Mayah, Grax, and Margaret, better known as The Royal Death Claws, have just entered the prize dungeon they won in the paladin’s tournament. Now they just have to survive in the bowels of a sprawling, massive underground world filled with dangers around every corner, and under every leaf. It’s a gamers paradise, but there’s one small problem.
Our tiny heroine, Pretty Princess Cuddle Fluff, is still stuck in the expansive VR game world of Majesta. It isn’t half bad until Grax and Margaret log out and she gets reminded that her life is on the line.
With her logout button inoperable and a malicious AI searching for her in-game, she’s struggling to get as strong as possible to survive the inevitable clash for her survival. Because in the dungeon her chances of dying have just risen significantly.
This novel contains big hammers, cats, enchanting, snark, grenades, necromancy, leveling, fetch quests, beeps and boops, misunderstandings of the deadliest kind, olfactory and gustatory offenses, grandmothers, Evil sentient computer viruses, truces, crafting, duels, getting gear, friendship, Happiness and sweet, sweet XP.
Safe for the kids. Great for the adults.
This book Is: GameLit / LitRPG and contains very visible RPG, video game mechanics, and fights that are integral to the story. No blood or cursing, though. Style: serial slice of life.
My Opinion: 821 pages, $3.99, Available on Kindle Unlimited
I enjoyed the story but not as much as the 1st book. Parts of dungeon dive felt like they went on too long and it started to feel like a grind to read. The brother’s story, while funny and interesting in its own right, didn't feel connected with the MCs story. I felt the same about the villain POV story. Very interesting stuff but unrelated to this book and likely a setup for future novels.
The Author Note at the end of the novel acknowledges some of the story decisions. The author notes why he decided to include the main character’s brother, in this book rather than give him a seperate one. Also that MC storyline may feel anticlimactic, even having characters make a joke about that. He notes her dungeon arc isn't done and that Book 2.2 will hopefully be out by Christmas to finish up that storyline.
I absolutely respect the author’s decision to setup his story the way it is for whatever reason he chose. While I didn’t like it as much as book 1, I still enjoyed the crafting and the good funny banter and dialogue. The main character still shines as a plucky heroine making intelligent decisions and not taking any guff from anyone while maintaining her heart of gold.
Score: 7.3 out of 10