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An NPC's Path #1

Мертвый вор

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Виртуальные миры — территория безграничной свободы. В игре любой может стать эльфийским магом и невидимкой-вором, вступить в клан и ходить в рейды, сражаться и развивать персонажа, а самое главное — отвлечься от забот и проблем повседневности.

Но игра остается игрой, только пока из нее можно выйти. Я в полной мере прочувствовал это на собственной шкуре. Хотел лишь немного развеяться в виртуальной реальности, а вместо этого оказался убит и заточен в тело ходячего мертвеца — медлительного и неловкого, обреченного раз за разом погибать от рук других игроков. И теперь есть лишь один способ выбраться из коварной западни — добыть легендарный свиток Возрождения. Но для этого придется превратить беспомощный чумной труп в настоящую машину смерти, и кто бы только знал, каково это — прокачивать мертвого жулика…

281 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2018

330 people are currently reading
252 people want to read

About the author

Pavel Kornev

102 books91 followers
Pavel Kornev is a popular Russian author whose writing crosses the boundaries of the sci fi thriller, fantasy adventure and steampunk. Genre mashing has long become his signature style.

“His books are a page-turning mix of non-stop action and hard-boiled detective stories in the edgy atmosphere of steampunk noir. Far from being a knight on a white charger, Kornev’s typical protagonist is an everyday man with his fair share of flaws who puts his talents to good use. His heroes struggle to survive and win their places in the sun; but most importantly, they manage to preserve their humanity even in the direst of circumstances.”

Pavel is a professional economist who spent years working for a large bank – until his first novel, The Ice, became an overnight bestseller, allowing him to quit his day job. He now writes full time.

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5 stars
245 (33%)
4 stars
247 (33%)
3 stars
159 (21%)
2 stars
55 (7%)
1 star
24 (3%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 54 reviews
219 reviews6 followers
December 16, 2018
I'm genuinely mixed on this book I prefer lit RPGs that focus more on the game world rather than the real world so the plot of him being trapped really interested me

The big problem with litRPGs is that they treat women like sex objects MC literally meets a character who's quest is to have sex with him....Why? 🤷🏾‍♀️🤨
Profile Image for Ebi Library of Poison.
22 reviews24 followers
November 11, 2020
Nejsem si jistá jestli je to volbou RPG nebo stylem, ale líbí se mi to. Občas mi tam chybí hlubší popisy, ale na druhou stranu to občas dokáže dokonale ukázat tu frustraci z questu najdi>přines.
Profile Image for Tony Hinde.
2,140 reviews76 followers
December 2, 2018
I liked the story idea. The plot and characterisation were decent.

The english translation was a real let-down though. It had poor grammar, questionable vocabulary choices and even failed to correctly use equivalent colloquialisms.

Despite this, I think I'll give the sequel a try since two different translators were used.
Profile Image for Reading Bunny.
447 reviews19 followers
August 11, 2020
(Kniha v rámci spoluprace s @fantom.print.)

Mrtvý lotr vypadal ze začátku fakt dobře. Uvěznění ve virtuální realitě? Jo, to zní originálně, trošku Black Mirror vibes. Skončit v těle nejhorší a neoblíbené postavy? Už trošku ohrané. Jasně, nemůžete někomu, kdo má mít těžký životní příběh, vrazit nějakou OP postavu. Chápu, ale zase nemusí být každá zápletka LitRPG stejná, ne?
Musím uznat, že to bylo napsáno lépe, než Cesta šamana. Asi bych to i zařadila jako dobrou sérii na start tohoto žánru. Autor se zaměřuje lépe na vysvětlení pojmů, což mi u Mahanenka chybělo.
Děj mě úplně nebavil, jelikož se dlouho nic nedělo a ke konci autorovi nejspíše došlo, že mu dochází stránky a je čas i na nějakou akci. Zbytečně nám příběh vyplňoval naháněním hlavního hrdiny jinou postavou.
Ohledně postav, dostalo jich zde prostor více, takže nejsme omezení pouze na jednu a dostává se nám pohled i na další formy, které svět nabízí. Například můj oblíbený klučík, který hlavního hrdinu doprovází. Ten je boží, fakt.
Ve finále je to něco, čím vyplníte čas, ale možná u toho úplně nadšení nebudete. Třeba další díly překvapí.
3.5/5
22 reviews1 follower
June 1, 2018
Good read

