The Spring 2023 Light Novel Guide

Only the Villainous Lord Wields the Power to Level Up

What's It About? 

Ryuichi Hasegawa, the top player in a strategic medieval RPG, is granted a special “bonus” by the developer and reincarnated into the game world—not as the protagonist, but as the villainous lord Erhin Eintorian who dies in the prologue!

This means Erhin's survival is a race against time, for his domain is set to be invaded by a hostile foreign power in just one day. In order to save himself, Erhin must use the leveling system that only he can access and his knowledge of the game to prepare his forces. The only hitch, of course, is that there's no way a villainous lord left a functioning military at his disposal! Can Erhin forestall the tragic fate scripted for him, or is he doomed to play out his own demise?

Only the Villainous Lord Wields the Power to Level Up has a story by Waruiotoko, and art by raken. English translation by Sean McCann. J-Novel Club, $7.99 digital. Available May 17.

Is It Worth Reading?

Rebecca Silverman

Rating:

Although it may feel like taking the easy way out, this book can be best summarized by saying, "If you like the genre, you'll like it. If you don't, you won't." That's not really a condemnation of what is a perfectly fine story. Ryuichi, the protagonist, finds himself in a position most similar to the one the heroine finds herself in the manhwa Villains are Destined to Die: he has to make it through a game as the antagonist and do his level best not to die. In Ryuichi's case, it's less about being reincarnated and more about accepting a bonus for being the top-ranked player in Japan. His task is to make sure that the bad guy, Erhin, lives past the prologue and to do that, he'll essentially live a VR version of the RPG. The good news? He has access to in-game systems. The bad? Yeah, he's still widely recognized as the villain, and that's a major handicap to work under.

The writing itself is fine, and if it doesn't take many (or any) risks, it at least does a competent job with the basics. While it may feel odd that the other characters truly feel like "characters" rather than "people," it works decently enough with the novel's concept that it is not immediately off-putting. There isn't much to say about this book, other than it is okay and very comfortable within the confines of its prescribed genre. If you want to read another iteration of the "trapped in a game" version of isekai, this does it just fine.