A basement dwelling deadbeat with positive attitude gets isekai-ed to a world of sword and sorcery, with litrpg game setting. Being darn near dullest tool in the shed, bobbing about without giving a second though to the consequences of his actions protagonist gets tangled in religious persecution by zealots and as a useful cog in an evil masterminds scheme. Luckily, for the protagonist, pay-to-win is as real in this world as the next.

Isekai is appealing to fantasy readers due to it’s easy to follow along nature. Typically readers being introduced to the world as is the main character. ‘Everybody Hates Death Knights’ follows this. Protagonists share ‘tutorial’ experience and learn about the world as they explore it, along with readers. The story portrays TTRPG mechanics imagined real e.g. berserker’s passive ability blocking critical hits combined with passive ability limiting equippable armor gear slots and cursed items. By no means a refined humour, story telling is witty.

The world is little explored. Author has sown seeds of mystery, e.g. the darkness dragon, the entities inhabiting Sol castle, the death knight armor set’s past owner, the MC’s impossible quest from supposedly fellow outsider, the different gods, possibly a god of vice acting as a god of virte. Book 1, doesn’t delve deeper than surface acknowledgement of these, spending more time on networking. Established narrative in ‘Everybody Hates’ series is that ‘Death knights are evil’, but it’s not explained why? Past history of mass crimes or just divine commandment? Which deity or pantheon?

Conclusion: 3/5. Listened on Audible included in plus catalogue. Narrated by: Phil Thron. Witty story telling. Mostly through discrepancy of expectations and an imagined implementation in reality for contemporary TTRPG tropes. Book 1 has hooked me with great many mysteries to uncover. MC being a petulant child in grownups body, the heavy lifting for said uncovering will be on MC’s party and social circle. Hopefully story holds true and existing plot points are covered more in book 2! Terrible value for the length of the book – 1.95 $/hour ( 22.02 $ / 11 hrs 17 mins ).

Values:

Terrible: >1.66 $/hour

Bad: 1 – 1.66 $/hour

Good: <1 $/hour

Dream: 0.4 – 0.27 $/hour

Stars:

1 – Not worth the resources to reproduce/preserve this title.

2 -Bad

3 -Good

4 – Personally, love it

5 – Recommended to everyone