I loved the miss matches in the classes the different abilities and the way they projected the players in a what's in it for me style.
Profile Image for Kati.
2,341 reviews65 followers
November 12, 2019
RPG in general and LitRPG in particular aren't my usual cuppa but this book read exceedingly well. It was satisfying to watch "John Doe" leveling up, gaining new abilities and defeating his enemies. I'm definitely interested in finding out where the story is headed...
Profile Image for DJay.
435 reviews76 followers
June 6, 2018
This is an interesting "trapped in the game" senario. The MC is a potential informant and has decided to trap the MC in the game so that they can't go to court and tell what happened to him making it so that he can be the fall guy for the scheme. Anyway, with that out the way, the game does paint the MC into a nice "what if" scenario. What if you were a player in the game and you were forced into the roll of an NPC? How would you get back to being a player? So the story does just that. It takes you through the game of an NPC trying to get back his player status before his body dies, and the clock is ticking!
Profile Image for Zrzi čte.
342 reviews5 followers
December 26, 2021
Na novou litRPG sérii jsem se neskutečně těšila a jsem ráda, že už je konečně venku první díl.
Zápletka je podobná jiným litRPG, především Cestě šamana, je ale zároveň neskutečně akční, čtivá, má svoje specifika a hlavní hrdina je sympaťák.
John je v domácím vězení kvůli tomu, že jeho šéfové jsou obviněni z praní špinavých peněz. Po dvou měsících bez lidského kontaktu mu jeho právník doporučí aby si zahrál hru ve virtuální realitě. Jak to tak chodí, něco se podělá a John se najednou musí poprat s nemrtvou herní postavou, tedy s něčím, s čím nemá žádné zkušenosti, navíc bez možnosti návratu do reálného světa. I když se mu ne vše daří, neklesá na duchu a snaží se pokračovat dál, aby se nakonec dostal zpět do reálného světa. To zda se mu to povede, je ve hvězdách.
Jsem ráda že Mrtvý lotr vychází u Fantom printu, díky tomu nebudeme muset čekat na další díl dlouho. Navíc musím pochválit za zlepšení korektury, nenarazila jsem na žádnou chybu.
Profile Image for Johnny.
2,170 reviews79 followers
June 29, 2018
Book one

While not a bad story, there are to many problems with this book for me to give it a better rating.
First off I almost stopped reading the to the two female characters. They where extremely grating.
I couldn't stand either one. The ones willingness to have sex with a walking corpse was just nasty.
The editing needs to be better as well. They are called horns not thorns.
A problem with the temple also bothered me. Signs of battle all throughout the temple, it's later desecrated, and yet when the demon is killed, suddenly the temple needs no defenders????
This needs more work before I will recommend it.
Profile Image for Karl  Ben-Shachar .
100 reviews2 followers
August 1, 2018
Seriously?!

Spoiler alert





This character just drove me nuts! He complains an absurd amount of the time. Constantly running from fights, and over all, not very smart. He's constantly hunted by a necromancer, that surprises him over and over. And once he finds out how he's being tracked, what does he do, nothing. Just run some more. I found myself literally yelling at my device for him to do something! And the book just ends. Like really!? Not looking forward to the next one.
39 reviews2 followers
December 13, 2018
A summary for my own memory:

A Lit RPG.
The hero is a banker that gets blamed for money laundry at work.
He is sent home with house-arrest.
His laywer suggest he tries the new full imersion capsule for a MMORPG game, of lack of other things to do, he dives right it.
He creates a rogue and starts playing. Shortly after starting he is hacked by another player, so that he becomes a lvl 1 walking corpse. Shortly after he finds out that he cannot log out, of message the developers for help. He's stuck. His body is now in a coma and could be put out of life support at any time.
Frustrated and angry he starts to lvl.
He kills unaware players left and right, trying to get his int high enough to be able to talk (zombies do not start with a high int score)
He finds a necromancer that agrees to help him, but soon betrays him for a huge amount of money.
The hunt begins.
The hero finds out there is a scroll in the game that can make anyone "come to life" he sees his chance and starts hunting it.

After a few lvls he is the same zombie lvl as his rogue was, and poof, he has two classes wich no one else in the game has. Hacker much?
Anyways, he focuses on 2H melee fightingstyle, wich is a little weird, since he is 50 % rogue.

He finds a woman that wants to have ritualistic sex with him, she gives him no choice in the matter (wich I would very much consider rape!)
He's okay with it, it's just.. undead cannot get it up.

She tags along with him to help getting the resurectionscroll so she can fullfill her.. sex.

