As with many LitRPG authors, he's getting far too tied up in 'game mechanics' and losing sight of the story.
I probably skipped about 1/3 of the book by scanning past huge tracts of exposition about combat strategy, self doubt, common sense approaches to facing challenges, and unnecessary and debates about different levels of proficiency.
And that's all without the excessive teen-age sexual tension drama.
I feel that a good editor could have removed at least a third of this book and pushed to have more of what Thompson is good at, characters with reasonable depth and an engaging story line.
Sadly, unlike his earlier books, this one had little of either.