Classic Overlord. The beginning is kind of slow due to exposition. I'm finding that to be a trend with these Overlord books. We get some savage Death Knight violence and the unique humor of Ainz unknowingly charming/frightening new followers into his fold. In this Volume Ainz travels to the Dwarven Kingdom in the mountains with Aura and a very enthusiastic Shalltear. We meet a NEET frost dragon and a very surprising ending. Next Volume is in the Holy Kingdom!! Bwahahhaa! Should be good. 😈
A great adventure with tons of world building and a refreshing time after all that’s being going on with the plot, we discover the runes and the dwarfs, the frost dragons and their position on the world. There’s some minor inconveniences and some character development with two guardian, as a plus we visit Carne… village?
Nudna jak flaki z olejem. Najgorsze w tym tomie jest to, że pozornie dzieje się tak wiele. Poznajemy cudowne rasy, ich kulturę, przedstawicieli, ich historię, umiejętności itd. itd., ale z drugiej strony nic się nie dzieje. Przeskakujemy z jednej rozmowy na drugą, brakuje trzymujących w napięciu walk, a rasie, tak potężnej i wspaniałej, jaką są smoki, poświęcamy maksymalnie 5 minut czasu antenowego, ignorując całkowicie tę radę. Lubię Overlorda, lubię konspirację, akcję, zabawne momenty, bohaterów, a co bohaterów. Ludzie... Nie wiem, jak brzmi oryginał, ale tłumaczenie wybrali używanie staropolskiego języka dla Shertear (wampirzycy), który brzmi tak sztucznie, tak tragicznie, że nie dałosię tego czytać, a niestety jej było dużo w tym tomie :( Także... zawiedziony czytelnik :(
*sigh* I had hope. I really did. Maybe, just maybe, there would be something to challenge Ainz in this book. Something to make the story interesting, something to FINALLY drive the story forward, something for Ainz to push against...
Nope. Nothing. And the ONE thing that could have possibly been a challenge, something they hype up as a possible antagonist... yeah. Not even a moment's hesitation. It was easily one of the most disappointing things in this book. Ainz has faced weaker beings in earlier books and had the fights drawn out for multiple pages. Here, a far stronger being, warrants one sentence. One. Gone are the battles where you get to watch struggles and Ainz learning about his opponents, studying them, drawing things out. It makes for some very, very boring reading.
We are eleven books in now and it honestly feels like the author has lost his steam and desire to keep writing. Some kind of antagonist should have been introduced long ago, and it hasn't. Hints about another player that were planted ages ago haven't born any fruit. All that is left is what now feels like a dying plant, withered and dry. I honestly only keep reading at this point on the offhand hopes that something, anything, happens in this story.
But I am afraid by the time the series finishes, it will be a disappointment, one where not a lot has happened, everything the series has been building up to is nothing, and Ainz is basically Saitama from One-Punch Man, Vol. 1, only far less interesting and with far less character development.
There are 6 novels left in the series. Hopefully something happens in the next novel or two, or I might not make it to the end of the series run...
The Dwarven Crafters is a little more tame than the previous two volumes of Overlord. With the Sorcerer Kingdom (still mistranslated as “Kingdom of Darkness” in the official translation, argh!) more or less established now, Ainz can focus his attention elsewhere. Which translates to letting Demiurge and Albedo handle the bureaucratic side of things so he can do that he wants. Readers see once again that more than anything, Ainz longs for the good old days of adventuring with his buddies. So, with a handful of his servants, he decides to venture out into the unknown and investigate the dwarven country he has heard rumors about.
Most of this book focuses on Ainz, more so than most of the previous books at this point. Shalltear and Aura join him as the sidekicks for this adventure along with one of the lizardmen and various unnamed minions. It is fun to see that even several years into the story, Ainz has to repeatedly tell his subordinates, “Do not just shoot first and ask questions later.” While they are growing as people and developing better critical thinking skills, most of them still view wholesale slaughter as their go-to option during any sort of confrontation.
There are several parts of this book that show other characters viewpoints, namely the new dwarf characters. This includes a single dwarven craftsman as well as their country’s governing council. Their reaction to someone like Ainz showing up on their doorstep goes about how you would expect. This includes Ainz BSing his way into success by making vague/innocuous statements and having others fill in the blanks. Oh, and magic. Lots and lots of super-powerful magic to scare the pants off anyone who witnesses it (and lives). While not as extreme as Volume 9’s events, this is a clear reminder that Ainz and co. are playing this game with God Mode cheat codes.
