Light Novel

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation (無職転生 〜異世界行ったら本気だす〜 Mushoku Tensei: Isekai Ittara Honki Dasu) is a Japanese light novel series written by Rifujin na Magonote published by Media Factory, with illustrations provided by Shirotaka.

Conception
Mushoku Tensei originated as a web-based novel series hosted on the website Shosetsuka ni Naro which ran between November 22, 2012 and April 3 of 2015. In just a year of serialization of the web-novel, Media Factory acquired the rights to publish the story in light-novel format under their MF Books imprint. The decision to officially publish the book was publicized by the author on his blog post on the first anniversary of the web-novel.

Magonote collaborated with illustrator Shirotaka to visualize the characters and provide illustration spreads inside the books. The first volume of the light-novel was launched on January 23 of 2014 and has continued to compile 24 volumes as of December 25, 2020. Subsequently, a manga adaptation of the light-novel spawned within the first year of publication and an anime adaptation in 2021.

Seven Seas Entertainment licensed the light-novel under their Airship imprint for localization in English on July 18 of 2018. The first volume of the physical edition was launched on May 21 of 2019 and has continued to compile 8 translated volumes as of December 8, 2020.

Reception
Mushoku Tensei has made its appearances on Takarajimasha's Kono Light Novel ga Sugoi! (This Light Novel is Amazing!) annual top 10 charts in the tankobon division. The series debuted in 2017 in the 4th place while in 2018 it held the 7th position. In 2019, it dropped to the 9th position until in 2020 the series bagged the 4th place for the second time.