From the broadcast of episode twelve all the way through episode sixteen, Steins;Gate had been tearing open, almost mercilessly, every clue it had planted in the beginning.
The time-leap text message from the first episode, the shift in world lines, the satellite lodged in the upper floors of a building, John, and then the four consecutive alterations of the world line caused by the protagonist sending messages to the members of the laboratory. Everything that had once seemed like eccentric detail, stray atmosphere, or ordinary science-fiction decoration was beginning to lock into place with suffocating precision.
Then, in that episode, Suzuha, the part-time warrior, made her final decision.
Alone, she boarded the time machine and returned thirty-five years into the past, carrying on her shoulders the mission to save the world and find the IBN 5100.
Yet the fate waiting for her was memory loss and suicide.
The plot was far too cruel.
It was a completely different kind of despair from Re:Zero.
The moment the episode aired, Sora's creator account was practically buried under the fury of the fans.
"So, old bastard Sora, is there something wrong with your head? Torturing Shiina wasn't enough for you? You had to make the part-time warrior die too?"
"In the Alpha world line, the part-time warrior is bound to go back thirty-five years into the past, then live twenty-five years in that era, and ultimately die ten years before the present, right? So even if the protagonist shifts the world line from Alpha to Beta, what does that change? She still dies."
"If it shifts to the Beta world line, then it won't be the world where SERN takes control and builds a dictatorship. In that case, the part-time warrior won't take the time machine back to this era in the first place, which means she won't die ten years ago."
"Damn it, cursed Alpha world line. Hurry up and die already. I want to go to the Beta world line."
"This anime is giving me chills now. I'm starting to fear that our ordinary world might be like this too, with everything already destined."
"Except for the protagonist, who can retain memories across different world lines, no one knows whether so-called coincidence is actually inevitability."
"It's over. I have no idea how this anime can break out of this situation anymore. The key item, the IBN 5100, can't be recovered. Without it, they can't delete the protagonist's time-leap message from SERN's servers after it was captured. They'll inevitably be noticed by SERN, then captured and killed. This is too hard to endure."
"Same here. This is my first time watching an anime with a setup this complex and this brain-burning. Without reading online analyses, I can't understand the plot at all."
"Liar Game is the same. Every new game in the story is more mentally exhausting than the last. After following the weekly update, if I don't go read analysis posts, I can't fully understand all the details."
"That old bastard Sora should create some works that normal people can understand without suffering."
"There's AD. Simple, light, healing, and funny. The problem is a lot of people don't like everyday romance anime. Personally, I think AD is better than Re:Zero."
"The main thing is that I don't like anime that sells cuteness."
"Still, Liar Game and Steins;Gate are more interesting."
"Now I just hope Steins;Gate doesn't collapse in the later plot. The foreshadowing so far has been too good, and the details and logic are handled insanely well. Aside from the creation of the time machine, which is basically a forced setting - like, that ridiculous thing is simply a time machine because the story says so - I haven't found a single bug so far. If this work manages to pull back every thread it has planted, then it will definitely be a work even closer to perfection than Liar Game."
In May, the Japanese television industry burned as fiercely as the sun hanging high in the sky.
Seiun TV, Aobane TV, HaiOn TV, and Shirakawa TV were all putting their full strength into resisting the assault of Steins;Gate and Liar Game.
But the ratings for the second season of Liar Game remained extremely stable, fluctuating only slightly around 5.2%.
The fantasy live-action manga adaptation airing that cour on Seiun TV, The Witch Next Door, had once climbed into the 5.15% range. Yet it was still missing that final breath. No matter how frantically the station poured money into marketing and promotion, the numbers simply refused to rise any higher.
As for Steins;Gate, after the sixteenth episode aired, its public score jumped from 9.1 to 9.5.
And from that episode onward, its ratings entered a new phase of growth as well.
In order to recover the IBN 5100, Okabe had no choice but to return the world line to its original state. Two full episodes were devoted to showing the protagonist erasing the effects of the messages sent by Faris to save her father and by Ruka to change her own sex.
The cruelest thing in the world was not giving someone a brutal fate.
It was giving them hope, then forcing them to erase that hope with their own hands.
