The Core of the Heart

About 65 million years ago, countless meteorites struck Earth, causing the devastating catastrophe known as the fifth mass extinction. Yet the disaster was not without purpose. The impacts brought a mysterious energy with them, carried in fragments of the meteorites, which changed Earth’s ecology and the forms of life upon it. Large and small meteorites became mountains and stones, then grew covered with plants over tens of thousands of years. Herbivores ate the plants, and carnivores ate the herbivores. In this way, driven through the food chain, the mysterious force spread in cellular form throughout every living system on Earth. Then, 1,000 years ago, humans discovered meteorite remains in outer space and brought them back to Earth. Research by a biologist named Xia Yuan completely unleashed this mysterious power, which had always existed within all living things, and gave it the name “Core.” In the world 1,000 years later, will this power bring humanity hope, or despair?