Killy, a silent loner possessing an incredibly powerful weapon known as a Gravitational Beam Emitter, wanders a vast technological world known as "The City". He is searching for Net Terminal Genes, a (possibly) extinct genetic marker that allows humans to access the "Netsphere", a sort of computerized control network for The City. The City is an artificial structure of immense volume, separated into massive "floors" by nearly-impenetrable barriers known as "Megastructure". The City is inhabited by scattered human and transhuman tribes as well as hostile cyborgs known as Silicon Life. The Net Terminal Genes appear to be the key to halting the unhindered, chaotic expansion of the Megastructure, as well as a way of stopping the murderous robot horde known as the Safeguard from destroying all of humanity.
This is the most that you should know before reading it for the first time.
Explanation
However, if it's not quite enough to make a decision about whether it's unique enough, see the undermentioned (which is a slight spoiler):
spoiler
Blame! is set in "The City", a gigantic megastructure occupying much of what used to be the Solar System. Its exact size is unknown, but Tsutomu Nihei suggested its diameter to be at least equal to Jupiter's orbit,[citation needed] or about 1.6 billion kilometers (a detail suggested in the manga by having Killy cross an empty, spherical room roughly the size of Jupiter, suggesting that it had housed the planet before its disassembly).
According to the prequel manga NOiSE, the City began as a much smaller structure erected on Earth by the robotic "Builders". Humanity controlled the Builders through the Netsphere, an advanced computer network whose access was restricted to human use only, and authenticated by a genetic marker known as the Net Terminal Gene. Anyone who attempted to access the Netsphere without the marker was eliminated by an automated security force known as the Safeguards. However, a terrorist cult known as "the Order" released a retrovirus that deleted the Net Terminal Gene from all humans, thus cutting off their access to the Netsphere and their control over the Builders. Without specific instructions, the Builders began to build chaotically and indefinitely, while the Safeguards' programming degraded into a mandate to kill all humans without the Net Terminal Gene, whether they wanted to access the Netsphere or not.
By the time of the events of the manga, the City has come to resemble a series of layered, concentric Dyson spheres, filled with haphazard architecture and largely devoid of life. These layers compose the supporting scaffold of the City, known as the Megastructure; the underside of each layer periodically illuminates the overside of the one below to provide a day–night cycle. The Megastructure is extremely durable, with only a direct blast from a Gravitational Beam Emitter being able to penetrate it. Travel between layers is challenging, both due to the City's chaotic layout and the risk of provoking a Safeguard response; due to the size of the City, it is also extremely time-consuming, despite such amenities as elevators that can reach relativistic speeds. The buildings on each layer are largely uninhabited, although scattered human and post-human tribes, rogue Builders, hostile Safeguards, and Silicon Life can be found throughout the entire City.
Mr. Beedell, Roke JL
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