The Second Coming of Gluttony (2025)

*Warning: Some spoilers*

The best story I’ve read so far because of the following things: The plot is ordered nicely and is interconnected at many points in time. The characters are well developed in the sense that you can accurately put yourself in their shoes and know how they would act, and the author also gives some backstory to provide details on why they are the way they are. Though a little confusing at times, the setting and world-building were done excellently. Additionally, the use of different points of view not only helps with imagining how events in the story go down but also to understand the different sides of the same story. The literary devices were very original and, despite this, easy to understand. One of the things I liked the most was the storytelling, it didn’t use unnecessary details and used a more show rather than tell approach. Lastly, as for the writing style, it is a culmination of all these things that, together, present the story at its best.

The Plot.
As one reads through the story one notices how well were things planned out. Or at least it feels like it. I am sure that the author had to go back a plethora of times to plant different things that developed into plot points. One great example is when the head of the Japanese Business Federation asked Jang Maldong to perform his mystic acupuncture on one of its members. This is later seen used on Seol Jihu to save him from the side effects of using skills beyond his means. By introducing this idea several chapters back the author managed to provide a way for the main character to survive the critical condition he was in. There are many other examples of this but this one stands out. This goes to show that Ro Yu-Jin cared deeply for his work and was able to cover any plot holes or inconsistencies that could come up when trying to stick to the timeline of events. This even shows that he probably read his ten-book long series more than just a few times to make sure everything was in order.

What can be applied from this to other writings is the structure of the writing process. Have a clear idea of what the story will be, write the timeline in which the events will happen, and, then, as you write the different parts of the story go back and add in things that could serve as important plot points or aspects of the story. For example, in this case, the timeline could be seen as follows: Seol Jihu dies in a parallel timeline and sends his feelings in the form of a dream back to the start of the journey. Jihu, who has a bad relationship with his family due to his gambling addiction, sees this dream. He then is introduced to another world, Paradise. He completes the tutorial and gets introduced to a small team of elites, Carpe Diem. Seol Jihu trains and goes through countless ordeals, the Forest of Denial, the Arden Fortress recovery, and the rescue of Hugo, Dylan, and others at the parasite’s laboratory, to say a few. Seol becomes the leader of Carpe Diem, trains even harder, and participates in the Banquet and Arden Fortress defense. He gets back in shape and goes on the Pagoda of Dreams expedition and saves the Spirit Realm with Tigol Fortress in tow, the turning point of the war. Lastly, Seol Jihu trains excessively during the parasite’s downtime and prepares for the final battle. This was a basic overview of the chronology of events but it doesn’t need to be as specific and thorough when starting to write the story.

The Characters.
In the series, characters are introduced promptly as a consequence of the story. This allowed for the reader to get accustomed to the initial characters that aren’t as many and slowly building on this small list as the story progresses helps get to know everyone. Additionally, the primary characters change depending on the stage in which the story is at, so the character development is well spaced and doesn’t feel too overwhelming. This can be seen with how at the start of the story, during the tutorial and the Neutral Zone, we see characters that are barely mentioned only until the side stories in the tenth book. During these initial stages of the story, those characters played a big part as allies but, naturally, they parted ways once the story entered a different stage, giving way to other characters and perspectives that would transform Seol Jihu, the main character, into a better person.

Some characters were consistently seen throughout the series but others came and went as they saw fit. Jang Maldong was one of the most persistent characters in the series and reasonably so too. He was responsible for directly and indirectly allowing the story to progress. He came to help Carpe Diem when it had lost its leader and he then helped Seol Jihu at every stage to become the person to conclude the war. This is an excellent way to help the story and characters develop. By using outside people and circumstances you incentivize for a change to happen. By doing so you help the reader better understand the different roles played by characters in the story, the reasoning behind the choices taken, and prospects of where the story might be taken to next. To do this the author must have taken into account the chronology and thought about what he would like for different characters to do. Then, to go the extra mile, he might’ve even defined the core values and backstory of each primary and secondary character to provide a strong presence for each person as they appear.

