The Rising of the Shield Hero is, by no means whatsoever, one's average isekai anime, despite following much of the same trends: it has a medieval world, monsters of the mundane and extraordinary kind exist, and a balance of power hanging on precariously by a singular horsehair; this setting, plot, and characters not only serve as a Deconstruction of tried and true tropes but also the genre and archetypes alike.
This page contains unmarked spoilers. You Have Been Warned!
- Aesop Amnesia: From time to time, various characters (be they the Three Heroes or the bad apples of the Melromarc family), are put through events that should give them humility and character. However, whenever the threat is over and it seems like the status quo has not been terribly affected, they tend to revert to their arrogant, boorish personalities. This can be best exemplified by Motoyasu, who witnesses Malty lie about trying to kill her sister and framing Naofumi, but he just goes back to believing her word and thinking of him as a rapist. Due to this, they tend to be given light punishments that should teach them to better themselves, but they still end up doing more and more stupid things. It reaches its limit when the Three Heroes try to fight the Spirit Tortoise and fail miserably, ensuring that what prestige they did have to fall back on is now gone forever. At that point, they had to improve their character or they'd have been stuck with the curse series forever. Malty, on the other hand, continuously refuses to improve her behavior, and is executed (twice in the web novel) and has her soul destroyed just because she can't learn her lesson.
- All Your Powers Combined: Tact has the ability to steal Legendary and Seven Star Weapons for himself to selfishly use and can wield multiple if not all of them at once. However, despite amassing a large arsenal at his disposal, the weapons only work on a surface level since Tact is not one of the chosen wielders he nabbed them from and has no idea how to actually use them beyond their basic functions. Furthermore, the individual benefits of each weapon don't stack up since a user was never meant to have more than one weapon. Thus, he still is easily curbstomped by anyone competent in actual combat with or without a weapon as a vengeful Naofumi and Fohl prove in a satisfyingly brutal fashion.
- Always Save the Girl: Motoyasu runs on this trope, as he insists on coming to the rescue of every cute girl he meets. Problem is, not only is this mentality born from a selfish desire for a harem that he's nursed from the very start of the series, said cute girls are perfectly capable of fighting for themselves. Most of them never needed his help in the first place and ultimately end up resenting him for his forced assistance (Raphtalia and Filo). Others are all too keen on taking advantage of it for their own selfish gain (Malty and the rest of his party) and use him as a glorified attack dog. What's more, this puts Raphtalia and Filo in danger by repeatedly antagonizing Naofumi and insisting he's "brainwashing" them.
- Attack! Attack! Attack!: The three cardinal heroes use this method for all their battles by spamming their most powerful attacks on who they believed to be their enemies with zero strategy in mind. Other than the first wave, they had not won a single battle without the help of other forces, particularly Naofumi and his party, and still refused to change ways even though the monsters become smarter and stronger in addition to the introduction of the Vassal Heroes. This way of battling was only applicable when they were sufficiently strong enough but since they don't bother to put any effort into training, the Three Heroes become outdated and ineffective.
- Battle Harem: Motoyasu wastes no time acquiring one to fulfill his perverted desires, but the way he judges people and chooses his party members based solely on their looks makes it easy for opportunistic Gold Diggers like Malty to get onto his team and take advantage of his Hero status. He also has no problem driving off the male members of his team who want to fight with him to keep his "personal harem" as it is or turning a blind eye to Malty bullying the other members into acting like submissive ditzes. This leaves him with a party of pretty freeloading weakling adventurers who are his glorified cheerleaders and are only "loyal" to him for his money and fame. As such, they all secretly despise him and have no problem leaving him for dead during the Spirit Tortoise disaster to save themselves.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: When life really hits Rock Bottom and someone shows a little kindness to that suffering person, he or she will have a strong attachment to that someone to an unhealthy degree. Motoyasu is the perfect example of this as at the end of his Humiliation and Trauma Conga Line caused by the Spirit Tortoise incident, Filo did show him kindness which resulted in his obsession with her increasing ten-fold while also unintendedly destroying his sanity.
