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Shade's First Rule (Divine Apostasy Book 1) by [A. F. Kay]

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A. F. Kay

Shade's First Rule (Divine Apostasy Book 1) Kindle Edition

by A. F. Kay (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

857 ratings

Book 1 of 6: Divine Apostasy

in Teen & Young Adult Martial Arts eBooks

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A new Fantasy LitRPG world has arrived!

It's Ruwen's Ascension Day, and he finally dies for the first time. His newly revived body can learn Spells and Abilities for the Class given him by the Goddess Uru, and dying is no longer permanent.

Ruwen's high intelligence makes becoming a Mage inevitable. With his new powers, he will locate his parents and clear their family name. But nothing goes as Ruwen imagined, and when a rival God tries to kill Ruwen shortly after his disastrous Ascension, his focus turns from his future to just surviving.

His choices place him in the middle of an ancient war, and he must overcome the limitations of his unexpected Class to reach level five. Only then will he have the tools needed to survive. But dying now comes with a terrible penalty, and failing Uru might not only cost him his life and loved ones but his entire world.

It turns out dying on your Ascension Day is the easy part.

***** Hey, LitRPG readers! I've created an FAQ for Shade's First Rule to answer some of the common questions and to help you decide if this book is for you. It can be found at: afkauthor.com/faq

Print length

438 pages
Language

English
Publication date

August 1, 2019
Reading age

13 - 18 years
File size

2415 KB
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From the Publisher


	Shade's First Rule	The Second Betrayal	Uru's Third Temple	The Fourth Secret	Legion's Fifth Vault
LitRPG (Crunchy)	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
World Contains System (no VR)	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Classes, Levels, Experience, Notifications	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Kid Safe (No Harem, No Swearing)	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Cultivation	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Progression	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Weak to Strong Character Arc	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Martial Arts	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Dungeons	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Audiobook by Travis Baldree	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓

Editorial Reviews

Review

Amazon BEST-SELLER in multiple categories!

A Breath of Fresh Air for LITRPG: One of the best of the LITRPG genre I've read in a while. Well balanced with good character development, game mechanics, and plot. Most LITRPG novels now a days are filled plot holes, spelling errors, ridiculous harem themes, and poor grammar. This book was a breath of fresh air. Well worth the read. (Amazon Reviewer)

...one of the most engaging books that I have read in months if not years. I truly had a blast turning page by page (Amazon Reviewer)

Amazing Novel, Must Read: I didn't want to stop reading. The litRPG system feels beautifully woven into the world and its inhabitants feel like they've truly been living with it all of their lives. The story itself is amazing and well written with a great cast of characters to support it. Do yourself a favor and pick up this novel. (Goodreads Reviewer)

Really enjoyed this. Clearly well written, good and interesting litrpg system with a hint of the cultivation aspects to come. Plenty of option for growth and wide world breadth, interesting characters rather than just an MC. Look forward to the 2nd book! (Goodreads Reviewer)

I loved this book! It was a very fun read that with a different take on litrpg, I cannot wait to read the next one in the series! (Amazon Reviewer)

From the Author

AFK is LFG! You can find more information at afkauthor.com

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07TTDGKP2
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Black Pyramid Press (August 1, 2019)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ August 1, 2019
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2415 KB
Simultaneous device usage ‏ : ‎ Unlimited
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 438 pages
Lending ‏ : ‎ Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #4,535 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #1 in Teen & Young Adult Asian Myths & Legends eBooks
- #1 in Teen & Young Adult Martial Arts eBooks
- #12 in Asian Myth & Legend eBooks

Customer Reviews:
857 ratings

About the author

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A. F. Kay

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A. F. Kay is the pen name of Ripht, a monk still wandering the Crypt of Dalnir looking for the Lumpy Goo that refuses to drop his Fighting Baton. Some of AFK's best memories happened online, and the Divine Apostasy, a LitRPG series, is his attempt to relive those days in some small part. He hopes you find a piece of yourself in this series and join him on the journey.