The necromancer popps up from time to time for murder time.
He, ofc, fails.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for Filip & Knihy.
51 reviews7 followers
March 28, 2020
„Uvíznout ve virtuální realitě bylo už dost zlé, ale navíc v těle mrtvého, to už bylo za hranicemi dobra a zla!“⁣

Říkáte si, že při hraní hry se vám nemůže stát nic špatného? John si to říkal taky.⁣
Co když vás ale hacker během hraní vláká do pasti, vyřídí vám pozdravy od vašeho šéfa a vy se znovuzrodíte jako úplně někdo jiný? A ještě k tomu jako nehráčská postava? Jedinou Johnovou záchranou jak se vrátit zpátky do reálného světa je získat vzácný artefakt Svitek vzkříšení. A tak se náš hlavní hrdina vydává na cestu do Království mrtvých se svým ohnivým flambergem na zádech a malým společníkem po svém boku.⁣

Na novou LitRPG sérii jsem se opravdu těšil a konečně je tady! Zápletka je podobná jako u ostatních sérií tohoto žánru, ale to vůbec nevadí, protože kniha je čtivá, akční, chvílemi napínavá a hlavní hrdina je sympatický chlapík, který se ve hře ještě úplně nevyzná. Číst o hraní za nemrtvého bylo zase něco úplně jiného než na co jsem zvyklý a opravdu jsem si to užíval. Jediné z čeho jsem byl trochu zklamaný, byla absence hlášek, ale snad to další díly napraví. I když věc, která mě opravdu velice a mile překvapila, byla téměř úplná absence chyb v textu, takže za to si Fantom Print zaslouží velký palec nahoru!⁣

Pokud máte rádi LitRPG stejně jako já, nebo byste jen chtěli zkusit něco nového tak vám Mrtvého lotra můžu jen a jen doporučit!⁣
93 reviews
January 16, 2019
This book being a litrpg I didn't expect much, and I was still disappointed, had to drop it halfway through. The writing isn't very good, the story isn't anything to write home about and the characters aren't very interesting. It even fails at the basics of being a litrpg, the game mechanics don't feel very well thought out, they just feel like the author just threw some numbers and quests in there just because it is what litrpg's do. The main character is bland as water, there's a bitchy female sidekick who gets upset because he can't fuck her. The story begins with main character getting stuck in a game because of a hacker, getting him stuck in the body of an undead. This could be an interesting premise, but nothing's done with it! He just gets into badly written fights and sometimes someone comments on his undead status.
Profile Image for Tiger.
218 reviews2 followers
June 30, 2025
This is a really cool premise with a great narrator and an interesting MC. I'm curious to see where this goes, if he can finally return home and, when given the chance, if he'll choose to stay and if he will get revenge on those that did this to him.

I deducted one star for the cliche scantily clad elf that needs to sleep with people to complete a quest. Thank Satan that didn't happen, though I worry about her reappearing in future books. I do not like her at all and I was happy she didn't stick around for long. I know she'll be back though 😮‍💨 And I can't even hope she gets killed because she can just respawn!

I really enjoy the fact that he made friends with an NPC kid, too. There's just something so interesting about NPC centered stories because they are usually background characters. Though, I feel at this point, he's no longer an NPC lol
Profile Image for Travis.
2,881 reviews48 followers
July 17, 2018
Not too many LitRPG stories have multiclassing, (especially unintentionally), so this book is a nice change of pace from others in the genre. It's a pretty decent story too, though it would have been nice if we'd learned a bit more about the character outside of the game, since his whole reason for being in it was because of what happened outside the game. Regardless, it's a decent story, and most folks should find it entertaining enough to enjoy the story. Doubtless there's more to come, and if you like this one, then keeping an eye out for the others would be in your best interest, since it appears this story is going to be a pretty good one.
Profile Image for Martin Zoul.
154 reviews4 followers
January 1, 2022
WAU WAU WAU

Nemám co dodat. Kniha se mi líbila od začátku do konce. Příběh Johna mě hodně bavil stejně jako jeho dějové linky s Garthem, malým chlapcem či s Isabellou. Pár vtipných částí skvěle doplní děj. V knize se objevilo spoustu prvků žánru LitRPG, od oživování, po vylepšování statistik. Fakt jsem si při čtení představoval, že chodím tím světem jako John a dokonce jsem se dokázal i "vžít" do pozice nemrtvého a do johnova uvažování.

Na knize jsem opravdu neviděl jedinou chybičku a nezbývá než říct, že pokud nám fantomprint bude servírovat podobně dobré knihy tohoto žánru pořád, tak nejspíše nebudu mít ve své sbírce nic jiného.

