Mother of Learning

Self-Published

Community Rating

Description

Zorian is a teenage mage of humble birth and slightly above-average skill, attending his third year of education at Cyoria's magical academy. He is a driven and irritable young man, consumed by a desire to ensure his own future and free himself of the influence of his family, whom he resents for favoring his brothers over him. Consequently, he has no time for pointless distractions or paying attention to other people's problems. As it happens, time is something he is about to get plenty of. On the eve of the Cyoria's annual summer festival, he is killed and brought back to the beginning of the month, just before he was about to take a train to Cyoria. Suddenly trapped in a time loop with no clear end or exit, Zorian will have to look both within and without to unravel the mystery before him. And he does have to unravel it, for the time loop hadn't been made for his sake and dangers lurk everywhere... Repetition is the mother of learning, but Zorian will have to first make sure he survives to try again - in a world of magic, even a time traveler isn't safe from those who wish him ill. ********************************** Mother of Learning is nowavailable for sale on Amazon. The story will remain available in full here on Royal Road and on Fictionpress, but if you're more interested to read the story as a Kindle Edition e-book you now have a way to do that. The audiobooks can be foundon this link here. The physical edition is available through a Kickstarter campaign, whichcan be found here. I will keep you all updated on that as things develop. ********************************** If anyone is interested, I have a story-related worldbuilding site that can be foundhere. I don't update it as often as I should, but there is a fair amount of content there already. It also contains a page with all the fanart, fan translations, audio books and the like - you can reach it directly by clickingthis link. I have apatreon accountfor those kind people that want to give me money. It also contains info for those who want to donate via paypal. The story was originally posted on fictionpress, back in 2011. When I reached chapter 91, I started uploading the story to RoyalRoad, one chapter per day. The Fictionpress version of the story can be reached by clicking onthis linkif somebody is interested, though at this point there is nothing there that isn't also on RoyalRoad.

Information

Status: Completed
Year: 2018
Author: nobody103

Royal Road Stats

Rating: 4.8/ 5.0
Followers: 31,146
Views: 26,127,388

What readers say about Mother of Learning

“[This is my third re-read after some years] When I accidentally had stumbled upon MOL, it was when I had gotten tired of Chinese webnovels, and randomly decided to check out this novel after someone on reddit recommend it. The synopsis was mildly interestin…”
nullSectorRoyal Road5.0 / 5
“Zorian is anything but a top mage entering his third year, but when he gets stuck in a time loop he becomes part of something bigger than he could have imagined. Layer by layer, Zorian gets sucked into a complex web of events and realizes the implications o…”
RznRoyal Road5.0 / 5

Reviews

No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts!

Community Reviews(10)

nullSectorRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
[This is my third re-read after some years]
When I accidentally had stumbled upon MOL, it was when I had gotten tired of Chinese webnovels, and randomly decided to check out this novel after someone on reddit recommend it.
The synopsis was mildly interesting, but mostly caught my eye due to the inclusion of time loops (which would later become one of my favourite genre, a major thanks to this novel). Even at the start the novel had hooked me, with a mixture of magic + low tech, the world itself was very interesting.
The characters were extremely well fleshed out and realistic, with actual behaviour I could see someone having in real life. Zorian starts out as a irritable teenager average mage who is antisocial but driven and smart. Over the course of story he develops into a much more mature and calm person, benefitting greatly from his smarts. Yet he somewhat retains his personality at start, rather than completely warping into another person as some bad novels use as replacement for character progression.
The plot is also very well thought out and definitely the major highlight of this novel. The Author has clearly meticulously planned out the story and there is staggering amounts of foreshadowing. The details you might have though are filler might turn out to be much more helpful in the future.
Overall I would say everyone should definitely give it a try, this is the most highly rated novel on RR for a reason.
RznRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Zorian is anything but a top mage entering his third year, but when he gets stuck in a time loop he becomes part of something bigger than he could have imagined. Layer by layer, Zorian gets sucked into a complex web of events and realizes the implications of the events and pursues the leads to a dark conspiracy. One of the best reads on RR and a great introduction to the time loop genre. I simply loved this book!
Grammar and style is not a problem, as the writing is straightforward and has a strong voice with very few typos. The story is complicated and yet unfolds based on the information and intelligence of Zorian, though tiny hints here and there exist that become more obvious on a 2nd read through. This is not a story which has to make up new things to keep the time loop interesting. The cast of characters are well-developed and while the tertiary ones have even some development, the focus on Zorian's contacts is wonderful. It is rare when a time loop story has characters think about the morality of their actions even if everything will reset. It is a deep story that is enjoyable without making notes on who is who or what purpose they serve in the plot.
Wili911Royal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Few books achieve an interesting time-loop based story, this one does it, and it's great.
dononofRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
A main character that use thinking and planning to try to win his battles. He has his faults, preferences, and connections with friends and family and not just some OP heartless MC. A wonderful story arc that covered so much yet didn't last forever to drag out the story.
nlaakRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Not sure what I can say that hasn't already been said about this story. It's excellent all the way through and despite it's extreme length it varies loop to loop enough that I never felt any story fatigue from reading it. I've seen written somewhere (or maybe multiple somewheres) this is the best story on RR and I can see someone making that statement.
ImperialusRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
As the title suggests, this story has one of the most amazing worldbuilding ever. And I don't use the word "ever" lightly.
First of all: the time loop, the premise and core of the entire novel. It's so damn good. Precisely crafted and interwoven with the entire story. It's insane how well thought out it is.
Plotwise: Everything is so interconnected in that the worldbuilding, characters and the storyline all coalesce into such a coherent direction. All of them has a purpose in advancing the plot. There's literally no loose ends whatsoever apart from a one very minor character that obviously got forgotten but even he was eventually redeemed and mentioned again.
Now on to pacing. By far, the weakest part of the story. It's a nitpick because in all honesty, it's objectively necessary for the story because of how ridiculously complex it gets down the road. It gets somewhat stagnant in the middle but the magic carries the weight of it all so it's tolerable.
Regarding the prose, I have nothing much to say about it because it's very subjective. Personally, I don't love it because it's a bit too neutral for my tastes. It's also quite "distant" for a lack of a better word as in it didn't pull me into the story. In other words, I didn't get immersed at all by the prose. The worldbuilding with all its intricacies had to compensate for my immersion. The grammar itself is fine, no mistakes or errors. However, this is obviously because of my tastes so don't let this impact your own experience.
Finally, the worldbuilding. I can't fully describe how much I love it. It's brilliantly crafted especially the magic system.
The magic system is top tier and its progression is simple and intricate too. The history of the world is also brilliant as it definitely feels like some past events have effected the plot in some way. Also, the political side of the worldbuilding is really good. Though, there's definitely some potential that didn't get explored. How the nation states work internally
DatateqRoyal Road
★★★★★ 4.5
Overall, I really enjoyed the story. The world building was great and the pace of the story was well considered. With the bulk of the story occurring in a loop, I was afraid in the beginning that it would bog down, but it only rarely did so. The twists and turns kept things interesting and I especially appreciate that even with all the advantages, the heroes still had to work for their win. Thanks for sharing your time and creativity.
CajunLibrarian22Royal Road
★★★★★ 4.5
This story was well developed and edited. There were very few typos or errors in spelling or grammar. I love the complex character and plot development. I'd love to find out how Zorion's story continues after the time loop; if he and the main character succeeded in maintaining a low profile.
Roozbeh44Royal Road
★★★★★ 4.5
The grammar and sentence structure are clean and polished, showing the author's command of language. The pacing slows down where needed for emotional reflection, and speeds up during tension—creating a satisfying rhythm. The main character is compelling, with inner conflicts that feel authentic and relatable.
I'd recommend this story to fans of fantasy who enjoy character-driven plots and emotional stakes. It feels like it’s building toward something profound, and I’ll definitely keep reading to see where it goes
Dunc0neRoyal Road
★★★★ 4.0
If you enjoy recursive fantasy levelling Lit-RPG this is for you.
Think Re-Zero but no isekai and more explanation for why everything is happening. MC is given all sorts of consequences for his actions and he is still in the same world as his family and other people outside the time loop so there is that.
Give this a read!