The Cheat Code

Wisdom Revolution #3

by Misba

After the terrible encounters with the war heroes, the Intuitionist is on the verge of breaking all promises she gave to her friends and her family. Worse: both the war heroes might become aware of her power—her intuition, for she is their shortcut, their cheat code.

As the Monk looks into the Oldest Dance, he nearly discovers the first language of mankind, or perhaps, the first language on earth. It could take him to the Source, he believes. But he can't do that without the Devil's Book--the book that now belongs to the Mesmerizer.

Soon enough, they realize that none may find what they seek unless they have the power to guess things right. Soon enough, they know who might be their Cheat Code to achieve it all.

And thus, the Intuitionist fights the whispers of the ones with voice. Her purpose calls her, but she has her life to deal with--a life that is too trivial compared to the ones who want her home. And it's not easy when she must handle all promises she has made, not when the oldest dance of the universe whispers in her dreams and when the Devil's Book calls her still.

In a world of voice where High Grades are too proud to lie, a promise made verbally is stronger than a red seal. So she must leave her mother's nest while keeping her promises, and in her journey, she must be aware of the whispers of the war heroes.

Genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Science Fiction Fantasy, Post Apocalyptic, Adventure, Dark, Adult

320 pages, Hardcover

Published May 10, 2023

About the author

I could write a bio here--long or short. You won't know me still. Not in the way you could if you read things I wrote. But you can start here--from some of my articles. As for the books, Wisdom Revolution is out there.

Article links in Patreon:
https://www.patreon.com/posts/87969455
https://www.patreon.com/posts/what-is...
https://www.patreon.com/posts/96800944

Reviews

[Misba · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's time to post the first few pages of the book. This time, though, I'd be adding a few other stuff from THE CHEAT CODE. Stuff such as--the Dedication section and the Quote section. I'll leave the Acknowledgment section to your imagination, though. Adding that part would be too much.
Love for all!


***Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/9843542843 ***

THE CHEAT CODE
Chapter 1: Canvas of Death

WHAT IS WORST ABOUT DEATH IS ITS MYSTERIES.
Not the ones about when it may happen or how it will come to you, or what it will feel like, no. It’s rather in what conditions someone would leave, what art the death would cause, and what details the art may have. You know the sort of details like how the skin would fade, how the shades of brown will turn worm grey or green, and how prana will leave the body. Like a poof? Like a whoosh? Like a bang? Or like a stealthy slithering snake? Most important: what will you smell like?

“What will I smell like?” Ruem, the Mesmerizer, mutters.

Good people will smell like heavens, they say, like the nectar of roses or mist in a meadow or honey in the ocean. Oceans in heaven are made of honey, no joke. And bad people will smell like rotten roaches. Another law in the universe God coded while creating it all.
In the lounge of Kuhawk, Ruem, the Mesmerizer, doesn’t see any color of death, but he smells it. Death is near. He doesn't wonder whose death, for now. Instead, he thinks of a question—a random one at that. Why does God promise only food and women in heaven?

Because he is the God of men?
Because men were God’s audience when he sent his books?
Because God is the greatest mesmerizer who knows how to lure?

The Mesmerizer finds no answer; he can’t just know an answer; he is not an intuitionist. However, he knows one thing. That God is one corporate manipulator who knows what his consumers want.
Food. Women. And youthful eternity.

Could be true, could be wrong, could be a delusion created from epics or an old song. But in his mind and soul, Ruem Drohung, the Mesmerizer, knows one real truth, the truth that no one else knows. That he will stop God. He will recode fate—his fate and everyone’s fate. And he will do it using the codes God made the universe with. Nothing can stop him. Not after what God took and termed it fate.

“I do not accept it,” he mutters to his painting—yet-to-be painting. It’s an empty canvas. Someone with evolved senses could smell the handmade paper made by the craftsmen of Kappa, but the Mesmerizer smells more. He smells the forest where the paper was grown. He smells the chemicals in it that repel the pests. He smells the box in which the ream of paper was imported and the ocean air through which the boxes have traveled. It hovers in his easels three feet away from him. Light, not too bright, glows only on the canvas, making the rest of the lounge darker. In that darkness, the Mesmerizer observes it. The paper will soon smell of colors.
What should he paint tonight? Death? Or life?

Maroc Metz, the only butler of Kuhawk, comes to the lounge in his usual attire—tailcoat, polished shoes, gloves, and glasses.

“Master Ruem, it’s time for the ritual, and our guest has arrived. Should I bring her here before it gets discourteous? Or will you continue contemplating?” he asks the Mesmerizer, in a tone he would never dare to use if it were a time ago.

“I am painting.” The Mesmerizer watches the blank canvas.

“The brushes are fresh, the oil still untouched. The painting has not even begun, and you’ve sat like that for four hours. You’re contemplating.” Maroc dares again.

“It’s part of the painting,” the Mesmerizer says.

“And you’re explaining,” Maroc adds with no surprised tone, but a hint of question is there. “You never explain yourself.”

“I can explain a thing or two to the only one I can depend on.” The Mesmerizer doesn’t look at Maroc; he doesn’t need to.

“You mean the only one left for you to depend on,” Maroc says, “after you’ve killed the lot of them.”

“Sometimes, you sound as if I am the villain.”

“And sometimes you sound as if being a villain is bad, Master Ruem.” Maroc curves his lips. His eyes are gleaming, which his master doesn’t see but senses. His tone has devotion, perhaps even grief. “I’m bringing the guest. Here is your suit.” Maroc calls a suit—a three-piece, polished with ionized fiber, conditioned with fragrance, smoothened with the right temperature and humidity. It flies here with a hover-hook. Soundless, no air blows; even the blue macaw in its silver cage doesn’t flinch. The suit hangs in the air from its hook.

The Mesmerizer ignores it. “Am I a villain, Maroc?”

Maroc was about to leave, probably to serve the guest of Kuhawk in the manner she deserves, but he looks back. His master still watches the yet-to-be painting. You’re my Master Ruem, Maroc wants to say, but he doesn’t. He knows something is troubling him. He never saw this man troubled with anything, not even when the toughest cyclone of the decade hit Alpha. He was there when the King of Mesmerizers stood firm before the mountain of water when it was approaching their city. He saw him speaking to the raging water, and the water listened. Water always listens to the Mesmerizer’s voice.

“You are the Mesmerizer I would follow to death,” Maroc says and turns to leave, but the voice stops him again, and this time, it’s the voice he always waits to hear.

