Parallel World : The Other World’s Animator

Episode 23 of Attack on Titan aired in mid-September.

In that episode, the identity of the Female Titan was revealed without the slightest attempt to soften the impact.

She had been one of Eren's former classmates in the Training Corps. Among all the female recruits who had graduated that year, aside from Mikasa, she had been the most outstanding soldier.

Annie.

The blond, silent girl who always seemed wrapped in a coldness no one could quite reach.

Someone who, despite her distance, had formed a peculiar bond with Armin, Eren, and Mikasa.

In truth, she was the real person behind the Female Titan.

When Eren had transformed into a titan to seal the wall, the vertical maneuvering equipment Annie wore at the time had belonged to a fallen comrade. It was because of that detail that Armin had first begun to suspect her.

And there was something else, something even more decisive.

When the Female Titan caught up to him during the pursuit, she had not killed him. On the contrary, her expression had softened for a fleeting instant, and she had simply let him go.

By connecting that memory with his earlier doubts, Armin reached a conclusion almost impossible to ignore: Annie was the Female Titan.

Even so, it was still only a hypothesis. To turn suspicion into certainty, they had to test her.

That was why Eren, Armin, and Mikasa deliberately returned to the city. They found Annie and, with hidden intentions, tried to convince her to follow them through an underground passage to another part of the district.

Was Annie really a titan?

When the audience saw that turn of events, many were completely stunned.

What?

Although Annie had not appeared in many scenes, she was actually quite popular. Because of that, as the tension rose, many viewers still tried to convince themselves that there had to be some mistake in the story. Maybe Annie was a good person. Maybe this was just a narrative trap.

But then Annie refused to enter the underground passage.

And that refusal made the suspicion weigh even heavier.

If Annie truly was the Female Titan, she would not be able to transform freely inside a narrow tunnel. The more one thought about it, the more reasonable the plot became.

The story, however, gave no one time to breathe.

Annie revealed her true face with unexpected directness.

Faced with Armin and Eren's questioning, she smiled in an almost deranged way and said:

"I suppose I'll admit that you won this time, Armin. But I've been thinking about what comes next too."

Immediately afterward, wearing a crazed expression, Annie bit into her own finger. A burst of golden light exploded through the air.

And the Female Titan appeared.

When episode 23 of Attack on Titan ended, the fans of the titan series simply could not hold themselves back anymore.

Annie could transform into a titan?

"The Female Titan was Annie? Are you kidding me?"

How many mysteries were still hidden inside Attack on Titan?

"My God, I never saw that coming!"

"What about the Colossal Titan and the Armored Titan? Does Eren know them too?"

"Annie's final line clearly suggests that she already expected Eren, Armin, and Mikasa to come after her. Did she walk into the trap on purpose so she could use the opportunity to capture Eren?"

"I'm completely lost. Did anyone actually understand this?"

"What exactly is Sora planning? I thought Annie joining the Military Police was a hint that she would become an important figure in the inner city and help Eren, the protagonist. But she's the Female Titan? That's insane!"

"I don't understand anything anymore! How many intelligent titans exist in this anime? Does anyone know? Now everyone looks suspicious. Levi, Erwin... do you guys think Mikasa might be a titan too?"

"Where did these conscious titans come from? And why are there so many of them?"

"Why did the Female Titan want to capture Eren? Why risk her life to take him away? What is so special about Eren?"

"If we look at titan transformations alone, Eren's titan is the worst of them all. It can't harden its body, it can't roar to summon mindless titans, it doesn't have defense like the Armored Titan, and it doesn't have absurd strength like the Colossal Titan. Eren is basically just an ordinary titan who knows hand-to-hand combat. So why are all these titans doing this because of him?"

"And where did all those titans come from?"

"How would I know where they came from? All I know is that even though Attack on Titan has already surpassed 6.6% in ratings, if Kantoku Sora doesn't explain the origin of the titans properly, it could become the fatal flaw of the anime."

"To be honest, I don't even think Attack on Titan is superior to Claire or Steins;Gate in terms of quality. So why are its ratings so much higher than those two works? And why is its influence and discussion so much more intense?"

"That's the power of its content. Attack on Titan has an excellent plot and an absurdly strong setting. People who understand the story praise it as a masterpiece, while people who don't can still enjoy the action scenes. Children, teenagers, and adults can all find something they like in it, and that's the advantage of an action anime. Clannad and Steins;Gate are different. One revolves around family and love; the other is a light science-fiction anime with a complex plot. Their audiences are naturally more limited. So it's normal for their ratings not to compare with Attack on Titan. But look at the scores and reviews within each work's own target audience. At least for now, Attack on Titan is still below Clannad and Steins;Gate in that regard."

The ratings for episode 23 of Attack on Titan rose only slightly compared with episode 22, reaching 6.69%. It failed to break through the 6.7% mark that many people had predicted.

When a hundred-kilometer journey reaches ninety kilometers, it still cannot be considered complete. In the same way, once audience ratings reach a certain level, even increasing them by 0.1 percentage point becomes extremely difficult.

