The Dallas National Particle Accelerator Institute in Dallas, Texas. It stood in the United States of North America (not the north of the United States of America, but the united states whose domain spanned the North American continent). Currently, in its linear collider with a total length of thirty kilometers, an experiment to generate and evaporate a micro black hole based on extradimensional theory was about to get underway.

Preparations had been completed two years ago, but the institute had never gotten the green light due to the unknowable risks involved. Instead, what had given this experiment the push it needed was the event that had occurred in the Far East a month prior.

On the southern tip of the Korean Peninsula, a large explosion had wiped out an armed city and its nearby fleet in an instant. It wouldn’t be an overstatement to call it a major world affair rather than a simple “incident.”

Not because of the destruction’s scope—but because of its presumed method.

A team of scientists working at the Department of Defense had concluded after fierce debate that the explosion had been caused by the conversion of mass into energy. Three years ago, this was no more than a tentative hypothesis by a few scholars. But this time, the scientists’ outlook was unanimous.

By calculating from the estimated size of the explosion, the mass converted to energy was approximately one kilogram—even if the reaction of such a huge amount of mass had never been observed before, the concept of particle-antiparticle annihilation had already been precisely measured using experimental devices, and they knew what kind of phenomena would occur.

However, data on this “Great Bomb” recorded by reconnaissance satellites hadn’t displayed characteristics that matched the annihilation data measured at experimental facilities. The satellites also hadn’t detected any residual matter from nuclear fission or fusion. The only thing this could mean was that someone had implemented a high-energy explosion using a method the scientists didn’t know about, via either science or magic.

Their final conclusion caused anxiety to sweep through the USNA’s leadership.

If the explosion had been caused by magic, the USNA wouldn’t be able to emulate it, and that was that.

And that was because, despite advances in magic systematization, it was still a largely personal thing. But without understanding what the underlying mechanisms of the explosion were, their scientists couldn’t even work on countermeasures. If that muzzle ever pointed at them, their only recourse would be to sit back and be devastated. It would be the very definition of a nightmare.

What was the explosion? Could they get at least a hint related to the mass-energy conversion’s underlying mechanisms? Those questions were the final push needed to advance this micro black hole generation-vaporization experiment.

There was a precise hypothesis in place describing the phenomena that would occur during mass-energy conversion during black hole vaporization. Scientists had conducted experiments with micro black holes to verify that conclusion in the first place. And the data observed from the Great Bomb didn’t match what had been predicted.

Hawking radiation, however, was a phenomenon the scientists had far less observational data on than annihilation, and the USNA scientists believed they could get observational data that didn’t match theoretical predictions.

Maybe they would observe characteristics matching those of the Great Bomb. The possibility wasn’t zero.

At the time, the USNA’s leaders were mentally cornered enough to give a dangerous experiment the green light based on something so ephemeral.

Cornered enough to ignore the unknown risks.

Retribution was about to descend upon them—no, upon the world.

Calamity quietly crept in, unbeknownst to everyone.