Did you hear that urban legend of talented young adults vanishing into thin air? Well, here is the scoop: the world is on the brink of a not-so-great ending and the only way out is for a bunch of kidnapped teenagers to ace this extremely tough twelve-floor tutorial. But here is the kicker — the chance of making it out alive? A whopping 7%. Yikes.

Sophia is a former junior Olympic with her eighteenth birthday around the corner. And after her injury, she cannot afford to lay low because of rumors and needs to secure her spot at the university the hard way: cramming. Unfortunately, the system had other plans for her and she got abducted three days later.

So what's a gal is gonna do to up those odds?

Key Elements:

- Inspired by (DnD) Baldur's Gate 3: Expect a world that feels familiar if you dabble in this game.

- Strong Emotionally-Driven Female MC: Follow her as she is trying to survive a crazy tutorial with her companions.

- It's all about teamwork: Loads of talking, bonding, and team-building — it's the heart of the story.

- Slow and steady wins the character and worldbuilding race: Characters grow organically, and so does the world, kind of how you get invested and attached to your D&D character and campaign.

- Grimdark with occasional lighter sub-themes: A bit gloomy but with moments that might make you smile.

- It's an apocalyptic game-lit without stats overload: You won't get bogged by numerical progression here.

- A dash of Profanity and potential for graphic violence: Characters got abducted and their lives ruined, so they might occasionally have bouts of inappropriate language. And their lives are constantly at risk so Graphic Violence might be on the table in later chapters.

- Oh, and finally: This novel uses a bit of Grammarly AI wizardry to ensure grammar is okay.

Temporary Cover

I edited the cover to an AI-enhanced version of my own drawings. For some reason, the AI removed the armor and decided to show a lot more skin and go wild with the hair, only because I specified the MC was Latino for skin tone coloring. I was aiming for a Brave/Encanto feel with nice historically accurate padded armor and weapons. And it got about 80% of my prompt right.

Author Notes

Though this novel is using the sixth mass extinction as a premise, ecology is not a main theme of this novel. So do not fret. This novel isn't political whatsoever and won't indulge in lazy commentary.

Also I think the only true measure of my readers' appreciation for this novel is that they are coming back for more and commenting, whenever they feel like it.

Don't have a good day, have a great day!