Virtuous Sons: A Greco Roman Xianxia

Self-Published

Community Rating

Description

The saying goes that when a man is born the Fates weave his destiny and swaddle him in it. Then one day the man dies, and the swaddle becomes a shroud. Heaven moves on. It is audacity to question the Fates. Olympus is Olympus. The land of men is the land of men. To transgress that, to cross the line of divinity and scale Olympus Mons? To defy the Fates and cast off their threads? That is hubris. It’s a mark that every philosopher bears plainly on their soul. [Updates Thursdays and Sundays.]

Information

Status: Hiatus
Year: 2021
Author: Ya Boy

Royal Road Stats

Rating: 4.7/ 5.0
Followers: 6,799
Views: 4,367,055

What readers say about Virtuous Sons: A Greco Roman Xianxia

“Virtuous Sons is a deeply philosophical and character driven xianxia, and it doesn't really even feel like it unless you want to examine it and really dive in. The characters are interesting and well fleshed out, and it has actually thematic depth, unlike t…”
333796951Royal Road5.0 / 5
“Not very many chapters so far but I am eagerly waiting for more. The bromance between Young Master Griffon and Slave Solus is great. Reminiscent of Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Lovely glance into the Greco-Roman world through the lens of xianxia. Never seen this p…”
BookmaggotRoyal Road5.0 / 5

Reviews

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Community Reviews(10)

