Book One of The Quest for Free Will Series
Discover the speculative journey
In a world where every choice is predicted, can freedom survive?
The Path Codex launches The Quest for Free Will, a haunting speculative series about memory, control, and rebellion. Three endings, one question: What will you choose?
Every choice predicted. Every memory controlled. Every life optimized.
The Codex was built to eliminate chaos and suffering — a perfect system where freedom is quietly surrendered for peace. But when Cael, a Tracker, begins to see things the system cannot explain, and Elara sketches memories she was never meant to recall, the spiral of control begins to fracture.
The Path Codex is the first book in The Quest for Free Will, a five-part speculative series that asks: When every path is already written, what will you choose?
For readers who love 1984, The Giver, and Brave New World, this debut novel blends dystopian vision with poetic storytelling, offering three possible endings that mirror the choices we face in life itself.
The Voices Who Defy the Codex
Cael Rhys — The Tracker
Trained to enforce harmony, Cael sees what Codex insists is not real. His gray-blue eyes reflect both duty and doubt, making him the first to glimpse the fractures in the system’s perfect design.
Elara — The Dreamer
Elara carries forbidden sketches that Codex cannot explain — spirals, faces, memories of another life. What she draws becomes more than rebellion; it becomes a path forward.
Mira — The Memory-Keeper
Born beyond the system, Mira was never logged, never scored. Barefoot and cloaked in patched cloth, she tends the hidden Citadel of the Offlines, guarding the fragments of choice Codex tried to erase.
The Forces Shaping Every Choice
Codex — The Algorithm
The Codex governs all. It predicts, assigns, recalibrates. To live within its spiral of light is to surrender chaos for order — and freedom for peace.
The Offlines — The Forgotten
In the caverns beyond the city, the Offlines guard firelight and memory. They are the unscored, the untracked, living in the fractures Codex cannot erase.
The Red Thread
A mark whispered through generations: fragile, frayed, but unbroken. The Red Thread hums with resonance, carrying the promise that choice still survives.
Meet the Author
Denzil Shepherd
He writes speculative fiction that weaves together science, philosophy, and emotional truth. His stories explore systems of control, the tension between identity and conformity, and the quiet rebellion of choice.
When he’s not building fictional worlds, Denzil is reflecting on real ones — observing the silent patterns that shape our lives, and asking how much of what we call “freedom” is truly our own.
The Path Codex is his debut novel and the first in The Quest for Free Will series.
Also from the Author
Stories should unsettle as much as they inspire — because truth often lives in the fracture.
Denzil Shepherd
Don't miss it!
Get a special copy signed by me
18 Apr
2021
Location
1234 N Spring St, Los Angeles, CA 90012, United States.
