The Magic Brawler: A LitRPG Adventure

The Magic Brawler, Book 1

By: Hunter Mythos

Narrated by: Amir Abdullah

Length: 10 hrs and 17 mins

Publisher's summary

Urmatia needs heroes.

In a world of interactive game stats, gods speaking through a System, weapon arts, magic cores, and supernatural creatures, the balance has been tilted. Vicious monsters and widespread mists plague the lands. Nefarious gods and villainous agents work in concert to bring ruin.

Urmatia needs heroes. That's where John comes in. He's a young boxer who died in one world and got a second chance to help a new one. It's a hard responsibility. Everything has a cost. But when other heroes crumble, John raises his fist, ready for more.

The System is XP and level-up based. The unique part is the System-based abilities that can be learned through the collection of magic cores, little orbs that have magical abilities, and weapon arts—a person has certain weapons that match them. There are quests, individual achievements, stats to gain, and recognition by the System for providing the greatest service/efforts during mass party quests, and more.

©2023 Hunter Mythos (P)2024 Podium Audio

decent

i was enjoying the story but the mc is just too much of an idiot for my taste and i just couldn't take it anymore when he encounters victor and honestly the author made him too much of a goodie two shoes/lawful good for him to end the life of a non-monster so ill save my disappointment and just drop it

Good start

This book was a great start to an unconventional little. I'm interested in seeing how the character development matures in the next books.

I would recommend for the simple fact that the narrator was god tier

the world is interesting, it a big slower paced but the protagonist was a breathe of fresh air from the zero to hero stories. he feels like a normal athlete in this isekai like world. 4/5

It's okay with criticism

First, spoiler warning, some examples may be used from the story. I will try to keep them to a minimum.

I’ll start with the criticism.

The characters have interactions and reactions to their environment and each other that often hurts the verisimilitude of the story. It also tends to expose the author as someone who lacks experience in these situations and is likely writing from knowing fictional tropes, etc. For example.

A reviewer on Amazon pointed this out, so credit where credit’s due, but the MC, John Wright, is a tall, muscular (even when he’s in a slump), handsome guy. Not only that, but he’s also a well-known boxer in his area. All those things will make anyone think twice about “bullying” him it’ll also make John process this interaction differently. He wouldn’t process it like someone who’s been bullied or even being bullied and would more than likely just see the other man as some kind of threat. This happened and was believable when John considered the ramifications of getting in a fight with the man and that doing that would be a threat of everything he worked hard for despite his current slump.

Yet, since I guess a collection of LitRPG readers probably like to self-insert and/or probably can only empathize with a character with some type of “loser traits” then the author wanted to make John relatable. So, John starts off in a zero-not-zero state. As someone also black like the MC, I don’t want to get into the “us versus them” mentality and all that, but I can’t help but point out that there would also be some cultural aspects to this situation as well. While yes, we do have bullies and bully each other, but it’s often not in the form you see in stories and movies aimed at children, teenagers, and young adults. While sure, there’s some of that there. Mean girl behavior and physical stuff for the boys, it’s just not like you see in popular culture.

With that said. I just don’t think neither of the men would’ve acted the way Mythos wrote. John wouldn’t have been thinking that way, yes, even if he was in a mental slump. His antagonist wouldn’t have sat there while John ignored him for all that time. This goes back to what I said about this exposing Mythos as possibly never being in a physical or verbal altercation with another male or anyone for that matter. Also, someone trained to fight like John would be the least likely to throw the first punch simply because a girl was present. I mean up until that point as I said, he was trying to avoid the fight BECAUSE HE WAS A TRAINED BOXER and yet all of a sudden it takes one more metaphorical poke from the “bully’ for John to throw the first punch?

What I’m getting at is that the starting scene would’ve worked better (to me and people who grew up like me, and probably a lot of athletes, especially trained fighters, and definitely guys who are tall, handsome, and know how to handle themselves in a fight) if John and his antagonist had some previous beef with each other and the antagonist sought to take advantage of John’s slump. It would’ve also worked better if John acted like his personality and someone with his background led you to believe he would’ve acted. But I have to admit how it played out is realistic contrary to popular social-political talking points. We (young black men) do end up statistics at the hands of other young black men. I’ll leave it at that.

