UBM 1

Chapter 1

Prologue

Necromancer of Unlimited Potential

The era of awakening dawned, and a great upheaval swept across the world.

Following this, gates opened all across the globe.

Humanity, which had already surpassed a population of 7 billion and reached saturation point, regarded this as hope and launched a massive investigation.

Indeed, the dungeons beyond the gates were El Dorado.

There existed materials never before seen on Earth, and through them, domains that had been insurmountable with science until now were overcome.

The representative example was the mana stone.

When mana stones first emerged from the gates, magic-type awakened individuals claimed they were merely objects that could be used to craft magical items.

However, upon investigation by scientists, it was revealed that while mana stones retained mana, they maintained superconductivity at room temperature.

In other words, mana stones were the famous room-temperature superconductors.

That was the first great revolution that struck the scientific world.

It bestowed upon humanity—who had been trembling over oil prices—an infinite source of power: room-temperature nuclear fusion technology, and innovations occurred across all electronic and electrical fields.

Beyond that, some monster byproducts were new materials that could not be synthesized even with existing materials engineering, and new substances that could not be realized through chemical engineering.

Even the dungeons required no worry about extinction from overexploitation, unlike Earth’s ecosystem.

After a subjugation, once a little time passed, monsters would regenerate and fill the dungeons once more.

Therefore, dungeons producing monsters composed of precious materials were managed at the national level.

Countries possessing multiple gates reaped greater profits than the oil-producing nations of the past.

The problem was that what could enter this golden land was only the human body itself and the items acquired beyond the gates.

It was only natural that the value of awakened individuals who could enter dungeons and acquire mana stones or monster byproducts would skyrocket.

Thus opened the so-called Hunter Golden Age.

* * *

Statistically, the ratio of awakened individuals was about 1% of the population.

In other words, awakening itself was fundamentally difficult.

Moreover, the knowledge or abilities gained through awakening were completely random.

Worthless abilities were countless, and cases of successfully awakening with abilities that could properly perform in gates accounted for less than 10% of awakened individuals.

That meant only 0.1% of the population could become Hunters.

This was the decisive reason Hunters could live while being called nobles.

Furthermore, there was only one awakening in a lifetime.

So there was this saying:

An unscratched lottery ticket still holds hope, but a scratched losing ticket is just a piece of tissue.

A non-awakened life was better.

Because one could live holding onto the hope that someday they might succeed in awakening with a 1% probability, and from there obtain a proper ability with a 10% probability.

But what about an awakened individual who awakened a worthless ability?

They had to live a life without a shred of hope in the world of Hunters.

That was my story.

That was all I thought.

Until I discovered the true worth of my ability.