Very formulaic. The protagonist reincarnates, gets really lucky, gets really powerful, and every time he gets some impossibly valuable weapon, he ends up getting something better soon after. Rinse, repeat, raise power levels past all sanity. There were a few good, unique moments where the protag lost, but these were few and far between.

Not terrible, but TDE definitely grinds down to average after he gets to what I call 'world punting' levels of power.

Desolate Era is one of the best novels I have seen on the developing of the story, from a simple mortal to an almight cultivator, from as they say a frog in a well to the vast world and so on. The character development is excellent and its always exciting and refreshing to read getting better after each book. If you are a fan of the Xianxia Gen this is a must read!

I personally love this LN, mainly because while it has the typical reincarnation aspect that a majority of the cultivation-oriented LNs have, he comes from a different world so he doesn't start off extremely overpowered. What I really like about this is that the MC, once he starts getting overpowered, he stays overpowered - really overpowered.

It's true that sometimes, there's pretty huge time skips, but in that LN universe, living for monstrous amount of time is not that complicated.

Likewise, at first I thought that the LN universe was actually pretty... more>> small, but it turns out that the universe is much, much, much bigger than it is described to be at the beginning of the story. In fact, this LN has potential for being multiple thousands chapters longer (unfortunately, the story is already completed in its country of origin :/)

There's also the fact the stronger the MC gets, the longer it takes for him to cultivate to a higher realm. While the couple first few realms and rammed through pretty quickly, it gradually gets slower for the MC to catch up to his goals since they are more and more ambitious.

Anyways, it's a good read, I love it. <<less

Desolate Era is without a doubt a flawed novel. It contains several of the typical flaws of a novels done by this author. A lot of the side cast falls into obscurity, Ji Ning is the only character who is extensively characterized, The romance is short lived and bad things keep happening to the MC simply to move the plot forward. I could go on and on about what's wrong about this novel. However, that doesn't mean this is bad novel. In fact Desolate Era is one of my favorite... more>> novels in this genre. The world building is fantastic, we get to see real character progression in the protagonist, and there are genuinely heart warming and heart breaking moments in this novel. Ultimately you end up becoming invested in the MC for better or for worse. I could go into specifics but that would take away from my intent of writing a short review.

Much like human beings, this novel is flawed. But if you can look past these flaws you can see all the great things it has to offer. I am gonna give it a 4/5, despite how much I want to give it 5/5. Give it a read, the beginning is a bit slow but it picks up after the second book. <<less

This more or less follows IET's formula for writing a novel. The world building expands quite well and the fact that it takes inspiration from Chinese mythology is a nice touch. The power levels might confuse you at the start but you'll get used to them as the story progresses. The characters are standard Xianxia cliches such as, young master, jade-like beauty and talking pet. So all in all if you can stomach forgotten plot points and ridiculous number scales, it's an okay read.

Alright, since I'm procrastinating from studies I might as well write an short review.

The good about Desolate Era? Well, think of it as a better written version of Coiling Dragon, for those who are fans of IET. Well written as usual, BUT this time there's a much better flow and less "overly-rushed plot armors". Furthermore, there's VERY VERY little "shoving" or "subtly getting rid off" side-characters, MUCH UNLIKE COILING DRAGON (Don't get me wrong, I loved coiling dragon but poor little wolf and his sworn brothers). Almost every good character introduced has came back to assist our MC one way or another, and is relevant to the main story-line somehow.

The story plot itself is a very typical xianxia, where our MC travels around, making friends AND enemies, kill said enemies and making even stronger enemies, gets stronger and slay said stronger enemies-you get the point; but there are scenes where events just go so unexpected and BAM, you're wow-ed.

Skills-wise, everything is quite organized and there's no "all of a sudden our MC is a master of all weapons" crap, so I'm fine with that. That's the good part about xianxia novels when u compare them to japanese LNs; the MCs mostly specialize in one, at most two weapons are they STICK with it.

Although I must say this is quite well written, it still is quite lacking as compared to ISSTH (But that sh*t is too freaking detailed so-) and there ARE occasional too-obvious plot armors.

Even so it's still a great novel and complains over small details like "He's a saint previously but now he kills people in this world", different conditions changes the mindset and thought process of different people. In a world where "might means right", the two main things are

Kill everyone that will cause harm to your loved ones

AND

Only when you're strong, you can protect those that you care for.

So there, if anything our MC is more of a victim of circumstances; he's still a kind and nice person who treats the people around him nicely, just not those who want to, oh I don't know, kill everyone he cares. TL;DR - Great plot, good storyline, give it a hundred chapters try. P.S. I gave up reading ISSTH THRICE before re-re-reading it, it's a superb novel but TOO. MUCH. DAMN. DETAILS.

