Split Infinity [Paperback]

On the technological, decadent world of Proton, someone was trying to destroy Stile, serf and master Gamesman. His only escape lay through a mysterious “curtain” revealed by a loving robot.

Beyond the curtain lay Phaze—a world totally ruled by magic. There, his first encounter was with an amulet that turned into a demon determined to choke him to death. And there, he soon learned, his alternate self had already been murdered by sorcery, and he was due to be the next victim.

“Know thyself!” the infallible Oracle told him. But first he must save himself as he shuttled between worlds.

On Proton, his fate depended on winning the great Games.

On Phaze, he could survive only by mastering magic.

And if he used any magic at all, the werewolf and the unicorn who were his only friends were determined to kill him at once!Piers Anthony, sometimes called Pier Xanthony, is the pseudonym of a Mundane character who was born in England in 1934, came to America in 1940, was naturalized in 1958, and moved to Xanth in 1977. His first story was published in 1963, and his first novel,Chthon,in 1967. His first Xanth novel,A Spell for Chameleon,won the August Derleth Fantasy Award as the best novel for 1977, and his fantasy novels began placing on theNew York Timesbestseller list withOgre, Ogre. He shifted from writing in pencil to writing on the computer, andGolem in the Gearswas his first novel created on the machine; naturally, the computer found its way into Xanth.CHAPTER 1
 
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He walked with the assurance of stature, and most others deferred to him subtly. When he moved in a given direction, the way before him conveniently opened, by seeming coincidence; when he made eye contact, the other head nodded in a token bow. He was a serf, like all of them, naked and with no physical badge of status; indeed, it would have been the depth of bad taste to accord l³.