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Earthen Contenders #6

Unbelievable Healer

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The final Developmental Phase is thrust upon the Contenders, whether they like it or not…

After inadvertently triggering the start of Developmental Phase 4 with the destruction of The Citadel, Thaden learns from his squirrel companion, Sadia, what the Wildlands has in store for him and the other Contenders. Unfortunately, despite his incredible power as a largely solo healer, he quickly discovers that in order to succeed in the final Phase, numerous additional people will need to participate.

In other words, he cannot do it alone.

The problem that arises is, sadly, an obvious one. While Thaden is powerful and more than capable of tackling many of the challenges that Phase 4 presents, the other Contenders in Region #1, let alone all of the other Regions on Tarth, are far behind the required Level to even have a chance of succeeding against the monsters in the Wildlands. And if he doesn’t find a way to get them to that point, then the deaths of not only every person in Region #1, but the entire world, will become an inevitability.

Will Thaden persevere when the odds of success are slim to none? Or will he do something unbelievably stupid and put the lives of everyone on Tarth even more at risk? Find out in the thrilling conclusion of the Earthen Contenders series!

This story contains an overpowered MC with a normally non-offense-based Class, LitRPG progression mechanics and stats, and isekai/portal fantasy elements. Contains no sexual content or harems.

383 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 20, 2025

362 people are currently reading
37 people want to read

About the author

Jonathan Brooks

82 books483 followers
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

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5 stars
568 (62%)
4 stars
218 (24%)
3 stars
82 (9%)
2 stars
26 (2%)
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14 (1%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
776 reviews4 followers
August 22, 2025
SPOILERS>>

The beginning and main body of the book was pretty good and followed the rest of the series. The end of the book was so awful and disappointing. I genuinely felt that the ending of this book caused me to feel that the rest of the entire series was pointless to have read to get to this point. Betrayal and anger is all I am left with in feelings toward this author.

The author stated the reasons why he did what he did in the "Author's Notes" after the story was finished. However, when or if you read the notes, the author basically admitted to getting burned out if the series is longer than six books. So he is writing a new "series" that has the same main character; who by the way has to start all over again at level 1.

I am NOT looking forward to needing to read the full progression of the main character as he starts over from the beginning. Especially when there were so many potential opportunities for the Author to have done something different with the larger story arch.

Some specific spoilers to help you decide if you want to read this book or not:

*There is zero justice for anyone from Earth in this book as more than 6 billion humans will be sacrificed and turned into Energy to fuel the system that just decided to take Earth even though we find out the great evil may never have gone to Earth.

*Turns out that the contenders are actually slaves and are being sold off at the end of the book to the highest bidders. And they are okay with this because the system has basically brainwashed them into thinking this is fair because they have a duty to protect the system.

*The Main Character gets separated/kidnapped from the world where he will basically be sent to Earth to be eliminated. Somehow all of his stats, and other system given traits have been seperated from him, so he is a weak little human. Also, the mana he has that his own body generates isn't able to be accessed even though it never stopped him before when the system or the great evil suppressed him, so I am not sure how that little, minor inconvenience happened.

*The Main Character tricks the agents of the system to allow him to absorb all PICK he had accumulated that he didn't get to distribute before he was taken away. We have no idea what happened to all of his accumulated PICK; apparently as the Main Character was forced to absorb the who knows how much PICK (we were never given a final number) -for reasons that were not explained by the author- The Main Character couldn't absorb it. Even though the author never had a problem before writing that the system could forcefully make the Main Character absorb all the excess PICK he had. Apparently the inability to absorb the PICK caused our character to explode.

*Main Character somehow explodes on a different planet/location from where he was kidnapped and was somehow resurrected and left as level 1.

In case you cannot tell I am beyond livid at this book. I started and finished this book in one day as I could not put it down as the beginning was fascinating and I was curious to see how the phase four would go.

The last few chapters were written in a way that felt completely different from the rest of the book and contradicts everything the author wrote about as far as system mechanics operated in previous books. It feels like the author broke his own series' rules to accommodate how he wanted the book to end. And the ending did not make any sense at all.

I hope you enjoy it more than I did.
And if you did, please respond to this horrible review and tell me why. I truly would like to know what you found so good about this. I really do. Maybe I am missing something important in the story that would make all of this make sense.
16 reviews
August 22, 2025
Still don’t understand MC (spoilers)

How has the MC not gotten filled with Rage at how the system has been trying to kill him. It even took away all the memories of him from everyone he knew, even his girlfriend! And yet he still acts like a cowardly crybaby. In the ending scene of him being strapped to the chair and begging to be let go… Never been more disappointed of an MC before. Almost no true emotion in this guy besides introverted whining and no true backbone. I think I’m done reading books from this author.
Profile Image for Ron.
13 reviews
August 22, 2025
Reader Beware

This is a legitimately good book but the ending deflates the highs of the saga abruptly. It kind of leaves the ROI lacking. Author explains why but the rating follows the feeling I’m left with at the end.
Profile Image for Michael Kahan.
88 reviews
Read
November 9, 2025
Honestly just straight up bad. I read this series because it's easy to skim and largely unobjectionable, but it's not one I had any high expectations of. Somehow managing to not even meet them is embarrassing. When you decide to end your series by undoing all the character development in terms of both personal relationships and in terms of the literal character sheet, it just makes me think reading all the previous books was a waste of my time. Sure the main character is a bit more wise to what's going on than he was at the start of the first book, but he'll be starting out the next book essentially from scratch and that's remarkably frusterating.