“Send the guest to the cave,” says the voice. “Tell her we meet where it lies. Tell her to leave if she cannot voice death. Tell her she will be a sacrifice if she bends her will.”

* * *

A SPIRAL TUNNEL taking deep into the earth.
A man humming a lullaby.
A gold anklet—one of its pair—ringing in his hand.

The man, the Mesmeriser, left the other around an Ungraded girl’s ankle. Perhaps she deserves it; perhaps she doesn’t. That’s something to see later, not now. The anklet, however, is something he needs for the time. It bells in the sweetest sound as some delicately forged gold, the sort of sound that only this anklet can make. In the cave, it creates a special frequency, a distinct ringing. Not always you find a word specifying the sounds of an anklet, not in all languages. But some do have a word or two, like Runujhunu—Bengali from the Old World.

“I didn’t want to come here,” says the symbolist the Mesmerizer has hired, Piuee Pariyeta. Her ginger hair is messier tonight, her face ashen from the dirt the path here has provided. Her analyzers aren’t broken. She appears confident but only on the façade.

The Mesmerizer remains silent, his eyes—fiery red, looking for things in the fungus-covered walls, things that only his eyes would see. It’s not the final destination. It’s not the cave, but it’s the beginning.

“Don’t you want to see the shrine you found?” Maroc Metz speaks on behalf of the Mesmerizer.
Piuee doesn’t reply at first. She was pleased with herself when she found the shrine where the Devil’s Book was forged. All discoverers feel such pleasure when they find something that could hold the truth. Still, who would visit a shrine that asks for a price?

“The shrine wants death,” she speaks her concern.

“You mentioned it,” Maroc Metz answers her, too quickly this time. “Thirty-nine times.” He also sneers, seeing the dirt on her nose. He tried not to do it all these times; his master taught him manners. “Do not use tones unobservant Low Grades use,” he said once, just once, and never again. The Mesmerizer never repeats instructions, but this woman is beyond—what you may call—acceptable. This woman makes people repeat instructions. He walks behind her, keeping distance between them as if he’s saving his valuable tailcoat from the world’s worst sewage. His gaze—scornful and repulsed—doesn’t soften.

[Blair Deas · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Ask yourself. Are you born to find the next comfortable water flask with which people can drink more comfortably? Are you born to design the next tiny box where below the average will get drunk and snore in their own vomit?”
“What makes you think I’ll make water flasks or boxes there? I might want to make—” the Intuitionist says weakly.
“It doesn’t matter what you want to make. You will make what they need you to make. They need innocent hands to do their work; they need children’s lips to parrot their words, and you will do it in exchange for a meager amount—more if you are a little rebellious. But still, a slave. For food. For home. And for a few months’ sense of security with friends you never meet. You will play a role in the vast plan that has spread worldwide like fungus, and your role will be this tiny,” the Mesmeriser brings his pointing finger and thumb closer to each other, holding his hand up, showing her how tiny her life will be if she takes any wrong turn being dazzled by a logo. “Easily replaceable by another set of muscles and brains when you can’t handle it,” he adds.

Last week I was reading book about a MOMMY with grey hair who wants her kids not to be ‘ALONE’ even though she knows being ‘alone’ is the true gate to freedom. But the problem is this MOMMY can’t say it directly because all her kids are adults. So she whispers and whispers and whispers until she turns into a worm of a lower dimension. Her eyes get black circles and voice turns meek and her spine loses all its bones—you know kinda like worms. And still she manages to brainwash a few of her kids—you know the ones who are the all-time-kind-type girls and boys. So the wormy-mommy manages to trap some kids in vines even from the lower dimension. All because they didn’t read the prophecy of truth: that the fire of lies isn’t actually a real fire, and the water of heaven isn’t actually a real heaven.

I felt so sad (read this word ‘sad’ without hearing the mocking tone of whispers that got stuck in your brain. Read this word ‘sad’ as if it’s true.)
I felt truly sad for the kids who are stuck that it pained me, and I took some time to read a book that will inspire me and lift my mood. And this book, THE CHEAT CODE, really really really lifted my mood to a point that I think I’m ready to slaughter any worm in my Biology lab tomorrow, and I think I won’t even need to wear gloves.

[BookishOtaku Danny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Imagine Patrick Rothfuss writing a Dan Brown book, but instead of blabbering in circles way too much, he takes a turn to Neil Gaiman’s tight pagery and chapter crafting, and then instead of getting a bit carried away with artisty, it brings facts onto the page like Martha Wells. And then, instead of being much in facts, the prose turns into the realm of magic like Paolo Coelho. But then, don’t stay in the whimsical magic either, go visit the cool boom characters you get to see only in games and anime. But then, the characters are not cheesy Gen-Z or all-time-slanging boomers and millennials; the characters are all now the mysterious, shawl-wearing, hat-spinning, and classical-music-whistling heroes from Stephen King and Jim Butcher’s books. But then, it’s 2022, the dudes of the old days thought only dudes could be cool, and there cannot be women as MCs/OCs who can mesmerize equally. Now here, the book takes a ride along N K Jemisin’s punching voice, that is, no more soft storytelling like an old wizard, sometimes do speak the truth harshly and hit 'em all with a bus. And lastly and most importantly, the story remembers to take a final turn at Margaret Attwood’s tight page numbering style—that is sum it all up within 300 pages. Oufh! Yes. So this book has the last thing that has always been missing in story books—some fully fleshed, not-annoyingly flawed, multi-talented STEM girls who are not drooling over boys or aren’t just being the supportive classical heroine who’re there to be the wives who will die, and they are not even the annoying asskickers! That’s the missing piece in the literature of all times—a cool heroine who puts a mark in the memory and in heart, a protagonist with the power of truth. This book a perfect synthesis of all legends! Only the end of the days can make a synthesis of it all--that's what I used to believe. Only the end of the days will connect all the pieces of the puzzle and solve it. This book makes me believe that we are entering a different era. The era of truth and wisdom and synthesis of the previous.

