Judgment: Apocalypse Survival Simulation

Esme Wynter’s marriage to Lennox Mercer was written like a business plan. He gave her protection and power; she gave him peace and a convenient alliance. She told herself she didn’t need love. He made it clear he didn’t believe in it. But when the test site collapsed, Lennox threw himself over her without hesitation— and Esme’s last memory was his heartbeat against hers before everything went dark. When she opened her eyes again, she was surrounded by blinding white light, unable to move forward, and unable to return. Then a guide told her she and him were not fated, and their connection had become a curse, one that doomed them both whenever they tried to love. And then came the rules: You must not fall in love with him. You must ensure he finds his destined partner in each lifetime. You must not intervene beyond your designated role. Break them, and one—or both—will die. Fail all five lifetimes, and your souls would be erased forever. Each time Esme awakens, she forgets the last. Each time, she meets him again— as a king, a freedom fighter, a general, a mercenary. And each time, her heart betrays her before her mind can remember. And in his own distant eyes, there is the hidden craving for her love, like a man trying to recall a dream he’s not supposed to have. She was never meant to fall for him again. But perhaps… he never stopped loving her.

The year I hit rock bottom, I got sucked into a game. The rule was to survive a week on 50 dollars, and the winner would walk away with one million dollars. Everyone else was desperate to win, but I was the only one trying to escape. What they did not know was that I was the previous round's winner, and killing me meant they could steal my 500 million dollars.

When the apocalypse struck, Ray Morley was brutally murdered and eaten by his wife's family. Only in his dying moments did he learn the cruel truth—his beloved son wasn't his own flesh and blood. He had been nothing more than a pathetic stand-in, a fool used and discarded. But fate gave him another chance. Reborn three months before the end of the world, Ray awakened to find himself in possession of an enormous, otherworldly storage space. This time, he wasted no time—he divorced his venomous wife, won a massive lottery prize, stormed into the stock market, and earned billions. He built fortified shelters and hoarded mountains of supplies. In this new life, he would make his ex-wife and her family pay—every last one of them. No more groveling. No more weakness. This time, Ray would rise above it all.

As a zombie outbreak spreads across the world, my boyfriend insists on delaying our evacuation so his drama-queen childhood sweetheart can catch the last rescue chopper. However, this is the last evacuation after the outbreak, and our team's only chance to survive. When she still doesn't show up, I knock my boyfriend out and haul him onto the helicopter. In the end, his childhood sweetheart is devoured by the surging horde, while I seize the opportunity to escape and start a peaceful, quiet life with him in the safe zone. The night before I am to take command and lead a massive counterattack against the undead, my boyfriend laces my drink with a tranquilizer and dumps me into a swarm of zombies. Thousands of zombies tear me apart, and I die in excruciating pain. He stands on the fortress wall, a cold smile on his lips. "Had you not been so selfish, Esmeralda would've survived. Now, you'll experience her suffering and atone with your life!" Given a second chance at life, I wake up on the day my boyfriend refused to evacuate on time. Since he's so determined to stand by his childhood sweetheart through thick and thin, I'll make sure they both become zombie food!

Our entire class gets dragged into The Tyrant's Atonement game. The only way to escape alive is to reach a 100% atonement score. The system lets us choose our roles. The class belle, Isolde Adler, picks the tyrant's first love. Her atonement score shoots straight to 99% on the first day. The class president, Asher Brooks, chooses to be a loyal chancellor. His atonement score jumps to 80%. Spectators watching the game flood the screen with comments. "This new batch is smart and way better at picking roles than the last. They might just clear the game in three days." "Even if just one person hits 100%, the whole class goes free. I'm looking forward to seeing who finishes first." "My money's on the first love. She's already at 99%." Just as everyone starts celebrating, the next morning hits us with bad news. All 20 classmates who picked their roles are dead, and Isolde suffers the cruelest fate of all.

