Chapter 1: Prologue
On 31st December 2019, the whole world went through a transformation. That day was written in history as S-Day, S standing for Survival. Mysterious rifts started forming through out the world, mainly in heavily populated areas.
The militaries of each country vacated the areas with the rifts and sealed the areas. After one week, the rifts all opened and beasts came pouring out. These beasts were killed by the use of bullets, but some beasts had forced the usage of missiles.
Scientists observed the beasts and came to the conclusion that the beast might evolve to become resistant to bullets, so an apt way to kill the beasts without resulting in loss of land and human population had to be found.
At this time, many people awakened different powers within them. These people could use these powers to easily kill the beasts. Hence they were called Hunters. Associations and guilds were formed to gather hunters and kill beasts.
After a few months, a Hunter decided to see if he could destroy a rift before it burst open, and he swung his axe at it. The axe passed through the rift and the hunter lost balance and fell into the rift. A few hours after that, he came out. Once he came out, the rift disappeared.. The hunter explained that there was a separate space in the rift that had all the beasts that normally would come out. He had killed what he believed was the strongest monster and then was teleported out.
This discovery was a major breakthrough. It allowed hunters to clear rifts and safeguard property. This made the crashed economy of the world recover. To make sure that every country was united, the United Nations became the ruling body of the whole world and renamed itself the Confederation of Earth. Each country was split up and the world became divided into sectors which were numbered.
There were 3000 sectors, each having 1 million people. The sectors were numbered randomly, but the emergence of large guilds brought fame to some, and trample over the others.
With increasing difficulties of rifts appearing. The Confederation of Earth decided to make a ranking system to divide rifts based on the strength of the monsters inside. However, to do that, Hunters would have to risk their lives and go into gates.
A solution to the problem came when some mages made devices that measured the energy emanating from the rift. The energy was called Source Power. This Source Power divided the rifts from D to S, D being the weakest. However, some strong Hunters called for a ranking between Hunters, as that would let apt Hunter deal with apt gates. Hence, Hunters were also ranked.
In 2027, they made ranking compulsory to Hunt. This ranking was based on a combination of Source Power as well as combat ability. This decreased the death rate of Hunters. To make Hunting beasts a viable occupation, the Confederation of Earth gave various benefits to Hunters, as well as many monetary rewards. Since the currency of the old world had died, the new currency was named Credits. The rewards for clearing of a gate would be deducted from the taxes of the sector the rift appeared in.
With new discoveries like that of the muon, as well as beast weapons, the corporations of the past tried to ally with guilds and profit off the new world.
The S-Day restarted the world, so the influence of corporations decreased tremendously. This was seen when a guild shockingly divided itself into a corporate company and hunting guild. It was the first and most successful combination of a Corporation and Guild.
The name of the guild that had divided itself was CrownStar. The guild that was the first to emerge, and had the strongest Hunter in the world. This guild decided that it would clear all S Rank rifts in the areas it operated in for free. This made CrownStar a very popular guild, so many members joined it. To make sure that all members of the guild were properly paid, the guild decided to diversify into the commercial field. Crown became a guild, and Star became a corporation.
Instead of clearing rifts as soon as possible, it cleared every beast except the strongest beast. They amputated the strongest beast and then used the space for commercial activities. Since the space was to be destroyed anyway, and it wasn't part of Earth, there were no guidelines for pollution regulation. The guild quickly depleted the resources of each rift and then destroyed them. By the time this method was adopted by other guilds and corporations, CrownStar had dominated the field.
The world stabilized slowly, and the world adopted the new normals. There were terrorists, but that was to be expected in the world. There were people that were against a united world. That was to be expected. People became accustomed to their life.
Then, disaster struck. On 21st June 2030, a rift that had emanated such power that no other rift had before appeared. To clear the rift, 5 of the world's strongest Hunters were sent. After the rift was cleared, Source Energy released from the rift, so the sector the rift had appeared in - Sector 3000 - was permanently evacuated. Two of the Hunters, and the 'World's Strongest Hunter' never appeared again. The Crown guild closed, and an academy was placed for Hunters. The world was shaken by the event. So shaken that no one noticed the mysterious appearance of a Father and Daughter duo in Sector 2999.