After-School Dungen Diver: Level Grinding in Another World. Vol 1 MC can freely travel between Japan and the fantasy world. Some interesting contrast between the MC who is dungeon diving as a hobby after school and the adventurers for whom this is their job and way of life. But it does not get too serious. Some cliche harem precurors (MC rescued two different women who immediately fell in love…) No real meta plot, at least not yet. 3/5
The Water Magician: Arc 1. Vol 1 Wow, I really enjoyed this one. No stat points, skills, hud, etc. Instead magic and abilities are gained through training and effort. Much of the first novel is in a survival setting with the MC learning to survive, building up a base and a routine, etc. It actually starts to feel lonely after awhile. 4/5
The Otome Heroine’s Fight for Survival. Vol 1 Another I really enjoyed. Unlike the water magician as this has ALL the stats, skills, hud, etc. complete with frequent print outs of stats in the text. MC is NOT an isekei protagonist, but due to an accident gained some memories from a character who was isekei’d causing her to realize she is the protagonist in a gameworld. This pisses her off and she decides to abandon the plot and prioritize her own safety and wellbeing, (and will kill for it if needed.) After a bunch of villainess novels, it is nice to read one with the protagonist going rogue 4/5
The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick Up Trash. Vol 1-6 Picked it up after watching most of the anime. Overall I really enjoy the story, but it tends to get bogged down and overly repetative at times. 4/5
Why Shouldn’t a Destestable Demon Lord Fall in Love?! Vol 1-2 Starts off a bit silly, and the slice of life moments while nice at first, drag on way to long, especially the over emphasis on cutesy speech from the 3 year old… Generally enjoyable, but not much of a plot to drive my interest. 3/5
The Water Magician: Arc 1. Vol 1
Just my luck. I was flipping a coin yesterday between starting this and “The Exiled Noble Rises as the Holy King” and chose poorly, because Exiled Noble is terrible so far. But I already dropped 3 novels last week, so I have to power through this one and stop being so picky.
Making Magic: The Sweet Life of a Witch Who Knows an Infinite MP Loophole Volume 6 - The book takes about a good two-thirds of it being fluffy SoL and then one-third on the actual plot point of the volume. For my taste, a 50-50 distribution would have been better or 50 more pages added to the later part so that that part didn’t feel so rushed. I hope there will be some kingdom-building in the next volume. I always enjoy those types of stories and the current plot would lend itself to it. - 6/10
Easygoing Territory Defense by the Optimistic Lord: Production Magic Turns a Nameless Village into the Strongest Fortified City Volume 2 - Super entertaining volume. After struggling to keep interested in- and ultimately dropping two other series, I was able to finish this one in one continuous sitting. It’s not really anything deep or gripping, but just really easy to read. - 7/10
Easygoing Territory Defense by the Optimistic Lord: Production Magic Turns a Nameless Village into the Strongest Fortified City
I read both volumes 1 and 2 this week. It was a bit entertaining but there was nothing special about the story. I got particularly annoyed that the MC was doing just about everything by himself and everyone else is practically doing nothing.
Hopefully, the characters get fleshed out by the next volume.
Land of Leadale vol 7: Took me a while to chunk through this one. It’s a weird one in that it’s kind of building up to some sort of climax, but nothing really happens. Still a weird series, I’m always halfway to enjoying it but not quite.
Apocalypse Bringer Mynoghra vol 6: To some extent things don’t feel like they move forward significantly here—the conflict doesn’t result in any major power shifts—but shit Vittorio was an interesting addition. Annoying as shit, but very active in driving the plot the whole time. Really enjoyed this one.
Somehow, Leadale was the series that drew me into reading light novels. I enjoyed them at first, but I agree the story is taking far to long to reach any sort of resolution and I’m getting tired of it.
Yeah, I get why and how people enjoy it, but for me it just feels unfocused and continually delays progress. There’s been one long-term problem for most of the series the characters just… Genuinely forget about. Makes it feel less like a slice of life and more like the author is just faffing about.
That said, I get just enough enjoyment that I may as well keep going at this point. Eventually it’ll bug me to leave it unfinished.
So I’m a spider so what? - Vol 12 to 13
I have continued spider this week.
This is my second read of the series and reading it at a slower pace has allowed me to catch something I missed the first time or forgot.
Vol 12 is ok but doesn’t have much of the MC who really makes the series so it can feel a bit boring. Vol 13 has the lead up to a big event so we have lots of fun moments with the MC.
