He's a part-time Imperial hero, full-time thief. Lucky for him, she's not that kind of Inquisitor. Illusionist and novice spy Alan Campbell just got out of one relationship only to have another woman walk into his life: the Lady Camilla Favonius of the Imperial Inquisition. He's close to broke and left without orders. She wears plate armor in the field and around her heart. Is the lady just what the Plague Doctor ordered, or will his efforts to get a job and woo her only leave him jaded...or dead? From the city of Harrowick to the perilous depths of the Grass Sea, Alan will have to fight a corrupt syndicate, earn his place in the Thieves' Union, and face down monsters and the risen dead if he wants a happy ending. All the while, in the real world, Robert Osmark is as close to losing his company as he's ever been, and both Sandra and Jeff will have to pick sides once the battle lines are drawn. Brazen thievery, Death caught off-balance, the Dawn Elves' dirty secret, and unexpected love in Inquisitor's Foil, the third book of the Illusionist series. From James A. Hunter-author of Viridian Gate Online, Rogue Dungeon, War God's Mantle, and the Yancy Lazarus Series-and D.J. Bodden, author of The Black Year Series, comes an epic new entry into the Expanded Universe of Viridian Gate Online that you won't want to put down!
The End is Coming.An extinction-level asteroid is cannonballing toward Earth. In humanity's final hours, a lucky few earn a one-way ticket to the brand-new, ultra-immersive, fantasy-based VRMMORPG, Viridian Gate Online. Making that leap of faith might mean survival, but it comes with a steep price tag: "Travelers" will forever be stranded as digital avatars inside a fantastical world filled with vicious monsters, all-powerful AIs, and cutthroat players. Let the games begin ... Six amazing authors. Six incredible new tales. All set in the best-selling Viridian Gate Online Universe. Side Quests is an anthology for fans, by the fans! Included in Side Quests: "A Gentleman's Work" by James A. HunterWhen an Imperial Inquisitor captures a Thieves Guild Operative, Cutter must undertake a deadly rescue mission while using every grift in the book to stay one step ahead of a Headsman's Blade. And the prize for this extraordinary quest? Nothing short of the keys to the Rowanheath Thieves Guild. Deception, subterfuge, and heavy drinking-all in a day's work for a Gentleman ..."The Funeral Parlor" by Raymond JohnsonA young spiderling is stranded in an alien land, surrounded by hostile creatures. Forced to fight for her life in a bid to find her way home, she must transform into the predator she is destined to become or die alone and forgotten, trapped in a dark world know as the Shadowverse."The Raiding of Rowanheath" by J.D. AstraThe Crimson Alliance has breached the walls of Rowanheath, inciting Aleixo Carrera's rage. Now Abby and her rag-tag invasion crew must reach the keep's Command Center before the defending troops mobilize and shut down the takeover, else they'll lose the battle and the war for Eldgard's freedom."The Ballad of Jaro Edgewalker" by N.H. PaxtonJaro is an assassin, and he's good at it. But when he finds a foe that is insurmountable by normal means and uncovers a plot to destroy everything he loves, Jaro has to balance his morality with his love for his friends and make an incredibly difficult decision."Buried Alive" by Nicholas ReidCarlos Vega thinks he's escaping certain death by entering the virtual world of V.G.O., but instead he's swallowed alive by the deadly Barren Sands. He'll have to overcome the riddles and horrors of a long-forgotten temple in order to escape, but can he do it before the evil sealed there centuries ago finds him?"A Final Kindness" by D.J. BoddenAlan Campbell was a talker, not a fighter, until someone murdered his girl. He'd almost given up on finding the killers; now he's got a fresh lead, a trio of mercenaries who outclass him in every way but his wits. He'll cheat, bluff, and steal to get his revenge, and as one of V.G.O.'s immortal travelers, he's willing to die trying.Want to keep up with the Viridian Gate Online Universe? Visit Shadow Alley Press and subscribe to our mailing list!
The end of the world is not such a bad thing for Russian weapons engineer Vlad Nardoir.Really his world ended six months ago when his wife died, and ever since then, things have been downhill. Soul-crushing medical debt. Favors to the Russian mafia. Now, asteroid. For Vlad, this is life in a nutshell.But, in a wild twist of fate, he has found a way out. A chance to start fresh in a brand-new ultra-immersive MMORPG called Viridian Gate Online. Making the leap might kill him, but again, death is not such a bad thing for a man with nothing to live for. Even in the virtual world, however, old grudges burn true, and the past is not as far gone as it seems. He must use his quick wits, rugged persistence, and peculiar set of skills as a weapons engineer to make a place for himself in this new world, or be forcibly dragged back into the very life he fought so hard to escape.
If the destruction of Earth and extinction of humanity were imminent, how far would you go to survive? Would you kill your body to save your mind? Jack Mitchel is willing to risk everything to survive the apocalypse-including his essential humanity. An EMT in 2042 San Diego, Jack knows he won't survive the impact of the massive asteroid hurtling towards Earth. After all, he's not one of the handful of lucky lottery winners scheduled for rescue. But he did luck into a NexGenVR capsule, which means Jack can risk a one-way trip to the virtual reality world of Viridan Gate Online, a completely immersive online multiplayer fantasy role-playing game, or RPG. The transition to Viridian Gate Online (V.G.O.) is irreversible, and will kill Jack's corporeal form. And once players transition fully into the world of V.G.O., the risks aren't over-from cutthroat fellow players to greedy developers eager to replicate the wealth discrepancies of Earth in virtual reality, V.G.O. is just as dangerous as the 'real world' was. If Jack can't game the system, he's going to be trading in a quick death for a long, brutal one... LitRPG books combine tropes and themes from role-playing games with sci-fi and fantasy elements to tell a unique story that's exciting and super-relevant to today's world. Jack's adventures in a cutthroat virtual reality fantasy world will grip fans of Ready Player One and The Stormlight Archive alike. With over 200,000 copies sold, this is one series you don't want to miss!
