Well, to be honest, I just want to let you guys know my true feeling. This is the best novel that I have ever read in my entire life. My life changed since the moment I read this novel.

For a very long time, I struggled, struggled so hard to find the correct path of my life. What kind of man I want to become. But now, it's clear, thank to this novel.

Guys, I was a useless, hopeless man. A coward who was lack of will to do anything. I was always stop in the middle, not able to achieve anything I desire.

Maybe you guys will laugh at me if you know I smiled but also cried a lot while reading this novel. The main character always put all of his effort into all things he do. But why, me, never able to give my best into things I want to achieve?. It's ridiculous to compare a fiction-character with a real person right? But let just say I did that, because I am s*upid and naive person. Hehehe.

And I realized the reason why he could try his best, tried everyday without stopping. It was because his strong desire. But, I have no desire. I have no desire girls (I am not gay lol), no desire for wealth, no desire for anything. I have no goals and I threw away my life and let the whole universe decide it for me. I realized how he could win people's heart. It was because he gave away his care, love, and all of him. We can only receive respect and love from people if we give them our love and respect first, isn't it?

'I don't need your acknowledgement, but I do need you'. Said by him. That sentence shocked me greatly. Roan himself is not a genius. He know that. Therefore, he need people to go with him. His people is his strongest weapon.

After witness so many his victories, in the first time of my life, I finally had a desire. It was to become a hero like him. A s*upid, naive kid want to become a hero. Hahaha, it's like daydreaming right? I know, but please let me live in my delusion.

Through him, I learnt a lot of things and I tried hard to achieve them.

..... And many many things more.

Thank to him, I was able to try harder and achieve results. I'm having a job, it's not really good but it can give me a freely life without too much worrying about bills. And I will try to have the better and better job in future. Although I only made some friends but I completely trust and love them. Fortunately, they also love and respect me back.

Yeh... There are a lot of thing that I still need to learn from him. To become a great man like him.

Dear author, you might not realize it but your novel saved my life.

****

This is the journey of 22 year old kid who try to become a great man like his fiction-idol.

Thank for reading.

09/04/2023:

I couldn't figure out how to write another review so I will add some updates to my current one. To be honest, I shocked to see my review receive such likes. I appreciate all people here because you guys listened to my long story. I received countless direct messengers to my box because of this review. However, I didn't read any novels after "I am the monarch" anymore. Therefore, I couldn't reply to all people in time.

Five years are not long but they are still a considerable time for a kid to grow up. The naive kid who wanted to be/become Roan, his fiction idol, now gains some achievements in his life. He comes from Vietnam, a small and developing country. Although the average salary of people here is not high, he can earn +$2.500 / month because of his endlessly continuous efforts. This salary is not high in powerful countries such as US, EU, Russia... However, it is something worth to be proud in small ones. When he wanted to give up and lie down, he asked himself:

"Hey, what will Roan do in this situation?" "Hey, Roan is humble although he achieved many things then I don't allow any space for my arrogance".

Then after having such questions, the kid stood up again and kept trying again.

He learned many things from his fiction idol.

He mimicked Roan and learned to put his care, love and respect to other people while developing all virtues he found in his fiction idol. Because that is the only way for him to become Roan. Day after day and time pass, his appearance change dramatically. His weight increase from 40kg (at the age of 22/23) to 72kg due to countless training, push ups, swimming and calisthenics. He was skinny and now he is muscular. He even has 6 abs in his belly :D

Thank to those changes in Appearance (this gives Health to work effectively) and Personality, his career soar up as he inherit "hardworking", "ambition", etc... characteristics from his idol. He become attractive and charming in other people eyes without realizing. However, after he told his girlfriend all the story, she was curious and found this novel to read.

"Hey, you really look like him. No, you really become him". Said by his girlfriend.

He startled for a moment. At that time, he realized he was born again, he was resurrected.

P/s: Thank you, author. I once appreciated you because you saved my life.

Now I bow my head to you because you gave me another life, a beautiful resurrection.

Thank you for writing this novel. Thank you for creating me.

