- #1
This is a story I only read when I'm waiting for other stuff, is not bad, but you'll have to subject me to torture for me to say it's good, but hay, the problem here might be me and not the story.Things I like about this story:* Wishit. Wish we had more info on him, but he only pops up here and there, not as relevant a character as one would expect.*... That's it, that's all I like in here.Things I find to be a little meh:* The love interest. He's handsome, smart and competent, and that's it, that's his whole personality, at least he is useful occasion.* The world building. Like what on earth even is this place?* The magic system. The concept is ok, but it's underutilized here, and the existence of spirits with powers like talking to bugs and controlling worms or whatever is... And interesting choice at best, a unfunny gag at worse.* The villains. Blandest bunch of people I ever read about, it doesn't help that they seem to have the collective IQ of a tomato, it's weird how they managed to achieve any form of success, in this timeline or another.* The side characters. They seem to exist to either help the protagonist, make her shine or fawn over here, is Lady Baby all over again.*The protagonist. Her personality seems to flip flop between Rubette and her Russian-Korean incarnation (can't remember her name to save my life), but the Russian-Korean one is the more prominent and pretty bland, she doesn't seem to care about anything or anyone, even the business she runs seems to be just something she decided to do for kicks and giggles, the only reason she's not on the list of things I don't like is the few moments her "Rubetria" side shows and she acts like an actual human.Things I don't like about this novel, in other words, reasons I'm putting this one on time out:* The technology. Is just a pet peeves of mine when these gown and carriage stories start inserting modern stuff, more often than not it just clashes with the rest of the world, why not keep the aesthetic of the story consistent? Or better, just make the whole place modern, no one said fantasy needs to have ball gowns and horse carriages.* Her business. Why is this necessary? And why are we spending so much time in this? I'm not opposed to the protagonist having a business, but this one brings nothing interesting to the plot, no conflict, no challenge, no drawbacks, it also took no time or effort into being made nor does it have any competition.* Her dad. I get that he was very depressed after his wife died, but he neglected all his kids, subordinates and any other responsibilities to wallow in self pity, now that his head was finally dragged away from his arse he wants to act like a father to his grown daughter? He also manages to be even blander than the ML, like how?* Her second brother Victor. I just hate characters like him, who jump around being a nuisance, never listening to everyone and being over the top, he doesn't have many scenes but I bet half of them are if him yelling at people.* Her older brother Viego. To be precise the way this character is being treated by everyone and the author, as if losing his mom, and basically his dad too he also had a bunch of adult responsibilities thrown at him (because of his dad's indifference), and now all the characters are acting like it's his fault for being manipulated from day one by the villains, like they can acknowledge Victor's pain and loneliness and how that led to him seeing the step grandma as a mother but Viego is tr*sh for being taken advantage of? If this were a story where characters are well fleshed out and things are developed neatly this plot line would be a reason to keep reading just to see the conclusion, but from what I read so far they're gonna keep putting this guy down, and he will continue groveling as if the neglect and manipulation he endured were his fault.* The pacing. It's more inconsistent than the protagonist's personality.* The whole mandated poligamy for royals. Like the Viego thing this one bothers me more because of the little faith I have in this author, and how long this is taking to be solved, outside of the emperor's opposition, what else is keeping them from changing things? And why is the emperor so opposed to this anyway? It's not like people are telling him to divorce all his concubines, just don't force your son to take any, and what's stopping our protagonist from just getting married and change the law once the ML is in power?* And last but not least, the ML's name, Lark Von what now? I swear these Korean authors and their names...Anyway, two starts for Wishit, one star for the positive side of everything on the meh list.