

My daughter, Ruby Pratt, has leukemia. She needs a bone marrow transplant—and fast. Out of everyone in the family, my husband, Dan Pratt, was the only match. I begged him for an entire month before he finally agreed to go through with the donation. But on the morning of the surgery, he went completely off the grid. I stood outside the hospital all day, waiting. No calls. No texts. Not even a shadow. That night, his childhood friend, Valerie Kinder, posted on Instagram. In the photo, Dan was holding Valerie's hand with one arm and carrying her young son with the other—on a beach in Lulabo City. The caption read: [Soaking up the sun! Dan cleared his whole schedule to join us on a month-long trek and we finally made it to the coast! My little boy said Uncle Dan made his ocean dream come true. Pure joy!] My heart splintered. While I was drowning in worry over my daughter, he was off playing happy family with them. I wiped my tears and typed a comment beneath her post: [Not 'Uncle.' From now on, he's your son's father.] That night, I finally got a call from him. "Babe, don't be like this," Dan said. "You're not being fair. "Valerie's son has been bullied at school for not having a dad. I couldn't stand seeing him hurt, so I took them on this trip. It was supposed to help him heal. "I'll catch the first flight back tomorrow and head straight to the hospital to donate the marrow. I promise." I hung up with a bitter smile. The next morning, Dan rushed into the hospital room. But all he found on the bed was a death certificate.

Avalyn, a lone girl raised by wolves in the northern wilderness, is brought back by her birth father Duke Snow only to get trapped in royal conspiracies. After her father is murdered, she bides her time and devises schemes. With her courage and beast-taming skills, she slays her enemies, quells barbarian uprisings and earns widespread renown across the kingdom. Eventually, she uncovers her true identity as the lost heir of the Sacred Court of All Beasts, returns to the divine realm, executes the usurper, and ascends the Throne of All Beasts.

"Three days before her eternal blood-binding, Sarah’s bridal shop goes up in flames. Lord Marcus stays by her burned body with gentle hands… while secretly ordering Sunlight Essence to destroy her Blood Core so he can raise his secret fledgling with his true lover Rachel. Sarah wakes as a Broken Vessel. She smiles, pretends to accept her fate, and quietly vanishes on the night of the ceremony by staging her own death. When the news reaches the altar, Marcus shatters. He abandons everything, cages Rachel, and burns half his power just to find the woman he destroyed. r Blood Core slowly reigniting under the moonlight."

Emily Porter, an ordinary housewife, finds herself shunned by her mother-in-law for giving birth to a daughter instead of a son. Her husband, Joe Baker, driven by greed for a hefty insurance payout, conspires with his lover to murder Emily. In a calculated move, Joe stages a car accident that leaves Emily in a vegetative state. In a shocking turn of events, he goes as far as to bury his comatose wife alive, only to rush off to marry his mistress moments later. But fate has a twist in store, as Emily awakens, ready to seek justice and reclaim her life.

At 18, Nadia Wolfe fell in love and began a secret ten-year affair with her father’s subordinate, Jack Mayer.When her brother died and her father became gravely ill, she begged him to marry her—only to be rejected again in favor of his childhood friend, Bree Ewing. This time, Nadia didn’t cry. She knelt before the gods, offered a prayer, and chose the fierce mercenary Lucian Wyler, setting the fastest possible wedding date.

After a childhood tragedy, Jenna Avery can see the dead. The ability doesn't fix anything. It just makes life exhausting and lonely. Then the spirit of Jasper Hart, a man left in a coma by an accident, shows up. Only Jenna can see or hear him, and their strange cohabitation begins. They bicker, help restless ghosts find closure, and slowly grow closer. But a nameless threat draws near and a buried past starts to surface. Can they survive, and can Jasper make it back to his body?

Ten-year-old Louie Barton tumbles into a world of deadly supernatural set in a hospital and accidentally activates Anomaly Kin-Binder System, a power that does exactly one thing: find his relatives. Turns out they are everywhere. The terrifying S-rank head nurse? His aunt.The Crimson Wraith haunting the corridors? Family.The Copper Coffin Bride? Related. The Gloom Sovereign who rules the underworld? Also his kin. While other players tremble and fall, Louie strolls through the most feared dungeons in existence with an ever-growing roster of monstrous relatives clearing the path ahead.Two worlds, countless horrors, one ten-year-old with the most dangerous family reunion in history.

Morrison, a former top CIA operative, lives under an assumed name after suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, leading a quiet farming life in a small town with his daughter Vivian. The local criminal syndicate, the Rosetti family, covets his farmland. To force Morrison into submission, Theodore, the family's young heir, kidnaps the 17-year-old Vivian and tortures her to death brutally. Having lost his sole emotional anchor, Morrison casts aside his medication restraints entirely, unearths the stockpile of weapons he has hidden away for a decade, and storms the Rosetti manor alone to exact revenge. Senior figures within the city's police force, municipal government and the CIA are all well aware of Morrison's terrifying combat prowess from his past. They order an emergency city-wide evacuation and stand aside to let him wipe out the entire criminal family, kicking off a brutal vendetta of blood for blood. Revolving around paternal love, trauma, corrupt power networks and unbridled vengeance, the story interweaves the lingering shadows of past killings with the mutual despair and devastation of the present, unfolding an unstoppable bloody reckoning.

The night before our group trip, Raymond Kane tags me in the group chat and tells me to check my flight ticket. When I open the booking, I discover my ticket was refunded three days ago—without anyone telling me. Before I can even type a reply, the messages start pouring in. Madelyn announces, "I bet Ray that you wouldn't check the booking before we left. He got you to look it up yourself. That's cheating!" Raymond shrugs it off. "Doesn't matter. You still lost. She only just found out. Just book another one. We'll just have to sit apart." Their casual banter brings back a familiar ache. It reminds me of the time they bet on how long it would take me to realize my hotel room has been downgraded from a standard double to a shared triple, leaving me to sleep on a folding cot. And before that, they bet on whether I'd notice the art museum on our itinerary had been replaced with an escape room. Whenever I tell them it hurts, they always give the same tired reply. "How were we supposed to know you cared if you never said anything?" But they never ask. I close the booking app and open another one, searching for flights to Isvind. I imagine myself surrounded by the silence of a 5°F night, with the northern lights painting the sky above me. Perhaps a solo trip is exactly what I need.

Three years ago, an earthquake struck. Lydia's husband and son died saving everyone in their building. Their neighbor Eleanor gradually forgot their sacrifice in the years that followed. For three years, Lydia has quietly honored her loved ones' memory, while Eleanor has come to see Lydia as a symbol of bad luck. Now Eleanor's son Marcus is about to hold his wedding. Lydia decides to make everyone understand in her own striking way that honoring the departed is honoring life itself, and that remembering an act of kindness keeps warmth alive in people's hearts.