The cold winter snow dropped on the cemented ground of the academy, the moonlight serving as a perfect illumination even if the stars refused to accompany it. Students of the academy scurried left and right while some stayed to observe the first snow of the year.
Alfere academy, although the name might sound flashy it was nothing more than an institution used to cage awakened, under the gyise of training them. A place where the powerful ruled and the weak either obeyed or suffered. The teachers turned a blind eye to bullying that happened right in front of them or even in the hall ways, not because they were afraid but because they believed that it was the best way to find the strongest, in the principal's words " survival of the fittest", a sick excuse used to justify their incompetence.
In the academy grounds, displays of supernatural phenomenon were illustrated; like how some students flew on wings or how some ran with an natural speed or some levitating objects in the air like it was a normal thing - which it was.
This world which was once a normal civilization 24 years ago suddenly broke into a disaster when the first ever fracture occurred, humans foolishly thought that guns could the defeat the monstrous atrocities that spawned out of the fracture and before they realized their own mistakes and acknowledged their ignorance about 30 percent of human population were wiped out.
As if it was planned, leaking mana from the fracture that flowed out integrated itself into the Earth's core, that raw, unfiltered,potent mana. Plants that absorbed the mana became mythical, possessing extraordinary healing powers or potent poison and some rare powers that caused other side effects. Even some plants originated out of nowhere creating a new launch of scientific research as they each had their own potent abilities.
While animals, which somehow able to absorb this mana, gained frightening abilities, thier size increased and they became more aggressive and more complex, possessing intelligence animals shouldn't have making them monsters. But these mutated monsters were nothing close to the monsters that came out of fractures or those that lived in dungeons, but they had their own fair share of usefulness as they were used as training for awakeners to progress.
And for humans, the change was miraculous.Humans benefitted mostly from this mana leak. They gained superhuman strength, speed, intelligence, agility and regeneration and this was just a fragment of their potential. They gained classes which was divided into; dealer, tanker and support and had different sub classes, like how dealer had assassin, knight, archer and many other. They also had the opportunity to make contracts with unique 'stars' and gain authorities from them. As if to gauge their abilities, they also possessed a special interface that activated once they awakened that displayed their stats and other vital information.
These first set of awakeners fought against the first fracture and cleared it although the loss was massive, it was a win for humanity. The first of awakeners that survived were called the HEREOS and they had statues of themselves built as a tribute for their sacrifice, to both the ones that died and the ones that survived. A massive slab of marble was placed in the middle of the awakeners statues and names of civilians that died in the fracture were engraved on it, making sure history and time never forgets them.
Time has flown, decades past, civilization had prospered once more, new technologies were produced as they no more ran on fuel but compressed mana called mana stones. These technologies ranging from trains that ran on invisible rails in the air, self driving cars that could convert to other mobiles, to floating bikes, highly developed security system made from rune and coding magic and so on. This new era of change was called the golden era, a break through from the dark past.
But a reminder of that dark past was the area where the fracture occurred, a space big enough to be a country became a polluted region, full of nasty corrupted mana. Corrupted mana that piled untop each other creating a thick, uncomfortable and polluted environment. The government quickly tried to do some research, sending animal life to see if the would survive but barely after two hours the animal died. Then they sent in monsters and after 7 hours the beast met the same fate. Finally, they sent in a death row awakener from the PRISM- a prison used to hold awakeners - into the corrupted area and after almost 13 hours the inmate died with skin wrinkled and hair white, as if life has been sucked away from him.
The government quickly barricaded the area with a mana infused fence to keep the corrupted mana from leaking out. They deemed that area unhabitable, putting a ban from anyone entering it as it was deemed dangerous.
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Pant ....pant....pant....
From the corrupted area a hand sticked out of the damaged area of the fence, slender fingers that had blood splattered over them. Then a head stuck out, black flowing hair and ethereal purple eyes.
The body crawled out of the area and passed out few inches away from the burricaded area.