Review as of chapter 12:

So far the novel has been good, its about a soldier with giant lips (seriously MC bites his lower lips like 4 times per chapter) that dreamed to be a commander for 20 years and gets killed and wakes up when he was a fresh recruit, the setting seems to be like those medieval stories but so far they haven't mentioned adventurers or any other kind of deterrent against monsters (orcs, goblins, etc), these few episodes deserve a 5 star but idk about the future.. Lets see

Review as of chapter 95:

The story is still solid but now it took a turn and seems more like kingdom building, nothing too extreme yet but he is trying to build something alike.

The characters stopped biting their lips btw now they have red light/flames in their eyes.. So now u have this bunch of cyclops from xmen wandering around.. This novel is still a 5 star

Its an okay series if you can look past its two major flaws:

This story worked okay for me on the small-scale, but the larger in scale it gets, the more incomprehensibly dumb it gets.

Everything always works out perfectly for the MC, even large-scale combat. You know the maxim, "No plan survives contact with the enemy"? Not if you're this MC, whose enemies might as well be following scripted AI you've fought a thousand times before the way they literally never do anything the MC didn't predict 5 months ago. MC is carrying out ridiculously elaborate tactics that would never work in a million years, and his enemy is all, "well, we're going to ambush the MC in a narrow valley, but we won't bother to take the high ground because, gosh, what would be the point and gosh it'll be so surprising when this becomes one of many factors that makes us lose this nonsensical battle later". I don't know what the hell is wrong with this world, because that's been basic military strategy for valley ambushes for longer than history has existed. Not that anything else in battles ever makes sense. Nobody has ever heard of keeping a reserve. It's completely unclear what the cavalry or archers are doing once the battle is joined. Armies fight basically to the last man instead of the 5-10% casualty rate in real life. Generalship is essentially nonexistent, nor is there any apparent form of communication between parts of the army. Armies are ridiculously large for how unstructured they are. His casualty rate is disgustingly, enormously large in any case yet his soldiers are completely 100% loyal, when any sane man would have deserted after their first fight.

His medieval intelligence network works a hundred times better than the multi-billion intelligence network the CIA has today backed up by dozens of satellites, thousands of agents, and computerized databases and modeling. Somehow, his spymaster/logistics/jesus druid can keep track of the entire kingdom down to the last conversation. Who literally showed up on his doorstep and asked to work for him.

Fear of the unknown? No problem, not only does he remember every event in intricate, incredible detail despite being barely literate, he obtains a guy with psychic powers who can instantly tell if anything bad or good is going to happen well before it ever does, by random stumbling upon him as a guard in the enemy nation, who joins him because his psychic powers tell him he'll jizz harder than he's ever jizzed before if he brownnoses the MC for the rest of his life.

Fear of betrayal? No problem. The kingdom's princess falls in love with him because he's a dashing young illiterate bum, and she also has psychic powers, able to instantly tell whether anybody is good or evil. Not that it matters, because, miraculously, every single one of the MC's henchmen and stoogies is a good guy. Except one, maybe. Also, she's probably the secret greatest merchant that ever lived. Of course.

Greatest spearman that ever lived? Actually totally part of his first unit he met in bootcamp. All his super top-notch commanders? Random militia bumf*cks also in his first unit, who miraculously have the capability to be top generals if they only had the chance.

He has literally never met a single competent person who opposed him and wasn't capital E-Evil. It's like, look, sometimes, in stories that aren't shit, you meet guys who are every bit as good as you or better who neither want to blow you or rip off your limbs and feed you to the pigs. A lot of times, smart, clever, skilled, important people have better things to do than to wrap their lips around the c*ck of a random bumblef*ck upjumped militia grunt, even if he has miraculously become a low-tier noble.

While we're at it, MC is an enormous hypocrite. Several times he's judging people as miserable pieces of tr*sh because he knows in the future they'll betray the kingdom. Except that's literally his plan. He wants to be king. And that's not going to happen quietly following the current royalty. There is never any sense he detects the obvious problem with him judging people on their loyalty here.

