Monsters and Terrariums

Self-Published

Community Rating

Description

Sylas Terrarium, a Half-Dryad, has spent his life as one of the unlucky few in the Age of Wells with no ability whatsoever to manipulate mana. But in a moment seemingly like any other, he suddenly, and inconveniently, became a plant.In a universe destined for a second cataclysm, Sylas must claw, rip, and cast his way to greatness before the monsters bring humanity to the brink of extinction once more.

Information

Status: Hiatus
Year: 2022
Author: HollowedBeThyName

Royal Road Stats

Rating: 4.1/ 5.0
Followers: 235
Views: 113,675

Reviews

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Community Reviews(3)

BookmuncherRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Unusual concept, entertainingly written, about a seemingly unpowered person gains a very unusual set of powers, and sets off on the path of adventure they had always yearned after. With forebodings about a possible world-ending catastrophe, and clear indications that they may be almost suspiciously uniquely gifted to surviving said catastrophe, the intrepid protagonist faces some interesting challenges in developing their abilities.
TheWormjRoyal Road
★★★★ 3.5
A slow build for the first 5-6 chapters or so but if you get past that(not great to hear but trust me, it's not that bad) it quickly starts to pick up. Sadly at this time it's still a bit early and so still has room to go.
As for the MC, I've read worse, but I've read better. It seems like he's a jerk(without a heart of gold) especially to kids for no seeming reason at this time, never anything blatant, just a general sense of "their not me, or my family so why should I care about them? Also kids suck, go fall in a muddy ditch" but that definitely hasn't come up much lately.
Further more it seems like many of his decisions are inconsistent, one moment he's trying to improve one thing as it's "very important" and the next he immediately sets it aside for something as it's not "practical" at the time. While I understand some of his reasons others feel quite abitrary and pointless, only a way to either show improvements later, or a needless sign of "look how hard he has to work to be useful, isn't he an underdog?"
While he has suprising knowledge on many things about making his terrariums (you'll understand later) at other points he seems to have the mind set of a dumb brute who simply doesn't care.
Please don't take this as reasons NOT to read this story, much of this may be the simple growing pains most new stories go through, and even with everything I said there are many inventive changes to the normal fantasy races, the first mentions of dwarfs in particular left my happily stunned for a time. You can see some creative thought has gone into world building, I for one couldn't wait to learn about the mana wells, and look forward to more similar revelations.
Over all, definitely a good read if you have the time, and something I VERY MUCH wise had MANY more chapters at the time.
Thank you for your work author, it is appreciated.
TL:DR a good story with decent potential and some suprising twists early on. Easy 3.5/5 Which to me, is above average.
Yodeling PicklesRoyal Road
★★★★ 3.5
I love the concept of this book, collecting things that are dead and curating a terrarium for them, I was on board for that more than the rest of the story and every time the tanks had setbacks I was even more invested in finding out how he was going to create a perfect ecosystem. This story has such great potential and I love reading stories that you can see how great something can become.
I have ready up to chapter 76 which I believe is the first book and I have a few impressions.
First the main character needs a little bit more work. They say that they are cowardly and lacking care for those around them especially kids but then near the end they both choose to go into an extremely dangerous situation when they are assured the person can take care of themselves and they have only interacted with that other person perhaps five times and disliked them every time, and they also make a statement that they want to save everyone if possible.
Obviously there is nothing wrong with having a huge turning point or character growth, but we just don't really see that. Our character basically left home after going to school where he wasn't even a very good student, to go to another town where he joins a group and goes to school, but this time he wants to learn.
I just feel like those two characters needed to interact more or we needed to see his mindset changing into more of a hero, or if this is the voice influencing him then it needs to be more apparent.
His parents had basically no character, like his dad is mentioned constantly as a good warrior and that's fine, but that's his one trait. When we meet him he is a guy who gets maybe two lines and then sends our character out into the world. The mom also has her lack of reaction and if you wanted to make them this way on purpose then that's fine but her brother is dead and she doesn't even get a single line of shock or surprise. Also her fields are being overtaken by animals and while I get that she has more important concerns