.

"Yeah, I know what an NFT is," said Austin. "But why are you gonna blow your money on one?"

"Well...because it might be a good investment," said Ken. "See, this is what I'm gonna get for $5,000." He showed Austin his phone, where he had open a picture of a cartoony, blonde-haired girl. The picture wasn't even that good-just a few shapes and colors arranged to look like a human female.

"Ken, do you even hear yourself?" Austin asked. "You're spending five grand on a digital image when you could easily just screenshot it."

"No, that's not how it works," said Ken. "Only the original file has value to it. If I take a screenshot, then it'll be worthless."

"So? People copy/paste digital images across the Internet all the time. I hardly think it matters if you quote-unquote 'own' the original one."

"Austin, this is the future," said Ken. "I don't know how much you know about NFTs, but-"

"Yeah, I know how it works," said Austin. "I know it's all just a big scam. You're wasting thousands of dollars just to say you own the file, even though technically the file still belongs to the person you bought it from."

"It's not just about owning it," Ken argued. "It's about investing in it. If I only spend $5,000 now, I can sell it for even more money in the future."

Assuming you can find someone else dumb enough to waste money of this shit, Austin thought. "Well, it's your money," he relented. "You can do what you want with it."

"Indeed I will," said Ken. He tapped his phone's screen some more and made the transaction. He watched with anticipation as the NFT file downloaded to his phone. When the process was finished, he smiled. "It's done!" he said.

"Oh, you did it?"

"Yup."

"Well...good for you, I guess," said Austin. "Have fun doing...whatever it is you'd even do with an NFT."

"I mean...I guess I can look at it," said Ken. He opened the NFT file and looked at the picture of the blonde girl. But a few seconds after the file was opened, something strange happened. The girl's eyes in the NFT glowed.

"What the..."

"What? Did the transaction not go through after all?" Austin asked hopefully.

"No, it did. But the file did something weird..."

"Whoa!" Austin exclaimed when he saw Ken. "What's happening to you?"

Ken looked down and was surprised to see that his whole body was glowing-and changing, too. His body fat was melting away, and his framework was shrinking. His waist pinched inward, his hips widened, and his thighs and ass got thicker. His throat smoothed out and his face softened, becoming that of a woman's. Ken's hair grew out past his shoulders and turned blonde. On Ken's chest, his nipples puffed up and his areolas grew wider. To his and Austin's shock, a pair of plump and perky boobs grew out on Ken's chest. But there was still one change left. Between Ken's legs, his penis and balls shrank away until they were nonexistent. Once they were gone, a vagina began its formation. Now Ken was Karen.

"What the..." Karen could barely even form words.

"You just turned into a girl!" Austin exclaimed.

Karen looked back at the NFT on her phone. "Was it the file? Was it cursed?"

As if in answer, the girl in the NFT file suddenly came to life. She looked at Karen and started laughing. "You are so fucking stupid," she chortled. "Spending five thousand dollars on an NFT when you can buy literally anything else!"

"Well," Austin said, trying to avoid laughing himself, "I told you it was a bad idea."

Karen just sat there, speechless.