The Eminence in Shadow (Light Novel), Volume 1 (2024)

DNF at 67%.

It strained credulity that the MC Shadow/Cid, both thought that his Shadow Garden was all put up by his Seven Shadows, that they were acting, had sets, etc., YET he also BISECTED BAD GUYS, killing LOADS of people on multiple occasions. Granted, they were all bad people who were murdering innocents, but CID didn’t “know” that!!

He thought his followers were ACTING, so why wouldn’t he think the bad guys were acting too?! Or did he think they volunteered to fight him for real, with death being a possibility?!?

If he wasn’t so out of touch with reality, this might have been better.

Also, the fan service for the reader is…weird and not really plot-relevant, unless the younger Princess telling the older one that she “Believed in her bottom” while trying on G-strings (after putting it on backwards at first by accident, OH SO FUNNY, not) and trying to convince her older sister to let her buy them, is SUPER important to the plot/character development, then it PROBABLY wasn’t needed.

It wasn’t badly written and it isn’t the usual isekai that I gravitate towards, but I was so desperate for something I hadn’t read yet, that I tried this. Thankfully I’ve learned my lesson and only picked up the first one, so I’m not out a scad of $$.

2, I wish this had been better, stars.

Alloraaaaa… in realtà non so se mettere 4 stelle e dargli fiducia, o se tornare in fumetteria e restituire il secondo prima di leggerlo 🤔

I disegni mi piacciono un sacco.
Mi ricordano molto Vanitas ma anche Sword art online.

Ma la storia sembra terribilmente commerciale… ha senso? Assolutamente no. Fa ridere? Assolutamente sì. E fa ridere proprio perché non ha senso (ma non mi sembra tanto un parere oggettivo, potrebbe far ridere solo a me)

Vi farò sapere…

Aggiornamento...
Ho letto anche il secondo volume e ancora non ho capito XD

Vi farò sapere...

This was...funny? Or supposed to be, at any rate, but I found that most of its jokes didn't quite stick the landing. I'm also not entirely sure why it was so fond of the word "bisected," but hey, it's got more than one syllable, so that's more bafflement than a complaint.

This book was way better than it should’ve been. I had read good things about it but what I got was extremely different from my expectations going in. What I thought was going to be a standard parody of the otherworld fantasy genre I got something similar to the misfit of demon king academy where it leans so hard into the tropes and cliches of an oversaturated concept that it makes it feel new and exciting.
I haven’t read a series with such a unique main character and hilarious side cast in a while and despite knowing there are no stakes due to the the MC Cid being unbelievably overpowered I found myself immersed in the story and curious about how he would escalate the situations to fit the image of the mastermind pulling the strings from the shadows.

A thrilling and hilarious debut!

I really enjoyed this first instalment of Shadow’s adventures. It has comedy and heart in equal measure. I went into this expecting a few laughs (which I definitely had) but came out really engrossed in the world itself! Already pre-ordered book 2 and can’t wait!

4.25 stars, I think?

I am a bit on the fence about this one, I definitely prefer female protagonists, but Cid had his own sort of, let's go with charm...
The story was a little bit choppy, but I enjoyed the art and I am intrigued enough to want to continue the series.

Also, I am reviewing volume 1 of the manga, not the light novel, so hopefully this is the right entry.

Review by Amogh Kumar:

Isekai is to light novels what superhero media is to movies. Overdone to death, and riddled with cliches, Isekai is a genre that I do not have a personal fascination for. It often involves an overpowered protagonist, a lot of hot girls, and usually has as much plot in a season that Tarak Mehta ka Oolta Chasmah has in a single episode.

So then why is one of my best Light Novels I have read in the past 3 years, an Isekai with an overpowered protagonist and tons of hot girls?

For one, if Isekai are the superhero flicks of the Japanese entertainment industry, Eminence in Shadow is Deadpool. Completely aware of how done to death its plot is, instead of shying away from the cliches, it revels in it. Every single stereotype, from the overpowered protagonist to the boss fight is done with a certain flair that I have rarely seen other light novels pull off. Nowhere in other light novels would the protagonist saying ‘I am atomic’, be both funny and cool, but Eminence in Shadow manages to pull this off.

Read Eminence in Shadow for its overpowered but still human protagonist, the incredibly well developed supporting cast, and most importantly , for the humor and action.

