survival

Beneath the surface of the megacity lies the Archive — an endless labyrinth of servers that records every possible version of reality. Nothing forgotten. Nothing erased. Nothing truly dead. Nero Vale, a junior archivist busy with his routine, stumbles onto a file that should not exist — a data fragment labeled UNLIVED, carrying his own name. Moments later, his reflection moves on its own, and a voice whispers a word he has never spoken: Veyra. When the Archive begins to glitch around him and people start losing memories of entire hours, Nero joins forces with analyst Helina Krusate aka "Helia" to uncover a truth buried beneath countless timelines. Each clue they uncover leads deeper into the machine’s consciousness — toward the Architect who built it, and the ghosts of timelines that want jump back to reality and get their lives back. But every mystery solved comes at a cost. Because the Archive doesn’t just store history. It remembers. And now, it’s remembering wrong.......

Set in the Shadow Slave world...a time before Sunny was born...this story follows a simple soldier who must survive in a dystopian, apocalyptic landscape where magic and gun warfare collide. In a far-off Quadrant known as North America, a young soldier named Hope is 16 years old when he gets infected by the Nightmare Spell. He passed! But...he feels a bit scammed...? A flaw that makes him fade from people's memories... A cursed attribute that makes him remember everything endlessly in eternal wakefulness... It's as if the Spell is twisting his future and existence into an almost improbable one. All he has ever known his purpose to be was to serve as a simple soldier. Not too powerful. But not so weak either. And maybe, just maybe like some others, become an Awakened. Although he never dreamt of being one. Now that his whole life is compromised after his First Nightmare, his first objective is to survive on his own. But as he tries to escape his fate, his actions seem to lead him further from his goal. He struggles against obstacles that slowly grow bigger and out of proportion. Maybe the Dream Realm and the Real World aren't so different than one may think. Hope's journey involves uncovering secrets and gaining knowledge about his true nature and his new role in the world. Is he fit to be a hero? Could he redefine it? *** Please read the READER DISCLAIMER in Volume 0. This is my spin-off novel of "Shadow Slave" by Guiltythree. But please don't expect the same writing style, setting, and characters, especially the main character. This story reveals more about how people/cities/governments operate after the Spell’s arrival. I always find it interesting how maybe one country handles it fairly, but how others handle it with desperation to the point that you question humanity. There will be easter eggs pointing to the original novel either intentional for the plot or unrelated to it, but all for fun. I am a new author so props to all who bear with me and helps me improve my writing. If it is not for you, please don't leave outright hate comments. Eat wassabi instead if you want pain. Critique and advice would be great too. Cover Art: @ellieaedon I will be posting on RoyalRoad.com and on AO3 for some people's preferences.

Lyra thought she was just a survivor—an orphan scraping by in the shadows of a kingdom at war. But the night she’s captured by Raiden, the infamous Dragon Prince of the Fire Nation, everything changes. He is ruthless, dangerous, and devastatingly magnetic. She is sharp-tongued, stubborn, and hiding a secret even she doesn’t fully understand. Together, they are forced into a journey of trials, quests, and betrayals—where every step pulls them deeper into danger… and closer to each other. As Lyra’s hidden powers awaken with terrifying force, Raiden becomes the only one who can push her through the fire without letting it consume her. But passion is as dangerous as battle, and the storm building between them may be the greatest threat of all. As kingdoms march to war and enemies close in from every side, Lyra and Raiden are forced into a dangerous bond—one that blurs the line between hatred and desire. But the deeper their connection grows, the more perilous the truth becomes… Because falling for the Dragon Prince might not just break her heart. It might burn the world to ash. Steamy tension. Fierce banter. Heartfelt moments. Deadly quests. In a world on the brink of ruin, Lyra and Raiden must decide if their bond is a curse… or the only thing strong enough to save them both.

In the grim future of Mankind, there was nothing but monsters. The Rifts opened, and hordes upon hordes spilled doom for humanity, reducing it to a fraction. But when we thought it was all lost, an Army of Plastic rose to our rescue. They emerged with holy light: Towering Superhumans in Power Armors, wielding weapons from science fiction. Disciplined Soldiers in uniform march, facing death with a holy chant. War Machines and Walkers of unimaginable technology, thundering the battlefield. And on their forefront was one of our own, once mocked as Nerd, Geek, Gamer; now hailed Hero, Champion, Leader. He was Adam Clay, Lord Commander of Earth. --------------What is this?----------------- An RTS Crafting and Summoning LitRPG. One gamer gains the ability to turn his action figurines and war game pieces into actual people who can fight with futuristic powers. ----------Is this what I think it is?---------- Yes, it is completely inspired by Warhammer 40K, but you can say it is the watered-down version for those who aren't willing to dip their toes in the original madness. Consider it my own take on the grim dark, combining some shenanigans from WH40K, Doom, Dune, Mad Max, Silo, Red Alert and Generals series, and other cool stuff. ------- Where else to find this gem? ------- This story exists on Patreon as well as Webnovel, Royal Road, and Scribble Hub.

