Reincarnated as an Apocalyptic Catalyst - Chapter 6: Hamming It Up

I am currently re-writing the first chapters of this story. They are quite rough and bounce around a lot and I can do better. At some point, I will replace these with the better chapters.Sometime in 2024 Aethon Books will publish the first volume of this story on Amazon, KU, and audible. This will mean the story will be stubbed. I will notify people far in advance of that.In the dystopian world of the future, life is rough when you live at the bottom. Jobs are non-existent. Far too many people live in poverty, crammed into huge buildings called Habitats. With no jobs in the real world, many people can only find work online in VR worlds as servants to the very rich. And it's getting worse. The old internet is unusable and hacked to pieces. The new system needs AI to run things, but all but one of them were destroyed. The last sentient AI is ordered to create a new game world so the rich can have a playground, and the corporations that rule the world can have a new global market place. Everyone wants a piece of the new game. The guilds are competing to be the first to find the dungeons and kill the biggest monster. The corporations are claiming land and putting in their online market places. Ozzy and his friends just want a paycheck.Four friends sign five year contracts as virtual serfs in a small village, and can't go adventuring at all to gain money. They don't have many choices. They can work as a blacksmith, barmaid and shepherd for all those years....or they can cheat and find ways to take advantage of the system and carve out a section of the game world for themselves, and earn a fortune in the real world.When they give you a mop and not a sword, you have to find the loopholes and change the rules.

Rise Lee, a well-known A-rank esper in the federation. He was even ranked as one of the strongest among the A-ranks and recognized as one of the hopes for humanity. However, he wasn't only famous because of his prowess or his attractive appearance; Rise was more infamous because of his terrible personality. He was called a villain by most guides and espers for a reason.And who would guess that Rise Lee was really a villain, in a literal sense? The terrible truth then unfolded to him. He, Rise Lee, is one of the main villains of the novel. Rise Lee spat out a mouthful of curses and swore that if he had a second chance, he would mess up this damn novel until everyone went down with him. If the author was in front of him, he too would be destroyed with him! And a second chance did come! Rise Lee, the villain, woke up five years before the main storyline! Heh. So what if he was a villain destined to die? That protagonist who killed him, and the author... He would screw them over. Being a villain, be damned. In this rebirth, he would take and mess up everything. What did you say? The protagonist’s love life? Heh. That too. Rise would take his lover. The male lead... will be his.

He was the cold-blooded prince of the Jin country. Decisive and smart, he had looked down on the world with apathy and disdain.

She was his Wang fei, a person who had saved him in the past, but even he wouldn’t look at her.

When the fire raged and death claimed her, it was only then that she realized her existence was nothing but a joke from the beginning.

She opened her eyes once more after spending two years as a roaming, vengeful ghost. In this lifetime, Ye Zhen promises that she will be a different person. With a slight smile, she will ruthlessly trample on those who had schemed against her and lied until her demise!

Most importantly, she would let him experience the pain of an unrequited love; the bitterness of seeking something you cannot obtain!

- Description from Novelupdates

Living together with my ex-husband?

Sarah never thought she would one day meet Michael, her ex-husband, again in the operating room with his body full of wounds and needing treatment from her.

They were already divorced for three years, and Sarah didn’t have a good memory of the man. If she could… she would have let him die. However, she was a doctor, and a doctor's job was to save patients.

Sarah immediately regretted her decision to save the man because it turned out that Michael had amnesia and remembered that they just got married!

To make matters worse, she stupidly accepted her ex-in-law's request to pretend to remain Michael's wife while taking care of him. Why did she do that?

However… during the time she spent with her ex-husband, Michael's attitude was very different from what Sarah had last remembered. He was very gentle… and loving. It made the feelings she thought were gone, come up to the surface.

Would Sarah be able to deal with her feelings? What would happen when Michael's memory suddenly returned? Would his attitude stay the same?

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EXCERPT:

“Wifey,” Michael called, looking at Sarah who was lying beside him.

“Hm,” Sarah answered curtly, not looking at Michael.

“I think I'm healthy.”

Sarah's body stiffened when she heard that. Was Michael healthy? Did that mean he had remembered everything? Would he scold her for tricking him?

“Wifey? Why are you silent? I think I'm healthy and I can do it,” Michael said quietly.

“What do you mean?” Sarah finally looked at Michael with raised eyebrows. “Do what?”

“Making babies.”