- Character Level: In RPGs, power levels are a numerical measurement and indicator of one's power but are by no means to confirm combat superiority against an opponent. One of Ren, Itsuki, and Motoyasu's faulty claims of being stronger over Naofumi is their high levels and stats, managing to be around level 50 by the time of the first wave while he was barely past 20 due to being sabotaged by the king. This mindset had led to them succeeding during the first wave but only the first wave as they proceed to repeatedly fail in the following waves and even regular battles out of complacency to train and grow stronger beyond their levels. Meanwhile, Naofumi was able to succeed to the point of outshining them anyway despite initially being stuck at a Level Cap of 40 due to his diligence in mastering his Legendary Weapon's various forms to boost his and his party's stats directly as well as using teamwork and cooperation. In other words, it's about quality not quantity when it comes to true power.
- The Chosen One: Three of the Heroes collectively end up being a mix of The Chosen Zero and The Poorly Chosen One due to letting their public status go to their heads and prompting them into putting no thought into their actions whatsoever, causing many problems while being convinced that having the legendary weapons meant that they could simply breeze through their adventure. It's to the point where, in the web novel, they outright try to invoke the Plot Armor justification for why they haven't died yet by the time of the Cala Mira arc, baffling Naofumi.
- Cock Fight: This is what the rigged duel for Raphtalia amounted to Motoyasu. For all his supposed chivalry, he just saw her as another girl to add to his harem, something he deluded himself into since he's blatantly ignoring her own feelings or the lack of evidence of Naofumi's supposed abuse or the fact that a demi-human's lack of rights gives him every legal right to own her, something outright stated to be enforced by the king. Unsurprisingly, the end result was Motoyasu being literally (and momentarily) slapped right back to reality by the girl he attempted to "save" and being called out for his unwanted white knighting by not only her but even Ren and Itsuki since he was acting that insufferable.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Naofumi wanted Malty to suffer for kickstarting his horrible experiences in Melromarc, and the feeling only grew when she either kept trying to kick him back into the dirt out of petty amusement, or just straight up kill him and his party off for her own gain. By the time the second Three Heroes Church uprising was foiled, he makes certain she gets what she had coming, exactly as horrible as he wanted it... and it's just too horrible for him to enjoy considering it involved being brutally raped to death by her own fat pig of an uncle while it's all being recorded by a magic crystal.
- Combat by Champion: King Aultcray sets this up between Naofumi and Motoyasu to determine the fate of Raphtalia, a bound slave. However, this was forced since he despised Naofumi to the point where he couldn't stand the idea of him doing anything on his own, even if it was through a well-treated slave legally purchased due to his own laws preventing demi-humans from having any rights in Melromarc. He not only ignores this, but also the blatant cheating Malty does to have the otherwise overwhelmed Motoyasu win, and it's only being called out by not only Raphtalia but Ren and Itsuki (since even they couldn't stomach the amount of foul play they witnessed) that forced him to save face, especially when it's revealed that he pre-emptively threatened the spectators to keep quiet about it. As mentioned above, Queen Mirelia wound up listing this as one of the many despicable actions he undertook as she vented her frustrations on his magically bound self.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: The trope is put through the wringer through Naofumi. In any other media, it's portrayed as a haphazard form of comedy to treat an otherwise capable person as the Loser Protagonist. But in this case, it's a serious problem that persisted since he was summoned to Melromarc, and all because he was chosen to use the "loser weapon" out of the four. Most of the ruling nobility and the other heroes refuse to believe he can get anything done on his own and treat him like crap for it, despite being the only competent hero of the quartet. It's to the point where Naofumi was perfectly fine with outright bailing on the country and leaving it in the hands of three massive screw-ups and the capital's corrupt higher-ups for treating him that badly. It took his chief tormentors being exposed, condemned, and humiliated in public, and the true ruler of Melromarc literally having to beg him to stay and lend his aid in the upcoming waves to change his mind.
