Arcane Apocalypse (Series): Book 1 - Prelude to War

Our world ended in a storm of magic and light. Mana, the essence of wonder, returned—and everything changed. Machines died, monsters rose, and the System came online: an invisible network designed by ancient sorcerers, recently deceased, to guide humanity through the Return of magic. Grant Smith, an alchemist by chance and a survivor by necessity, discovers that rebuilding might be more dangerous than destruction. With his wife Sandra, a planeswalker bound to nature’s pulse, and a team of bruisers, engineers, and zealots, he scours the ruins for materials, knowledge, and truth. But most of all, he's just trying to survive. NOTES: Bit of a slow burn in the beginning. Also, all the trigger warnings at the beginning, don't care. Also, no harem at all. MC is married. the opinions of the characters in this book in no way allude to the Author's personal beliefs, etc. If you are easily offended, please move on to the next book. I hope you find what you're looking for. I'm trying to write real people in unreal circumstances. You may not agree, but people are or can be just as selfish, dumb, stupid, ignorant, and pathetic as they can be evil or saint-like. Embrace your inner human if you dare. Everything will be made fun of at some point. Get over it or move on to the next work.  SPOILERS" Includes (some of this is  early and some of this is eventually): Slavery, Cultivation, Different Fantastical species, blood and gore, death, politics and religion.  SIDE NOTE: I did not know someone else already had the title 'Arcane Apocalypse' on RoyalRoad. I swear on all that is holy, I started writing this on google docs in april of 2021 (I checked my version history to verify). I updated my stuff so that the series name is: Arcane Apocalypse and book 1 is 'Prelude to War'. I plan on having 3 books in this series (still working on titles for books 2 and 3).