 Alright, so I just finished reading a bunch of a Wuxia web novel called A Will Eternal, and this was recommended to me by Kevin Zhang. So if you see this review and you think, oh, that sounds kind of neat, and I'm gonna go check it out and you like it, say thank you, Kevin. If you check it out and it turns out you hate it, then I guess go burn his house down or something. This is the introduction song. It's not very good, but it's not too long. So like I said, this is not really a book in the traditional sense. It's a web novel series, which means it was kind of done in the style of like a Wattpad story or a fiction press story or something like that. And so it wasn't really divided into a bunch of novels in a series. Like, on Goodreads the series is divided into like seven or eight books, but I couldn't find anywhere where the actual, what chapters consist of each book. So I actually have no idea how far I read in this. Now I did look into it and it's like 1300 chapters long and doing some math, I saw that that would be over 3 million words, which would be like me reading the first 10 Wheel of Time books, which like I wasn't gonna do that for just this video. So I just read for a while, like 40-ish chapters, and then I said, okay, I think that's a good enough spot to really have an idea of what this is like. And plot-wise it wasn't really a good stopping point, but I don't think there really would be one, unfortunately. So just keep in mind that when I'm reviewing this, I'm not really reviewing stuff that comes in at like the middle or the end of the series. This is, in some ways this is kind of like just opening thoughts, but at the same time this section of the series that I read is longer than a lot of books that I have reviewed on here. So I don't know what to make of that. You can make of that whatever you want. So the plot here is basically that there is this young boy named Bai Xiaochun, at least I believe that's how you pronounce it. And he just wants to go off and become a badass. He wants to join this group called the Outer Sect, and he wants to learn how to like do chi condensation and become immortal and stuff like that. And it's kind of neat, but at the same time we never really learn why he wants to do all this. He just does. And out of the many little issues I have with this book or this series, I'm not sure what to call it. I'm going to call it a book for now. It's a web novel. It's a web series. Whatever. I'm referring to it as a book. But anyways, out of all the many little issues I have with this book, not knowing exactly why Bai Xiaochun wants to do all this stuff is a bit disappointing. Because I think Bai Xiaochun is a fun character actually. In fact, he's kind of an idiot and he's disruptive and he's a jerk to everyone around him. But the book acknowledges that he's an idiot and he's disruptive and he's a jerk to everyone around him. Because at the very beginning he leaves his village and the village just immediately starts celebrating. And he is still in earshot and he's like, you guys know I can still hear you, right? And we don't care. Woo! Which, yeah, that was pretty funny. And after that a lot of people just straight up hate Bai Xiaochun and he kind of deserves it. So I did enjoy that. And he is really good at learning all this new stuff. He's good at learning how to utilize his chi and he's good at learning how to grow magic plants and stuff. He's not instantly perfect at everything. I'll say that. It's a little too quick in my opinion but he is still amazing at almost everything he tries, but he has to work at it for a while. He does have to, when he starts learning chi, it does take him months in story time to really get it and we do see him training with it. And because this is kind of written in light novel format, which I don't really like, it'll do something like it'll show him learning a new training technique one day and then it'll just say he did the same thing every day for three months and then at the end he was really good at it. And so it does save a lot of time admittedly. I think if this was written more like a regular novel as opposed to a light novel, it would go on so much longer than it does. But that said, I just, I don't like the way light novels are written. I never have and I have yet to find anything that really changes my opinion. And just like with Japanese light novels, this was translated. It was originally written in Mandarin, at least I believe it was Mandarin. I suppose it's possible it could have been Cantonese or something else, but I'm going with Mandarin for now. I think that's what it was. And yeah, maybe it sounded better in the original language and it just doesn't sound that great in English. It's impossible for me to say because I don't speak Mandarin and I have not seen the original text. But that said, yeah, I don't like the way light novels are set up and I don't like the way this is set up. It's just there's not nearly enough detail on things. Once in a while we'll get something like we'll get a character description if they're important, but, you know, for action scenes, for descriptions of environments, for descriptions of what people are doing. Dialogue is usually trimmed down. It's just it's difficult for me to form a picture in my head. And some people might like that more, actually. They might like that. Oh, OK, I can use my imagination more. And sure, maybe if you're if you're into that. But to me, it just it I hate to say this because it just sounds like so much harsher than I wanted to. But it kind of reminds me of Onision's books. Like if you remember the video I did, I said that if he properly if he put in