Four hundred years ago, humanity learned that Earth was not the only world in existence.
The first dimensional gate appeared above a major city without warning. From its depths emerged creatures that had never existed on Earth. Some resembled beasts, others insects, and a few possessed intelligence that rivalled human beings.
Humanity called them OZ: Otherworld Zygotes.
At first, people believed their advanced weapons would be enough to repel the invaders. They were wrong.
The creatures brought something with them. An energy that spread through the world, changing the laws of nature and awakening extraordinary abilities in human beings.
Some could manipulate fire. Others could control water, strengthen their bodies, or command lightning. Certain families even passed their abilities from one generation to the next.
Humanity fought back.
Four centuries later, the war was still raging.
And for one unfortunate girl, the war wasn't even her biggest problem.
---
Three days before military collection day.
A young girl lay on a hospital bed, staring at the unfamiliar white ceiling.
Her body hurt.
Every time she tried to move, pain travelled through her ribs and down her arms. Her face was swollen, and several parts of her body were wrapped in bandages.
She remained still for a while, trying to understand what had happened.
Where am I?
She turned her head slowly.
White walls. A small bedside table. A window with its curtains drawn halfway. The steady beeping of a medical monitor.
A hospital.
But why was she in a hospital?
She closed her eyes.
Memories flooded her mind.
An enclosed arena.
A military training institution.
Three students standing over her.
Laughter.
The taste of blood in her mouth.
And finally, a foot striking her stomach.
Her eyes snapped open.
"Those bastards..."
Her voice came out hoarse.
She tried to sit up, only to gasp when pain shot through her chest.
"Easy there."
A nurse approached her bed and pressed a hand against her shoulder.
"You've only just regained consciousness. Don't move around too much."
The girl stared at her.
"How long was I unconscious?"
"Almost two days."
Two days?
Her expression changed.
"How long until the soldiers arrive?"
The nurse paused.
"Three days from now, I believe. Your military collection is scheduled for the twenty-ninth."
The girl went silent.
Three days.
She had three days before the soldiers arrived to collect her and the other graduates.
Three days before she was sent into the military.
Three days before her life became considerably more dangerous.
And she had spent almost two of them unconscious in a hospital bed.
She wanted to laugh.
Unfortunately, even that seemed to hurt.
"Wonderful," she muttered.
The nurse gave her a puzzled look.
"What's wonderful?"
"Nothing."
The nurse adjusted her blanket.
"You should be grateful. Another few kicks in the wrong place might have caused permanent damage. You were lucky someone found you before things became worse."
Lucky?
The girl looked toward the window.
She had been beaten because of something she couldn't control.
Something she had spent years trying to improve.
Something that had made her the laughingstock of the entire institution.
Her ability.
---
The Weakest
In this world, supernatural abilities were not unusual.
Most people inherited theirs from their parents. Some inherited powerful abilities that had been passed down through generations, while others developed weaker variations.
A family known for controlling fire might produce a child who could only generate sparks.
A family famous for manipulating metal might produce a child capable of moving only tiny pieces.
Abilities could weaken.
They could strengthen.
Occasionally, they could even change into something entirely different.
But one thing was certain.
Your ability determined how people treated you.
The girl had learned that lesson early.
Her family possessed an ability that allowed them to control and tame insects. That alone was already unusual, but their power extended further.
They could create weapons for their insects, transforming tiny creatures into formidable weapons of war.
A single insect might become a deadly scout.
A swarm could overwhelm an enemy.
With the right preparation, even the smallest creature could become a threat to something many times its size.
It was a respectable ability.
A useful ability.
An ability that had earned her family a place among the people who mattered.
Unfortunately, she had inherited only a fraction of it.
She could control insects.
That was all.
She couldn't create weapons for them.
She couldn't strengthen their bodies.
She couldn't even control particularly large numbers of insects without exhausting herself.
Compared with other students her age, her ability was pathetic.
At least, that was what everyone told her.
She had heard it so often that she had stopped counting.
The other students mocked her whenever they had the opportunity. Some called her useless. Others wondered aloud whether she had been switched at birth.
Even the physical bead used to display a person's ability level offered her no protection.
Her bead showed a low level.
Anyone could see it.
Anyone could laugh at it.
And anyone who wanted an easy target knew exactly where to look.
The three students who had beaten her had known.
They had known she couldn't fight them on equal terms.
They had known nobody would be particularly interested in defending her.
And they had known that, in just a few days, she would be leaving the institution anyway.
What difference would one more beating make?
That was probably what they had thought.
The girl clenched her fingers beneath the blanket.
If I had been stronger, would they have dared to touch me?
She already knew the answer.
No.
---
Three Days Until the Battlefield
The institution was officially called a military training academy.
Calling it a school, however, was a little misleading.
At fourteen, children with awakened abilities were sent into enclosed training arenas, where they spent three years preparing for military service.
Teachers appeared regularly to provide instruction and oversee training.
Beyond that, students were expected to handle much of their own survival.
Food required points.
Accommodation required points.
Equipment required points.
Almost everything a student needed could be obtained through the academy's internal economy, provided they had enough points to pay for it.
The system was intended to prepare future soldiers for the harsh realities of war.
At least, that was the official explanation.
In practice, the academy was a place where strength commanded respect, weakness attracted predators, and survival often depended on how well a student could navigate the people around them.
