Mu-ryeong's Spirit - Chapter 28: What Must Be Protected (1)

I am currently re-writing the first chapters of this story. They are quite rough and bounce around a lot and I can do better. At some point, I will replace these with the better chapters.Sometime in 2024 Aethon Books will publish the first volume of this story on Amazon, KU, and audible. This will mean the story will be stubbed. I will notify people far in advance of that.In the dystopian world of the future, life is rough when you live at the bottom. Jobs are non-existent. Far too many people live in poverty, crammed into huge buildings called Habitats. With no jobs in the real world, many people can only find work online in VR worlds as servants to the very rich. And it's getting worse. The old internet is unusable and hacked to pieces. The new system needs AI to run things, but all but one of them were destroyed. The last sentient AI is ordered to create a new game world so the rich can have a playground, and the corporations that rule the world can have a new global market place. Everyone wants a piece of the new game. The guilds are competing to be the first to find the dungeons and kill the biggest monster. The corporations are claiming land and putting in their online market places. Ozzy and his friends just want a paycheck.Four friends sign five year contracts as virtual serfs in a small village, and can't go adventuring at all to gain money. They don't have many choices. They can work as a blacksmith, barmaid and shepherd for all those years....or they can cheat and find ways to take advantage of the system and carve out a section of the game world for themselves, and earn a fortune in the real world.When they give you a mop and not a sword, you have to find the loopholes and change the rules.

“Did you really think that after all that you've done to me, I would simply let you go, Rosalie? You might as well go to the Devil himself because otherwise, I will definitely find you. No matter what.”One day, Wang Meiling, an ordinary office worker who likes to read romance fantasy books, wakes up in the body of Rosalie Ashter, a minor villainess in the R-rated fantasy novel that she was reading before this weird transmigration.As expected of the plot, Rosalie is supposed to die at the hands of her crazy and abusive brother Raphael, thus, armed with the detailed knowledge of the original story, Meiling is set to save the tragic villainess whose body she is now possessing and approaches Duke Damien Dio, the story's male lead who is suffering from the “Acme fever” curse.She offers him a one-year contract relationship, promising to help him relieve his suffering in exchange for his protection from the Ashter family and a hefty payment afterward.Although skeptical at first, Damien agrees to sign the contract, but when the time finally comes for Rosalie to leave the Duke, she realizes that ending their relationship might not be as easy as she thought.This novel can be categorized as “he falls first and he falls harder”.WARNING: The story contains mature content such as R18 scenes, obsessive/yandere behavior, domestic abuse, an indication of sexual abuse, and gaslighting. It will also include the depiction of violence and gore. Read at your own discretion.

Bestselling author Elias Vayne has spent years writing stories to escape the horrors of his past. As a child, he was the sole survivor of a massacre that wiped out his entire orphanage. He doesn’t remember how he survived—only that when the slaughter ended, he was the only one left standing.His latest work, The Arcane Academy Chronicles, takes place in Veylin Academy, a prestigious school of magic and combat. But one night, after finishing the final chapter, Elias wakes up inside his own book—not as the hero, not as the villain, but as an extra. Worse, he’s been reborn as Kael, the very same orphan who survived a similar massacre in the story.But something is wrong. The academy isn’t as he wrote it. Characters are acting off-script, unknown forces are rewriting events, and the mystery surrounding Kael’s survival mirrors the one in Elias’s real life. The more he tries to regain control of the narrative, the more he realizes this world may not be his creation at all.

Qi Condensation. Foundation Establishment. Core Formation. In the current world, only these three realms are known to be achievable. Nascent Soul is but a legend and the realms above it lost to the the long river of time. The modern era is known as Cultivation Civilization, a balance of power and civility, excess and moderation. While cultivation remains a secret practice, it has long since exposed itself to the mundane world, quietly intertwined with each facet of society. While the world appears to be at peace, what lies underneath is a conflict between human, cultivator, and demon, brewing for ages and waiting to implode. Yet in the wake of humanity’s rapid industrialization, qi—and consequently cultivation—is dying.