This is so difficult to rate because I've already read the manga and watched the anime (like many people) so I come in with full knowledge of the characters and the plot, and that's definitely skewing my enjoyment of it.

I love the both the manga and the anime, they're a 4.5/4.75⭐ to me; I adore Maomao and Jinshi, and I find the plot and mysteries and dynamic of the court absolutely fascinating and masterfully done.

But in novel form, which is ironically the source material, I found the writing highly amateurish and dry. It spells out everything (if two people are arguing and one is on the floor, with a red mark under the hand that's holding their cheek, we don't need to have "she must have been slapped in the face" written out; we can guess), so much so that I wonder if I would have dnf'd it if I wasn't already familiar with the story.

I'm definitely treating this as supplementary reading to the manga/anime for now, and I'm really hoping the writing will get better because this type of story is so closely tailored to my taste

"Forget my real name, my real origins—the Hierarchy would have me executed, buried, and all memory of me erased within an hour of realising what I can do."

This definitely had a big change in pacing and plot direction from book 1 and it didn't hold my interest quite as much.

One of my main issue is the pov split, which, although interesting storytelling-wise, meant that some people will prefer this or that pov and indeed, I disliked the Obiteum pov, which I found dreary and very difficult to visualize. And the pov swap being almost every chapter made me feel pulled out of the flow of the story everytime. Directly related to the split pov, so much happened off page, or things were being only briefly mentionned when it felt like we needed to take the time to cover it, or even world building elements were barely touched upon and never covered in depth the way I feel like book 1 would have, which is wild considering what a thick boi that book is.

I also (I feel like I only have complaints; I don't I swear) didn't like the change of antogonist, and while the end hints at something more complex than the classic one big bad villain, I also thought Vis's decision at the very end of the book felt wildly unjusfied.

It still has great themes, a more and more complex world building and magic system, and I love many characters dearly (James Islington, we need to talk) so I'll definitely read book 3 but book 2 has greatly reduced by expectations.

"What is it they say, again? The need of the many will always be loud. But in the end, it is only the strength of the few that matters."