Forbidden Quest (Hypnotic Journey) (Volume 1)

Wouldn't it be cool to suddenly have the battle skills of a seasoned warrior? What if the battles felt real but there was no physical risk to you? Wouldn't it be perfect if the hypnotist in charge of your session were not insanely evil and using you as a weapon in a plot for revenge?

Four friends enter into a Group Hypnosis study attempting to introduce fantasy adventures to small groups. Promised a video game type of adventure rescuing an Elf Queen from her crystal prison as elf warriors, a sorceress and a fairy they blindly agree to be test subjects. As soon as they fall under the good doctors spell the adventurers find a world of magic and beauty.  Their transformation into fantasy creatures came with incredible battle skills and powerful magic. Yet something just does not feel right.   Soon they find themselves in a hostile world that considers them the enemy.  A world filled with monsters and untold dangers; a world more realistic than they ever imagined. Soon they realize the one life Dr. Strong advised the game afforded was their own.  Their only option is to complete their mission and pray it will be enough to return home.

When Nicole Waters' boyfriend Tom becomes ill, the prominent St Louis Assistant DA is forced to take Tom's best friend Jack Tyler, a local travel agent on a business vacation. Certain she's discovered the next hot trend in adventure vacations Nicole takes Jack and two others; Sarah Sims, a shy nurse and Todd Hopper, a professional hockey player into a test program for group hypnosis. They travel to a small town in the middle of Kansas to meet Dr. Strong, the psychologist researching group hypnosis at his clinic. Undaunted by the fact that the so called clinic is housed in an ancient looking run down hotel and Dr. Strong's creepy assistants the group is eager to get started with their 'adventure'.

Dr. Strong introduces the soon to be adventurers to an equipment filled gym explaining, "The wall of netting might become a series of vines or perhaps the side of a rock cliff. The weight machine will serve as stimulus if you are required to lift or push a heavy object. The stair climber will act as a tree, fortress wall or perhaps a rock incline you must scale." He then offers Nicole and her friends a mild sedative to aid in their simultaneous entry into hypnosis. Yet instead of experiencing an action packed fantasy adventure akin to a video game quest; they find themselves trapped in a deadly world of elves and monsters that is more real than they could ever imagine; where a cry for help goes unanswered.