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Little Mushroom
Type
Genre
Tags[ ]
Rating(4.8 / 5.0, 1319 votes)
| 5 | 87% (1144 votes) |
| 4 | 9% (120 votes) |
| 3 | 2% (28 votes) |
| 2 | 0% (6 votes) |
| 1 | 2% (21 votes) |
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Language
Support Book (#ad)
Author(s)
One entry per lineArtist(s)
One entry per line
N/A
Year
Example: 2012
2019
Status in COO
Status in Country of Origin. One entry per line
84 Chapters + 5 Extra (Completed)
49 chapters (published edition)
49 chapters (published edition)
Licensed
Yes
Completely Translated
No
Original Publisher
One entry per lineEnglish Publisher
One entry per lineRelease Frequency
Every 96.9 Day(s)Activity Stats [Graph]
Weekly Rank: #409Monthly Rank: #208
All Time Rank: #806
Reading List [Graph]
On 12077 Reading Lists
Monthly Rank: #3727
All Time Rank: #177
Description
Links are NOT allowed. Format your description nicely so people can easily read them. Please use proper spacing and paragraphs.“Until the day humanity falls.”
In the year 2020, Earth’s magnetic poles disappeared and humankind was nearly wiped out by cosmic radiation. Within the span of a hundred years, living creatures began to mutate and devour each other while the remaining humans, numbering in the tens of thousands, struggled bitterly in their man-made bases.
In the Abyss, home to the mutated xenogenics, there lived a sentient little mushroom. Because it had been nourished by the blood and flesh of the deceased human An Ze, not only did it take on a similar-looking human form, but a similar name as well: An Zhe.
An Zhe is determined to go to the human base to search for his spore, which had been harvested by humans. Once there, however, he faces the omnipresent risk of discovery and certain death as he tries to keep his non-human nature hidden from the Judges, whose responsibility is to inspect for and eliminate xenogenics like himself. And of all the Judges, Colonel Lu Feng is the most perceptive and merciless—as soon as he determines that someone is a xenogenic, he will execute that person on the spot.
But An Zhe’s mutation goes undetected by Lu Feng’s eyes, and so a tale of humans and xenogenics unfolds…
Silver Award winner at the 12th Chinese Nebula Awards for Chinese Science Fiction.
Associated Names
One entry per lineCây nấm nhỏ
Xiao Mogu
เจ้าเห็ดน้อย
小蘑菇
Xiao Mogu
เจ้าเห็ดน้อย
小蘑菇
Related Series
N/ARecommendations
Saving Unpermitted (12)How to Feed an Abyss! (10)
Thrive in Catastrophe (8)
I’m Not Shouldering This Blame (7)
Laws of the Other World (7)
Mist (5)
Recommendation Lists
3 group(s) hidden due to dead links. Click here to show all releases.
- adorkable enemies-to-lovers relationship
- comedy gold balanced with serious/somewhat dark things
- worldbuilding different from your typical cardboard cut-out ability users/zombies/beast tides
- ethical dilemmas!!
- "legit" sci-fi pseudoscience that is super cool and could totally happen (math, physics)
- really great tension, pacing, and concise writing
- CUTE MUSHROOM!
Readers discover a whole new world with our ultra-innocent, trying-hard-to-be-human little mushroom looking for the vestiges of human civilization for clues to his missing spore. This is a story about hope, redemption, humanity, and most of all, kindness. I was pleasantly surprised by the writing, to be honest. An... more>>An Zhe is vital to the story in ways that often elude protagonists. In most stories there really is a lack of something that makes a protagonist belong to their world/story. An Zhe is vital to this story, this world, and to the other characters. He cannot be changed nor removed without the story being shattered.
The reason I say this without directly addressing his character (yet) is because his point of view of the world enhances it's charm. He is a child of the setting, something that isn't supposed to be who we relate to. We do. Oh, we do. This is primarily why I believe the world will grow on the reader so much, because as An Zhe grows to understand humanity and their fight to survive in the world, the closer he will be to 'humanity.' Rather than a cliche "human" tries to learn to be some other species like a spider, sword, dragon, and whatever fictional being where we too are forced to learn this new setting/culture/etc. An Zhe does the reverse, and that's how we learn about him. Perhaps I'm explaining this poorly, and perhaps that doesn't make sense, but to me that was the greatest accessory to enhance the world.