Then there's the inanity of the economics at work here. He tells his soldiers to give their hard-earned money to the poor, and they do it. In any sensible universe, this would have been basically completely wasted, as a petty lordling is hardly going to make a dent in the needy of the capital city, but somehow it all works out, and everybody thinks he's the greatest guy ever. Did I mention none of his soldiers ever get angry or r*pe or pillage or kill, because, he's such a good guy, so are his soldiers? Except when he's actually executing all the enemy soldiers to the last man, EVEN WHEN THEY'RE THE SOLDIERS OF HIS OWN LAND. Yeah, that'll endear him to the populace. Like, he's doing this to his own future knights, and that of the neighboring fief, and the author is treating it like genius strategy. Hilariously, this is just after he gets super mad and judgy about the bad guy treating villagers badly. Somehow this is okay, because this is the battlefield. No, I'm pretty sure the king and the nobles will be at least a little pissed at you for executing the enemy to the last man when the "enemy" are their own bannermen and they're kind of pissed at your side for starting the war in the first place. I've given up on this. It's clear the author has absolutely no idea how to write the MC running any sort of enterprise, and the larger in scope it gets, the worse it gets. Since his plan is to run a whole kingdom and actually the world, it's going to get incredibly s*upid and I don't want to watch this trainwreck any longer.

I mean, other than all that, it's okay.

FINALLY! A time-related/reincarnation story that has actual butterfly effect. Although some novels depict this phenomenon as well, most of them are just bad, negligible, or "doesn't matter because I reincarnated and I know everything". While this novel is not perfect, it is better than most cultivation/power-up stories.

This novel starts with the typical "I know what happened at X time, and what would happen next at X time, and so on...", but later on, the butterfly effects are slowly shown, and they are clearly TOLD and SHOWN. The deviation on the events are clearly differentiated, and some of them even affects major characters' decisions and actions. These deviations, so far, are not just some pebbles on the road but acts as tests for the MC's capabilities. There are also

Spoiler

casualties (although only 1 so far IIRC)

which indicates that he is no god, that not everything is going to go according to plan, and that just because he reincarnated, he can now magically save everyone.

Oh yeah, did I mention told and shown? Yes, the author tells and shows the story. Although not perfect, but still way better than most similar themed novels. The problem with most novels I read is that they TELL TOO MUCH without showing just much.

Ex:

Narration: This MC is super strong. He is 1000+ years old. Peak existence. Uber cool dude. Number 1 public figure. Definitely not a petty person.

MC: I f*** ur mom last night!

*brain fart*

Me: Well f*** me.

The story so far is simple and easy to follow, granted that there are just tens of chapters released, but it is getting more interesting and that the potential is good in this one. It is still in the relatively early parts of the story, but dry and wet sh*t are already starting to get thrown at the MC. I just wish that the author can maintain or even improve the quality throughout the remainder of the novel.

Another good thing is that some things are IMPLICITLY narrated, to allow us readers to use our brain work even if just a little. Unlike some novels, where the authors assume that the readers have potatoes as brains, and that we need to be constantly reminded which way is left and which way is right.

FINALLY! A time-related/reincarnation story that has actual butterfly effect. Although some novels depict this phenomenon as well, most of them are just bad, negligible, or "doesn't matter because I reincarnated and I know everything". While this novel is not perfect, it is better than most cultivation/power-up stories.

This novel starts with the typical "I know what happened at X time, and what would happen next at X time, and so on...", but later on, the butterfly effects are slowly shown, and they are clearly TOLD and SHOWN. The deviation on the events are clearly differentiated, and some of them even affects major characters' decisions and actions. These deviations, so far, are not just some pebbles on the road but acts as tests for the MC's capabilities. There are also

Spoiler

casualties (although only 1 so far IIRC)

which indicates that he is no god, that not everything is going to go according to plan, and that just because he reincarnated, he can now magically save everyone.

Oh yeah, did I mention told and shown? Yes, the author tells and shows the story. Although not perfect, but still way better than most similar themed novels. The problem with most novels I read is that they TELL TOO MUCH without showing just much.

Ex:

Narration: This MC is super strong. He is 1000+ years old. Peak existence. Uber cool dude. Number 1 public figure. Definitely not a petty person.

MC: I f*** ur mom last night!

*brain fart*

Me: Well f*** me.

The story so far is simple and easy to follow, granted that there are just tens of chapters released, but it is getting more interesting and that the potential is good in this one. It is still in the relatively early parts of the story, but dry and wet sh*t are already starting to get thrown at the MC. I just wish that the author can maintain or even improve the quality throughout the remainder of the novel.

Another good thing is that some things are IMPLICITLY narrated, to allow us readers to use our brain work even if just a little. Unlike some novels, where the authors assume that the readers have potatoes as brains, and that we need to be constantly reminded which way is left and which way is right.