You can find summaries of the first four books at https://afkauthor.com/book-recaps

To stay informed, please sign up for the newsletter at www.afkauthor.com/subscribe

Customer reviews

5 star		65%
4 star		25%
3 star		7%
2 star		1%
1 star		2%

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Top reviews from the United States

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P. G. McFinnigan

Started out good, got meh.

Reviewed in the United States on September 28, 2019

Verified Purchase

The story was progressing decently when character stupidity struck. Stupidity built into characters is my biggest pet peeve, especially after I'm already invested in a story. Especially when the story is a bit mehhhh to begin with.

So, here we go:

Main character supposedly lives in a world of magic and studied their entire life to become a mage. They're supposed to be smart and wise as a result, at least stat-wise.

So when this character happens across magic, does it make any sense, at all, to freeze up? Because that's what he does.

Then, after freezing up and being saved, and being told to run to safety, what sounds smart to you? Standing there like an idiot staring at your impending death, or running? Well, I'm pretty sure you can guess what they chose. Then, after being saved and yelled at again to move, instead of running like their life depended on it, do you think it would be smarter to just, I dunno, jog towards safety and then stop again? Then, for a dumb reason, just kinda hang around to get caught by someone doing this magic?

DOESN'T SOUND ONE DAG NAB BIT OF SMART, DOES IT?

Also, part of their entire world, where he's apparently lived his entire life, is based on coming back to life. And when he gets caught after sitting there like an idiot, and a person he's considered a friend for years can't free him so kills him, what would you think their intention was?

Because apparently this genius couldn't spell it out for himself and was like "DERPA DERRRR WHY MY FRIEND KILLS ME?!" I've got some grade A stupid friends IRL, and only one of them wouldn't be able to figure this out. But no one would dare call this fellow smart and say he'd been studying a difficult field, either. And even his dumb rear end would have run if he was being shot at, let alone if someone was standing there yelling for him to run. So the stupidest person I know is at least 50% smarter than the main character in this story.

162 people found this helpful

Helpful

LitRPGPodcastTop Contributor: Fantasy Books

The story has potential, but is too frustrating for me.

Reviewed in the United States on August 1, 2019

Verified Purchase

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This is a seriously mixed bag of a story. There are sections that I thought were quite good, but there were a lot more frustrating moments that ultimately made the overall experience not good.

First the good. The RPG stuff is well thought out and even if it feels like it’s padded in some spots, matters and is constantly used throughout the story. The relationship between the main character (MC) Ruwen, Sift, and Blapy is well written. Their banter and developed relationships is a real highlight of the novel. The story was best when it was relaxed and just flowed with those aspects like the relationship building, or the casual dungeon dive, or the more mundane seeming moments like talking to your class trainer and seeing what options you have or just worrying about the class conflicts between RPG classes. Those chill moments felt the most genuine and had a lot of good potential.

Now the not so good. The storyline is kind of a mess and feels frustratingly forced sometimes. The novel starts out with this YA, vibe where the MC is finally getting his RPG class after coming of age. He has a goal to show everyone that his parents aren’t traitors and needs a good class. Then betrayal, and the MC ends up with a class that he thinks sucks but luckily something happens that may change his luck and he gets a potential advantage. The story is a bit slice of life as he learns about this unwanted class and there are some hints that it can be powerful. Good so far. I especially think the bits where his advantage and the special bag of holding he gets are going to be really important to the story and cool. Then the story just makes this sudden twist and it feels like it is forced into a ‘chosen one’ story where the MC is being hunted, then another twist where the story feels forced into a rogue test dungeon dive, then again later forced again into cultivation stuff, then ending in this huge cliffhanger. Ultimately by the end of the story I realized all the earlier plotlines are just not resolved in this novel. The stuff with the parents is never even mentioned past the beginning, the setup for RPG class conflict with the camping is also abandoned, even the hunted chosen one stuff is put on pause while the MC power levels in a DBZ style time compression dimension that lets him train for like a week while only ten hours pass outside.

