By the Sword: A World Conquest Isekai

Empress, Book 2

De: J. V. Simms

Narrado por: Hollie Jackson

In this follow-up to the hit isekai, a villain continues to find her power—and develop her sadism—even as she's haunted by her ex-love.

Seventeen years after her rebirth into a magical medieval world, Everly Vae Balsar, the Empress, has made it. With her exceptionally potent earth magic and powers of spiritual manipulation, she stands poised to conquer a kingdom that lives in fear of her and her dangerous servants: Carter the goblin assassin, the marauding General Grail, and her elementals, the sadistic Eris and ditzy Titania. She's a villain and proud of it.

Well, she's not a fan of cannibalistic monsters. Villainy is her domain, not the presumptuous Mister Whisper's. But at the moment, Everly is experiencing something she's never felt before: genuine regret over killing someone. Specifically, her mage maybe-love Fenneth.

As she reconnects with her conniving father and impetuous sister and continues to grow her power, Everly's schemes slowly become more complex. But she's still haunted by her actions—and maybe by Fenneth as well . . .

The second volume of the hit portal fantasy series—with more than 400,000 views on Royal Road—now available on Kindle, Kindle Unlimited, and Audible!

©2024 J. V. Simms (P)2024 Podium Audio

Meh. Starting to get boring halfway through.

Pretty much stop listening to it with four hours left. Started out strong. Too bad.

If you liked the first book you'll like this

same stuff as the first, very enjoyable. only down side would be the 1 1/2-2 hours at the end that set up the next book and has an extended story made by Tatiana. Not saying I didnt like the story but it felt like padding to increase the Length of time shown on audible.

Love the new and storylines, but…

Tons of new ideas and characters, but definitely felt more like episodic events brought up and resolved in tv-show like installments, instead of one big escalating adventure like the first novel.

Also, Asher SUCKS. Please god let future segments with her be less brain-meltingly repetitive and uninteresting.

And the new “Big Good” looming threat seems to be really dragging their feet, just a minor story issue, but they really could have been doing what they set out to do instead of playing around all book.

Can't get enough!

Seriously addicted to this story and Everly! She's just way too entertaining and the way the narrator brings her to life is just perfect!! I can't wait to see how the story evolves and im already dying for the next audiobook!!

lacks focus

While entertaining, the story tends to pointlessly wander onto tangents that do nothing to advance the plot. If your looking for basic amusement it's fine, if you want to listen to an actual story with advancement look somewhere else.

villains and even worse villains

This story is about villains and even worse villains that exist within this world. it's an interesting take to see how people within the authors universe say they are acting in righteous good but are in fact doing evil deeds to control the population. But that is expected in some cases. To see the narcissistic evil, that is Everly as probably the least evil thing that exists within this world makes for quite an interesting tale. it's crazy and highly entertaining to see her point of view on many of the topics that are presented within the story. and in a strange way it has the listener agreeing with the point of view and rooting her on to win.

needs to get back on track

Started out as good as the first book and is still enjoyable. However, the author has the characters go off on so many tangents that the storyline basically doesn't progress at all. This is fine in doses to lengthen series and get more books in and all. i get it... but too much is too much. The book needs to make some progress.

Too much dialogue between the clones. That whole section was just a waste of time.

Extremely uneven pacing and inconsistent narrative

TLDR: I recommend the Salvos series instead - although she's more of a chaotic anti-hero, where as Everly is a true chaotic, psychotic villain (which I actually like about the series as it is refreshing). The author was more ambitious his scope... with several plotlines and more characters, but really fumbles the execution.

The first book was pretty decent for the genre. However, this book really could have used an editor to help the author organize the the story arcs and characterization and pacing - it was the last few chapters that pulled the book out me giving it one-star. The author clearly was trying to be more ambitious, with multiple plotlines and story arcs and at a high-level I thought they were decent ideas... but the execution of those ideas was extremely inconsistent.

The books suffers from pacing issue with basically nothing happening in the first half and there being an entire chapter or two of the MC having a long random debate with herself that had as many nerd pop culture reference as Ready Player One. I mean I got basically of the references, so I don't mind them in general as a sort of flavor-text and Deadpool-like witty banter... but not when they were didn't advance the plotline, weren't funny, and you culd have deleted the entire chapter or two without missing. a beat on the rest of the story. Then the book gets decent in the third quarter of the book... and then over-corrects, with plotlines that literally could have had an entire separate book to explore, but was resolved "off-camera" between chapters.

The side characters are noticeable limited in depth, with many of them almost being interchangeable and having overly similar dialogue styles (to be fair John Scalzi, who I like, also tends to have all his character either be snarky misathropes, pompous assholes, or random template people reacting to the first two types - and I'm ok with that). Annoyingly, the author was so interested in exploring some story ideas, that he's basically willing to retcon characters between book 1 and 2 (and sometimes between the early and later chapters) just to fit into his vignettes and ideas. Even the general theme of the series is thrown for a huge curve... only to bring itself right back to where it started in the end (making the detour feel somewhat pointless).

I loved it!

I can't wait for the next entry. Five stars all around. I highly recommend it to anyone!

still a book about reprehensible character

honestly I don't know why I came to read the second book. The first one was like watching me Trainwreck filled with nuclear waste crash into an orphanage. meanwhile people are introduced who might be able to stop that train but instead they're either corrupted or crushed in its path.

The second book is much like the first. still fascinating to watch but I feel dirty for having done so. The only problem I have with the story is that the main characters behavior is inhuman. Good luck!!!