Personally, I think Release That Witch is much superior (in both writing and translation), but this is nice, too.

Since the translator for RTW is out due to his personal circumstances, I ended up reading this in English, even though I already read this in Korean.

I'll try to be as fair as possible on this review...

Overall:

Pros:

Cons:

Spoiler

The translator uses the term "ghost of the battlefield", but that really didn't sound right. Personally, II would translate it as the "devil of the battlefield"

EDIT: I've caught up to the most recent chapter (c148). And honestly, I would now rate this 3 star, as the story is very bland and boring. No drama, no real danger, just pub-stomp. This is especially a big problem since the setting of this novel was already shallow to begin with. It's all just "MC went here and he did this. He then went here and did this, and earned this reward." I mean... it's been like this for the past 100 chapters now, so I think there is some problem here. I'm dropping it here.

Really s*upid the way it is written. Half of the chapter is basically "aah" and "ooh" and "hiss". It should be titled "I am Moaning". S*upid as how MC is worshipped and how dense people are around him. Just the style of writing ruined this story for me.

Could have been interesting if the writing style wasn't so poor.

What the hell is even wrong with these "Bastards" and "Ah...". It's like they know no other way to express themself, it's so annoying, let alone those "Dududududu" onomatopeias which are immersion breaking. And it's not just once or twice, they are very common and are present at every chapter. A sentence like "we heard horses footsteps" is enough. No need to mimick the onomatopeias, we're reading, not watching an anime.

About the story, it's a reincarnation cliché style story, where the MC is OP as fk, knows the future and blablabla. Everything that happens to the MC has an immediate use. The story has no depth with a really shallow world building.

It's supposed to be a war/kingdom building novel, but seriously, every single character is here only to emphasize Roan, the protagonist. They either belong to the amazed audience ("Ah...") or either to the side of antagonists whose only purpose is to get destroyed by Roan. No side character has any use nor character development. They just stand still and wait for Roan to do the job. AYE ! What's the use of introducing them then ???

In the end, this story could have been great if the author didn't have such a poor vocabulary and if the story didn't have such a straight story line where everything is in the range of our expectation. It's only but slightly better than the average novel, so I can't understand why it has such high rating.

Standard time-travel novel. More of the same, but lacks in-depth content and finesse.

There've already been so many reviews, I'll just point out the obvious flaws.

(1) A dumbed-down version of the kingdom-building genre

Newbie concepts of warfare/tactics/stratagems/logistics. I know Koreans don't traditionally do kingdom-building genres, even the best they had was styled after gameplay-mechanics (Legendary Moonlight Sculptor). But this is REALLY BAD.

It makes it worse if you've read all the other better kingdom-building novels, such as "Release that Witch", "The Amber Sword", "Overlord", etc.

(2) All friendlies/enemies are dumb

Nobody in the entire world has any concept of how to conduct a war, even experienced veterans.

Nobody knows how to stand in formation, nobody knows how to scout, conduct intelligence activities, defend, perform guerrilla tactics, perform cartography, etc. The Kingdom doesn't even know what villages they have in their borders.

And yet, somehow there's supposed to be a great Renaissance/Golden Age of development and warfare within the next 20 yrs , and so the MC cheats by using foreknowledge to gain an advantage. REALLY? Author clearly has no idea how civilizations and technological progress develops, and never read any books on military history.

Even in our current age, just because people didn't have the internet 20 yrs ago doesn't mean they were idiots. These nonsensical scenarios seem to be built from very s*upid Hollywood-perspectives, like Mel Gibson's portrayal of the American Civil War ("The Patriot"), where soldiers could only stand in line formation and shoot at each other. And Mel Gibson was somehow the only genius to ambush officers and hide in the woods.

FYI that NEVER happened. Line formation was a last tactic used, people were always shooting from cover, and charges only happened from flanking positions and when they had numerical superiority.

(3) Therefore... it's Shounen , and a weak one.

The low-level plot and overly simplistic content makes it feel like it was written by a teenager, for teenagers. MC reverted back to being 18 yrs old, which clearly states the author's intended audience.

I don't know why people called it seinen.

It's not impressive even judged on the level of shounen. There's no character growth at all, it's just a story about a middle-aged man who got a chance to relive his life and seize opportunities he missed, a pathetic wish-fulfillment type story . It's not for anything significant like saving the human race, or any greater good.