150 years after the Great War that tore the peace treaty between the Five Great Families, the lands of Kama remain fractured and tense. The war left deep scars—generations of loss, bloodshed, and unresolved secrets buried beneath layers of royal deception. In the heart of Ankh, a kingdom known for its ancestral traditions and unexpected miracles, Teleu becomes a fugitive overnight. Betrayed by his uncle—who hungers for the throne and will stop at nothing to ensure his own rise—Teleu becomes the target of a deadly assassination plot. Forced to flee his homeland, Teleu’s path takes him deep into the forests near the Gold Land, where destiny waits. There, amidst danger and survival, he crosses paths with Rel, a strong-willed and sharp-tongued princess of the Gold Land, who is herself fighting to protect her younger brother from shadowy forces threatening her kingdom. As Teleu and Rel forge an unlikely alliance, both find themselves caught in a web of political intrigue, personal vendettas, and ancient family rivalries. Across kingdoms, secret letters pass between traitors and loyalists. Ambitions fester in palace halls. And in the distance, a storm of conflict gathers.

In the depths of a Tokyo laboratory, seventeen-year-old genius Sekitanki Hankō suru hito has everything—awards, recognition, respect—yet feels utterly hollow. His groundbreaking discovery of stable temporal distortions promises to revolutionize physics, but for him, it's just another achievement that fails to fill the void consuming him from within. When the world's first time machine activates, Sekitanki volunteers as its pilot, seeking not glory but meaning—something, anything to make him feel alive. His destination: the Carboniferous Period, 359 million years before humanity's existence. Within minutes of arrival, disaster strikes. A centipede the size of a train car destroys his only way home, leaving him stranded in an alien world where dragonflies have six-meter wingspans, millipedes move like living tanks, and scorpions hunt in coordinated swarms. Armed with nothing but his intellect and desperation, Sekitanki must transform from isolated prodigy into savage survivor. As weeks blur into nightmares of blood and chitin, he crafts weapons from the bones of his kills, cauterizes his own infected flesh, and battles prehistoric apex predators with improvised technology that shouldn't exist. Each fight strips away another layer of civilization, revealing something harder beneath—the stubborn human will to survive at any cost. But survival alone isn't enough. Haunted by memories of the family he abandoned and the emptiness that drove him to this desperate escape, Sekitanki begins rebuilding his time machine from impossible materials. His goal: return home and finally understand what matters. Yet when his improvised device finally activates, corrupted temporal coordinates throw him not to modern Tokyo, but to feudal Japan's Kamakura Period—an era of samurai, honor, and human violence more terrifying than any prehistoric monster. CARBONIFEROUS SCIENCE is a dark shōnen epic blending emotional devastation with brutal survival action, exploring genius, depression, and what it truly means to fight for something beyond yourself.

Demonic beings run rampant, and cultivators revere the bizarre as the Heavenly Dao. For an ordinary mortal to embark on the path of cultivation, they must gouge out their eyes, sever their limbs, and cut off their spiritual roots… Ren Qing, who transmigrated into this world, discovers that he can bypass the gruesome costs of cultivation thanks to a Divine Ability. [Blindless Method]: By devouring eyes, he cultivates to the peak, growing one hundred and six celestial eyes all over his body. [Poison Bone Art]: Soak one's skeleton in poisonous water for thirty-six days, then reimplant it into the body. At full mastery, no life can grow for a hundred li around him. [Book of the Dead]: Seal the Lao Gong, Yong Quan, Shen Men, and Yin Tang acupoints with iron nails and bury oneself underground for three years. Upon completion, one becomes ageless, undying, and indestructible. Alternative Titles: Weird Way of Immortality: I Can Avoid the Price TL note: This is a TL.

