The Metropolis Airport.
Engines roared overhead as rows of passenger aircraft taxied across the tarmac.
Among them, a flight arriving from the United States touched down smoothly and braked to a halt.
Chris Nolan, accompanied by a professional corporate business team from WB Pictures, slowly descended the gangway steps.
Inside the arrival hall, dense crowds moved back and forth, yet everything operated with silent order.
Nolan took in the clean environment.
Back in the States, whether in an airport terminal or a subway, there was always some odd scenario playing out.
Staff members were constantly resolving bizarre issues triggered by travelers.
The contrast left him with heavy internal dialogue. The Federation and the United States operated on different wavelengths.
"Chris, how are you holding up? Adjusting fine?"
An executive from the WB division asked with a friendly smile.
"I am fine, Miles."
Nolan answered easily. "Standing inside this city, it feels like an incredible place."
"This is the most developed hub inside the Federation,the Metropolis."
"If you take some time to explore the local areas, you will experience incredible things," Miles replied with a chuckle.
For most foreigners, the Federation essentially consisted of one and a half cities.
The "one" with full status was the Metropolis. The "half" was the Federal Capital.
To their logic, these two represented the entirety of the Federation.
They held zero knowledge regarding any other provincial cities.
It was a mirroring effect: aside from locals, most international travelers only knew of New York and Washington, occasionally remembering San Francisco or Los Angeles.
"I'll pass on exploring for now. My single focus is securing the cinematic adaptation rights for Edgerunners."
Nolan smiled warmly.
"Once the ink is dry on the file, I will take the time to properly absorb the local culture."
"You are consumed by this title, aren't you?" Miles chuckled with a helpless shrug.
"Well, who isn't looking at it lately? Let's hope having you here personally tilts the scale for us."
Nolan nodded, heat igniting inside his pupils. He hadn't flown across the ocean just to negotiate.
He arrived holding a set of intentions: Edgerunners was going with WB.
He had performed extensive research, intending to meet the original author personally and convince him to sign.
Inside their separate offices, the Manga World division quietly received reports of WB's arrival earlier in the morning.
They didn't dare treat the itinerary with anything short of priority.
Chris Nolan, possessing Oscar trophies for Best Director and Best Screenplay, was a legend inside the cinema. Losing focus on him was impossible.
Staff members had been waiting outside the arrival gates for hours, immediately driving the crew to a high-end luxury hotel to check in and rest.
The formal negotiations sitting inside the Manga World headquarters would commence tomorrow.
---
For readers who once closely tracked the release of Edgerunners, time continued ticking forward rapidly.
Unnoticed in passing, two full months had already melted away following the series conclusion.
Aoyama and his new serial, Chainsaw Man, had reached Chapter 10 in the magazine.
In the preceding chapters, the protagonist Denji had been ordered to board with Aki Hayakawa, absorbing a basic discipline routine.
Simultaneously, readers were introduced to a proud, unhinged, yet "physiologically gifted" Blood Fiend: Power.
A "Fiend" was defined as a Devil taking over a dead human corpse, resulting in an entity that possessed slightly weaker strength than its raw monster template.
Their distinguishing features included odd growths on their skulls and the ability to consume blood to restore their organic condition and baseline health.
Power was another unique Devil Hunter, pressed into Public Safety supervision much like Denji.
Following the story this far, readers firmly understood that inside the Chainsaw Man universe, traditional religion couldn't resolve Devil scenarios.
You fought Devils by weaponizing Devils.
The Public Safety division relied heavily on weaponizing Fiends like Denji and Power, entities who didn't strictly prioritize slaughtering human settlements.
Shuu Fumiya, after punching out of his shift, habitually bought the latest issue of Manga World GoGo from the stand and headed back to his apartment to begin reading.
To address the truth, comparing the setting to Edgerunners, Chainsaw Man felt slightly less dense in world-building.
As a heavy sci-fi consumer, Shuu Fumiya noted that Chainsaw Man didn't satisfy any science-based metrics.
But following the conclusion of Edgerunners, he'd been fully locked as an Aoyama subscriber.
Being trained into reading habits, he sustained full support for Aoyama's latest.
Picking up from the previous installment: Power had deceived Denji, dragging him before the Bat Devil to offer him as a blood battery in exchange for her safety.
The Bat Devil had been holding Power's cat, Meowy, hostage to force her into compliance.
But despite Power completing the trap and feeding Denji into the monster, the Bat Devil broke the contract, swallowing the cat and its cage directly into its stomach in front of her face.
Following the absorption, the Bat Devil took off toward the city looking to slaughter inhabitants.
Readers had initially felt a heavy dislike toward Power for betraying Denji.
But Denji didn't harbour any residual anger; he understood the motivation.
He remembered how panicked he had felt when Pochita went missing previously.
Without blaming Power, Denji chased the Bat Devil into the city looking to halt the slaughter.
During the chase, Denji saved several ordinary civilians before pulling the starter cord on his chest and activating his Chainsaw Man form.
Relying on the raw power sitting inside Pochita's heart, Denji butchered the Bat Devil to ribbons.
But...
Though the Bat Devil met its end, a second monster immediately materialized to fill the vacuum: The Leech Devil.
The combat cycle had left Denji's system fully exhausted.
Most critical, Fiends relied strictly on blood consumption for maintenance. With his levels bottoming out, Denji couldn't even summon the chainsaw blades growing from his head.
Worse, activating the chainsaw directly tore his own organic casing open, causing his own blood levels to drain.
Shuu Fumiya turned to the current Chapter 10 entry.
Denji was virtually unable to activate combat status, yet he forced his breaking system to continue standing up against the Leech Devil.
The overarching reason powering his survival?
"I haven't felt up a pair of breasts yet, I am not dying here..." Denji announced, his face fully coated in blood.
The Leech Devil stared at him in flat-footed confusion.
"Boring. Losing your life to a thug with nothing inside his head but low-brow desires? It makes the Bat pathetic."
Shuu Fumiya read the scene with a highly amused, awkward smile fitting his lips.
Well, looking at it objectively... that was right.
The Bat Devil had been cleanly daved and sliced to pieces because Denji held a drive to touch Power's chest cavity.
That was a ridiculous death driver.
But evaluating Power's Fiend design,she was highly attractive, and her chest dimensions were drawn generously...
So inside an adolescent script... he couldn't say Denji's index was fully wrong either.
[Translated and Rewritten by Shika_Kagura]