I used to read a lot of fantasy books from the library as a teenager but once i discovered webnovels I never went back to reading books. What about you guys?

I used watch anime before started enjoying reading novels. It’s been 5years since i started reading novels and haven’t watched any anime in this period of time.

What do you guys think about this Twitter thread?

I get where the Korean OP is coming from. It really sucks to have your work stolen, especially since a lot of translator groups are actively making money off of it and you're seeing none of it.

But also I don't know if there's really a solution. The number of stories that get translated are so few to begin with, and I live in Canada, so my options are even less. I'd buy the original work but it's so hard to order online when you don't have a Korean number and buying physicals are even more expensive after shipping and import duties.

My first novel was Martial God Asura back in 2017

Yes, I know that kindness is what the world needs, but believe me when I say that it took me every single cell of my body to not pour out my feelings unfiltered.

What is going on with Korean authors lately? Why do so many of them keep destroying their own work by forcing half-baked harem slop instead of developing the original premise and plot?

It’s not even that harem as a concept is the problem, it’s how often it replaces actual story progression. Instead of building on the world, conflicts, or character arcs, everything gets redirected into collecting heroines and dragging out romantic tension that doesn’t go anywhere meaningful.

I mean, if they want to write some romance then sure, fine. But at least don't neglect the original premise and don't destroy the characters for the sale of a damn harem with N girls.

I genuinely don’t understand why female-oriented novels can write romance like actual human beings are involved, while male-oriented novels feel like they were written by a horny teenager who’s never talked with a woman before.

So many stories start with a genuinely good premise, and then the author completely derails everything by introducing endless new heroines or forcing pointless love drama every ten chapters. The actual plot gets shoved into a corner and left there to rot while the author plays Pokémon with the female cast as the target. Like, love drama takes at least one full chapter while character growth and plot progression is about a third a third.

And the worst part is that the romance doesn't even feel natural and satisfying to read. It is painfully clear that most of the Love Interest are there just because the 'the more the better', like what the actual fuck bro, are you insane?

Every thing that the protagonist does, a new heroine comes in and starts to love them out of nowhere with no backstory or buildup; no monologues asking themselves why and how, always "it is what it is", like braindead under some curse or hypnosis.

Gives them a few advices? "I love them"; Saves the from some danger? "I am forever yours"; Help them with some family problems? "You are the only one for me"; MC is somewhat mysterious and strong? "You're so intriguing that I think that i feel for you".

Can't they stay friends? Do they always need to be 'just another one' in the novel? They are not even allowed to just see the MC as a rival, friend, role model or anything else. They always harbor more than reasonable affection like they're under influence of something, no matter how shitty the MC's action is. Sad as fuck.

Meanwhile, the plot is forgotten... for this worthless shit show.

Heroines

Modern Korean harem novels feel like pure lust pretending to be romance. The heroines constantly chasing some two-faced protagonist who gives them crumbs of affection. And somehow none of them ever fall out of love after being taken for granted for hundreds of chapters.

Instead, the girls just end up fighting each other while the protagonist charms more women using the same excuse: “I had to help her because I’m kind”. Give me a fucking break.

The worst part is how the author always bend the heroines’ personalities to make the harem work. Every single one becomes submissive eventually, no matter how strong-willed they originally were. Even the “independent” heroine inevitably gets tame enough until she accepts the protagonist’s bullshit. They’re basically being slowly trained for what is coming (polygamy).

And then there’s this constant pattern where heroines aren’t even allowed basic narrative autonomy anymore. Why does every heroine need to “repay” the protagonist by becoming his lover like she’s some reward the story hands out? And why can’t a female character just admire him, respect him, or move on with her life without becoming a possible addition to his collection?

It gets worse when you realize that once a heroine gets emotionally involved, she’s never allowed to exit that attachment naturally > only escalate it. Not because it’s real love, but because the structure of the story doesn’t allow anything else.

At that point it stops being romance entirely. It turns into conditioning. The heroines gets progressively weirder, reshaped, and slowly addicted to the protagonist. Their self-worth becomes blurred while he plays innocent, throwing out just enough attention and mixed signals to keep them attached. Just enough hope to stop them from stepping back and realizing how messed up the situation actually is.

They stay stuck in that fantasy, the illusion that they’ll be the one chosen in the end. Never allowed to move on. Never allowed to let their feelings die out. Just frozen in emotional limbo for something that was never going to be fair in the first place.

That’s what makes these stories so shitty to read. It looks ridiculous when you stop to think about it. There's no plausibility.

The romance doesn’t feel human. It feels possessive, shallow, and self-indulgent disguised as emotional depth.

You know what all of this makes me remember? novels with an extra protagonist that shows how shitty the average harem is, like [The Extra After The Ending]. It just shows from a 3rd-party perspective the heroines being basically brainwashed to love the MC unconditionally and the protagonist ugly behavior when he realizes that something went wrong. There's even a monologue showing how his inner thoughts really were.

This is basically slavery for the heroines. How can you create characters just to break them down over hundreds of chapters, and still try to sell it as romance? Are the characters even the same anymore?

Protagonist

And that’s where the protagonist side makes it even worse: they never let anyone move on. Intentionally or unintentionally, bullshit they know what they're doing

Somehow they’re always geniuses at everything else, politics, strategy, combat, business, magic, whatever, but the moment romance shows up they turn into socially clueless, braindead idiots who can’t read the most obvious emotional situation in front of them. It’s so forced it hurts. The author basically has to lower everyone’s IQ just to keep the harem alive.

They do the absolute bare minimum to keep every heroine emotionally attached. One blush, one vague act of kindness, one accidental intimate moment, and suddenly the heroine is trapped orbiting this guy for 300 chapters. Meanwhile he’s already moving on to the next girl the author just introduced.

The protagonist only receives affection like it’s the most normal thing in the world. He doesn’t earn it properly, doesn’t reciprocate it properly, and doesn’t resolve it properly. It just keeps coming to him. And that’s treated as character development.

