Shadow Slave by Guiltythree

Dropping at 1772, and a review.

Fantasy: I have nothing but praise here. The concept may not be new, but what matters is how it’s implemented, and the author does excel in that regard. Mythology and history, while not the main focus, are handled thoroughly. You’ll know it’s good stuff when find yourself coming up with theories about events and things left unsaid. There are some fumbles and inconsistencies, but these are more related to the writing rather than the genre or idea itself. 5/5

Action: If you're here for the fight scenes, you've come to the right place. There are times when the story consists of nothing but battles for long stretches, just remember fight sequences in Naruto. However, the author deliberately lowers the intelligence of the nightmare creatures (NCs) starting around volume 3. There are moments when the main character is surrounded by hundreds of NCs, each with at least one unique abl, and the only reason he survives is that instead of drowning him with a barrage of ab, 95% of them simply charge at him. 3.5/5

Adventure: Easiest genre to incorporate into any novel. Every vol, you can expect a new location and risky situations at every turn. However, in my opinion, this becomes excessive, as moments that should evoke worry instead lead to apathy. Additionally, the main character lacks an inherent, personal goal—one that is truly his own. All of his objectives are merely reactions to someone else’s decisions or actions. While he does have short-term goals, aka becoming stronger to break free, there's no overarching goal.
4/5

Romance: For the first 1,500 chapters, it was practically nonexistent—the closest thing to romance was mental masturbation. The author obsessively writes about the main character ogling everyone as if they were unbelievably, ridiculously good-looking. You won’t find more than 3 chapters without this, and sometimes entire chapters are dedicated to describing "city-toppling" beauty using the same vocabulary that was already used to describe the previous three levels of beauty. More recently, romance has started to develop rapidly, reaching a point of 120% saturation. 2/5

Character: None to begin with. He went from manipulator with the qualities needed to survive—a character with distinct looks and values shaped by his experiences, with the potential to rise to the top at the end of Volume 1—to a whiny, dull, beta-boy idiot who can't even look at a girl without cowering. Behaving like an indecisive teenage in love. Insulting everyone he meets with “truth”, and never learns from his mistakes to repeat them over and over. "How did we get here?" Women. Aka Nephis, aka star of RUIN, who basically assassinated mc personality becoming his personal drug. In the most recent chapters, he's essentially an edgelord. 1/5

I don't understand. You saw a group of people having fun, you go there and see what they're doing, didn't like it and call them losers. You go away but turn back to see them still having fun, not giving a shit about your opinion. And here you are instead of moving on like a normal "winner', came back again to bark about your 'right' opinion while everyone is ignoring you.


Why are you still here?
Do you have no friends of your own?
Is it because you are a 'winner' than you are alone?
Is life in the real world too hard on you that you are bitching here for attention and begging for laurels.

Character: None to begin with. He went from manipulator with the qualities needed to survive—a character with distinct looks and values shaped by his experiences, with the potential to rise to the top at the end of Volume 1—to a whiny, dull, beta-boy idiot who can't even look at a girl without cowering.
Behaving like an indecisive teenage in love.
Insulting everyone he meets with “truth”, and never learns from his mistakes to repeat them over and over.
"How did we get here?" Women. Aka Nephis, aka star of RUIN, who basically assassinated mc personality becoming his personal drug. In the most recent chapters, he's essentially an edgelord. 1/5

Arbiter
My biggest gripe with this novel.
Many thanks to the fellow daoist who wrote this above review.

SquidInk

I don't understand. You saw a group of people having fun, you go there and see what they're doing, didn't like it and call them losers. You go away but turn back to see them still having fun, not giving a shit about your opinion. And here you are instead of moving on like a normal "winner', came back again to bark about your 'right' opinion while everyone is ignoring you.


Why are you still here?
Do you have no friends of your own?
Is it because you are a 'winner' than you are alone?
Is life in the real world too hard on you that you are bitching here for attention and begging for laurels.

Character: None to begin with. He went from manipulator with the qualities needed to survive—a character with distinct looks and values shaped by his experiences, with the potential to rise to the top at the end of Volume 1—to a whiny, dull, beta-boy idiot who can't even look at a girl without cowering.Behaving like an indecisive teenage in love.Insulting everyone he meets with “truth”, and never learns from his mistakes to repeat them over and over. "How did we get here?" Women. Aka Nephis, aka star of RUIN, who basically assassinated mc personality becoming his personal drug. In the most recent chapters, he's essentially an edgelord. 1/5