sj_zero on Nostr: I was reading "Enough with this slow life! I was reincarnated as a High elf and now ...
I was reading "Enough with this slow life! I was reincarnated as a High elf and now I'm bored volume 7" the same day I wrote the article about the Matrix, and it had a great scene in the first third of the book that proves my point. Spoilers, I guess.
In the story, we've seen the main character spend decades learning to fight with a sword to honor his teacher. We've seen him master magic with a great mage. We've seen him make friends with many different people, and become a world-class blacksmith and later learn to make magical weapons. We've seen him help build a nation, and we've seen him help to win a war.
He is approached by one of four true dragons in this world asking "Do you want me to destroy this world?", and he had previously made friends with that dragon but he said "No, and if you try I'll fight you". The dragon was his friend and took that as proof that the world was still worth saving so they go off to fight another high elf who wanted to destroy the planet to kill all the humans.
The two of them in their capacity as high elves are roughly equal, but he's slightly stronger with a bow. His opponent is surrounded by the spirits of dead high elves from the war that broke her heart and made her want to destroy the world. With his century of mastery of the sword he learned from the humans, coupled with the sword he crafted with lessons he learned from the dwarves teaching him blacksmithing imbued with magic the mages taught him, he was stronger than the other high elf and would be capable of beating her, except with the spirits of the dead high elves around her he'd have to kill her, and he despaired because he didn't want to kill her. As he prepared to do what was required, the spirits from his village alongside all the spirits he'd met in the blacksmithing forges, and in the waters he sailed, and in the wind against his back as he walked, and in the statues he created from stone came to back him up. It never said it out loud, but it was obvious that this battle was actually about the connections each fighter had gained, and it wasn't even close. With all the connections he'd formed with all kinds of people through his travels he was able to stop the other high elf without killing her, and that thread of the story ended (One of the story's core themes is that there's a lot going on because the high elf lives for 1000 years, 300 years longer than even the elves, so we revisit people and places and their descendants, so there's another book and a half)
It hits so many different points I mentioned in that post -- winning through superior diligence and industriousness, winning through connections with everyone you've met along the way, focusing not just on winning but on being just in doing so. One side had the angry spirits of dead soldiers, the other side had the spirits of nature. One side actively sent its spirits to attack, the other only used its spirits to defend.
I actually got a bit misty eyed at the whole thing, because it was a beautiful moment after 7 volumes, even if it was just a tiny piece of the book (I said in another post that this series of books are super dense)
In the story, we've seen the main character spend decades learning to fight with a sword to honor his teacher. We've seen him master magic with a great mage. We've seen him make friends with many different people, and become a world-class blacksmith and later learn to make magical weapons. We've seen him help build a nation, and we've seen him help to win a war.
He is approached by one of four true dragons in this world asking "Do you want me to destroy this world?", and he had previously made friends with that dragon but he said "No, and if you try I'll fight you". The dragon was his friend and took that as proof that the world was still worth saving so they go off to fight another high elf who wanted to destroy the planet to kill all the humans.
The two of them in their capacity as high elves are roughly equal, but he's slightly stronger with a bow. His opponent is surrounded by the spirits of dead high elves from the war that broke her heart and made her want to destroy the world. With his century of mastery of the sword he learned from the humans, coupled with the sword he crafted with lessons he learned from the dwarves teaching him blacksmithing imbued with magic the mages taught him, he was stronger than the other high elf and would be capable of beating her, except with the spirits of the dead high elves around her he'd have to kill her, and he despaired because he didn't want to kill her. As he prepared to do what was required, the spirits from his village alongside all the spirits he'd met in the blacksmithing forges, and in the waters he sailed, and in the wind against his back as he walked, and in the statues he created from stone came to back him up. It never said it out loud, but it was obvious that this battle was actually about the connections each fighter had gained, and it wasn't even close. With all the connections he'd formed with all kinds of people through his travels he was able to stop the other high elf without killing her, and that thread of the story ended (One of the story's core themes is that there's a lot going on because the high elf lives for 1000 years, 300 years longer than even the elves, so we revisit people and places and their descendants, so there's another book and a half)
It hits so many different points I mentioned in that post -- winning through superior diligence and industriousness, winning through connections with everyone you've met along the way, focusing not just on winning but on being just in doing so. One side had the angry spirits of dead soldiers, the other side had the spirits of nature. One side actively sent its spirits to attack, the other only used its spirits to defend.
I actually got a bit misty eyed at the whole thing, because it was a beautiful moment after 7 volumes, even if it was just a tiny piece of the book (I said in another post that this series of books are super dense)