The Desolate Era

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Fate had never been kind to Ji Ning. Wracked by illnesses and infirm his entire life on Earth, Ji Ning knew early on that he would die as a teenager. What he didn’t know was that there really was such a thing as life after death and that the multiverse was a far larger place than he thought.

A lucky twist of fate meant that Ji Ning was reborn into a world of Immortals and monsters, of Ki Refiners and powerful Fiendgods, a world where Dynasties lasted for millions of years. A world which is both greater… and yet also smaller… than he ever could imagine. He would have the opportunity to join them, and in this life, Ji Ning swore to himself, he would never let himself be weak again! The Era he was born into was a Desolate one, but Ji Ning would make it his era.

Associated Names
One entry per line
Age of Desolation
Jade Sword (official English title of drama and anime version)
Mãng Hoang Kỷ (Man Huang Ji)
Records of Barbarian Ji of the Primeval Era
العصر المقفر
莽荒纪
Related Series
Coiling Dragon (Shared Universe)
Recommendations
Coiling Dragon (23)
Stellar Transformation (12)
I Shall Seal the Heavens (10)
Swallowed Star (9)
The Nine Cauldrons (8)
Tales of Demons and Gods (7)
Recommendation Lists
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  5. Wow there's a manhua version (ML)

Latest Release

Date Group Release
03/08/15 World of Watermelons v1c18
03/08/15 World of Watermelons v1c17
03/07/15 World of Watermelons v1c16
03/06/15 World of Watermelons v1c15
03/06/15 World of Watermelons v1c14
03/05/15 World of Watermelons v1c13
03/05/15 World of Watermelons v1c12
03/04/15 World of Watermelons v1c11
03/04/15 World of Watermelons v1c10
03/03/15 World of Watermelons v1c9
03/03/15 World of Watermelons v1c8
03/02/15 World of Watermelons v1c7
03/02/15 World of Watermelons v1c6
02/28/15 World of Watermelons v1c5
02/28/15 World of Watermelons v1c4
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Queen of Sheba
Queen of Sheba rated it
September 6, 2017
Status: --
Spoiler

Only decent story ever written by IET. The protagonist in this story isn't one dimensional. He adapts, acclimates, and grows.

The adventures are amusing to read about, fairly entertaining as well, but there's Just nothing unique about this story. Not truly. It's all Just expected. The same old moral righteousness. The only difference is there's more to this story than accumulating a harem of twelve members. There's only one love interest in this story, and she becomes his wife early on. Her death actually functions as a major catalyst to Ning's quest for power (he seeks to resurrect her).

A read recommended when wishing to consume for consumption's sake alone.

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reigndrops
reigndrops rated it
June 14, 2017
Status: v28c26
One of my favourites so far.

Pros:

No harem

... more>> Interesting plot

MC isn't omnipotent like a LOT of other novels seem to make their MC's seem

Not crazy heavy on the face-slapping

Cons:

Side characters get tossed to the side after they've served their purpose for MC

Time jumps seem completely random after the first couple hundred chapters with the author throwing out random weird numbers down to the tens like *6970 years passing* or something

A lack of details on the mechanics of certain techniques/items, etc. Sometimes certain key details are slipped into later chapters to make up for the author's initial lack of explanation/depth of of detail

Spoiler

Example: Time speed up treasure was super ambiguous and seemingly OP but a couple arcs later author throws in a line that it's apparently not super OP because the effectiveness isn't that great for people at such a high level because they need actual experiences to provide insight

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mechafanboy
mechafanboy rated it
May 21, 2017
Status: v18c47
Let me just start off with saying, there's very few moments in any novel where I feel that a writer has done something particularly well to the point that I feel despite all the mistakes in the novel (and trust me, there are plenty of basic mistakes),

the event that is portrayed works out so well that my blood runs cold. Admittedly this moment also relies on a large number of contrivances (but well, most events are contrivances regardless), but this novel has at least one of those. One of... more>> those moments is what compelled me to write this review.

On to an things that matter, first the good things, there's limited romance throughout the novel (and hence very limited fanservice) which makes the novel a lot more interesting in my personal opinion to read. Too often, novels get bogged down in talking about the physical aspects of a female character when honestly, they're usually central characters, they're generally all going to be a godlike beauty, there's only so many ways to rephrase that.