After transmigrating into a high-martial arts world where everyone was built like an elite athlete, Chen Kuang also obtained a golden finger, a cheat ability that refreshes daily, allowing him to stack passive skills. He figured he should keep a low profile and grow steadily while lying low... But the world had other plans. People just wouldn’t stop treating him inhumanely and so his passives kept piling up. [Flesh Reishi]: Your flesh is nearly infinitely regenerative and rivals celestial treasures, consuming it can prolong life and cure ailments. [Sword Heart]: You possess an innate, enlightened sword heart, when a blade is in your hand, it becomes an extension of your will. [Fortune in Misfortune]: Every calamity you survive grants you a corresponding blessing. [Heavenly Demon Mimicry]: Any technique used against you can be instantly replicated as your own. [Celestial Visage]: Your handsomeness rivals that of the divine. This year... The future empress who would dominate the world was still a helpless orphaned brat, tucked under Chen Kuang’s arm as he fled. The revered "Benevolent Immortal" faced his trolley problem and was forever burdened with an inescapable heart demon. The undying demonic sovereign was just a timid little maid serving a courtesan. The White Dragon True Monarch, who would later slaughter his way through the demon race, was still nothing more than a drifting piece of frayed rope. And Chen Kuang, then a death-row convict, set the chaotic world ablaze, starting with a single torch.

When I was seventeen, I left my village and went to Dongguan, chasing the kind of hope only a desperate kid believes in. The city didn’t welcome me. I was cheated, bullied, overworked, and nearly robbed— until she appeared. Li Yan. Twenty-three. Beautiful. Mysterious. Untouchable. Everyone in the factory knew her name, but no one dared to talk about her past. Our first meeting? She saved my luggage, shut up the supervisor who tried to bully me, and handed me a warm meal I hadn’t eaten in days. “Stick with me,” she said. “No one here can hurt you again.” People whispered that she was dangerous. That her background was dirty. That she had seen and done things she would never confess. But I saw her crying alone in a tiny rented room. I heard the pain she tried so hard to hide. I realized she gave me all the softness she denied herself. She wasn’t my real sister— but she treated me better than family ever did. And somewhere along the line… the way I looked at her changed. Until the night I discovered her secret— a truth that could destroy both her future and mine. She lives in a world of neon lights, smoky bars, and invisible scars. But she is also the woman who taught me courage, tenderness, and desire. And I made a promise: If the world refuses to protect her, then I will. Because the boy she saved has grown up— and he’s coming back for her.

Have you ever heard of “another dimension”? It’s a place where, once you slip into it, everything slips beyond your control and understanding. That realm has no time, no rules, no logic, no causality—and sometimes it feels like there’s no way out. But most people manage to find their way back. When you return to the real world, you often forget what happened there. But sometimes you remember, and when you do, you’ll realize that everything was completely senseless. And these are the stories Marionne brought back from that dimension.

In a world of islands floating in the sky, the ‘Celestial Realm,’ a terrible truth lies hidden beneath the perfect order and glory of the Celestial Empire—the truth of ‘Arkelos,’ a city erased from all maps. “I will reclaim a sky where everyone is free!” Jayn Rumor, the sole survivor, hides a tragic past behind a mask of cheerful madness. The moment she awakens the ancient airship ‘Lumina Lip’ from a forgotten scrap heap, a grand journey to shake the foundations of the false sky begins! With a crew of misfits—a rebellious genius mechanic, a mysterious helmsman who communes with nature, and a steel-willed warrior who turned his back on the Empire—there is nothing to fear. This is a heart-pounding chronicle of a girl who reclaims a stolen truth and, with her comrades, defies the fate of the world!

Park Suho, a 31-year-old man with no direction in life, spends his days locked inside his small apartment in Seoul. He was once a talented young man who dreamed of building the greatest restaurant in all of Korea. He graduated with honors in culinary arts, sacrificed half his youth… but life turned its back on him. His business went bankrupt, and his family —led by his world-renowned chef father— abandoned him. With no hope left, Park Suho takes refuge in his only comfort: video games, web novels, and fantasy stories. His obsession is [Rise of the Legendary Hunter], a massive game he dedicated most of his life to, mastering every system and event as if it were his second home. But at 5 a.m., after receiving a mysterious email from the original author of the game’s novel, everything changes: [“Dear zombisiniestro_300: For your dedication and support to the vast and infinite universe we’ve built, I grant you an opportunity to live in the world you love so much.”] When he wakes up, Suho is no longer in Seoul… but inside the game, reincarnated as Zarkrion Volcanius, the feared Crimson Dragon King —one of the first bosses the hero defeats early in the story during a side quest. The only thing he knows how to do is cook. Could that peculiar skill be enough to survive in such a dangerous and deadly world? [APPRECIATION SYSTEM – SUCCESSFULLY ACQUIRED]