Cid has always dreamed of being a power in the shadows: the mysterious figure secretly manipulating events or hunting evil on his own terms. Which is why he's thrilled when all his efforts result in a reincarnation straight into a fantasy world. Now, at last, he has the opportunity to live out his dreams . . . but why is everyone else so eager to play along with it?

I have been waiting so long for this novel to finally see print. The web novel was fantastic, and this is now the official English translation.

This is, at its heart, a misunderstandings comedy. Cid points out in the very beginning of the prologue that what he wants requires him to go far past sanity into lunacy. So from Cid's perspective, he thinks he's merely playing out his delusion of being a shadowbroker, and making things up as he goes along to fit whatever narrative catches his fancy at the time. The school terrorist incident being an item on his bucket list still cracks me up.

Of course, what he hasn't noticed is that to everyone else, he IS what he pretends to be---they're not playing along in a game, they're dead serious. And Cid just so happens to have accidentally guessed correctly on, well, everything, so the villains are actually legitimate.

The way the chapters put everything together can result in some odd scene breaks (where in the web novel these were separate chapters and therefore a bit more understandable due to having a new chapter heading).

Other than that, though, this is pretty much perfect. Cid manages to take the typical girls-throwing-themselves-at-him scenarios and barely notice. As he puts it, he's been busy stripping things out of his life so he can focus entirely on his singular goal. If it's something a cool master in the shadows would do, he totally wants in.

He also idealizes a "normal" character that he plays up as intensely as his shadow identity (because it's his secret identity and therefore MUST be perfectly average in every way). This leads to scenarios like him confessing to a princess simply because he wants to make the most awful confession possible and get turned down, because that's what a normal person would do. That this typically fails to work out for him the way he expects is his own bad luck.

Overall, if the first page or so grabs you at all, read this book. I fell in love with the prologue and found the rest of the story just as entertaining. I rate this book Highly Recommended.

See my reviews and more at https://offtheshelfreviews.wordpress....

An hilarious spoof on the ‘hidden super villian’ trope. This story is a fun read with cliches galore, but it does them super well.

My only gripe with the story is the sheer stupidity of the MC to the misunderstandings around him; yes it works as a story, yes it’s probably the only way to make the story as it is, but I personally hate following MCs such as this.

Hilarious

Isekai and chuuni behaviors combined with high levels of misunderstandings and harem with no progression. Basically everything you would look for in a novel of this genre without being boring as a result.

Everyone’s an idiot, and that’s the joke. I found it rather wearing.

The iconic "I am Atomic" saying when this elder casts his ultimate.

So at first I thought this was a story of a school fighting crime, so Minoru Kagenou as the protagonist was fixated on being as strong as possible, and could go beyond the limits of "I thought".

In fact, it's also an isekai with a truck-kun intermediary xD. A young man practicing taekondo head-butted a rock while saying magic over and over again, presumably under stress he ran into the street head-butted a truck-kun and ended up in an isekai.

Unexpectedly he managed to be born into a world that has magic with previous memories. born as Cid, the second child of the noble Kagenou family, in another world in another world where magic is common. With the power he so desperately wanted finally in his grasp, he took on the moniker "Shadow" and founded Shadow Garden: a group whose sole purpose was to combat the Cult of Diablos, an organization born from Cid's imagination. However, as time passed, as membership and influence grew, it became clear that the Cult of Diablos was not what Cid had intended.

So from his home world, he's been practicing avoiding confrontation as a named character or you could say trying to be a dumb-looking NPC, and night rooting out biker gangs and training and aspiring to be a shadow. That's what Cid brings to the Isekai world, how hilarious and funny it is that he plays the drama of an NPC character and befriends similar ones, but instead becomes an unexpected source of major attention xD.

Throughout the twenty episodes, the exposure of the protagonist is that he has the principle of the person behind the shadow with overpowering power, not good and not evil but the chronfontation clearly attacks the evil group Diablos but he also seems to portray evil to the people and the kingdom such as: whether you want to fight me or not doesn't matter, just don't get in my way. Cid' is like the Final Boss. And the representation of the power behind his ultimate name is why he says "I am Atomic" because in the normal world Cid thinks that if he is hit by a nuclear bomb no matter how strong he is there, he will definitely be destroyed, so he finally wants to become Nuclear itself in the current world.