Secondly, the overall plot doesn't feel overly contrived (obviously as with every wuxia, there's going to be a ton of "breakthrough at that exact moment" scenarios, but those are a fact of life in these type of stories), for the most part, I think the foreshadowing is pretty light for a novel like this so that made it a lot more enjoyable to read.

Moving onto the negatives though.... it's a Wuxia. The power level ratings are legitimately dumb. Due to how they work out, something that is "astonishingly powerful" or "ridiculously overpowered" becomes obsolete basically as soon as the next chapter. It's again, part and parcel of the genre sadly, and this one doesn't even try to break away from it. Although I think the balancing is a lot better than in most due to the fact that the MC spends a fair amount of time at each level of cultivation.... Still makes no sense for how treasures are valued in the long run though, especially bad when "important figures" show up.

The novel has an extremely terrible habit of either getting sidetracked in something and then leaving it as a potential plotline for.............. well the whole novel, there's a few threads lying around that have been hinted at since 5-10 volumes prior to where I'm reading and they still haven't been activated leading me to believe that the author legitimately forgot or laid down red herrings, in either scenario, I feel it's a sign of poor planning.

The setting and world building tends to be pretty weak as well, with most places feeling like they're filled in as necessary rather than capable of existing even without the protagonist getting involved, this is particularly bad when considering the idea of prestige of each school and the importance of the worlds.

The relationships between characters never really "blossom", or rather, they tend to skip stages of getting to know each other and jump from acquaintances to friends to blood brothers/sisters in basically 0 time flat, I mean, it's kinda obvious that certain characters would get along with other characters, but without a reasonable time skip or reason for x and y character to get a long, this means a lot of relationships come out of left field and basically alienate the reader from beginning to end, depending on how well the reader empathizes with the protagonist, I feel a lot of the impact of the relationships turning out the way they do becomes muted.

Overall, the novel has enough solid enough writing that if you can enter the mind of the protagonist and like his character, the novel will grow on you, conversely if you dislike his character, just stay far away, the novel won't impress.

Edit: this is mostly true for up till volume 23 or so, everything after that has been sub par because the author built up a major climax heavily, delivered on it and then tried to disperse back to the old format of meandering around..... Sorry when you make a climax, you either follow through and end it properly and maintain some level of suspense. changing gears makes me think it's no longer worth bothering with the series. <<less
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Myriadfold
Myriadfold rated it
March 23, 2017
Status: v25c8
I greatly enjoy the series that IET has written with a range on offer.

Every story he writes follows its own sequence of events, events that define the character's outlook on life and their progress through the martial dao as they climb the ladder to supremacy.

Every piece IET writes is much more grounded in reality than many other series that other reviewers have chosen to compare him to. The MC's will encounter various people and upon meeting their partner they become devoted and attached, he portrays their anguish when they lose... more>> them and their joy when reuniting or escaping the jaws of certain death. Unlike many other authors who care only for a long exciting series that can award them tons of clicks and votes. IET gives us a devoted husband and father, other authors give us harems that border on insanity with little common sense in their interactions.

Ignore any reviews that claim IET just recycles his older stories into making his new ones, because this is shortsighted ignorance at its finest. 2 stories written by different authors with the same materials can be similar yet end up travelling very different places, the same can be said for the different works provided by the same author. To an author like IET, copying old stories (cloning and rewording) holds absolutely no benefits or rewards, it is not fulfilling and it is obvious to ALL who read it, not the ignorant few who believe themselves "smarter" than everyone else for noticing similarities when they occasionally appear.

The system between IET's stories are all DIFFERENT in their function and flow. In SS it is grounded in science, in CD it was the laws of nature, and DE too possesses its own take through gaining insights.

IET places a similar message in all of his stories and that is "hard work and genuine effort is the true path to success". There are lucky breaks, but those lucky breaks would be worthless to characters too ignorant to appreciate their value. IET greatly favours the path of the sword for his MC's, yet each time he tries to handle it differently to reflect the differing backgrounds and situation of his characters. In CD, Linley looked at the 4 western elements, in DE Ji Ning travels a different path through the eastern system of elements, In SS Luo Feng follows the path of a spirit reader who looks into the origin laws behind the elements in a scientific setting, and in ST Qin Yu uses stellar science as the basis for his path to power.

