The Shift

"In 1998, Earth went through a sudden cataclysm. In the day now known as The Shift, portals started appearing in all of the main human cities and settlements. The appearance of the portals in itself brought a great disaster, since no building could withstand the sudden energy that exploded when one appeared, but that wasn't the worst of it. From inside these portals started appearing monsters thought to only exist in fantasy. Goblins, orcs, zombies, undead skeletons. 

The first year after The Shift was hellish. Governments couldn't come up with a solution and lost their authority, to the point the UN got disbanded; and the military couldn't deal with the threat the monsters represented. During that year, humanity lost close to a third of its population. Then, in 1999, they appeared. Humans who had awoken to inhuman powers and who were capable of fighting the monsters. 

The tides changed, and humanity was able to drive the monsters back where they came from. Then the internal problems started. These people, who were nicknamed Hunters by the masses, were too powerful for those in positions of power to ignore. The first country to try to subdue the Hunters was the US, and they served as an example of why power is dangerous and why greed is even worse. 

The US government fell overnight, and a new one had to be erected. Contrary to what people believed would happen, Hunters didn't covet charges in the govt.; they knew they were untouchable. What they wanted though was for there to be an organization separate from the government that could regulate their actions and act as a law enforcement for those who tried to abuse their powers. 

That is how the WHO, World's Hunter Organization, was born. With branches in every country in the world, the WHO served as a new form of UN, which not only regulated and kept track of Hunters all over the world, but also punished those who used their powers as a Hunter for their own personal agenda. While outlaws and illegal organizations still exist, the current state of the world would be many times worse if not for the WHO. 

Currently, sixteen years after the birth of the WHO, the world is in a state of relative peace. While portals still appear from time to time, humanity is now capable of detecting them beforehand through the GEMSs, short for Global Energy Measurement Satellites. These devices are constantly searching for abrupt increases in energy levels, which signal the near appearance of a Dungeon –the name given to the portals. This in turn gives the local WHO branch to send out an evacuation notice as to avoid possible casualties. 

Finally, I wanted to end this article by personally thanking the WHO and each and every Hunter out there for doing their best to keep us, regular people, safe. We owe our lives to each and every one of you.

Alan Gilmore, Journalist for the Shift Continental."

Alex finished reading the article right when the bus arrived at the stop near his high school. His brain was still trying to process everything, from the small changes to the bigger ones. While he had found some answers, he still had too many questions. Why had he woken up in this weird world after living seventeen years as a regular person in the regular Earth? Why was his grandfather's necklace able to awaken a person's dormant powers as a Hunter? Who was really his grandfather?

All Alex knew was that he didn't know enough, and he wanted to know terribly much. Alas, he couldn't do anything about it from his current position. If he wanted answers, he would have to earn them. And the only way to do that was to become a Hunter.

"Guess that's it then." Alex said to himself while tightly clutching the necklace. 'It's totally not because I thing being a Hunter is cool. Definitely not.'

"Yo Alex!" Someone called out to him from the school's entrance. Looking at the person, Alex recognized him as his best friend since kinder, Darius Namgung. Son of a Korean mother and an African-American father. "You seem a bit out of it today, bro. You okay?" 

"Yeah dude, just been thinking about the future lately" Alex answered while walking into the school with his friend. They spent a couple minutes talking until a girl Alex didn't know passed by them. Alex couldn't help but feel the girl was somewhat familiar, but at the same time he was sure she didn't attend his school until the day prior. "Who's she? I don't remember her." 

"The shemale with the short hair and a piercing?" Darius asked for confirmation. Seeing Alex nod, he went on to answer. "That one would be in my class, so that's why you don't know her. Her name is Subin Lee and I have the displeasure of saying I've known her for a long time."

'Subin Lee? Where have I heard that name before...' Alex began thinking, but unfortunately couldn't remember. While still thinking about Subin Lee, Alex separated from Darius since they were both in different classes and the first period was about to begin. 

Compared to what Alex was expecting, classes were as normal as they could be. Regular Math, regular Science, regular Hist... not History. It could be said that, for Alex, that day's History lesson had been the most interesting one in his entire life. They were studying modern history currently, which meant that The Shift was right in the eye of the storm. 

Besides History, Geography was also interesting for him, since the map he knew didn't exist in this new world. Not only had a lot of cities been wiped out in 1998, but even some countries didn't exist anymore. An example of it was the African western coast. Countries like Ghana, Togo or Ivory Coast didn't exist any longer, being now gathered under one flag and called Western African Union.

Alex had never felt like such a child, learning things that had been common sense to him his entire life all over again. All of that excitement had driven Subin Lee and even his soon to be awakening out of his mind. Unfortunately for the eager-to-learn Alex, classes had ended. And since he had no club activities, he could just leave school. While on the way out, he heard someone screaming. 

"Huh?! Who did you call a shemale, you babbling baboon?!" A clearly female voice screamed with the uncanny aggressiveness of a man. When looking more attentively, Alex could see Subin Lee grabbing Darius by the collar. "I will kick you ass all the way to your house!" 

'Wait, Subin Lee, Subin Lee...' Alex began thinking once again and finally arrived at the answer he wanted. 'She's from that webtoon I once read out of boredom!' 

'Wait... if she's here and she looks exactly like in the webtoon...' Alex began putting pieces and bits together. 'This world is much more than what I thought it was.' 

Not only were there "Dungeons" and "Monsters"... but also "Fictional Characters"!

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