Awakening Horde

Shieldwall Academy, Book 1

By: M Zaugg

Narrated by: J.S. Arquin

Against all odds, a defiant street rat takes on a ruthless empire.

Pax, a cunning street rat without a class, navigates life in a city constantly threatened by monstrous beast waves. He's dedicated to keeping his crew safe and fed, especially after his family vanished without a trace. But when his best friend is captured, Pax risks it all—even his freedom—on the eve of the Awakening.

Caught and thrust into the Astan Empire's war machine, Pax must adapt to survive the perils of the empire's elite mage academy. While struggling to harness the forbidden magic surging within him, he must avoid the attention of corrupt leaders determined to snuff out any hint of rebellion and maintain their iron grip on power.

With ancient secrets, and long-lost spells at stake, can Pax triumph against his foes, defeat fearsome monsters, and secure a future for himself and his crew?

©2023 Misty Zaugg (P)2023 Misty Zaugg

alright book.

decent story, the main character is a little annoying but the story's alright. worlds interesting but the magic restrictions feel off.

Loved the story

Once the story got to our main character I loved it. I want to know how Pax is going to make it through the school year

Street rats go to magic school

In a world with four-element magic, street rat Pax awakens a forgotten fifth element in the government enforced RPG Class draft. He's shipped off to magic school, where any deviation from the norm is Very Bad News, and has to disguise his magic to keep from getting caught. His closest allies are a himbo fire mage and cautious water mage.

If you've been craving a magic school story that actually focuses on how magic works and what happens in classes, this is a great choice. Pax quickly learns to hide system notifications until he pulls them up, so the LitRPG elements don't interrupt scenes.

Students are sorted by their elements as well as combat and support based on their power levels. There's also a wide social/wealth range, so there are some scenes of bullying but not as much as many school based stories. Pax makes more friends than enemies.

There is some monster fighting throughout and the awesome cover art does eventually pay off.

The narration is nothing exciting but it does the job. The two best friend characters have distinct voices, along with a few other characters. Some voices are reused for similar characters but it only got confusing for two "floaty noble girl" characters. I'm pretty sure they were two different characters, at least.

A few gripes: The prologue chapters are heavy combat without context, which I found off-putting. Most character descriptions include what mix of human-elf-dwarf they appear to be, but this never really matters in this book. Some repetitive word/phrases. I look forward to reading future books in this series and from this author.

A good start!

The story is fairly basic. Street kids has unknown magic and all the problems that come from being in a crumbling corrupt society. The performance was done very well and had a nice verity of voices. The only problem I had was the time jump at the start of the book. It kept distracting me from the rest of the story while I tried fitting the future character with the 16 year old version. I will be interested in seeing where the story goes.

Odd choices

The author made some of the characters so unlikeable and I don't understand why. It wouldn't change the story to make them reasonable but instead the other characters are fine with a char that hates everyone.

Fun first entry

A good academy style Litrpg and lots of potential. Slow pacing but enjoyable magic system. Looking forward to see how it continues!

Where are the street smarts we keep hearing about?

So much is angled at the MC being a clever, cautious street smart “street rat”. But one day after meeting a girl he thinks is “tough” and talking to her all of two times, he is ready to share his deepest secrets. Two days after knowing her, she’s family. It’s just a weirdly forced relationship that could have been written in a lot better and more sensibly. As is, it just undermines the MC’s portrayed personality.

The story takes about 20 chapter to deal with a two fay carriage ride that is supposed to be part of the intro. It’s way too slow.

And then explaining the gains in a way that is longer than just showing the notifications is dumb. It was vague and more long winded.

Loved This

M. Zaugg has written a fast paced book that drew me in from the start and kept me engaged to the end. The characters are well developed and I rooted for them to over come a world designed against them. J. S. Arquin was the perfect choice to voice this action packed book. Can't wait for book 2. Lorrie

Imperfect but Enjoyable

The limitations and benefits of the magic system are not defined, so when the protagonist uses his powers, it doesn't come off as inventive or clever; instead, it feels like the author is giving the character knowledge he hasn't earned. This breaks the fourth wall.

Additionally, the writing has a lot of issues in the micro-chronology. For example, at one point, a character falls and the protagonist cries out to tell the falling person to use their magic to save herself, and then he looks over to people on the ground and asks them to save her. She's not falling from a skyscraper or from a plane several thousand feet in the air, so there should be no time for this. In general, the author doesn't seem to have had any editing or even just advice from beta readers who are writers and it shows as these are obvious mistakes that are easily fixed with quick edits. Further, it seems like the author has not read anything about how to write (or edit) books for the audiobook format as we regularly had to listen to an entire character sheet being read instead of just having the important stat increases read to us. This is especially true for the incremental increases that don't actually raise a skill's value.

Having said that, the world is intriguing, the game mechanics seem like they might be interesting when the author stops being coy with exposition (probably the biggest sign of a new self-published author as this seems like the right thing to do to create interest but instead it just creates confusion and lack of interest), and the characters are likeable.

While I won't recommend this to anyone, I'm a huge fan of the genre, so I won't be returning it and I will even be buying the next book in the series while hoping the writer has improved his craft. The author does the hard things well, but stumbles on the easy things that seasoned writers (and even new writers who have had to deal with a publisher) know to fix in their second draft. I say this to point out that easy mistakes are easily fixed so this author has every chance to improve and possibly become great.

Pax

This was a very solid book. Loved the progression and pace. It's interesting to see that whole magic and makes, but society only lets people use one type of magic. There was no mixing and very stuck in tradition. Ren did explain that the males of old that didn't experiment and stay alive are the ones running society now. Doing so, they are very cautious and hold themselves and next generation back.
Pax goes through his trouble like a normal teenager would with him being a low born (aka Street Rat) but then also with fact he had light magic. He has to hide it from the start. Not only does he have light magic, but he can control all forms of magic. Luckily, he has two loyal friends he can confide in. I would love love to have a tamed animal.