Sitting in a bus full of other children and teenagers, a boy was slouched down in a seat next to the window with dark circles under his eyes. It was already nearly midnight, not a time for a fourteen-year-old boy to be awake.

The boy was trying his hardest to fight against his drowsiness, and it seemed like he was winning that battle this time. Occasionally suppressing a yawn, but the boy's eyes were darting around as this was the only change of scenery he had every month.

Driving at a modest speed in a line of other cars and busses spanning several kilometers, it looked like the entire city was headed for the same destination.

The boy wasn't mad that he wasn't going that fast, however, being able to take in the view better. And it was an interesting site no matter how many times he saw it. Every few hundred meters they had to drive through one of the gigantic black reinforced steel walls of the fortress.

With each gate they drove through, the walls were not only getting taller, but also wider. The gate they were currently driving through felt more like a tunnel, continuing for dozens of meters before they could see the night sky again. The inside of it as black and dense as one would have guessed looking at it from the outside.

And the wall they were now driving towards was even bigger, standing strong at over a hundred meters tall. The top of it lined with machinery so big it could only be operated by a giant… or technology.

This would be the last wall they had to drive through before they could set their sights on the last line of defense, a gigantean dark blue dome as tall as the last wall and more than a few hundred meters in diameter. A defense so strong as if trying to stop a siege from the gods themselves.

But all of humanity knew that this feat of a structure wasn't made to defend from anything coming in, instead, it served the opposite purpose, preventing anything to make it out from this place.

Driving into this dome, the boy's eyes widened as he laid sight upon a rift in space itself. Lighting up the inside of the massive dome, an unfathomable arrangement of blue and red nebulae was surrounding what seemed like darkness itself.

As much as you looked at the darkness inside the arrangement of dark blue and red nebulae, there didn't appear to be anything. But there was definitely something there. Something humanity couldn't forget even if they wanted to.

An interdimensional portal.

Around a hundred years ago, out of nowhere, six of these portals appeared on earth. Never having seen anything like this, whoever laid eyes upon them was mystified and struck with awe. Unfortunately, humanity quickly found out that these portals didn't just appear to be admired.

Through some of these portals came hordes of creatures unlike anyone had ever seen before, quickly running rampant on earth. And just like that, as quickly as they were admired, they became the very existence of horror.

Earth's whole military strength immediately got put to the test. Countless wars that had taken place in the past or had been taken place when these portals appeared suddenly seemed insignificant, uniting earth in these disastrous times. All with only one purpose, kill whatever came out of these portals whatever the cost.

But earth was not quick enough to react. How could it have been?

Before the military could even take action, numerous cities, even entire countries were already destroyed as nightmare inducing monstrosities dyed the world red.

And even when the military finally took action, starting a counteroffensive using every piece of technology and modern weaponry that had been developed by humanity, thinking they were ready.

They weren't…

Some monstrosities wouldn't even flinch when the most powerful of missiles were shot at them, and the monsters they did manage to kill were coming out of the portals at the same rate as they were being killed, maybe even faster.

Humanity's last piece of hope was lost on that day.

People who were shuddering in their place of hiding while they hugged their lover as if it was going to be their last, ironically had a moment of peace hearing bombs being dropped and fighter jets fly by.

But these sounds quickly vanished along with their last piece of hope that they had desperately latched onto, once again replaced by the harrowing dread and sounds of monsters growling and running rampant in their cities.

But a spark of hope appeared not very much later, exactly at midnight when a new month started, something which is now referred to as the marking phenomenon happened. Beacons of light started appearing in these dark times when people suddenly received marks on their bodies, bestowing upon them supernatural powers beyond human understanding.

With this, humanity's combat strength increased significantly. People who were sitting in hiding surfaced and faced the monsters without any fear in their eyes. With a sudden wave of people with supernatural powers, humanity's offensive picked up once again, this time even with some success.

But that success didn't last long as even the people with supernatural powers were massacred indiscriminately, as children and adults alike were not accustomed to their powers. So, even with this new power combined with the advanced technology that earth had, humanity was still losing this war.

