Michael was proud of his life and his accomplishments. During the day he was Michael Semione. He worked, spent time with his family, and did everything young professionals were meant to do. At night, he became Creighton Dian-Cecht, a druid healer in Fjorgyn Online. He was head of a company of crafters and adventurers known throughout the game.
Things changed, however, when Michael was killed in real life while playing the game. He was reincarnated in a world based on Fjorgyn a level one, alone and naked in the woods. When he played the game, all he wanted to do was craft and heal. Follow his new life and his new adventures and challenges. See how he reconciles his desire to only heal in this dangerous, new world.
My Opinion: 173 pages, $2.99, Available on Kindle Unlimited
Michael, a high level gamer, dies while playing his favorite VR game. He wakes up to find he’s been reincarnated into a new world just like the one he was playing. Michael has to discover the hard way how the world works and who’ll he’ll become in this new world.
The first 13% of the novel is an introduction to the game mechanics of the world and quick instance of combat. Then there’s an odd shift in the story after Michael makes his first kill and he passes out. He finds himself in a wagon about to be enslaved. The story becomes about slavery in this fantasy game world and the main character’s quest to free himself and the group of slaves he’s with.
Like:
The clear explanations on how the game mechanics of the world work. The character gets and raises his skills by doing things. Learns magic spells from a teacher or spell book. There’s the standard character stats, health, mana, and stamina. Lot’s of clear numbers that tell me how the character is progressing and becoming more powerful.
Reputation matters - The mechanic of reputation and being able to get people to trust him is the main characters best ability. Without the support of the other people enslaved he wouldn’t stand a chance at freeing them on his own.
At about the 57%- a romantic storyline develops between the male main character and a male noble. There’s no sex but there are sex jokes and romance. Well done foreshadowing didn't make this development a surprise.
Good alchemy/herbalism descriptions. I’m a suckered for crafting.
Dislike:
The abrupt shift from rat hunting to being trapped as a slave. Small thing.
As a matter of personal taste, I would have liked more action. This is not a combat centered story. A few dungeon runs but not much else in the action department.
At the end of almost every other chapter, there is an exhaustively detailed character sheet which includes descriptions of all the spells and skills the character knows. I’m all for detail, but I only need a spell/skill description once. That information could have been included in a glossary at the end of the book and some of the repetitiveness would have been eliminated.
Overall:
I had fun reading this story. The thing I liked the most about the story was the attention paid to the game mechanics, spell system, and crafting stuff. Very well done. You can tell the author put a lot of thought into this part of the story.
I would have liked to have seen more happen than ‘the great slave escape’. Thankfully, the end of the story hints at a larger experience in the next book. Maybe with some town building/city management game mechanics.
Score: 7 out of 10.