During a long holiday, my husband booked flights for a family vacation. On the way to the airport, I suddenly saw numbers appearing on everyone’s head. The numbers on my husband’s head indicated sixty years, but my parents and I had only six hours indicated on our heads. While I was puzzled over the meaning of those numbers, I noticed that the driver next to us only had six seconds indicated over his head through the car window. Five… Four… Three… Two… One. When the number turned zero, a massive truck immediately rammed into the car next to us. I saw flickers of fire, flesh and blood exploding before my eyes. People were screaming for help, but I could not hear anything. I trembled as cold sweat drenched my entire body. It was because my flight would be taking off in six hours.

The entire world froze. Overnight, the city plunged to –40 °F. Yet, in the middle of this frozen apocalypse, my mother, my sister and her son moved into the home I bought for my marriage. Even my own husband took my sister’s side. They threw me out into the freezing cold to scavenge for supplies. I came back frozen half to death, and they had not even saved me a bowl of warm soup. Then, my sister shoved me straight off the fifth-floor landing. In that bitter cold, my body hit the ground and shattered like glass. When I woke again, I found myself back in the week before the apocalypse struck. This time, I resolved to cut them all off. I would make every last one of them pay.

My younger son, who is seven, is bitten by a snake. I take him to my elder son's hospital to be treated. To my surprise, my elder son's girlfriend thinks I'm his mistress. Not only does she stop the medical personnel from treating my younger son, but she even slaps me. "My boyfriend and I are a perfect match. How dare you bring your illegitimate son here to challenge me!" She pins me to the floor as she pummels and harms me. She even screeches, "A slut like you will only stop going around seducing others once you're incapable of it!" I'm bruised, battered, and bleeding as I'm wheeled into the emergency room. My elder son handles the operation. His hand trembles as he clutches his scalpel, and he looks ashen. "Who did this to you, Mom?"

“You loved a lie. Now love the one who created it” Ophelia Veline thought life couldn't get any worse after falling from grace to grass and being murdered by her older sister and fiancé. Bruised emotionally and broken physically, she’s left for dead. Left in a pool of her cold blood. Her pathetic life saga was meant to end here, she saw the light just ahead and it was reaching out for her soul until he snatched it instead. The unlikely god with an otherworldly aura. “I can grant you a second chance. Only if you agree to play my games” “Please…” she begged. The next time she’s awake, it's not in her former life that used to be all sugar and icing. She’s trapped in a hellish world of survival and madness. Once a decadent princess, now a pawn in a god's twisted playground. Ophelia will have to adapt or die trying because death doesn't wait. And the god who brought her into this hell hole couldn't care less about her or maybe…he does. But one thing is certain…she has to SURVIVE!

I never chose to enter the Arena— the place that swallows humans and supernaturals from every era and throws them into a death game with only one rule: survive. One moment I was walking down a normal street. The next, I woke up in a prehistoric jungle with the ground trembling under massive, thundering footsteps. That’s where I met him—Kael. An Alpha Werewolf with lethal instincts, a body built for violence, and eyes that could pin me in place more easily than his claws ever could. He had zero interest in saving anyone. Especially me. To him, I was a burden. To me, he was a threat. And he definitely wasn’t planning to keep me alive. “You’re not human, Maddie.” His breath ghosted my ear, hot and shivering down my spine. “And whatever you are… you shouldn’t exist in this world.” But the Arena made its choice before either of us could: Every round in this cursed place keeps forcing us together—fighting back-to-back, bleeding for each other, breathing in sync. Yet every time danger closes in, I end up pressed against his chest, his breath warm against my ear as he growls instructions I shouldn’t find intoxicating. “Stay with me, Maddie. You won’t survive a single night without me.” Maybe he’s right. Maybe I don’t want to survive without him. But the truth inside me—what I am, what I carry— …might be the very thing that gets him killed. And when Kael finally corners me in the dark, his voice a low, wicked whisper at my neck, I realize the Arena isn’t the deadliest thing here. He is. “Tell me what you are, little flame… before I’m forced to claim you.”