A million years ago, the Western Continent was forever changed by the establishment of Yi City, the largest nation in recorded history. Split into many districts, it was the greatest accomplishment of its creator, but its glory did not last long.
Now, it is separated, and even those connected to the ruling families may be reduced to servants. Yi Wei is one such servant, but even when she isn't being ordered around by the likes of her aunt, she struggles to make any progress in her cultivation. Her own talent seems subpar, and the strange, inert characters floating around within her dantian don't help in the slightest.
However, her life will be changed by a simple accident that will set her onto the path of growth and discovery. The Planar Continents hold many mysteries, and the path she has chosen gives her no choice but to investigate them, for that is the Path of the Ascendant.
(Sexual content will not appear prior to Volume 2. Futanari will not appear prior to Volume 3. The main content of the story is already complete and chapters will be released daily, with exception of bonus chapters, which will come out alongside main chapters. Bonus chapters are being written right now, and once they're done, I will move on to a new novel which will feature more sexual content and futanari, in case that's what you're interested in.)
(Also, if you come across this on a website other than Patreon or Scribblehub, it's stolen. I don't know why anyone would even bother (though at least two websites did), but please read it here, on https://www.scribblehub.com/series/375756/path-of-the-ascendant/)
It was good up until the end of the first volume where the author
decides to kill off all but 3 of the MCs allies and have the other 3 disappear kill off all of the notable characters excluding the ones that I previously mentioned, trap the protagonist in another dimension, and take away all but one of her powers and drastically nerf that one. To make it even more frustrating it wasn't because of her making enemies or doing something stupid two randos came out of nowhere and sealed her because they didn't like her parents. I'd be more accepting if they had a good reason but it just sounds like the authors making excuses.
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I'm afraid that by chapter 150 I'm going to drop this book. The story has become repetitive and boring, the characters feel devoid of any personality, and the MC feels like a robot since the end of the first volume, and the Prision Realm arc felt forced to no end. And with all of that, I cannot read the chapters because I literaly have to force my eyes open no to fall asleep. I hope that the author reads this and attempts to improve their writting for future novels.
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Heyo, I got pretty deep into this last year and finally felt like making a proper review. And Imma just be blunt and hit you with the cold water..
The Main Character; Wei Yi, is one of the most poorly written character's I've ever seen lmao.. Maybe it's because I liked this story and grew somewhat attached to the character, sunk cost fallacy and all that..
But that just made it all the worse when I had to come to terms with how bad the character was... And how bad she was making the entire novel. And after ranting about it for a bit I never was able to bring myself to read any further.
But I did enjoy reading this story at the time. I'd even go so far as to say that it's a good story. Depending on what you're after you might have fun.. But, do NOT at any point expect actual good character writing..
oOo
I'll explain in a moment but I feel like I should get this part out the way.
X—General Plot Ting:
The story itself is pretty f**kin interesting. It likes to break troupes.. Especially the Young-Master ones.. This still maintains some interesting drama and action DESPITE a lack of face-slapping.
X—Abilities:
The main-character had a somewhat interesting power, I can't remember much but I don't think it was anything terribly special.. It mainly oriented around her physique and the energy that stems from there..
It's basically one of a kind in her world, but you've probably seen similar in other cultivation-novels.
X—The Baddies:
The bad guys (and girls) were pretty goddamn cool and interesting.. Not in the whole "Oh, I Feel bad for them" or "Oh, look they had a reason" they were no Madara.. They were just very interesting.
And broke some troupes for me. They were unusual and their powers, strengths and little quirks were even more so..
X—The Power-scaling 🤨 (One of the most important goddamn bits) :
The power-scaling is alright as well. She doesn't become a god overnight, but she's never really a push over..
But thankfully, and most importantly, for readers who are experienced in Cultivation-Stories.. This story doesn't feel like you're climbing a tumultuous mountain.. You don't constantly defeat the big-bad and the next day find another asshole even stronger..
Here; she's not constantly offending the NEXT Young-Master's whole family and has to defend herself against an entire Sect and all their sons, fathers and uncles..
Here; the bar isn't constantly set higher, where there's always another old-man with robes and a long white beard, riding a flying sword, monologuing about how he's going to beat the protagonist for offending his "Heavenly Sword Sect"
There's none of that.. It's extremely refreshing.. And I'd rate this story a f**king 9/10, because I really liked THIS and all the other elements so damn much..
X— BUUUT
However, towards the end of Volume 1, all that kind of falls apart.. Mild spoiler..
Protagonist ends an arduous and tragic expedition, heads back on home, and is there for but a few f**king hours before hearing that two immensely strong people, she has NO HOPE of defeating show up out of nowhere.. Nothing she's done or said could've EVER led to something like this happening.
So once these two showed up, simultaneously everyone reading let out a big f**king sigh of disappointment.. It was obvious the author was doing this to give the main character a new obstacle to overcome..
Which by the way, is an extremely sh*t thing to do, when we've only had like TWO CHAPTERS of satisfaction after defeating the previous big bad.
So that whole thing I said about not having to worry about climbing a huge mountain where the bar constantly gets higher? Throw all that out the window..
After this point, Volume 2 starts. And in my opinion the entire story takes an extreme nose-dive from there.. It's interesting, but overall worse than Volume 1 in just about every way I can think of..
It's still interesting, even serviceable, but I didn't enjoy it nearly as much..
X— And now, character-development..
Up to my current reading point? (Which is pretty deep) The main character is just bad. And if u ever make the mistake of looking at her other actions in hindsight it gets worse..
