Mahan's ready for new adventures - just as the gaming world of Barliona thought it was about to re-enter its old comfortable rut. The winds of the Dark Forest have finally died down; Altameda has recognized its new owner while Geranika is nursing new schemes of global destruction.
Would Mahan be happy with this predictable old life? We think not! New storylines, new monsters, new dungeons and a new status: our High Shaman hates the daily grind! He wants a new apprentice? - then he'd better find someone who has no right to summon Spirits. A new ship? - it's going to be one of a kind! A new love? Well, we'll have to see, won't we?
My Opinion: $5.99, 390 pages, Not Available on Kindle Unlimited
Set moments after the end of book 4 when Mahan finally takes control of the phantom castle but loses all his class abilities for letting the big bad guy steal the heart of chaos which will let him become an evil god. Mahan now has to not only manage his new castle, his guild, and figure out a way to restore his class. But he also has the task of making The Karmadont Chess Set.
This was just a fun story. In a lot of the recent books in the series there’s always some huge world changing event that puts pressure on Mahan. In this book, that’s all gone. Well, mostly gone. There’s still the global threat of Geranika becoming an evil god and destroying the world but that’s not our main characters problem. He’s been stripped of his character class and can’t even access the questline to deal with that problem. He’s literally been forced on a two month break before he can even try to get his class abilities back. So, instead he’s clearing out his quest log and finishing up any loose quests. Remember that quest from book 1 with the wolves, or the goblins he had as workers briefly? All resolved spectacularly. And most of the book is like that, older storylines are finally tidied up. There are still plenty of new cool things that Mahan and his crew do but there are no big guild politics stuff. Its Mahan, a couple of his close friends, and his new apprentice going on quests. Each quest is resolved before starting on the next one. There’s no hopping around the globe partially completing one quest but not another. There’s crafting, some nice city and village management stuff, even later on in the story some adventures on the high seas. Great stuff. Finished the entire book in a single sitting.
Be aware that there is a WTF cliffhanger ending. According to an interview Vasily Mahanenko did with me, he’d originally planned for the series to have five books. Then he remembered he was contracted to write a total of seven books for the series and had to come up with additional material.
Our interview with Vasily Mahanenko and his apologies for making people mad with book 5 (cued to 20:55). Warning, SPOILERS: https://youtu.be/2knw1Z0_YaA?t=1255
Score: 8 out of 10