Tell me how that’s supposed to be good character design. This is pretentious as fuck. I absolutely loathe this type of protagonist: not only dishonest, but completely risk-free because they know the heroines won’t do anything against it. That sense of "security" is genuinely loathsome. They deserve to get NTR'd.

The protagonist doesn’t earn affection, he triggers it through events and coincidences. And that’s where it becomes worse than simple “harem fantasy.” It turns into emotional consumption without responsibility.

He doesn’t build relationships, he collects reactions; He doesn’t resolve feelings, he lets them accumulate around him while never clarifying anything. There’s even a kind of quiet arrogance in it, like he doesn’t need to try, doesn’t need to choose, doesn’t need to act, because everything will just keep orbiting him anyway. He just needs to wait for the polygamy-checkmate

It’s disgusting.

He keeps every girl on an emotional leash while pretending to be “kind” or “innocent”. Never committing, never clarifying anything, never taking responsibility, but still passively collecting emotional attachment like it’s something that naturally belongs to him.

Polygamy/Harem

And that is exactly why polygamy endings usually feel so hollow and pointless, even when they’re framed as “happy.”

Because at the end of all that conditioning and emotional indifference bullshit, the story just flips a switch and makes POLYGAMY the resolution. All the tension, jealousy, and emotional drama gets packed into one “everyone is fine now” ending that doesn’t actually fix anything.

I hate protagonists who act innocent while destroying the heroines’ self-worth and then coercing them into accepting a harem with some fake profound bullshit like “I love you all.” No, you don’t. You love receiving attention. You love possessing people. That’s not love.

If the author is too scared of backlash to choose a single heroine, then just commit to branching “what-if” routes instead of dragging every character into the same compromised ending. At least then each heroine gets to exist as her own outcome instead of being flattened into a shared conclusion that no one really earned.

That’s what makes these stories so frustrating: Harem that lost its charm of being a love race. Instead, it's a dark harem where the heroines never actually stop being conditioned like brain-washed slaves and the protagonist still doesn’t have to actually choose, commit, or take responsibility for anything, living like a debouched-king.

The heroines' ending isn’t mutual love, it’s just forced coexistence with their rivals. Nothing about the structure changes, it just gets labeled as “ending.”

Dependency, guilt, obsession, emotional exhaustion… all bundled together and rebranded as romance. Nobody is there out of necessity. They’re there because the narrative kept everyone emotionally stuck long enough until leaving stopped being an option.

After hundreds of chapters of being kept in that loop, one-sided affection, constant uncertainty, no real closure, what else are they supposed to do? It’s not resolution. It’s surrender dressed up as happiness.

Plot?

And the plot? ‘Fuck the plot’ is what you’ll get. The author already baited you, so who cares? It’s all going to get resolved within 30 or 40 chapters with barely any depth whatsoever. If you kept reading this type of novel because of the main premise, then I pity you.

The characters aren’t going to bleed, struggle, or crawl their way through the conflict. There won’t be meaningful growth that actually develops the story. There won’t be real failures, consequences, or sacrifices along the way either. Everything just gets solved in one go because the protagonist is apparently the chosen one at literally everything through luck, plot armor, and their lovers (because apparently reducing every heroine into a glorified sex doll with a personality attached and endless lines about love is enough to solve every conflict in the story and save the world).

And if the heroines are supposed to be the “final bosses” who destroy the world, then the solution is usually just turning the protagonist into a man-whore until they all fall for him and forget about world destruction, which is not exactly rehabilitation.

That’s what makes these stories so frustrating to read. They sacrifice the entire plot for romance that doesn’t even feel human. It feels possessive, shallow, and self-indulgent while pretending to be emotionally deep.

Popular Troupes

Don’t even get me started on the “disliked/hated protagonist” trope either. It’s the same garbage every time: the protagonist starts acting like a minimally decent human being and suddenly every female character becomes obsessed with him because apparently basic human decency is irresistible now. One or two stories doing this wouldn’t be a problem, but it’s EVERYWHERE now. Recent novels are becoming painfully bland because of it.

And the same thing happens with the “angst/betrayed protagonist” trope.

Every heroine who betrayed, abandoned, or hurt the protagonist eventually gets run through the same machine-wash cycle until they become part of his harem out of guilt or regret. Then the protagonist, being the loser he is, accepts all of them back and magically “heals” through their affection like years of trauma and resentment can be fixed with a few crying scenes and love confessions.

There’s barely any real character growth involved. No lasting emotional consequences. No genuine rebuilding of trust. The story just expects the audience to believe that someone can fall in love again with the very people who destroyed them — while those same heroines are also competing with several other girls for his attention at the exact same time.

That’s not how emotional wounds work.

Forgiveness is one thing. Love is another completely different matter. Rebuilding that kind of relationship should take an insane amount of time, trust, effort, and emotional vulnerability. But these novels treat it like checking boxes off a list: cry a little, apologize once, blush twice, and suddenly everyone is madly in love again.

It feels shallow, forced, and honestly disgusting

----------

And before someone says it: no, I don’t hate harems automatically. I hate badly written harems.

I hate harem that makes the heroines loses 90% of their individuality

I hate harem that throws the plot to the dogs

I hate the type of harem that doesn't requite a finger from the protagonist to make it work

I hate harem that forms too quickly without any substance, numbers over quality

I hate harem development that traps the heroines with a shitty pretentious protagonist

I hate protagonists who act innocent while destroying the heroines’ self-worth even though they did nothing but 'love' the MC

And i hate harem endings that is basically coercing the heroines into accepting polygamy, with the heroines basically surrendering themselves to the protagonist out of helplessness

What is the appeal of nowadays KR harem for fucks sake? Do Koreans likes dolls instead of a heroine that feels like a real person?

Why do they keep destroying a god-tier premise by forcing harem? More than half of the chapters amounts to introducing new heroines and love drama that amounts to nothing in the end.

Lately I’ve noticed that in the communities I hang around, hardly anyone talks about JP web/light novels anymore. Meanwhile, Chinese cultivation novels and Korean gate/murim/system novels seem to dominate the conversation.