Four instead of 5/5 because the first few books rather 'generic' xianxia. Almost skip-able world building, full of kill-kill-kill and BIG contradiction.

... more>>

Spoiler

MC made BIG good merit before he passed away from this Earth, so he can reborn with goodies since birth. He had luck to be able to learn the greatest Spirit Training Art in all worlds, Maiden Nuwa Visualization.

For you who doesn't know Her, Maiden Nuwa was the one who create this Earth, and all lives that moveth upon it. Because some error while Pangu created Heaven and Earth, Maiden Nuwa sacrified her life to protect all living creatures.

However, the MC learned her greatest art, but he starts to kill since being child. He cared for no one, despite his 'good' merit on Earth that he still remember. Blah Blah Blah.

OK. That's nuff. Let's pass quickly these very first books. After that - it's good.

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MC has brain, and know how to use it, not choose to replace with muscle as other MC.

Spoiler

There's plot twist about his Dao Companion which make me shock. Hahaha.

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There're plots. There're reason behind. Not much nonsense babbling. **No plagiarism**. Some books/chapters are good enough to be read twice/trice.

That's all. Good that you read. Not as legendary as Coiling Dragon, but definitely not waste your time, nor regret. <<less

A very ordinary, kinda-borish at times, decent start all the way until it finally gets something going. It has now stabilized it's quality and is one of the very best xuanhuan in the entire NU.

With much more focus on the insights of the Dao compared to many xuanhuan novels, DE has become a very exciting read whenever the MC, Ning attains an advancement in the Dao.

Ning has a mostly similar personality to all IET Mcs, the usual hard-working and genius MC.

The only thing you should not expect when reading DE... more>> is the beast companions, Ning is advancing at a speed too fast for pthers to catch up to, and in the end he would leave them in the dust.

8.2 for the early chapters and 9.4 when things are finally getting started. <<less

This is excellent xianxia. Where many of the other xianxia constitute mu*der and feuds, the worldbuilding and the meaning built into comprehending the 'Dao' makes this an interesting read. The protagonist does not simply fight and gain power meaninglessly, but in a vibrant, immense world that you can sense the scale of. Thus far it is like Coiling Dragon's early days, and my dearest hope is that it would preserve that feeling even when protagonist becomes a celestial immortal.

Anyway, read it.

Love it nuff said... jk no seriously if you are tired of those harem novels and are actually looking for an adventure + action packed novel this is the one I just cant explain how grate and refreshing it is, you just cant stop reading after you start the only thing that will stop you is the last translated chapter so give it a go and enjoy the ride. 5/5

If you're new to this then picture a super child prodigy with hacks that makes him a monster among monsters before he is even in double digits (Age).

It's enjoyable and well translated with a good release rate.

Not all characters are 'memorable' but it's still enjoyable.

Another cultivation mediocre novel. It has some good ideas on the plot but unless you are bored with no new reading don't waste your time. Is really too repetitive, and I mean it. Half of the novel is the author rephrasing statements over and over.

I actually read this first before Coiling Dragon and I forgot to put a review on Desolate Era first and remembering it now. It gave me quite a great impact after reading Desolate Era that I also read Coiling Dragon which is also a great novel. I Eat Tomato became an author to me that is really an amazing author and makes really great novels. It just that It's a bit lengthy that sometimes I pause reading it before continue reading it again.

Anyways. Great story and has quite a good... more>> importance also in real life, I mean reading it gave me some morals that I could use in real life.

Not much on the supporting characters. I've mostly focused on the MC rather than the supporting characters because their really not much, there are some but not all. It's just that the author introduce them but didn't gave them context for me.

Great read recommended for people who likes lengthy stories. <<less

I read twice the novel. The first time I loved it as it was one of my first xianxia and IET novel. But I really didn't enjoy as much my second reading.

MC is stepping on every possible kind of landmine all over the story, and survives each time only after a cultivation breakthrough. MC never plans, or uses his brain even knowing the new places he'll go are deadly, yet he always comes out with inheritance from dead powerhouse. It's very repeatitive and if the story is ok up to... more>> chapter 500, starting the story arc of the endwar, ennemies pop up everywhere just to become MC's stepstones and the plot is all over the place...

Luckyly, it's not a face slapping novel, but the cultivation explanations and cultivation levels names are really badly done or translated as written in some reviews bellow. It's a bit of a pain to remember all cultivation levels for some time. MC faces one setback during the story but it's a bit too close from the end to really entertain you, as he is already quite op. The end is ok.