It was like the hundred-meter dash. The difference of only 0.1 seconds between 9.8 and 9.7 seconds could be enough to carve an athlete's name into the history of the sport.

The first season of Attack on Titan was exploding in popularity.

Even so, its audience ceiling was beginning to show.

On the other hand, Attack on Titan was a long-running series. Most specialized media outlets remained optimistic about the future development of the work.

If the following seasons maintained the same level of excellence, combining the natural strength of an exhilarating action anime with Sora's current status in the Japanese anime industry, would it be possible for Attack on Titan to break the old 7% ratings barrier?

Just thinking about it was enough to leave many people in the Japanese television industry dazed.

After all, a television production surpassing 7% in ratings was something that had only happened with any frequency two or three decades earlier.

Back then, personal computers were not widespread, the internet did not exist in the way it did now, streaming platforms had yet to appear, and even across the entire country the number of national and regional broadcasters was far more limited. Audience fragmentation had been much lower, and yet programs with 7% ratings were still extremely rare.

Attack on Titan, however, although it had not yet reached that final answer, had already shown enough potential to make people dare to imagine such a scenario.

The titan series had been airing in Japan for almost half a year.

In a very short time, it had become one of the strongest intellectual properties in the current anime industry.

Several commercial companies began approaching Yume Animation in search of collaboration.

Especially in the mobile and browser game sectors, companies were offering investments worth tens of billions of yen. Yume Animation barely needed to do anything. It only had to authorize the creation of banners, items, and joint campaigns inside those games, using the titans and soldiers as their central figures: Abnormal Titans, the Armored Titan, the Colossal Titan, vertical maneuvering equipment...

At the same time, novelists and mangaka contracted by the company began developing spin-off novels and manga, all based on the world of Attack on Titan. Those projects were then negotiated with some of Japan's largest publishers.

Sora's plan to acquire poorly managed foreign companies, even if they had limited capital, unstable teams, and inferior game development capabilities, also began to produce concrete results.

Three companies fit Sora's requirements, with acquisition values between twelve and sixteen billion yen.

While remaining busy with the production of the film The Battle of the Two Cities, Sora still had to deal with the acquisition negotiations.

Whether it was Attack on Titan, The Battle of the Two Cities, which would premiere the following year, or even the high-value commercial works Sora might adapt in the future, turning those properties into games was an essential step in maximizing their influence.

Moreover, adapting anime into games was one of the most profitable areas of the market. Rather than waiting for other companies to buy the rights, resell products, and later pass back only a portion of the profits, it was better for Sora to prepare in advance and build his own production team.

Once a game development company was acquired, its employees would immediately be assigned to begin designing games based on the worlds of Attack on Titan and The Battle of the Two Cities.

The story of Attack on Titan was not short. Sora's plan was to wait until the anime had advanced far enough and until The Battle of the Two Cities had premiered. Only then would two games adapted from those works be released, gradually expanding Yume Animation's influence through anime and its derivative projects.

Episodes 24 and 25 of Attack on Titan aired in mid-September.

The plot of those two episodes revolved mainly around the Survey Corps joining forces with Eren to corner Annie inside the city.

At first, Eren could not transform immediately because he was trapped inside the tunnel. After Annie took on her titan form and caused the underground passage to collapse, he was gravely injured.

But on the verge of death, Eren's hatred for the titans erupted. He transformed into a wild titan and fought Annie in a brutal hand-to-hand battle. With Mikasa's help, he finally destroyed Annie's chance to escape.

At the final moment, Annie used her hardening ability, sealed herself inside a massive crystal, and sank into a deep sleep.

That was the ending of the first season of Attack on Titan.

Although the viewers had thrilled at the spectacle, many of them still felt a lingering dissatisfaction.

They had defeated Annie, but they had not killed her or truly captured her. Because of that, they still did not know why she had been so determined to take Eren away.

And in the final seconds of episode 25, after the battle between Eren and Annie, an extra scene appeared: inside a damaged section of the wall, a titan opened its eyes.

That ending left behind the greatest number of unanswered questions in the entire first season.

Why was there a titan inside the wall that protected humanity?

Considering that titans were immortal, did not age, and possessed an extraordinarily powerful regenerative ability, those beings were probably still alive.

And there was something even more disturbing.

That was the upper section of a wall fifty meters high.

If the problem were limited to just one part of the wall, perhaps it could still be accepted. But what if the entire wall was like that? What if titans were buried throughout its whole length?

These were not ordinary titans.

Each of those beings was comparable to the Colossal Titan. And if they existed in large numbers, that might be enough to destroy all life on earth.

That suggestion, made without any direct explanation, set the Japanese anime community ablaze on the night the first season came to an end.

"Attack on Titan has way too many mysteries. I hope the second season can explain those gaps!"

"The second season is going to exist just to fill plot holes? Are you kidding me? I heard Yume Animation has already started producing the third season."

