A certain scientific Rulebreaker and a certified magical idiot read Marcie and Gina

"Hello guys and gals, me Mutahar, and today we're reading Marcie and Gina!"

"Is your name Mutahar, though...?"

"No, but the joke was too good to pass up on. Either way, today we're reading what happens when two very tired individuals are subjected to some of the biggest slog in their life. Their words, not mine. Also one of them is so sexually frustrated she will probably rip the head off the next person who proposes her to solve that issue."

"...why do I feel like it's being foisted on us?"

"What do you mean? At best, it's foisted on you, kid."

"I'd prefer you didn't call me that. I'm over 25."

"And I'm about to hit my fifth century. This isn't dick measuring, Travis, just accept your faults."

"..."

"Anywho, let's get to it!"

READING IN PROGRESS (BGM)

...

"That was something."

"Gina is rather feisty."

"That's why crossbreeding cats and humans will definitely not end well, but whatever, there's always at least one guy who thinks it's a good idea. PSA: Please do not the cat."

"I feel like that's a reference I can't get."

"You don't even know what Wi-Fi means, so no, you won't get it. But either way, let's get into this."

“So, this is about a goon named Travis(nice fantasy name, bucko) who trains to become a Rogue. He kinda sucks at it though, so his teacher sends him on a mission to steal some earrings, probably to get rid of the nerd.”
“Indeed.”

"...what's wrong with my name?"

"I mean, aside from it sounding like someone got hit with a brick before coming up with it, nothing."

"I thought you were on my side?"

"On whose side? I'm an objective observer (although I am a subject of this reading session as well). That aside, Gina has a severe problem with it because if sounds mundane, that's all. Though, that's coming from a person whose name is 75% made of **** type, and the other 25% is literally the ending of every female name in one of the languages. Good going, Gin, I'll drink to that."

“This is the most anime bullshit ever.”

"Dear Gin, I don't think you of all people should be the one to say that. You're literally doing a Youtube reaction video format, so curb your enthusiasm a little. Besides, it's all about wording. Your average trip to the grocery store can be anime bullshit if you're good enough a bullshitter. Between this and a story about a guy reincarnating into a vending machine, I'll take this, thank you."

"Into a what?"

"Yeah, and there is also the one where a guy becomes a girl's panties."

"...who--"

"Don't even ask."

"..."

"Continuing..."

“Everything in this fucking story takes an eternity. Just fuck already!”
“There is a bit of...verbosity to this story that makes it somewhat exhausting to read. Don’t get me wrong, we had worse but still it could do with a bit a fat trimming.”
“A LOT of fat trimming!

"As per author's words, 'I blame my English teachers for requiring sermons'."

"No, but I see her point. Several points could've been shortened."

"I can imagine how they'll react to reading parts 2 and 3."

"Wait, they're going to read them?"

"I heard so. But back to the issue: I admit I'd rather have not seen certain parts myself, but let's be real, at least it's broken into proper paragraphs. Count your blessings."

“Get to the sex!”
“Gina?”
“What?”
“Are you in heath?”
“FUCK YOU!”

"Pfft."

"Yeah, Gin constantly emanates this aura of having a dildo just a smidge too short up her ass. I think it's cute, in a way."

"Cute? I wouldn't touch her with a broomstick."

"Neither would I. I am simply saying, her immense sexual frustration is quite entertaining to watch. I could see her getting along with Sia. Or maybe Vivian, she'd put her in her place within 15 seconds."

"...I just received forbidden knowledge. May we just continue?"

“Where was I? Ah yes, the danger of making your story too anime.”
“Riveting subject.”
”Let me explain. On the surface level dropping your protagonist into a dangerous hostile environment is not bad per se. As for now Travis’s Mind Control powers are very weak and he has to work around their limitations. It’s actually fairly refreshing. The problem is that there are no stakes attached to this penalty zone.”
“Uhu.”
“We are at chapter five. The official competition hasn’t even started and -spoiler alert-, won’t for the remainder of the available chapters. We can make an educated guess that Travis will not die in this jungle, but simply make it trough and return to the real world. Why oh why then do we have to spend numerous chapters dedicated to this fake tension?”

"Alright, Marcie, first of all: That's an excellent idea that I really think could have some use in the execution of any story writing."

"Well, I'm mostly against this. Even if you could've made that educated guess about me, what about Aria? For all you know, she's my enemy at that point, and we're **** to work together."