Setting.
As said previously, the world-building was a little confusing but was done very well, nonetheless. The biggest confusion I had was on the difference between a castle and a kingdom. As it stands, kingdom refers to the territory over which a king or queen rules and castle simply refers to the residence of such royalty. However, throughout the story, it was mentioned that when entering the castle gates were the city’s buildings found. This created confusion in that sometimes the author referred to the royal palace as a castle and the kingdom’s capital as inside a castle. I don't know if this was a mistake in translation or if both terms are simply interchangeable in Korean. Also, they sometimes referred to certain kingdoms as being in one of the four cardinal directions which were a little hard to imagine when taking other elements into account. However, I believe this wasn’t much of a problem because these details were irrelevant, just something that stood out a bit. Despite this, the author was able to provide a clear understanding of the world known as Paradise.

You get to understand that it is divided into 3 main territories, the Parasites, the Federation, and humanity. Adding on to this, it is clearly understood that in the human territory there are 7 kingdoms and that this territory shares borders with the Federation. Additionally, one can name many of the important locations even if they are not present in the current chapter, showing how well-done was the world-building. This allowed for a deep connection to the story and also helped the reader form their hypothesis of what could happen in the future. One way this could've been done is by drawing out a map and focusing on where certain events are most probable to happen. For example, Tigol Fortress is of major importance in that it is close to all three territories. This allowed for it to play an important role in how strong its defense had to be to start with and also why so many people would risk their lives for it.

Points of View.
In the grand scheme of things, there aren’t many different points of view throughout the story. It all revolves around the main character’s perspective. However, that is not to say that we’re given some insight as to what was going on with the other characters. For example, along all the different arcs we catch glimpses of the parasite camp, whether it is just the queen looking up at the sky giving some weird parallelism of the story with the use of constellations, or the commanders and queen preparing to attack. This can be seen when we are told that they are preparing a long-range teleportation spell to get into one of the cities inside the human territory. Additionally, towards the end, when the expedition into parasite territory went awry, we get to dive a bit into the story of Seo Yuhui the character which we knew least about until that moment. We see her relationship with Yoo Seonwha and Seol Jihu in the first timeline. And we also get to see a hidden bit of story from chapter 1 which helps explain all the mysterious instances with her throughout her participation in the novel. Lastly, we get to see how life revolves when Seol Jihu is not around when humanity is standing on its last leg, and also during the side stories, (Book #10 or Chapters 489-549).

This exclusion of the main character allows for the reader to get to know more about all the other characters and maybe even allows for development in their behavior. Though a little late in the book, when Kim Hannah is the president of Jihu’s old company, Valhalla, she realizes that she isn’t such a great leader as Jihu was in his active time, (Chapter 537, Side Story 48). This creates a need for her to mature and realize that she wasn’t as good as she led others to believe. After she developed into a more mature person than she already was, she was ready to go ask for help from a certain someone, something she was reluctant to do before. And just as she reformed herself, she was met with the sole person that could aid her in all her troubles, Seol Jihu. Proving that even a brief exemption of the main character can bring more depth to all the other people that surround him.

Literary Devices.
The use of literary devices was immaculate. Sometimes using commonly known metaphors and other times hyperbole, symbolism, and personification that you wouldn’t have thought of ever before. A great example of this is “[...] just looking at the cracks on his skin sent a shiver down his spine. It was like he was looking at a once rich farmland that had gone arid from a long drought.” (Chapter 181). This simile speaks volumes about the condition of Seol Jihu’s body at the time. You get to understand that, not only does he have really good mana (energy) pathways in his body, but that he demanded his body way beyond his means even when he no longer had energy left in his body. Or this metaphor, “A heavy voice pulled on his leg from behind him.” alluding to him stopping in his tracks because he heard the voice of someone behind him. These literary devices bring life to what is going on inside the story and enable the reader to imagine all these different scenes profoundly. Despite the lack of citation and quotes, it is clear to see that the literary devices used in this novel are of a high level.

Storytelling.
Very compelling storytelling to say the least. The use of Latin words and concepts unknown to the reader shows that both the author and translator team are good at what they do. It is no surprise that the novel has become such a huge hit in South Korea. The storytelling of The Second Coming of Gluttony is a culmination of all the aforementioned subjects. The order of events, the characters, and their development. Exemplar literary devices. Excellent world-building. All of these are an essential part of how the story turned out to be told. Without any one of these elements, it would’ve felt off. As to how all these were narrated it is done from a third-person perspective. Although, sometimes the author, editors, or translators didn’t do that great a job at keeping to this type of narration. This can feel a little distracting at times but it is of minor importance when considering that it is only for very small segments where the story became a first-person narrative.

