After the Day of Change, people lived with an unshakable sense of unease.

The sudden shift in the color of black holes, the white ash that fell like snow, the increasingly frequent appearance of gates and rifts, and the presence of monsters—all of these signs seemed to herald a new disaster. Even though J had appeared as a hero, everything felt like an ominous prelude to another catastrophe. People had not forgotten the loss that the Day of the Rifts had carved into their lives.

Gradually, street preachers who claimed the end of the world was near became a common …