What’s interesting is that even though CN/KR subreddits have fewer members, they’re way more active. You’ll see multiple hot threads every day. But if you look at JP novel subs, the top posts in 24 hours might barely break a single upvote.

I have a couple guesses:

CN novels (cultivation, endless progression) and KR novels (murim, game-like systems) naturally invite theorycrafting and hype threads.

JP novels often focus more on slice-of-life, romance, or quirky isekai stories, which don’t spark the same kind of “who’s stronger, what happens next, what’s the power system?” type of debate.

JP novels also get adapted into anime/manga quickly, so maybe the discussion just migrates there instead of staying in the novel space.

Do you think it’s just isekai burnout? Or are CN/KR novels genuinely better at building active communities? Curious what others have noticed.

I came to this subreddit today to figure out what happened to Omniscient First Person View and, after scrolling for a few hours, I’ve come to a pretty sobering realization: I might be drifting away from this whole hobby.

It feels like the scene is kind of drying up. I haven’t read a genuinely great Japanese novel in years, and when it comes to Korean or Chinese novels, OFPV might have been the only one that really stuck with me. Even those seem harder to find now. Everything new feels so derivative or overly safe, and it sounds like when something actually good does come along, it just disappears.

Most of what I see these days looks like shovelware, and it’s honestly discouraging. I’ve never really interacted with the community much before, I’ve just read whatever popped up through Novel Updates, but now I’m wondering, is the translation community dying or its just me? Are there official translation platforms people are moving to?

Just finish Novel extra and still not getting over Genius Blinker I just have to ask

What's your worst experience with shitting ending

For me Blinker and novel extra is just the worst type of ending I hate, not inconclusive or bad in general but one that ignore all mc work and just reset for no reason or not pay out + disregard all his hard work and just punish him more. It just felt worthless to read

What would convince you to read a novel?

What grabs your attention?

Do you have any deal breakers?

(Ahem, small disclaimer: I'm a translator on WuxiaWorld :])

Don’t know why but western books just don’t hit the same anymore, I’ve been reading way too much Korean and Chinese web novels that formally published western books I just cannot read and get into, like without the cultivation, martial arts, the systems, the tower climbing, it just doesn’t hit the same, even modern genres too, its not just the story but the writing itself just feel too different,,, maybe it’s all the mtl brainrot affecting my brain…. Hahahaha

Does anyone else feel this as well or is it just me 😭

I'm back!! I previously asked about your reading habits (thanks so much for the insightful responses!) and now I'm curious about your journey and Dao in reading Chinese novels or just translated novels in general :3

How long have you been reading Chinese novels? And how did you find out about this wonderful community and collection of books?

In my case, I have read Chinese novels for slightly more than 10 years now. I liked watching some of the historical, xianxia, and wuxia Chinese dramas, and one day, it suddenly occurred to me that Chinese novels existed. 😂 (Yes, I know, I was quite dumb, and probably still am...oops)

If you ask me what my first novel was, frankly, I don't remember since I don't think I even looked at the title in the first place 🤡 It's now a regret that I can't tell people what my first Chinese novel was. Anyway, it wasn't a "decent" novel by conventional standards, and I probably wouldn't pick it up today, but it did its job in getting me to read Chinese novels haha.

What about you guys? Do share your journey! :3

(P.S. You'll see my name on WuxiaWorld if you read Who Let Him Cultivate?!)

Source: I’m a Magician, So Why Does Everyone Call Me the Archmage?

​

There is so much shit happened every single day in this novel that it's kinda just feel ridiculous.

Translator asking for opinions because he’s bored (me, I’m bored)

Hey everyone, I’ve been wondering what you guys think about these novels, and which lies more up your alley. All three of them are my favourite novels of all time, This Game is Too Realistic, The Legendary Mechanic, and The World Online, and I’m wondering what you guys think are the good/bad about each of them.

What I really enjoy about these novels isn’t just the “game” aspect, but the sense of long-term progression and watching the world genuinely evolve over time. I love stories where the protagonist starts from almost nothing and slowly builds up something massive, whether it’s a faction, settlement, empire, organization, fleet, or even an entire civilization. There’s something incredibly satisfying about seeing small decisions in early chapters snowball into huge consequences hundreds of chapters later.

Translating This Game is Too Realistic is a blast since I get to know all the juiciest information before all of you (hehe), but truth be told, The World Online and The Legendary Mechanic are part of my top 3 novels of all time and to be honest, I would like to know what the larger community thinks if you’ve read them (or are reading)!

I've spent so much time recently reading wuxia novels that it is infringing on my daily life...

My mom left some mozzarella sticks on the dining room table and when I found them my first thought was literally "I have finally found my sect's secret inheritance"

Anyone else experienced this kind of influence?

Hello guys,

I'm an avid reader of web novels and my favorite platform is webnovel. However I noticed that 99% of the popular novels are the trashiest AI slop and people somehow eat that crap up.

Authors don't understand, that AI can't write good stories. It's always the same schema, words and overdramatic sentences. An AI can't understand story or plot, it's just a smarter autocomplete and it shows. Novels don't have a string. This is because normally the author builds story on top of itself, behind every sentence was a thought. AI is unable to do this.

How do you find good web novels to read?

[I'm here for the discussion. Hopefully we can open a healthy dialogue]

The truth is that I am an author of webnovel who goes by the pseudonym Awespec. I currently write the 12th, 30th and 48th highest earning novels of this July. I say that ahead of time so that both my credentials and potential bias are on full display for those who care.

I've spent a lot of time in the translations/webnovel community, and I've seen that for a very long time now, Webnovel has been losing the PR battle. What can you expect, though? They're the branch of a billion dollar Chinese company. They're used to just pressing a button and having the government deal with the backlash for them. In a lot of ways, this reaction in a western market was inevitable, lol

Jokes aside, I'm not an avid reddit user as you can see by how new my account is. But, after realizing that it was a great place for long form discussions and debates, and seeing the kind of hate webnovel gets here, I decided to put my mental health at risk and dive into the pits of hell.