Overall, this was one of the more fun Overlord books. The stakes were not high and while the events were not action packed, they were not bland either. We get to see Ainz doing what he most wants to do: going on an adventure. Exploring the unknown, fighting monsters, and finding treasure. All the things that adventurers do. While he still must play the role of king to some degree, that is almost more of a secondary objective. In the end he gets what he wants, in more ways than one, as Nazarick’s world conquest continues.
In this volume of Overlord, you get to see a multitude of tactics used by Ainz Ooal Gown and some more incite from his old life as Suzuki Satoru. The beginning of the volume starts off in another kingdom , the Dwarf Kingdom. Most of the time the setting is set in caves. We are introduced to a multitude of characters ranging from dwarfs, quagoa(another race that lives in caves), and in this instance frost dragons. Primarily we are introduced to three new important characters, Gondo Firebeard a dwarf, Pe Riyoru lord of the quagoa, and Hejinmal a frost dragon. Ainz travels to the kingdoms of the dwarfs and provides assistance with a war between the quqgoa and the dwarfs in return for their runesmiths. The quogoa however are supported by the frost dragons. In the game of Yggdrasil dragons are the strongest enemies and are hard to deal with. This puts some worries in Ainz. Their is a running theme throughout the light novels, the theme is Ainz is way to powerful for this “New World”. We see him casually slaughter and army, kill the strongest warrior of the Re-Estize Kingdom whom was wearing their sacred and strongest armor and sword, and The Theocracy stated his power to be on par with the strongest of the Six Great Gods, Surshana who held the mantle of “God of Death”. In the future I hope to see Ainz fight against another character that gives him a hard time. He has overcome many obstacles with unparalleled ease and I predict that he learns of the Six Gods and would determine how powerful they are and go against the Slane Theocracy.
Charlie Chaplin once made a parody of Hitler. I get the feeling that this overlord author is trying to portray a parody of a former player with regular intelligence and no apparent talents that is slowly but surely becoming the ruler of this new real world. His killings are in the hundreds of thousands of sentient beings, his fetishes, whims and thoughtless actions fill the pages of this overlord light novel. Ainz (Suzuki-Momonga-Momon) the main character acts according to the expectations of his Floor guards and still believes he is playing a game even though the Yggdrasil game closed down at the start of this Light Novel. Ainz is a sociopath/psychopath that feels nothing and has no physiological necessities (sexual desire, eat and drink, go to bathroom, etc.) while at the same time the former NPC's (non-player characters) that served as floor guards and servants in Nazarick guild home, develop human emotions and feeling. Yggdrasil apparently was a grotesque character game (filled with monsters, torture, death and gore). Ainz and his retinue continue the roles and characters they used to have in the shut down game and seek to control this new real world. With highly over-powered (OP) characters, skills and artifacts, but without any ambition or real plan or vision, they slowly but surely conquer all of the species of this alternate reality world.
Another volume of power tripping fantasy, Volume 11 offers insights into the dwarf kingdom, dragons, and a race of odd mole-like creatures. The "accidental-genius" schtick never gets old and I relish in the cathartic feeling whenever there is a major accidental payoff. This book is littered with those moments, as Ainz is a regular human, with basic human understandings and goals, in the body of an god-like overlord, but his subordinates see every action he takes as some unfathomably methodical master plan--and it ends up working out that way.
The only thing this volume misses is a big blockbuster confrontation of belief and emotion. While the book is all about subverting expectations and making a parody of the genre, I feel that there is at least a moment in these books that everything comes together--that moment is absent. It's a small gripe, though, because everything else is great. The characters are developing well and the story is slowly but surely laying the foundation leading to the big conflict with the theocracy.
Summary Basically this book is about a guy who gets transfered into a frictional world or a game where he is overpowered and has ~42 overpowered followers who thinks he (Momanga or something like that later he becomes Ainz) is the greatest and the best. One of my best Frictional novels I have ever read. It joins togather comedy with the seriousness and also answers about the reality of socitey. It's fun when his followers overpraise him about something he dosen't Know. For example one of his Smartest follower Demurgus thinks Momanga is smarter than him their conversetion goes like.
Momanga: So everything is fine right? Demurgus: Oh how smart of you My lordyou found something was wrong So fast? You are talking about that right? Momanga: Yes that? Demurgus: That is amazing? Momanga: Oh, Can you solve That? Demurgus: Of course that is not a probelm. Momanga (on his heart): "But i dont know what that is?"
