The mental strain on the spectators and the audiences was tremendous during the Shadow vs Iris and Beatrix fight.

In that fight, Shadow, while acting as the “Mundane Man”, showed the most artistic form of swordplay, which was such a polished and refined form of artwork that it made Iris, Perv Asshat, Beatrix, Annerose, and everyone else mesmerised and speechless. Princess Rose Oriana, the princess from the country of art, thought it was the most perfect form of art she had ever seen in her life.

Then when Mundane Man actually revealed that under the guise he is actually Shadow himself, that put another mental toll on them — the realisation that Shadow can disguise himself as anyone, blend with anyone, and appear as weak as anyone.

Then when Beatrix challenged him, Shadow showed another form of swordplay, which was a natural sword style, completely indistinguishable from nature itself like wind and rain, making it very hard and difficult to separate it from other natural phenomena.

Then there comes the clash of two of the strongest fighters in that isekai world, with Iris and Beatrix both engaging together (a 2 vs 1 situation), both wielding swords, and Iris also wielding a mithril high-output magical artefact at the same time, yet both getting completely overwhelmed using nothing but what appears to be a simple construction tool ( two crowbars) with very poor magical conductivity if you also include the Anime narrative put on top of the LN narratives.

Then comes the martial arts part, when Iris tried to grapple Shadow by grabbing his hip and Beatrix was trying to strike him. Shadow used his signature speciality, which is his martial arts system formed from MMA, karate, kickboxing, and other martial arts, which he combines together.

Shadow also did something amazing at that point — throwing the sword into the air before Beatrix could do anything significant, and after overwhelming and slamming Beatrix’s body into the ground and wall, Shadow picked up the sword from the air as it returned from its trajectory.

And when Shadow was leaving, Iris asked whether he was running away. At that moment, Shadow released an absolutely absurd and monstrous amount of magical energy from his body — not from his sword, weapon, or any artefact — which gave Iris, Beatrix, and the spectators the biggest imaginable form of cognitive dissonance in that world. It was like believing a pebble is the biggest possible object, and then suddenly seeing the scale of Jupiter. At that point, Iris had all her doubts completely shattered after witnessing a scale of power that she and her researchers and Dark Knight associates concluded no human being can attain.

And before leaving, Shadow released all of this magical energy into the atmosphere, clearing all the clouds gathered there and changing the weather from raining to completely sunny.

LN V6 and V7's Persona Evolution: What the Author Is Telling Us About Where This Series Is Likely and Most Probably Headed

(Not canon though — just speculations and guesses from the WN and current available information from the LN, anime, game, and manga)

From LN V01 through LN V05, there is a comfortable, recognisable rhythm to how Cid operates: mob persona when something uninteresting is happening, Eminence during the most prime moment when something very interesting is happening or to steal the show from both protagonist and antagonist as the third-party shadowy puppet master, with his own internal POV threading through both — but volumes 6 and 7 deliberately break that rhythm, with V6 having no POV from Cid's side while he was actively being JtR (though we do get his mob POVs), and LN V07 having no mob character portrayal and no mob shenanigans at all, only the Eminence character Mystery Ousmanne / Nazono Seinen character portrayal, and I think this is one of the most quietly impressive authorial decisions in the series so far.

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Jimina Seinen and Nazono Seinen: The Two Faces of "Plain"

The things being common between Nazono Seinen and Jimina Seinen is that both pretended to be weak before displaying their true potential, with Jimina looking as plain as you can possibly be and Nazono being given a mysterious vibe along with that plainness. Also, Jimina used the fancy artistic style of swordplay which Cid devised during a time once he had mastered a fancy artistic style of swordplay — somewhere along that time he rescued Rose from bandits as the Fancy Bandit Slayer — and for Nazono Seinen he specifically devised this entire new brand of swordplay just specifically for this trip. So it is highly probable that once Alpha told him about the situation of the elven country, he devised it before visiting the elven land, or he devised it previously (though the LN tone does not lean too much in that direction). The reason I am saying "though the LN tone doesn't lean too much in that direction" is because the LN specifically says:

> "I'd developed this specific style just for this trip so that Alpha wouldn't recognise me. I'd even refined my disguise to the point that even Delta couldn't see through it. There was no way Epsilon or Beta would realise who I was."