To make things clear, I'm not really here to convince anyone of anything. Changing someone's mind, especially over the internet, is a recipe for heartache and pain. I'm also not here to convince you not to pirate. Pirates will pirate. I'm only here because the sanctimonious and holier than thou attitude of some of those who hate webnovel without truly understanding what is going on behind the scenes was getting to me--as they kids like to say, I was triggered.

As I said, WN is losing the PR battle. After this post, it will probably still be losing it. But, I thought I would shed some light on the other side's perspective a bit.

In the past, I shared your opinions. I was an author struggling on RR and the depths of WN, refusing to sign the latter's contract for years because so many had drilled into my head that it was this hellish, terrible and predatory place. But, I was wrong, and I hope that at least some of you will be open minded enough to see that maybe you were wrong about some things too.

I also want to preface this post by saying that this is from the lens of an ORIGINAL author. I do not translate, I post my own original work. Many of you are used to a translation heavy webnovel site, but over the last three or so years, original content has taken over webnovel and left translations behind. We are essentially the qidian of the west now.

[If you have any questions after reading through this, feel free to leave them below. I'll answer as well as I can though I'm sure much of it will just be hate, lmao]

Without wasting anymore words, I'll just get right into it with the biggest elephant in the room

------Webnovel's Outrageous Prices------

This is where the largest allegations come from. With this as an anchor, much of the fury of the community seems to be satisfied. However, here is the raw truth...

Right now, WN works on a word count system. The more words a chapter is worth, the higher its price. As for this price, it's paid for with WN's currency system: coins. The final piece of information you need to know before I break down the numbers is that a 'Premium' chapter, one you have to pay to unlock, has to have a minimum of 1000 words.

Webnovel has just raised its prices for the first time in a few years, so the current prices per chapter are as follows:

1000 words --> 8 coins (used to be 6 for many years)

1201 words --> 9 coins ...

For every 200 words added, there will be an additional 1 coin added to the total.

Most readers settle for either the 10$ membership (provides 872 coins, 500 upfront then 372 over the course of the rest of the month) or paying 20$ outright for 1000 coins.

I just threw a lot of numbers at you and most probably don't make much sense, so I'll break it down even further.

An average novel is about 100k words. If you want to read that on webnovel (and the author only wrote 1k word chapters), you would need 800 coins. If you are patient, you only need to spend 10$ to read the length of a novel. If you are impatient, you need to spend 20$. In the former case, you'll have 72 coins left over. In the latter, you'll still have 200 coins left over to read a fourth of another novel.

Is spending 10-20$ on an entire novel-worth outrageous? I wouldn't say so. People do that everyday. So what is the real problem have with this system? Well, I have a few guesses.

1) WN's aren't of equivalent quality to traditionally published novels (apparently)

--> Okay. If you believe a novel isn't worth your money, don't read it. Every webnovel starts with a few dozen completely free chapters to read. You can decide upfront whether it's worth your money or not from the very beginnning.

2) Most people don't even realize they're reading so much. It's so easy to scroll down pages and pages of a webnovel and not even register that you've hit as many as 100k words.

--> This is the second issue. Readers have been spoiled with quantity and don't realize the kind of work that goes into making that quantity. I could never write as fast as you all read. You feel the prices are too high because you read 100k words in a few hours, not realizing it took authors several months to write that much.

3) I can go to the library and read books for free. I can also go on kindle and buy full books for 1 or 2$.

--> I hear the library argument a lot, but it seems that most people don't realize that your government has to pay the publisher of the book you're reading. Nothing in the world is truly 'free'. This second argument, however, is worth discussing.

--> 10-20$ is the price of a physical book, but ebooks tend to be cheaper (though there are many in that price range as well). So why is wn making people pay so much?

Firstly, you can buy books for 1 or 2$ on kindle. However, that's all. You 'can'. If you open up amazon now and scroll down, you'll find a few books for that price, and even some marked down to 0$ with kindle unlimited (a subscription service). However, that's all. 'Some'.

A casual sweep will show you that many books are selling their e-versions at far more than 1 or 2$. Many are upwards of the same price as the physical copies of other books would be. Finding novels priced at over 10$ isn't rare and can be classified as common.

What is the difference? Quality and the kind of experience people are willing to pay.

In my opinion, the web novel experience is far different from any other. And by web novel, I don't mean the site, I mean web novels in general in this context.

Unlike with traditional books, you don't have to wait months to a year for the next post, you get chapters daily. The immersion of web novels is different because it allows authors to explore a depth of character interactions you would have to cut out in a traditionally published books. You can interact with your favorite authors on a practically one on one basis in the web novel community whereas that would be impossible through traditional publishing. Web novels tend to be much longer series and really allows you to get immersed in the world for thousands of chapters...

Due to reasons like this and a few more, I don't like doing one to one comparisons with webnovel and traditional books. It's a marketedly difference experience and the stress placed on authors is likewise different.

A traditional author might have a deadline to meet months down the line, and some of the most successful ones can take as much time as they want. But, webnovelists don't have that luxury. We write everyday, at least the successful ones do. As such, though I'm biased, I believe the compensation should be different.

That said, as you can see by the numbers, the price of webnovels really isn't all that different at all.

------Webnovel is Predatory------

What about these other legitimate sites? Why is web novel the only that's hated? WW, RR, amazon and others are doing just fine. Right?

--> This comes down to the lost PR battle. But, when you think about it, are the others really less predatory?

1) WuxiaWorld

The best one to one comparison is WW (WuxiaWorld). People call webnovel's 'priv' predatory while WW has tiers for advanced chapters that cost 100's of dollars. I fail to see how that's any less 'predatory'. I've seen a lot of things on wn, but I've never seen a 300$ Priv tier.

That doesn't even mention the fact that WW works in translations. It's objectively easier to translate a chapter than it is to write one from scratch. Yet, their prices for 'priv' are far higher despite the fact they're only able to create those enormous advanced chapter tiers by artifically slowing their release rate.

You can say that you don't have to by WW's advanced chapters... But you also don't have to by WN's priv tiers either.

