It's Ruwen’s Ascension Day, and he finally dies for the first time. His newly revived body can learn Spells and Abilities for the Class given him by the Goddess Uru, and dying is no longer permanent. Ruwen’s high intelligence makes becoming a Mage inevitable. With his new powers, he will locate his parents and clear their family name. But nothing goes as Ruwen imagined, and when a rival God tries to kill Ruwen shortly after his disastrous Ascension, his focus turns from his future to just surviving.

The guards say there are no children in the Moonstone Mines, a place walked only by men condemned to slavery and death. An unyielding curse ensures none can depart its dark depths. And yet, a child named Red awakens in the mines with no memory. Haunted by enigmatic dreams, he melds with the slaves, enthralled by tales of the world above. He learns how to cultivate and hunt the deadly monsters that infest the mines, but escape remains an impossibility. Until escape is the only option left.

Books 1–3 of the Painting the Mists series. Clear Sky, book one: Martial cultivators, flying swords, and magic talismans. Blood Moon, book two: The kindest hearts make the cruelest villains. The perfect tools if you know where to buy them... Light in the Darkness, book three: Cha Ming and Huxian have faced the heavens and lived.

Sen never dreamed of ascension. Such were the aspirations of the rich young nobles, not orphans like him, scraping together a meager living on the streets of Orchard’s Reach. However, when destiny takes an unexpected turn, Sen finds himself thrust into the role of a cultivator’s disciple. Chosen over the nobles who once looked down on him, he is adopted into a makeshift family of three ancient cultivators, each with a lifetime of knowledge and insights. These old monsters will teach Sen everything they can, from the art of the jian and spear to the mysteries of arcane alchemy.

Humans have been pushed to the brink of extinction by an ever-evolving demonic threat. Portals are opening faster than ever, Towers are bursting into the skies, and Dungeons are being mined below the last safe havens of society. The demons are winning. Quest Academy stands defiantly against them as a place to train the next generation of Heroes. The Guild Association is holding the line but is in dire need of new blood and the powerful abilities they could bring to the battlefront. To be the saviors that humanity needs, they need to surpass the limits of those that came before them.

Tad doesn't have any memory before waking up on the beach, apparently the sole survivor of a shipwreck. All he has from his past is a necklace with a symbol no one recognizes. After growing up in the orphanage, he takes a job managing inventory for a merchant catering to adventurers. He knows he's a bit off, the world just smells different to him. When he's confronted by a group of adventurers with more power than ethics, he learns that it's been magic he is smelling all along.

Zach grew in power and thrived in the post-Framework world. He became a respected leader, a shining example of what it meant to be good. But as the world ended, he had only one thought: to punish the monster that had killed the world long before the Framework ended it. Yet not even with his incredible power was he able to stand against the World Ender. His arrival in the new realty, the Infinite Realm, gives him the chance to grow stronger, to find the monster again-and make it pay.

Elijah Hart is dying. Wracked by cancer and weakened by chemotherapy, all he wants is to spend what little time he has left with his sister and her family in Washington. But fate has other plans. When the mysterious World Tree extends its branches to Earth, Elijah's Seattle-bound flight crashes into the Pacific Ocean and a game-like system takes hold—reshaping humanity's future as well as his own destiny.

Rockland Barkclay has had a rough year. On top of everything else, his father has just passed, and Rocky has to go it alone on their annual trip. But his plans for drinking alone in Algonquin Park are rudely interrupted by a sea of cosmic energy that governs the universe. Ether, the driving force of creation, has returned. Now a confused Rocky must navigate odd hovering messages to survive.

Silas is inducted into the System, becoming the last in a long line of Earth's "forerunners." The rewards are great, but the danger is greater. We are not alone in the universe. The fate of five worlds hangs on how their forerunners perform. Will Silas have what it takes to win Earth a place in the multiverse? Or will Earth become another mining world stripped of all resources and left a barren husk floating in the cosmos?

The Founders were the first marked, and they used those powers to build kingdoms, subjugate the land, and enrich themselves. They will not suffer another to join their ranks. Lost in a world with levels, stats, and monsters, Hal fights to survive in an unforgiving land, and to escape execution from its rulers. Ingenuity and courage won’t be enough. With marked powers he doesn’t understand, he’s easy prey for all the goblins, bandits, aberrations, and foul monsters that plague the realm. He’ll need to abandon his humanity by embracing the beast within.

Percy was born with little hope of standing out—just another face in a world ruled by bloodlines and class. Starting with the lowest Red core and mocked as a waste, Percy was always overlooked by his peers and scorned by the powerful. But when his bloodline awakens with the power to send clones across worlds, he seizes the chance to shatter expectations.

Orodan was an orphaned street rat who clawed his way to the county militia with hard work. When calamitous events unfold and draw him into events bigger than himself, Orodan's battle-loving disposition leads to a warrior's death. Then he wakes up again at the start of the Cataclysm. Then again. And again. In a world of skills, titles, and blessings, a smart time-looper would perhaps scheme, plan, amass equipment, and allies. But not Orodan. If there's one thing he's good at, it's stubbornly trying the same thing over and over again via brute force till it's done.

I never believed in the whole “light at the end of the tunnel” folly where people, after having a near-death experience, would startle awake in a cold sweat exclaiming, “I saw the light!” But there I was, in this so-called “tunnel” facing a glaring light, when the last thing I remembered was sleeping in my room - the royal bed-chamber, as others called it. Had I died? If so, how? King Grey once benefited from unrivaled strength, wealth, and prestige in a world governed by martial ability but now finds himself reborn in a society dominated by magic.

Oren was a dominant force in the bustling digital realm of NEO, commanding wealth, prestige, and high levels. But when fate deals him a cruel blow, trapping him in the body of a lowly goblin and depriving him of his ability to log out, Oren is forced to fight for survival. Stripped of his immense powers and cast into a hostile, monster-ridden wilderness, with the constant risk of the game frying his nervous system, his only way out of the virtual purgatory is to win.