The flood of comments in the livestream finally started to slow down, but the excitement wasn't going anywhere.
The screen had gone dark, showing nothing but the Poké Ball logo with Pikachu's ears and lightning-bolt tail, and the viewers were nowhere near satisfied.
"That's it? Already? It felt like it barely got started!"
"What happened to Pikachu? With injuries that bad, is it gone for good?"
"What was that golden Pokémon at the end? Even the Pokédex couldn't identify it. It felt almost holy. It has to be insanely powerful!"
"Ash was incredible. The moment he threw himself in front of Pikachu got my heart racing. That's exactly what a main character should be!"
"I have to say, this show has something. It seemed kind of kiddie at first, but then it just went there. What happens next? Ash is going to save Pikachu, right? They're going to be unstoppable together eventually, right?"
"I need the next episode. Right now. I need it."
Dan the Demon King took a slow breath as he watched the screen fill with desperate pleas for more. That restless, hollow feeling had settled in his chest like an itch he couldn't reach.
Without really thinking, he moved his mouse and found the "Next Episode" button below the video. He clicked it.
A popup appeared instead of the footage he was hoping for.
"Next episode unavailable. Please wait for updates."
He stared at it for a second, then clicked again. Same thing.
"They only released one episode? And there's no update schedule?"
For any other anime, that would have been unthinkable. Other shows practically fell over themselves to dump twenty episodes on launch day, updating daily or every other day at the very least.
In a market this competitive, slow updates meant getting buried. Everyone was racing, and you either kept up or disappeared.
But this anime seemed to play by completely different rules.
Had they just... forgotten to post more?
He scratched his head and pulled up the video's details page. It had one simple line: "Updates irregular. Stay tuned."
"You've got to be kidding me," he muttered, though it came out more anxious than annoyed. He desperately needed to keep watching.
The viewers in his chat had clearly noticed the same thing, and the comments went off.
"No next episode? Are you serious? I had my snacks ready and everything!"
"The production team is trying to kill us. You can't just cut it off there. That's genuinely cruel!"
"Just post something! Even one minute! Anything!"
"They can't even give us an update date? Is this studio brand new? Get it together!"
Dan the Demon King watched the flood of complaints and sighed, rubbing the back of his neck, trying to settle everyone down.
"Alright, alright, relax. This show is clearly doing its own thing. With writing and production this strong, they obviously need time. Since there's no next episode... how about we check something else out?"
He pulled up his recommendation list and pointed to one of the titles.
"How about this one? 'Mech God of War.' Brand new, great effects, intense fights, and they dropped three episodes at once. Plenty to get through this afternoon."
The suggestion landed with immediate pushback instead of the enthusiasm he was used to.
"Pass. Already watched it. Same formula as everything else. Not feeling it."
"I can't stop thinking about Pikachu right now. I can't focus on anything else."
"Same. I tried 'Mech God of War' earlier and bailed halfway through. Compared to Pokémon, something's just off. I can't explain it, but it's missing something."
"Don't bother recommending stuff, Overlord. Just let us know when Episode 2 drops. That's literally all we want."
"Exactly. There's no going back for me now."
Dan the Demon King stared at the comments with the beginning of a headache.
"You're all impossible... it really is a good show, though..."
He stopped himself mid-sentence. Because he realized he had absolutely zero desire to click on "Mech God of War" either.
He used to enjoy it just fine, but one episode of Pokémon had set the bar somewhere completely different.
The bond between trainer and Pokémon, the hope that broke through at rock bottom, the rainbow and Ho-Oh at the end. All of it had rewired what he expected from the genre.
Going back to a standard action anime now felt like drinking tap water after really good whiskey. Technically fine, but completely flat.
He let out a long breath and sank back in his chair.
He almost regretted clicking on the anime in the first place.
Not because of the pressure from his viewers. He'd been doing this long enough to handle any crowd.
The real problem was that he'd fallen in headfirst, harder than anyone. That gnawing, desperate need to know what happened next was almost unbearable, even for someone as seasoned as him.
"This show really knows how to sink its hooks into you."
---
Meanwhile, in a completely different space, Kairos sat at his workstation, watching a series of data panels float in front of him, a small smile at the corner of his mouth.
With the first episode wrapped, a wave of feedback data was pouring in.
[Faith Points incoming...]
[Emotion Points (Shock / Moved / Anticipation): +6000]
[Faith Points (Ho-Oh): +0.5]
His eyes moved across the numbers and landed on that "0.5."
Right on track.
He wasn't surprised. Back when he created the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon content, Ho-Oh had personally stepped in to rescue the player, a genuine miracle made real. The gratitude players felt had been raw and immediate, which was why it generated a full point of faith, even with only Yancy as the source.
This time, Ho-Oh had only appeared briefly at the end of the episode, a symbol of hope and legend. The imagery was stunning and felt almost sacred, but it was still just a glimpse.
Viewers were moved by what they saw. They weren't worshipping it as a divine being.
Half a point was modest, but it was still a nice surprise.
The primary goal of this episode had been to introduce the world of Pokémon anyway, not specifically to build up Ho-Oh's faith value.
Kairos ran the math in his head. As the anime's reach grew and more people watched, those points would stack into something real.
Then another system prompt blinked to life, its blue light glowing in front of him.
[Main Quest (Phase One): Use animation to introduce Pokémon to the current world. Completed.]
[Evaluation: Perfect. The premiere generated massive response and left a lasting impression on viewers.]
