The Laptop Hero (Portal/Isekai LitRPG)

Self-Published

Community Rating

Description

[participant in the Royal Road Writathon challenge] - April 2022

Silas got summoned to another world—by a group of kids attending magic school who seemed rather unhappy with the results of their ritual. After a brief glimpse of his summoners Silas woke in the town dump. Unable to speak the local language, a misunderstanding escalated and before long Silas wound up in a jail cell, the locals having confiscated all his worldly possessions aside from his laptop, which had formed some strange bond with him. Now he can summon his laptop at will, and he can view his Status, level up, and gain powerful skills and magic as if he were some character in a video game, which is great and everything, but all Silas really wants to do is sit in a dark room and play games on his laptop.

Only, life isn't a game, and Silas needs to get his act together because everyone else is playing for keeps. Or does he? Maybe for Silas life is just one big game now, with everyone else stuck playing by his rules.

Assorted Disclaimers, in no particular order:

I am only posting this on RoyalRoad.com, so if you find my story elsewhere it was not posted by me. Please do let me know!

While I do consider this a progression fantasy, and have tagged it as such,Silas's Status improvements will not necessarily proceed in a linear fashion. His RPG stats will have ups and downs, exploits and nerfs, periods of growth and stagnation. Such is the life of a gamer, to be held under the thumb of the all powerful devs, or in this case a certain goddess devoted to the idea of Balance. SIlas himself should learn and grow, improving and progressing in areas where he struggles, or rather, to show such is my goal.

The story is told from multiple points of view. While other PoVs will come and go, Silas shall remain the only lead character.

The world Silas finds himself on is not a nice place. Expect him to encounter gore and traumatizing content and bad people who do bad things for selfish (or possibly noble) reasons from time to time.

Some characters will use profanity, however due to cultural differences the curse words used will differ from those used in our corner of reality, so I'm not including the profanity content warning. Silas himself isn't one for foul language.

No explicit sexual content here. This novel is intended for mature readers, however, and will include mature topics, including, but not limited to, sex, violence, death, and taxes.

No harem. Might be an eventual romantic interest, possibly even some competitive jealousy, yet as his story begins Silas is too overwhelmed with other concerns to consider long term plans.

Musophobics might want to steer clear of this story. Same goes for turophobics. You have been warned.

Keep in mind, however, if my other disclaimers didn't make this clear, I only have the faintest of outlines at the moment. This story will take me where it will. My goal with this story is to write it to the end, something of a long-term writing exercise, with the hope others might take an interest in my work and encourage me to keep at it. I've started a number of works before, even finished a few, but this is the first time I've shared any work in a public forum.

My temporary cover was made by me, in GIMP using public domain images. If you can do better I'll happily accept your submission and give credit for your work here!

Information

Status: Hiatus
Year: 2022
Author: Khyliard

Royal Road Stats

Rating: 4.3/ 5.0
Followers: 1,305
Views: 253,558

Reviews

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

Community Reviews(10)

wothereRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
An excellent story with potential for awesomeness.
From the get go, both the world and characters are unique, quirky and interesting.
The MC starts looking like a normal person with a strong interest in gaming and programming, but leave him alone with his laptop and his real colors shine though: he is insane! Alone in another world that doesn't follow the rules of reality, not knowing what his jailers or jail-mates want or will do, and all he cares about is that he can finally game in peace. Too bad the world itself won't let him for very long...
And that is not to say he is a one dimentional caricature or a stereotype (okay, maybe a little). His thoughts and analysis are all coherent and very well formed, his reactions feel real, his feelings are perfectly understandable, his ideas are things that most would think about. They would just not use them the same way. His mindset and personality are as much of weakness as a strength and that propels the story to great hights.
Other characters have berely begun their turn in the spotlight, but they ALL felt real and natural, with their own feelings, histories, hobbies and life in general. Even those barely glanced at.
About the world, well at this point he haven't seen much of it. Just enough to know litterally (correct use of the term here) everything is possible, but power has to be earned, and author seems to go to great length to be as little earthlike as possible while still making sense (ex: sundered moon, more than 24h/day, and the people. I will not talk about the people to avoid spoiler, so lets just say this story will be easier to adapt in anime than live action).
Both character and setting being complemented by impecable grammar (didn't see a single error) and a flowing style and that catch your attention and doesn't let go until you have to push the 'next' button. Even the expected or anticipated twists come at a surprise.
Lastly, a small disclamer that will be made relevent if you delve in the novel (starti
SpeleVinkRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
This is a nice start! Straight up, it is ridiculous. The mc ends up in jail, much as the description says, but that does not stop him - rather the opposite. Early on, he gets an op skill
helping him get other skills that will let him do everything he wants - all from the comfort of his comfy gamer chair and
safe from just about all external hindrances. Is he locked in? I'd say he's mostly happy everyone else is locked out. His status page is growing excessively fast, his skills are growing what seems to be ridiculously fast as well, and
there seems to be some super powered enemies showing up rather soon.
All in all, it is a fun, ridiculous story, an interesting start and premise, though I feel it won't be able to keep it up due to how quickly and easily the MC grows. Thus far though I have quite enjoyed it and happily give it a 5!
SteadyRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
I enjoyed the worldbuilding of the story. The characters for the most part seem rather well written- they're distinct from each other, their dialogue matches well with their background. I think the premise is interesting- got summoned, but the hero is somehow not traditional (his skillset is basically imagination).
I think there's an insane amount of details- and sometimes it distracts me from the story. For example, there's been the issue of language barriers. I think the general idea of being a foreigner, and therefore being unable to communicate is a point that's consistent with the plot/theme of the story (the main character has been transported to another world). But it gets brought up several times in nearly every chapter. "Hold on, I can't understand you" gets tiring to read after the 50th time. It's a little odd given that basically, the main character oscillates between being able to understand and not being able to understand the people around him between chapters. Not to mention it varies from "hold on, my A.I. is translating" to "my WoW character is translating" to "whatever magic in this world is translating" to "ok, now my A.I. is translating but it learned a little bit more" etc.. There are other parts of the story that in my opinion, things that I appreciate, but get way too much attention. Another example is explaining how time is different. Cool, people keep track of time differently here. I'm not going to remember two paragraphs of how a flex hour works. Whether it gets brought up again, or not, it feels like a waste of time as a reader.
I think I have some similar dificulties with the entire skill/stat system of the world. In general, it feels like it has so many quirks to keep track of. I don't really fully understand why the mc has such a special skillset- the relationship of being 'bonded' with his laptop, and the skills he can buy seem... I don't really understand the relationship between the two. A skill that can generate more skills seems p
TheOldLord10256Royal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
It has weird pacing at times but the amount of scaling and the handling of the magic structure and system nature is very good and is changing in good ways as the story goes on. The story has very good grammar as far as i have seen and the characters are good all around. Give the story a go because it isn't all that bad at all.
I Like It. You might too.
milkman7121Royal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
This is a good series so far. 14 chapters are not enough to judge a work, but I'm *cautiously optimistic* that it will keep up the quality, and my only fear is that it, like so many other young series, will be cut down in it's youth by indefinate hiatus.
I eagerly await more.
AuntiedeeRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
The Laptop Hero has been a fun read for me. It's not a usual genre for me but it was recommended by a friend and I'm enjoying it. It keeps me wanting more. I check regularly to see if a new chapter has been uploaded. I'd read way too late into the night if the book was completed!
The story is unique and well written as the author describes the characters and their world in a way that makes them very clear to me as the reader. I like the vocabulary development and the lighthearted humor the author uses throughout the story. The characters and their world become very real to me even though their world is 'a bit' different than mine.
The first few chapters give background information about the main character, Silas, and explain the gaming information which is essential to the story line. The gaming information was a bit challenging to me, however, I got it; and then, the story dives into an intriguing world of gaming, magic, and much more. The Laptop Hero keeps me wanting to know what will happen next.
The grammatical aspects of the writing are solid, without spelling or punctuation errors. Good thing because otherwise I couldn't keep reading as I hate spelling or punctuation errors.
I recommend The Laptop Hero! You'll enjoy it.
CrowbeRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
This is a fun read, I'm really enjoying the mc. He's a proper gaming addict using his desire to game as leverage to break the system he's found himself isekai'd into. Good writing, in terms of grammar and punctuation, and tantalising world development so far. Looking forward to where it goes from here!
Leahcim ZanathaxRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
The Laptop Hero is nothing trend setting or genre breaking, what it is, however, is good fun, isekai.
The MC gets sucked into another world - no spoiler there, really, it happens in the first paragraph, and things go downhill rapidly from there. His power set is intriguing and a little different, in a good and interesting way!
The grammar gets high grades compared to a lot of RR, and the author is aware enough of problems he's creating for himself to correct those problems in story without going back for major edits and rewrites.
There's a touch of absurdist fantasy in here and a bit of humor, though the MC is definitely OP and becoming more so as the story progresses, and the author has done a decent job of representing how a modern day teenager might react to being thrown into such a scenario.
Definitely worth a read, as long as you enjoy System isekai with a bit of an absurdist bent!
baelrathRoyal Road
★★★★★ 4.5
Hijinxs ensues. Amusing characters, interesting world building. patches and nerfing exist to "balance" MC.
Mix of Sci / Fantasy elements. Both jokes and characters and abilities.
Our MC's quirk seems to be to pull anything fiction related from Earth into New World.
Plot is either as needed or dealt with off screen to progress comedy. And it works so far.
Unsure if this is going to be an ebb and flow of MC gets nerfed, powers up to next fight, might get nerfed again.
Builder BobRoyal Road
★★★★ 4.0
If you are looking for a lighthearted and mostly silly read in the Isekai/LitRPG space this is certainly a contender. While not groundbreaking in terms of storytelling or prose, it is nonetheless well written with no major grammatical or syntactical errors. The few characters we've gotten to know so far are each distinct and generally entertaining in their own way. The premise does also actually manage to be somewhat unique, or at least not something I had encountered before which is always a plus in my book.
Mild Spoilers for a taste of the kind of story it is…
Basically everyone gets their powers from their “bond”, and while most people seem to choose some kind of monster or animal our protagonist manages to bond to his Gaming Laptop – granting him abilities and leveling possibilities related to gaming. Belief and conviction also play a part in the skills one can acquire, which suits our Gen-Z protagonist just fine (obviously I need pizza, comfy clothes, universal translation, etc to game, right?!) To the point that the ‘Goddess of keeping things balanced and fair’ decides that she needs to step in and take a more active role in what he can acquire... (Not actually sure yet if these means we won't be getting an OP Protaganist or not)