- Empathic Weapon: The Legendary Weapons change and evolve to become stronger based on the user's thoughts and feelings sound great on paper but what if it also reacted to negative emotions? The result is the Curse Series, a "special" set of weapons based on the Seven Deadly Sins and activates when the user underwent their Despair Event Horizon. While it possess tremendous power and grant powerful finishing moves, the curse weapon also eats away at its user by intensifying the respective emotion to the point the user is motivated solely by it alongside long-lasting mental and physical detriments. As a result, all four Legendary Heroes suffered under the effects with Naofumi almost burning his companions and losing a majority of his blood from Wrath, Ren being unable to touch anything of value without it crumbling to dust and most of his levels and experience drained from Greed and Gluttony, Motoyasu becoming irreversibly insane and only seeing women as actual pigs (Except Filo) from Lust and Itsuki turning into an Empty Shell Yes-Man for months on end from Pride.
- Enemy Mine: Motoyasu tries to pull this with Naofumi against the Pope, once he finally realizes that the latter was made The Scapegoat in the schemes of the Corrupt Church with the intention of avenging Ren and Itsuki after they were reported killed. However, because Motoyasu had just tried to kill Naofumi just minutes ago, and over yet another flimsy lie Malty told him about killing the other two heroes, Naofumi flat-out refuses to have anything to do with him, even if it might increase the odds of them surviving.
- Evil Is Petty: Stupid is petty, to be more specific. King Aultcray's sole reason for hating Naofumi and going out of his way to make his life in Melromarc miserable is simply because he bears the Legendary Weapon that his sworn enemies worship. It's due to a lifetime of war against the demi-human country Slitvelt and his sister being taken away by one of their nobles, as well as it being arguable at best whether he genuinely believes Malty's claims that Naofumi actually raped her. But the fact that he even refuses to give him a trial and goes out of his way to make his job as difficult as possible, to the point of both ignoring his own laws and making one up just to unfairly handicap him when it's stressed that all four Heroes are needed at their strongest just shows what an utterly despicable moron he is. It even turns out that he's responsible for Raphtalia ending up as a mistreated slave when he ordered a demi-human district in Melromarc weakened by the Waves to be completely torn down. Even with his full backstory out in the open, what he did was so disgustingly petty, and wound up either indirectly ruining or ending countless innocent lives just erases whatever sympathy he should have had otherwise.
- Excuse Plot: Because they see Melromarc and the world around it as nothing but a consequence-free video game world with a cliché "Save the world!" plot, Ren, Itsuki, and Motoyasu see the whole "Summoned To Another World" thing as an excuse to indulge in their personal fantasies, especially Itsuki's hero complex and Motoyasu's harem fantasies. However, especially from Naofumi's point of view, it becomes increasingly obvious that there is much more to the world than "Save the world and reap the benefits", as Naofumi himself winds up suffering due to events that occurred long before he was summoned. While he prospers regardless, partly by understanding and accepting just how real the world is enough to ask questions, investigate its extensive history and actively study things that'll prove useful in the long run, the other three heroes end up causing problems due to the fact that they expect to succeed through the bare minimum amount of effort, refuse to think critically beyond what several obviously shady people tell them, leaving easily-avoided disasters in their wake in the process and leaving the civilians to see them as just plain inept.
- False Rape Accusation: Malty doesn't bother to keep up the traumatized, rape victim act she used to frame Naofumi which stymies her efforts to keep his public image in the dirt. Immediately after the Second Wave, she acts insufferably smug and greedy when she uses Motoyasu to overtax a poor village and gleefully sics the royal knights on the villagers when they point out Naofumi was the one who actually saved them. The general public isn't stupid and can easily tell that this sudden shift in behavior means something was off about the accusation. When combined with fixing the other hero's mistakes and his own good deeds, Naofumi has his reputation mostly restored thanks to Malty's rotten attitude and after he was finally proven innocent, the general public easily accepts it as the truth with some claiming to have not believed it from the very start.
