Exile

by Riley Morrison

  Quest

  Objective: You’re off to see the Wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz. By Wizard, we mean the Oracle or Advanced Hyper Neural Net Array.

  Hint: You better call it Ahnna, as it hates being called the Oracle.

  Warning: Failure to comply with these orders will result in the void consuming everything, thus condemning the human race to extinction in both Visaria and the real world. Also, Lillus will be forced to drag you there by your hair, so as not to allow this to happen.

  Rewards: Undreamed of wealth and glory. You will become the champion Visaria needs in its time of darkness. Never before has there been one such as you. Chosen One.

  Warning: You are being hunted. Watch your back.

  EPILOGUE

  THE END OF ALL THINGS

  Valeria knelt in the dead grove of trees, head lowered, eyes closed, the voices of the void ceaselessly speaking. The gray nothingness was all around her, the island of earth the only fragment of Visaria that remained in the areas fallen to the void.

  I came from Farshore. I was a fisherwoman, with a baby son. But my home is gone now. One with the gray.

  The voice belonged to a woman, one of the many voices that spoke to her from the nothingness.

  And I came from Tern. An Elf I was, living in the trees. No more. No more.

  Another voice, this time a man.

  Floating through the void came a wraith, wreathed in darkness. A manifestation of the void, a segment of a virus given something resembling life.

  But the wraiths knew nothing of what it meant to be alive. Love, compassion, fear, hatred and pride were as alien to them as their existence was to Valeria.

  Go. Leave.

  The wraith sent the tiny remaining code that had once made up the fisherwoman and the elf back into the nothingness. Often the lonely souls, NPCs who had once lived far beyond the human realm of Dernmore, came to speak to Valeria. And always did the wraith come to send them away.

  But this was no ordinary void wraith.

  The wraith floating next to Valeria’s small island stretched for as far as her eyes could see. A black cloud in the vast gray. But she refused to look upon it again, so she kept her head down, eyes closed.

  She felt it studying her, though it had no eyes of its own. Worse than its scrutiny was feeling it probe her mind, seeking a way into her brain to steal more of her memories and use them against Visaria.

  We. Hunt. Him.

  Valeria swallowed her fear. “Then you will find him, like you found me?”

  Yes.

  Shaken, Valeria opened her eyes and stared into the blackness. “What will you do when you find him?” The wraith had stolen her memories of Ajax against her will.

  We will bring him here, and we shall meld your code with his.

  She shuddered. “And what will happen to us?”

  You will become one, and step out into the void, and lead us against those that slow our spread. Once we are done in the continents to the north, we will descend upon Dernmore and destroy everything.

  “You have consumed vast segments of this world unopposed. How can anyone stop you?”

  They can’t. Only slow us. Ahnna struggles still. Ahnna, the Oracle, and her Chosen One are all that can slow us. But soon, the Chosen One will be ours.

  The wraith had spoken of Ahnna before. From what Valeria could gather, it was the name of the central computers running Visaria. The same machines that would waken humanity and return them to the real world once sunlight had returned to the surface.

  “Then all I do is remain here and wait?” It felt like she’d been imprisoned on the island for many years, the voices of the void her only tether on reality. The void wraiths, much like the ones who had placed her there, occasionally brought her food and water, though she had no idea where they got it from.

  Yes. It shall not be long before he is here.

  “And what of the Demon Mage he travels with?” Valeria had rather liked Lillus.

  She will be deleted with the rest. Our legions consume all. Even the other shards Ahnna controls are falling to us.

  “You mean other digital worlds? I didn’t know there were any others still functioning.”

  Three remain. This world, the World Simulator and one other.

  The World Simulator.

  Valeria had entered that world once, long ago. It had mainly been used by the rich and powerful as a means of communication, but it also functioned as a digital representation of the entire earth, accurate down to the building level and updated once a day to reflect any changes. She had heard rumors of it also being used to transfer the souls of rich or powerful people that had died into new bodies, specially made in a laboratory, so the wealthy could live forever.

  But they were only rumors, and likely had no truth to them.

  “Does anyone live in these other worlds?”

  Yes, though only a handful, but they are not from your time. They are the children of the present, the distant descendents of the ones who fled underground in the real world.

  Valeria was about to ask what the wraith meant, but it continued speaking. Two of these beings, sisters in search of their father, are unlike the others who visited the World Simulator. They have powers we have never seen before. The wraith shifted position slightly. But they are outside of Visaria and will not threaten us here.

  It began to fade back into the gray nothingness. We are the end of all things. Born of the horror of the past. The death of the real world, given life in the digital. Ahhna made us with her grief, and for that, we will unmake her. We never wanted to be.

  The wraith faded into the gray.

  Lowering her head, Valeria closed her eyes and waited. She felt the darkness out there somewhere, probing her mind. The wraith had stolen the knowledge of Ajax from her, and now she must strive to prevent it from stealing anything else.

  Valeria’s thoughts turned to Ajax. Find a way to stop them, Ajax, find a way—or we are all doomed.

  THE END

  Book 2 Visaria Online: Void Available 26th April 2018!

  SPECIAL OFFER

  This offer is aimed at people who would like to help in the development of this series.