[Quest Reward Issued: Advanced Module - Authentic Voice Acting Module.]
[Effect: Once activated, allows the addition of high-definition voice acting that perfectly replicates original voice actors for games or animations, or supports custom voice configurations based on the user's vision.]
Reading through the reward description, Kairos felt a genuine spark of excitement.
A voice acting module. This took care of one of his biggest ongoing headaches.
Up until now, whether it was games or animation, the visuals had been strong and the music had held up, but character voice acting had always been the weak link.
Even in this world, where AI voice synthesis had advanced to a genuinely impressive level and could convincingly pull off a wide range of emotions, something always felt like it was missing to Kairos.
Soul, maybe.
In this episode, for instance, Ash's voice and Pikachu's "Pika-pika" had been handled well by AI, and the emotions came through clearly enough, but stacked against the classic performances Kairos remembered, ones that carried the real humanity of actual voice actors, there was always that faint but unmistakable gap.
Some things just couldn't be fully replicated.
This module closed that gap.
Voice acting was what gave a character's voice its soul, the thing that captured personality and emotion in ways that made audiences recognize a character from sound alone.
With this, Episode 2 was going to hit differently.
He closed the reward panel, and another prompt appeared with a chime.
[Ding! New Quest Issued: Current world restrictions still prevent game development. Continue using animation for promotion.]
[Objective: Total views for the Pokémon anime to reach 100,000.]
[Additionally, Host may now use the Story Transit Scroll to return to the first world.]
Looking at the 100,000 view target, Kairos gauged the timeline. The buzz from Episode 1 was still building, and with a major streamer like Dan the Demon King helping it spread, hitting that number shouldn't take long.
As for going back...
He paused for a moment, then shook his head.
The momentum was at its peak right now. The smart move was to push through and finish Episode 2 while things were hot. Going back could wait.
With solid results in hand and a new quest already lined up, Kairos got straight to work on Episode 2.
Producing animation wasn't any easier than developing a game, but the situation was completely different now. With an established asset library and the world-building already done from Episode 1, no rebuilding models or designing environments from scratch, the workflow moved significantly faster.
The voice acting module also cut down a meaningful chunk of his audio workload, though it still took a solid number of prompts to hand off properly to Night Owl.
Kairos worked through his notes.
"Here, Ash's voice needs to sound more frantic, like he's right on the edge of tears..."
"Pikachu's weakened voice should come out softer, more worn down..."
"Team Rocket's opening monologue... that absolutely stays in."
A little over an hour later, the rough cut of Episode 2 was finished.
He watched it through once, gave a satisfied nod, and was about to move on when his messaging app lit up.
Night Owl.
Night Owl: "Holy crap, bro, you're unreal! The response is completely insane! Every forum out there is talking about Ash and Pikachu! I knew your stuff would hit! I just knew it!"
Kairos looked at the string of exclamation marks and typed back.
Kairos: "Good response. Let's keep the momentum going."
Night Owl: "Keep the momentum going? What does that mean?"
Kairos: "Episode 2 is done. Sending it over now."
A few seconds passed. Then a row of ellipses appeared.
Night Owl: "..."
Night Owl: "Bro, are you messing with me? How long has it even been? You're telling me it's already done? This is animation, not a slideshow. And with the quality you put out in Episode 1... nobody works that fast. Nobody."
Kairos didn't bother explaining. He packaged the Episode 2 video file along with the audio files and sent them over.
Kairos: "File's on the larger side. Voice acting assets are included this time."
Night Owl started downloading while grumbling.
Night Owl: "Voice acting assets? Look, I'm not trying to be negative, but AI voice synthesis is insanely convenient these days. If you find it tedious, just let it generate automatically. Honestly, voice acting as a profession is basically on life support at this point. Why go out of your way to do this? Seems like way more work than it's worth."
He genuinely didn't get it. In this era, AI could handle virtually any audio task. Sure, it could sound a little mechanical here and there, but the speed and low cost more than made up for it. Going out of your way to source real voice work felt completely unnecessary.
Then the download finished. Out of habit, he opened a few of the audio files and hit play.
"Hey! That's my bike! Where do you think you're going with it!"
Misty's voice, and just hearing it, you could practically feel the heat rising in a girl's face.
"Since you asked so nicely, I'll be generous and tell you!"
Jessie's voice, soaked in that Team Rocket attitude, equal parts arrogant and theatrical.
Night Owl went still.
He clicked on Ash's audio.
"Pikachu, you have to be okay! Please, I'm begging you, please!"
The raw desperation. The sharp, clear quality that could only belong to a young boy's voice. It hit him straight in the chest.
"What the..."
Night Owl sat up straight and stared at the screen.
This was... exactly right. Impossibly, perfectly right.
In that moment, he finally understood why Kairos had gone with real human voices instead of AI.
Because nothing synthetic could come anywhere close to this. Every verbal habit, every breath, every subtle trailing note at the end of a line was flawless, like something out of a textbook, yet so natural that it felt like the characters themselves were actually speaking.
"No wonder he went with real voice acting."
The confusion Night Owl had felt a moment ago disappeared completely, replaced by something close to giddiness. This wasn't extra effort for nothing.
With voice acting like this, the whole anime had jumped to an entirely different level.
He sat up straight, cracked his knuckles, and grinned.
Everything else could wait. First, he needed to see what happened in Episode 2.
۞۞۞۞
~ Push the story forward with your Power Stones