In episode seventeen, another time-leap message sent by Faris herself returned her father to the fate of being kidnapped and murdered.
In episode eighteen, the message Ruka sent once again caused her sex to return from female to male. To save her dearest friend, Shiina, she had no other choice, even though her greatest dream had been to remain by Okabe's side, the person she loved, while living as a woman.
Two consecutive episodes of pure depression left countless Japanese viewers emotionally wrecked.
But precisely because of that, the ratings rose even higher.
Episode seventeen reached 5.41%.
Episode eighteen reached 5.48%.
Then came episode nineteen. With the confrontation between Okabe and Moeka, the fans' emotions finally exploded.
The ratings surged to 5.58%, surpassing The Demon of Time for the first time and taking first place among all anime that cour.
With Steins;Gate turning the tables and climbing to the top of the season, the stock price of Shikoku Alliance TV began rising in the second half of April. At the same time, calls from advertisers all over Japan flooded the station's reception desk until the phones were practically overwhelmed.
To Shikoku Alliance TV, everything felt like a dream.
It had only recently gone public. It had secured nationwide broadcast rights less than half a year ago. And yet it had already defeated Seiun TV in both live-action drama and animation, taking first place for the cour in both fields.
Of course, it was only this cour. The real gap in strength and influence between the stations still objectively existed within the industry.
Even so, it was enough to shake the entire television world.
Too fast.
It had not even been half a year.
Could that Sora really be some kind of heaven-sent child of the industry?
Creating one hit work was not that unbelievable. The real problem was this: how did every work he created become a hit?
If this situation continued, it would not be long before the loyal viewers of the four major stations were steadily drawn away by Shikoku Alliance TV.
Under normal circumstances, if they could not beat someone, they would simply poach the talent. That had been standard practice for the four major stations over the past several decades.
But now that road was blocked.
Sora had signed exclusivity and cooperation clauses with Shikoku Alliance TV. More than that, he had become one of the station's shareholders.
How were they supposed to poach him?
At the moment, all four stations were in a deeply uncomfortable position.
The additional advertising revenue gained by Shikoku Alliance TV was, in effect, flesh carved from their own bodies.
Meanwhile, Yume Animation had not been idle either. The second Blu-ray volumes of AD and Steins;Gate were released nationwide.
And just as Steins;Gate ascended to the throne of highest-rated anime of the cour, news about the broadcast of AD's second season was released across the entire internet.
"AD?"
"This anime is actually getting a second season?"
"I feel like the first season should be enough to explain the story. Can the romance between Nagisa Furukawa and Takasaki really be stretched to fifty episodes?"
"I have no idea. Anyway, the anime still hasn't explained what the orbs of light that appear after each incident is resolved are for. We still don't know the meaning of that girl and the robot in the lonely world either. Maybe that's what the second season will cover."
"Yeah. Kantoku Sora said before that both AD and Steins;Gate are anime that gain strength in the later stages. Now Steins;Gate has already started showing that strength, but AD still feels the same as before. Is it possible that, in AD's case, the real late-stage payoff starts from the second season?"
"What kind of payoff can a romance anime have? Isn't it always just that kind of thing? Although the production quality of AD is very good, in the end it's still just a good anime. No need to overthink it."
"Instead of making a second season of AD, they should make a second season of Steins;Gate or a third season of Re:Zero."
"Thank you for your hard work."
"Thank you, everyone, for your efforts over the past six months."
"Not at all, Kantoku. You worked hard too."
"I hope Steins;Gate can keep its first-place ratings until the end of the cour."
Inside the recording room at Yume Animation, Sora personally presented a bouquet of flowers to each seiyuu in the cast.
After that, he asked them to stay a little longer and assigned the public relations staff under him to take everyone out that night for a company-funded celebration.
To be honest, Sora felt somewhat melancholy.
Although it would still take another two weeks for all post-production work on Steins;Gate to be completed, the voice recording had already ended.
That meant the production of the anime had entered its final stage.
Nearly ten months had passed since he first redeemed this work. During that time, Yume Animation had gone through a rapid expansion in staff. The total number of employees was now close to four hundred. The office location had also changed during this period. And now, with some spare money in hand, Sora had already begun seriously considering where to buy several floors of an office building to serve as Yume Animation's headquarters.