proper descriptions in there, then every book would be two and a half to three times longer. And yeah, this is kind of the same thing. And I that's what it comes down to. I just I just don't like the way it's written. You might notice I haven't really been talking about the plot, except in very broad strokes. And that's because there isn't much of one. And again, maybe there is more later on. But in the chunk I read, which again, was longer than a lot of actual books, in that chunk, there wasn't really a villain and there wasn't really a greater goal other than by Xiaochun wanting to become super powerful and become immortal, which in a lot of ways it kind of reminded me of like a shonen manga or shonen light novel sort of thing. You know, it's just we get this one guy who's like really hardheaded and he's not the smartest, but he's super determined and by Xiaochun is extremely determined. Like that that's the main way he gets so good at all of these skills that he keeps learning is because he's willing to undergo horrible pain and discomfort for it, which is also kind of funny. Like on one hand, it is inspiring because I'm like, oh, wow, I respect this kid for going this far, but he is still again, like I said earlier, he's kind of an asshole. And so it's funny to watch him suffer. But, you know, you have this kid who is doing that. And there's other people that are saying like, ha, kid, you're below average. You'll never get up to my level. I am way better at being a battle fighter, king of the Kono Ha, whatever, than you are. And the kid just like waves him off and then he goes off. And usually he goes off and fights progressively stronger bad guys. And then he'll find some like ultimate bad guy and defeat him. And that's a some people would call it a tired formula. And yeah, in some ways it is. But as long as you have like fun action scenes and stuff, people like me will, yeah, we'll be fine with it. And this one doesn't really have all that much action in the in the first, like, I don't know, 100,000 words ish, I should probably check actually. OK, I just checked. It was around 95,000 words is what I read. So it's it was it was a bit. It was it was a bit. And basically in that whole chunk, until you get to around 30 chapters in, there's really not that much action or anything. And because we don't really know why Bai Xiaochun is going to all this trouble, even if we're amused by his actions, we don't really feel that much for him. And so, yeah, as like a fun action romp, it doesn't do that great of a job. But when the action does pop up, I did enjoy it. It's a lot of fun. And Bai Xiaochun is very good at what he does. But he's he's again, he's just an asshole. And he mistreats people and people hate him and he's fine with it. I kind of want to talk more about this because, you know, someone paid me to review it and they're a bit more in depth criticism, I think. But honestly, I just don't think there's that much here. And maybe there's some later. But for the time being, there's not that much of a plot. There's not really any themes or deeper stuff behind the scenes that I can analyze or think about or anything. It's just a very straightforward action romp story. And that's not a bad thing. I really don't think it is like I was saying earlier. It's a bit like a shonen anime. And I do want to bring up that it feels distinctly Chinese. And I'm not quite sure how to describe what I mean by that because. OK, so like, obviously, if you've ever watched anime or Red Manga or anything, you know that Japanese media is different from Western media. You know that it has its own set of tropes and cliches and stuff, which gives it its own feel, its own distinct feel. And this is, you know, like I said, Chinese. And so it feels distinctly Chinese. Like, obviously, there's some elements which remind me of Japanese stuff, but it is still its own thing. And I it's different. I'll give it that. I'm not saying that it's inherently good or bad that it feels more Chinese. And I'm not even sure exactly how to describe it, but it is a little different. And, you know, I haven't really read Wuxia before. And while I don't like light novels that much, I haven't read all that many of them either. So I really I enjoyed this story. I did like it's a very good to turn your brain off and just get to work sort of thing. So recommendation, I think if you're someone who likes light novels, then you probably like this. If you're someone who likes light novels and shown in manga, then you definitely like this. If not, I don't really know if this would appeal to you. I mean, you can check it out. And if you get like two or three chapters in and you're not feeling it, you're probably not going to enjoy it. I'll say that much, but I don't regret spending my time on this. A special thanks to everyone who watched this far and an even special or thanks to all of my patrons, including the ten dollar and up guys, Appo Savilainen, Olivia Rayan, Ava Tumor, Brandon S. Pilcher, Brother Santotis, Christopher Quinten, Ambus, Pfizer, Jeremy, Joel, Carcat Kitsune, Kevin Zhang, Liza Rudikova, Madison Lewis Bennett, Mel Austin, microphone, Sad Mardigan, Tobacco Crow, Tom Beanie, and Vaivictus. Man, that list is getting long, but I could not do this without you guys. You are seriously the best. And thanks again for watching. If you want to get your name on here, then consider donating to my page. We also have other perks that you can have access to. And if you don't want to do that, then simply rating the video, commenting on it, subscribing to my channel, all that stuff I'm supposed to say at the end here. That is a huge help. Anyways, bye.