Also, saying that there will be a new series continuing on from the end point of this one because you lose momentum after six books in a series is just lying to yourself. Number 1 in whatever the next series will be us really just Earthen Contenders 7. New readers won't just be able to pick it up and go in from nothing. I'm sure there will be a recap section at the start of the book to help them, just like there was in this one. But the actual first book in a series has nothing to recap.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for Jonathan.
638 reviews1 follower
October 31, 2025
fun

Thaden survived landing in the bad lands. He quickly learned how things worked then headed back to help out. He and his guild must now rush the region to advance to protect the area from the newly released monsters. Thaden power levels thousands then guides them through conquering the badlands. He fakes his death too well and ruins his name tag making the system forget him and everyone think him the enemy. He discovers a secret the System is hiding and accidentally releases the world bosses meant to reset everything. He defeats them. The trials complete, And everyone is teleported away to be auctioned off. Except Thaden is to be disposed of, again. He learns dark secrets about the System. He escapes by dying. He wakes up on the System world, naked, injured, and reset to level one. Series end.

Good continuation. Frustrating conclusion. The arc ends but the story continues. Great narrator. Please enjoy
Profile Image for Andy Murphy.
316 reviews1 follower
October 22, 2025
Unbelievable Healer

Tarth has entered into the fourth and final phase. Monsters will pour from each nest until stopped and the base there is held. Thaden can certainly solo each monster nest, but he can’t guard more than a nest maybe two at most. This is something he simply can’t solo. He might be able to power level the other contenders to help, but that will probably not be enough. It might be time to do something more creative.

The summery of previous books at the beginning and all the heavy stat sections being their own chapters are super helpful. This Isekai litrpg is a fun way to wrap up Earthen Contenders. There was a ton of action in this one. Thaden is one of my favorite characters from Jonathan Brooks’ books. I’m looking forward to his next series. Miles Meili does an excellent job with the narration!

Content Warning: language
Profile Image for Trey richardson.
228 reviews20 followers
August 26, 2025
Horrible Ending

It was great until it wasn’t. I can’t expound on my disappointment without spoiling the book. So all I will say is the author fell prey to power scaling and opted out of it in a very predictable and some would say ,lazy manner. The ending aside I really enjoyed the book and applaud the author for being one of the few that genuinely wrote a solo MC series. I love solo and it’s extremely rare to find in a series. Most authors cave and end up giving MCs groups and attachments and most Solo series aren’t really solo past the first book or two. With that said, the set up for the next part seems interesting but all the handicaps is going to be extremely redundant and annoying to read.
Profile Image for Mark.
974 reviews80 followers
August 23, 2025
Part 1 of the adventures of the human spreadsheet finally ends.

The *exciting* *new* character development in this book is that ... drum roll please ... he has a lot of sex with Corinna and he likes it. In fact he likes it so much that it makes him decide to bring JUSTICE to the Assimilation System. Sorry for spoiling the book for you.

Of course all the sex is off-screen because, my god, you can't expect the author to write actual scenes of actual human interaction. So we don't see this enjoyment of sex. Yes, the major character development in the entire book, arguably the entire series, takes place entirely off-screen. Flabbergasting.
1 review1 follower
August 30, 2025
Review fir Earthen Contenders Series

The Earthen Contenders Series is an excellent story arc. Good main character, good supporting cast, good "realm", good "system ". Multiple twists and turns that you don't often see coming. Can't wait for the sequel series. Highly recommend. While some may love all the details on how certain things were calculated, or detailed lists of things provided multiple times, I often skimmed through them over time as they got a bit long, but did enjoy reading them the first time they came up, or after certain scenes. Footnotes may have been a better route.
Profile Image for Dannan Tavona.
968 reviews10 followers
September 11, 2025
Another cliffhanger

Alternate universe, OP MC, magic, save the world

Plenty to unpack here. The forces of the System and the Persistent Adversary still have a lot of secrets, but both seem intent on ignoring individual free will and readily kill sentient beings with callous regularity. The ending is a cliffhanger, and the world that was a fairly dark as in grim and brutal society finds that the remnants of humanity have been tossed into an even grimmer and more brutal one, with politics thrown in. Memory alterations compound the grim nature of the milieu.

Excellent editing, and I may be interested in seeing where this reset takes our MC. Diverting.
91 reviews
November 26, 2025
This is a bit better than the prior book. There's still the problem that Thaden solves most problems just by having ridiculous automatic damage output, so can kill most monsters just by standing near them. There's a much, much bigger monster late in the book that seems like a real challenge and maybe impossible, but that ends up getting resolved by Thaden doing the magical equivalent of punching it really, really hard.

