The Mana Archive, Book One: When Magic Returned

Nate Mercer was seventeen when he found the book. Until then, his life had been ordinary: school, friends, chores on his family's Wisconsin farm, and an unhealthy amount of money spent on comics. Then a fall down a muddy roadside uncovered an ancient book buried beneath the earth. Its language was unknown. Its pages should have rotted centuries ago. And hidden inside its damaged records was something the modern world had forgotten existed: Magic. Nate begins learning in secret—first to sense Mana, then to shape it, store it, and eventually cast spells of his own. For years, he believes he may be the only mage left alive. Then the monsters return. As Mana spreads across the world, creatures once thought extinct begin appearing, and the same returning laws of magic start interfering with the technology civilization depends upon. Nate has a head start. Humanity does not. When Magic Returned is a modern progression fantasy about lost magical knowledge, a slowly escalating apocalypse, and an ordinary teenager forced to grow into something the world has not seen for thousands of years.