A striking para that I had to read several times simply because how hard it affected me:

Weapons. In the end, that’s what they are, just weapons. People began making them. They’re for defense only—they told themselves. They’re to fight the bad guys, the tyrants. But in time, they realize weapons look cool, but making them is exhausting. Thus, everyone—tyrants and heroes alike—come into a truce—either with words or without them. Sometimes, a truce happens in silence: no words are spoken, only a nod or two, and that’s it; the truce is there. The Monk saw such a truce many times in his life.
Truce might sound like good news, but it’s not. Men’s impatience isn’t built to last long. A truce means peacetime. Where is the fun in peace? What to do with the cool weapons they’ve already made? It’s boring not to use them. It’s not profitable to hoard them in the basement. Let’s use them as tools for fear. Let’s terrorize the weak, the civilians, the new. There you go. That’s one use of the weapons rusting away with time, the weapons that men made when their youthful time was bubbling with unused energy because of underwhelming masturbation. There. Even in the dark storage, weapons have their use now. It might fall on your head anytime—inducing that thought is enough of a use.

[Paula Greythorn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Her jaws drop when she sees them. It’s an entire bunch of the reviewers she used to follow four years ago: Baby Boo, Stinky Bees, Boy Doll, Goo Pie, Anchovies, The Pig Five, Slaves For Food, Slave For Pats, Poop Shaker, and Master Of All Poop … She recognizes them all. In fact, she even remembers Anchovies had a logo of sharks in their channel. Are they all applying in Alphatech? Yes. If they join the Marketing Tower here, companies worldwide will have a tough time in the coming days.

That was the most hilarious para I have ever read. White masters created the term 'whip'. In 2023, the 'whip' took a modern and civilized twist--you do it while staying withing a 12'x12' box, sitting behind a 14" screen--in a veeeeeeery 'civilized' manner. The modern, 'civilized' whip. That whip is still for the white 'mewsters'--intended for each and every person of color (they're fooling themselves if they think they are something otherwise). Well, after reading this book, I've realized, Misba is a kind of person who will never touch a whip. Because in Asia, you don't whip. You just use a bamboo of certain thickness. It's good for all purpose use. And sometimes, it can be used metaphorically even from behind the screen! How wonderful is that?

[Ruhina Jannat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Flashy jackets, shining shoes unfit to wear in the Junkland, sunglasses in their eyes even though the sky is cloudy today. They don’t look like they shower even once a week. Their faces covered with round layers of fat, their hair cut short down to their scalp as if they’re born to be pawns of an army or, at best, clerks in another’s office. For some reason, they all look the same, just as all insects look the same. Without intuition, she could never identify them apart. Their wrists are empty—no CRAB wrapping them around. Junklandians—not the very best of their kind. One of them moves with his shoulders wobbling. Probably he thinks it’ll mark his leadership.

It’s really amazing how Misba depicts things in such a punching tone. I cannot tell enough how much satisfactory it was reading this paragraph as if I wanted someone to say all these aloud. You know whenever you look around and you see only misogynistic and illiterate people who are the type who cannot be fixed with words. You know the type who have gone too far that maybe beating them with some stick wouldn’t even work because their parents have just beat them too much already by the time they were ten. Yeah, so how do you portray such crowd properly and show exactly what they are? Yes, I think you do show them just like Misba did.

Their faces covered with round layers of fat, their hair cut short down to their scalp as if they’re born to be pawns of an army or, at best, clerks in another’s office. For some reason, they all look the same, just as all insects look the same. I will never ever forget this part, Misba. Thank you so much for writing such a splendid book. And thanks so much for portraying the cockroch-looking men from the League of Donkey’s in Junkland...

[Alima Ikissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Their conversation moves to the tragic way Moslin got lost. Nazeli shows them some of her findings from the historical archive. The part about how the handloom artists of an entire country got their fingers cut by the British colonizers three hundred years ago. All because their machine-made clothes weren‟t selling. How would they sell? They all looked the same—only one colored throughout, no designs, no crafting, nothing apart from boring blandness. And they were coming like swarms of pests. A hundred above-the-average things are more profitable than one best thing, they said. The birth of capitalism and the death of art go hand in hand, just as they did.

This book speaks some terrifying truth!
No wonder some foolish men whose ego got hurt (because of this series and because the author is a woman) would rather worship some fools in some 3rd-world, slave supplying country. Interesting is they even arrange 'talk shows' trying to identify why their education is actually 'degrading'?

As if they don't know why they are shooting out dumb children from their shackled wives bellies? As if they don't know it has happened because they have run the intellectuals away from their country. As if they don't know it's because they beat the intellectuals who stay.
The light bulb farmer is now selling the light of the country to the white masters' continents, and they still can't find the reason why their children are getting dumb.

Tell me, what did you do to keep the light at your homes?

Perhaps they forgot when the politicians and some whoresons were attacking the artists, singers, teachers, and writers of their they country, all they did was just watch. Perhaps they forgot they do not promote the best books their own people make. Instead, they promote the books by some 3rd grade politicians. Perhaps they forgot that it's them who are responsible for the 'Degradation of Education System' because they do not put the mind-evolving, thought provoking books their new generation is bringing to them. Instead they put the books by cheap, low class politicians who write books about their nations father. Perhaps they forgot that diseases have afflicted their country because they worship illiterate men instead of One God, because they fear the kind of men who do not wash their hands after wiping their asses.

And then they go to arrange some 'talk shows' on 'how the fuck our education is degrading!' How my baby boy is so damn dumb that no girl would kiss them, so he just went on to pull the girls scarf. Oh my poor baby boy, so shy that he can't talk to girls properly.

How do you talk about 'Education Standard' when you promote books by the white masters who writes only to enslave your kind. Each of their words are dedicated to 'keeping their own positions in the pyramid' while stabilizing your position at its base? How do you promote books by satan worshippers of another country, when you don't support the books by the ones who are fighting them?

And you talk about Education Standard? You? The ones who push away the strongest voice that your white masters are fighting each other to have. You illiterate dumb fucks will always remain illiterate dumb fucks! Even if you see the pyramid, even if you have the eye to see the truth, what you will do at best is try to climb it with your puny hands and legs that suffer from malnutrition because your mother taught you to feed your brains more so that it will work better for the white masters. Your brains are empty of enough grey matter to stand up with your spine straight. Yes, you may have enough grey matter to do math and physics, but that's just enough to be your masters' slaves to build the pyramid.

The truth is, your white masters designed to make you slaves, and they started it 250 years ago. While you, peaceful enough to sleep after work, and brave enough to rape the neighbor's 4-year-old child evolved to be spineless pieces of worms. And you all know it! That's the interesting part. Your schools and colleges taught you the entire history--at least in our time. And what did you do with that knowledge? You memorized history. You vomited how your country suffered in the exam. And then you laugh it out, or talk it out in the tea-stall--or at best, at the 'talk shows.' You are just talkers. You will do nothing unless satan funds you from its ass.

