Eleventh Cycle (1) (Mistland)

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I actually found myself preferring the side-characters, even the ones that were mere fleeting encounters. Why can’t it just be about a clueless, young bard who is simply trying to make good on a promise with a wise-cracking skull as their companion? The Elder had four arms, two on either side, entirely of moulded earth with crags of lava running through.

But, in Eleventh Cycle it felt like there was a very clear divide from the moment the four main POVs come together with the Seed. And the accessibility does not mean the world and lore of the novel failed to match the epic scope of the world-building and lore contained in Dark Souls games. I really enjoyed how this was employed by the author and found that it helped answer some questions while also creating an air of mystery that made me want to keep on reading through the wee hours. The physical and mental damage done to one of the main characters in this novel is one of the most messed up and fatal devastation inflicted on a main character I have ever read, out of all storytelling mediums. I think another reason for that, is we see Dalila reconnect briefly with others who witnessed that death, and in those moments, it felt like the impact of that loss slipped away.Non-players of Soulsborne tend to think we gamers are masochists when we constantly play, rage, and love playing these challenging games. And the aesthetic and imagery that has been built up in the design of the book, and in the worldbuilding itself is carried forward in the prose – and yes it does lean towards that awful term of ‘purple prose’ – which usually is something that I love. It also seemingly has experienced a tumultuous and chaotic history that is gradually hinted at in brief snippets at the beginning of each chapter. Ievarus has no understanding of the real world nor of human customs, and yet this lack of knowledge comes out in such real and lived in ways that by the end of the novel I liked Ievarus more than any other character.

Eleventh Cycle then shifts perspective to Chroma, an adolescent akar who struggles with finding his place within akar society.to anyone who loves Beserk and Dark Souls and knows the darkness of those worlds, to anyone who wants to go on an odyssey of spectacular worldbuilding, who wants to delve into the darkness and see what light and fight can be sparked in the shadows – but that it is certainly one to approach with a certain amount of awareness. Perhaps, because the narrative was so focused on these four main characters and their emotion, it felt a bit much when the world bit and tore into them, bleeding them, wounding them so deep that who they were bled out, and then did it again, and again.