To add on, the author did well in not revealing all the details during the early stages or the late stages of the different arcs because this helped build up to a climax in what seemed like a more timely manner. However, I would like to say that there were some little discrepancies in what is said that can be pretty confusing.

Inconsistencies.
At first, the time dilation between both worlds was initially said to be 1:4 meaning that while an hour passed by on planet Earth, 4 hours have gone by in Paradise, but, this is later said to be 1:3. This is just a minor thing though. A much more noticeable one is Seol Jihu’s change after being to Paradise for the first time. Before ever setting foot inside the other world, he could be said to be a literal piece of garbage from the sickening way he treated his family members. But, as soon as he entered the tutorial, the first stage to entering Paradise, he acted like a whole different person. He was nice to almost everybody and was pretty naive, his anti-social and rude behavior from before was nowhere to be seen. This robbed the story of what could’ve been a great addition to the character development of Seol Jihu.

The last example and maybe one of the most noticeable ones is how during the final battle, after just one exchange of attacks with the Parasite Queen, he mentioned he wouldn’t be able to hold on for long. Seol Jihu says that he would only be able to use his best ability a limited number of times more, 3 if I remember correctly. However, when telling the events that surround this battle it wouldn't be unreasonable to think that he should've died because of the time that passed by. Such a long time passed from the start to the end of the encounter that it wouldn't make sense for him to last that long. And then, to top it off, he proceeds to use the ability one last time to finish the battle, when in this situation he should've been tired and unable to do so.

Lastly, we are told that both he and the Parasite Queen are fast beyond imagination and that nobody on the field was able to see them move but for the last exchange it doesn’t seem that way. The Parasite Queen is delayed by Seol Jihu’s teammates many times but this is impossible and illogical when taking into account that she was hundreds of times faster than them. Despite these discrepancies and some others I can’t remember, the story was still pretty great and, without a doubt, the best I've read so far.

The Second Coming of Gluttony

The greatest masterpiece, magnum opus, and chef-d'oeuvre of literature that I have had the fortune of partaking in and reading from the beginning to its end.

This story has made me cry like a baby at its tragic yet beautiful moments, like the time Seol Jihu (Main character) finally confronted his family and beloved to repent to them for all the wrongs, absurdity, and faults he had done to them in the past because of his wretched gambling addiction. Moreover, him trying his best to pick up the broken pieces he broke and putting them back all again together, albeit it will never be the same as before.

I have also laughed so hard at Seol Jihu's playful antics and pranks of his against both his dearest friends and mortal and sworn enemies; hyped-up, heated, feverish, and kept at the edge of my seat at its most intense and epic battles, conflicts, and wars. A final epic war against Paradisians, Earthlings, the Federation composed of Fallen Archangels and Angels, Beastmen, Dwarves, Cave and Sky Faeries, Spirit Kings and Lords, the World Tree, and a Phoenix, Ghosts, Witches, Adventurers, Apostles of the Seven Sins, and Seol Jihu, a man one step from being a God of the Spear, and his organization, Valhalla vs. a Goddess of Parasitism that has once ruled a galaxy, her Army Commanders that have reached divinity, and an enormous army of parasites such as Goblins, Orc, Medusas, Banshees, Succubi, Undead Knights, Ghouls, Nests that produced these hideous creatures at an insane rate, and other more kinds of evil beings.

I loved every bit and parts of this beautiful story but the thing that I truly appreciate the most is the important lessons it imparted to me and the other readers; learning to come to accept who you are and coming to love yourself, continually improving both your mind and body, facing your past and regaining the lost love that one has broken, treating others the way you want to be treated, and protecting what you hold dear.

Truly, this novel has never made me lose interest, not even once, as I've read and shared the journey with Jihu and his friends, and this story, The Second Coming of Gluttony, will forever be my number one book in my heart. I'll keep on re-reading this story, always. 100/10.