Hello, I love this story, and seeing I had a book review assignment for my freshman class, I decided to write a review on this. I also decided it was also fitting to put my review here seeing as I already wrote one. So, here it is: (Please don't mind my writing skills, still an Hschool student.) The first work of the author, Arkinslize, The Oracle Paths is a fantastic apocalyptic science fiction story. Currently, at 295 chapters, The Oracle Paths has a diverse cast of characters and world-building the likes of which I have yet to see before. World building may be an understatement considering the story is based around multiple universes. The main character of the tale, Jake is an average man who works at a VR retail shop in the year 2106. Orphaned at a young age, Jake goes about his days with repetitiveness until something drastically changes. The story has just the right pace and slows down a bit here and there for the sake of constructing the giant universe. The novel rarely lingers on plot points to the point of excruciation like many novels tend to do. The character building is quite intense and connects you to the characters in many different ways. I have loved some characters and hated some, but I can appreciate the way Arkinslize has built them, all the same. Each character is intricately built to fit each character archetype. A character, Tim, for example, is a frail child that I thought on multiple occasions would be removed considering the apocalypse genre, yet he has found his own way to stay that doesn’t seem like plot armor, which is rare. Another character seemed an ally at first but with the ‘cruel’ actions they committed, the main character showed his moral boundaries which helped with the character progression of the ‘ally’ and the MC. Many people on the site that I read this on complained about the pace of the novel. While I can admit that pace can be slower than many novels of the same type, you have to realize that in exchange for a somewhat slower pace, the world-building is better than any form of media I’ve ever seen. I feel connected to not only the characters but the entire world itself, this novel does better than any giving you ways to visualize the story as it goes on. This unique novel is a construction of science fiction, wuxia/xianxia, and system story types. The unique construction of these ideas may seem an unlikely one, but a very well put together piece nonetheless. If you are a fan of any of these types of stories or just good world-building in general, I strongly recommend this novel to you.
