The first book in a new fantasy LitRPG series has arrived.
A Goddess is stirring up trouble, and Arthur happens to be the one caught up in the action. After an unfortunate encounter, Arthur is given a second chance in a new world. To his surprise, this new world has mechanics that remind him of Role-Playing Games from Earth.
He has been given a simple directive from the Goddess, to help the people of the world and spread her name. He quickly discovers this will not be an easy task. The world has been overrun with bandits, who work for the lords of the land and cause all the denizens to live in abject ruin. Can Arthur tame Dravincia and push back against these forces or is he destined to fail spectacularly and have to hope for another try?
My Opinion: 474 pagees, $4.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited
This one is a bit of a mixed bag for me. Overall it just didn’t work for me.
There were some parts of the story that I did like. Eventually the MC gets earth magic and that progression was rather neat. It ventured into some interesting uses of the earth magic and even applied to farming. I also liked the town building that happens. The game mechanics are pretty normal with a leveling and skill system I’d seen plenty of other places. There are lots of notifications and numbers here for those that love that stuff, though for me there were sometimes too many. Some places there were up to 10 pages in a row full of tables or notifications.
But that’s kind of all I liked about the story. I never connected with any of the characters. The action was okay at best. The beginning in particular has lots of technical writing issues with the biggest issue being mixed tenses and not identifying who is actually being spoken of in the 3rd person. Example: "Instead of running into him, he stopped close to him and swung his head at him with his sharp tusks." There are also dialogue issues, with the way people talk in the story feeling stilted and unnatural. Especially the way the main character (MC) speaks to the residents of the fantasy RGP world. It reminded me of how someone on a roleplaying server talked. Intentionally archaic to create flare or get into character. It’s not terrible, but a little example would be when the MC meets a dark elf lady, "I have never seen one of the dark elf kindred before. Is your beauty a normal trait shared by your race?” No one up to that point in the story had used the word kindred, so the MC is basically pulling it out of nowhere with either knowledge he shouldn’t have or he’s just using words the people of this world may or may not know.
Worst, for me, the storyline was super forced and the MC regularly got powers, items, and abilities that he never earned. Even the ending is resolved not by the MC using his hard won and practiced magic or good tactics, instead he uses a never before seen power that has no connection to his earth magic or any part of the story and is explained away in the epilogue.
Overall, though there are many people that seemed to like this story, I couldn’t. Sure, some parts were smart and well thought out, but it had issues that ruined the reading for me.
Score: 6 out of 10