By the sheer virtue of the starting point of all of IET's MC's being so very different, so too are the paths each MC treads.

I would recommend any of IET's works to new and old readers alike to enjoy. <<less
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GianCarpio
GianCarpio rated it
December 25, 2022
Status: B42C11
If you want to see what to EXPECT then read. There's barely any spoilers here but I did keep notes of what I as a reader felt reading this. It's pretty long but I did a goodjob reviewing if I do say so myself

This book is so incoherent I do regret giving it 5 second chances.

The author is so stuck up in his Journey of the West references that it is taking away from his OWN story. Stuck too hard to trying to remember his references that he forgets... more>> what he has written himself.

For example, the fact that he is a RainDragon guard is completely forgotten and disregarded. The fact that he can transform into anything and hide in everything is completely forgotten after one use because the author is too h**ny for Sun Wukong and wanted to reference his actions in one part. The worst part is he doesnt even try to use that power anymore, so we dont really get to see if it wont work against his current enemies because the author dont care anymore as long as he gets a wukong reference in.

This story really takes me out a lot and instead of creating a unique experience like the lore of Reverend Insanity, we get a tired repetitive and loose story held by mediocre world building.

There's no unique planning and schemes, he literally gets one of the best bows in order to prepare for a fight and even orders a unique bow string but HE DOESNT EVEN USE THE BOW FOR THE ENTIRETY OF THE FIGHT (and the novel) The author literally said he can shoot someone from like 1million kilometers away I was like will he shoot them to weaken them from afar? Nope, hes just gonna ignore the bow in his stash and use his hands I guess and rush in like an idiot.

The only thing barely decent about this story and the only thing making me want to read it are the things unique to the story like ji ning and the treasures and powers. Idgaf about anything else the plot is basic, the author isnt smart at all, hes just creative. Also the treasures quickly lose relevance.

Barely creative in a way that every one of his villains must be 'villainy'. Even the supposed backstabber has a disgusting personality. There's no moment to be shocked since every foreshadowing is basically a spoiler with how the author does it.

Also the framing of mysteriousness is very s*upid. His master has 2 rules, and one of them is not to say he's affiliated with him. Yet every enemy he has come across mysteriously somehow knows who his master is without anyone telling them and without him showing any skills that is unique to his master.

The battle of Karmic Luck also has to be the s*upidest thing that's ever seen on Xianxia. Instead of naming it the Battle of Karmic Luck, might as well have named it Ji Nings training session since each battle corresponds to which level Ji Ning is at currently. At best its just a poor excuse so that Ji Ning can hone his skills. SMH

The author also has a tendecycto Reveal something cool and worthwhile for the author to never bring it up again.

-The treasure spirits never talk again. - a cool concept thats spoilers but whatever. Most likely because hes a fraud that plagiarizes ideas and cant come up with his own so he has no idea how to expound on it further and make it florish. Each idea here ROTS.

Worst auction and even worse treasures. Auctions are my guilty pleasure and the one thing I look the most forward too. Tr*sh auctions I cant even explain. The treasures he bought arent worth a damn and quickly disappears in the next book or used in only one fight. No interesting thing at all are presented. IETS creativity are stretched as far as "This treasure can block a fourth step dao lord." No purposes just what blocks and what attacks.

The cultivation part is bad. Most Xianxia MC are MC because they do things that have never been done in cultivation before.

Everyone, their mothers, fathers, grand mothers and grandfathers has 6 arms technique which is quite disgusting for my reading experience.

If there's a legend about something impossible 90% of the time he wont be able to do it. Yes not be able to. If theres a universe treasure that hasnt been picked up then he definitely wouldnt be able to. If theres an opportunity that has been foreshadowed for atleast 10 chapters the he wouldnt be able to get it. Then get something great by luck randomly in a chapter no one cares about.

The clone concept, just as everything else has great ideas but lacks in the execution and creativity. He has gotten the best Archery technique in the three realms and the best Pill Making Legacy in the whole universe. Has he ever used them? No. He has clones doing nothing might as well use them to train but the author also doesnt care.

