Kage no Jitsuryokusha ni Naritakute!
The Eminence in Shadow

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tl;dr Eminence in Shadow is chaotic and illogical but comedic entertainment

This is a review written based on the first 4 volumes.

The story is about a 18-year old that never grew out of middle school and is so obsessed with wanting total invulnerability (even to nuclear bombs) that he gives himself a concussion and one day sees what he thinks is threads of mana (truck lights in the darkness), and gets reincarnated in another world. This other world validates his chuunibyou desires and he attains absolute power.

Of course, what probably actually happened is that he got taken to the hospital, and the story is actually his ... dreams in his coma. Just my hypothesis. Evidence:
- Everything he says appears to turn out to be true or otherwise work out in his favor even though he very clearly doesn't believe a word of what he's saying.
- He achieves absolute power.
- As the reader, you don't have to worry about plot holes. Are your dreams perfectly logical? Didn't think so.
- Character names. For example, Skel Etal, Po Tato, Prev Asshat.

Anyway, don't take the premise too seriously.

Given that, this LN is genuinely entertaining. It reads a bit like the American Psycho.
> “It makes my blood boil…,” I say, compressing the magic in my hand down further. In a flash, I release it, causing the air to quiver around us.
> There’s no particular reason for that. I just love to put on a good show.
> Plus, it startles Beta, who even murmurs, “Incredible.” Nice.

Of course, this makes some of the exchanges stale and overused, especially in the first 3 volumes, where he just does things and says things and is praised for his incredible foresight by everyone around him, as they're oblivious of the fact that he's making it up as he goes. Volume 3 started to get boring but volume 4 was quite a bit more refined, adding fresh jokes. I am a bit concerned how the author will choose to end this series, especially given my hypothesis above.

The official translation is also incredibly well done. It localizes quite a few names and adds to the comedic value of this work. The afterwords are also short and entertaining.

Story:

This story at first glance seems to be your typical fantasy read. However, there is much more to it that meets the eye. The story is intriguing, with the general "MC Wants To Hide Their Power" being remade to a new tier/level of storytelling. It exhibits its indivisuality and uniqueness through its art and characters.

The story is based around the MC's group, "Shadow Garden", which is sort of a vigilante group seeking to protect peace. The series has a fair share of action and comedy-the comedy part is that people think the MC is a mastermind genius;while in fact he does things randomly at times ... and has no particular reason for it.

The MC's "Overpowered Factor" is his advanced magic and skills in combat, which he intends to use to preserve peace and order.

Art:

The art compliements the themes of the story to an amazing extent and the work meticulously explores detail in every panel you see. Truly fascinating.

Characters:

The MC is a comedic and pyschopathic person at the same time, which shows a very intersting combination that has never been seen before.

Overall:

This series is certainly worth every second of your time and is an excellent masterpiece. The story, art and characters all heavily compliment one another and advances the story to a whole new level that I have never seen before. Excellent storytelling in every panel.

(After vol1 of the LN) It's not so bad but disappointingly cliché.

The first thing to speak of about this series is that the title and blurb are misleading, it's a really generic power fantasy harem isekai with some comedy, the mastermind and organization stuff are ultimately just a gimmick and mostly irrelevant.


First the story:
A guy wants to be a mastermind in the shadow -> trains a lot -> realized it's not possible on earth -> is reborn in another world with magic -> create an organization to fight off the cult of Diablo (a completely made up enemy).

The start is actually quite good, the MC ... training and death on earth making for a fun parody of the usual isekai tropes, and his infancy and childhood in the new world serving as a nice introduction to the story.

It's after that that things start to go south, first there's too much time skips: the whole creation of the organization is skipped, we also don't see how the MC deal with his lies. Which if, like me, you've started reading expecting a story about a mastermind controlling both sides... Is rather disappointing.

But at least the story is rather quick to show it's true colors, and we rapidly see that: the organization doesn't matter it runs itself, every lies of the MC just turn out to be true so he doesn't have to deal with it, and the actual goal of that series is just to follows the double life of the MC.
That life consisting of 2 sides: his public identity where he tried (and fail) to appear as a normal student and Shadow the cool op and (above all else) edgy anti-hero fighting a cult.

After that there's no real story we just follow the MC while both his organization and the cult act out, nothing particularly interesting and overall quite predictable.
3/10


Characters:
It's hard to judge the characters mostly because most are so irrelevant, but the few that are developed have some interesting interaction so it's not that bad.

First the MC: he is the best character and by far, unlike most protagonists from similar stories he is quite apathetic towards others and doesn't shy away from being amoral if need, sadly he is also a dense moron.
Overall he is quite fun to follow around and his focus on acting cool or like a normy (depending on his identity) makes for some good comedy.

Sadly the other characters are barely worth mentioning, most have a name, a function, and some basic personality trait and that's it, even the girls appearing on the cover and color images are mostly just plot devices. And when they get some development it's usually just for that arc and they go back to being irrelevant after that
Also don't expect other male characters to be important, they're all either background characters, enemies or pathetic tag along whose function is to make the MC look good.

That said none of the characters are annoying and the interactions are for the most part pretty well written.
5/10


Worldbuilding:
To put it simply there's none, be it geography, politic, or magic we only know the bare minimum for the story to kind of make sense.
1/10


Art:
8/10 Really good, the girls' design is especially good. But it's a novel so it doesn't really matter.


All that said despite all the negative it's overall not that bad as the writing is good and the story flows well never being particularly good but also never really annoying. Surprisingly there few true comedic moments, but the few there is are good.
5/10

To conclude if you like that kind of cliché power fantasy it's can be an enjoyable, if predictable, read.
If you would rather read something closer to what's described in the blurb give a try to "There Was No Secret Evil-Fighting Organization (srsly?!), So I Made One MYSELF!".