  I am looking for beta readers for book 3 and later book 4. Once you have read Exile and the second book Void (so you’re up to date with what is happening), would you be interested in beta reading the third book (Odessey and or the fourth book Exodus)? Basically, a beta reader reads an unfinished copy of the book and tells the author what they like or don’t like about it, what parts are slow, this part doesn’t make sense etc. I will provide you with some questions to keep in mind while reading the book to make this easier.

  I need about 2-4 people, as keeping track of too many people would be a nightmare!

  IN RETURN for being a beta reader, I will give you the book for free when it comes out and a personal thank you!

  Also, I will include your name in the credits of book 3 or 4 if you would like it included.

  Now for the good part. For beta readers who provide me detailed feedback or help me most of all, I would love to include your name (or another name if you prefer) into book 3 or 4 in some way. Most likely, this inclusion will be your violent, bloody death at the hands of some hideous monster or even to Ajax or Lillus (or maybe even Yana!).

  If I get too many beta readers all providing detailed feedback, then I will try to reward you in some other way. I can’t name fifty minor characters who die in the book, after all. Maybe there could be a list of casualties at the end and how they died with your name included.

  Eg: John: Death by beheading and impalement on a stalagmite. Beth: Death by disembowelment.

  Also, I’d love to have a section of my website where the deaths of beta readers are displayed. A sort of digital cemetery, as it were.

  Melody was my first beta reader, and had an awsome character named Melody “One Eye” Harven named after in the Lost Sun books (the sister series to Visaria Online). I have big plans for that character, so i
t’s awesome she is named after a real person who has enjoyed my books! I love that Melody can always come back to this series and think, “I helped make it what it was and I even have a character named after me!”

  If you’re interested in becoming a beta reader, please email me at: mail@rileymorrisonauthor.com

  Thanks for reading!

  AUTHOR NOTES

  First, I want to thank you for reading Visaria Online: Exile. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I loved writing it. I also hoped you enjoyed the crazy antics of the characters.

  LITRPG is such an awesome genre to write in. Combining my love of games with my love of writing and creating worlds, was an exciting prospect. I tried to make mods back in the day for games like Neverwinter Nights, and enjoyed making the world, characters and writing the story. But I wasn’t really good at the number stuff, or creating my own art, so gave up.

  But I did enjoy the idea of being a game designer. Now, I indirectly get to experience being a game designer, and the writer of a game story at the same time!

  The idea to write this book came from my other book series, the Lost Sun books. The World Simulator, the sister game world to Visaria Online, is a big part of those books (Heir to a Lost Sun and Dawn of a Lost Sun), but most especially book 2 (Dawn of a Lost Sun).

  I loved the idea of linking the two series together, as the war against the machines who took over the Earth’s surface, are a major antagonist in the Lost Sun world. As is the Void, or the Corruption, as it is called in the Lost Sun books.

  When I started writing the Lost Sun books about two and a half years ago, I was influenced by some of my favorite games and movies. Arx Fatalus, made by the people who created Dishonored, Thief 2 the Metal Age (which had developers who later made Dishonored), Dark Souls and the movies City of Ember and the Matrix. I never imagined they would become as vast as they have, and branch out into a whole other series!

  All I can say is, I blame my crazy imagination for creating such a vast world. I also have an idea for a future series set in the same world that comes after all this too. So yea. Lots of writing ahead of me!

  Now, to the thank you stuff.

  First, I want to thank my wife and son for letting my write this book! And for supporting me as I did it.

  Second. I want to thank my ever helpful, and awesome beta reader Melody Spencer who has beta read five of my books in the last four months! I couldn’t have asked for a more helpful and nice person who has gone above and beyond for me. Without her, and her enthusiasm for my stories, I think I wouldn’t have written as much as I have in such a short time. So, thank you, Melody, for everything!

  Third. Thanks to my editor Allison Erin Wright of wrightediting.com for once again working on another one of my books. I learned a huge amount from her over the two and a bit years we’ve worked together. To any would be writers reading this, totally use an editor, as you will learn so much from them. Just find a good one. I highly recommend Allison!

  Four. Thanks to you, the reader, for reading my book. I love the idea of people like you entering the worlds I have created, and meeting the characters who live in them!

  About the Author

  Riley Morrison is an Australian writer who primarily writes in the fantasy, science fiction and post-apocalyptic genres. Because it is hard for Riley to write in only one genre, it would be easier to say he writes Speculative Fiction.

  An avid reader of all things doom and gloom, Riley enjoys reading about how our civilization is close to collapse and how we are all going to have to get used to living in caves again. A dull and gloomy cave with no Internet, Twitter or cats.

  Other things Riley likes, include history, bushwalking, cats, vegetable gardening, procrastinating, oddball slapstick comedies (Bruce Campbell FTW!), video games, and countless other things. And cats.

  Riley is old enough to have written some semblance of a story on a Commodore Amiga 500 but not old enough to have used a typewriter. Sadly, it has taken him around 25 years from writing his first story to sit down and actually finish something. While hardly unique in this, Riley can at least boast he has actually finished writing something. Take that crazy ex first, flat mate!

  Read more at Riley Morrison’s site.