It does not say:

> "After my John Smith failure, I had a thorough self-reflection and have been especially careful, and thought I might end up in fights with Alpha and the girls again, considering that I have since then worked on developing a specific style, just for those cases in advance as a caution and extra measure of safety, so that Alpha wouldn't recognise me. I'd even refined my disguise to the point that even Delta couldn't see through it. There was no way Epsilon or Beta would realise who I was."

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The Author's Craft and What Cid Actually Brings Across

It shows that the author can adjust perfectly. LN V06 has absolutely hilarious moments despite there being no POVs from Cid when he is JtR — we observe the carnage and comical scenes not through Cid's POV but through the perspectives of others, with Cid's own internal voice reserved entirely for his mob scenes — and LN V07 also has many hilarious elements despite there being no mob elements present, with the entire volume running on the Nazono Seinen persona: an entirely new Eminence and never-before-used elven Eminence persona Cid specifically devised for this trip, delivering deep comedy purely from blending Cid's chuuni eccentricities on top of the Eminence Nazono persona. Notably, V7 is also the first volume cover in the series not to feature Cid or any of his mob guises, such as Suzuki Hope. The author is demonstrating, volume by volume, that the formula is modular — and that he knows exactly which components to swap out — and Cid further reinforces this by blending in some of his mob-fu techniques from his Bushin Festival preliminary fights with Rose in LN V01 and the terrorist incident fights, to refine Nazono's character and acts; so the Eminence Nazono persona has been splashed with some of the mob-fu techniques like cold sweats, blood bags, etc.

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The Unspoken Trajectory

If this trend follows, then what to expect next is: the dropping of the entire mob act and going on for the full Eminence act even when Cid is using his actual CID KAGENOU appearance, like what happened in the sanctuary in LN V02, and in LN V04 when massacring the plundering knights to return Marie's money; or enacting the Great Sacrifice for World Peace and Science on DOEM in the WN; or observing the entire thing from the perspective of a third person to understand what an Eminence really means and how to become a real one — not just trying to act like one or pretend to be one, also happened in the WN — and also thinking about what to do when completely satisfied with the Eminence thing, also happened in the WN, like becoming a power outside the shadows, i.e., a regular hero or a protagonist, a master who teaches future heroes, or a demon lord on his way to destroying the world, and also thinking about returning to Oriana when things are over to do nothing but eat good food and sleep after his life has been at full throttle (if we combine this with the LN, then all this he could do when he goes on a temporary hiatus from being the Eminence for a couple of hundred years, lets people forget about him, and then once again suddenly appears to make them feel "isn't that the legendary...?" — and the WN's Oriana can be swapped with the elven kingdom since he seems to be so fascinated by the World Tree and the elven lands); or deciding what to take as a career, like becoming a doctor — or more precisely a plastic surgeon — since many Eminences had this as their occupation (probably persons like Glenn Engelman, who was an evil kind of Eminence: a dentist by day and a mastermind serial killer by night); and then enacting the Shadow Marionette in the WN; or saving Christina Hope in the WN and even telling her that she is a very beautiful woman and later confirming to her that she is an exceptionally beautiful woman.

Cid also does something very un-Cid-like in the Zombie arc of the WN: he tells Christina that she is a very beautiful girl, which he later, when discussing with Magari, confirms he did to give the downcast Christina hope and aspiration, so that if Ijiruwa turned out not to be a good man and she did not get to marry him, it would not feel like the end of the world for Christina — there would still be Cid who appreciated her beauty. He did this despite knowing how influential Christina is as a noble, how good she is as a student, and how he had on a couple of occasions also taken note of her natural protagonist-like attitude, despite calling her "Miss Mob" since he initially could not remember her and thought of her as a mob character.

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The WN Elements in V6 and V7: What Comes Next in LN V08 and the Upcoming LNs?

Since many of the WN elements — like the Atomic Radar, Epsilon donning herself as a boy, and so on — have been implemented in LN V07, and this was also done in LN V06 with elements like Chia trembling, etc., which do you think will be utilised in the later and upcoming volumes?