She doesn't reflect on events, she doesn't develop, she doesn't change in a meaningful way, her thoughts & Beliefs contradict themselves, she doesn't react in a way that makes any sense, sometimes she doesn't react at all..
She seems apathetic, but it's not that Wei-Yi HAS no emotion, the writer simply doesn't want to, or know how, or when to properly depict it.
The author's other story is much, much much much better in this regard.. It is actually night and day.. If I didn't know any better I'd think this author was two different people.
oOo
The main character ONLY FINALLY changes in some way at Volume 2, where her entire personality does a 180 nose-dive, in the most unexpected anti-climatic and disappointing way possible..
Mild spoiler.
Instead of her snapping, and changing at ANY of the numerous climax points she has throughout the story. She talks to some random jackass who's entire speech basically boils down to: "Might makes right and everyone's the same yada yada" and now she lives by that memo..
So I guess she Justifies every murder with "Oh, but I'm trying to become the Master of Yi City!" now.. A goal I originally didn't mind, but now I wish she just stayed the stereotypical uninspired protagonist. It's better than whatever she is now.
Heavy character-personality change spoilers, but it's pretty important regardless.
She's at a point now where she seems to have zero empathy or sympathy for anyone or anything else...
She used to swap back and forth from Morally Upright to heartless and apathetic.. If not both simultaneously.. Back then I felt like she was just faking all of her emotions.. I thought the author did this intentionally, and it was a sign Wei-Yi was trying to convince herself to be a good person..
I was wrong. It was nothing that well-thought out.
And now..? She's straight up evil.. She's a tyrant now. She attacks and kills any and everyone who opposes her in anyway.. Every other faction, every other group, lethal force all the way, no conversations.
And the craziest part is, at the beginning she used to monologue about how dumb the people that did that are. And now she's doing the exact same.
Intentional or not, her entire development to get to the point where she is now in Volume 2 was horrendous..
So throughout Volumes 1 and 2? Pretty piss-poor character writing.. And I didn't get far enough to see if it ever gets better.
If for whatever reason anyone is interested in a sum up rant I made last year
Volume 2: Chapter 24 in the comments. | OR | V2C24: Preparations for Danger
https://www. scribblehub. com/read/375756-path-of-the-ascendant/chapter/379847/?cid=1439441#comments
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I don't hate the story. Also I might pick this up again in the future as your writing definitely improved considering I prefer your other story. I just didn't get hooked by this one.
The exploding talisman was interesting, but afterwards it derailed too much for my liking. It just felt superficial and too focused on technique mumbojumbo. It was interesting to read for a bit but it was too many chapters on just theory.
Furthermore our main character barely interacted with others without meeting Hidden Masters that instantly took her as a disciple and which techniques she basically also mastered instantly. Till the RNG end it felt like Mary Sue. (I had to skip chapters.) We also never saw her really working and interacting more with her surroundings and other servants. (At least not till Application, I skipped to V1 end in the middle of it)
Most of it also read like a diary instead of her having actual conversations and interacting with the world. It was more tell instead of show. She did that and that and that. Master: Wow you're amazing.
Overall I feel like as a comment said that the first volume probably counts as a prologue, but at the same time I feel like it should have been 20 chapters at most and quite a bit could probably be improved on or cut out. There are also quite many events that didn't make sense to me. (Great Light attacks MC, Hidden Masters etc. //Why allow the disguise if you really can just kill people as you like in the application?)
It just needs editing, but considering on how many chapters are out there it would probably be too much of a pain. I would usually give this a 2* but considering how I only read one volume it doesn't seem fair to do that.
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I give it five stars not because it is a unique cultivation story, but because it is enjoyable. It is a reasonable story with understandable characters. The thing that I liked most about this story is that the MC isn't targeted without reason, if at all. She just tries to carve out a nice life for herself whilst not trying to get murdered by her families elders for "having a heaven-defying artefact that is wasted on her" or something similar.
As a conclusion, if you just enjoy a cultivation novel, then this is it.
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I've read the 15 chapters that are out at this time, which seems like enough to form an opinion. If you like cultivation stories, you will probably like this one. Granted, certain cliches unique to cultivation stories do feel a lot more toned down than in other works. The main character may have the "grow in power rapidly" trait like other mcs, but there isn't a lot of face slapping arrogant young masters or murdering enemies with wild abandon just yet. Whether you like that kind of thing or hate it is up to you. I don't mind it either way, I just like cultivation stories. Just note the tags, the author has said in a chapter comment section that the main character hasn't realized it, but she doesn't like men. Though neither the girl's love tag nor the futanari tag has come into play yet as of the fifteenth chapter.
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so this is pretty great. This is a cultivation story that is attempting (and I would say mostly suceeding) at being very sensible and very consistent, also quite mysterious (which sometimes does make seeming holes in the story disrupting the consistency for a period of time (for example the apparently most liked review thinks that
the MC gets targeted by some OP f**kers at the end of V1 because they didn't like her parents as an asspull but towards the later half of V3 we learn that there was a very good reason for it
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For now it is ok but can me bit more slow. Will change after completing the novel.
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Like any long book the story changes either more to your liking or less. I finished it all and thoroughly enjoyed it. I'm really hoping there is a book 2 because I'm very attached to the characters and the world the author built.
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It`s very good, but because the end is not really the end but only the end of the first book, I can`t give 5 stars because a lot of sh*t can be done to a good story toward the end.
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