The Kingdoms Of Ruin

This reads like a fanfic written by an angsty seventeen-year-old. Since anyone other than the MC or registered big bad gets killed off after showing even the least bit of character development, the writer tries to fill the gap by dumping more and more disposable characters into the mix. Because of this, you can’t feel engaged because you know that the person with the semi-cool design that just got introduced is going to die in five minutes, and although that makes you focus on the MC, the MC isn’t anything to write home about.

The MC’s a psychopath for no real reason other than the fact that their mentor got killed. They then proceed to obliterate literally every single plot option that doesn’t result in a bloodbath just because of hurr-durr revenge, then get a companion that has no conceivable reason to even like the MC due to the MC killing all their mentors, but somehow manages to like the MC anyway because they’re the MC.

Big bad’s also poorly written: despite having a power that they explicitly state only works on half the population, everyone thinks they’re perfect and beautiful and can do no wrong at all. A bunch of other big bads also got thrown into the soup recently and I didn’t even bat an eye; why care about anyone if they’re going to explode into gore in a few chapters or so, then get replaced with a cheap cliffhanger that introduces the new arrival to the abattoir?

Story could have been something good, but all this killing and character replacement only manages to murder its prospects. After 42.2 chapters that ran together like molasses in July, it’s a hard pass.