For a light novel adaptation, Alderamin does the unthinkable and has no schools and no direct fan service. It even attempts to have tactical warfare instead of overpowered beta males that need to fulfill some destiny by forming a huge harem.At the same time, it is way less entertaining than your typical light novel adaptation because the writing is still bland. The reason they stuff these stories with panties and high schools is exactly for dressing up the otherwise barebones writing. It’s like soup without salt, pepper, or anything else that would flavor it somehow. It comes off as unimpressive and boring to follow for anything else besides the mind games the characters occasionally play amongst them.Even there, the presentation is not the best, since animation and soundtrack are passable. The setting is supposed to be taking place at a serious looking military academy yet many of the characters are using magic through the use of fairies. And I don’t mean the cute cuddly type of fairies, since these spirits behave like they are animated corpses. With their dead eyes, expressionless face, and simplistic design, they serve as weird looking magic batteries as well as weak points. Exposing them is the same as incapacitating a magic user, which seems to be a neat idea, but just like everything else it comes off as bland.It doesn’t always have to do with fairy exposing, since most of the battles are about politics, thinking ahead, and outsmarting the enemy generals, but even there it doesn’t feel like it’s that smart. The protagonist is supposed to be a genius strategist, yet most of his plans are working because his opponents are idiots instead of actually competent opponents. And yes, I know the same issues plague even Legend of the Galactic Heroes but at least the cast there was charming. Other than that, I like Ikta, since unlike most protagonists in anime, he is not scared shitless of women and does not believe hard work and believing in your friends can make everything possible. He is lazy and easy going, essentially a clone of a certain character from the aforementioned show. It also doesn’t help that the first third of the anime is a very slow introduction to cast and setting where nothing much happens, and why most casual watchers will drop it before it gets to the juicier parts. And no, I am not saying it gets better, I am only saying there is plot actually happening after that. The characters are otherwise dull and usually expressionless from start to finish; there is no real charm in whatever they are doing to make you care about them. You cannot even call the chicks sexy, despite having exposed midriffs and miniskirts. They have the warmth of icebergs. The ending is incomplete, which is like they are telling us to go buy the novels because there is most likely not going to be a second season. Even as an infomercial, I don’t find it very successful since it fails to make me care about anything that is going on in the story. Although I consider it way better than something similar like the hot garbage that was Lord Marksman and Vanadis, it is still far from what can be considered a decent series, and yet another proof of why light novels are an insult to literature.