One of his retainers is a beauty who can charm anyone yet he has never once used her to interrogate people or use her abilities to gather supporters. He does use her to control golems to fight which is NOT her expertise at all. Shes mostly there for longing even if she has a higher cultivation than him she will do nothing in front of enemies. Expect her to just do some longing and emotional crying. He also spends books nurturing a pill master. Has he ever taken a pill from that pill master? Nope. Cause the author isnt creative. If the character has more things to do than block, attack, cry or be worried for ji ning then thats out of the authors scope of talent.

I hate the word retainer. Dao Guardian is more tasteful.

The best part of the romance was when Yu Wei died so I wouldnt have to read about shitty romance for the rest of the book

When he comprehends something it's always "Ah I get it now hahahaha." "It was like that all along." But never explanations because the author knows more than to spill somebush*t he doesnt even hnderstand. It doesnt make me believe. If you want to read something that can explain and constantly explains cultivation in a wonderful manner - read Grand Ancestral Bloodlines. The best in terms of explaining cultivation. What IET does here is mostly spewing some lazy sh*t thats been recycled again and again from folktales and chinese sayings. <<less
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aa.
aa. rated it
March 30, 2022
Status: --
The author really has difficulties with numbers/maths and physics or science in general. For instance he repeatedly stated that "The Grand Xia Dynasty has been existed for trillion years" (multiple 1, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000 years).

We human has evolved from apes 15my ago (million years) or from fish in 350my (0.00000035 trillion years). Even if we stretch it far away from a single cell bacteria 4by ago it still only 0.004 trillion years. Our universe itself is only 8by old (0.008 trillion years).

And a millions-km between cities? Even the... more>> biggest known rock planet is only 2.5 times of earth, or less than 200, 000km circumference. Anything bigger usually a gas planet like jupiter with 440, 000km circumference, or too heavy it will become a star instead. For reference, the Sun is an average size star with 4.4 million km circumference. The Sun can swallow 1, 300, 000 earths inside.

It has different physics than our universe? Absolutely. Not. It has exactly earth's characteristics: earth, water, fire, air, grass, snow etc., even the seasons is exactly identical with china (the author didn't even seem to aware of the equatorial season).

My point is, the author doesn't have to exaggerate the numbers 10-100times unnecessarily, it really just look childish and stup*d.

Beside of that, this still a good reading though. <<less
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Kurokazin
Kurokazin rated it
April 21, 2019
Status: v27c1
Unfortunately, this novel falls into a lot of the same "traps" most xianxia novels do. After a certain point combat details just get shoved to the side and it's just "dragon fist!" "tri-beam!" "kamehameha!" over and over. It seems extremely odd to me in the grand scheme of things. Xianxia authors do have a propensity to pad things out, I don't know why they'd fluff up completely inane story aspects rather than just make the fights longer and more interesting. We see this is in most (I haven't read them... more>> all) IET novels, we see this in Martial God Asura and the list very likely goes on.

The story is readable, if you skim past the completely unrealistic measurements of time and space. 13 trillion year old dynasties, infinity kilometers, I wish translators would just take some creative freedom and dial this down a bit. The most important aspect of any story is suspending our disbelief which most xianxia authors struggle to do. You can go big, but if you go bigger it really takes you out of being immersed. "How the f*ck did a dynasty last 13 trillion years and not develop modern technology?"

Overall it's a decent read, I'd never advise anyone not to read a story unless it goes completely off the rails with author laziness or the ending is snipped (and therefore unsatisfying), but at the point I'm at in the story, it was great for a while though it's starting to teeter off. If you're just looking for a xianxia novel to read, I'd recommend Against the Gods, Nine Star Hegemon Body Art, or the first quarter of Martial God Asura. ATG and NSHBA specifically, I feel like these are the gold standard of the whole xianxia power fantasy that also do a pretty good job of maintaining an equilibrium of story, plot, characters, and consistency in the MC.

2/5, The excessive measurement system alone accounts for the loss of 1 star just because of how far it pulls you out of the immersion. If you just skim read over those bits like I do, it's probably a solid 3/5 which for a xianxia is about as good as you can hope for. The vast majority of xianxia novels are definitely a step below most genres besides "Young Adult", so getting 3 stars means it's at least readable. However, I operate under the assumption people will actually /read/ everything, so I can't in good faith give it that extra star.

