There is a dying world where darkness reigns, but one stranger’s quest for vengeance will reshape the fate of two realms.

Boren, once the savior of his homeworld of Komad, now walks a treacherous path through the corrupted world of Taytos. Hunted by ancient demigods of unfathomable power, he forms a perilous alliance with an imprisoned dragonlord, embracing a forbidden magic that threatens to consume his soul.

Meanwhile, on Komad, chaos rises. Deuc, a priest grappling with shattered faith, and Feridun, a scarred warrior-mage, must unravel the mysteries posed by renegade magic wielders before their world crumbles into oblivion.

Boren must confront his past demons and the darkness within. Every choice he makes could mean salvation or damnation. Will he emerge as the hero he once was, or succumb to the evil he seeks to destroy?

Rise of the Nemesis breaks the boundaries of dark epic fantasy, blending morally gray characters with intricate fantasy world-building and post-apocalyptic themes.

Immerse yourself in this breathtaking odyssey through decaying and vibrant realms. Prepare for heart-pounding battles and impossible choices in the Portal Wars Universe, where the true cost of power blurs the lines between hero and nemesis. This dark, captivating tale will haunt your dreams long after the final page.

Rise of the Nemesis is due for release 10th August. You can pre-order your copy HERE

Prologue

 Mid-Sapphire, Year 3125 After Emperor Teu (AT)

Outskirts of the Empire of Elakon, World of Komad

A ship sailed over cobalt waves under the blistering sun. To the starboard, rocks jutted out of the water like the broken bones of a leviathan. Not one voice dared challenge the howling of the winds.

At the bow, a man wearing priestly robes stood with purpose, his eyes locked on the horizon. A circular brass object rested in his hand, its needle wavering between ancient runes etched on a faded surface. The crew, ignorant of its true purpose, mistook it for a compass.

Fools, he mused.

He felt the crew hustle behind him. All for a handful of gold and the promise of a blessing by a holy man. The object grew colder in his hand, numbing his fingers with its icy halo.. It was the only part of his body not covered in sweat under the stifling heat. His gaze shifted to the sun-struck island emerging in the distance. Meiurk. One of a dozen making up the Scymnee Archipelago. Islands that, for many generations, had been imperial backwaters, filled with tribes too deadly even for the continental armies. But few had cared for the fate of those rocks until ten years ago. Since then, the archipelago had become the subject of hushed conversations in watering holes from Siniar, capital of the Kingdom of Siskail to the north, all the way to the imperial capital of Temark, far to the east. Those islands were now the stuff of legends and whispers. Cursed.

But not for all. For the man at the bow, there was treasure to be found there. As for Meiurk, the island had mostly disappeared. It had been swallowed by the sea ten years earlier, around the time that the sky had turned purple. Its fate had remained a mystery. Rumors had it that only Percus Guyot, head of the Order of the Righteous, and Emperor Klemer the Third knew the truth.

They knew, indeed, but they were not alone in that forbidden knowledge.

Something had happened that shattered everything they knew of their world: a gateway between their world and another had opened. A few miles ahead of the ship, he would find proof of that event. A pulse emanated from the object in his hand, coursing through him with a jolt so strong that his knees nearly buckled. As he struggled, the sails went dead. 

“Captain?” called the voice of one of the sailors.

“Hush, dog!” the ship’s captain growled back.

The priest gripped one hand on the gunwale to steady himself, and raised the other, summoning again an unnatural gale to propel the ship forward. The captain, a few steps behind him, looked away, feigning ignorance of the dark forces at play. As the ship sailed on, the priest repeated a single thought in his mind, over and over: 

Today we shake the pillars of the earth.

Chapter I

The Vagabond

Date Unknown

Location Unknown, World of Taytos

Boren’s fingers dug into the rock as he hoisted himself up the mountainside. A fang-topped staff dangled from his belt. Each strained breath brought him closer to the summit, where he hoped to find answers.

Is it you, Kleos, my brother? Will I find you there?

