Gladesbale Grove (Stubbed!) [druid, litrpg, town building, slice of life, cozy]
Self-Published
Community Rating
Description
Torn from a life of mediocrity, Shawn needs to assume his new role as caretaker of a druidic grove in a fantasy world. He dons his new name, Rud, and gets to work!
Being a cog in the machine of an uncaring corporation has dulled Shawn's desire to see his dreams come true. He has accepted that he will never be a park ranger, fire watch, or anything fun. Instead, he works his keyboard to clean up other people's messes.
Working late one night, Shawn is visited by a strange woman... With wolf ears and samurai armor. She says his soul belongs to her, but the last time he checked, his company didn't have a LARPing department. He watches the clock as the time of his prescribed death draws sooner. Turns out, she was right.
Shawn is thrust into a strange ritual with a bunch of weird forest creatures. "Plant the seed!" they chant. And plant the seed he did. Now he finds himself in a fantasy world with druidic powers and a new name and body. Rud is now the caretaker of a sapient tree and the grove it encompasses. As if interacting with the local 'mortals' wasn't hard enough, he'll need to recruit help from intelligent forest creatures to make this work.
What to expect:
*Druid MC who is not overpowered.
*Sapient tree that generates production buildings and grows with the MC.
*MC helps others fight, but does not engage in combat himself.
*Low-stakes, cozy, forgcore vibes.
*Lots of talking animals, healing nature, and helping people.
*Tea. Lots and lots of growing, brewing, and selling tea.
*A house made from a mushroom. (A really big mushroom).
Schedule is:m/w/f
Information
- Status
- Ongoing
- Year
- 2025
- Author
- emgriffiths
Royal Road Stats
- Rating
- 4.5/ 5.0
- Followers
- 1,355
- Views
- 389,798
Chapters(168 total)
Reviews
No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts!
Community Reviews(9)
- 7whitewolf7Royal Road★★★★★ 5.0With the fastest adaptation of a protag I've seen this story launches into the good stuff and keeps giving.
A true slice of life, while there is conflict, focus isn't given to endless combat or subterfuge. The theme is truly one of growth and it incorporates fantasy elements with dungeon core/monstercore elements as well as widespread... well that would be a spoiler.
I loved the world building and imagery, and how easy story paths aren't ubiquitously chosen as how to progress the novel.
The characters have presence, though it feels like they are being viewed from the protags lens, which makes sense.
Update: still reading and loving it! I wanted to address something I saw in a review here simply to express my side of things.
A lack of characters was mentioned, and while I understand where they are coming from, the basis of this novel being a secluded Grove somewhat makes a degree of separation simply logical. I am actually glad not to be bombarded with half baked characters frequently as I am reading a lot of novels and will totally forget them.
Characters are slowly added, and they ARE added. So if it feels empty at first, we'll how else is there space for growth? This is the type of story that just gets better the more it goes on. - BentoRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0A wonderful read, everybchaoter leaves you satisfied....but also hungry for more.
The writing is good, the characters are great and doesn't feel empty. The World is small atm, revealed at a slow but not frustrating pace. I really do not like the 50 word minimum requirement for a review. bonk - LitrpgMaster999Royal Road★★★★★ 5.0I find this to be an interesting take on the litrpg style of writing and love the base building elements.I like how well thought out the character's are and how they develop. So far this seems to be a very good book and can not wait to see where this goes.
- Mister BillRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0So, this is quite good so far. The MC is a Druid and it’s almost base building. Basically base building. Base-ically.
The grove thing is neat and it’s a cozy story so far. It’s what it says it is in the description. It’s well written, it doesn’t really have many errors, and it keeps the attention well. Give it a shot! - jumureRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0EDIT: I’ve been on their Patreon since April 2025 time and also they PUBLISHED the first book on Amazon go read it
this story is honestly the best. There are only two patreons I stay subbed to come zero account or high water and this author’s is one of them, because Gladesbale.
So I straight up commented this before I read the latest chapter that was posted today:
“Haven’t even read this chapter yet but right off the bat I’m chanting:
“Gladesbale! Gladesbale! Gladesbale!” thrusts fists into the air
I love this story lol.”
I enjoy this a lot. It brings sunshine to my day. And it’s cool and fun. The world building is great, I’m invested in the mysteries of the world that we’re discovering slowly, and the family of the grove is lovely and close to my heart. It’s worth. Read this book. - Continuity ManRoyal Road★★★★★ 5.0The description promised Tea and cozy times.
You get a lot of Tea but really its just cash crop and not a major story focus. The story was pretty action packed and fast paced so I am not sure where cozy comes in unless it is a reference to the goal the MC has for himself.
Don't hear what I'm not saying; this is an awesome story about a druid tending his grove like a town/kingdom builder story. He isn't much of a combatant but he is surrounded by allies who are it is a good time with a lot of rising action.
TLDR: Read this. - oatesiRoyal Road★★★★ 4.0The story is interesting and im interested enough to want to see how it progresses, but their are parts that I think it doesn't utilise well.
The main issue is characterisation, the characters are kinda two dimensional and lacking depth, especially mint and ban who became more of an after thought as more characters are introduced.
To be honest most of them dont really have distinct personalities and roles, it would have been interesting to have some other poverty chapters to add some individuality.
Another miss step is making ban the only talking tree, how interesting would other groves be if their trees had their own personalities. It would have made sense considering how their made of acended spirit beasts.
The last issue I had was how the whole gain abilities from observing nature was just dropped completely, the mc just begs the guardian spirits for abilities now. - RikkiUWRoyal Road★★★★ 3.5I really like the Newt & Demon by the same author so I when I realized they had another story I was excited, but unfortunately it's been a real letdown. N&D has a lot of characters in it and the author wanted to do something a bit smaller scale for this story. Fair enough, N&D has a lot of moving parts. It feels like they've gone too far to the opposite extreme though. The lack of tertiary/background characters - which actually gets worse as the story goes on - makes the world feel empty.
I had thought there would be something like town building in this as well, but there isn't. That may be on me for the mistaken impression though. The MC does develop a fancy rest stop for passing adventurers, but that's not the same thing. It gets used regularly by nameless, faceless people passing through, but by the beginning of book 2 I can count on one hand the number of named characters that have visited it.
The MC himself is the biggest problem though. When he first arrives there's a comment made about how his mental faculties aren't all there yet and that'll go away soon enough. I expect it's supposed to be a few minutes, but for a large part of the first book it felt like that never really changed. He has the occasional independent though, but other than that just does what he's told. It's even mentioned that he's a pushover, and he just sort of nods and smiles. He does eventually develop something of a personality, often doing silly dances in front of strangers and striking poses while the mortals clap politely while probably thinking something like 'this guy has a few screws loose'. Maybe I'm just being grumpy, but I don't find his new personality to be charming or funny. So on the one hand you have the morbidly obese middle aged office worker that he used to be, and on the other you've got the quintessential forest spirit that's a bit touched in the head that he becomes, and there's a complete disconnect between them. They don't feel at all like the same character. It wo - CatgurlRoyal Road★★★ 3.0Prose style and story reads disjointed, disconnected and unappealing to me. I like the concept as described in the blurb, but did not care for the story as executed and could not manage to read far. Felt oddly structured. Too much tell and not enough show? Too pat, no discovery or emotional connection to mc and what he was experiencing? Felt clinical and weird, almost old-timey but not in a good way - stilted, stiff and cluttered? I guess this isn't very helpful. I am a good reader, but likely could not write my way out of a paper bag, so author you are way ahead of me on that score.