3.5 ~ Second time read.

There was a lot of character background and world building in this volume. While some of it, like Conquest’s connect to the message and her reliance on “The Chosen”, make sense plot wise, other things, like the plea for help from The Kingdom because of the turmoil in The Republic, seemed like a reach to be relatable and to turn the conversation around and point a finger elsewhere.

The Beast, for we have no other name for him yet, has turned the plot around unexpectedly. When I first read this, I suspected a lot of it went over my head.

The Beast pretending to be a mindless robot but instead, being fully sentient and using his knowledge to learn about the events happening outside his prison, shows a lot about his parents and the biology that helps him from turning into an empty monster. Something that other creatures would succumb to because of similar isolation.

The psychology mixed with the lore makes this series utterly unique to its genre.