Davin Pentcross has achieved his lifelong dream of being a level one hundred adventurer on his homeworld Eternity Ring, a massive ringworld in which strength and a person's level dictate how society functions. But Davin is old. When he loses everything he holds dear, Davin discovers an odd ring in an ancient dungeon. The moment he puts it on, he loses a level. In exchange for returned youth, the ring saps his powers and makes him lose a level everyday until he is killed or becomes a level one again. In a world where a person's level means everything, Davin is doomed to become weaker and must use his experience to survive the harsh world of the Eternity Ring.
My Opinion: 220 pages, $2.99, Available on Kindle Unlimited
Just a quick warning, there are regular spelling and grammar errors in this story.
While I was reading this, I could tell that this was originally a serial story on the royal road. There’s not much world building for the first 17% of the story, just a basic setup getting the main character the rare artifact that propels the remainder of the story and his search for answers about it. As the story goes on it feels more like a collection of short stories than a novel with a purposeful plot.
It goes from a vague description of the main character, Davin, as a commander leading a troop, to him teleported to a forest trying to survive, to him in a city sentenced to death and fighting in pit for his life in a series of increasingly difficult fights for the amusement of others. The action isn’t bad. The RPG elements of skills, abilities, and stats are well thought out, if occasionally used as a magic wand to solve a problem.
However, aside from the interesting stories about the main characters past, I don’t know much about where the plot of the story is going or even if there is one. It also just ends abruptly. Which happens on the royal road all the time, an author gets tired of writing a series and just drops it.
Overall, it was only ok for me.
Score: 5 out of 10.