Jasných 10/10
568 reviews23 followers
February 10, 2019
This was a hoot. I liked it.

A very short novel involving a criminal (or material witness, I couldn't tell), getting stuck in a VR game as a decaying corpse.

It's not deep or meaningful but it's fun (even with an unnecessarily obsessed villain) with a bunch of short encounters that feels like a series of short stories instead of a single coherent book.

I was surprised when it came to an end. Should there be a second book on KU, I'll pick up. Otherwise, I'll probably let this be a one and done.
Profile Image for Stanislas Sodonon.
479 reviews106 followers
November 5, 2018
For once, we're spared the teenage boy's wet-dream! Amen!
A very good story. Enjoyable in spite of some very strange decisions from the MC.

I listened to the audiobook. It wasn't bad, but:
- The book would have benefitted from a better editor: overuse of "immediately" and translation inconsistencies.
- The narrator lacked energy, I think. I almost dropped the book because of it.

Over all, one of the better LitRPG examples out there.
Profile Image for Lubos Elexa.
361 reviews3 followers
October 25, 2020
Pre mňa zatiaľ najslabšia z LitRPG, čo som čítal...niekam-nikam smerujúci dej, v ktorom hrdina síce má svoj cieľ, ale aj tak robí všetko možné. Chaotické vlastnosti, v ktorých som sa už pri treťom máchaní mečom stratil. Nevysvetlené pozadie spúšťačov reálnom svete (zločin), veľmi slabé až žiadne dialógy. Na druhej strane, pozitívom je nehrdinská postava, čo sa však pravdepodobne v ďalších dieloch zmení.
Profile Image for Tracius.
10 reviews
June 18, 2018
Excellent Story

I really enjoyed this book. There are some grammar and spelling issues but nothing you cant understand as you read. The game world feels very much like a real MMORPG with mechanics that are believable and world events that help the story.

The main character is put in a nearly impossible situation and is able to make it work with a fair amount of effort.
Profile Image for Piotr Jantos.
12 reviews1 follower
August 11, 2018
I simply couldn't have forced myself to complete this book.

The plot was promising. The world and characters likewise. What failed? The delivery, I daresay. The book is as exciting as steamrollers road-race. Just slower. It gets annoying quite soon and fails to get better. I gave up at 60% mark.
Profile Image for Jonathan.
637 reviews1 follower
August 28, 2018
So much fun

This was amazing! I loved it! Bad luck abounds for the MC and life happens. Truly it is a wonderful tale that I’m even telling my coworkers about. There are some periodic edit issues, but nothing too noticeable or distracting. It is a captivating story and I think I’ll start the next book now!
Profile Image for Ty.
155 reviews2 followers
June 13, 2018
Very good!

Very well written and so entertaining! I really enjoyed the main character and appreciate that he has a believable conscience. The litrpg contents are amazing! Write longer stories! Read this!
Profile Image for Estevam (Impish Reviews).
194 reviews19 followers
May 18, 2019
I really liked the scenario and the take in double-classing as an npc undead, that truly was a creative idea, plus i love the idea that the line between virtual and real is getting blurry for our protagonist, and i quite like neo.
Profile Image for Magila.
1,328 reviews14 followers
February 23, 2020
It took me two times trying to listen to this book until I finished it. There was nothing bad about it and I enjoyed the concept. Of all the books I’ve read in this genre, it was decidedly not bad, just not one I’d prioritize. I plan to jump into the second installment and see where it goes.
12 reviews
April 15, 2020
Didn't make it far.

I quit the book very early because the reader doesn't know what the mc is thinking and/or the reason behind it. It's written in a way that just tells you what the mc is doing and almost nothing else.
2,524 reviews71 followers
December 25, 2020
Good start but fumbles a bit in the middle.

It has a good story with an acceptable main character. The only trouble is the rambling nature of the progress. He just falls from one incident to the next with no real control. It makes everything feel forced rather than natural.
631 reviews15 followers
February 22, 2023
Just bad

This was the second time I tried reading this book !! I still could not do it! I never quite understand how a dead man had health or any other alive stats!! The mc was just a moron and why would you want to stay with anyone that called you Kitten?
Profile Image for Lee Clark.
33 reviews
February 13, 2024
This book started of rather well but I reached a scene that was extremely off-putting. I've read some strange stuff but when I tried explaining it to my coworkers even they were like WTF....... I may revisit but it'll be a while.
161 reviews1 follower
June 26, 2018
Great Book

Really nice flow to the book, here is not OP and a nice twist to the genre look foreword to the next book
Displaying 1 - 30 of 54 reviews

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