Now, don't get me wrong, It's not An Zhe's work alone. No, in fact the other background characters as well, when they are relevant will do similar work. An Zhe is special, because he is just a little mushroom
This, and also Lu Feng works as a foil to An Zhe as well. It's a classic "inhuman human" and a "human inhuman" type of deal... except they both are exceedingly human. Despite the 'name' of that trope, that was always the draw, the inhuman one is always at least a tiny bit humane-- just could never explore those feelings for one reason or another. Boy. There sure are reasons
While you don't really get to see from Lu Feng's perspective, it's not that difficult to tell even with An Zhe being both oblivious to human behavior (and perhaps just a little silly) who Lu Feng is exactly. I don't exactly plot out my reviews, as it would be far too long if I actually did, so this may be redundant. I think to a degree, the devastation this novel can tear from you also comes from An Zhe's inability to understand certain aspects crucial for humanity and how they act. It also comes from Lu Feng's overt understanding on how his (humanity) is supposed to function. How it should be logically. How he should protect it-- even to the point of ruining it.
"It's the narratives!!!" I scream, as I am dragged back to my chambers.
Of course, they're not perfect (though writing a 'perfect' character is sometimes a flaw; but I mean this that sometimes they are not the best written) but that's barely noticeable, when everything else is so stellar. But this is just becoming me talking about how much I liked their contrasts rather than explaining why the world building is good.
One major pitfalls that stories sometimes can lead into is that the setting will sometimes become a s*ave to the narrative. Sometimes the characters can be too. The dialogue, the pacing, and everything else. As much as people trapeze about how 'X character is a s*ave to a narrative' (I.e. Yoo Joonghyuk (or any other ORV character), Yun Woo, and etc) This is not usually a good thing. The reason why those characters are good is because of their refusal to be swayed- They are a s*ave to the narrative out of their own will, of their own determination to work and fight. Otherwise, they would barely be a character at all.
That's a tangent, certainly. But this is for me to say that this isn't what An Zhe is like, nor is it what Lu Feng is either. Every obstacle the world presents to them, they react to them with genuine thought and feeling, every action feels reasonable and thought through.
I... should move on.
Let's just say you resisted the urge to click the Pandora's box titled spoilers. Let's say you saw nothing about what I had said in there. Congrats!! Woopee!!! You did it!!! Now I have said that An Zhe (MC) is important to enhancing the charm of the overall story, world building, and even other characters, there is a lot to say about him, himself. Or, more precisely, how he sees himself. "naive protagonist" can be a huge turn-off for most people especially knowing it's shounen-ai. (not because the 'genre' itself is bad, just that it tends to produce a... certain kind of character)
Sometimes novels are praised for how well explored and 3D their background characters are. Some of the character's are 2D, yes, but it's borderline impossible to expect every character to be deeply explored. Despite being 'flat' characters, they serve their purpose and even if they themselves do not change, the protagonists who interact with them do. Having a flat or bare-bones character in a novel isn't the flaw, it's how they are utilized. Obviously you can't have a villain be a flat character ("That was his mistake!") but for characters who will only be present for a scene or two, there is no possible way to make a character like that fleshed out without running back in time to carefully operate on an empty story-line. The background characters can be, and are charming when intended. They do drive forward the plot, though some of them definitely do come in heavy-handed and feel a bit.... obvious? But it's not enough to take you out of the story unless you focus on it. (Though there are some things that can be said about the events of the story... and how some background characters react to them & how it can come across as unfortunate.) Hmm... It's hard for me to exactly go over some of the background characters I genuinely care about, but it's easy for me to say... a lot of the background characters are tragedies, and in themselves
Now, to say more exactly, after all that grief and etc. It takes back all of it. I'm fine with that... kind of. It's not the worst epilogue, but it's more jarring than anything. You go from grief to... I guess what the entire novel spent it's time not falling into the pitfalls for. Perhaps it's because I was never that convinced by their romance, so it felt more uncomfortable for me than not (and upon reflection, I might've liked it better if they merely treated what occurred in the epilogue more like friendship)
Also I sincerely advice not to fall for or love any other characters aside MC and ML unless you want to feel the pain of tragedy.ROMANCE: Despite being a serious and tense survival plot story this novel doesn't lack in romance. The story doesn't only focus of sci-fi/survival plot but also on romance and the presence of romance is very clear. It's not sweet and fluffy romance but more like bittersweet romance which especially hit really hard in this tragic world making us lose hope again and again. ... more>>