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
As I said before, season four is my least favorite season of "Overlord" by a pretty wide margin. And the arc with the dwarfs is probably my least favorite arc of that season. So I wasn't expecting much from this volume.
However, it didn't turn out to be as bad as I expected. There were some shining character moments here and there, especially when Ainz and the others first met the dwarfs. Though I still ended up having the same problem as I did in the anime, which is that I'm much more interested in everything that happens before, and after, this arc. I found myself repeatedly just buzzing through the words without really retaining anything while reading this volume, just waiting to get to the stuff I was much more interested in.
Overall, this isn't the worst volume of "Overlord", but it also doesn't really do much of anything for me either. I can see other people being really into it though.
This book deals with the Dwarven kingdom, we see Ainz trying to change the image he has of being infallible. The pressure of always having to be right is pretty high.
The power level difference is funny as usual with him being orders of magnitude stronger than anyone else he meets.
The world-building is great with dwarfs being crude, direct, loving beer. The frost dragons were not "cold" in the personality sense.
At times it feels sad to remember how much the guild is inhuman, while ainz has remanents of humanity and a wish to value life. He is far from being human. The massacre of the Quagoa just because shalltear wanted to make Ainz happy seemed sad. The disregard for life is very telling and consistent with the world the author has made.
Decent book.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Muy bueno y todo pero después de 11 libros siento que falta algo que me matenga seguir leyendo, ya no me interesa tanto como antes. La verdad no estoy de animos para leerme el volumen 12, por ahora dejare la novela a un lado.
Pero lo que más me dolio y me hizo ponerle cuatro estrellas, MI PAREJA FAVORITA DE LA SERIE SE CASO Y NO LO MOSTRARON, NOS LO MENCIONAN 6 MESES DESPUÉS DE QUE PASO. LA OSADIA, LA TRAICIÓN. Alguien mandele mi queja a Maruyama-sensei que esto no es justo, yo queria ver boda auque fuese por un minuto de lectura T_T. Quiero ver los momentos felices de mis personajes favoritos.
If all lives are equally important, then put a criminal who tormented and murdered people in one electric chair and in another, put someone precious to someone who blathers on about equality, before telling the idealist to kill one. If that person can choose which to kill by rolling a die, then I’ll be convinced they truly believe what they say." —Ainz Ooal Gown, Overlord Vol. 11: The Dwarven Crafter
I loved reading about the dwarves, the kuagoa, and the dragons! Found it more enjoyable than what I remember from the anime adaptation (it's been a long time since I watched it).
One thing I appreciate is that we get to really understand how each tribe thinks. The kuagoa king didn't stand out to me much in the anime, but it was great to learn the nitty-gritty about the kuagoa clan's history, and what made the king special. Very cool!
Another novel of Overlord and another country explored in depth, in this case, the Dwarves. I've found the last two volumes packed with comical moments, which pleasantly surprised me, additionally, the amount of political planning developed particularly in this one caught my attention and keep me reading until the end. Nice volume 4/5
More than 5 years since the last time I read this series. Seems like this light novel still ongoing and not much progress been made. Though it already years, this light novel plot still fresh in my mind, for this is one of the best light novels out of there. The kingdom building genre here was good, though sometimes it's feel circling around.
Better than vol. 10. Less action overall but I enjoyed it even more. I can't help but feel that the sword Ainz was about to appraise will actually turn out to be of some significance latter on. Anyway good book, great series.
O autor esta explorando mais o mundo que ele criou mas ainda tem dificuldade de lidar com as diferenças de poder entre os personagens. Mas a escrita e a criatividade do autor ainda é incrível de se ver.
10/10 series continuation. I currently only exist to frantically grab for the next book, because i didn’t see this book ending coming from ANYWHERE and I need answers!! I love and hate this feeling SO MUCH! Like, whaaat?? Amazing! How dare you end a book like that! Truly superb! I’m in awe!
Continuamos con este Satoru más atrevido y cínico, me provoca mucha curiosidad que pasa por su cabeza ya que siento que no están profundizando tanto en su plan por una razón aunque el final me ha dejado en shock, muero por saber que va a ocurrir.
It’s good but not great. The overarching story doesn’t seem to progress at all. It’s not like I disliked it, but it’s about time we get some developments!
Ainz goes to the Dwarven Kingdom and manages to forge friendly relationships with them. He also kills two dragons and acquires another bunch of them, even a chubby one.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.