Chapter 346 - 345 Winter

Chapter 346: Chapter 345 Winter

Throughout early and mid-September, the tidal wave of emotion sparked by Mitsui Hisashi’s redemption arc continued to surge across the country.

For the better part of a month, devoted Slam Dunk fans across various streaming platforms and forums took Mitsui’s flashbacks and his tearful return to the court, set them to the most popular rock and pop ballads, and flooded the internet with a dizzying variety of fan-made music videos.

Basketball might not have the same massive participation rate as baseball, but Slam Dunk wasn’t becoming a phenomenon because of the sport alone. It captured the public’s heart through its masterfully drawn characters and the raw, hot-blooded sincerity of its plot.

Truth be told, you could have swapped the basketball for badminton, table tennis, or even soccer. As long as the narrative beats remained the same, the show would have been a massive hit.

The audience isn’t necessarily obsessed with the mechanics of a jump shot, but that scene where a broken, kneeling Mitsui sobs in front of Coach Anzai? That is a universal language. It resonated with everyone. Younger viewers saw Hanamichi’s brawls and felt a surge of adrenaline, while adults saw Mitsui’s return from the brink and felt their own eyes well up with tears.

This emotional resonance caused the popularity of Slam Dunk to skyrocket in the following weeks. While this growth wasn’t as explosive in terms of raw broadcast ratings, it was significant.

The ratings for Slam Dunk climbed to a respectable 6.68% over those two weeks.

Given the fixed number of television viewers, a sudden jump is rare. However, Tokyo TV1 noticed a substantial increase in the ratings for the show’s reruns.

Dedicated fans who watch the Saturday night premiere are usually a consistent demographic, but a massive portion of the general public only tunes in once they see the internet buzzing with high praise. These casual viewers then clear their schedules to catch the rebroadcasts, and the growth in that specific segment was nothing short of staggering.

Before the Mitsui arc, Fullmetal Alchemist had consistently held the top spot in terms of popularity. Fullmetal Alchemist is a legitimate masterpiece, after all, and its early-to-mid-game pacing is far more stable than Slam Dunk’s. It is the kind of show with a very high floor and a very high ceiling.

Slam Dunk, on the other hand, is the type of work where you might find yourself nodding off during the slower buildup segments, but once the emotional stakes catch fire, its peak is arguably higher than anything else on the market. During those two weeks of the Mitsui craze, Slam Dunk actually managed to overtake Fullmetal Alchemist in the rankings.

Of course, that lead only lasted for a fortnight.

Once Mitsui officially joined the Shohoku team, the story transitioned into the Inter-High Prefecture Qualifiers.

The initial matches were against lower-tier teams, experience fodder that didn’t stand a chance. While these episodes were still entertaining, they couldn’t compete with the white-hot intensity of Fullmetal Alchemist, which was currently deep in the throes of a high-stakes battle against the Homunculi.

Consequently, by early October, Fullmetal Alchemist reclaimed its throne. But after the tug-of-war in September, it was clear that Slam Dunk and Fullmetal Alchemist were in a league of their own, far ahead of the rest of the market.

In this context, "the rest" referred to Haruto’s other hits, Initial D and Gurren Lagann. And when the Monogatari series premiered in October, the anime market took on a truly unique shape.

The ranking of broadcast ratings stood as follows: first was Fullmetal Alchemist, second was Slam Dunk, third was Initial D, fourth was Gurren Lagann, and fifth was Monogatari.

Every single one of these top five shows was written by Haruto, and every single one of them maintained a rating above 5%.

The show in sixth place was an adaptation of the popular fantasy game Sword, Magic, and Maidens!, which premiered with a rating of 4.52%. The original source material was a massive gacha game with millions of players worldwide. In any other year, such a title would have been a guaranteed powerhouse. This year, it had to settle for being a distant sixth.

Haruto’s current influence over the industry was something a simple game adaptation couldn’t shake. He had conquered the realms of anime, light novels, and manga simultaneously, creating a feedback loop where fans from one medium migrated to the others. It was, frankly, a bit terrifying.

Naturally, this situation fueled the jealousy and resentment of the industry’s corporate titans. Ordinary creators didn’t really feel a personal grudge against Haruto anymore.

His level of success was so far beyond them that they didn’t even dream of surpassing him..

The real suffering belonged to the executives.

It was one thing for Haruto to take the biggest slice of the pie, but for him to monopolize the top five ratings slots in a single season? That was unbearable.

While Haruto feasted on the prime cuts, the only companies getting even a taste of the leftovers were the ones partnered with him, like Kiyozawa Library and Prime Manga. Everyone else was left standing outside, looking in through the window. The old-guard animation studios were feeling the squeeze, and they were miserable.

But there was nothing they could do.

Haruto’s momentum was such that unless he self-destructed, he was untouchable. While the old companies saw their profits shrink, a new ecosystem of partners was thriving in Haruto’s wake, and they were fiercely protective of him.

Advertisers, partner studios, and even various cultural bureaus were now heavily invested in Haruto’s success. He had become a golden goose that everyone wanted to keep laying eggs. In essence, while Haruto himself hadn’t set out to radically dismantle the industry’s hierarchy, the flow of talent and capital had naturally shifted in his direction.

Haruto’s company continued its aggressive recruitment drive, bringing in fresh talent and expanding its workforce significantly. They had even officially established dedicated film and television departments. Haruto knew that his older works still held massive market potential for live-action or theatrical adaptations.

However, Haruto didn’t bother himself with the minutiae of growth anymore. When it came to operations and business development, there were experts who could handle the logistics.