- Hard Work Hardly Works: The trope is definitely not in effect here. Even with each of them wielding their respective Legendary Weapon, the fact that the Four Heroes were all random people from different worlds means they have no actual combat experience with their weapons. The weapon's special abilities help them grow more powerful and they learn basic combat skills because of this but it's repeatedly shown that their fighting abilities are average at best, so any sufficiently strong fighter can match the raw power of the weapons if they are skilled enough. This is demonstrated later on when Eclair and Ren have a duel where no magic or hero skills are allowed. He is easily overwhelmed by her battle skills because Ren is just a gamer who only recently started fighting, while Eclair is a knight who has been training most of her life. When you remove the weapon's Story-Breaker Power aspects, you have four regular people without the needed training to stand up to any reasonably skilled fighter.
- Headbutting Heroes and Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: It's been stated repeatedly that the Four Heroes need to work together to stop the Waves and save the world. Unfortunately, Ren, Motoyasu, and Itsuki are just incapable of working as a team. Not just because of their inexperience in serious fights, but their utter refusal to cooperate with each other for their personal flaws and selfishness. What's more, even after his name is cleared, they still looked down on Naofumi for being the "useless" one of the four, and for "cheating" his way to success, which just contributed to his justified reluctance to have anything to do with them in turn. It's partly this that leads to them only succeeding in the first Wave, making no progress whatsoever in the second until Naofumi stepped in, and blowing off the advice they need to hear from him during the Heroes Meeting in Cala Mira.
- I Fight for the Strongest Side!: Elena Haven admits that she only joined Motoyasu's party because he started off as the strongest hero but is now interested in joining Naofumi as he became way more powerful in every aspect than all three heroes combined after selling the former hero out to avoid arrest. However, Naofumi rejects the offer since this means she wouldn't have to do the fighting herself but rake in the spoils anyway which goes against his party and thus will only ever trust her as a skilled merchant, not an ally in combat.
- I Know Mortal Kombat: Ren, Itsuki, and Motoyasu are all convinced that their "expert gamer knowledge" makes them perfectly suited to their job of being heroes due to the world's similarity to their RPGs. Not only is this not the case since they're too conceited to think their actions through, but it also resulted in them severely underperforming in battle because said knowledge amounts to only needing high levels and flashy skills. What's more, making note of their poor track record will just make them double down and ignore any criticism of this mindset, where they actively refuse to put any more work in than is "needed".
- Infinity +1 Sword: The Legendary Weapons (and to a lesser extent, the Vassal Weapons) are known as the strongest weapons in existence, putting the users on a level above normal adventurers as well as unlocking another method of getting stronger depending on the user's beliefs. However, they require constant time and effort by the users to keep being above everyone else, otherwise, they fall behind. Naofumi was (initially) the only one of the four willing to constantly keep himself ready for the next Wave, and repeatedly succeeded in doing so despite the Capital's attempts to sabotage him. Meanwhile, the others got complacent despite receiving all the help they can get and found themselves only succeeding in the first before repeatedly failing to measure up to their titles, something that even the King himself noticed at one point.
- Insane Troll Logic:
- People can tolerate only so much of it before they stop taking that individual seriously, no matter how famous they are or how much political clout they have. When Ren, Motoyasu and Itsuki double down on their screwed-up game logic to justify their actions/beliefs, the whole kingdom starts to see them as incompetent idiots who they cannot rely on to protect them anymore. This makes several citizens and nobles very wary of trusting them with quests and drives Motoyasu and Itsuki's parties to the brink of abandoning their leaders. Naofumi, the Queen and even Fitoria give up on trying to talk to them when it becomes clear they will not drop the video-game ideology. People start solely relying on the Shield Hero to get anything done, which pushes the trio to take extreme measures to prove themselves.