"Yeah, that's my second of all: Marcie, why do you think it's 'fake' tension? It's certainly real tension. It doesn't feel like that to you, but Travis and Aria were 100% affected by that."

"Aria's state afterward speaks volumes about that."

"And besides, 'no stakes attached' is a big statement. If this idiot doesn't give it his all, it's the end of the story. And if you think the author isn't capable of doing that, you clearly haven't read some of the other works he'd done."

"I feel mildly offended, but I agree. It's all or nothing at that point."

"Well, but before I descend into this pit of striking a wall with my hands, let me make the hammer and say: Moving on."

“One last thing I want to point out is that Travis does in fact not tell Aria that they only have to survive for a couple hours in this penalty zone because he is still worried what she might do in the real world.“

"...I'm sorry? Was I supposed to tell her 'Oh don't worry, it's just a punishment I received from a god'? Do you even think me telling her that would make things better?"

"Yeah, Marcie is really pulling that argument out of nowhere for once. It's not like that knowledge would've saved either of you much. Horror is horror, even if you know it'll end soon."

“But we get to that later. So! As expected our heroes survive the penalty zone get transported back to their fantasy world and everybody is surprisingly casual about the fact that these two just vanished for a couple of hours.”
“You would think that’s a bigger thing. There was a big earthquake and all that.”
“It is not just the police station either. Aria herself barely asks any questions about this harrowing experience.”
“You know, the inspector, who has a fucking magic lie detector doesn’t ask any questions!”

"...casual? Who the hell was 'casual' about that? Chris was ready to kill me because he suspected me on the spot!"

"That and the whole 'big earthquake' thing is quite superstitious. For all we know, the building might've been hit by something. And, mind you, that's literally the first thing Aria and Chris seem to suspect. He goes out to check on things while Aria makes it her mission to escort Travis back to his cell. Who in their right mind would've expected that a guy who literally admitted to being a level 1 would be the culprit?"

"Chris would, and Chris did."

"Aria doesn't ask questions? That's really rich, Marcie. She literally asks Travis in Penalty Zone and deduces the Orb might've misread his truths as lies. Speaking of 'magic lie detector', Gin, that's not what Orb of Truth does. Well, alright, it is, but not in the way you might think. It's not asking the law of truth, it's asking an opinion. And Aria, who the Orb belongs to, is more than aware that in his current state, Travis's answers would be as useful as asking a blind person what the sky looks like."

"Sheesh. You're getting worked up."

"What? Not at all. I'm just explaining a point that someone who claimed that 'readers can fill in the gaps themselves' failed to fill the gaps in, even though my point was literally stated by an outsider a couple of chapters later."

"...let's just continue."

“MeedrowH also has the obnoxious habit of forgetting articles. A lot.”

"It's called 'not being amazing at a language', you should try sometime."

“But back to the story. After a bunch of nonsense, Travis gains another companion. An elf named pfft... Leaf.”
“Hilarious.”

"Correction. It's Leavalja. She shortens it to Leaf. It's exactly the same kind of thing as 'Richard' being nicknamed to 'Dick'... for whatever reason. Besides, if you knew the proper pronunciation of this name, you'd eat your words, Gin. But because I know it was never properly explained, I'll let it slip this time."

“Their relationship started out somewhat rocky with Leaf trying to kill Travis and it never quite recovered from that.”
“Right? Travis uses hypnosis on her to make Leaf more amicable. But he is also still very paranoid and only lets her sleep with hand and feet tied. Then he tries to get her into the tournament, knowing full well the dangers of it. He’s just this sort of slimy manipulative bastard and I get that this is kinda his stick, but the story portrays him as generally well meaning and as someone who cares about Leaf so it’s just kinda fucked up.”

"Uh... you know what, no. I'm not defending you on this one. You did make it seem like you're the bad guy in the guise of a good one."

"How so? By trying to recruit Leaf?"

"After what's happened? Yeah, kinda."

"We're going to ignore the fact that I didn't need to help her in Icla nor that I could've been less considerate, or even the fact that with all the power I literally had over her, I didn't turn her into my servant or something?"

"Go on..."

"Paranoid? Yeah, I was. Can you blame me? Leaf literally almost killed me, and I could have no guarantee she'd leave me alone if I told her. At that point, I still knew almost nothing about my abilities. I literally got Hypnosis to get out of my initial predicament with her. Paranoid? Yeah, I was. Slimy bastard? Reading comprehension calls, Gina, it misses you dearly."

