2015: Initial appearance of the Corona Aurum flowers recorded. Scientists are baffled at its DNA, which does not share any resemblance with any flowering plant on Earth.
2016: The flowers are found to contain compounds that promote cellular longevity. Research intensifies.
2018: First animal experiments involving the flower extracts take place under a project by the Fenrir Corporation. Ends in the death of twelve researchers and twenty security personnel.
2020: The Ash Giant manifests in the Tokyo Bay. Inhabitants initially think it is a prank for an upcoming monster movie. Millions die in the first few hours. In the coming months, the Ash Giant proves to be impervious to conventional weaponry. Japan is thoroughly ravaged. The decision to utilize nuclear weapons is approved. Eventually, the giant is successfully destroyed, but the cost in lives and infrastructure is immense. The Japanese Home Islands are reduced to a lifeless radioactive wasteland.
2021: The first Ash Winter occurs as the giant’s dispersed particles, circulating in the upper atmosphere for the past year, finally fall back to Earth. They prove to have adverse physiological effects. Not all succumb to the infection, but those life-forms that do mutate into ashen-white creatures that do nothing but devour. Cases begin appearing simultaneously all over the globe. The creatures are dubbed the Cineres.
2024: Corona Aurum flowers are proven to be able to resist the infection. Work on a nanomachine-deployed vaccine begins in earnest as mankind makes their retreat into filtered biodomes, losing ground under the Cineres onslaught.
2025: The Fenrir Corporation completes their work on the nano-vaccine. Humanity starts to fight back.
2030: The last of the Cineres are eradicated. The world begins its recovery. Rapid progress is made in the field of artificial intelligence, networking and cybernetics.
2038: Children with strange, inexplicable abilities begin to appear.
2040: The children are traced back to mothers who were vaccinated while previously in preliminary infectious stages of the Cinis disease. The media begins calling them Ash Children.
2045: Tensions regarding the Ash Children intensify, with religious cults forming around some of the more powerful individuals.
2050: A war over the Ash Children begins between the surviving nations, as they struggle for dominance in the rubble of their once thriving civilizations.
2052: Nuclear weapons are used, though the circumstances behind the event are unclear.
2053: The war ends with the remaining countries agreeing to unite for the sake of their continued survival. Most of the Ash Children did not survive the war. New Children are still born occasionally.
2060: The Fenrir Corporation establishes the League of Superheroes, a commercial endeavour that utilizes modern technological advancement and the abilities of the Ash Children to develop an organization of superheroes that fight crime. It does not take a year before the first eager supervillains appear.
2070: The League has become a reality TV show where heroes are ranked by both power and popularity. Superheroes are now a career pathway...
***
[CONFIDENTIAL]
[PROSPECTIVE MEMBERS SAMPLE]
FIRESTARTER
Strength: B
Speed: B
Intelligence: C
Power: B (Pyromancy)
CYBORG JACK
Strength: A
Speed: A
Intelligence: B
Power: C (Cybernetic Enhancements)
THE MENTALIST
Strength: C
Speed: C
Intelligence: A
Power: A (Telepathy, Telekinesis)
ANIMAL FRIEND
Strength: A
Speed: B
Intelligence: D
Power: D (Animal Communication)
HOBO RIDER
Strength: D
Speed: D
Intelligence: S
Power: - (None)
***