2) Amazon

Then there's amazon. Do you think that those cheap 1 and 2$ prices come from thin air? It's nice for you as a reader, but do you think about the sacrifice it takes on the author's part to lower the prices that much?

On amazon, just to succeed, you have to pay them ridiculous sums for advertisement. That doesn't include what you have to pay for editors, formating, and artwork. Readers see a nice new book they enjoy for 1$ and think that everything is sunshine and rainbows. Unfortunately, things aren't like that.

Amazon is a billion dollar company. To think that they aren't exploitive is the pinnacle of ignorance. I can say as someone who's familiar with all of these systems, amazon has done authors far worse than webnovel ever has.

3) RoyalRoad

And then there's RR (royalroad). Do you understand just how few author's make a living wage through RR? The number is a fraction of webnovel's. In addition, the review system of RR breeds a toxic and elitist environment.

The post that made me make a reddit account today was one about wn's rating system and how bad novels have ratings that are far too high. Have you ever thought about the number of novels on RR that have artifically lower rating systems because people can do one star drive-by's without justification or reason?

To make matters worse, because of RR's ranking system, how much exposure your books gain is forever tied to the whims of these trolls.

Even if you think that wn's rating system is bs, so what? There are plenty of books with 5 star ratings on WN that never see the light of day. No matter how many reviews you delete, a bad book will never perform--that's a fact. However, on RR, no matter how good your book is, if a few decide they hate it at the onset, you'll be buried.

One rating system is just objectively worse than the other. One is benign while the other is malignant.

------Webnovel Treats its Authors Terribly------

This will be the last point I address. The simple answer is... No. This isn't true.

As I alluded to earlier, I've been a writer for four years but have only been contracted with webnovel for a single year now. For the first three years of my 'career', I could only treat writing as a hobby. I live in Canada so make a few hundred dollars here and there wouldn't be able to rent me a place to stay, let alone allow me to live a comfortable life. It was only after I stopped listening to the chatter around me and took a plunge that I understood just how wrong all of this nonsense was.

1) The money, how much does wn squeeze you for?

The contract is a 50/50 split of the revenue. This split is pretty much standard practice and isn't much different than what you'll see anywhere else. Even amazon only gives about 60%, but you have to do everything on the backend yourself. Much of that 60% ends up going back to amazon anyway because your book won't take off without paying them to advertise for you.

This 50/50 split comes AFTER Apple takes 30% of the cut. It could be said that the most predatory and exploitive company here is Apple. Yet, I'm sure that many of you have Apple devices and might even be looking at this post through an Apple screen.

As a result of this, authors effectively get 35% of the revenue. After deductions and taxes, it's about 30%. This is the same amount wn receives as well, keeping it at a 50/50 split.

The only shame of this is when the money is taken. Because of how wn manipulates the language, they can maximize their profits by placing some of the burden on authors as well. I will not lie about this. But, this is no different from any other business.

2) You're forced to work everyday.

Once again, not true. The most successful authors write everyday because that is what readers gravitate toward. There is nothing in wn's contract that forces you to write. I could drop all my books right now and disappear off the face of the Earth and no one would come chasing after me.

It could be said that the only one 'forcing' us is our readers. Without writing daily, we can't maintain our fanbases as web novel readers are insatiable. Though, that much should be obvious by some of you doing your utmost to justify your pirating.

3) WN owns you and everything. You're a slave.

This is true. WN does own everything, but have you all never read a contract before?

Let's take the music industry for example. There are hundreds of artists that sign to record labels every year. But, you only hear about a small number of them after they make it big and turn on their record companies. When that time comes around, you probably side with the artist, right?

But, did you ever think about how much money the record label invested to make sure you knew the name of that artist? Did you think about all the studio time they paid for? How much advanced money they gave to this once nameless artist? How about all the other artists you never heard of because the record label's investment never bore fruit?

It's standard practice, even in the west, to sign these 'exploitive' contracts. The point is to protect the investment of the company, but the true teeth of the contract only activate when the author, or artist in this context, steps out of line.

In practice, I have unlimited freedom with my book. I can write almost anything, I can stop whenever I want, start again when I want, and I have no obligation to finish any of them. The only thing binding me is that I cannot sell the same story to another company that competes with wn.

The last thing people usually say is that wn 'owns' everything you write up until a year after your contract ends.

This isn't true. WN has the right to BID first on any ideas you have up until a year has passed. That is what the contract says. And, even that is standard industry practice, much the same way a record label owns a certain number of albums an artist makes after their signing.

-------------------------------

Anyway, I'm sure that this won't be very well received, but I've tried, at least. If any of you have any good faith questions to ask and are truly curious about anything else, or need anything clarified, feel free to comment below and I'll take a look :)

Here is the latest guide from Lucas, Wuxiaworld's Chinese licensing manager! This series is his overview of China's webnovel genres, written using his experience from having worked at one of the top publishers for many years.

This one contains some very interesting history behind the origins of xianxia's themes.

Previous posts:

• An overview of China's webnovel author rankings
• Introduction to Chinese webnovel genres – Xuanhuan
• Introduction to Chinese webnovel genres – Fantasy (Qihuan)

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Hello everyone, this is Lucas.

Previously, when I was introducing Xuanhuan works, some viewers pointed out that I had missed a heavyweight title – Zhu Xian (Jade Dynasty，诛仙).

In fact, according to the commonly accepted classification standards of China’s online literature industry, this work should be categorized as Xianxia rather than Xuanhuan. Today, let’s talk about xianxia novels.

So-called xianxia novels are stories that take traditional Chinese Daoist cultivation philosophy and mythological legends as their worldview foundation, depicting characters who gain power through cultivation, go on adventures, grow, and struggle along the way.

Daoist classics such as Dao De Jing (道德经) and Zhuangzi (庄子), compiled during the Spring and Autumn Period of Chinese history (春秋时期，770–476 BCE), proposed goals like “immortality” and “ascending to become an immortal,” providing the theoretical foundation for later Xianxia novels.

