>>It made me think about the readers of my code (...) I don't always need to have n+1 layers in my architecture where all the layers just call the next layer anyway.

Your assertion doesn't make sense. N-tier architectures are primarily intended by the needs of said reader of the code, because it provides a clear understanding of how the overall code is organized.

More importantly, it provides a clear idea of what code is expected to call which code, and makes it clear that dependencies only go one way.

I have no idea what leads people to believe that ad-hoc solutions improvised on the spot are helpful to the reader instead of clear architectures where all the responsibilities and relationships are lined up clearly from the start.