Let me tell you the max you will do. You will read books about 'How to gain financial success' and 'How to unlock money' and 'How to get a masters degree from Florida and get settled in Amrika.' These are the books that you will promote on your home page. You do not read anything that provokes thought. You do not spread about words that will help in mind evolution for every one. You are not wise enough to see what keeps people in the chains. Even if you see, you are too afraid to do what is right. You are cowering because of the fear Satan placed around you with fake disasters. You forgot those disasters harm only those who God wants.

You, Fools! Know your enemies. If rain leaves your country, it will be because the One God wanted it for you--only hypocrites will suffer then, and believers will not, because believers will know these are all meaningless and the end is coming. And then perhaps, out of the believers there will rise hope.

[Jason Quinn · Rating 5 out of 5]

The girl is a high maintenance, and soon he begins to wonder whether his plan will ever bloom.

I was wondering when I read a book so full of humor as The Cheat Code, yet so ironically punching at the face with each of its page. I could say Misba has a mesmerizing voice and she lured me into her books quite efficiently. Several times I wondered who in the world the mesmerizer could be? Perhaps the author herself? Here is what the Mesmerizer is like from the Monk's words:

“Your world’s one of the top-ten architects is also the one with the world’s best convincing tongue. You can’t do anything about it if he shows his arguments without even using voice, especially displaying the old-friend card,” the Monk defends.

I also loved the depth to which Misba keeps going into each of her characters as if she is a master of observing human minds. The author, as expertly as possible, always goes a deeper level to show hidden parts of a human. For example, she says:

“I heard the world’s best beauty flirted with you last year, using voice. She couldn’t make you slither into her bed, but the Mesmerizer made you stay in a luxurious home! Fraud monk or not, people never do things they don’t want to do,” Lidsus says.

And then, Misba goes into another layer suddenly showing the faults of the Monk character who was supposed to be the 'High Grade' with will and voice, who are of the kind who aren't supposed to do what they 'don't want to do'. But suddenly the Monk says:

“I did thousands of things I never wanted to do even when I thought I had a strong will and voice, Lidsus,” the Monk says.
“Like signing on the paper that began the Grade system?”

The plot and the structure of this third book of the series in particular captured my attention. I could see how smartly all the chapters are woven and connected into a perfect flow. And I couldn't help but notice how Misba begins each of her chapter with immensely mind-fucking expositions. I feel like I want to quote them all, but that is impossible, but it's clear that we are seeing one of the strongest writers of the century. You don't see that unless it's a literary fiction with a hoard of old editors working towards Pulitzer or Nobel these days.

Here is a strong entry to a chapter around the end. I think this one broke my mind real good that I could say I ended up in tears. I'm saying because it truly sounded like the author made someone really teary with this one, and it doesn't feel like she is mocking here. I do not think people with true rage can ever mock. Everything that comes out of their mouth are, in the end, what they are--truth!

Before that, it was only wars. It was only children trying to hide in their little tents, shoving off their nightmares during sleep while guilt drove them into madness during their day. It was their existential crisis hitting them every moment, every second, in every breath as if they were alive. For they had to do the most terrible things the adults had asked them to do. Meanwhile, the adults had to do even more terrible things while making sure the children finished those tasks. Things get ugly when intentions become questionable.
Things get ugly when people lose faith.

And then, I really cried when I came to the end of that chapter.

“I’m sorry it has happened to you. Children have always been on the front line, suffering the flame first in all wars in history. It was always the youth who had to shield the monsters. The children were preyed on first through the wrong stories, through dreams dazzling and dancing before their eyes. But you’ll be able to take the right decisions eventually when you become stronger,” the Monk speaks.

I have to say, this chapter had real truth in it. If the ones who say they are fighting evil, they should revise their goals, stakes, and reasons once again. Because I do not think you can ever be a part of such a strong voice with 'pretense' and 'fakery'. Because with The Cheat Code, I believe the author has proved that it's us who have to prove our faith to the strongest voice. Not the other way around. It's us who have to earn trust, not the ones who so far has always been true.

In the end, voice makes one king. Not lies and 'reaping what is being sown.' In the end, farming and speaking aren't same.

[Azrin Naaf · Rating 5 out of 5]

“After a hundred years, I believe. The weaving of the devil is too deep, and I see it everywhere. But I’m not leaving my children in such a world alone.”
“You needed a hundred years to see it. If everyone needs a hundred years to catch up on their history, I’d say the devil has already won,” Hussaini argues. She has read history, perhaps most of all history men have discovered. She even plotted all events in graphs and made an AI to predict their patterns. She knows events repeat every time, every century. She knows the devil uses the same blueprint, and it works! All because men forget while the devil doesn’t.
“No, he didn’t win. Not yet,” Meera says again. “Don’t you always say that this life doesn’t matter? Don’t you say what we get here isn’t the goal? What we choose and what we do is the goal?”
“What do you propose?” Hussaini asks.
“I propose we understand that the devil doesn’t want our treasures. It doesn’t want our lands or positions or power. It only wants our fall. It wants our choices. Whether we do or don’t do, whether we just sit or don’t sit—these choices are the only things that matter. These choices are the only treasures we have still. Not power or property or life. I propose we guard our choices. Just enough that it won’t make our children’s choices harder.”

I really have no words to say about this book. If The High Auction and The Oldest Dance did something to steal my mind, what The Cheat Code did was just reap away my heart. This book is a timely need. In times of the end when everyone is crying about their own lost souls, Misba talks about real freedom. Misba tells us that maybe not climbing the pyramid at all and not following anyone’s path is the true freedom.

Maybe the wilderness and learning to hunt again would be the right course to reach the pinnacle of human evolution. It never is a fight if we take one of the paths laid by the system because all the paths are on the devil’s board. You do not break the system by entering the system and being inside. You break the system by not entering it at all. By not keeping faith in it. By acting like it doesn’t even exist.

Remember what that author said in his book about Darwinish evolution? (Yeah, that author.) He praised high about the Peugeot Lion and gave an advertisement about how everyone can get a funding by opening and LLC(?!) in a book about ‘anthropology’ and ‘evolution from monkeys’! That book is international bestsellers, of course after advertising about ‘Limited Liablity banking system’ in the first thirty page of his book.

