Villain: After Slacking Off, The Protagonist Collapse Chapter 119 Discussion

A promising novel, but recent chapters make me think that it's going severely downhill (maybe it recovers after that, but I ain't got no $$ to read premium chapters, and unfortunately everything over ch 120 is one as of this moment).

The plot premise is very mundane: MC gets reward for not interfering with the plot of a book in the world of which he is reborn.

The setting is also very cliche: MC is a holy son (basically most exalted disciple) in a cultivation sect. Also, the character he takes over is supposed to be a villain that the actual MC would gradually defeat and dominate.

The above are boring per se, but can be interesting enough if the rest of the story is done well.

Unfortunately, it is so-so at best.

The protagonist is lazy and doesn't have all that much character. First he had some dignity of someone of his position, then he became shameless after some shameless dude (another sect's holy son) showed up, and everyone rightfully complains about this change. Basically the MC is a Chinese Gary Stu that any random Chinese reader can self-insert into. Just that he's handsome so that the self-insert reader can feel better.

The antagonist (the original MC of the novel that our villain protagonist is reborn in) is a typical hypocrite "good" xianxia protagonist without principles and honor. If he does it to others, it's good, and if someone does it to him, it's not good. The author did well in making a satire of the typical xianxia protagonist. Or rather, he captured the hypocrisy and double standards well. It's not very funny.

The love interests are varied. The first female lead is total garbage and everyone seems to hate her (as in readers). The second love interest is a hoe-but-actually-virg*n chick that seems good only on paper. The third love interest is annoying at first but then more normal, but she's a loli.

As for other characters, at least there's some variety of both male and female characters, but they're all more or less 2D (at best).

The comedy part was good at first, making me enjoy the novel. Especially the part where

Spoiler

heroines could hear MC's thoughts, and kept getting pissed off

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but the author screwed this up by

Spoiler

letting MC control it and use it as a tool to manipulate heroines, though he only did so once so far.

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Also, there's too much boring duel crap (so I started skipping these parts eventually), and the part around chapter 100 is also boring because there's too much crap about fights between sects and other factions. I mean, it's fine if there is some, but the author spent too many chapters at once on it. I.e. This ruins the pacing and makes bored readers like me who came to read about MC messing around, and not about sect politics and conflicts.

Overall, I wouldn't read it unless there's at least 200 chapters available for free and the chapters 120-200+ prove that the novel has only gone downhill temporarily around chapter 100 and gets better again. Definitely not worth paying for premium chapters as of chapter 119.