"How many episodes is this anime even going to have?"

"I don't know. But one thing I do know is that we won't have to wait years between seasons. This anime is definitely going to continue airing from beginning to end, without that pattern of releasing a new season every two or three years. That's what Kantoku Sora said in an interview last month."

"Really? My biggest fear was that Kantoku Sora would do the same thing he did with Re:Zero and wrap everything up all at once. If he really keeps this going until the end, that'll be amazing."

"Is everyone looking forward to the revelations in Attack on Titan? Am I the only one feeling uneasy? The more mysteries the work accumulates, the greater the chance it'll collapse in the later episodes, right?"

"Exactly. If there happened to be only one titan inside the wall, that would be fine. But if the entire wall is filled with Colossal Titans, what purpose do they serve? Destroying the world? But the world, as far as we know, is made up of the people inside the walls. No matter how you look at it, in the end those titans would only destroy the country where the protagonists live."

"No need to guess. If supervisor Sora dared to dig a hole this big, then he must have already figured out how to bury it."

"The first season gave me chills. I never imagined a high-intensity action anime could be this good. Before this, I preferred school romance anime."

"I hope this anime doesn't start strong and then decline. I want the quality of the plot to remain as consistent as it was in the first season. If it ends at this level, Attack on Titan will definitely become a masterpiece in the history of Japanese anime."

"Stop talking about crowning a king already. Kantoku Sora is still young. He's only twenty-three. Who knows? He might create even better works in the future."

"We still have to wait two more weeks until the second season airs. It feels like an eternity!"

"Buy more Attack on Titan merchandise, and read the manga too. There are lots of extra scenes and details. It's genuinely interesting."

"But that stuff is way too expensive!"

"Kantoku Sora said in an interview that product pricing follows industry rules. He can't take away other people's livelihoods or break the market standard. But he also reminded students not to buy expensive merchandise. The most important additional information will be released by Yume Animation on the official website. As for working adults, if you have money to spare, buy plenty of Kantoku Sora's products... Of course, he must already have plenty of money now, but the more capital he has, the greater his motivation will be to keep creating in this industry."

"Before this, Sora's works were popular mainly in Japan, but he already managed to earn more than forty billion yen in five years. That doesn't even include the value of adaptation rights from those works. Now it seems like Attack on Titan is becoming a global phenomenon... I think that in a few years, Kantoku Sora will become a true billionaire."

"A few years? It's already happening right now. Many billionaires with net worths in the trillions of yen got rich through stocks and inflated valuations. They just raise capital by pushing concepts into the market. But if you asked them to produce hundreds of billions of yen in actual cash, how many could do it?"

To celebrate the end of the first season of Attack on Titan, Southern Union TV organized a special variety program. Sora appeared during the final five minutes of the broadcast and answered questions submitted online by fans.

When would the Armored Titan and the Colossal Titan appear again?

Were they the final bosses?

Was Eren's father still alive, or had he already died?

Was the titan inside the wall alive or dead?

Naturally, all of those questions involved spoilers. Because of that, Sora did not give direct answers. He only revealed small pieces of information capable of increasing the audience's anticipation for the second season even further.

The next day, the ratings for episode 25, the final episode of Attack on Titan's first season, were revealed.

6.74%.

Although the increase was not enormous, it was still steady growth.

The animation production company held a celebration banquet as usual and distributed bonuses to its employees.

The success parties held by Yume Animation for its works had already become something many people in the Japanese anime industry watched with envy.

After all, with summer bonuses of several hundred thousand yen per person, who would not feel envious?

More importantly, that per-person figure was not a distorted average where a few people received a lot while most received almost nothing. On the contrary, the amount was generous for practically everyone.

In the end, those bonuses represented only a small fraction of the company's massive profits.

At present, a work at the level of Attack on Titan was not successful only in Japan.

It was also exploding overseas.

Its popularity among foreign anime and manga fans was already approaching its domestic popularity.

Because the first season had surpassed 5.5% ratings in four international markets, the second season of Attack on Titan would begin airing in October during weekend prime time on four partner broadcasters overseas.

In addition, several of those broadcasters launched massive promotional campaigns for the anime.

The reason was simple. For a television station, owning the broadcast rights to Attack on Titan and receiving a large share of the revenue generated by the work was not the most important point.

The heart of a broadcaster was audience share.

Since its premiere, Attack on Titan had gained an overwhelming advantage over the other anime airing in the same time slot, both in Japan and in other countries.

Even without directly counting all the licensing revenue from Attack on Titan, broadcasters could still profit by using the work to pressure competitors and steal their audience.

Thus, after the titans became a phenomenon in Shikoku, across the rest of Japan, and in the main international economic markets, the fever began to spread as well into poorer but densely populated regions.

Every day, an immense amount of emotional value from overseas flowed into Sora's system.

Although the first season of Attack on Titan had come to an end, for that series, this was only the beginning of its true rise.

patreon ImmortalEmperor