So, what did he say again? He said, that we believe in papers because we all together believe in papers. So if you believe you can break the system by being ‘inside’ the system, then I think you still believe in this ‘system’ thingy. Maybe we all still believe that at the end of the day you need to be somewhere, a home? I think everyone is too damn scared of being a Nomad because people forgot we came here to be nomads in the first place. Maybe we forgot, the home you seek isn’t here. So maybe you should be a nomad, and the entire universe will conspire to make the whole universe your temporary home until you reach your real home.
God bless you all.
This book is bloodydamn brilliant.

[Maria Anjum Shelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

In THE CHEAT CODE, I loved this concept of Mind World a lot. It’s a paired device where the ones wearing them on their forehead are able to see and talk to each other while being in each other’s mind. Which means the High Grades who are able to control their thoughts can communicate with each other in there while constructing whatever they imagine in that world. For example—Misba writes:

In the Mind World, there is freedom. Whatever you think happens. Whatever you imagine forms. Unless you can control your thoughts, you must not be there for too long …
… There are rumors about the Mind World. Some say it has been devised for the rebels in the west—to keep them imprisoned for forty days in their imaginations, to make them see all sorts of lies. But that’s not all. Some say the first day of their prison is equivalent to a year; the second day there is like a month, and the third day is like a week. The rest of the days are the same as it is in the real world. But the most interesting rumor is: anyone who crosses those forty days yet never breaks, can never be broken by any Mind World ever.
Many called the false gods their gods after being thrown into the fire of a Mind World, but only the rarest few didn’t, and those rarest few never called themselves gods or queens, nor kings or emperors.It’s forbidden to speak of rebels inside the walls, but the Intuitionist has heard about it from the whispers of the Old City.

Misba also adds an interesting detail about this Mind World for a universe where High Grades do not touch the Low Grades because they have taken an oath.

Besides, she knows the secret reasons why they invented them. “I bet it’s where the High Grades can fuck the Low Grades,” Haley told her once...

And that sure adds imaginations in my head about the future books in the series. (Oh and, yes, the story doesn’t end in this one. It sure isn’t a trilogy—structured by the white-masters and vomited by an exotic author-of-color from a potential slave-supplying country.)

But truly, what I enjoyed the most is the [SPOILER] mind fight of the Mesmerizer and the protagonist in the Mind World. That was the most interesting, thrilling, and hottest-written-ever chapter I have come across. What’s so brilliant is that Misba planted the seeds about it in the book The Oldest Dance, in 2021—the part about ‘ants crawling in her cheek and neck.’ Misba perfectly brings it to a full circle when the protagonist thinks about the ants crawling in her cheek again, this time, while being inside the Mind World, and Gosh! What a terrible thought that is! She starts seeing them on her body because the Mind World creates whatever she thinks! How beautiful portrayal of the fact that Low Grades can’t think properly enough and that their thoughts are not focused and not always in their control. And that no matter how much they claim that ‘their thoughts are of their own and their actions and choices are of their own’, but in reality they all could be planted by agenda holders from far high level of the pyramid. How brilliant portrayal of such an important thing, and all that, without giving me a civics and sociology lecture!

She knows they’re in her mind, but in the Mind World, they feel real. Too real. She quickly backs off, trying to rub the ants out of her face, but there is nowhere to run when her own thoughts are her prison.

And then, Misba brings the concept of the universe around the end of the book while describing about ‘Mind World’. Before I say about this ‘Mind World’ in Misba’s Kusha Universe, I have to show that para because this part really intrigued me.

It’s believed all the universes and all creations are the One god’s constant thought that is so focused and so strong that nothing bends, nothing breaks, nothing displaces from its course. And what else would men want on earth other than mimicking their source?
“How does it look like without a construct?” she asks.
“Empty. All dark. All nothingness,” the Mesmerizer says, “and then suddenly things appear out of nothing. You could almost call it a big bang in a lower dimension...”

[BookDragon DeSanjorgs · Rating 5 out of 5]

the Monk doesn’t feel cringed anymore. He doesn’t feel hatred for anything; he doesn’t frown; he doesn’t roll his eyes; he doesn’t sigh when he witnesses human stupidity, for he knows what every event in this life game is—a drama to stir you, a farm to make you walk along a designed path, a show to make you act. As long as you react within the things in the list, the dice succeed.

After reading book 3, book 1 feels mediocre to me—if I compare it within series. For me, I would say, people were ‘muttering’ a lot in Book 1. And then people started ‘whispering’ a lot in Book 2 instead of ‘muttering’. Even though I have to admit, Misba has a lot of control in her usage of verbs. She always elaborates her verbs either with striking vision or with exposition that somehow makes you think wow, it makes sense, doesn’t it?. Her pages never get boring. But I gotta say, in Book 3, she surpasses herself. I got so much into the pages, the characters. Even her chapter names are interesting. This is a new mark to reach. She uses poetry a few times.

In the days of famines,
I have seen—
The true hunger was not in the bellies.
It was in the souls—
Devoid of tales and songs so sweet like the ones in the old
Times.
I’d say that’s the true face of a famine—
The famine in art.
The famine in words.
The famine of truth.
Sad! We are living it still …

That’s definitely a new touch in a sci-fi. I don’t find enough scifi written lyrically that almost feels like fantasy. As for the theme of this book, I think this time, Misba touches a lot of occult stuff along with creatures/beings of other dimensions here--along with the usual stuff she writes which feels like she is the only one who could write about those so well within some 280-300 pages. I wonder if the series will get into some sort of alien/monster invasion on earth in the future or not, because honestly, I don’t like alien stories at all. But so far, as it remained in the occult/dark alchemy/ programming-in-the-universe-to-get-access-into-other-dimensions realms—whichever Misba calls it, I’m enjoying that a lot. Because it’s no typical horror or alien story. It's no typical sci-fi with blabbering about techs/machines. It's definitely not a typical Conspiracy Theory book filling up the pages with pyramid's length and height.

The most important part is: it combines the biblical stories as ‘The First Stories of Mankind’ and adds a lot of interesting angle to them. I’m saying ‘interesting’ very typically and blandly because if I begin I don’t know where to end that discussion. Overall, it’s a perfect book in perfect size and weight giving us some envious number of things to think about. Honestly, I still do not know how Misba did it, but she definitely made some characters to watch. I’m not just talking about the Machinist/Intuitionist and the Monk and the Mesmerizer. I’m talking about Meera and Ren too. And well done with Haley Harrowvy and that mind-breaking chapter about Maroc’s first moment of darkness in book 3! Clearly it’s going to be long series. Otherwise you don’t put attention to every character of a book.