I could also do with fewer numbers. I'm into numerical analysis when I'm playing a game myself, but reading about someone *else* tabulating how all his bonuses can add to really big damage isn't very interesting.
82 reviews
September 24, 2025
Agh it's the end....

..of the first Act of Thaden's New Life.

Unfair, boo, hiss, I don't want to wait.

Oh well, I have to regardless.

I have thoroughly enjoyed the story progression. I will continue on along with the new branching of his life path.

I would prefer less crunchiness in the stats, levels, inner monologue, and stressing over which upgrade, points assignment choice, or feature selection debate - but that is just me being a curmudgeon.

I do hope Mr. Ambulatory Ruination finds clothes, friends, growth, and excitement, but not necessarily in that order.
7 reviews
August 30, 2025
Relief!

When I started reading this series there was only two books and I patiently waited as each new book was published. When I read that this was the last book in the series I was saddened by the prospect of no more of Thaden’s adventures. I knew the overarching story still had a lot of ground to cover though so I was worried the author would cut it off unresolved. Thankfully that is not the case! I’m looking forward to more stories about Thaden!
91 reviews
November 27, 2025
A great series determonation/system screwups/ A path less followed

Tandem is whisked away from Earth as a contender, he misses class. Really. He's sent off to a strange planet knowing nothing about what's going on. He dives in and makes the best of it. That's just book one in the series. Here we are at book 6 and the end of the first arc. It's a good read and you won't be disappointed.
321 reviews5 followers
August 23, 2025
Interesting Ending to the series

Wow, what a way to end a series when the main character becomes so overpowered. Where do you go from here? Well, the answer is in the book. Great ending to a really interesting series. Spoiler alert! I can’t wait to see where the new series will lead us.
Profile Image for Michael Ballinger.
48 reviews1 follower
September 8, 2025
An Amazing Series!

This is definitely one of my favorite series that I’ve ever read! It’s so unique in its buildup of Thaden as a character and cheat within Tarth. I’m super excited to see what the next continuation of this series has in store for us! Overall, this is a perfect LitRPG experience with great world building, statistics, and characters!
35 reviews
September 12, 2025
Very disappointed

I love this series right up until this absolutely horrible ending. It answered absolutely no questions and finished absolutely nothing. Now I guess we got to read a whole another series of books before we ever find anything out. Think I'll pass. Cannot recommend this series
Profile Image for Larry.
183 reviews4 followers
October 11, 2025
Well I never expected THAT ending!

I liked seeing some issues resolved.
I did not like the way the series ended.
I liked seeing what happened after the development phase.
I did NOT like how the supposedly all mighty system went about implementing the next step.

And I do not like cliffhanger hangers.
Profile Image for Mike Goodman.
1,583 reviews12 followers
August 25, 2025
Overall Good Stuff

I did not enjoy the finale as the enemies level was too high and hard for me to imagine. Not sure this is the guy you want to do another series with, but I really enjoy all this Author’s stuff nonetheless.
5 reviews
August 26, 2025
Noooooo

It wasn’t bad but after 6 books when you look at constant improvement of the main character you are smashed by the ending. I might be petty but: - one star for the stat points!!! >runs away crying and angrily hitting things<
25 reviews
September 15, 2025
Totally Awesome

Jonathan Brooks brings out the best in the genre of Fantasy LitRPG. Enjoyable storytelling, excellent & fast moving combat, a story arc that has me constantly looking forward to his next installment.
2 reviews
October 9, 2025
Inspiring Read

Even if you don’t get caught up in the complexities of the advancement process, you will be enthralled with the spirit of determination, hope, and rapidly shifting adventures of this ever evolving protagonist! Super fun and captivating series of books!
Profile Image for Danny Moody.
1,414 reviews11 followers
October 30, 2025
Great conclusion to the series. I appreciate that the door was left open for more in the future. Brooks has made a name for himself in dungeon core but is starting to make waves in wider world of LitRPG.
Profile Image for Jim Phillips.
970 reviews3 followers
November 5, 2025
Its over

Interesting conclusion to the series. SPOILER ALERT!!!


it's not really over we're just ending this arc. Still alone though. We can hope he finds his girl this time around.
Profile Image for Michael Garbanewski.
22 reviews
August 22, 2025
hurry up write more

Enjoyable series
need to put a whole bunch of words seems silly. Nothing else needs to be said besides this is well worth reading.
11 reviews
August 23, 2025
Well ended.arx

Great series, excellent choice for the arc, and most of all a fun read that flows well. Waiting for more as always
8 reviews
August 23, 2025
Too much stat/strategy

I like the overall story, but the books bog down in too much game lit strategy explanation. I had to skip waaaayyy too many pages.
3 reviews
August 25, 2025
Awesome!!

Can't wait for the next chapter of Thaden's adventure. Wish the next book will be longer . Please do not take long
Profile Image for Steven.
36 reviews
August 25, 2025
Unsatisfying ending to a hit-or-miss series that missed more than it hit.
138 reviews
September 22, 2025
I like the story line; however, the pages and pages of stats and rewards get so long I start skimming and skipping them. It is just TMI for me to go through.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews

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