- #1
This novel is a masterpiece, even among the regressor genre as a whole. It's a non linear story, existing the world itself as a memoir written by the Undertaker of the 1183rd cycle, and it breaks the mold from the very first chapter. Every "set" of chapters usually follows a single story, sometimes throughout multiple cycles. There is still a sense of progression, important events like defeating the boss that was previously caused the end of the world, or finding out information that completely changed future cycles. However, it allows for more whimsy. One of my favorite stories was on a vacation cycle for example, where Undertaker opened up a "mysterious" convivence store with a bunch of the tutorial fairies. The book knows how and when to take itself seriously, and despite characters resetting with each cycle, we see different sides of them, and see how their characters stay consistent or differ. We have emotional moments as characters reveal new sides of themselves at the end of the world, we feel weight as we see that one last note left at the end of the world. And don't get me started on the anomalies. A lot of them are twisted, all of them are at least interesting. Many can be taken advantage of, but others are complete tragedies. Of course we have the 7 "Major bosses", but even a newly born anamoly can cause huge problems if left unchecked. It's genuinely interesting to see how different ones are tackled, and it's rarely a matter of "Have the bigger stick". Cycles exist where main characters turn villans due to bad infulences (Yes, the time the saintness became a potato and etablished potato utopia counts) and there's a sense knowing that, A, everything will be ok, next time, probably, B, everything they bulit up will be erased, next time, sadly. And C, we see a part of the character in a way we've never seen before.
