The Devouring Tide: The Splintered Five Saga: A LitRPG Isekai Adventure

Outworlder's Blood #5

by WillPowah

A Deadly Tide is RisingJust when Kay thought he could relax, a new wave of terror crashes in. Eldritch horrors are emerging worldwide, and now the Seramist Isles are under threat. Answering a call from Queen Alahna, Kay is thrust by the System onto an island paradise where the enemies are like none he’s faced before – duplicates of people only he can detect, and no one knows what they’re after.

With no one he can trust, Kay must navigate the treacherous waters of the foreign court while keeping an eye on every single person around him for a knife aimed at his back.

Can King Kay of Avalon unmask the duplicates and stop the tide of devastation before the people of Seramist are lost forever? Dive into the action and find out!

Genres: Fantasy

409 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 19, 2024

Reviews

[Jacob Proffitt · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is fifth in a LitRPG isekai series. Read in order.

The central story of this one seems a bit strained. Kay gets pulled into the Seramist Isles where his pal Eleniah is from by a very clumsy plot device. Essentially deus ex system. So he goes and meets Eleniah's family. There's shopping. And reconciliations. And a simmering plot for actiony bits.

I'm being dismissive, but I was fairly engaged once I let go of my annoyance at how shallow some of the setup was. I'm glad I wasn't too wrapped up in the villain plot because Kay does a lot of faffing about while things happen behind the scenes. To be fair, there's not a lot he can do except await events or the results of investigations by those with actual skills to do so. Indeed, I'd probably be even more dismissive if Kay had had to lead the investigation. That's just not his skillset so his contributions made sense—at least for me to go along with.

I feel like it was a lot shorter than some of the other books, but I'm not motivated to verify if that's actually the case. I was surprised to find myself over two-thirds through and feeling like it just started. I did like that this book let us know that "eldritch taint" has different flavors and different sources. We've been so hyper-focused on vampyr as the big-bad that actually seeing the world-wide crisis unleashed in the previous book have wider impact was a good thing.

All told, I'm going to give this 3½ stars with enough engagement that I'm rounding up. There's one more book to come. It's up on Royal Road if you just can't wait but I've seen a note by the author that it is, indeed, the last. We'll see how it goes with a wrap-up.

A note about Chaste: Sigh. Still very chaste. We get a little movement on the romance front with Eleniah as they agree to "date" with intention. That needed to happen, but I found those scenes a bit wooden. Maybe because I'm impatient for that to kick off already. Almost certainly that, actually. At any rate, there's no intimacy or shenanigans or even kissing. So this is still very chaste.

[Lana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another very exciting LitRPG book by Will Powah, where in this book 5 we see Kay being crowned King of Avalon, giving a very worthy speech to his citizens, and preparing to enjoy a life of peace, however this was not to be. An incursion of monsters was attacking Torotia and Queen Alahna of the Seramist Isles, who also happened to be Eleniah's cousin, asked for his help. Turns out that what Kay found was a threat from another world, a threat of very advanced technology in the form of nanites. He was the only one who could recognise duplicates, so whilst very willing to help Alahna by checking out all the people on the isle, he also had to watch his back. Meantime even through all the danger they were facing he and Eleniah managed to find time for a bit of romance, strengthening the bond they always enjoyed, and turning it into something more. The final battle against the tide of blackness which threatened to drown the isle is massive, and both Kay and Eleniah nearly lost their lives, but all of them including the queen whose powers were to call up the storms were amazing. I really loved this very thrilling adventure, but the ending is scary, and I need to have book 6 in my hands right now to go on reading as a new monster is coming!

[Japhrimal · Rating 5 out of 5]

Felt a bit short for me

I feel like kay didn't make much progress individually, and i feel like the thing with miri could have been wrapped up in the last bit instead of the stuff about the gold king.
Otherwise i really enjoyed the book. I hope the next book comes out sooner than several months

[Cynthia Proctor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best one yet!

I’m excited at the way the book is developing and can’t wait to read the next one. We’ve finally started moving past the “learning” phase and gotten to the “doing” phase!

[M · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lost 2 stars for NOT writing a Recap.

I think every reader needs to start doing this to force authors to write a quick Recap chapter, which readers can skip if they remember, and those who don't won't stop reading the series.

[Danny Moody · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun, quick read. It did a good job taking about some of the events of the previous novel at the beginning which brought me up to speed. There was a lot of action and some interesting progression. Overall, it was a lot of fun.

[Ray Ritchey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow

Nice plot twist with a new Eldridge horror that is more science based, but definitely malevolent and evil. Good character development.

[Mike Goodman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome Stuff

This story of a guy getting zeked to another world and becoming a type of vampire to fight the evil was a fantastic read.

[Emmanuel Obi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome stroyline

Loved every aspect of this book. Looking forward to reading the next book in line. Great adventures and world building.