From the age of six, she decided that she wanted more and with the help of her local gang-leader she learned the skills to escape the relentless pressure to mediocrity. On her sixteenth birthday, she was inadvertently implanted with a Neural Enhancement Chip instead of the free Government provided basic level personal AI. This mistake not only removed the limits placed on the AI but also broke some of the Government instigated control parameters. Leah’s life rapidly becomes a battle, both in the virtual-multiverse and in real life. On the Stork Tower by Wáng Zhīhuàn Along the mountains sink the last rays of sun, Towards the sea, the Yellow River does forward go. If you would fain command a thousand miles in view, To a higher storey, you are expected to go.

    Like one moment you’re drinking your coffee and the next you are naked in what looks like a medieval village. And worse, the coffee is gone. Must be a Monday. Paul Walsh really didn’t need this. Divorced, Wrong side of 40 and not exactly what you would call fit. Now some mystical force has set him up as today’s hope to save a village. Kill Monsters, Harvest their Souls and Power their Wall. A magical wall of black energy that stretches further than the horizon and up higher than the clouds. It keeps the monsters out and lets those selected thru. And he’s one of a thousand that have been selected to go forth in the last 3 years. New ones get selected only if the previous never returns by nightfall. No pressure. No pressure at all. Paul’s definitely too old for this sh.. At least there’s Orcs, Centaurs, Elves, Lamia, Harpies and the odd Spider. He also runs into the Dead, Night Ones, Dryads, Driders and Troublesome Nobles. To comfort him there are Fair Maidens, Noodles and yummy Rice Balls. Warnings and Minor Spoilers: This is an Isekai (Portal Fantasy) novel with Adult themes, Swearing and Graphic Violence in its many forms, set in a Medieval style Society, with cultural values to match. Adult relationships with Societal Harem themes that slowly disappear as the story progresses. Please Read with that in consideration. And watch out for the Snotters, they bite.

    But when a solar storm reconnects Earth to the Fae Nexus, the world is engulfed in magical energy, altering the laws of nature… violently. Fuel, ammunition, and electronics explode, leaving the world in a dark apocalypse.As the flames die down, demons emerge through the Fae Nexus, swarming Gage’s hometown and enslaving the survivors.To fight back, Gage and his reunited friends harness Fae powers, becoming the Wizard, Ranger, and Fighter they’ve always played in their favorite roleplaying game.With the help of a pair of moonshiners turned Alchemists and the ghost of a long-dead gunslinger, Gage and his friends have to level up fast to free their families and defend their home against the demonic horde.He may have walked away once, but this time the only thing Gage is leaving behind are his regrets and a pile of dead demons.

    Collision, imminent. An international team of scientists is working around the clock to avert the cataclysm—few are optimistic. World governments are preparing for impact with deep earth bio-dome bunkers, but only a select few lottery winners will be saved. Jack Mitchel, a thirty-two-year-old EMT living in a tiny studio apartment on the West Coast, isn’t one of those winners. Still, there might be a way for him to survive Astraea: a slim chance, requiring a radical leap of faith. Through a connection at Osmark Technologies, Jack’s acquired a NexGenVR capsule and with it, a one-way ticket to the brand-new, ultra-immersive, fantasy-based VRMMORPG, Viridian Gate Online. Taking that leap of faith, though, means permanently trapping his mind in the game, killing his body in the process. Worse, one in six die during the transition, and even if Jack beats the odds, he’ll have to navigate a fantastical world that’s home to vicious monsters, domineering AIs, and cutthroat players. And when Jack stumbles upon a secret conspiracy to sell off virtual real estate to the ultrawealthy—transforming V.G.O. into a new feudal dark age—the deadly creatures inhabiting Viridian Gate’s expansive dungeons will be the least of his concerns. If Jack can’t game the system, he’s going to be trading in a quick death for a long, brutal one …

    And so am I ...Sixteen-year-old Leilani loves surfing and her home in Hilo, on the Big Island of Hawaii. But she's an outsider - half white, half Hawaiian, and an epileptic.While Lei and her father are on a visit to Oahu, a global disaster strikes. Technology and power fail, Hawaii is cut off from the world, and the islands revert to traditional ways of survival. As Lei and her dad embark on a nightmarish journey across islands to reach home and family, she learns that her epilepsy and her deep connection to Hawaii could be keys to ending the crisis before it becomes worse than anyone can imagine.A powerful story enriched by fascinating elements of Hawaiian ecology, culture, and warfare, this captivating and dramatic debut from Austin Aslan is the first of two novels. The author has a master’s degree in tropical conservation biology from the University of Hawaii at Hilo.