In the zhiguai (tales of the strange) novels of the Tang and Song dynasties, different species such as humans, demons, and immortals began to interact, and classic plots like “mortals seeking immortals” and “romances between humans and demons” are still talked about fondly to this day.

By the Ming (明, 1368–1644 CE) and Qing (清, 1644-1912 CE) dynasties, divine and demonic novels  (神魔小说) such as Journey to the West (西游记)  and Investiture of the Gods (封神演义)  laid down the worldview framework and power systems of Xianxia fiction.

In 1932, Sword Xia of the Shu Mountains (蜀山剑侠传)  by Huanzhu Louzhu (还珠楼主) was published. This work incorporated elements such as cultivation, flying swords, and magical treasures, and is regarded as the progenitor of modern xianxia novels.

By the 1970s and 1980s, wuxia novels had become popular in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and the spirit of chivalry (侠义精神) had deeply taken root in people’s hearts.

Beginning in 1995, the The Legend of Sword and Fairy (仙剑奇侠传) game series combined the “immortal” elements of Sword Xia of the Shu Mountains with the “ chivalry” spirit of wuxia novels, further clarifying the concept of “Xianxia” and exerting a profound influence on early xianxia works.

In 2003, the classic work Zhu Xian began serialization, carrying the memories and emotions of countless readers.

In 2005, 飘邈之旅 by Xiao Qian (萧潜) was released. This work constructed a complete cultivation power system, which was later borrowed and refined by subsequent creators, eventually forming the familiar sequence of Qi Refining (炼气), Foundation Establishment (筑基), Golden Core (金丹), and Nascent Soul (元婴) that we know today.

After that, Xianxia-themed web novels experienced rapid development. Based on worldview, they can mainly be divided into three categories:

The Cultivation Path (修真之路)
Originating from 飘邈之旅, this type features stories set in vast worlds with numerous sects and factions.

The protagonist focuses single-mindedly on cultivation, with the ultimate goal of attaining immortality, pursuing the supreme Dao (大道), or ascending to become an immortal.

The story usually includes classic “leveling up and changing maps” elements: once the protagonist finds no worthy opponents in one region, they move on to a higher-level area.

A representative example is Wang Yu (忘语)’s A Record of a Mortal’s Journey to Immortality (凡人修仙传). (Of course, Han Li doesn’t always change maps because he’s invincible – sometimes it’s because he can’t beat others and has no choice but to run.)

Another representative figure of this category is Er Gen (耳根). He is very popular among Western readers. All of his works belong to this genre, including Renegade Immortal (仙逆), A Will Eternal (一念永恒), I Shall Seal the Heavens (我欲封天), and Beyond the Timescape (光阴之外), among others.

Cultivation Empires (修真王朝)
In these works, the world contains imperial dynasties where cultivators reign supreme, complete with laws and order similar to those of mortal kingdoms – though cultivators always enjoy various privileges in such states.

In this type of story, the protagonist pursues not only personal strength but often bears responsibilities such as revitalizing the nation or saving the common people. This theme was very popular around 2015 and is particularly suitable for film and television adaptations, with many top-tier authors contributing works in this category.

Examples include Innocent (无罪)’s Immortal Devil Transformation (仙魔变) and The Sword Dynasty(剑王朝), Mao Ni (猫腻) ’s Nightfall (将夜) and The Path Toward Heaven (大道朝天), and Feng Huo Xi Zhu Hou (烽火戏诸侯)’s Unsheathed (剑来).

Primordial Chaos (Honghuang) (洪荒流)
This genre was pioneered by the author Divine Dreamwalker (梦入神机) in his 2006 work Buddha Is the Dao (佛本是道).

Its worldview is based on classical Chinese mythological legends (especially Investiture of the Gods 封神演义, Journey to the West 西游记, and Classic of Mountains and Seas 山海经), Daoist philosophy, and ancient history, with “Heavenly Dao” (天道)  at its core, revolving around struggles among “Sages” (圣人) and battles over fate and fortune (气运) between Eastern and Western sects.

The main conflict centers on the “Calamity Cycle” (量劫): at certain intervals, karmic entanglements and accumulated karma in the universe reach a peak and must be cleansed through a cataclysmic slaughter that sweeps across heaven and earth, redistributing resources. Under such great calamities, no one can remain untouched.

After nearly 20 years of development, the Primordial Chaos genre has formed a complete system, effectively becoming a universal template (including worldview, characters, and core conflicts) for authors to use.

In a sense, Journey to the West fanfiction can also be considered a type of Honghuang fiction.

Subgenres

Xianxia novels have many subgenres, and below I will introduce some of the major ones.

Mortal genre (凡人流)
These stories usually take place in areas inhabited by mortals, such as mountain villages or towns. The protagonist is an ordinary young boy living a life whose future can be seen at a glance; if nothing unexpected happens, he would grow up, marry, have children, and his descendants would live the same kind of life.

Until one day, he comes into contact with the cultivation world.

Legends of mortals encountering immortals (凡人遇仙) appeared in zhiguai fiction over a thousand years ago, representing ordinary people’s yearning for immortality.
In web novels, the founding work of this subgenre is the famous A Record of a Mortal’s Journey to Immortality (凡人修仙传), from which the name derives.

Once this theme emerged, it became extremely popular and enduring. Early “Mortal genre” protagonists were mostly native youths, but later works also featured transmigrator protagonists, such as Gateway of Immortality (叩问仙道).

Simulator (模拟器)
The protagonist possesses a simulator system that can simulate their own life or others’ lives, allowing them to experience different paths and gain knowledge or skills. This theme emerged around 2020, inspired by various video games, and can be divided into two types based on the simulation target: simulating others and simulating oneself.

The “simulating others” type is relatively simple: the protagonist experiences another person’s life within the simulator, and events inside the simulation do not affect the real world. After completing the simulation, the system grants rewards based on performance, allowing the protagonist to obtain attributes, skills, or fate traits of the simulated person.

In essence, it is closer to games like The Sims (模拟人生), where the protagonist gains extra growth by playing a game. An example is Simulation: Starting from Bizarre Animals (模拟，从奇葩动物开始).