Edit: dropping a star, down to 1. The writer of this story must have the c*ck size of a mouse. It may seem like nitpicking, hell, it feels like nitpicking. But /holy/ f*ck this guy has such a hard on for putting things on a massive scale. How the sh*t is anyone supposed to even fathom 200km+? Due to, y'know, science, gravity, etc, at that point your fancy grand xia world is so dense it turns into a black hole, killing everyone. Most xianxia authors tend to overexaggerate, but this guy is a massive twat about inserting it EVERYWHERE IN THE TEXT. It's like having a neo-nazi friend that ends every sentence with "hi*ler did nothing wrong", how the f*ck do I ignore that? <<less
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kirtil
kirtil rated it
December 28, 2018
Status: Completed
The story was good, and I like the writing style of the author except 1 thing.

too much exaggeration. When I read about three thousand kilometers long/big swords and feel epic; I was 7 years old. Now, I just feel ridiculous.

Only way I had to enjoy this series was by ignoring/generalizing whenever the author started describing something. Like when I read 3k km sword, I read it like big ass sword. After I managed this, it was quite fun.
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Master X13
Master X13 rated it
May 22, 2018
Status: afterword
This book is my ALL-time FAVOURITE!!!

There are several reasons for this: The storyline is also great. I loved the beginning (the Three Realms) the most but the ending is also quite nice. The power hierarchy is also well constructed despite it's slightly confusing for this many variation in fiendgods and immortals. I felt bad that there were no fiendgods after he left the Three Realms. MC's personality is also great (hardworking as hell).

MC has good character, got talent and is hardworking. Not arrogant and resolute.

This is how a true man... more>> should be. <<less
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Dr.Flash
Dr.Flash rated it
December 28, 2017
Status: v32
After reading so many translated novels from the community iet is one of the very few authors whose novel I can read without caring for the reviews. I am not saying his novels are the best out there but whatever problems his novels has I can bear with them. If you get through the fact that a human less than 2 metres can travel trillions of kilometres you will probably get through the novel easily.

Desolate era for me is not his best novel but it has its own good points.... more>> In terms of power system/ dao it is far better than its predecessors. The story doesn't revolve around arrogant young masters left and right which is another plus. <<less
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AardwarkThe2nd
AardwarkThe2nd rated it
November 21, 2016
Status: Completed
Review:
With 1450 chapters and 45 Volumes, Desolate Era is IET’s latest completed work. Beginning with the reincarnation of a terminally ill mortal into a small tribe in the corner of a vast world, this story tells how Ji Ning rises from his lowly birth to the apex of the Three Realms and beyond! The main theme of this story is sword cultivation, rising to the peak of sword arts!

Story Setting: Desolate Era (DE) is a mythological xianxia. This means that this story takes place in the mythological Three Realms,... more>> featuring gods, demons and immortals. Sun Wukong and Lu Dongbin are some of the mythological figures introduced in this story. There is predominantly Daoist cultivation, while the background has some figures who cultivate Buddhist and Demonic techniques as well. Mythological techniques like the Three Heads, Six Arms transformation (Asura) are commonly used. Nearly every character has a Daoist name, a name they have chosen for themselves as cultivators. Ji Ning’s Daoist name is Dark North, otherwise translated as Bei Ming. Since simply stating his name as Bei Ming will lead to readers not getting the significance behind it, translator RWX takes special care to translate most Daoist names in a way that removes the wordiness (so Dark North > Darknorth) and not simply type in the Pinyin name.

World building: Three Realms comprises the three realms of Heaven, the Netherworld, and the Mortal Realms. It is wide without end: only the Mortal Realm has 3000 major worlds and trillions of minor worlds. Earth, with a population of a couple billion people is only a minor world. IET numbers come into play at the very first chapter.

In the beginning, there are two types of cultivation: Fiendgod Body Cultivation and Immortal Ki Cultivation. Cultivators use various divine abilities and magical techniques in battle. Dao enlightenment and Divine Will (telekinesis) are prominent in high level battles, with the protagonist being a peerless genius of the Sword Dao. Weapons are not limited to swords, spears and the like as eccentric weapons like flywhisk tails, magic seals, formation arrays are more popular.

Cultivation: Cultivation is surprisingly detailed. It isn’t simply absorb ki, get enlightenment and power up; cultivation transforms the self and every transformation is exquisitely written. Dao cultivation is also neatly written, reading IET write about the MC’s enlightenment feels amazing.