- Similarly, this is an underlying problem with Naofumi's antagonizers as their complete lack of reasoning skills causes him no amount of grief with how they spew so much nonsensical, self-contradicting bile at him as if it were indisputable facts. In any other situation, these people could just be ignored and dismissed as bat-shit insane but said bat-shit insane people are ones of high power and influence, from the aforementioned Three Cardinal Heroes to members of the royal court, whose accusations are obstructive and even downright hazardous to not only Naofumi but the entire country's safety at large. Their rumors of Naofumi being a useless coward who cheats by stealing powers from the other heroes and then an evil brainwashing demon capable of enslaving mankind, despite zero proof of the abilities they kept insisting he has, had enraged the rest of the world who highly respect the Shield Hero and have a brain not to believe their utter crap to the point an all-out war was almost declared on Melromarc if Queen Mirelia hadn't talked them out of it. It's no wonder when Laser-Guided Karma finally hits these people that the Melromarc citizens heaved a sigh of relief from being free of those so Lethally Stupid to drive the country right into the ground over a pointless grudge, having been already doubtful of their claims from the very beginning.
- Kidnapped by the Call: As the Three Heroes point out at first, no matter the justification, the kingdom of Melromarc technically kidnapped them by summoning them without consent, something Ren is initially upset about.
- La Résistance: Itsuki forms one to assassinate the king of another kingdom because said king was heavily taxing his citizens and making things pretty bad for the commoners. After doing so, he basically leaves the resistance fighters on their own to rebuild the kingdom and create a new government. Only for them to heavily tax the citizens again because its military needed funding for its army to protect the kingdom from monsters and leaving the kingdom worse off than before since the rebellion had also caused collateral damage and depleted food resources. Removing a government just because they were heavily taxing the people doesn't mean the new government automatically can fix the issues left behind, especially ones that are needed for the basic protection of the people.
- The concept of Level Grinding is also deconstructed due to how seriously it's treated in-universe. It's pointed out in a conversation between Naofumi and a Shadow that there are only so many monsters to slay when it comes to gaining levels, which is why they can't simply have an entire army of properly trained soldiers ready for the waves. It was also why "hunting etiquette" was introduced in the Cala Mira arc in order to properly ration out the high-EXP-yielding monsters on the awakened island. Combined with the fact that the Heroes repel each other when nearby means they cannot simply level-grind together, and have to form parties of their own to varying levels of success.
- Marathon Boss: Overlapping with Damage-Sponge Boss for its Super-Toughness and extreme Healing Factor, and Puzzle Boss for the non-straightforward method to defeating it, the Spirit Turtle shows just how terrifying a raid boss could be if it were fully unleashed in the real world. Once Ren, Itsuki, and Motoyasu identified it as a kaiju-sized enemy from their games, they sought to unseal and slay the nigh-unstoppable behemoth to prove they weren't as ineffective as everyone believed. But this is an enormous monster capable of weathering most attacks thrown at it, seamlessly regenerating the damage it incurs, and throwing around attacks capable of leveling cities. It's no surprise that it wound up simply shrugging off the other heroes' assaults and effortlessly defeating them and their parties. Unlike in most video games where the boss stays in one place for players to challenge again without fear of repercussions, it proceeded to lay waste to wherever it went after leaving them for dead, resulting in a monumental death toll (and zombified people and chimera-like monsters) left behind in its wake for entire months.
- No Body Left Behind: Ren kills a Dragon to protect a village but fails to actually dispose of the body due to believing video-game logic is in place and that it will disappear after defeating it. Naofumi even invokes the trope upon hearing it, thinking to himself that Ren should have known that just like in real life, leaving meat out will cause it to go bad. Thus, not only did the rotting corpse spread a devastating plague to the surrounding area, destroying the wildlife and leaving a nearby village in critical condition, but also turn into an Undead Dragon from its hatred of being slain.