    But Shining is now something more than human. And the scrapyard is no longer just a scrapyard, but a place full of secrets that she has guarded for years.This life she has built, while empty, is predictable and safe. Until the only friend left from her previous life shows up, dead, in the back of a scrapped Tesla warplane, a note to her clutched in his fingers - a note warning her of a coming attack.Someone knows who she is. Someone knows what she is guarding. Will she be able to protect the scrapyard? Will she even survive? Or will she have to destroy everything she loves to keep her secrets out of the wrong hands?

    With it, anything becomes possible. The world is changing... and it has yet to be determined if it is for better or worse. Two friends who grew up together, Ace and Vincent, decide to use the tattoo to do what they always dreamed of.

    Whenever you play your favorite online game, beware: your mind might merge with the virtual world and dump its comatose host. Woe be to those stuck forever in Tetris! And still they're the lucky ones compared to those burning alive eternally within the scorched hulls of tank simulators. But some unfortunates - the handicapped and the terminally ill, shell-shocked army vets, wronged crime victims and other society misfits - choose to flee real life willingly, escaping to the limitless world of online sword and sorcery MMORPGs. Once a seasoned gamer and now a terminal cancer patient, Max grasps at this final chance to preserve his life and identity. So he goes for it - goes for the promise of immortality shared with a few trusty friends and the woman he loves. Together they roam the roads of AlterWorld and sample its agony and ecstasy born of absolute freedom.

    In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . .Five thousand years later, their progeny—seven distinct races now three billion strong—embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilliant.

    The world has succumbed to an alien plague, with most of the population transformed into mindless, savage creatures. The planet’s refugees flock to Darwin, where a space elevator—created by the architects of this apocalypse, the Builders—emits a plague-suppressing aura.Skyler Luiken has a rare immunity to the plague. Backed by an international crew of fellow “immunes,” he leads missions into the dangerous wasteland beyond the aura’s edge to find the resources Darwin needs to stave off collapse. But when the Elevator starts to malfunction, Skyler is tapped—along with the brilliant scientist, Dr. Tania Sharma—to solve the mystery of the failing alien technology and save the ragged remnants of humanity.

    Noncitizens and individuals of low social standing can only find work in one place – the virtual world of Disgardium. And that might mean mining ore; it could just as well mean cleaning pigsties or washing dishes in a tavern, but that’s about as glamorous as it gets.Fifteen-year-old schoolboy Alex has dreams of working as a space guide. All he can think about is the stars, but life gets in the way and now his only path to achieving that goal is through the game.

    A gamer and a bit of a nerd, Sean's philosophy in life has been to keep his head down and get his work done, he doesn't have the time or money for anything more. But when a failed kidnapping attempt leaves him with a gaping hole in his memory, his oldest friend dead, and his mother missing, Sean suddenly finds his whole world turned upside down as he's suddenly thrust into the hidden world of magic and the supernatural. Apparently he's now wanted, dead or alive, by all of the magical societies, though he has no idea why. About the only thing going for him is what his friend did for him just before he died, and the cute track star that lives in the room next to his, that has suddenly taken a very personal interest in his problems. WARNING: “Black Friday” contains explicit sexuality, nudity, violence, bad language, attempted murder, actual murder, self-defense, pro-active self-defense, destruction of private property, arson, tantric magic, polyamory, mayhem, gratuitous sex and violence, littering, jay-walking, firearms, a racist goblin, an honest lawyer, and a kindly old gossip who likes to give cookies to kids.

    The catch: The only current VR with the capability to receive him is the unreleased video game, Enora Online, and Gemini must survive until level ten or be completely wiped from the servers… and existence. Welcome to Enora Online, where virtual is reality.

    They just have to survive, level up and find other survivors.Jake is no gamer. But when he finds out aliens have arrived, he'll do anything to protect his little sister Sam.Will they be able to grow strong enough for the second wave or will they become alien plant food?APOCALYPSE ONLINE is a litrpg/gamelit post-apocalypse fantasy series filled with action, adventure, aliens and snarky AIs.If you are a fan of System Apocalypse, Defiance of the Fall, or the Sun Shadow series, you'll love Apocalypse Online!

    Only that he had a bit of a disagreement with the church -- something to do with a beheading?Now reborn, Ryan begins to arm his darkness dungeon with devious traps, bestial zombies and ill-named skeletal creations, without doing anything too evil. Well, mostly. Some adventurers just deserve a stalactite to the head.But Ryan quickly learns being a darkness dungeon isn't all loot and bone puns. With a necromancer on the rise and the Adventurer's Guild watching his every move, he must prove that not all darkness dungeons are malevolent... even if they do have a few skeletons in their caverns.Sadly, all of these issues keep distracting him from his own guilty pleasure, skeletal fight club. But don't tell his fairy about that.