He leaned against a ledge in the ashen rock and looked out and down, into the void. The air was thick with the scent of sulfur, the sky a perpetual twilight blending crimson and violet streaks. 

Taytos. 

The dying world he had been exiled to was a place of eternal dusk. He climbed on, one slippery ledge at the time. 

No, not exiled. I chose this. 

Every waking moment was a reminder. He reached up, resuming the climb. His muscles burned with each step, the hammering heat making his fingers slick and dangerous as he gripped, scraped, and crawled upwards. He paused to listen, the silence of the wasteland broken only by faint howls and screeches in the distance. Poisoned clouds hid whatever was up there, looking down on him. 

The Anjun’s minions? Here? 

He had thought himself safer this far from the bits of broken civilization one could find in this world. But they were hunting him; they had been since he had set foot on this world. Now, there was no other path but the one up the Gheroin mountains. 

The Invincibles, they call them. And if this turns out to be a dead end, they will claim me, too.  

None of the sentient creatures that lived down below dared approach the mountains, which made even the wasteland seem more hospitable. Yet he had to. Someone on the peaks had called to him, a pained whisper carried down on the wind, reaching him in visions and fractured dreams.

Are you hurt, brother? I am coming.

His heart pumped faster, fueling his resolve. 

***

He felt himself slipping out of the cave and towards the edge of the cliff. But he didn’t fall. He leaped into the air, leaving the rock and brambles behind. Hundreds of feet below, solitary predators, their shapes hazy, crept upon the dusty earth.

Behind me. 

He spun around mid-air to find a featherless, long-beaked bird with a vast wingspan soaring by. The monster was scouring the barren land, ready to swoop down for the day’s prey. He soared up, gliding next to the bird-like creature. The pink-fleshed monster could not sense him. He changed course, bending space to his will and projecting himself higher towards the highest summit of the Gheroin.

There it is.

A swirling hole stared at him from across an expanse of ashen rock. Its cool, sharp scent reached him from afar, sending tingles across his skin alongside echoes of the call that had brought him here.

Water. I feel it.

He dove toward it, as he had done dozens of times during the climb. But as he pushed to cross the threshold, the tension in his body grew into pain, then agony. He screamed. 

His remaining healthy eye flared open. He was once again in a shallow cave on the face of the mountain. His body had not actually moved. The projection vanished, leaving him breathless. The cave floor rubbed and scratched against his back, as if pushing him away.

Thirsty.

He counted inhales and exhales to regain control of his heartbeats and of his thirst.

Not yet. Not yet.

He had to ration his water, for the mountain offered none. These peaks were far from every wretch who called the wasteland and its few, often tainted, wells and streams, home. 

But at least I am hidden from their servants. 

He had been on the run from the Anjun’s hunters for years. How long exactly, he did not know. He had stopped counting the days and months. Even time felt alien in this world. He rubbed his callused palms, then scratched the scar tissue over his blinded eye. A shiver ran down his neck as he saw it again.

Kleos clinging to his hand as they approached the portal, the Anjun’s claws tearing into his flesh as he shielded the Infant. With his brother in his arms, Boren rolled forward, crossing the vortex into the unknown.

He shivered and pushed back the memory, leaving the shallow cave. The sky’s purplish glow blinded him with a luminescence that had once nearly driven him mad. He inhaled deeply, the air on the Gheroin mountains tasting sour yet less humid than in the lower plains. He kept breathing it in until the sting in his eye eased. Though the light was intense, fear didn’t grip him. His heart had a steady beat. 

I’m still alive. 

He looked out toward a hidden horizon and the barren lands between them. Few dwelled in this region, far from the only hub that mattered. The last bastion of civilization.

Xingon.

Too boundless to be considered a mere city, it was a place far from here, worth months of slow trek. He got up, reflecting on the vision of the threshold at the top of the mountain. He had seen it many times in his sleep, the visions never revealing what was hidden beyond the threshold of that cave. They came in dreams that were not dreams, a magma that burned and bubbled in his mind, fragments that showed past and future with no distinction, a mosaic of ever-changing colors, voices, smells and flavors. 