- The Power Fantasy is also deconstructed since all four heroes start out thinking they're in some kind of Wish-Fulfillment story. Of the aforementioned foursome, Naofumi is the first one to become disabused of this notion after being looked down upon by everyone and then screwed over on his third day. He also had to deal with an obtrusive capital due to its inherent racism as well as fellow "heroes" who expected to simply breeze through everything, but ultimately proved to be next-to-useless or even a hindrance because they didn't take their duties seriously or think things through. It's slowly reconstructed though, as because of Naofumi's hard work, it all pays off big time when he acquires a following of devoted female admirers (and slaves), gains the gratitude and favor of the true ruling authority of Melromarc, becomes hailed as a successful merchant, then savior of the people, and finally founder of his own kingdom; after much turmoil, the other heroes also eventually earn their own happy endings as well once they start taking responsibility for their own actions.
- The Power of Friendship and The Power of Trust: Motoyasu claims his party to be running on this and makes passionate speeches about their close bonds at various points. In reality, this is yet another example of his naivety and other reasons getting in the way of his already short-sighted judgement since his party and especially Malty are clearly all Gold Diggers exploiting his trust and "friendship" for fame and fortune without lifting a finger and he later finds out they don't even like him in the slightest.
- The Power of Hate: Naofumi's seething anger at the world for screwing him over helps him unlock the Wrath Shield, a Curse Series variant that allows him to attack enemies at the cost of his health and stats. Despite its incredible power, it does nothing to help him against Glass in the Third Wave. A power boost from getting angry or more determined does not guarantee a victory and serves as a reminder to Naofumi that he must continue to train and get stronger the hard way, or that some situations can't simply be solved via brute force. Additionally, the Wrath Shield is only pulled out in dire moments given his rage completely consumes him to the point of detriment as he cannot tell friend or foe apart if he doesn't control his emotions in time.
- The concept of Protagonist-Centered Morality is completely ripped to shreds by demonstrating that the phrase "when in Rome, do as the Romans do" exists for a damn good reason. Because he is treated like crap and dropped like hot garbage on his third day due to the violent history between Melromarc and Slitvelt, Naofumi went out of his way to avert the trope and play by the rules of this new world. He is able to easily adapt by learning everything he needs to know, such as studying the world's alphabet, practicing magic without the need of his Legendary Weapon and especially exploiting the part about slavery being legal, and thus prospering in spite of all the crap he's put through from the Capital's obstruction. Ren, Itsuki, and especially Motoyasu - who fervently insists that Naofumi is an Asshole Victim and deserves all his suffering and more beyond all reason - continue to stubbornly cling to their own internal compass and ignore all empirical evidence of how their mindset is completely wrong. Despite having every possible advantage, they cause one disaster after another, refusing to learn their lesson, until they get knocked off their high horse by a low bridge known as the Spirit Turtle. At this point, when the reality finally hits them, Ren goes into abject poverty and can't even touch anything of value, Itsuki becomes an empty shell, and Motoyasu not only falls into a depression, but comes out the other side incurably insane.
- The Revenge Fantasy is downplayed since even when Naofumi understandably wants revenge over having his life ruined, he never actively pursues it over fulfilling his (essentially forced) hero duties. Even after he gets the Wrath Shield and there's nothing physically stopping him from simply burning Malty, King Aultclay, and others to death the first chance he gets for either screwing him over, leaving him in a mess he has to dig himself out of, or trying to bury him deeper into it for some petty reason, he refrains from doing so for the pragmatic reasons of making his reputation way worse and becoming the very "Devil of the Shield" they accused him of being, and settles with rubbing it in their faces that he's too powerful to restrain until Laser-Guided Karma comes for them. When he finally does get his chance for revenge against Malty and Aultcray, courtesy of an equally pissed-off Queen, he allows them to be given a lighter punishment since he had time to mature and mostly moved on from his anger and resentment. And then when Malty eventually does get the horrific punishment that's coming to her, it's so terrible that even Naofumi gets no joy from it.