Try this novel it it's one of the first xianxia novel you'll read, else, just binge read it! <<less

1. It starts really good, but it quickly devolves. The MC goes from having a good personality, family values and clear goals to having zero of those. Halfway through the first major war he loses all but one goal, and by the end of that realm he holds no regard for his clan, his mother's clan, friends, servants or spirit beast. He goes from moving forward with a purpose to getting forcibly shoved into plots that offer no character development. In fact all of his character gets erased aside from my name is Ji Ning and practice the sword. Edit: dropped it 300 before end, the start seems well planned and after it just goes wherever, past the halfway point the only thing that remains is the MC's training ethic and his drive towards a dao companion he spent a century out of a quintillion life span with. He just floats from realm to realm getting carried by his HUGE karmic luck, legacies that have no place being taught to people in his realm and big shots that are nice.

I'd probably give it a 4 for the first quarter / third, it's pretty entertaining with some good unexpected things as well as a relatively solid story. There were definitely some problems, the biggest of which being scale... the author really loves nonsensical big numbers, it's utterly unreadable unless you mentally scale everything down by a factor of at least 1000 or replace numbers with "really big" / "huge". The romance is rather rushed and there seems to be no concept of dating / courtship, people just say they like... more>> each other and bam, they're married. The author totally forgets about stuff too, such as (minor spoiler, author forgets anyway)

Spoiler

he gets a disciple and she hasn't been mentioned a single time since.

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Despite those problems among many others, it was still engrossing enough that I lost sleep to keep reading more. At this point though, the negatives and obvious word count inflation ("it must be understood" constantly, lots of repetition, etc) have worn away my desire to keep reading since it's at a point where it should be about to end, but then I look at the volume number and I'm less than halfway there... <<less

This was my first Chinese cultivation novel, so it has a special place in my heart. Honestly, I'm happy that it was my first, as compared to other cultivation novels, this is around the top ones in my opinion.

• • First, a HUGE plus for me is the fact that it doesn't have harem. I hate it when annoying girls keep appearing. He has a special someone, the story mostly progresses due to that.

• • The MC is not arrogant. And of course, annoying characters like young masters do keep coming up here as well, but the amount is fairly toned down.

• • Unique cultivation system

• • Spoiler

    Ji Ning uses a child form almost all the time. It certainly is unique.

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I would definitely recommend reading this if you like Chinese cultivation novels. Compared to it's kind, where you would be angered anyways, this is really, really good.

Good Beginning but at the end it got very boring and repetitive. At the last chapter I swore that I wouldn't ever read a single more word of this story ever again, goddamnit! It was like torture, I spent so much time that I just had to keep going and going, but every moment was so stupendously terrible Q-Q (Maybe I am a masochist). Anyway, younglings should. Never. Ever. Touch this piece of S#it. Stay away folks and don't become like me, unless you want your time and life to... more>> be drained to nonexistence. <<less

I've been holding back not to complain before finish reading the whole chapters of this novel..

Ignoring those 'out of humans 'comprehensions' / illogical details of immortal's super power 🤭 to me..4 out of 9 IET's novel i've read.. im like this one the most..

Most people like to compare between IET and ErGen.. but to my own opinion, I prefer IET style.

... more>> Unlike ErGen with his 'THE SAME repetetive-face-slapping-plot' with a FAIL mysterious-Plot in his 'every' novel

.. to me.. IET's novels much more simple and easy to understand.. (althou I dislike the MC's wife character here)... Lol <<less

If you compare this to other Xianxia, this can be considered above average so if you are a fan of Xianxia as a whole then I guess this could be a enjoyable read. For me who has read at least a dozen Xianxia, above average is just another term for mediocre. You got your usual Xianxia over exaggeration: A trillions world, "planet" with billions of kilometer, a step that move a hundred kilometer, etc etc. All these serve nothing beside giving the author a chance to pull crap out of... more>> his ass when he needed to invent new villains for an arc and give a wow effect for people who are into these kind of world building. These kind of setting always sound so s*upid to me. So you got a civilization that has been around for BILLIONS of years and yet you expect me to believe that their technology never get past medieval age ? Yes you can train your body to move as fast as a car but if you actually look at the statistic, 1 in 10, 000 might be able to do cultivation. So you are telling me the other 9, 999 are just content with shitting at the sh*t house for billions of years ? Not like they have low population either since in one of the arc, the total population of mortal inside a large clan is 30 billions and yet after billions of years, nothing change.

Plot are laughably predictable. MC will never lose. If he is close to losing then either one of 2 thing happen: an OP character come to the rescue or he scream so loud that he got a power up and proceed to pick up the villain like a baby, pull down their pants and start spanking their ass in front of their ancestor. Yes you can make a novel where MC never lose but you have to convince me that he earned that status. After reading 17 volumes where author literally pull the same style in every fight, I am convinced that the author is incapable of doing it. <<less