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3.99 AVERAGE
3.99 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
fast-paced
04 Mar 2022
Webnovel; DNF @C39 + Skimming
1. Transmigrator is now in the body of a pill-making apprentice in a magic sect. He's got a can-do work ethic and an extraplanar space with magic water to help him on his quest to be a successful mage. Too bad he almost immediately finds himself in the crosshairs of a clearly inhuman doppleganger who's replaced his senior martial sibling.
2. Okay so technically, this could have been a three star story. Kinda. Maybe. I do like alchemy-like stories, and I'm not opposed to weak to strong narratives and those are normally enough to carry me through a considerable number of other weird tropes. Also, Ling Xiao is a malicious asshole and I have deep and abiding soft spot for those. But I could ALREADY tell at chapter 40 that this book was going to rely a LOT on repetitive plot points. Also, it was clearly setting itself up for an m/m relationship both toxic (which is not a dealbreaker) and aggressively gendered (which is).
3. I know there may be an argument to be made about how the uke-seme/shou-gong system means gendered m/m relationships are a natural offshoot of the BL genre, but I've read enough of the things to disagree with that. Stories like Mo Dao Zu Shi, The Husky and His White Cat Shizun, and Sha Po Lang all manage to conform to the shou/gong system while making both characters in a relationship fully realized characters with their own strengths and weaknesses. And I didn't even like Sha Po Lang.
4. The Legendary Master's Wife, on the other hand, leans really hard into the "wife" bit. This was particularly evident in all the skimming I did. This is not a healthy romantic relationship, and not even in a fun way. This is just a way to be misogynistic without actually being misogynistic. Although I suspect there was plenty of garden variety misogyny around too. Everything is a sausage fest.
5. It wasn't actually all that bad. The MC's internal screaming at being singled out by the asshole was fun. The asshole himself was fun. And like mentioned before, I do like the alchemy bits. But the skimming told me it was gonna keep going the same way for 5000-odd pages. Which... yikes. No thank you.
6. It's sad really. I've seen this recced so many times that I was hoping to like it. Ah well.
Webnovel; DNF @C39 + Skimming
1. Transmigrator is now in the body of a pill-making apprentice in a magic sect. He's got a can-do work ethic and an extraplanar space with magic water to help him on his quest to be a successful mage. Too bad he almost immediately finds himself in the crosshairs of a clearly inhuman doppleganger who's replaced his senior martial sibling.
2. Okay so technically, this could have been a three star story. Kinda. Maybe. I do like alchemy-like stories, and I'm not opposed to weak to strong narratives and those are normally enough to carry me through a considerable number of other weird tropes. Also, Ling Xiao is a malicious asshole and I have deep and abiding soft spot for those. But I could ALREADY tell at chapter 40 that this book was going to rely a LOT on repetitive plot points. Also, it was clearly setting itself up for an m/m relationship both toxic (which is not a dealbreaker) and aggressively gendered (which is).
3. I know there may be an argument to be made about how the uke-seme/shou-gong system means gendered m/m relationships are a natural offshoot of the BL genre, but I've read enough of the things to disagree with that. Stories like Mo Dao Zu Shi, The Husky and His White Cat Shizun, and Sha Po Lang all manage to conform to the shou/gong system while making both characters in a relationship fully realized characters with their own strengths and weaknesses. And I didn't even like Sha Po Lang.
4. The Legendary Master's Wife, on the other hand, leans really hard into the "wife" bit. This was particularly evident in all the skimming I did. This is not a healthy romantic relationship, and not even in a fun way. This is just a way to be misogynistic without actually being misogynistic. Although I suspect there was plenty of garden variety misogyny around too. Everything is a sausage fest.
5. It wasn't actually all that bad. The MC's internal screaming at being singled out by the asshole was fun. The asshole himself was fun. And like mentioned before, I do like the alchemy bits. But the skimming told me it was gonna keep going the same way for 5000-odd pages. Which... yikes. No thank you.
6. It's sad really. I've seen this recced so many times that I was hoping to like it. Ah well.
I loved everything in this novel, this was a very funny and adorable read.
Official licenced version is being published, will wait for that to be available and reread then
adventurous
challenging
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
It took me almost two months with probably close to around 3,000 pages. That being said, I loved it. I liked the detail on refining pills and the banter between various characters. I'll probably reread this at some point.
adventurous
Until halfway, I could still bear it. But after around chapter 500 or so, it started to get really hard to go on (but I still did, yeah)
- The characters having a smooth grow is not a problem per se, but to not even show it or make it seem like a little effort was made...?
- Thanks to them growing so smoothly, not even one enemy or problem was really a problem. Every important fight ended just as easily.
- Around ch 500-600 my biggest problem was their relationship (ml and mc). It looked like the author forgot the initial charac setting of Ling Xiao. He went from being the one who loves everything You XiaMo does, to the person who just won't stop calling him dumb and idiot.
- Sexism. Oh my god, sexism!!!!! I pray that this author never again writes female characters. Not one of them had a nice development, but like 98% of them were just cannon fodder and they seem to love saying women are not that strong even in a fantasy world??? hello?? Was it really necessary?
- At last, they kept saying society wouldn't accept a gay couple, but in the end, they did accept. It's not that I want homophobia, because I don't, but make things make sense please or just stop saying this all the time!!!!
I finished it because I wanted to know the end. The world in itself was what attracted me, and I got all the way to 500ch so I wouldn't give up. But it's also sad that so many good side characters were just forgotten along the way (I'm sorry team Qiu......). Oh, and the extras were nice!
Anyway, a lot of chapters to something that could be shorter or simply better developed. Would never reread.
- The characters having a smooth grow is not a problem per se, but to not even show it or make it seem like a little effort was made...?
- Thanks to them growing so smoothly, not even one enemy or problem was really a problem. Every important fight ended just as easily.
- Around ch 500-600 my biggest problem was their relationship (ml and mc). It looked like the author forgot the initial charac setting of Ling Xiao. He went from being the one who loves everything You XiaMo does, to the person who just won't stop calling him dumb and idiot.
- Sexism. Oh my god, sexism!!!!! I pray that this author never again writes female characters. Not one of them had a nice development, but like 98% of them were just cannon fodder and they seem to love saying women are not that strong even in a fantasy world??? hello?? Was it really necessary?
- At last, they kept saying society wouldn't accept a gay couple, but in the end, they did accept. It's not that I want homophobia, because I don't, but make things make sense please or just stop saying this all the time!!!!
I finished it because I wanted to know the end. The world in itself was what attracted me, and I got all the way to 500ch so I wouldn't give up. But it's also sad that so many good side characters were just forgotten along the way (I'm sorry team Qiu......). Oh, and the extras were nice!
Anyway, a lot of chapters to something that could be shorter or simply better developed. Would never reread.