THE MISTS OF ARATHIA

NPCs aren’t supposed to gain skills. They don’t go on monster-slaying adventures. But levelling up is their only chance of escaping the Mists…

Three years ago, the Mists devoured Arathia and killed two-thirds of the population. Those like Rey who survived the mysterious fog were permanently branded and thrown into a new world with monsters, levels, and skills.

Returning to their way of life seems impossible until Arathia’s resident crazy homeless guy proposes a plan that just might get Rey and his friends out of their dead-end village.

When they leave their safe zone, they find that the truth about the Mists is far closer to home than they ever could have believed.

And wait, what do you mean they’re not real people, but non-player characters in a new full-dive role-playing game?

Hi, I'm J.N. Ward!

I'm a new author, but a long-time lover of games and books. To bring my friends together during the pandemic, I got really into being a Dungeon Master. I looked up youtube videos, spent a disproportionate amount of time catering to my players, building a world in which they'd fall in love with. One in which they could escape from their woes and worries and engage in a fantasy, if for a little while.

But then my creativity took me further. I wanted to tell a story. I wanted to create a story that mattered to my players, but we could never do it at the pace I wanted.

Then I saw a meme "What if I wanted to play Dungeons and Dragons by myself, what if I wanted to create stories and play through them by myself?" The response was "That's called writing a book." I imagined a Key and Peele sketch, about robbing a bank. "That's called getting a job."

Basically, if you want to tell a story, tell the story.
I have a passion for narrative and telling the story of the everyman.

Here we follow Reynar who struggles with a world, not too much unlike our own, in which we attempt to break through the barriers between nature and humanity. Reality is shaped by forces which we cannot control. What if, instead of being dragged along by the current, we take control?

Welcome to Arathia, the world where every person can build the fantasy life of their dreams from the ground up.