Overall, what I can say is people who can't even write some typical one-liners in each of their chapters (let alone every page) will have a lot to learn from this book.

[Mizzele Ressner · Rating 5 out of 5]

You depict a man’s face and the man’s pride boosts. You shape a devil’s face, and the devil will be pleased. And it will talk. It’s not a specific rule. It’s not a chemistry formula written in books. It’s the basic code of the universe—something conscious has an ego; boost it, and you’ll have access to its soul. Now you can be as imaginative and passionate as you want during the process of ego-boosting. The devil loves your sin. Be passionate about your sins as much as you can. That’s the only rule in the game.

I was wrong when I thought this book is a scifi when I started the first book. It was a mix of fantasy and philosophy in the near futuristic set where a massive One World government has enslaved the entire earth putting the slaves in different ranks. It wasn’t as original as most people say. I mean, yeah, every other scifi is a futuristic time and stuff where a villain gov enslaves the us all, isn’t it? But then, Misba comes here to give it a twist of Biblical references, bringing the concept of Satan-the-wormy-boy who is wormier than Voldemort-before-falling into the cauldron, and then Misba brings up Satan-the-wormy-boy’s children too who are wormier than the wormy-boy-Satan. To say frankly, Misba brings occult and horror and Dark Alchemy.

I have to mention here, her book already had the mention of Dark Alchemy since Book 1, but here is where the readers encounter the ‘other beings’ whose purposes we so far know as ‘they want their earth back from the Children of Adam’ and they want to show ‘the Children of Adam are so weak that they don’t deserve the earth.’ That’s a really interesting turn of stuff. Honestly, Misba depicts three major religion in a new light, and somehow, she makes sense! I have never heard of concepts the way she shows us especially in The Cheat Code. She portrays the universe as a simulation where all the rules and laws of people’s action and choices are coded somewhere like we do in a program or a game. Which explains the sins and laws of being good and moralty. Misba shows people’s choices and actions and, most importantly, what people speak aloud, are what changes the codes of the universe and brings a result in the form of evolution (Misba doesn’t say it directly, but she hints the concept of ‘Hereafter’.

I wonder if it will come later in the series or not. But one thing I can tell is that this ‘Hereafter’ and the so called ‘Paradise’ marketted by some cultists false-gods are not the same thing. And finally what chilled me throughout the book is Misba’s strong voice which, I believe, has gone even stronger than before. Because, ouch! Her pages sting in a finer manner than a scorpion—it has no poison but rather something serene—the kind you’d feel when you read truth. Yes, I just said it. I think I kinda understand what she means with ‘truth’ and why she is going all on rage about bringing the Age of Truth. Even at the end of the book, in her Acknowledgment section she signs her name after the phrase ‘To bring the Age of Truth.’ Considering the times of fake-media and the prophecy by MIT about the fall of society by 2040, I would say I had goosebumps reading that part....

[Olivia Avon · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Source is God's power. Anyone who can bend the Source can create matter, craft events, and change the grand storyline. To do that, one must bear the seeds of rebels. One must be brave enough to rebel against god, for you cannot control the universe if you do not win its laws.
The Mesmerizer knew it from the Dead Sea Scrolls and from the mystics who belonged to the first People of the Books. Still for ages, it wasn’t quite a revelation to him. It only stayed as knowledge, never becoming wisdom. Until he saw what he saw when he was busy making the world.

So he searched. He searched and searched. The path was just as he thought—one thing leading to another, one book taking to more books. One map revealing the next map. The devil loves working in puzzles—the ones that are built like chains, like a ladder made with thousands of steps. The devil was the smartest of its kind before he fell. He always picks the smartest ones to design your fall. The Mesmerizer has passed many falls, yet he has followed the steps, the clue after clue that came to him. And in the middle of those clues, perhaps somewhere at the trench of one step or two, he forgot that the truth is always simple. He forgot if the Source is God’s power, it would need only one step, not thousands.

The cave is drowning, and with it, drowns the truth.

I do not know in which era we are living in. I always knew fictions had some truth in them, but I have never seen truth displayed in such a marvelous fashion before. This book needled me in a way no fiction book did. Yes, I believe. Oh, the real and one and only God! How true it is!

[Sejoka Zeo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Past is past; just laugh it out—they say. Why? Because people only remember the summaries and the conclusions, never the details. And sometimes, those conclusions are edited by another—through whispers and therapies and pep talks.

I'm telling ya, this book DOES NOT villainize the children. Because this book is already full of adult villains who are psychos, murderers, cannibals, mesmerizers, High Grade manipulators, even the secret sniffers of smells. Oh yeah, they sniff your necks mostly, and they touch you with nails if you are unlucky. And on lucky days they will touch your with a hand crafted out of water, cus the motherfuckers can even voice the water in a scifi book. So yeah, here is the fantasizing part in the scifi: people achieved fantasy level superpowers through mind control and hypnosis and self training in the himalyas. THE MOST IMPORTANT thing is, this book KICKS THE ADULTS’ BUTTS for real good. You know the kind of adults who represent kids as villains in all stories and books. And this book does not steal another dead author’s world to tell its own stuff. This book doesn’t need ‘poc’ or ‘female’ or ‘cult daddylicker’ tags either cuz it sure stands on its own. The Evil Motherfucking eye will have to kidnap people’s children for real to come up with a book like this that they will be allowed to sponsor.

[Reviewpixie]

In the days of famines,
I have seen—
The true hunger was not in the bellies.
It was in the souls—
Devoid of tales and songs so sweet like the ones in the old
Times.
I’d say that’s the true face of a famine—
The famine in art.
The famine in words.
The famine of truth.
Sad! We are living it still.

Poetry in scifi! If that isn’t something …
I couldn't find any words to say anything about this book or the series yet. I feel like I belong too below in the steps of the pyramid to even think I can say anything about this book. Because I do not believe this book could ever belong to the pyramid at all. To be honest, this voice will shatter the pyramid that time made stand on the sand desert for thousands of years. And while living at its foot and carrying its stones like a slave in the tiny society, I will not dare to review this book until I learn how to live outside the stone 3D-triangle.
All I can say is that this book is the MUST READ of the century.

