Trope: Zero to Hero

  • The Adventure Zone #2: Murder on the Rockport Limited!

    The Adventure Zone #2: Murder on the Rockport Limited!

    In the second Adventure Zone graphic novel (adapted from the McElroy family’s wildly popular D&D podcast), we rejoin hero-adjacent sort-of-comrades-in-arms Taako, Magnus, and Merle on a wild careen through a D&D railroad murder mystery. This installment has a little of everything: a genius child detective, an axe-wielding professional wrestler, a surly wizard, cursed magical artifacts,

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  • Because I, the True Saint, was Banished, that Country is Done For! #1-3

    Round and cute with a lot of low stake plot points. I mean, not for the country she left— they’re having a whole other problem— but for the Saint, she’s just having cute little day-to-day slice of life adventures. Like feeding a giant dog, or going on a date. There’s kind of some plot, but

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  • The Ancient Magus’ Bride

    The Ancient Magus’ Bride

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    Chise Hatori was a child nobody wanted. Told by her own mother that she should never have been born and passed from one neglectful guardian to the next, the young girl has grown up feeling lost, hopeless, and emotionally numb. At age fifteen she sells herself into slavery, desperate for a home where somebody –

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  • The Adventure Zone: Here There Be Gerblins

    The Adventure Zone: Here There Be Gerblins

    Join Taako the elf wizard, Merle the dwarf cleric, and Magnus the human warrior for an adventure they are poorly equipped to handle AT BEST, guided (“guided”) by their snarky DM, in a graphic novel that will tickle your funny bone, tug your heartstrings, and probably pants you if you give it half a chance.

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  • The 31st Consort Vol 2-3

    The 31st Consort Vol 2-3

    I really like the 31st Consort. The conceit is having a queen who stands as an equal no matter what, changing the patriarchal idea of demure women who only fight socially. She’s forced to live within this construct but still manages despite her headstrong nature. The romance is cute, but the political infighting is what

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  • Grand Metal Organs Vol. 01

    Grand Metal Organs Vol. 01

    In a world where human evolution has reached new heights, life has become reliant on newly developed electric abilities. But not everyone has the power required to survive in this new society. Enlil, a young man born without electrical prowess, dreamed of being a hero no matter what. And though life without powers is a

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  • No Longer Allowed in Another World Vol. 3-9

    No Longer Allowed in Another World Vol. 3-9

    ISEKAI’D BY: Truck-Kun! (this entry does not add to the total) I ended up reading all the volumes I had in a row. I enjoyed the comedy, meeting the fucked up fallen angels— and then found that there’s rewriting powers, so things get reset, except they don’t, and also Sacchan is kinda an asshole. I

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  • No Longer Allowed in Another World Vol. 1-2

    No Longer Allowed in Another World Vol. 1-2

    ISEKAI’D BY: Truck-Kun! An adventure in another world with cute girls by your side and video game-like powers–sounds like an anime fan’s dream, right? Not so for melancholic author Osamu Dazai, who would quite literally prefer to drop dead. Video games haven’t even been invented yet when he gets yanked into another world in 1948.

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  • Natsume & Natsume Vol. 1

    Natsume & Natsume Vol. 1

    Natsume Shiranui has the face of a villain. From strangers on the street to his own high school classmates, his creepy grin freaks everybody out. But secretly he yearns to be a hero like his childhood friend — the kind, brave, and beautiful Natsume Minazuki. Can he become her hero, or is he destined to

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  • My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero’s Season 1

    My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero’s Season 1

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    Oda Akira is the kind of guy who people forget is even there. His unassuming nature pays off, though, when his entire class is swept away to a fantasy world, and he slips easily into his new role as a silent assassin. Between his suspiciously high starting stats and too many details that don’t fit,

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Welcome to the Menagerie.

Here is where M logs their media activity. Partly because Goodreads is forgettable and keeping physical logs is harder. Sometimes M writes a lot. Sometimes M doesn’t write enough. It doesn’t matter. This is just a for-fun little blog so that M can remember what they thought about whatever they watched or read or played or. Whatever.


What is M?

I read. Voraciously. I have subscriptions to those book things on digital retailers. I consume books at nearly all hours. The hours I don’t spend reading? I’m writing. I’m drawing. I have a problem. I have a problem in that I love to read things that are in the same vein repeatedly. Book journals don’t work and as much as I text my friends screenshots of book passages, it doesn’t scratch the itch. Now I’m going to be doing… tiny… tiny book reports.


Truck-Kun Kill Count:


Books & Light Novels Read in 2025: 23/50
46%
Comics Read in 2026: 51/200
25%
Physical Owned Books Read: 470/809
58%


Menagerie Categories


Tagged in the Menagerie

Absolute Asshole NPC (93) Accidentally in Charge (43) A Fetish For Suffering (48) Can't Say No (76) Chekov's Gun (47) Childhood Friends (52) Curiosity Fucks You Up (79) Cursed (64) Damsel in Distress (64) Damsel in Distress (subverted) (91) Dangerous Reputation (89) Doting Husband (68) Everyone Loves MC (94) Evil Eyes & Big Heart (49) Fan Service (98) Grumpy x Sunshine (54) Hypercompetent MC (74) If You Love Them, Set Them Free (55) I Know a Guy (52) Last Minute Hero (106) Loss of Humanity (53) Main Character Coloring (75) MC's Skewed Metrics (76) Mean Boy (123) Mean Boy Love Interest (49) Modern Morals (48) Nat 20s (92) Not Actually Dead (80) Nuclear Revenge (70) OP Protag (92) Petty Revenge (45) Power of Friendship (78) Power of Love (74) Self-Sacrifice (69) Shock Value (47) Sympathetic Evil (67) The Moral is Community (62) Tragic Backstory (84) Twist! (59) Uniquely Skilled (90) Unreliable Narrator (56) Weird and Wacky On Purpose (80) Western-Style Fantasy (87) Wrong Place Wrong Time (65) Zero to Hero (81)


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