Most cultivation novels have a step by step routine: breakthrough to new cultivation realm + 10 chapters of battles for pills + cultivation to peak of early realm + 10 chapters of battles for pills + cultivation to beginning of mid realm + 10 chapters of battles for pills and so on. It is a blatant way to increase chapter count without having to think up further plot and keep the protagonist underpowered to make battles ‘interesting’ cough ATG cough. IET spares us from this: it is pretty easy to get from early to peak in cultivation by using liquefied elemental essence.

Breaking through is quite difficult though, as each cultivation realm requires increasing level of enlightenment, talent and resources. Cultivating for hundreds of years is pretty common. However, the Three Calamities and Nine Tribulations are controlled by the Heavens to test cultivators after every three centuries. So cultivators are forced to train and cultivate to increase their power for survival.

In the early cultivation levels, it is fairly easy for our MC to battle above his cultivation levels. In later cultivation levels though, even gathering the power of a million 7th Stage cultivators into a formation will not help kill a 8th Stage cultivator. Every cultivation realm is truly a realm where lower realm cultivators cannot infringe into.

Story: Desolate Era is divided into two parts:
Spoiler

The first part is up till Vol 1-23, where Ji Ning is in the Three Realms. The second part is from Vol 24-45 where Ji Ning leaves the Three Realms to explore the vast universe beyond.

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Common xianxia clichés are few and far between-
Spoiler

the
MC joins one sect, takes part in one tournament, kills one young master and exterminates one family

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. Other than that, the focus isn’t on random battles with small groups of cultivators over treasures, revenge and the like. An entire volume is written on Ji Ning
Spoiler

calmly cultivating in the Dao and refining sword arts in his master’s personal paradise.

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Meeting various mythological figures is one of the highlights in Desolate Era. Gods like Subhuti, Heroes like Houyi and Immortals like Lu Dongbin are prominent characters in the story.

Conclusion: The majority of the first part of Desolate Era is taken up by a massive War between Three Realms and another universe. A truly epic war between two universes is depicted, beginning with low level conflicts and ending with the Endwar. This war is one of the biggest reasons to read Desolate Era; a conflict of this scale has not and will not take place in any other xianxia.

Stuff I didn't like:

Haerwho: The common xianxia problem of forgetting once important characters after the MC has surpassed their cultivation level, aka Haerwho is still there. If you don’t like, don’t read. However, all xianxia suffer from this problem, even ISSTH
Spoiler

cough
Blood Demon Mask, Li Clan Patriarch, Ji Nineteen, Lightning Flag, Flag of Three Streamers

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cough If you really don’t like this, it might be a good idea to give up on xianxia altogether to avoid unending disappointment.

Romance: Romance, politics and most things unrelated to battle and cultivation aren’t given much time. The romance parts are written pretty well, but IET decides to move on in short time.
Spoiler

Actually, after Yu Wei’s death, there is understandably no romance for the rest of the novel, except for Ji Ning’s reminisces. There was some teasing with a few women, but IET didn’t venture into harem territory.

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Timeskips: Due to the scale of the story, everything is bigger. Unfortunately timeskips are included as well.
Spoiler

Beginning with 1-2 years, it expands to decades, centuries and thousands of years. At the story’s end time skips happen for thousands of chaos cycles. (And a chaos cycle is the amount of time a universe exists. Yes that ridiculous)

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Talent: Even in the current story, Ji Ning has a ridiculous amount of talent in many fields.
Spoiler

Body refining, Ki refining, Fire and Water, Lotus techniques, sword techniques, bow and arrow, Formation arrays, soul techniques... There is literally nothing he isn’t a genius in. This list gets larger and larger as 1450 chapters progress. It gets pretty ridiculous in the end.

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Diabolus ex Machina: This is the opposite of plot armor, where author piles misery upon misery (which comes out of fricking nowhere) upon the protagonist. Ji Ning’s family dies early on.
Spoiler

Then his wife betrays him. Then Godking seals his wife’s soul. Then Godking destroys her soul. Then there is no way of reviving her. Ji Ning searches, searches and searches and only gets a way at the end of 1450 chapters. Then there is that ridiculous plot where he fails to turn his Dao into Eternal due to ridiculous bullsh*t IET sticks in just to increase 3 volumes.