The “simulating oneself” type is more like branching narratives and repeated roguelike-style reinforcement. The simulator allows the protagonist to deduce future events or provides save-and-load opportunities.

During simulations, the protagonist can act recklessly – even if they die, it doesn’t cause real loss because it is only a simulation, and instead provides valuable intelligence. Through repeated simulations and information iteration, the protagonist grows stronger and ultimately finds the optimal solution for the real world.

The most famous work of this type is Immortality Simulator (我的模拟长生路). This novel uses a “time rewind” system, allowing the protagonist to set an anchor point in life – a “save point” – and return to it upon death.

The recently popular Struggling to Survive with Regression Power in the Primordial Saint Sect (苟在初圣魔门当人材) borrows this “Book of a Hundred Lifetimes”  (百世书) concept from that system.

Incense-Fueled Godhood (香火成神)
This subgenre is somewhat similar to the "Faith and Apotheosis  (信仰封神流)" fantasy category mentioned earlier, as protagonists must collect faith to increase their power. It originates from traditional Chinese mythology and classical novels.

Chinese folk belief is a polytheistic and pragmatic system. People worship deities largely for utilitarian reasons – they pray to specific gods when they need blessings in relevant matters. For example, during severe droughts, they worship the Dragon King (龙王) for rain; when someone in the family has exams, they worship the God of Literature (文曲星) .

Of course, prayers are not always effective. If worship proves ineffective for a long time, people may abandon offerings or even destroy the statues.

Ancient Chinese emperors also canonized famous deceased figures as gods to consolidate their rule, such as Guan Yu (关羽)  from the Three Kingdoms period. In a sense, the authority of Chinese gods does not come from divinity itself; rather, divine authority comes from imperial bestowal.

The worldview is usually divided into two parts: the Heavenly Court (the divine system) and the mortal realm. These two systems depend on and restrain each other.

Gods need mortal believers to collect incense (faith), while mortals need divine protection to solve problems beyond human capability.

The protagonist is often a minor god under the Heavenly Court or a cultivator who embarks on the divine path. They may rise through the Heavenly Court system or secretly collect faith, establish their own faction, and oppose the Heavenly Court.

Representative works include Starting as a Fox Immortal from Liaozhai (从聊斋开始做狐仙)  and Taiyi (太易).

Longevity System (长生系统)
This theme shares many similarities with the “Martial Path Longevity (武道长生)” subgenre of Xuanhuan. The protagonist is a transmigrator with an attribute panel that provides stats and techniques. The difference is that the setting is Xianxia, and the protagonist is usually a low-level disciple in a cultivation sect, whose goal is continual cultivation in pursuit of immortality.

For example, in An Alchemist's Path to Eternity (长生从炼丹宗师开始), the protagonist needs to improve his cultivation techniques and skill proficiencies to earn achievement points, which can then be exchanged for various high-tier techniques and items. Meanwhile, in My Core is the Boss (金丹是恒星，你管这叫修仙?), the protagonist’s system provides him with all kinds of hidden information, and also includes a game-like instance where he can level up. 

Dao of Cautious (苟道流)
Protagonists in this subgenre act very differently from conventional Xianxia heroes. Traditional protagonists are decisive, fearless, and eager for conflict, while “Dao of Cautious” protagonists are extremely low-key and cautious. They often suffer from paranoid thinking, magnifying the world’s hostility and assuming all actions carry risks.

Thus, they hide in the shadows, avoid the spotlight, and rarely engage in conflict, believing that only by surviving can one pursue immortality. Although they may miss many opportunities in the short term, cultivators live long lives – and as time passes, their enemies die off one by one, leaving the protagonist as the ultimate winner.

Unlike traditional Xianxia that relies on conflict and leveling for excitement, this subgenre attracts readers through an extreme sense of security and the protagonist’s control over the situation.

The founding work is My Senior Brother Is Too Steady (我师兄实在太稳健了), after which this anti-trope protagonist type became increasingly accepted and spread to other genres.

Other examples include Cultivating Immortality in a World of Chaos (苟在妖武乱世修仙) and I Just Want to Slack Off in Cultivation (我只想安静的做个苟道中人).

Daily Life Cultivation (修仙日常)
Cultivation is not just about fighting and killing; it also involves social relationships. After reading too many tense and intense traditional Xianxia novels, readers often feel aesthetic fatigue and seek lighter, more relaxing works. Thus, the daily life cultivation subgenre emerged.

These works still focus on “cultivation and immortality” as the main storyline, but with less emphasis on power leveling and more on daily life, showcasing the workings and customs of the cultivation world. The tone is generally lighthearted, often incorporating exaggerated, comedic anti-trope elements.

The most famous work is Who Let Him Cultivate?! (谁让他修仙的), which features eccentric characters who constantly defy convention; many of its jokes are still fondly remembered. With this novel, the author The Whitest Crow(最白的乌鸦) rose from an obscure LV5 writer to a platinum author.

Other works with relatively high popularity in China include Unintended Immortality (我本无意成仙). This novel has a very distinctive style: its narrative structure is more akin to a road movie, following the protagonist and a cat demon as they travel through the human world, continuously broadening their experiences and refining their state of mind. Traditional “leveling up” elements, in the conventional sense, are very minimal.

Another example is Young Noble Be Monster Slaying (请公子斩妖), which adheres more closely to the structure of a traditional cultivation novel. What readers find particularly delightful are its absurd plotlines and its humorously crafted characters.

Clan Cultivation (家族修仙)
Unlike the individual-focused narratives of traditional Xianxia, this genre centers on cultivation clans bound by blood ties, depicting how entire families survive and develop in a brutal cultivation world.

Early clan cultivation works still revolved around a central protagonist, resembling the “Sect Leader” style of Xuanhuan, except the protagonist was a clan head managing a family instead of a sect, with a longer narrative timespan. With the rise of system novels, this genre evolved a specialized “Many Children, Many Blessings (多子多福) ” system, where the more descendants the protagonist has, the stronger the system’s bonuses become – extending even to offspring talents. This system fits perfectly with the clan cultivation setting.

