I read the first four Mage Tank books back to back, and they were very fun.
Mage Tank 1-4
Mage Tank #1-4
By Cornman
Aethon Books
2025-2026
Book one opens with Arlo dying (a car and a tree are involved) and waking up in a new world, so it’s another isekai. Within about an hour he’s thrown into a Delve, a dungeon run, with four strangers, set to the highest difficulty. He’s underpowered and under-equipped: no armor, no weapon, just a linen shirt. But someone is quietly on his side. A hidden patron leaves him notes and options nobody else gets.
Unlike a lot of LitRPG heroes, Arlo doesn’t go for damage. He ignores his best stat, Intelligence, and dumps everything into Fortitude, and his big ability is an aura that heals and buffs everyone around him. He’s a mage built like a wall. He’s also super overpowered.
If you want a normal, tough, survival kind of story, this isn’t it. He gets exactly what he needs from every drop and has the right tool for every boss. It’s wish fulfillment where everything goes right. His Pocket Closet, a personal pocket-dimension inventory, keeps growing until it’s basically his own kingdom. And his witty sidekick is Grotto, a Delve Core with a dry, sarcastic streak.
The rest of the series keeps raising the stakes. In book two, the party he met on that first run, now Fortune’s Folly, clears Delve after Delve and heads into a nation on the brink of war. Book three takes them into Deijin’s Descent, a legendary Delve where time outside slips away. In book four, Closetland becomes a full dimensional kingdom and they go looking for dragon allies.
The problem is that everything is too perfect, and this is why a lot of people struggle when they switch to LitRPG. The peril never feels real, the good guys almost never die, and the heroes are always overpowered.
But it’s popcorn. If you want something to listen to or read and get through a bunch of quickly, this is probably your series. Super low-effort popcorn.
