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It's a trap!!! See below for why.

This was a fun read. The power fantasy is a bit muted with this one as Eryk is bullied into the army early and remains a scrub throughout. He does have some advantages from isekaing into the world, but he has motivation to keep that on the downlow as much as possible as there are sinister forces that may or may not be harvesting otherworlders.

So this is very much an army tale and it's based on Roman legions seeing that the kingdom Eryk portals into was founded two thousand years ago by a legion that got pulled into the world together (otherworlders come in batches in this world with Eryk being an exception as he was isolated when transferred). He gets sucked into an elite unit so it isn't leaning into the brutality and stupidity that such stories might forefront and I liked that. And I liked the other members of his unit as we get to know them over time.

So this was headed for solid five star territory with an engaging main character, strong characterization, interesting world building, and a great pace and plot. And then it ended on a cliffhanger*. So four stars.

A note about Chaste: There is some minor soldier talk about women, but nothing graphic or crass. So this is fairly chaste even if it's a bunch of soldiers. This may be at least partially due to their main commander being a woman they all respect, but maybe not.

It's a trap!!!: So it turns out that this is a four-book (so far) series with the author ramping up the price by a dollar with each book. What's that you say? It's on Kindle Unlimited so you don't care? Not so fast my binge-reading friend! Only the first two books are in Kindle Unlimited. The third is a hefty $7. You might want to take this into account if you decide to start this series.

* Cliffhangers and why they are evil: Cliffhangers are the ultimate disrespect to readers. They're an overt emotional manipulation to invest you in the next story by holding a metaphorical pistol to your head saying "you don't get a satisfying conclusion unless you read the next book, sucka!". Or, less hyperbolically, "I don't trust you to be interested in the next story unless I employ this emotional manipulation to ensure that you are." If you don't believe me that they are an active offense to readers, try this mental exercise: imagine for a moment that an author put a big star on the front of their story proclaiming "Contains Cliffhanger!" Would that make readers more or less likely to want to pick up that story? Right. That's all you really need to know about cliffhangers. Which is why cliffhangers are an automatic loss of at least one star.