The winner of the "This Light Novel is Amazing!" award that no one cares about

"This Light Novel is Amazing!", better known as "Kono Light Novel ga Sugoi!" is an award by a Japanese magazines that list the top ten Light Novels of the year. It uses internet polls and votes from collaborators of the industry to determine the results. If you browse through the list, you will find many works licensed by English publishers, while the less popular ones are at least fan translated. Here's the wiki link if you want to browse through the list.

Alderamin of the Sky got 2nd place in the 2014 awards, and was adapted into an anime

However, it doesn't mean there aren't any flukes either. The best example would be the 2019 winner, Sabikui Bisco, that just fell completely off the landscape. That's one winner no one cared about, since it's set in a 'mad max' type apocalyptic future instead of a fantasy world with game mechanics, not an isekai, and don't have waifus for readers to fawn over.

But that's not the focus of this post today. Allow me to introduce you to the winner of the 2020 awards, Nanatsu no Maken ga Shihai Suru (七つの魔剣が支配する).

Winner of the 2020 "Sugoi" award

Roughly translated into "Domination of the Seven Magic Swords", it's set in a fantasy world, with lots of waifus, and is basically a magic school battle novel. Unlike the author that won the 2019 award, this author is a veteran with a proven track record of a light novel series that spanned 14 volumes, which was adapted into a manga and anime.

It's not an isekai, but it appears to hit all the marks that will make it a popular series. So, why is no one taking notice? Well, the author had a track record of killing off fan favorite characters. That's right, he is also the author of Alderamin, Uno Bokuto.

Pic not related.

Killing off characters happens all the time in Games of Thrones, but that only works because the story is told from the view of many factions, which spreads the importance for any one character. It's also fine to build up one character and kill him/her off in one volume, so readers can empathize with them. But doing so over 7 volumes is just devastating.

Right now, everyone is just watching from afar, waiting to see if the author kills off anyone important again. An anime adaptation will probably happen if he manages to do so. If not, no one will want to touch it with a ten foot pole.