The girl had survived three years.
She had endured the training.
She had endured the mockery.
She had endured being underestimated.
Now, with graduation approaching, she had only one thing left to do.
Get through the next three days.
Then the soldiers would arrive.
She would leave the academy and begin her military service alongside the other graduates.
The battlefield was waiting.
And she was going to arrive there with one of the weakest abilities anyone had ever seen.
She closed her eyes.
Maybe I should have stayed in bed.
For a moment, she seriously considered it.
Then another thought crossed her mind.
No. I need to recover before they arrive.
Whatever awaited her in the military, she couldn't afford to be helpless.
She needed strength.
She needed a way to survive.
More than anything, she needed something that could make up for the pathetic ability she had inherited.
But where was she supposed to find such a thing?
She couldn't suddenly acquire a powerful ability.
She couldn't change her bloodline.
And she certainly couldn't ask the world to give her a second chance.
Or so she thought.
Because just as she was about to turn over and try to sleep, something strange happened.
A faint sensation stirred deep within her chest.
It wasn't pain.
It wasn't the familiar exhaustion that accompanied the use of her ability.
It felt like something had awakened.
Something that had been sleeping for a very long time.
The girl frowned.
"What is that?"
She pressed a hand against her chest.
The sensation disappeared.
She waited.
Nothing happened.
Then, just as she was about to dismiss it, a strange image appeared in her mind.
A gemstone.
It was beautiful, with a surface that seemed to contain countless colours hidden beneath its depths.
She had never seen anything like it.
Yet somehow, she recognised it.
Not with her eyes.
Not through a memory she could explain.
She recognised it in a way that made her heart skip.
The gemstone floated in a vast darkness.
Then she noticed something else.
The gemstone wasn't outside her body.
It was inside her soul.
Her breathing stopped.
"What...?"
Before she could finish speaking, the gemstone released a faint pulse.
And something answered.
A space unfolded in her consciousness.
It was vast beyond comprehension, stretching farther than she could perceive. There were no walls, no visible ceiling, and no clear boundaries.
She couldn't tell whether it was a place, a dimension, or something that had never existed in the physical world.
But she could feel it.
It was real.
And somehow, it belonged to her.
The girl stared into the impossible expanse.
Then she noticed a second sensation.
A connection.
It extended from the space toward her, as though something inside it was waiting for her to understand.
She instinctively reached for it.
The moment she did, a single thought appeared in her mind.
Materials Fusion.
The words carried no explanation.
No instructions.
No convenient voice telling her what to do.
Yet she understood that they were connected to her.
She didn't know how.
She didn't know why.
But the gemstone, the strange space, and those two words were undeniably linked.
Her heart began to pound.
For the first time in years, she felt something other than pain, humiliation, or fear.
Hope.
It was small.
Fragile.
And she had absolutely no idea what it meant.
But she was desperate enough to grasp it with both hands.
She looked at the insects crawling near the hospital window.
A tiny ant moved along the edge of the frame.
Normally, she would have been able to sense its presence and influence its movements. That was the extent of her ability.
She had never been able to do anything remarkable with it.
Now, however, as she focused on the ant, she felt something else.
A connection to the strange space.
A connection to the gemstone.
And an unfamiliar possibility that seemed to hover just beyond her understanding.
She swallowed.
"Come here."
The ant stopped.
Then it began moving toward her.
She watched it crawl onto the windowsill, then across the bedside table.
Her hands trembled.
It was the same ability she had always possessed.
Nothing about the ant had changed.
Nothing about her surroundings had changed.
Yet she could feel that something within her was different.
She reached out with her mind, trying to understand the new sensation.
For one brief moment, the ant's tiny body appeared in her awareness alongside a fragment of material lying somewhere within the vast space.
She didn't understand what she was seeing.
She didn't know what would happen if the two were brought together.
But she understood one thing.
Her ability was no longer as simple as she had believed.
The girl slowly smiled.
Then she remembered the three students who had beaten her.
Her smile disappeared.
Wait until I figure this out.
She wasn't foolish enough to believe that one strange discovery would immediately make her powerful.
She had no idea what Materials Fusion could do, how it worked, or what it would cost her.
She didn't even know whether she could use it successfully.
But for the first time, she had a reason to find out.
Three days remained before the soldiers arrived.
Three days to recover.
Three days to understand the gemstone.
And three days to discover what her newly awakened ability could do.
She looked at the tiny ant on the table.
Then she glanced at her own hands.
"Let's see what you can do."
Far away, beyond the hospital walls, humanity's war against the OZ continued.
Dimensional gates scarred the world.
Monstrous creatures hunted human beings.
And somewhere beyond the front lines stood the enormous tree known as Nestoz, a living monument to the enemy's conquest.
The world was filled with creatures that could tear armies apart.
Humanity needed powerful warriors to fight them.
It needed exceptional abilities.
It needed people capable of turning the tide of a four-hundred-year war.
Nobody expected anything from a girl who could barely control insects.
Nobody imagined that her future might one day be written in the shadows of a monstrous swarm.
For now, she was simply an orphan lying in a hospital bed, trying to understand a power she had never known she possessed.
But the smallest creatures could survive in places where the strongest could not.
And sometimes, the most dangerous army was the one nobody bothered to fear.
Three days later, the soldiers would come for her.
She intended to be ready.