[Mishela Meyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are three kinds of arrogance. One kind is the attractive kind; it comes from toddlers. People wows and oohs seeing this kind of arrogance because it looks cute. The next kind is in the middle; it oozes out from certain people whose parents wowed them for too long, and it comes in them in a subtle manner, like a fart—smelly, discomforting in public, yet no one can exactly point it out even if it comes loudly. The last kind is the most unattractive kind. It makes you want to piss and puke. You see it in a man, and you just want to slap hard. All you’ve to know is when to slap and how hard to slap.

In the previous book of this series we saw the ‘three kinds of sins’. Here Misba talks about ‘three kinds of arrogance’. I have to admit: Misba sure does have a strong voice that kicks the butt with a boot.

[Mist Pl · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Good that you know magic,” she says.
“It’s not magic,” the Mesmerizer says, still exhaling strongly.
“What is it then?” she asks, gasping.
“Barter system.”
“What did it ask of you? What did you deliver?” Piuee frowns.
The Mesmerizer doesn’t speak. The Knights of the Dark have asked for souls, but he didn’t deliver souls. In the end, the cave belongs to the universe, and the universe has only one key.
“Music,” he answers. “I delivered the right music.”

Oh dear! What would you do if you knew for real that your actions really damn really codes the universe? What will you do, if you knew for sure that your words damn freakin codes the reality? What will you do if you knew for fucking real that if you embrace only the One God through your heart and mind and your tongue, the universe will do all the fighting for you. Don't indulge into the worldly worldgames. Wait and watch, and don't get lost as others hail in your name. There is only One God, and you will lose the One's power if you let your mind have praises for another.

[Bella Kneale · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Treachery. You’ve tricked the tricksters. You have angered them,” Piuee says, breathing loudly as if her lungs will burst. “You know they’ll find another way to get what they want. They wait for the next point of your suffering, and they strike when you’re the weakest.”
“I’ll trick them again,” the Mesmerizer whispers.
“Then you should be worried. If you trick them once more, they’ll think you belong to them,” Piuee says. “And three times you trick the tricksters, they make you theirs …” She repeats what she has translated from the Twin of the Devil’s Book.

Wow! Am I reading a fantasy or a scifi or what really? This is my best read of the decade. And I know it's too early to say 'it's the best series of the century,' but again, who knows how much of human society will last in this century. Even faking wars and rebellions and climate disasters and plague may not save the real world this time. Even casting lies and bringing magic also fall in a curve, and over use of it in a century will cause a peak, which will eventually fall to a drop, my dear idiot-moron-old masterminds with tinsy bits of occasional cleverness and a whole baggage of shortsightedness. You all are short-sighted. Period.

[Michael McCall · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Voice isn’t a formula, Kusha Gaumont. It comes from being fearless of consequences,” Maroc Metz only says.

Oh dear freakin' Universe! This book will make me fall in love with Maroc Metz even!

“Words don’t mean much unless it comes from someone with voice,”

Do I truly believe it now?
Yes, I do! Yes, I do!

“Why do you want the Source?” she asks.
“Get into that place, get anywhere in the world, and you’ll know why I look for the Source. If you are not just another human passing the day blindly, you will eventually follow the path I followed.”

Yes, I think I might be looking for the Source too in the very near future. It's just as Misba says, everyone don't gather at the same point unless the universe forges the Time of Gathering.
Doesn't mean we can just sit. Prepare for it like they are preparing to live in space while the earth drowns. They think they will be able to escape Judgment while making hotels in Mars using people's money. We will see who finds 'home' in the end.

[Shola Parisia · Rating 5 out of 5]

The only reason he has met her today is to receive her punches while making himself familiar. It always works with the young minds—beat them real hard, and then let them beat you in their own inexpert and weak manner. Soon they will believe they have repaid enough of their debt. Soon they will forget what they have suffered. It’s always better to fool yourself, believing you’ve taken your revenge, rather than accepting that you are weak—incapable of handling someone so above you. So all he does is plant seeds in her mind—just enough to confuse her.

Honestly, I have been wondering for a while now, is Misba a psychologist? Cus that would be scary, but I want to ask her a lot of questions. Like I don't know why, but as a gen-z even I can't tolerate myself sometimes. But after reading this book I have realized that I should not answer to whatever anyone says within 3 seconds. Instead, I have learnt from this book 'The Cheat Code' that I must must must pause for at least 5 seconds before answering literally any daddies that want to pet me.

[Shaha · Rating 4 out of 5]

“… The secrets to god’s power are now open to all.
How much of it will you believe? It’s fine if you don’t believe it. The law of probability confirms that some will always fall. Some must always drop. In the end, your belief marks your boundary. Your belief determines how far you will go. Will you limit your faith when the possibilities are infinite? Will you look away when the One’s consciousness can be yours?”

Misba knows how to make it worth reading. That’s for sure. Half the reason I think is because the publishing industry isn’t cutting and ‘razoring’ your middle to the point that it totally looks like skeleton and you can’t read the fuck out what the hell’s happening around there. I mean seriously, most scifi books I read, they look like the fucking agents and editors and the god-daddies of these authors ‘blessed them just enough’ to ‘let’ them write to their soul’s content only at the first page of each chapter (after the first 100 pg of the book). I mean seriously. Why aren’t these people letting the authors write? Do they have page shortage? Well, they can make the font shorter like this book here and let the authors write as much as they want. I mean it’s not like the book price will be any less than 30$ anyway, right? And they can’t give them extra fifty or sixty pages for the 30$s from us plus the cult money from Satan’s tits?

[Duane Richardson · Rating 5 out of 5]

The wrong sort hurt another, not because they’re good at it, but because they know most are bad at pointing it out. Most are bad at discovering patterns. Time heals anything—knowing it is a philosophy for most people, but believing it is magic for the wrong sort. So the wrong sort schedules their love and hate. They hate, and then they love when they know you must have healed by now. The Intuitionist doesn’t know, but today is the day when she decides to enter into that world—the world of scheduled love and hate.

I seriously mean it. I have no use of dogs. I seriously need people who can download the truth from the universe. I need people whose ambition isn't only to be the kings and queens within their own small circle--just pieces in the bigger plans of some fat old people.

People live in fear because they live only on the current page. People fear because they never rise and look from above. They never find the entire plot of a story—just like the Intuitionist.
She lives in the current moment. If the page is designed with apologies crafted by someone with voice, she forgets what has happened in the previous chapters. The chapters where the wrong sort came and hurt her, knowing that they will pay a visit after a month, confident with their designs, with their plans.