- Revenge Before Reason and Revenge by Proxy: Despite King Aultcray's beef being with demi-humans, he had no problem taking his blind hate out on Naofumi, a fellow human, simply because he was made to bear the Legendary Weapon his sworn enemies worshipped. He couldn't even see the young man behind the Shield, just a target for abuse and ridicule that he could blame for everything wrong as his way of giving the biggest middle finger he could to their nation of Slitvelt. Unfortunately, this being a king with power and political connections, his behavior ends up causing a number of problems both in and out of Melromarc. Between actively trying to hinder his progress when he needs all four heroes at their strongest, ignoring the citizens' plights caused by the other heroes' recklessness, and pissing off every other country to the point his wife's intervention was the only thing preventing an all-out invasion.
- The RPG Mechanics 'Verse that Naofumi, Motoyasu, Itsuki, and Ren were summoned to is not a world based on any video game but rather a world with video game elements and full of its own extensive history, culture and rules. This didn't stop the latter three from fixating on the idea Melromarc is the backdrop for an Excuse Plot of their native world's games and will automatically function as such.note Consequently, their indulgence in their personal fantasies and ignorance of proper training causes the three to be quickly dragged behind and wind up in nastier situations than Naofumi was in on the first day.
- Screw the Rules, I'm Beautiful!: Part of the reason why Malty was able to get away with so many of her crimes such as false rape accusations, thievery attempted assassination on the crown princess and treachery is because she has a pretty face. Even Motoyasu's blind devotion to her is merely born of a deluded belief that Beauty Equals Goodness despite the opposite being true as proven by her repeatedly showing to be one of the most rotten characters in the series and not even bothering to hide her true colours most of the time. Since this is widely considered her one-and-only redeeming trait, it's not even close enough to save Malty from her downright repulsive personality once her horrible actions catch up to her. When preparations are made to finally dispose of her, she winds up being thrown into the clutches of her Eviler than Thou hedonistic Caligula of an uncle who lusts after her because of her beautiful looks. What's more, the person who cheerfully sends her to him is none other than Motoyasu, whose betrayal at the hands of Malty caused him to snap and see all women (including her) as gross pigs, which means he can only see her for what she truly is in a semi-literal sense.
- Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: A King consort is not the same thing as a King proper, as Aultcray finds out from repeatedly abusing his position. You can and will be overruled by the real ruler if you try to enforce actions they do not agree with. Additionally, creating new laws while ignoring pre-existing ones to spite innocent people is a very good way to get you tried for treason as the Queen points out during his trial. Furthermore, the Queen was gone because she was trying to avert war from the King's decisions, that he made with the power she gave him. As such, she has to cut him off for both moral and pragmatic reasons.
- Just as Screw the Rules, I Have Connections! will not protect a member of the royal family when they break the law, Screw the Rules, I Make Them! will not always allow a ruler to exonerate the people they love. No one is ever high enough that they have to answer to no one. After returning home, Queen Mirelia immediately offers Naofumi hefty compensation and plans her family's trial and execution. Although she doesn't want to kill them, the Queen knows they must be held accountable. This is not only to make it up to Naofumi and her citizens but also to keep the other countries from declaring war on Melromarc because the King kept twisting Melromarc's own laws to screw over the other nations. The most she could do is to offer a new punishment (web/light novel) or her own life (anime) in the hope that he might spare them. She was very lucky that the Shield Hero chose another option when he had every right to let the execution go through. She was gone for so long in the first place because she was trying to avert war with other nations.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Overwhelmed and fed-up by the world-ending threat that is the Spirit Tortoise and the incompetence of the Cardinal Heroes, Motoyasu and Itsuki's parties bailed on their leaders the first chance they get. They soon find out there's no easy way to escape punishment once the queen and the high court catch wind of their cowardice, causing both parties to be wanted by the kingdom for high treason. As the ones who helped their leaders create the mess (either by releasing the beast in the Web Novel or trying to fight it head-on in the Light Novel), their decision to flee is completely unacceptable when they were commissioned to protect Melromarc the moment they joined their respective Hero. Their desperation to escape the consequences causes them to sink into villainy by helping Malty stage a coup against Melromarc and later join the Vanguards of the Waves simply because they won't own up to what they did, compounding the crimes they already committed.
