It’s been a while since I wrote a post on the web serials I’ve been reading so here’s an update. Do check these out if you’re looking for something to read.
Out of the three serials in my last post, this is the only one that I’m still following. It’s all the way at the end of book three now with the scope of the story growing in line with Catherine’s personal power. She also gains her own entourage of Named and gains some authority of her own independently of the Tower. The writing and characterization is as good as ever, though it does get a little silly how Catherine always solves problems using brute force.
Perhaps my favorite thing about the newer chapters is that there are a lot of interludes featuring different characters, vastly expanding the world. In the third book for example, we actually spend quite a bit of time in the Free Cities and get to know new characters like the Tyrant of Helike and Anaxares of Bellerophan. We also get to see the Calamities in action in the Free Cities and in particular how the Black Knight’s plans are much more calculated and intricate than those of Catherine.
This is a LitRPG that was posted on a forum that I read through only recently. It was written by the same person who wrote the excellent Dire Worm fanfiction for Worm and seems to have been completed within an astonishingly short time. This story is indeed complete though the author says that there will be a sequel.
LitRPGs are usually groan-worthy to me. To those who don’t know what that means, it refers to a whole genre of fiction in which one or more characters run on RPG mechanics and are aware of it. Usually it’s only the main character and the genre is very popular at the moment. I think that’s because of the Korean comic The Gamer though I haven’t read it at all. It’s an interesting way to make a character measurably more powerful over the course of a story and to make readers feel like the stakes keep raising without the author having to work too hard at it I think.
This one has the whole world running on RPG mechanics. The main character is a teddy bear, brought to life by his creator’s animate golem spell. His owner is a little girl, his creator’s daughter. After surviving multiple household mishaps, he is brought along with a few adventures. The main plot starts when the big bad attacks and kidnaps the girl and so Threadbare has to gather his friends and save his little girl, no matter what it takes and no matter where it takes him. Though a little predictable and on the simple side, it makes no mistakes and is highly entertaining. I like how Threadbare’s increasing intelligence directly impacts his perception of the world.
This one is also a LitRPG though the mechanics are most blatant at the beginning and tapers off as the story goes on. This is also a guilty pleasure as it very definitely has an X rating due to its explicit sex scenes. However this is not erotica as the sex scenes are not meant to arouse but to make you laugh instead as they are horribly over the top and usually result in horrific injuries that would kill any normal person many times over.
The protagonist is an ordinary mimic, yes the monster that you find impersonating treasure chests, who is spawned in a dungeon. Though quite stupid at first and relying almost entirely on instincts, the creature manages to survive and eats several adventurers. Eventually he becomes smart enough and powerful enough to break out of his dungeon and takes on a name, the perfectly appropriate Boxxy T. Morningwood. In addition to his mimic class, he also adds on the warlock class, allowing him to bind and summon demonic familiars, every one of which is female. Indeed it accumulates an entire harem of monster-girls of every imaginable but it’s all good as Boxxy is completely asexual and cares only whether or not something is tasty, as in good to eat, or shiny, as in good to add to its treasure hoard.
Reading it, I laughed and had fun but kept thinking of it as a joke that can go only so far. Luckily the author has a much richer imagination than me and manages to outdo himself in going over the top. Boxxy manages to gain the favor of a very irreverent god, get involved in a major war and pretty much bamboozles everyone. It’s fantastic.
Lately, I’ve also started reading quests on forums. These are games in which a questmaster narrates a story and invites players to participate in the decisions of the main character by voting. There are game mechanics, dice rolling and tracking of inventory to make it all feel like a real game. The more ambitious of such quests involve taking control of nations or even star-spanning civilizations, necessitating a degree of effort which frightens me.
So far I’ve only been an active participant in this one, a xianxia-themed quest about Ling Qi, a young street waif who is drafted into a sect to practise cultivation when it is discovered that she has some talent. Less than a year has passed in-game and Ling Qi has gone from a mortal commoner to one of the most promising students in the Outer Sect as everyone prepares for the end of year tournament.
I like this mostly because it invokes the best bits of xianxia, the arts, the spirits, the fantastic items but actively works against the worst tropes. The very fact that the main character is female, as voted by thread participants, is great. The worldbuilding is fantastic with plenty of cool details but most importantly there is a great sense that everything is laid out in a way that makes sense. It feels real and not merely a thin shell that revolves solely around the protagonist as in so much of actual xianxia fiction. Not bad for a guy who doesn’t actually speak Chinese.
The game mechanics seemed pretty cool when the quest started out but is starting to feel very unwieldy now. I understand that there will be a major mechanics rework after the current quest ends with the tournament. I did like how much work the QM put into developing all these arts with evocative names and descriptions but as the number of dice has increased, the sheer number of arts seem to make individual ones seem less significant.
