Fantasy World

Not long ago, NSLICE-00P—short for Non-Standard Leashed-Intelligence Cybernetic Enforcer—performed her job with cold, calculated, merciless obedience. When she was ordered to destroy something, it got seriously destroyed. Unfortunately, that led her to take out her own creator before he created her, casting the cyborg out of her reality and into a world of magic, levels, and skills, with her very own dungeon core and no one to tell her what to do. As it turned out, fate put NSLICE-00P in the right place at the right time: she's become a legit heroine in this new existence.

A smog has spread. Food crops are rapidly disappearing. A chef escapes her dying career in a dreary city to take a job at a decadent mountaintop colony seemingly free of the world’s troubles. There, the sky is clear again. Rare ingredients abound. Her enigmatic employer and his visionary daughter have built a lush new life for the global elite, one that reawakens the chef to the pleasures of taste, touch, and her own body.

Join Tribe Moonguard as they continue to improve, adjust, and grow on their epic journey. Damien is no longer the lost and confused Earthling. His magical progression provide powers greater than he ever envisioned, and he now commands an expanding army. To the south, a ratkin swarm prepares as Damien and Tribe Moonguard invade in the hopes of finding a permanent home. Fortune favors the bold, or so Damien believes as he leads his forces into battle.

The Galactics arrived with their Battle Fleet in 2052. Rather than being exterminated under a barrage of hell-burners, Earth joined a vast Empire that spanned the Milky Way. Today, Battle Fleet 921 is returning to Earth. It hasn't been seen by human eyes since our blissful day of Annexation. But what should be a joyful occasion, a chance to grovel at the feet of superior lifeforms, is rapidly becoming a nightmare.

Telos is a world at the center of a Universe. A bright jewel wrapped in a Lattice of realities. It is a world that gods and demons call home at the beginning of a new age. Remy is a newly risen deity, struggling to survive in a Battle Royale where the consequences are worse than death and last longer than damnation. He will find that he cannot live with his tribe of worshippers. Their strength is his, and his is theirs. Other tribes want nothing more than to feast upon their flesh and consume their power.

Look outward beyond the stars with six stories from bestselling visionary authors. An AI awakens to its purpose. A researcher seeds a thousand new worlds for one more chance at love. A murder rocks the crew of an interstellar ship. With a sweeping sense of wonder, these stories explore the galaxy . . . and the horizons of humanity’s potential.

Forget cute fairies in pretty dresses. In the world of Aluvia, most fairies are more like irritable, moody insects, and almost everyone views the fairy keeper mark as a gift. But not 14-year-old Sierra. She hates being a fairy keeper, but the birthmark is right there on the back of her neck. It shows everyone she was born with the natural ability to attract and even control the tiny fairies whose nectar is amazingly powerful.

It was a hard-learned lesson but Jim Powell finally understood that isolating his group of friends and family was no longer the best idea. It was a strategy that had once kept them safe, but lately seemed to be doing exactly the opposite. Staying out of town and away from people had led to them missing critical intelligence—that there were people in their community actively plotting against Jim.

Sickly and starved back home, Aegis is stripped of his memory when transported to the magical land of Strathmar. His new body aches as he arises as a noob warrior lost and confused. Though one thing is certain…an uncanny strength flows through him like never before. With a shield as his weapon and a bleeding heart as his curse, Aegis starts his journey by taking beatings that no man ever should to protect those in need.

Jeb is settling into his role as the head of the biggest orphanage in the alien city of Solmnath, taking in hundreds of human children orphaned by the harsh trials of the Tutorial.

Kazuma's first winter in another world isn't going so well. With companions like Aqua (Arch-priest), Megumin (Arch-wizard), and Darkness (Crusader), his party of advanced classes should be the most powerful in Axel--but they're so dysfunctional, even the easiest-seeming quest goes terribly awry, and they can barely save enough to afford a stable!

What if your town was sliding underwater, and everyone was ordered to pack up and leave? How would you and your friends spend your last days together? While the adults plan for the future, box up their possessions, and find new places to live, Keeley Hewitt and her friends decide to go out with a bang.

Fog rolls into Tulsa, and with it comes Darkness. Zoey knows something is up, and that the something involves Neferet, but Neferet can’t possibly be freed, right? Other Neferet and her companion, Lynette, arrive in Woodward Park to set this world’s Neferet free from her grotto prison, and discover there may be those who sympathize with their cause. Meanwhile, Other Kevin and Other Stark are hot on their trail, but how can the new friends travel to this world without invoking Old Magick and paying a costly, perhaps deadly, price?

"Something Passed By", a story by Robert McCammon, was originally published in his short fiction collection Blue World and was selected for inclusion in The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: Third Annual Collection.

Kuni Garu, now known as Emperor Ragin, runs the archipelago kingdom of Dara but struggles to maintain progress while serving the demands of the people and his vision. Then an unexpected invading force from the Lyucu Empire in the far distant west comes to the shores of Dara - and chaos results. But Emperor Kuni cannot go and lead his kingdom against the threat himself with his recently healed empire fraying at the seams, so he sends the only people he trusts to be Dara's savvy and cunning hopes against the invincible invaders: his children.

My retainers are my strength. With a massive number of monsters appearing in a "Demon Wave," the group of small to medium-sized countries known as the Union of Eastern Nations faces a crisis. During a conference with Empress Maria of the Gran Chaos Empire, Souma is asked to dispatch reinforcements to the union. The place Souma sends those troops to is the Kingdom of Lastania. Which is where a former foe, the crown prince Souma once drove from the Principality of Amidonia, Julius, is putting up a hard fight as a visiting general?!

In a night of devastating terror, ISIS operatives have unleashed a coordinated attack on America's infrastructure. With thousands of trapped travelers and scarce law enforcement, the miles between Jim Powell and his family become a brutal gauntlet where the rules of civilized society no longer apply. As Jim puts his years of preparation and planning to the test, he is forced to ask himself if he has what it takes to make it home. Does he have the strength - the brutality - required to meet this new world toe-to-toe?

Having returned from the Star Dragon Mountain Range, Souma heads to the next destination on his diplomatic tour, the Republic of Turgis. While he is there to investigate the possibility of forming cordial relations with a neighbor they currently have no interaction with, Souma finds his attention drawn to the high level of the local blacksmiths, and a plan occurs to him. Sensing that state level negotiations will be necessary to make his plan a reality, he succeeds in arranging a meeting with the republic's head of state.

After a long and treacherous journey south, Andrew and Jamie have finally found safety in the Florida Keys. But they soon learn that safety doesn't always mean happily ever after. Settling into life in the Islamorada colony with other survivors of the bug, Andrew believes they've finally found themselves a home, even a family. But anxious Jamie is less comfortable in their new community and is eager to return north to keep the promise they made to their friend Henri—to bring her to the colony and reunite her with her daughter.

In the valley of Fruitless mountain, a young girl named Minli lives in a ramshackle hut with her parents. In the evenings, her father regales her with old folktales of the Jade Dragon and the Old Man on the Moon, who knows the answers to all of life's questions. Inspired by these stories, Minli sets off on an extraordinary journey to find the Old Man on the Moon to ask him how she can change her family's fortune. She encounters an assorted cast of characters and magical creatures along the way, including a dragon who accompanies her on her quest for the ultimate answer.