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TL;DR: Ignoring some problems, DE is one of the best xianxia ever written. Among the stories being translated, it is #2 on my list, second only to I Shall Seal the Heavens. MC and side characters are intelligent. The battles never get boring. The cultivation is deep. IET doesn’t do blatant word repetition and add meaningless filler. I liked this story enough to MTL the whole story in a month. 10/10 Will Recommend. <<less
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omarct
omarct rated it
August 29, 2016
Status: v17c21
In my top 5 fav novels and I have read close to 70. This novel has everything from IET previous novels like CD and ST, but it is done so much better. A lot of the flaws from those 2 novels have been reduced or removed completely while keeping the good aspects. I have always loved the whole concept of Daos and enlightenment as cultivation instead of just the usual level up by just spending enough time cultivating qi. IET does training really well and this novel excels at that,... more>> the action is really good but what hypes you up is watching how the character uses his tribulations and hardships to get stronger and stronger both mentally and physically. If you love a solid story with no major flaws, good action, decent drama, and a genius on his path to Godhood to be able to protect everything he cares for, then this is the novel for you. <<less
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Varno
Varno rated it
August 8, 2016
Status: v12c12
Desolate era is like a mash-up of xianxia and xuanhuan genres.

To me it would be better if it were one, instead of both. Im more bias towards xianxia, being a martial arts junky myself.

There are alot of s*upid and ill conceived plot devices in this novel, many of which are quiclky made redundant in following chapters.

... more>> Cultivation methods that run out of use pretty quickly, divine abilities that are only relevant for one chapter.

In fact such a conception spawned this very novel.

Our MC used to be a saint in his pasted life. He was such a good man heaven choose to keep his memory in tact after reincarnation.

Despite having these memories he assimilates pretty quickly to this new world. Quickly becoming overly attached to his new parents and accustomed to killing really fast.

Maybe he only kills the bad ones. Pff, saint my ass.

Oh and luck plays very major role in this; especially in the later chapters, so don't start if you aren't ready for some asspulls.

Final verdict. Very action packed, shallow characters, childish world building (bring a calculator) and generic but fun.

Don't let all that tension in the beginning fool you it only gets worst.

3 out of 5. <<less
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readingdigest
readingdigest rated it
March 20, 2016
Status: --
There’s been a fair bit of reviews here detailing the positives of this story so I won’t go into details the merits but focus my review mostly on issues I have with this story. For those of you who have read other IET novels, Desolate Era is more of the same. The framework of this story mirrors closely to Coiling Dragon and Stellar Transformation. This directly leads into the main issue I have with Desolate Era and it’s that the story lacks very much in originality. I can’t believe that... more>> an author can get away with plagiarizing his own work to this degree.

Desolate Era do play to IET’s strengths of world building and pacing, but falls short on character development. The narrative becomes highly repetitive when Ji Ning is basically the same stock character as MCs from IET’s other series. His background as a tragic genius from another world is not leveraged and has no lasting influence in the story. He became just as simple minded as the rest of the people of this new world, right and wrong be damned in the name of following his Dao Heart. No internal conflict arise from having to follow the laws of the jungle after living in a world of law and order. The extraordinary nature of his circumstance and how surreal his reincarnation is never seem to have an affect on the MC. He just accepts it as his new reality and assimilates quickly in the famous IET power crawl. The themes are as usual; a very simplistic search for power and good-vs-evil. This is why there’s never a lot of depth to his cardboard villains and he goes out of his way to distinguish bad people to justify the MC taking action later on. In fact, all the characters in the story lacks depth and their actions become highly predictable and routine. Overall, it’s unfortunate that IET hasn’t improved through the years but is stuck writing the same novel years after his debut with Coiling Dragon. <<less
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Enter Wind
Enter Wind rated it
January 22, 2023
Status: Completed
5/5 story

Although I despise the kind of overly righteous MC type, how IET include those Chinese mythologies really awesome.

2/5 for smartass mixed chinese+translated names

Wtf is Mu Northson, Bei Goodson, Northmonth Baiwei -_-
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NineStarVenerate
NineStarVenerate rated it
January 20, 2023
Status: v12
I pushed through book 12, finally something interesting going around, though I have to say, overall this is one of the worst novels I read recently, if we dissect one by one it definitly has aspects that are superior to your average novel such as : characters who act their age, (ex: you would expect someone who has lived for hundreds or thousands of years to be mature and level-headed and not get angry at every little thing and act like 15 year olds) decisions made by enemies, side... more>> characters in this series are also pretty reasonable and understandable, it's not go kill revenge 24/7 it has thought process into it.