The Gift.

An arcane vision which had awakened before he had crossed the portal with his brother, and that had gotten stronger since. 

He had always believed that the knowledge of the future was the prerogative of gods, assuming they existed. But on Taytos, he had stopped questioning whether there were gods. They existed. They were called Anjuns, as he had learned back on his world, Komad. 

Are they the ones lurking at the top of the Gheroins? 

He knew it could be a trap. But one way or the other, there were answers waiting on the peaks of the mountain, and he would find them.

He climbed on, bending almost to the point of touching his knees with his chest at every step. Each  one sent a cloud of dust into the air, while the rough terrain scraped against his palms, and the distant sound of shifting rocks echoed in his ears. Hours later, after crossing a plain that stretched on to the next steep ascent, the dusty earth gave way to a pitch-colored quagmire, its fetid stench filling the air. It was so wide that it blocked his way across, forcing him to trek around itand stay as far as he could from the bubbling surface. 

***

Having left the stench of the quagmire far behind, he stopped for the day. He was crouching downand in front of him were the ingredients to the highlight of his day. A small pile of dried-out twigs, grass, and bark shavings, a fire pit, and the skinned six-legged body of his prey. The animal was the size of a wild rabbit and was one of the few species capable of surviving the barren moors. He knew little about it, except that its meat was edible. To survive this far from Xingon one had no choice. He was hand drilling, spinning a straight stick between his palms against a flatter piece of wood. He blew the few embers gently onto the dry grasses, patiently working the flickers into a fire. He then fueled the fire with more wood until it was strong enough to spit-roast the nameless animal. 

Lovely, juicy friend, he caught himself thinking. 

When his teeth sunk into the lean meat, he forgot all about prophecies, gods, and even about the deadlands around him.

“Yes, yes,” he muttered to the wind.

One by one, he picked up the bones and sucked every drop of marrow from each before throwing the few leftovers that were too hard to chew into the fire. He looked up at a nearby tree. It was a typical example of Taytos’ vegetation: a twisted mass of wood with a handful of leaves. He walked over and ripped one of those leaves, then chewed it. It was the final dish of that meal. He hoped the leaf’s sour taste would clean away the taste of the charred flesh from his mouth. He smothered the fire and kicked the pile of coals away. He approached the tree again, and with a leap, he grabbed onto the nearest branch, then climbed up as high as it would hold him. Here he lay down on the oily mantle of his long, braided hair and stared at the cosmos above him. He had dreamed of that, too. Some nights, he had soared to the scarlet stars nestled beyond the purple mist. In these visions, he had felt that he was somehow close to the truth about this mysterious world, but he always awoke just before the revelation. He stared at the stars, relaxed by their remote pulsing. With one leg dangling off the branch, he fell asleep in the endless twilight.

***

He heard a snort from below and opened his eyes just in time before something shook the tree from the root to the branches. He sprang and clung to a branch with his free arm. Below him, a wild goat with horns the size of his arms was digging with its hooves, ready to charge, drooling.

Weren’t these damn beasts herbivores? 

He stared at the animal and noticed its hairless patches with yellowish, discolored skin. The wretched creature was sick. He understood, with a sense of annoyance, that he could not leave without confronting it. Balancing himself on two feet, he leaped to a branch on the farther side of the tree, then dropped to the ground just as the goat turned towards him. He flipped the fang-topped stick around. The gift, as he called it, the premonition that had saved his life countless times, possessed him, pulling him out of the present moment: he saw the goat rush at him with its snout down, ready to smash his legs with stone-hard horns. It hadn’t happened yet, but he saw it. 

He snapped back to the present, his vision having delivered what he needed. When the charging animal was close enough to his knees, Boren slipped to the side and sank the pointy end of the staff into the animal’s skull, piercing it from side to side. The beast made one last hoarse cry and crashed to the ground, the weapon still stuck in the orbit of one eye. He approached the carcass and pressed his foot against the neck to extract it. 