It was only about twenty years later, twenty years of brutal war where nearly half of humanity had been wiped out or died fighting, that a change in the tide appeared.

A scientist named Theodore Harrell made the most significant discovery till date and had managed to copy a mark of someone and grant this power to another human, thus creating the first artificial marking.

The world was in such a dire situation that the government widespread this method all over the world in hopes of giving as many people powers as possible, creating the largest combat force in humanity's history.

And this worked! Humanity could finally fight back and was winning the war as they eradicated every monster that had come to earth, making them regret ever having set foot on earth. The world had finally become a safe place again.

The war was over. Earth had survived. Humanity had won.

But that was the moment greed set in. Humanity wasn't just content with having defended against this siege attack.

Humans themselves took the initiative to go on the offensive this time, going through these portals and starting a new war of their own, even setting up camp there, claiming that land as ours, claiming that WORLD as rightfully ours.

With the new resources that these worlds brought, and entire new land that had no owner, organizations, families, clans, entire branches of militaries or governments started forming, claiming these things as theirs.

To hinder the other parties, only having eyes for growing stronger themselves to get more resources and bigger pieces of land, they began monopolizing the method to create artificial marks as they had tasted power.

Now, the only people who could get marks were people from these parties or rich and influential people. But for the remaining people, mundane people, they had no way of getting an artificial mark anymore.

However, they could still get a mark through the marking phenomenon that happens every month. But the people in power even monopolized this, spreading propaganda about an increased chance to get a natural mark if people are closer to a portal.

That was why Yune, and every child from his orphanage were brought here, in front of one of the six portals, standing between the thousands- no, hundreds of thousands of people, in the hopes of getting marked in the marking phenomenon and receiving powers.

With the amount of people in the dome, it was very rowdy. People couldn't even hear the person next to them talk, in return talking louder to make themselves audible, creating even more noise in this deafening dome.

But approaching midnight, it became quieter and quieter until it was completely silent. The once casual atmosphere had vanished and the tension in the air could now be felt, a mix of nervousness, hope, and desperation. Some people could even be seen looking up, praying that they would get a mark even though there was a massive dome between them and the god they were praying to.

Not even a second later, after it became quiet, midnight hit. At that very moment the darkness in the dome vanished as beacons of light started appearing amongst the sea of people, exactly like it had first happened more than a hundred years ago, and every month since.

One of these beacons of light was especially bright this time. Only around a hundred meters in front of Yune, a girl with blonde hair started emitting a golden radiant light, blinding the people who stood close to it and demanding the attention of so many more. It wasn't only demanding attention because of its beauty, an angelic golden ray, but it was just too bright and big to miss.

But that wasn't the only beacon of light that appeared in the darkness. At the exact same time, Yune also started emitting a glow from his body. Only was this glow entirely different from the radiant and bright golden beacon that the girl was emitting.

A deep-set dark purple glow was closely surrounding Yune as if trying to defy the pull of light itself, keeping itself close to the boy's body creating a small dome around him instead of a radiant beacon.

This sight caught the attention of the people surrounding the boy, but it was nothing compared to the number of eyes pointed towards the radiant golden glow, pulling the attention of nearly everyone in the dome.

As each second passed, the beacons of every person who was experiencing the marking phenomenon started to shine brighter, growing in size. But Yune's beacon, however, didn't let itself escape from his body, remaining the same size, only growing deeper in color as time passed.

After nearly a minute, the deep-set dark purple glow had become immensely saturated, almost blending in with the darkness surrounding it. And then, exactly when the one-minute mark hit, the light started to rush toward Yune as if not being pulled away anymore.

What happened next passed in the blink of the eye, the already condensed and deep-set purple light condensed even further, forming a sphere around the size of a tennis ball, gravitating towards Yune's chest.

As it made contact with his chest, it started gaining shape, lines of light moving in different directions using up all the energy in its creation until the ball of light completely exhausted itself. In its place a dark purple mark had formed on Yune's chest.

Yune had received a mark.