Another area the author does this is with the love interest. Yes, for those of you who absolutely hate romance in these types of stories, well there it is. It’s there. But why am I criticizing how the author handled it? Well, the MFC later in the story finally reveals more details about her background. Suffice to say, she’s an experienced manipulator. She knows how to wear faces (act really well) to get close to guys who are her targets. Yet, even after this reveal, she’s still looking away shyly when John gives her an offhand compliment or does anything remotely close to them being in a somewhat intimate relationship. Prior to this reveal, her behavior was fine because you can backtrack from the reveal and tell yourself she was putting on an act, but after it, she should’ve matured up real fast for more reasons than one. The author has her drop a line about how all the faces she wears are the real her, which is fine, but it leads to the point that her character should’ve had a significant shift in maturity levels. Yet, the author wanted to write her as if she was some character without any of this experience or any real interaction with others due to her behavior and responses.

Two final criticisms. One, you can tell this is one of Mythos’ first writing attempts. I’ll leave it at that. Two, the story ends on a relative cliffhanger and Mythos has produced several other books but I see no Book 2 for this one on Amazon. I purchased it because the premise and MC interested me over his other two books. John is a fighter, tall, etc. I wasn’t interested, at the moment, in shorter, smaller MCs.

With that said, my positives.

I liked the fact John isn’t a sociopath who doesn’t empathize with or care about others. I like the fact that he’s a reluctant aspirational hero who leans into being heroic and saving others and trying to do the right thing no matter what. A reviewer hated this and gave the story a negative review for it, so let this be a warning to you, if you’re the type of reader/listener who wants a sociopathic, non-caring, obsessed with getting stronger for selfishness (or whatever flimsy justification) sake, then John is not the MC for you. I’m reluctant to call him lawful good as we’ve yet to see how he would actually deal with non-monster villains contrary to what some negative reviews have claimed.

I’m fine with a character having a no-kill philosophy so long as it’s a reasonable one and said character can recognize when it’s proper to take down a villain once and for all. Again, this story doesn’t fully get into John dealing with non-human villains. There’s some brief interaction with one, but circumstances in the story prevent John and party from actually fully getting into it with them. So, once again, if you’re the type of reader/listener who just wants your MC to go full murderhobo on anyone who slights them, this might not be for you. However, should Mythos write book 2 and force John to foolishly ignore the threat and foolishly, like some American superheroes, have a hard line drawn in the sand no-kill rule which ignores the fact that each time they let a dangerous villain go, they are also contributing to the harm said villain would do in the future, then yeah, I will criticize that.

John is not the only OP person in the world. There’s people more powerful than him. I get bored with stories where the MC goes from someone with no power to nigh-godlike within the span of a few chapters. While John is obviously stronger and more powerful than his immediate party members and while, yes, some of the fights he has with monsters that in-story-universe are considered big bads are resolved somewhat easily, everything doesn’t go his way all of the time.

With all that said, this was my first time listening to a story narrated by Amir Abdullah. While he didn’t do anything to push me out of the story, I feel that, as it is with any solo narrator, he needs to work on his female voices or work with a female narrator. For example, the aforementioned MFC, he didn’t do a good job whereas other female characters he handled better.

Overall, I don’t think Magic Brawler was a bad story. It kept me entertained. I’d be interested in checking out book 2 to see where Mythos takes this story, however, seems the author has put more time into his other two series, unfortunately.

JOHN THE BRAWLER!

Hunter Mythos has quickly became one of my favorite authors.. i love the story he fleshed out.. from this to Jay and the divinity system and rouge ascension next week.. bruh!

CHANGE THE NARRATOR!!!!!!!!!

I've listened to all of the authors other available books, and I'm a huge fan. This book was just ok. Not because the writing or story was sub par, but because the narrator is trash. He can't do female voices to save his life. Doesn't even try for one of the main characters. "She said dryly" doesn't mean she sounds like a man. I have high hopes for this author. Hopefully he gets a new narrator moving forward. Like seriously, get somebody different. Bring back the guy who did the Gravity and Divinity books, or even the guy you have for Rogue Ascension, this guy is going to be the reason this book does poorly.

trash. don't waste you time

the story is meh. the writing. not even close to the level of he who fights with monsters or primal hunter.