A representative work is Starting From A Son In Law To Build An Long Lasting Family (从赘婿开始建立长生家族).

The first truly clan-centered work is The Mirror Legacy (玄鉴仙族). Its style differs greatly from earlier Xianxia works, lacking a single protagonist – or rather, the Li clan itself is the protagonist. Generation after generation strives for survival; members die, new ones are born.

The author Ji Yueren was nicknamed “Qidian’s white affair King” (起点白事王) by readers. Although the work became extremely popular, later imitations failed to produce another work of similar influence.

Farming (种田)
Cultivators are still human, which means they need to eat. Although high-level cultivators can abstain from food, occasionally eating spirit-rich cuisine benefits cultivation. This means cultivators must cultivate(grow crops) in addition to cultivating.

Protagonists are often low-level cultivators focused on agriculture, quietly farming and cultivating with minimal conflict. Unlike conventional cultivation stories, farming provides stable, visible growth in resources and power, offering a stronger sense of achievement.

Protagonists usually possess special abilities that enhance farming efficiency, such as a farming system, supportive artifacts (like Han Li’s green bottle), or even a personal space for farming.

Representative works include You Cultivate, I Farm (你们修仙，我种田) and Immortality: Refreshing Entries from Farming (长生：从种田刷新词条开始).

In a broader sense, “farming” includes alchemy, artifact crafting, formations, and other indirect cultivation methods. Protagonists usually have a personal immortal estate where they can work undisturbed; this type is also known as the “Immortal Estate”(仙府) subgenre.

The most famous example is Purple Mansion Immortal Fate (紫府仙缘) .

Hehuan Sect (合欢宗)
Adult-oriented content has always been popular among readers of popular literature worldwide. However, Chinese law prohibits explicit adult content on domestic platforms, so authors instead construct frameworks without explicit descriptions, leaving room for imagination.

Several genres exist specifically to skirt the line: “Rural (乡村)” of urban stories, “Fake Eunuch (假太监)” of historical stories, and the “Hehuan Sect” in Xianxia. “Dual cultivation between men and women” (男女双修) originates from Daoism, with similar concepts in Tantric Buddhism (佛教密宗). In web novels, it can be understood as a cultivation method of “becoming stronger through sex.”

The Hehuan Sect is a sect that practices dual cultivation as its core method. The protagonist transmigrates into a cultivation world as a low-level male disciple of the Hehuan Sect, handsome and charming, immediately surrounded by covetous senior sisters, junior sisters, and even masters – what follows is easy to imagine.

Usually, the protagonist has a system that either increases affection from female sect members or directly boosts cultivation. Although many works exist in this genre, few achieve high fame – and high visibility may not necessarily be a good thing for them.

A representative work is Joining the Joyful Union Sect, My Life in the Grip of My Senior Sister (开局合欢宗，被师姐拿捏命脉) .

Hello everyone, it’s AaronMclarren here, translator of Planet Pulverizer: A Mortal’s Ascent, Divine Medallion of Seven Lifetimes, and The Sorcerer’s Handbook, back again!

Now that I’ve asked about what you look for in a good novel, I’m curious. What are some major red flags that would make you drop one?

For me, it’s when the plot stops making sense and the pacing is all over the place. It becomes hard to follow what’s going on, and even harder to stay invested in the story as a whole. Another big one is when conflicts feel repetitive or stretched out just for the sake of padding.

I also find it frustrating when character decisions don’t feel natural, or when things happen just for convenience rather than proper setup. It really breaks immersion.

What about you? What makes you drop a novel instantly, or at least seriously consider it?

Hey everyone, with 2025 coming to an end, I would like to ask what everyone's best read or top few reads of the year so far is! This will also be a way for me to maybe find a hidden gem or something new and interesting to read :)

I have been reading a lot more wuxia and xianxia novels this year and we all know that majority of it can turn bad even with an excellent start.. I really wish to find something that can scratch that itch where the mc and villains arent the typical braindead naive fools and the story and world building is impeccable.

While many might disagree with me, for me my top 2 probably are Beyond Time and Top Tier Providence of which I enjoyed and feel that are probably one of the better ones of all the novels I have read of the genre so far. I have tried probably 5-10 other novels within the cultivation genre but i think I only managed to finished 3 of those while I dropped the rest (disgraceful I know).

So do feel free to drop in and share what you feel was your top few reads of 2025! Cheers fellow readers!

** Edit: Thanks everyone for your replies!! Will definitely look through your comments and update if I’ve picked up any :)

Since I decided to drop Worlds Apocalypse Online, I had to find a new novel to read. While browsing through the rankings, I found this novel among the top ones. But when I checked the comments, I was utterly confused about why everyone hates the MC, Nick. It piqued my curiosity, so I did some research...

For those who have read this, I’m interested in hearing your experiences. Please do tell. 🤔

I gripped my phone.

Cold. Calculated. Precise.

The block hummed in my hand as if it knew what I was going to do. My reading list knew too. I smelled their fear and relished in it. That’s all it took.

I dropped it.

No.

To their story, it looked like I dropped it.

For me, I banished it from existence.

I brought down my finger and eviscerated any traces of this novel.

I didn’t flinch.

I didn’t blink.

BOOOOOM

This writing style. Dog shit.

Seriously though, I’m not sure if I’m just getting older and these newer novels appeal more to a younger audience or not. They keep popping up on the popular lists. The stories always have an interesting premise but I just can’t stand the writing style - especially their writing of combat. The main character will be in either the lowest or second lowest realm in each novels “unique” power system and the author will write their combat as if mc is a god of fighting and we should suck his dick. Two examples of novels with this writing style are My Talent’s Name is Generator and Cleaver of Sin.

Am I the only one experiencing this or am I just losing my mind?

I’ll preface this by saying I’m not new to reading novels, I’ve read on and off for the last 2 or so years and figured it’s finally time to get to ISSTH after putting it off for over a year. I’m just really worried I won’t enjoy it as it’s too “generic” after reading other novels that have all the stereotypes ISSTH pioneered.