"Wow. I didn't think you'd make a point like that. Well, I guess you can stand your ground once in a while, kid."

"..."

"Continuing..."

“I don’t mind that. As this will allow me to critique the technical aspects of the story instead. Starting with a sort of pet peeve of mine when it comes to storytelling.”
“...fuck.”
“You see, the longterm objective of Travis is of course winning the tournament but there is also a midterm goal right now which is to steal this earring. This was established in the first chapter and it is the prime motivator behind Travis’s short term actions.”
“Yes?”
“So, by establishing that goal, you prime the reader to focus on that. But by doing so you also relegate everything that isn’t directly related to this goal to filler content.”
“I mean there is one entire fucking chapter dedicated to Travis plowing a field!”

"Point was likely taken (although most likely not adhered to), but that's not why I'm bringing up this snippet. I'm bringing it up specifically to point out a hypocrisy the girls do right here. Can you spot it?"

"...plowing the field?"

"Yeah, what about it?"

"...Where's Norbert?"

"Exactly. He's not mentioned with a word. Rather, his entire chapter is reduced to 'plowing the field', which, if you recall, is a device that indeed takes the whole chapter, but it's barely even focused on. It's a shell around the whole point of that chapter. And this is where the hypocrisy comes into play. It's actually beautiful, in a way."

"...explain?"

"Marcie just made a big point about making filler content and whatnot, but neither she nor Gin even acknowledged Norbert's existence. That's the point. He was never mentioned because of what he represents. He's a person on the bring of suicide, grappling with severe ****, and willing to leave it behind with a literal stranger. He's a person broken to the point where he doesn't care if he lives another day or not. And what do you do to him? You helped him. And that's the hypocrisy. They say you're a slimy bastard, but literally nobody told you to help him. Leavalja literally told you that it risked you being exposed and killed. All of that, and neither of the girls acknowledge it. To me, this clearly shows that neither of them actually understand what the story is about (which, given the nature of the site the said story is on, I can't blame them for) despite making huge claims about you being an asshole and whatnot. One thing I will say is, I respect Marcie and Gin for at least not bashing him, but at least let us know there is someone like this who really lets us see the other, proper side of yours."

"...I guess I see your point."

"Well, but me sweating buckets over this is one thing, them understanding that is another."

"Let's move on from this, now."

“Ugh, I’m so done with this. Are we done with this?”
“I suppose so? This was more or less a prologue. It wasn’t all bad. There was some promise in these chapters. I particularly liked the POV chapters that were dedicated to the other apostles or gods. That one fight between the two goddesses was pretty nifty.”
“You mean that one nerd fight between two bitches in which the author constantly links to cringy memes?”
“Ah, but you see, Gina, the links makes perfect sense.”
“…”
“Because it was...pfft...Beatrice Hylia!”
“…”
“So of course she would use many Links!”
“I don’t get it but I still hate it.”

"What? You are a goddess?"

"Nope. It's just another example of reading comprehension going over their heads. Although, I didn't expect that to hit Marcie in particular."

"Huh."

"That aside, I like Marcie for this part."

"...what's a link?"

"Pfft. Well anyway, it's Hyllen now, Marcie (copyright possibility be damned). But yes, links are cool. We should definitely use more links. Travis, do you have any links to show Marcie to add to her link list?"

"...what's a link?"

"Oh, you're still on that. Well, let's just continue."

“There are also surprisingly little sex. Aside from Aria at the start and occasionally molesting Leaf’s tits there is no erotic content in this. Despite the fact that this shit basically writes itself! Like have the pope **** some heretics. Or that Dog and Cat could have fucked. Or you know what? Hot lesbian hate sex between Beatrice and Sia! Fuck you, Medrow! More like Me drown in no pussy!”

"I really don't have the heart to tell you, Gin, but one of those sex scenes was actually removed recently. So, yeah, it's even less now. But that aside, this further proves my earlier point. One of those examples, however, I will say something clearly about. The only interactions I will have with Sia and most other gods is with my hands around their necks."

"...should I be worried about that statement?"

"Not at all."

"Then, since we're at the end of this, should we call it quits?"

"Yeah, sounds good to me. I'll see you around when the two commit more to your fuckups."