333796951Royal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Virtuous Sons is a deeply philosophical and character driven xianxia, and it doesn't really even feel like it unless you want to examine it and really dive in. The characters are interesting and well fleshed out, and it has actually thematic depth, unlike the vast majority of stories on this platform. The plot is interesting and goes directions that are hard to predict and are engaging. The only critique I can strongly give it is that the pacing can be a bit wonky at times, and that the early section is comparatively weak against the rest. Strongly recommended.
BookmaggotRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Not very many chapters so far but I am eagerly waiting for more. The bromance between Young Master Griffon and Slave Solus is great. Reminiscent of Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Lovely glance into the Greco-Roman world through the lens of xianxia. Never seen this premise before and I'm so glad I found this. Recommending it to all fans of stories like Beware of Chicken.
CycriaRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
The audacity of Griffon is amazing to read. The story oozes style, and the plot is strong. The world building is great, and I like how the power system inherently incorporates character development for progression.
The story sometimes meanders with lots of wordy descriptions at the start of a chapter, but it's usually fun enough that I don't mind. Chapters are meaty as well - I haven't really felt like I've run into any obvious fillers yet.
Also Sol is okay.
9/10 needs more olive oil.
DhruPRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
I've got to confess. Until this point, I really couldn't get into Xianxia. Maybe it was the dialogue, the character achetypes, maybe the translation that was done. I'm not sure but something irked me about the genre.
But this story changes that.
Amazing characters, captivating story, awesome dialogue and almost too much promise. How can I even dream to go back to the routine stuff now?
Donte RhinoRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
This story is one of the few beautiful gems I stay on this site for. In between the thousands of novels that are poorly written copies of each other, there are a few things that are genuinely fresh and exciting to read, and this is one of the most exciting I've seen in a while. It's made me both laugh out loud as well as audibly muttered "hell yeah" on multiple occasions. It's also worth noting that this isn't a lazy reskin of Xianxia set in ancient Greece, but a clearly well thought out and developed answer to the question "what if Xianxia tropes and elements existed in the world of the ancient Greeks?"
The style is really interesting and fun. Ya Boy isn't afraid to use historically accurate terms and leave it up to you to google them or use context clues, and that approach somewhat spills over to worldbuilding. Anything you need to know will be explained, but it might take a few chapters before you really understand it. I love that, but if there's anything where someone might have legitimate grievance, it's probably with that. Otherwise his style is immaculate.
Grammar and spelling are about as perfect as ths site gets. I can't think of a single typo or error I've seen. Additionally, the prose flows like water and is a blast to read.
The story section is a bit harder to grade just as we're only just out of the prologue, however what we have so far is fantastic and I can't wait for the story to unfold. I think the best way to put it is if your prologue is 200 pages of content with more exciting narrative than most of the novels on this site, the rest of the story must SLAP. (Or at least I hope so.)
The two protagonists are the lifeblood of this story. While the setting and reinterpreation of Xianxia are dope and it's technically great in terms of writing, Sol and Griffon are what really make this story. The bromance is strong and god I want it, and both of them are really interesting characters on their own who play off of each other beautifully. The prologue was m
Forgettable MinionRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Won't go into a lot of detail, as other reviewers already have.
Greco-Roman setting is refreshing. The bromance and vitriolic best buds dynamic is well-done, fun to read about both leads in a scene together, they are great foils. One of my favorite xianxia.
It tries something new and doesn't feel forced or awkward. It doesn't have the story revolve around commentary on what's wrong with the genre, which is starting to feel overdone, although maybe that is just an indicator of writing skill. This and Ave Xia Rem Y are my favorite cultivation stories on the less action packed end of the spectrum.
Gaslight Gatekeep GirlbossRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
~ Handily one of the best stories in the genre, having wasted my life reading millions of words of xianxia.
~ Legitimately strong characters with magnetic interpersonal dynamics
~ Truly deep engagement with the Ancient Greek setting on details big and small instead of the Greek just being a slapped on aesthetic facade to differentiate it from the sea of other garbage xianxia infesting RR/SB/SV/etc
~ delicious slow burning escalation as our favorite homoerotic Greco-Roman dynamic duo start tangling with things they can't even begin to comprehend with song in their heart and olive oil on their skin.
~ afore-mentioned slow burn makes the *relatively* short outbursts of vicious, calculated brutality Ya Boy seems to favor in his fight scenes pop so much more when they do happen.
Will try to come back and expand on this review when it's not 2am, but suffice to say it's one of the few serials I've encountered over the years that makes me drop everything to check it out and get my fix ASAP. The hype is real, and I think it speaks volumes that so many of the even vaguely negative reviews are people poisoned by immediate gratification progression fantasies having the heroes power-leveling or fighting some crazy ass monsters and seeing Number Go Up by chapter 5 instead of taking the time to really set the scene for the tale to follow.
kaiern9999Royal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Miles above the garbage xianxia you so often see on RR. Interesting characters, an unique setting (or at least, a unique twist on familiar setting), a fresh progression system, good grammar, good dialogue.
Read it. You can immediately tell that the author has a very good thing going. I expect this to very well. Hope you keep on writing mr Boy, the story is a great read so far.
kriegRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Virtuous Sons, is perhaps one if not the best novel I have read both in RR as well as more traditional publisher.
Is worth buying the books and hearing the excellent audiobook version, sadly until the writing of this review still only of book 1. If any work is worth your money is this one.
It deal with something that most story lack, specially xianxia, both from china as well from here, that is the moral center of a character, here it is crystilized in it own cultivation system. Virtue.
In others works, so much is the philosophy is lost in the most inane questions, that dao of water is that water can be soft and hard as if that was greatest revelation of the century. That their path/their dao, is one they need to make and that they will kill anyone that goes against it. That their moral is whatever they feel like. All so very superficial, all characters so boring.
So much that I might recomend someone that just want understand how to be live in real life, not shoved platitudes but ideas worth thinking and easy to understand in the context of action adventure.
That not to say that the perfect mix of greek-roman mythology and xianxia tropes and ideas, fans of the genre will be able to point out similarity enough to share a conspiratory smile with the author, while the non-initiate would take a taste of the best incarnation of theses tropes.
Not here, there characters if front and center, the climb of Olympus Mons is set by character development, by the confrontation of your ideals with the reality of the world and others, to look at the reality and stand. Following Griffon and Sol on a journey of self-refinement that go beyond simple qi/neuma/mana hoarding, each new realm is marked by great decisions that will mark them forward.
However, while the philosophy is very well-deserved merit of this story, the entertainment of watching the 2 leads interact with each other is pure gold, griffon is that asshole that you can't help but bring you along his crazy antics, while S
IdentityRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
The first few chapters left me in confusion, almost nothing is explained, and with many blank spots in my knowledge the story also wasn't all that enjoyable. Then chapter 5, the turning point. A relationship is established, over the chapters until the arcs end we get to enjoy that relationship, as well as the side characters, their povs and a bit of background. Even if the prologue was the only thing this story had, it still would be a wonderful read.
But, it isn't the end, only the beginning, and hopefully we'll be able to enjoy this story until the end.