Also, let me get ahead of any “just skip over the a/n” comments: I wish I could, but it requires too much effort due to my reading method.

Review around mid 200s: The story was great and quite interesting until sometime after the full reveal of the MC’s OPness. After that, at least in the current arc, the elements of the story seemed diminished, forced, and pointless. It would be fine if the story didn’t focus directly on the MC, but it does. The author tends to drag out events with lots of padding. The MC’s values seem to change on a whim, maybe in reaction to the readers. Grammar: high quality with a couple of mistakes here and there. The author’s notes, meant to drive engagement, break immersion in an annoying way. First, most of us don't want to pay coins for these notes. Second, the author constantly apologizes for his mistakes but refuses to change or correct the problems. Seriously, don’t apologize for it if you're not going to change it. Also, readers aren’t always itching for a fight scene. What’s important is drama, tension, novelty, mystery, promise, and fulfillment. The latest scenes I’ve read sorely lack these elements. Those initial fights, even those ending in one sentence at random, had those aspects. The time outside of the physical fighting had even more of those elements and was, therefore, more enjoyable. Maybe I need to skip ahead to a future arc to get that tension and intrigue back, but I loathe to do so. (Note: Being told about the presence of and structure of arcs directly by the author's notes makes me irritated because it is also immersion-breaking. For readers, arcs are elements meant to be realized in retrospect or not at all.) I would likely recommend this story if it was an abridged version with the padding and author notes removed. The story has many worthy moments.

Review from around chapter mid-60s (brace for wall of text): Interesting fantasy tropes fill the story. There are many nice details, but the beginning dumps us headfirst into it without setting enough expectations about where it's going. The result is a rough and painful beginning. Additionally, there are too many quotes of wisdom cluttering up all of the MC's actions and speech. Dialog is often packed with cringy one-liners and unnecessary references. I understand it is supposed to be MC's personality, but how can he be simultaneously like a 20-30-year-old shut-in pop culture nerd and a guy whose entire life experience is 5 years with a strict master learning all about fighting and magic? And, I know that his teacher also supposedly drove all these silly references into him, but only so much can happen in those few years. Regardless, the author is inserting his interests into the MC, where they don't feel like they belong, and it is jarring and annoying. And don't get me started on how "groovy" is one of the most obnoxious catchphrases... It's also baffling that he simultaneously has a crippling hatred of a certain, let's call it an "ethnic group," but immediately decides one of them will be his BFF because she's pretty, shares a couple of similar life views, and happens to be assigned as his guide. The beginning of that relationship should have taken longer to develop. Speaking of things that are too fast, the pacing. Let's start with a battle to enter the school, followed by rapid-fire shortcut level-up adventures before a single class or a general picture of the school. Out of breath yet? Surprise! It's time for dungeons and an invasion! Finally, tens of chapters in, we are addressing what an adventurer is... Still, some aspects of the writing felt slow, but let's leave it alone. No, wait, let me say one more thing: Too many useless dialog tags! Overall: There's some good stuff in there. With a reworked beginning, I might recommend it. As is all too common in interesting but poorly started novels, the middle part was much more engaging because there was finally a sense of direction and enough pieces of the longer-term plot to engage immersion. It only needs a little cleaning of the cringe and a few rounds of restructuring.

Typo: relieve should be re-live

Typo: cruse should be curse

Typo: deadest should probably be dead set

Technically fight or flight are the choices and not being able to pick one is failing to make a decision.

Typo… why is the quality dropping?

A quick glance at the other reviews looks like I’m the first to not read the previous book. LoL. What they have to say gives me more confidence that I should check out more of this authors work.

Review from chapter 75ish: So the beginning of the book was hard to get through. Maybe because it was a sequel and I hadn’t read the first book. The affairs of weird op video game people/entities are not very interesting or believable without explanation. It’s like reading a second prologue and most books are better without prologues. So, the OP comes out cringy. Perhaps a more condensed version starting with the MC and his reputation from the knowledgeable perspective of others would have served better. Anyway, once the MC got run over and the story really began, I really enjoyed the book. Sadly I didn’t get very far before the limited free ended. However, I’m a fan the later portion of this novel now. The author is capable of weaving a captivating narrative. Decent flow and excellent technicals.

Review from about chapter 70: The grammar is bad, but there was clearly some attempts at editing. The storyline is decent. The narrative is pleasant and has a reasonable flow. The mc’s character development is fake, but the justification is the system is affecting how others view him and making him op at everything. So it’s acceptable in the context of the system genera. It’s a decent story to read while doing other stuff.

Review from a couple dozen chapters in: This is an ambitious and wide-sweeping storyline. However, the writing is rough and feels rushed. More time should have been used in thinking/research. Thus, the biggest problem is that the state of the world and the reactions of the characters in it do not seem logical and realistic enough. They are too simple and the MC convinces and amazes people too easily. As it is, readers need to turn off their brain in almost every chapter to accommodate this unrealistic portrayal of the world.

It seems incredibly ridiculous that they don’t know what an iron pot is or that you can cook with oil…

WTH? “You’re not busy in the next few days right? And can use training. Go relax for the next few days while I get you a fake ID.” Huh? What was the point?

No that’s welding…

Wow. What a terrible explanation for mechanics. Oh yes, all a mechanic needs to know is the machine does everything for you.

Dominoes pizza really changed.

By definition this is not a prologue. It’s another preface.

This is a critique with high standards because, after 34 chapters, I still can’t say that it hooked me or even that I’ve enjoyed it. But it's not bad. I want to like it because there are signs the story may be a late bloomer. Grammar: Good minus some commas and high-level stuff Writing Style/Sentance Structure: Dabbler - Beyond amateur level, but still not yet professional level. Immersiveness could be improved through additional colorful descriptions and more concise/direct phrasing of actions. (good for high-speed writing with no editor) Narrative: Okay. It's stiff and standard. There are a couple of minor holes in the logic. The writing style also takes some of the impact away here. Characters: Meh. They are mostly flat, generic, and lack background. There are too few reasons to like the MC. They need more drama and it needs to be believable. Plot: Unoriginal. Many events are generic, dull, and bland. It lacks compelling events, conflicts, and dilemmas. But it's still early and there’s a lot of room to run from here. Prolog: Wow, someone did it right! (a rare feat on this website). Good job! Overall: B- letter grade. Considering it is a web novel and theoretically written at a sprint for a contest, it’s decent. I hope the story improves and blooms to become like a beautiful lotus. Please improve and develop it so I can re-review it with a higher score.

Mixing up land of the dead and free here.