Chapter 1: Prologue
Since the dawn of life, the living have struggled in the never-ending struggle for survival.
Fragile life, desperately trying to maintain form and function.
Over time, life had begun to change.
New forms appeared and disappeared, and new tools appeared on their bodies.
Life had divided into roles.
Predator and prey, equipped with simple tools from evolution, battle for survival on a daily basis.
For an untold period, life meant survival of the fittest.
The weak ceased to exist, while the strong lived to for another day.
Eventually, the course of natural selection brought about one clear victor.
Humans.
A unique eusocial creature with great dexterity and intelligence proved to be a formidable foe, humans proved to be an oppressive presence to all other forms of life to encounter them.
They built great machines of both destruction and creation. Humans were capable of producing weapons capable of untold harm, and medicine to cure deadly afflictions. Like gods, they were capable of changing the layout of land, and even aspects of living creatures on a whim.
As the apex of life on the planet, humans could wipe out the weaker competition with ease. Extinctions of several forms of life at the hands of man became a common occurrence.
Then one day it all changed….
The world suddenly became flooded in a tide of strange energy, felt by every inhabitant on earth – except for the human race.
Perhaps it was due to the dulling of their natural instinct after generations away from natural influence. Perhaps it was doubt of its existence since the energy was undetectable by any scientific measuring tool. Perhaps it was because of the social stigma against those who spoke of it. Perhaps it was misunderstood and dismissed because the majority of people did not perceive it.
Whatever the case, humanity carried on idly as if nothing had happened.
However, the forces of nature were still at work.
Life was entering into the next stage of evolution, giving form to new lifeforms capable of using supernatural abilities.
Large sheep that put people to sleep before absorbing the body into their wool. Blue wolves that freeze victims before completely disappearing into the darkness with their bodies. Mysterious deer creatures that are said to shapeshift and possess unfathomable strength. Fat yellow rats with the ability to shoot thunder. These are among the first to evolve and still greatly resembled their original forms.
Creatures were rapidly evolving, their bodies becoming more and more adapted to use the mysterious new force in the world.
As observed following every mass extinction event, following the great dying at the hands of man – the end of the Anthropocene marked a rapid evolution of brand new lifeforms overflowing with the strange new energy throughout their being.
In the years that follow, humanity fell prey to the rapidly multiplying quantity and types of predators. Predators that became widely referred to as "monsters".
Across the world, nations used their military powers to control the populations and some even calling to eradicate the monsters that popped up in their domains.
The centralized powers of the human world began conducting tests on the monsters they had captured, possibly in an attempt to weaponized them to add to their military arsenal.
However, monsters evolved too quickly – much faster than anticipated by mankind.
Many unrelated species of monsters evolved intelligence and eusocial behaviors independently in convergent evolution, yet were able to work together regardless of species.
Monsters began uniting, forming alliances across species to fight against humanity. Soon the intelligent monsters and demons began to coalesce around a leader, the "Demon King". Organizational efforts spontaneously ignited for the unified enemies of mankind, founding a nation that declared war against all of humanity.
The war against the monsters soon became an integral aspect of the society. Leaders of human nations recognized the threat, but did little to resolve the situation outside of their own borders. While playing political games of international aid and propaganda between the nations, no one nation was willing to potentially lose their military force in a fight against the monsters. They argued that their military is preoccupied defending against the threat in their own countries. In secret, many would rather use their strength to invade a weakened nation that engaged with the monsters for territory and spoils after "saving" the citizens.
In addition to the bureaucratic mess of international politics, governments around the world spread propaganda blaming secret testing of captured monsters by other nations to be the cause of the problem. People from different nations began to distrust each other, stifling cooperation in this ordeal.
While the humans idled away the years fighting amongst themselves, the Demon King and its armies grew in number and strength. Over time, more and more monsters evolved the capabilities of using the strange power. The threat that the demon army posed became greater with each passing day.
Disagreements over the nature of the monsters were also heated, as many people still did not believe in the existence of the purported strange power that permeates the planet. Instead, many think they are more likely to be biological weapons and a part of the enemy nation's military.
Since there was still no official acknowledgement of the phenomena, online forums such as yonchan and readit carried the topic. The dedicated and growing online forums dedicated to the topic referred to the permeating energy and supernatural powers of the monsters as "mana" and "magic" respectively – perhaps in homage to common tropes in games. Some users posted claims of being able to see and even use the mana in and around them.
The mainstream and government elites dismissed those who claimed such things as conspiracy theorists, and continued to play around idly with their guns and bombs.
When the bureaucracy finally realized their situation, it was too late.
The demons had developed their own language, built a magic powered civilization, and studied a new science centered about the mana that blessed them with power.
They had developed technologies mimicking the human tools of destruction, building similar machines that made use of mana as an energy source. These machines proved to be far superior due to their ubiquitous supply of free unlimited energy and integration with magic spells.
Soon the demons have learned to create improved machinations with original designs – massive floating battalions in the air, magicians wielding powerful spells on the ground, and underwater magic earthquake devices that can generate tsunamis.
Humanity's dominance had ended.
Following the fall of the human nations, survivors fled to the wild to escape certain death at the hands of the Demon Lord's army. The world was now once more a chaotic struggle for survival.
Humankind, once 9 billion strong, had scattered across the world surviving only in small scavenging groups. Their population numbers plummeted so low it was difficult to form an estimate.
It is said that immense stress is the main driving force of evolution.
Stress from the environment in the form of natural selection.
Stress as a mental affliction, which causes a chemical imbalance that causes damage to the genetic code.
Stress as a mechanical force on the physical body, toning and molding it through labor and injury.
Evolution had already brought forth the ability to utilize mana among some individuals over the years. Magically gifted humans have guided their small tribal groups in the wilderness overrun by magic wielding demons.
Unfortunately, they were far weaker compared to the demons and struggled to survive even against stray unintelligent magical beasts in the wild.
At this time, the only thing humanity could do was pray for a miracle.
And then that very miracle happened.
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