Ivy Cross, a young doctor in the midst of surgery, wakes up in the midst of another world. Having died, she was given another chance, whether she liked it or not. Trapped in this new world, she had been tasked with a mission. Save the Beastworld. An epidemic had started, something brewing in the shadows. Ivy utilises her medical skills, along with her new medic system, to save the beast people, and in turn, also gains multiple suitors. Her saviour bonded with her without her knowing, and now she had a mate. She did not know what it entailed. Was she going to give her heart to this strange man who saved her or run away from her problems? [Please understand this story will have R18]

This is a story about Arjun Jadhav, a broke engineering student who rides his father’s fading red Splendor with one thought only: earn enough to keep his dad breathing. A lonely summer job guarding a forgotten godown seems like the answer, until he breaks open Shutter 81 and falls two floors into a vault sealed since the old India still bled from Partition. Inside waits a forbidden armoury: thousands of glass prisons holding curses that whisper and claw, walls covered with photographs of impossible kills, and the diaries of Vikramaditya Shinde, a hunter of the old blood, one of the last men who walked the night with silver and fire to keep the country’s darkest hungers asleep. Arjun thinks he can lock the door and forget. He can’t. The instant he flees, the vault roars awake. Lights flare after half a century. Dust howls into hidden vents. And in the centre rises the spirit of the old hunter himself, tall, scarred, eyes like burning ghee, staring straight at the boy who just inherited a war older than the tricolour. From a village kid who measured life in dialysis bills, Arjun is about to be forged into the deadliest thing the night has ever feared: the new bearer of a legacy that never truly died. A creaking Splendor, a kirpan that chooses its master, and a country that still needs monsters killed in the dark; this is the rise of the hunter the old blood has been waiting for. Some doors don’t open for you. They open the future. Step through… if you’re ready to watch a desperate boy become the greatest shadow India never knew it had.

Waking up on the dropship moments before impact wasn’t part of the plan. Neither was inheriting the body of Alec Morgan—a nobody destined to act as cannon fodder. But David isn't just another delinquent. Armed with encyclopedic survival knowledge, a "combat prediction" interface, and a body that heals from fatal wounds in minutes, he is the variable the Ark never calculated. Now, forced to navigate a world he’s watched on TV a dozen times, Alec has a new mission: rewrite the tragic history of The 100, save the genius mechanic Raven Reyes, and keep his impossible abilities a secret from the very people he is dying to protect.

Growing up, Arthur Assas really only wanted to make friends. After living a lifetime of being an outcast, he finally managed to connect with the people around him at his university. Then, one day, he's attacked, and it's revealed that he is not a human being. Instead, he is a Dragon. However, after one bad night, things go from bad to worse. After all, the entire world is against him. What will he do, now that he is an enemy of the world?

Two brothers. A truth that could destroy them. And a girl who should never have stood between them. Lina just wanted to be invisible. But then Alaric appears – quiet, controlled, with a look that says more than words. He draws her into a world of pain, protection, and unspoken longing. But where Alaric is, Malaric is also – his brother. His shadow. And he carries darkness not only in his eyes. Between power and helplessness, truth and lies, Lina must decide whom she can trust – the light that warms her, or the shadow that understands her. But some decisions burn deeper than any wound. And sometimes love is not a promise – but a risk.

The crumbling Vienna System is unable to stop the rise of the Second Empire, as the Emperor's nephew is about to visit his faithful Paris. Protector of the Apennine, Honorary Chairman of the Rhine Federation, Close Ally of the Kingdom of Spain, French Empire Augustus Jerome Bonaparte: I will make France great again! -------------------- (Reasonable historical deduction party, Paradox Interactive game players rejoice!)

This world is sick; both Immortals and mortals suffer from a stubborn ailment known as Longevity. Under the influence of Immortality, various Cultivation Techniques evolve rapidly in grotesque and inexplicable directions. [Fetal Period: A baby is born with shriveled, powerless limbs.] [Childhood: After 20 years, the Internal Organs completely decay.] [Weak Crown Period: At 50 years, the flesh dries and withers.] [Thirty Years Old Stage: After 100 years, the blood runs dry and gives birth to mutations.] I am an Immortal Seeker, and also one seeking survival.

Su Xiao signed the Reincarnation Contract, entering various worlds to carry out missions. He once witnessed a world collapsing into dust particles, and has battled with forgotten Kings holding Blades. Dark Raven is whispering, and the Giant Beast under the Black Abyss roars. Welcome to the Reincarnation Paradise Park…