"With that look on your face, you seem reluctant to let it end already."
Holding a stack of documents, Yumi suddenly walked up beside Sora and smiled.
"A little, yes. After all, it's an anime I made with my own hands, and now it has reached its final stage." Sora paused before asking, "What is it? Did something happen?"
"Several advertising agencies have contacted us and want to negotiate with you. They want to place product advertisements in the second season of AD, which airs next cour."
"Also, organizers from several manga conventions, anime events, and game expos across Japan have invited you to attend as a special guest for promotional activities."
"And the company's planning department has submitted proposals to adapt works such as Re:Zero, AD, Steins;Gate, and Natsume Yuujinchou into games and manga. You need to review them."
"There's also…"
"All right, all right. I understand."
Sora quickly took the documents from Yumi's hands and let out a sigh.
"This work is real. No matter how much I do, it never ends."
"Of course it doesn't. If your goal was only to become rich, then you have already achieved it. But if your goal is to stand at the very top of the Japanese animation industry, then creation, operations, merchandise development, and rights management for your works are all things you'll inevitably have to deal with." Yumi smiled gently. "If you don't want these trivial matters to drain too much of your energy, then besides the production staff the company already has, you also need to start recruiting people for a dedicated copyright and IP development department. After all, as chairman of the company, once the scale expands, you can't possibly handle every detail personally. Even if you worked yourself to death, you still wouldn't be able to manage it all."
"I know," Sora said. "After all, our company has already grown out of its initial weak phase. Now that we've accumulated some funds, we need to use that money where it matters most."
"From the way you're talking, it sounds like you never planned to be merely the chairman of an animation studio from the very beginning." Yumi looked at him with curiosity.
"Of course not. The commercial value of an anime broadcast itself is very limited. My vision for Yume Animation's future is for it to become a company that develops and operates IPs for the otaku industry."
Just like Marvel, Nintendo, and other companies from his previous life. Spending years, decades, sometimes even generations producing works and operating their IPs was the proper path.
Television broadcasts and the like were merely ways to promote a work and expand its influence.
"One day, Yume Animation will become Japan's number one otaku industry IP company," Sora said.
"You really do think far ahead." Yumi studied his face seriously.
If someone else had said those words, she would have thought they were overreaching.
But coming from Sora…
All she could say was that his achievements justified that degree of arrogance.
"What about you? When you chose to invest in this company back then, didn't you have that kind of idea?" Sora asked, curious.
"No. At first, I invested in Yume Animation simply because I thought it seemed fun. How could I possibly have thought that far ahead?" Yumi leaned against the wall and laughed. "You might have the potential to become the number one person in the animation world, but I have absolutely no talent for investment. The fact that my investment in Yume Animation succeeded was pure accident. But as things stand now, those ideas of yours are still very far away. Although works like Re:Zero and Steins;Gate have very good ratings, they are not exactly IPs with enormous commercial value."
Sora naturally knew that.
In Japan, the anime with truly high IP value were the classics from ten or twenty years ago. Works of that kind could release derivative films and games every year, earning money steadily and reliably.
Something like Re:Zero might generate very high income in the year it aired, but once the work ended, its revenue would immediately plunge.
In Sora's previous life, works with truly massive IP value - such as the Fate series, Gundam, Evangelion, and the great shounen giants like One Piece, Naruto, Bleach, and Dragon Ball - required astronomical amounts of emotional value to redeem.
Re:Zero, Steins;Gate, and even works like Fullmetal Alchemist stood at the peak of reputation among anime audiences, but in terms of pure commercial value, they were not especially monstrous.
In the end, there was only one conclusion.
Emotional value was something that never seemed to be enough, no matter how much came in.
If Sora wanted to produce works with enormous commercial value, he could only watch the three productions currently airing and wait to see how much emotional value they could contribute to him - and whether it would be enough to redeem those works.
___________________________________________________________________________________
Additionally, more chapters exclusive content are available on Patreon: https://patreon.com/ImmortalEmperor?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink
- CHRONICLES OF THE ICE SOVEREIGN
-PLAYING ANIME LEGENDS
-THE OTHER WORLD'S ANIMATOR
Join now and help shape the future of the story while enjoying special rewards!