There are other issues, like how most of the initial power the MC gets feels unearned. He gets the really cool advantage (I’m being vague so as not to spoil things) for no reason. He gets some really good gear that feels like it belongs to a level 20 character, not a level 1. He’s magically good at things that he should have to practice according to the established story lore, like spells and cultivation. While eventually, the MC does feel like he earns some levels and power while dungeon diving, these other parts made the story frustrating.

Overall, the story has potential, but is too frustrating. I can only guess that the author is setting up some series storylines, but because there’s no resolution to the many plotlines started it ends up feeling like either the author kept changing his mind about what he wanted to write, or that he was trying to check some boxes about writing ‘good’ LitRPG. Either way, the frustration over shadowed the good parts for me.

Score: 6 out of 10

91 people found this helpful

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J. Looney

A wonderful LitRPG story without the bad parts!

Reviewed in the United States on August 1, 2019

Verified Purchase

Ruwen, can't wait to be a mage. He's perfect for it! The arcane knowledge, the cool spells, it's everything he wants, but something goes really wrong. He doesn't get the class he wants and now there are people trying to kill him!
Shade's First Rule is so much fun, has snappy dialog, and the world is filled with an incredible sense of wonder.
If you are like me and tired of overpowered MC's who solely invest in "Luck", or some single attribute to overbalance the world, then this book is for you. If you are tired of harem's, or super mature rated themes in your LitRPG, then this is for you! If you want a main character who's invested in the world he lives in, and doesn't drop 80's references every three pages, then this is for you! Also, there's very little bad language in it, so if you are looking for something to suggest to a younger cousin who's interested in DND or roleplaying games, then you've just found that book!
So what are you waiting for? Start enjoying it now! I'll be waiting for book 2... :)

19 people found this helpful

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Jason L

Wait until you meet the Black Pyramid...

Reviewed in the United States on August 2, 2019

Verified Purchase

This was an enjoyable and fast read with an epic world and consistent gaming rules and logic. There are strong male and female characters, and the dialogue between them is snappy, clever, and fun. The loot is awesome and everything works together and makes sense. From the FAQs, this is the start of a big series, and there is enough action and world to sustain many books to come. Shade's First Rule: you'll love reading this book, and will come back for more.

16 people found this helpful

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David

A lesson in picking the worst option and then whining to yourself about it.

Reviewed in the United States on August 28, 2020

Verified Purchase

If stupid characters with no sense of self preservation or self worth are your thing, you'll love this book.
The MC messes up almost everything he does, complains to himself about it, and then makes the exact same mistake the next time.
How many times can the same person drop their weapon or get distracted in a fight by the smallest detail, hold a pity part about it (mid combat and outside of combat), and then do it all over again the next fight?
If this was a horror movie, I'd be yelling at him to hurry up and die already so we can get to the real story.

18 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Technopath

Really fun read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 7, 2021

Verified Purchase

I have read a lot of stories in the LitRPG genre and this is definitely up there. Already downloaded the other 3 books is the series, at the time of writing, to read over the weekend. I am intrigued to see how the battles will play out especially considering he is not yet OP and so it feels like clever decisions and a whole lot of luck will be needed for the MC to thrive. I just hope the story does not lean to heavily on luck steering our characters through disaster.

One person found this helpful

Gazzmann

A good start

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 3, 2021

Verified Purchase

I'm loving the characters and story more as I read along. There are some mistakes here and there but they are just bumps in the road of a good story. I do get frustrated with the MC who is supposed to be quite knowledgeable but seems to know nothing. He lives in a library and has a love of reading yet still knows very little about anything. Quite irritating. Cheers!

Gareth

promising start

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 10, 2022

Verified Purchase

A welcome change for the hero to have the skill set where they can barely fight against chickens. Enjoyable read.

Kindle Customer

Fun read.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 4, 2020

Verified Purchase

Got this tittle by mistake-and it was a good one too xD. Nice miss click accident,but it was suprisingly nice read. Pretty light on numbers as for a Litrpg,but story is decent and flow good.

Mr Happy Douglas

Solid book

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 6, 2019

Verified Purchase

I enjoyed this one, neat mechanics and plotting. The pace was precise and fast paced. I really forward to next one.

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