I’ve known about v-tubers for a while, but I wasn’t spending much time watching them. Recently I stumbled across Nijisanji EN and their two guy groups – Luxiem and Noctyx. I’d like to pretend I wasn’t drawn in by the pretty boys, but…I was. I’ll admit it. I’m pretty shallow like that. Within the new group Noctyx, we were introduced to Fulgur Ovid. Supposedly a cyborg from the future, this is a guy into sci-fi and fantasy novels, danmei/BL and some good games. He’s a man after my own heart.
When I found out he was doing a stream reading the story he’s written about his vtuber character’s past? I knew I had to watch it. I didn’t watch it live, I was out during the day, but as soon as I settled down to properly listen, I knew I also had to review it.
So, this won’t be a typical review. The story is unedited, there are some choices viewers can make, and it’s not perfectly written. If you’re looking for a serious review critiquing the writing, then you won’t be getting it. This was an unedited story written by someone who wants to explore a world but needs more practice. Writing can be improved with practice, so today, I’m just going to talk about the story and how he shared it.
Fulgur Ovid is a vtuber, like I said. The video featured his avatar standing to one side with the story on the screen and content warnings for chapters shared as the pinned comment. I didn’t require any of those content warnings, but I love to see it. They’re something we definitely need to use in books more. And he included these per chapter. I think that doing it for every chapter where they are necessary is a good way as it means people can enjoy the rest of the story and dip out in the parts they can’t deal with.
As this was a stream, he did try to make it a little more interactive. As well as breaks to drink and chat with the viewers, there were also some choices people could make. He had written two possible outcomes, and the viewers could choose which route to go down. The other routes will disappear forever, so now we will never get to see fuck boi Fulgur, which is a shame. That would have been hilarious. Those options may impact where the story goes in the future, which is fun.
I will say that I didn’t physically read the story. I know he is going to be posting it up on a blog, so you will be able to read it yourself if you like. However, I do recommend sticking the streams on in the background and just listening. The fact I only listened may have made my reading experience a little better. He commented a lot on grammar issues, but since I was just hearing him read it…I didn’t really pick up on them. I was able to focus solely on the story. As well as that, he uses music in the background and attempts to do different voices for different characters. It’s a bit more audio drama than an audiobook, but with a single narrator, and I appreciated it.
Now onto the story. I liked it. I will say there may be some issues with the slightly episodic format of the chapters. He said that he wishes the side characters had been more 3D, and I get that. But to do that, he would have needed more content. For each chapter to be spread across a few chapters. That’s not really going to work too well when he’s reading two chapters out at a time on a stream every few weeks or so. For that reason, I get that it helps to have the chapters to be their own self-contained story, but it will make it harder for him to flesh out any characters that aren’t recurring.
I think he had a good start though. Because though the characters could be a little flat other than Legatus himself…they did make me feel things. This is a dark story. It follows a cyborg agent who works for a bounty department that hunts down criminals committing cybercrimes. In a future filled with cyborgs, where everyone sees their daily life through AR, this is clearly important. In the second chapter, we have children in a normal school committing suicide. No one knows why, but they think it might have to do with something digital. Legatus has to go undercover in this school. The deaths to wind up being related to a hack and the boy who put it together… was really something. He was an abused child who was encouraging other kids to treat others the way he was being treated at home. It was hard to listen to. I was so mad that this kid could be doing something so cruel, yet him crying for his dad just hit hard. I wouldn’t describe him as flat as you can see both sides, but at the same time…he did do wrong, and you can’t ignore that. I didn’t quite tear up, but I was feeling a lot of conflicting emotions.
In my book, this was a great example of character writing.
I still don’t know much about this future world from the story, but I want to know. I want to see how this agency works and see more of the crimes and pain that are bound to occur. I’m fully invested, and I’m genuinely excited to read more of this and discover more about Legatus. This wasn’t something I expected from a vtuber, and I’m so glad that he’s done it this way.
If you’re curious and want to check out Fulgur yourself, then you can find the video here. I hope more of you check it out and have fun with it. As long as you remember that it’s not going to be as good as anything published – he said he’d hire a proper editor before even attempting to self-pub, and he’s not sure he wants to do that – but it still has its worth then you’ll have fun with it. It’s a dark sci-fi story set in a world that I’m eager to explore more of! Bring on more Legatus!
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