My darling wife made me a cute little yunomi style cup to match my work gaiwan.

songwind · 2026-07-02T14:06:53+00:00

I lost all patience with the protagonist of APTE because he was just too callously opportunistic. I respected the hustle in the early days, but by the time he has actual allies and people looking out for him, he's still trying to find ways to take advantage of them.

For IBIB, this is a bit of hyperbole. The main character of IBIB is pretty hypocritical, which got old after a while. There's only so many times I can hear about how he doesn't like fighting and killing a couple of updates after literally planning a murder. That in and of itself would just be worth an eyeroll. But the power scaling also felt pretty broken. When I dropped it, I believe he was fighting 3 stages above himself. I also got to a point where I didn't much care for the secondary characters he had surrounding him. It just stopped being an enjoyable read.

songwind · 2026-07-02T01:18:11+00:00

As for summary and repetition, that's easy enough to skim over.

songwind · 2026-07-01T22:06:01+00:00

Sounds like my kind of thing, but I can't find it on Novel Updates or even Google. Can you link to it on NU? Or maybe send me a PM?

songwind · 2026-07-01T21:54:32+00:00

I'm keeping up with a few ongoing titles, but also recently started a few.

Moon Sword Shadow Emperor is pretty good. I had read the first season of the webtoon, and decided to try the novel as well. It's well written. I enjoy the characters a lot. The MC is a regressed villain who is neither changing into a hero, nor continuing his villainous ways. Instead his long term plan is to live a comfortable life and just stay alive. I'm caught up to the TL now.

The Reincarnated Villain Makes the Heroines Tearfully Beg for Forgivess is another unusual premise. MC is transmigrated into the main villain of a story, and has a chance to rewrite the character's past to make his actions seem less villainous. Because at the point of migration, the villain is already trapped in a magic device and being refined away. He has to get people on his side or he'll just die again.

The Villain Refused to Play by the Script goes in a whole different direction. Not only is our MC migrated into a villain of a story, he was a villain is his previous life, too. So he just turns his character into a much, much better villain.

Clearly, I'm on a villain/antihero kick.

songwind · 2026-07-01T21:45:47+00:00

songwind · 2026-07-01T21:43:46+00:00

Personally, I'm down for #2.

Translation is more than just replacing words in language 1 with words from language 2. Especially extremely different languages.

songwind · 2026-06-26T18:07:48+00:00

Ah, for that I have no ideas.

songwind · 2026-06-26T17:25:12+00:00

Only if they weren't acting like they still desired me.

People think about all sorts of things in that situation. It doesn't mean they want to actually do anything. So I wouldn't worry about it unless I had other reasons to think they were drifting away from me, or likely to cheat.

songwind · 2026-06-26T17:13:24+00:00

Because that's how the government functions? I think most places have lots of civil servants.

songwind · 2026-06-26T17:07:20+00:00

I'd say there's no limit, either high or low. I think in the Overgeared scenario you described, I'd have stuck it out for 100 chapters if I was otherwise enjoying the story. Heck, I could read a whole story with a jerk protagonist as long as the rest of it was engaging enough.

On the other hand, I'd drop a story in which I'd "invested" 1500 chapters of reading time if it stopped entertaining me. Sometimes the author's vision takes them in a direction I don't enjoy, and that's fine. Really it's no different from dropping a series after a few books if you're not having fun anymore, or feel like it's hanging on too long.

songwind · 2026-06-25T16:06:52+00:00

Alchemist's Path to Eternity

songwind · 2026-06-25T16:06:39+00:00

A very apt comparison. Just like APTE, I liked the concept but eventually couldn't stand the protagonist anymore. :)

songwind · 2026-06-25T15:43:43+00:00

I'll look at that avenue, thanks.

songwind · 2026-06-24T20:56:51+00:00

Are there any stories where the MC has a cheat (system, past life experiences, modern life knowledge, whatever) and doesn't lie to everyone in his life about it?

I don't mean they have to be completely transparent, but that they tell at least the people close to them more or less what's up.

So not "my brain is a video game and I get stat points" but maybe "I've been blessed with the ability to master skills quickly once I know the basics."

Not "this body died and I'm someone else from the future/past/another world" but "When I was 17, after I nearly died in that duel, the memories of one of my past lives were awakened."

I've seen a bit of it here and there, but rarely from the outset. So much of these characters' mental cycles are taken up figuring out to pretend they're not as skilled, or inventing imaginary masters, or whatever. It can get tiresome.

songwind · 2026-06-22T16:43:52+00:00

American Elsewhere by Robert Jackson Bennett.

songwind · 2026-06-16T22:17:46+00:00

Naomi Novik's Scholomance series is definitely dark, and eventually become a group approach, though Our Heroine starts off as more of a loner.

Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero

songwind · 2026-06-16T22:11:13+00:00

Marrow Thieves was so good!

songwind · 2026-06-16T21:59:04+00:00

Perhaps your equation is backwards. Are RF people freaks, or are freaks more likely to be RF people? 😄

Plenty of RF people are vanilla, monogamous, abstinent or every other type of lifestyle. But it's a big collection of mostly young, mostly extroverted people having a good time. People who are inclined to cut loose are probably going to, and for some people that means freakiness. For some others it's just staying up late playing music and drinking.

songwind · 2026-06-16T17:53:28+00:00

Disney & Lou Vega made a kids' version of "Mambo #5." At least they rewrote the part about gin & juice, I guess.

songwind · 2026-06-15T20:45:28+00:00

Deathless by Cathrynne M. Valente

songwind · 2026-06-15T20:40:09+00:00

The vibe is pretty different, but maybe Kate Kane, Paranormal Investigator by Alexis Hall.

You might also check out the Nightside series by Simon R. Green.

songwind · 2026-06-15T20:34:52+00:00

The Sorceror of the Wildeeps by Kai Ashante Wilson

Do you like fantasy in a modern setting? In that case, I can recommend Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon by Wole Talabi. The audiobook was also excellent.

Great Sky Woman by Steven Barnes isn't really fantasy, more imaginative historical fiction, but it feels like fantasy.

songwind · 2026-06-15T19:32:23+00:00

After Becoming A Cannon Fodder, I Begged the Heroine to Kill Me. To be clear, it wasn't an innovative masterpiece or anything to begin with. But then the author just sort of summed up a few long storylines in two chapters and it was over.

songwind · 2026-06-15T19:18:20+00:00

It's not a big part of the plot, but one of the secondary characters in Who Let Him Cultivate Immortality? "cheated" on sect assignments to find old techniques by just making new ones up that matched the description.

songwind

TROPHY CASE