This is a pretty good series that deserves seven stars for those who like the protagonist to look like an antargonist, iconic and overpowering, the story is also quite dense. October will see the release of season two "can't wait".

This is just pure and hilarious power fantasy, but rather than in the bright spotlight we're lurking in the shadows, hunting shadows.
The Eminence in Shadow is intensely enjoyable for its mix of a quite original concept in which the protagonist Cid Kangenou wants to be neither hero nor villain but rather the unseen mastermind, and meta-commentary on typical isekai-type fantasy narratives that makes its astute observations exclusively in genuinely funny language (our protagonist attempts to be a perfect NPC, recognises Named Characters and Heroes, waits for cut-scenes, or analyses flaws in the story). I like all the characters, though I wish I would know more about the girls; I think it is great how Cid makes sh*t up and accidentally gets everything right, uncovering a whole dark cult; I enjoy the OP-power-fantasy elements; and extra-points to Gamma building an entire capitalist mall empire in the European middle ages. Do I think that there is something to be said how a guy can bullsh*t his way through it and all women take it as greatness and wisdom, interpreting whatever he does in his favour, assuming his generosity and superior skill? Absolutely, but I am deducting the one star not for this, but for how I'd like more background stories of the girls, actually. I do love them.

I suppose the bright side is the author does establish an overarching plot and actually moves on it. The not so bright side is the dull humor, the superficial characters (and dumb names that reduce females to a simple letter), the perfunctory fan service in service of nothing, the lack of world building, the flaccid action descriptions, the early appearance of vaguely explained overpowered item that contributes to the aforementioned flaccid action sequences, and the utterly goofy concept of the make-believe enemy conspiracy actually being real and the MC failing to see that the organization is real despite all evidence to the contrary. I’m sure it can all be explained away in the final volume when Shadow wakes from his coma in the real world. It’s not the worst light novel I’ve ever read, but...

6/10. Quite average in the isekai genre. Read it cause the anime had one scene that made me laugh quite a lot. Sadly the light novel is less detailed than the anime which is typically the other way around. It is also not funny most of the time. It's not a work of art and doesn't have good plot, good characters, good dialogs, or good word building. Nevertheless, it isn't a bad novel. I like that even though it is a harem, the protagonist doesn't care or is part of any harem tropey situation. I like that it feels like a parody of some sort. Maybe it is. Maybe the author intended it to be serious. Either way, I enjoy it as one does when listening to music while working.

Kinda mediocre. The book really stretches its premise thin. So you came up with this cult and now it turns out the cult is actually real and also all the speculation you've made around it also happens to be true? I get that it's comedy but some suspension of disbelief is urgently needed here. Also it isn't particularly funny.

Whole thing is a one trick pony, where you're getting hammered with jokes regarding how our MC is way more clueless than he appears (a-la Overlord).

Also has terrible pacing, it just jumps from scenes to scenes, with very little concern for world-building.

There's also a villain nicknamed "The Game of Betrayal" which is frankly speaking a stupid name.

The author for the series changes thinks up for each version that some like different ones. This the list of my favorites in descending order.

1.Web Novel(over details)
2.Anime.(great OP and artwork
3.Manga
4.Phone game(only good for the side stories that explain the early years of shadow Garden.)
5.Light Novel

The light novel gets rid of everything superficial and sticks to only the story with only A spot and getting to B spot with little to no detail on B path. The story covers episodes 1 - 9 of the anime but lacks and real description of places that make the story feel lacking when the MC gos some where.

Again too male gazey for my tastes. Wish it leaned less into talking about how hot the ladies are. But aside from that this book is a genuine riot, and legit kind of cool. I think Cid is one of my favorite characters of all time hes so f*cking funny. But only when put in comparison to the dead seriousness of every other character. I love the gimmick of the story. It's a great gimmick.
And despite the male gazey issues/wish fulfillment that I'm not the biggest fan of- the female characters are generally wonderful. Especially Cid's female classmates. Wish the seven got more focus but im excited to see more.

I really enjoyed this book. An over the top main character, who wants to exist in the shadows as a mastermind? One of the most interesting premises I've come across lately and I'm glad I listened to the recommendation to give it a try.