The high-level executives he employed weren’t there for show; they had a clear roadmap for turning Haru-Yuki into a premier media conglomerate.

With Haruto constantly churning out the most popular hits on the market, the company was flush with cash, fame, and resources. With tens of millions of fans worldwide hanging on his every word, it would be almost impressively difficult to mess up such a winning hand.

The only thing they needed now was time.

Haruto wasn’t worried about that. At the current rate of growth, Haru-Yuki would likely become the largest animation studio in Japan within a few years.

As for TV anime, Haruto didn’t have to worry about new content for at least a few years. Once his current slate finished, he could always pull out the heavy hitters, the long-running Shonen giants, and settle in for a long-term serialization. Those shows were famous for lasting so long that fans went from being teenagers to parents before the finale ever aired.

The only area that actually held Haruto’s attention was the film sector.

He hadn’t ventured deep into that territory yet, aside from the success of the To the Moon movie. He hadn’t put a new project on the silver screen in over two years.

In the film industry, the market share is usually split between animated films, live-action domestic films, and foreign blockbusters. Haru-Yuki already had projects in development to adapt Haruto’s previous works into live-action films. Haruto viewed these mostly as secondary ventures. He was far more interested in original animated films.

Once this year concluded and spring arrived, he planned to launch major animated film projects. He intended to curate and produce masterpieces from the legendary directors in his memories.

Thinking about the scale of it all, Haruto rubbed his temples. Since graduating last year, a huge portion of his energy had been consumed by the business side of things. Now that the film, television, and gaming departments were fully operational, the company’s headcount was approaching a thousand employees. Because the company ran entirely on Haruto’s intellectual property, he felt comfortable delegating power to his subordinates.

Still, even after delegating as much as possible, managing a company of that size required his attention on a daily basis. With over a dozen projects running simultaneously, Haruto had to review and sign off on monthly budget allocations.

"So this is what twenty-two feels like," Haruto mused with a wry smile.

Back in university, when he was struggling with coursework, he had imagined that graduation would bring a life of leisure. In reality, the growth of the company was a force that even its founder had to work hard to direct. Even if Haruto wanted to slow down, his thousand employees wouldn’t let him; they were all counting on the company’s expansion.

By the time the global royalties for Slam Dunk and Fullmetal Alchemist started hitting the company accounts, Haru-Yuki’s cash reserves would likely balloon to nearly 100 billion yen. Given Haruto’s current output speed, he literally couldn’t spend the money fast enough. It was just sitting in the accounts, which was part of the reason he had been so quick to greenlight the new departments.

"But this is the limit," Haruto sighed.

Writing movie-length scripts wasn’t a huge burden for him, but he absolutely could not take on any more long-running TV series.

He would work himself into an early grave.

In October, Slam Dunk spent several episodes showing the Shohoku team crushing the various lower-tier teams in the qualifiers. Finally, the narrative was moving toward the showdown with Shoyo High.

In the original story, there were only specific games that fans truly remembered as major arcs. There were the matches against Ryonan, the game against Shoyo, the battle against Kainan, and the final showdown in the nationals.

Haruto considered every other opponent in between to be buildup.

They might have had their own gimmicks, but the moment they stepped on the court, they were meant to give Shohoku some experience.

This upcoming game against Shoyo would likely take over a dozen episodes to conclude.

The current fans had no idea just how agonizing it was to follow Slam Dunk on a weekly basis. A single basketball game could last for months in real-time.

In truth, Slam Dunk was the king of cliffhangers. Once the tip-off happened, every week was a test of patience.

But at this moment, the fans were oblivious to the suffering ahead. They were too busy reading the in-universe hype for the Shoyo team. They were the second-best team in the prefecture, the powerhouse that had previously crushed Ryonan.

The fans remembered that Shohoku had lost to Ryonan by a single point when they only had three of their main stars on the court. Now that Mitsui and Miyagi were back in the lineup, a win against Shoyo would signal that Shohoku was ready for the throne.

The hype for the qualifiers was reaching a fever pitch.

"Sensei finally knows what we want to see!"

"We finally have a real opponent. What was with those other teams? Sensei loves throwing in these diversions right when the tension is building."

"Speaking of which, we’re many episodes in and Hanamichi has only scored one basket. Is he actually the protagonist?"

"I’ve finally figured out the rhythm of this show. This Shoyo game is probably going to take a long time to finish."

"I just want to see the Shohoku Five finally go all out against a strong opponent."

"I hope Hanamichi scores at least two baskets in this arc. I like him as a lead, but his lack of skill is starting to get frustrating to watch."

"It’s weird. Usually, if a protagonist were this bad at the main gimmick of the show, I would have dropped it ages ago. But with Slam Dunk, I still can’t look away even though Hanamichi is a total amateur."

"I’m not even watching for Hanamichi anymore. I’m here for Mitsui. He’s the real legend."

"I’m here for Rukawa."

"Am I the only one who actually enjoys the Akagi segments?"

By late October, Slam Dunk, which had been overshadowed by Fullmetal Alchemist for a month, began to trend upward again as the Shoyo match approached.

As the season progressed, the standings for the other shows became relatively fixed.

As Haruto had predicted, Monogatari was the niche performer among his current slate. The fanbase, while enjoying it, found it a bit too heavy on the unique dialogue for it to become a mainstream monster like his other works.

Gurren Lagann, meanwhile, was entering its mid-season sprint. The plot was accelerating at breakneck speed. While it couldn’t quite catch Fullmetal Alchemist or Slam Dunk, it was nipping at their heels.

And as the calendar turned, the first chill of the winter began to settle over the country.

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