Can a single promise change the world? Even with the Crimson Alliance formed, Rowanheath taken, and Carrera dispatched, the onslaught never ends for Abby Hollander. Keeping the Spider Queen in check and handling water provisions was never what Abby wanted to do with her life, but it's what the war demands of her. To add to that never-ending list of demands, suddenly Naitee Mungal has need of Abby as well, and unfortunately, Abby already promised she would answer if Naitee called. Now Abby will have to go where no Traveler has ever been allowed before, face a series of grueling trials, and battle the gods themselves, risking everything to return balance and save her sorceric brethren. If she fails, the realm of Gaia could once again be overrun by the power of the elements. If she succeeds, she'll become the greatest Firebrand in all of Eldgard. From James A. Hunter-author of Viridian Gate Online, Rogue Dungeon, Bibliomancer, and the Yancy Lazarus Series-and bestselling author J.D. Astra, comes an epic new entry into the Expanded Universe of Viridian Gate Online that you won't want to put down!
Build. Evolve. Conquer. The dawn of the Troll Nation has begun ... Roark von Graf-former noble and hedge-mage, current mid-level mob in a MMORPG-has taken down the Dungeon Lord of the Cruel Citadel, but the battle has only started. Lowen, right hand to the Tyrant King, has come to Hearthworld, and he is building an army of his own. Worse, Lowen and company have taken over one of the most powerful dungeons in the game, The Vault of the Radiant Shield. Even as a Jotnar and a newly minted Dungeon Lord, Roark is supremely outclassed and he bloody well knows it. If he's going to weather what's to come and topple the Tyrant King, he'll have to unlock the secrets of the stolen World Stone Pendant, master his new Hexorcist class, form some very unlikely allies, and most important ... Grief some heroes. Let the games begin! From James A. Hunter, author of the litRPG epic Viridian Gate Online, and eden Hudson, author of Path of the Thunderbird and the Jubal Van Zandt Series, comes an exciting new litRPG, dungeon-core adventure you won't want to put down!
What would you do if you awoke without memory, crucified, and on the brink of death? Varnoth, a shadow panther, must struggle to survive in the cruel world of Albattara. He must use his natural-born skills in this fantasy LitRPG to explore the land, complete quests, conquer dungeons, craft potions, destroy terrifying monsters, and find answers to his questions: Who is he? Why was he crucified?
After being betrayed and cursed by an extremely rare spell, Oren, a powerful and influential player, finds himself as a 1st level Goblin!Without even a fraction of his previous power, he vows to pull through and have revenge on those who betrayed him.His thorough knowledge of the game's world and his unique ability to immerse himself entirely are his only advantages. But first, he must figure out how to survive long enough playing what is basically a low-level fodder monster!
Priest or not, Liset is a healer, and she's here to save their ass, not kiss it. After rescuing a holy relic from Darklings, Liset the Blessed learns no good deed goes unpunished. The Temple of Areste has given her a day and a half to make a choice: be excommunicated for turning in the quest item or excommunicated for stealing it. Either way, she risks losing her hard-earned class as a Priestess of Gaia, and with it, her ability to heal the people of Viridian Gate Online. But the world has other plans, and her temple is the least of her worries. Between the return of the Darklings, an ancient Hvitalfarian evil, and a brewing civil war in Rowanheath, there's plenty of need for a healer. As a former physician, she has more tools at her disposal to heal people than magic. Even if she must go to war with her own temple, she won't let her faith be ripped away without a fight. Not when so many people depend on her.
The author of the Yancy Lazarus series introduces a golem forged from the ashes of WWII in “a dark tale of vengeance and redemption” (Domino Finn, author of the Black Magic Outlaw series). Levi Adams is a soft-spoken, middle-aged Mennonite man—at least he tries to be when he’s not murdering people. Levi’s a golem, a Mudman, crafted from the muck, mire, and corpses of a World War II concentration camp and saddled with a divine commission to dole out judgment on those who shed innocent blood. But now, after seventy years as a cold-blooded murder machine, he’s turned to AA meetings and church services to help change his grisly nature. Until he runs across a wounded girl, Sally Ryder, during one of his “hunting expeditions.” Someone is attempting to revive a pre-Babylonian murder god, and the road to rebirth is paved with dead bodies. Lots and lots of them. Now, Levi must protect Sally—the key to an unspeakable resurrection—and defeat a Nazi mage from his murky past, one who holds a terrible secret about the Mudman’s unorthodox birth. It’s a secret Levi would pay anything to uncover: maybe even Sally’s life. If Levi isn’t careful, he may end up turning into the monster he always imagined himself to be. “A timeless tale of striving against evil . . . Highly recommended if you like paranormal thrillers, psychological thrillers and books such as Jeff Lindsey’s Dexter Morgan series, Thomas Harris’ Hannibal Lecter books, the TV show Supernatural.” —Port Jericho “A mash of styles and creative ideas, blending religious mythology from Jewish and Christian beliefs alongside Nazi atrocities and supernatural ghouls.” —TheBookBeard’s Blog