[Shaley Reed · Rating 5 out of 5]

What I'm surrounded by:

Beautiful liars.

What this book gave me.

TRUTH!

[Bobby Hart]

The Mesmerizer, among his schedules of work, has grown a new hobby—watching the two most important souls in the world at the moment. One is his old friend, who is playing sarod in the forest, and the other is his cheat code, who is watering a seedling.

Why Misba has to craft each of her last pages to the point of perfection too? And that seedling came several times already. I believe the seedling was in the first chapter of her first book too. Now that I wonder, wasn't that her 'save the plant with a screw' scene?
Anyway I totally got hypnotized reading this book. And I think if Misba hadn't written this para, I couldn't have gotten out.

“Blink. From now on, you will blink whenever you want to. You will close your eyes whenever you do not want to see. And you will sleep with your eyes closed. I remove you from my voice. I remove you from my will. I remove you from the Mesmer I hold on your mind …”
The Mesmerizer repeats it for a long time because to win against your own voice, you must voice stronger than before; you must will fiercer than before, and you must do it with words. Because only with words, you can recode fate.

Thank you, Misba. I appreciate that you have allowed us to blink. I finally feel sleepy, and I think I should rest. I have to wash my cloak and remove the stinks from me and then I have to do some self reflection. I guess.

[Horner Cammons · Rating 5 out of 5]

They’re making her bleed. It’s not some movies; it’s not a drama on a stage; it’s not a story or a life-threatening journey in fantasies. It’s real life, and in real life, the talentless do have the time to gang on others and make the skilled ones bleed. It’s the same old pattern: the below-average ruling the world because the intelligent ones are busy with the toys they make. Worse—they’re busy fighting over whose toy is fancier. ‘Your toy is fancier,’ the below-average claps, and the intelligent—giddy and proud—dances in their dreams, bringing more of those toys. 

Most books I read in the last five years were like cupcakes. That is, they only look good, but tastes horrible. This book among them all felt like the freshest of date juice straight at the dawn of of a winter morning. I genuinely believe people will love and cheer for this book a 100 years from now, and that is after considering the (real) world will still be there after the world war three and climate 'control' (not change/shift) and other fuckerism that are yet to happen. Basically, if the human species don't go extinct and if they don't go brainless, this book will be there—read and praised and talked about like we talk about the good ol’ stuff.

[Dam Duck-Young · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Of course not. That’s my plan. Hard-working, talented children do not plan or want anything. They only execute a fraction of another’s plan in exchange for a meager sum.”

Let me tell you what happened to you. You began when you thought you can change the world. For a while you were doing it. But then, bit by bit you kept compromising. It was like salt--one pinch at a time. But then after 10-some years, you realize the salt has grown heavy. And all those self-justification every time you 'all' needed to convince someone wasn't working anymore even to yourself. Oh dear! You wanted to change the world, but it has changed you. And now, all you are is an old definition of your old self--just wake up and revise in front of the mirror that--'today too, I will be doing some good' or 'this one too will help people' or 'I'm doing this for everyone.' But then, those sound like excuses even to yourselves these days, and those fake tears don' wanna come anymore, do they?

[Tenira Sumita · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Intuitionist pauses in her spin—in the middle of her mad dance. It’s as if a bird was flying, but suddenly time has stopped, the world has stopped, and the bird remains stuck in its flying motion—still in the air. She pauses just like that. Her gaze finds that boy in a shawl—his leg injured but not broken. Not yet. His fake shawl is nowhere to be seen. He is dragging himself along the floor. Perhaps, never in his life had he imagined he could be punished for his actions. Perhaps he never believed that the universe always brings back what you give. The Intuitionist gazes at that boy: him she could kill.

One true incident: When I was regular in my critique groups, some of them showed worry about the author's voice. One of them said, 'I'm worried about the narrator. Is he or she ok?'
Oh dear! I don't know what she would say if she read The Cheat Code. Pity we lost contact or I could've told her about this book.

[Natasha Mia · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Is that why you joined IF? Better too far below in the chain of slavery than being close to the masters of the game,” Ody remarks.
“Schemers of the game,” TJ says.
“Not seeing and just serving is easier, I get it,” Ody says, toasting his empty glass in the air after finishing his drink.

Even the conversations in this book are so interesting!

[Howard Wilfong · Rating 4 out of 5]

She notes the kind of words he speaks; he’s using terms from official agreements. Some of his lines are taken straight from law books. It reminds her of an old song written after a famous book: I know why caged men sing like lawyers …

Oh dear! I totally remember when and at which points of life such phrase may appear in the brain of humble Misba. I know why caged men sing like lawyers just totally made my day.

All I can see is that Misba took a journey to truth, which means complete lack of faith on laws and money and other sort of paper work that is basically another world in 'Paper dimension' with identities and life details. You know what? I think people love their property papers and identity insurances so much that if someone tore it, it might even work as a Voodoo doll. Just like all our profiles over the social media will work as Voodoo dolls when the AI comes. Like, you know, you will get your legs cut in real life if your legs get cut in the virtual world.
Oh yes, you still do not understand the mind world and the rest of the things, but you will soon do.

[Christopher Partida · Rating 5 out of 5]

Waiting for both the book and the cover. Where is the cover?

[Masuda Akatsuki · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's too good. I got addicted to the lyrical writing and the voice.
Its characters are extremely cool with super-complex flaws and their problems are too over my head. They are thinking big stuff, they're looking for big stuff, and that's hurting my mortal, super-normal, low grade ego. I feel relatable with the protagonist. But I can't relate to the high grade evolve lot at all. I'm not saying people can't think big stuff. I'm just saying, I'm so intrigued by these characters that I'm sure I'll be looking for the next books to see them as many times as possible.
The world building is too visible. I saw the floating houses, the rich peoples' city who can afford the 3000% air-space around their houses, as well as the Old City where the people in the ground level can never see the sky and feel the rain. I could see the roads, the auction venues, the people, the rich women who has four husbands and talks about her four mother-in-laws. I could see Junk Land and its people. I could see the middle aged man who denied his high grade and now lives in a bus in the Junk Land and his passion to create, I could feel the politics told in snide remarks. I could see what war heroes mean, and what revoking your own war hero status could mean. Overall, this world was visible, livable. I wanted to live here. It wasn't scary dystopia or the kind of utopia that I would want to run away from. It was a world that I loved and would want to live in.