- Summon Everyman Hero: The people chosen to become the Legendary Heroes lack knowledge of the world and actual weapon training; although three of them are familiar with similar worlds from playing video games, treating everything like a video game leads them to take things for granted and making mistakes that could've been avoided had they been more careful, and it's only the fourth hero (who, because of a conspiracy, is forced to strike out on his own, allowing him to learn things on his own without the bias of previous knowledge) that actually makes a difference, even fixing the other three's mistakes. In the first episode, even the three other heroes point out that being summoned to another world without consent, a trope that most isekai works use to get their protagonist to come is essentially kidnapping, which they are understandably upset about.
- Surrounded by Idiots: Deconstructed in the way that Naofumi really is surrounded by complete idiots, ones with power, authority, and royal privileges that they probably shouldn't have. Naofumi has to constantly clean up the messes said idiots make because of their petty, irrational grudges, refusal to help anyone actually in need, and blaming him for every bad thing that happens.
- Then Let Me Be Evil trope gets deconstructed throughout the story, at first subtly and then much more overtly: Naofumi makes things a lot harder for himself by letting his rage and resentment take over, not accepting genuine help or gratitude from anyone. While this behavior is understandable in the beginning and does have several practical advantages to it, the Jerkass act also works against him at several points and makes it that much easier for King Aultcray, Malty, and the Three Heroes Church to lie to the public about him. It isn't until several people (Melty and Fitoria primarily) point this out that Naofumi finally starts to leave his shell, although he admits that he's still unlikely to ever become the person he used to be again.
- Tokyo Is the Center of the Universe: The heroes from different Japans are summoned into the kingdom of Melromarc and spend most of the series taking care of events there such as dealing with the monster waves and the local Corrupt Church. Turns out later the rest of the world is not happy that Melromarc is seen as the only place in need of the Heroes' help, as the Waves affect the entire world and not just Melromarc. The other nations also are not happy that Melromarc is mistreating the Shield Hero and nearly go to war with them over what they see as a religious figure being mistreated. The only reason the other nations are not overwhelmed and destroyed is because of allies that are working to ensure they are safe, and it takes a good amount of time for the political backlash to calm down enough.
- Undying Loyalty: Ren's party has ideal teammates who are trustworthy and supportive from the start to the end. Perhaps too trustworthy in believing Ren is strong enough to take on the waves despite how vastly underpowered and unskilled he actually is and too supportive of his decision to go their separate ways for travelling and leveling up when he's clearly making little-to-no progress. Still, the party members try their best to be by his side during the waves out of their utmost admiration and allegiance for the Sword Hero. Unfortunately, this Undying Loyalty easily turns into Blind Loyalty since they never doubt Ren's dubious reasoning for solo adventuring which all resulted in a Total Party Kill at the foot of the Spirit Tortoise from the severe lack of basic teamwork and communication skills.
- Unskilled, but Strong: Ren, Motoyasu and Itsuki rely solely on their raw strength from their Legendary Weapons and treat everything that happens as a fantasy game without putting in the effort to learn skills to become stronger. As a result, the three have been falling more and more behind with every wavenote and getting their asses routinely kicked by the vassal heroes, not to mention the Spirit Tortoise fiasco. Raw power might win you a few fights but it can only carry you for so long before you cannot qualify as strong anymore when someone both Strong and Skilled comes along and wipes the floor with you.
- Zerg Rush: The royal knights and the soldiers of the Three Heroes Church repeatedly use this method when trying to attack or apprehend Naofumi. Normally a large number of people attacking a single target, regardless of strength, should be able to wear them down even a little. But because Naofumi is a defense-oriented Hero and the knights are incredibly weak/under-leveled by comparison, it does nothing to stop him. Plus their insistence on using this method despite its ineffectiveness causes them to continually lose against his party.
