No worries. I think I'm a relatively capricious reader, so you may want to wait for more feedback. Feel free to PM the first chapter if you feel like it's necessary for the narrative.

Thanks a lot for the feedback! Yes, it is indeed isekai.

I guess the point of this prologue is more of just showing the reader that there is stuff happening while the protagonist is doing his thing elsewhere. That the demons are actively looking for him in need of help while he's just messing around, discovering the world in his own eyes. 

You said that there's no reason to tell the history because the main character will learn them soon anyway, but the thing is, the mc kind of doesn't learn them. I'm currently at chapter 20, and only at this point is he even barely aware of what's happening around him.

I'm not too sure whether the first failed attempt was necessary, but at least in my opinion, it makes it easier to understand the situation. 

And about why I didn't go into the details of the corpse, it's because gore doesn't fit with the tone of the series. Now that I think about it, I probably should've used lighter words instead of "corpse".

So, really, the point of this prologu

is this... isekai?

In all seriousness, if you're concerned about pacing I would consider speeding it up. There's a crap ton of world building and exposition in a vacuum, when the intrigue of works like this should lie in experiencing said world through the eyes of your protagonist. Let us self insert instead of dragging our disembodied heads along with narration. Your protagonist is going to have to learn all of the stuff you're covering in the bulk of this chapter, no reason to feed it to us before Mr./Ms. Stoner even appears. 

But this is a prologue, I suppose. In which case, question it's value. How much of this is actually needed? Do you need the first failed attempt? Can you get away with just including the visceralities, the raw action, of demons summoning a human? Would that be more interesting as a hook? 

Maybe. 

I mean, you've got demons digging up a corpse of their king to perform a sacrilegious ritual. And instead of embellishing on the fetid rot of a dead king, there's 

There is not a good visual on how they are casting the magic:

>Cultists began casting magic through the pentagram while chanting...  
>  
>the cultists began the ritual, once again, by casting magic through the pentagram.

Is magic coming from their hands? Are they holding wands? Are they spilling magic into the pentagram, or is magic coming out of the pentagram and going into the cultists...? Saying *"Casting magic through the pentagram"* is just really vague. Give us at least one specific! For all I'm reading, I could imagine magic entering their belly-buttons, and that would be perfectly legitimate, based on what you've written!

\~\~\~

You don't have to say, "a variation occurred":

>Finally, halfway through the ritual, ~~a variation occurred as~~ a bright ray of **light shone through the Demon King’s eyes**.

The reader read the scene just a page ago. We know this didn't happen the first time. So we know it's a variation.

It's also hard to imagine what these remains look like. 

Respectfully, this definitely reads like an author who just started writing. Rather than saying that to disparage, I say it to give you piece of mind that the mistakes you're making are what most authors go through. You can only improve!

I would maybe read this story, to see where it goes, if the prose was cleaned up a little.

Try not to use the, "Specifically,..." construction:

>...a ritual was taking place. Specifically, a summoning ritual following the...

The *Specifically* cadence typically just makes readers think, "Well, why didn't he just say that in the first sentence?" And if you ever publish, publishers will definitely ask the same question. It's like: *"Alice held a book in her hand. Specifically, a big red tome by Robert Madison..."* Why didn't he just say, *"Alice held in her hand a big red tome by Robert Madison..."*? What's the point of withholding that information for another sentence? You CAN use stuff like that to reinforce style or character (it's particularly go

This is the re-written prologue of my first novel: The Devil is a Stoner. I started writing less than two months ago, so don't expect anything too amazing.

I think the pacing might be too fast, but I honestly don't know. Just give me feedback on anything you find worthy of mentioning. 

&amp;#x200B;

[Link](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zsIQmMXEdi95xDF5KqyQtWK8rodQ1wuR_FP8nNhLTl4/edit?usp=sharing)

[My critique \[2198\]](https://www.reddit.com/r/DestructiveReaders/comments/pcefh0/2198_the_letter_d_nsfw/hakl1wo?utm_source=share&amp;utm_medium=web2x&amp;context=3)

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[1186] The Devil is a Stoner, Prologue