The vultures will thank me, but what a waste of meat. 

Had it been in better conditions, he would not have hesitated to make an instant feast of the goat. 

He got back on the road, facing the rising temperatures and a breath of torrid, implacable wind. He marched on until he noticed that the air was struggling to accumulate in his lungs. 

How many thousands of feet up have I climbed? 

He looked up to the peaks. The ground looked like fine white flour among dried trees and shaggy bushes. He felt the impulse to turn around and give up the climb. The unknown above him was as suffocating as the absence of clean air. The gift whispered to him to proceed, but that power itself was at times cryptic. He had decided long ago that he would not become the puppet of a kind of magic he did not fully understand. The first signs, the first visions, had manifested themselves when he was still on Komad. Those visions had shown him the way to his brother Kleos, then the path to reach the portal between worlds. But on Taytos, somehow, its power had grown manifold.

When he stopped for a sip of water, he saw from the fading light that half the day had slipped by as he tread the winding path. He rested, feeling the gritty mixture of sweat and dust permeating his skin, caking under his nails, and coating the inside of his nose. Balancing his staff in one hand, he listened to the stillness. The only sound was his own labored breathing, rasping in the dry air. All else was silence and desolation. Eyes closed, he sought any whisper of life on the hot wind.

When the prey came close enough, he hurled the staff like a spear. It ended up in a bush thirty feet away, causing a dying howl. 

It must be a big one.

Licking his chapped lips, he approached the blood puddle where the prey lay. It turned out to be slimmer than he had hoped. It resembled a fox but was far less elegant. More like an outsized, chestnut-colored mouse. He huffed, blowing away the tuft of hair that had slipped in front of his healthy eye. He dragged the trophy with him, looking for a suitable place to camp, then crossed a slope and found himself on the edge of a narrow path between the side of the mountain and the steep face of the rock. A path too narrow to cross. A dead end. He examined the mountainside for a long time. He traced every rock and crack in the facade in his mind. Every muscle begged him to stop, to give up. He tied the beast to the back of the rope that served as a belt on his waist. His fingers tightened on the first ledge and he began climbing.

He climbed to the top, muscles spasming, screaming for rest. He took the second sip of water of the day, then started the same dinner ritual. A rare gust of wind blew, scattering sparks. He looked up. Wisps of smoke danced upwards, then suddenly froze, suspended in mid-air. The sparks too hung motionless as if time itself had stopped. The wind died. He froze, listening, muscles taut. A low hum reverberated through the stone beneath him. The mountain trembled. Rocks tumbled down its flanks. The hum grew louder, becoming a rumble. He stood, alarmed but mesmerized. Suddenly, the stone beneath his feet fractured. The cliff face he had climbed shattered, tons of rock crashing down into the chasm below, the booming and shattering filling the air. But the rock under him somehow held firm. The rumbling ceased, but an echo made its way through the rock into his skin. With one word.

“Welcome.”

Rise of the Nemesis is due for release 10th August. You can pre-order your copy HERE

Paolo Danese, creator of the Portal Wars universe, blends his rich international experiences with his career in journalism and technology to craft epic fantasy narratives that captivate.

Born in Southern Italy and educated in Canada and the UK, Paolo’s journeys from Hong Kong to Singapore infuse his tales with a unique global perspective, enriching the intricate plots and vivid settings of his series.

‘Path of the Guardian,’ his first novel, is a young adult epic fantasy that introduces readers to a world where medieval grandeur and Mediterranean mystique collide in a story of destiny, magic, and conflict.

As an experienced publishing professional and tech startup founder in Singapore, Paolo continues to pioneer innovative ways to share stories, engaging readers beyond the printed page.

Dive into the Portal Wars universe with ‘Path of the Guardian’ or follow him on social media for news of his upcoming adult two-book series set in the same universe.

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