Entertainment wise I'd give this series a 2/10, it hasn't managed to keep me entertained at all.

Introduction rating I'd give it a solid 7/10, the first chapter and the first ones to come after that were pretty good but it was very slow paced and boring.

Main character rating, I'd have to give him a 4/10, he is not as charismatic as I would like, he is not talented either he just relies on a very powerful visualization technique to be leagues ahead of others, his cultivation speed is so-so, he is stuck in the same cultivation rank for even 9 years, but it's considered pretty fast in this world.

He is a person who appreciates relationships and would rather break then bend when the situation arises, but also level-headed when needed that makes him likeable at the very least. The plot is kinda generic, it starts out as a reincarnation series, because of his good deeds in his previous life he was eligible to become someone born by the world, a heavenly child of sorts and cultivate extremely fast but because of some attack on the netherworld, he joined one of the 3000 big worlds, the plot is typical revenge plot, both his parents die so he gotta kill his enemies, the parents deaths are pretty s*upid as well.

He also relies on this treasure pagoda thing with an item spirit to quickly advance in power, similar to the one in apotheosis pretty much, overall 6/10

I'd give this novel overall a 6/10 so far, and maybe the rating will increase later, but so far it hasn't impressed me, or hooked me yet. <<less
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aovel
aovel rated it
March 18, 2021
Status: Completed
I loved this. I'm not sure about the low rating given by others but I thoroughly enjoyed this and couldn't stop reading it. Yes, it was a bit long winded on some parts and some parts were a bit exaggerated and maybe a bit cliche especially if you've read other wuxia, xianxia or xianhuan type of story. But I think this is an acquired taste.

For me, the best stories don't need to be original or new (although it's a huge plus) but writing something about something commonly used or seen... more>> on other stories and making it appear new. This was an experience to be honest. Love it or hate it, it was a good story and it was brilliantly told. <<less
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Kezmark
Kezmark rated it
July 19, 2020
Status: c1250
Alright, so I'm doing this review way after actually reading it, so less going in to detail and more a broad view.

This is IET's best novel yet (including the newest Archean Eon Art, which is so far slow and boring, following the same formula he does every time).

The first large arc of the Desolate Era is actually quite good, and I mean the part before he leaves his tiny corner and joins the larger universe. The supporting cast is ok, the story is also fine, good pace and it... more>> ends well enough to where it could have been a nice little story, but IET just couldn't let good enough alone.

Honestly, there's some of the best characters and moments, even plot threads later on. The problem is, that all that good stuff is suffocate by all the sh*t around it, just too much irrelevant garbage, the plot is often going nowhere, characters aren't used to their full potential, just pointless developments that can't go anywhere cause he doesn't have the balls to end the story in a satisfying if unconventional way.

I liked it well enough back when I read it, but even then not enough to actually stomach to the end and finish it, and I had very little left. It is just ok, it doesn't offend me and has some really good moments here and there, especially if you're a fan of the genre.

<<less
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laov
laov
July 2, 2019
Status: afterword
Good up to 400 chapters... After that? Torture to read. Characters are like toilet paper - used once and then discarded only to be mentioned in 1-2 lines in nostalgia context. All there is to this novel a story how a protagonist reaches the top of his universe. And what I mean by that is that there is ONLY that. Power up, trial, discard all used characters - move to a new stage and then repeat.

I regret reading this. Stay away if you want plot, world development or character development.... more>> The only thing that develops is the protagonists power. The rest is like toilet paper - discarded after completing its purpose. <<less
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wadaface57
wadaface57
October 7, 2018
Status: Completed
I don't really believe in giving objective scores to things and this novel is a good example as to why, because I think this is an objectively bad novel and I can't really give it a good score, but I still absolutely adore it so I'm going to do it anyway, the novel is so long that you can't help but feel invested in the main character and the story and whenever the main character pulls off something ridiculous or gets a massive spike in power you get soaked in... more>> all that addicting dopamine which is deep down the reason we all keep reading these novels. <<less
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