Brian Simons

Travail Online: Transcend: LitRPG Series (Book 3)

Travail is collapsing. The terrain is crumbling, the economy is in tatters, and strange mobs are turning innocent people into mutated beasts. Coral wants to rally players and overthrow the CEO behind the game's decline, but there's a catch. He employs her parents. In an offshore facility. And he won't guarantee their safe return unless Coral plays nice. Has she picked a boss fight she just can't win?

Meanwhile, Daniel struggles with his mother's gambling addiction, Sybil fights to keep Farah safe from Jack, and Sal keeps eating things he probably shouldn't, all while preparing for their inevitable battle with the elf queen at the helm of the game's most torturous content.

Ripcord Online: (LitRPG Series Book 1)

After a week with the implant, Ripcord Online had translated all of my memories, hopes, and dreams — all of me — into binary code. I was ready for the uplink. There was just one thing I had to do first.

I had to die.

Ripcord was a revolutionary new product that launched people into a virtual reality world just moments before death, sparing them their painful end-of-life memories and allowing them to live in a video game utopia for all time.

At least, that’s how it was advertised. No one ever came back to say whether Ripcord lived up to its promise. It was a one-way ticket for those lucky enough to get in.

Well, maybe “lucky” isn’t the right word for it.

My wife had been in Ripcord for two years. I was finally ready to go find her. When I got there though, it was nothing like I had expected and she was nowhere to be found.

Oh, and did I mention something is killing everyone off? “Griefing” players that are already grieving.

If I ever wanted to see my wife again, I’d have to get a lot stronger, learn how to level up in this strange new world, and hope she found a way to survive this long…

Travail Online: Resurrection: A LitRPG Series

Coral, Daniel, and their friends have their heads in the game. But what happens when the game gets in their heads?

Strange things are afoot in Travail Online. People like Coral who couldn’t find jobs offline joined Travail so they could grind away at the virtual reality video game and sell in-game items for a bit of real world cash. Travail, however, has just launched new content that turns that premise on its head. The game resurrected a dead god and is using it to brainwash players into pouring their life savings into the game, ruining their livelihoods and threatening to destroy the game’s economy worldwide. Coral can’t stand by while the game mind-hacks players and siphons away their gold, but will getting involved cause more harm than good?

Meanwhile, Daniel has his own concerns. The head of the Assassins’ Guild is still trying to recruit him, the Regent of Travail’s human city wants him to start a war with the dwarves, and the elves seem to be hunting him and his friends. The game just keeps throwing roadblocks in their way, not to mention the mess it’s making of their minds…

Welcome to Travail, where hard play makes fun work!

Travail Online: Soulkeeper (Book 1)

Coral has been fired from her job and replaced by a robot, just like just about everyone else in the U.S.A. To make ends meet she starts to play Travail Online, where she can convert in-game gold earned to real world dollars. She chooses to be a crafter, a seamstress, and on her first day lucks into a group of high level players looking for a 4th to run an instanced raid. There she lands the killing blow of the boss, somehow gets all the XP and jumps to level 18 and gets a new quest to design armor that will protect the army from a magical artifact that’s perma-killing both NPCs and Players.