After reading the sample, I wasn't sold, but the more I read, the funnier and more entertaining things got. I'll be following the series now, and would recommend others give it a shot. You get OP characters, good comedy, solid action and a nice mystery to unravel. What more could you ask for?

Writing style: 3.5/5 stars
Overall plot: 4/5 stars

This is a book that takes the tropes of isekai or cheesy stories and spins it into a wonderfully hilarious story. It’s the type of story that’s fun to read and will make you laugh, all the while written in a way that sounds just as serious as any other light novel.

The balance of humorous plot and the tone of the writing will keep this story on my mind for a long time to come. I highly recommend it if you like reincarnation/isekai stories, or know of their typical tropes and plot hooks.

Absolutely amazing and hilarious!

This is an isekai story of a strange variety. The main character is dedicated to the art of acting like background character number 95, while secretly pulling the strings in the shadows. The most amusing part is he makes up a story to explain why he creates a secret organization that turns out to be true, but he is convinced is fake and his underlings only pretend to make him happy. Fully worth reading. If you are looking for similar books I also suggest "I am not the Demon Gods Lackey". Its also an isekai of a different sort from the norm.

More crack but damn good all the same, I would say it;s closer to a parody, it takes the usual protagonist and flips him around, from the outside it seems that it;s the usual protagonist of such novels, the determinator, carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders, always helping others, knowing a lot of information to intervene at just the right time, boundless wisdom. Once we get inside his head we see that that is not the case, at all, hot damn is it completly different, the guy manages to fail at being a mob so hard and not understand why and how he does it.

Great comedy novel. You'd have to be a certain demographic to enjoy it, but if you're in that demographic, this novel is absolutely spectacular. MC is probably the 2nd stupidest MC I've ever read in a novel (The 1st probably being Akihisa from Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu), and it leads to some amusing situations. I'm not entirely sure if the world itself bends itself to Cid's whims or if he's so incredibly lucky that he manages to guess the hidden nature of the world he's in. Either way, the misunderstandings that result are top class

A lot of potential.

The story and the way is written is good enough to keep you engaged to the end. Nothing new in terms of characters or plot, with some funny parts but ruined by the excess of violence that doesn’t match the plot. Everybody can murder without having any second thoughts. My other complain is a lack of editing, as some parts are really hard to follow or some dialogues doesn’t make too much sense. Overall, a good book with a lot of potential.

This book was so frustratingly amazing I couldn’t put it down. I love the characters. I hate the characters. It’s a never ending cycle of these feelings but I can’t put it down. My husband is pretty pleased with himself that I had such a reaction to something he picked for me to read…that also is frustrating since he’s gloating now.

Overall it’s a frustrating masterpiece and a new favorite series.

This book is so good the plot and how he started as someone with no magic trying to become a hero and as powerful as he can get but he sadly dies but he’s reincarnated as the strongest person in the world with magic i love how he is so secretive about him being the strongest in the world but i wish the ending ended with him showing everyone who he truly was but I LOVED when he scared the two girls at the end saying I AM ATMIC almost blowing up the whole kingdom.

Great read!

I love the new approach in this book. When I read it there are many different perspectives you can take which makes it fresh. For example during the fight scenes you focus on the tragic drama aspect, the fun and well thought out fight, comedy of what he is really trying to do, and how cool/powerful he is. Effectively getting four different plots in one scene and you could focus on your favorite one.

I liked this one more than I thought I would.

Fair warning, the main character Cid is absolutely insane. He is completely removed from the real world.

This one is also fairly bloody and there's this weird scene where one of the female characters tries on underwear that I still can't figure out why it was included.

With all of that said, I did enjoy it enough to want to read more. This is definitely one of those guilty pleasure light novels.

i just can’t put down this book once the school arc starts, the story has its flaws but it makes u want to read and wonder what else is going to happen, overall, i really like the female characters the most and i can’t wait to read the next volume! (anyway this is my first light novel that i actually managed to finish it and keep on to read the whole thing) im impressed 4.2/5

Una maldita locura, jamás he leído un libro de fantasía tan bueno, deja en claro que los libros populares no significa que sean los mejores ni de cerca, es una pena que un libro como este apenas sea leído en los países hispanos por falta de traducción OFICIAL al español y falta de marketing.

Actualmente sin duda alguna puedo decir que es MI LIBRO FAVORITO