Neon Dust

Self-Published

Community Rating

Description

In 22nd-century New York, survival is a hustle, and secrets refuse to stay buried.

Tony, once a corporate operative, knows betrayal firsthand—abandoned by the elites who molded him, he’s been exiled to the Blast, a low-income, no-exit wasteland in the heart of New Brooklyn.

Now, he scrapes by in a world of gang-controlled streets and Dust-fueled powers, finding reluctant allies among the outcasts he once scorned. Amid the despair, Tony starts to uncover a surprising strength—and a chance to feel something more than just a simmering need for revenge.

Addie, a fiercely independent journo, is determined to expose the district’s corruption and the ruthless toll it takes on its people. But as she digs deeper, her quest for justice drags her into the city’s darkest shadows—and into the grip of Dust. What starts as a mission to expose the underworld soon spirals into a harrowing journey of self-discovery, where even truth itself becomes suspect.

Together, Tony and Addie are an unlikely team in a world where loyalty is rare and survival comes at a price. But if they can trust each other, they might just be able to challenge the forces that keep the Blast under heel—and maybe find redemption in the ruins.

***Updates Friday and Saturday

There are 25+ more chapters available on my Patreon.

Discord invite: https://discord.gg/jrkHqZhdeK

Information

Status: Ongoing
Year: 2025
Author: PlumParrot

Royal Road Stats

Rating: 4.8/ 5.0
Followers: 2,495
Views: 410,478

Reviews

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Community Reviews(10)

mr_tdarwinRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
PlumParrot writes amazing cyberpunk. In our time, the grimmer and darker cyberpunk seems to get. I've had to put down a lot of series because I just can't deal with it right now.
I will read every chapter of this story in every media it gets released. PlumParrot writes a story of hope, in a setting where the grimness can't get grimmer. For all the characters that try to beat down and destroy others, Plum plants seeds of goodness, idealism, and human decency that brings hope for the story, and reminds me that there's hope in real life too.
I love PlumParrot's other stories, but in my mind, they're the premier cyberpunk writer of the day. So I'll reread Cyber Dreams a million times, and eagerly await every chapter of Neon Dust until I can be rereading this story too. It's amazing!
HammyRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
I read this on the author's Patreon and I loved it. It a great story with an engaging story with a grounded cast. It a nice mix of sci-fi and Dust magic. Best description I can give without spoiling. I really look forward to more in this universe.
If you like cyberpunk give this a shot.
JoeyRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Only 10 chapters up so far.
Its a nice pacing in a cyberpunk world with a bit of "magic" mixed in.
The Main cast is likeable with some mysteries waiting to be Explored.
Interested in where this goes but if the quality stays like the other works of the author, expect frequent great uploads
Definitely recommend checking out the already finished Story cyber Dreams.
Im definitely hooked so far
LunacracyRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Great books so far. Love how Plum keeps it gritty and heartfelt at the same time. Their stories are one of my favorite escapes. I really like how you don't need to fear falling in love with the characters as they might be killed off cause Plum wouldn't do that 🤨
Noc73mRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Great cyberpunk. On par with GiTC and Cyberdreams. Good characters with visible growth and realistic concerns, neo-noir investigation and plenty of friday night firefights.
Setting is classic dystopian. Complete with megastructures. Fun use of magic/tech being the same via dust/mana.
Check it out, it's worth it.
And for all that's holy
RonSwansongRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Well written, good world building and pace. The cyberpunk elements are established a rate where it strikes a good balance between a believable society and there still being some deeply intriguing sci-fi elements. The dialogue is especially well written, the characters feel real and we're able to get a true sense of who they are with simple interactions and not page long monologuing about themselves. There are two PoVs, but it never goes beyond that and their storylines stay so close to each other that there's no hopping to the other side of the world while you wait 6 chapters to get back from a cliffhanger. Well done.
C. elegansRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Perhaps “fun” isn’t the first word to come to mind when considering only the blurb. Some other equally apt descriptions like “thrilling” might be closer to the forefront of the mind. However, the story is fun. Not fun as in the amusement provoked by comedy, but fun as in the enjoyment derived from reading.
Neon Dust is far from Plum Parrot’s first story, and the experience accumulated from so many other works is illustrated by the (as far as I can tell) flawless grammar with no typographical errors or awkwardly placed punctuation. Accompanied by excellent prose that immerses you into an alternate Earth, along with boldly distinct characters, this firmly places it into a category of writing few on Royal Road can attain.
With Tony tossed into slums home to rival gangs and vast (and at the very least amoral) corporations as a backdrop, the setting borders on grimdark. But the kindness from individuals like Bert and the hope and determination from those like Addie cut through the darkness like beacons on a stormy night.
There are well-deserved moments of respite for the characters from the action and excitement of the story. Still, there’s always tension buzzing in the background, no matter how quiet, always the long shadows cast by megacorporations looming in the not-so-far distance.
Characters (excluding those who die immediately) are strikingly distinctive, with each character having their own set of defining characteristics. However, without the layers revealed as the story progresses, characters can seem a little simplistic at the start (though admittedly, this is true to some extent no matter how a character is written). The main characters also seem to bear some resemblance in their speech and mannerisms to counterparts in Plum’s other stories, some of which I like more than others.
With so much storytelling experience behind it, Neon Dust is a pleasure to read. In other words, fun.
Natalia HeyingRoyal Road
★★★★★ 4.5
Very good read, the people feel real and the world is well flushed out without being over bearing. Some novel ideas which I will be stealing when running a cyberpunk ttrpg game. I am very interested in how both the story and author evolves during reading. Would definitely say give it a try.
drandreasRoyal Road
★★★★ 4.0
I want to like this story. It has the setting. The world building and interesting mechanics of how tech and ‘magictech’ work in this world. The pacing needs some help. This is not an edge of your seat action drama. More slice of life. A bit of romance. So while I like the story in general when you get down to specifics it looses me. Rather well written scenes. Just not something I can’t put down.
iggy2789Royal Road
★★★ 3.0
I'm a big fan of the Cyber Dream series so when that finished I decided to look for something similar to scratch the Cyberpunk progression itch. When I saw the same author had started something in almost the same setting I decided to give it a shot but sadly this wasn't it. I gave it 20 chapters and so far its just slice of live with basically no progression to speak of. That's fine but its not what I was expecting coming from Cyber Dreams and when the word Progression is in the title.
Also the characters in Neon Dust feel like they have no agency. They are too passive, and there are no stakes in anything they've done so far. It makes it hard to care about anything that's going on. It's disappointing because I know the author can do so much better. 20 Chapters into Cyber Dreams Juliet's life had completely changed, she'd made new friends, she'd done some missions, she'd killed some people, she'd moved to a new city, and she was actively on her way to being a bad ass operator.
In Neon Dust on the other hand, Tony, a bad ass operator already, is betrayed and has everything taken away from him at the beginning of the story. But by the 20th chapter he still has no plan to get it back or what he's going to do with his life now. He's also supposed to be this rich, bad ass operator in a Cyberpunk dystopia, but has no plan in case he gets betrayed, the most common thing that happens in a Cyberpunk dystopia? No data backups, no alternate IDs, no money stashed somewhere? He's only alive because he lucked into finding the nicest group of people in the slums that gave him new prosthetics and life saving operations for basically free.
Also Addie, the other MC, is just way too naive for the setting. She's going to fix the slums through the power of journalism? Seriously? In a world where corporations can basically kidnap people off the street whenever they want, for any reason, without anyone caring? Something that the MCs see in one the chapters by the way, and just keep walking