When the numbers were released, the Japanese anime industry was thrown into an uproar.
For years, the four major television stations in the capital had always locked down the top four spots in seasonal anime premiere ratings. It had become such a familiar pattern that most people no longer questioned it.
And yet this time, that order had been shaken.
Two of those stations had actually lost their seasonal opening ratings to a broadcaster from the Southern Alliance.
For the television industry, that was no minor matter. Especially not now, when the Southern Alliance stations were standing at such a critical point in their own rise. The timing alone was enough to make the entire industry stir.
The new work from genius director Sora Kamakawa had opened with dazzling results. At only eighteen, he had created just three anime so far, and all three had become massive hits.
Re:Zero had premiered to overwhelming praise and, for the moment, sat on the throne as the highest-rated anime launch of the season. But that very night, The Man in the Mirror and Dragon's Flame Breath were also set to air, and no one could say for sure where the number one position for the first week of July would ultimately land.
The media wasted no time fanning the flames.
Some framed it as another chapter in the bitter history between the prodigy director and Seiun TV, even suggesting that refusing to work with the network might have been the best decision Sora Kamakawa had made all year.
Others pushed the rivalry angle even harder, placing Sora and Touga Kuze at the center of the season's biggest showdown. One had dominated the industry last year, the other the year before. Naturally, people wanted to know what kind of ending this clash would bring.
Of course, there were skeptics too.
No matter how good Re:Zero looked, some were already declaring that Dragon's Flame Breath would crush it across every major metric.
That was normal.
Sora paid some attention to those discussions from time to time. After all, many anime fans were easily swayed by public opinion, and media narratives often had more influence than they should. Still, as long as people were not forcing malicious slander onto his name, he could not be bothered to take it too seriously.
At eight that night, Sora sat on the sofa in the villa he had rented in Tokushima, the television in the living room tuned to Seiun TV.
He did not care much for luxury, but he was hardly some self-denying ascetic either.
Natsume Yuujinchou had earned more than fifty million yen, so setting aside a small portion of that to improve his living conditions felt perfectly natural.
In the spacious living room, the first episode of Dragon's Flame Breath began right on time.
The instant the visuals appeared on screen, a look of pure admiration rose in Sora's eyes.
The backgrounds. The art style.
It was beautiful.
To Sora, animation had always been art.
But this kind of art needed money to burn before its texture could truly come alive. Low-budget productions always carried a stiffness that was impossible to ignore. In his previous life, every time he watched those hand-drawn animated films backed by enormous budgets, he could not help but feel moved.
The charm of hand-drawn animation was something 3D could never fully replicate.
And in Dragon's Flame Breath, Sora could faintly sense that same artistic presence born from the collision between lavish spending and an exceptionally capable director.
It took only a single shot to capture his heart.
When the twenty-minute episode finally ended, the ending song began to play.
It was stirring, bright, almost powerful enough to pour strength directly into the viewer's chest.
Sora's eyes grew slightly damp.
To be honest, he had been genuinely moved by the first episode of Dragon's Flame Breath.
Though it was also an isekai adventure series, it had still managed to create something fresh in its opening episode. Even judging it with the eyes of someone who had lived two lives, Sora had to admit that the first episode was extraordinarily well done.
"As expected... the level of Japan's anime industry really is incredibly high."
He thought back to Touga Kuze and Natsuyuki Shirasawa, the pair he had seen at the music festival in Tokyo the year before.
"The chemistry between those two is real. Compared to when she worked with Maki, this is on an entirely different level."
Shaking his head, he muttered the words to himself.
At that moment, his phone rang.
It was Sumire.
"Sora, did you watch Dragon's Flame Breath?"
"I did."
"What do you think?"
"Do you really need to ask?" Sora said with a laugh. "The first episode is obviously going to dominate the summer season in ratings."
Then, still smiling, he added,
"It was way more interesting than the first episode of Re:Zero produced by our company."
There was silence on the other end for a few seconds.
When Sumire finally spoke again, there was a trace of unwillingness in her tone.
"Then what about the goal you mentioned before? Taking first place this season?"
"That hasn't changed."
Holding the remote in one hand, Sora switched the channel to the station where The Man in the Mirror was about to begin, and answered with an easy smile.
"It's only the first episode. There's no need to rush."
Then a joke from his previous life surfaced in his mind, and he put it to use without hesitation.
"Re:Zero is the kind of series that builds slowly. It needs a little time to ferment. Let the bullet fly for a while."
After hanging up, another call came in almost immediately.
This time, it was Yumi Noriko.
The pressure in her voice was impossible to miss.
"What do we do, Sora? I watched Dragon's Flame Breath, and honestly, if I weren't your top collaborator, I'd be making a short video tonight praising that first episode to the skies."
"It really is a good anime," Sora said after a brief pause. "You're an anime content creator. If you want to make an objective video praising it, that would only be fair."
"How is that possible? Wouldn't that be helping the enemy?" Yumi Noriko shot back through clenched teeth.
"Two months ago, I said on my account that Re:Zero would kick Dragon's Flame Breath aside, punch down The Man in the Mirror, trample Detective's Night, crush Natsuoto, and take first place in the season. If I go praise Dragon's Flame Breath now, where am I supposed to put my pride?"
"You have that much faith in Re:Zero?" Sora asked in surprise.
"I have faith in you," Yumi Noriko said flatly, as though that should have been obvious.
"And what exactly are you asking me?" he said.
"I just want to know if you really have confidence in what comes later. In the story, in the production quality, in the overall strength of Re:Zero. Do you think it can overtake Dragon's Flame Breath later on? My comment section has already been overrun by Natsuyuki Shirasawa's fans. Swallowing my anger isn't my style. Even if we're behind right now, I still want to throw out a few harsh words and get some ground back. So I came to borrow a little confidence from you."
Sora thought back over Re:Zero as a whole.
Its story. Its emotional impact. The weight it had once carried for him in another life.
Those memories, those feelings, slowly resurfaced in his heart.
Then he smiled and answered in a light tone.
"It can."
In his previous life, Sora had never found a traditional fantasy isekai series he personally thought was better than Re:Zero.
And in this life, in Japan, he still did not believe that the pairing of Touga Kuze and Natsuyuki Shirasawa could reach that same height.
"I understand," Yumi Noriko said. "I believe you."
She hung up, and that very night she posted a long essay of over a thousand words, mocking the fans of Dragon's Flame Breath for celebrating too early. Both anime were two-cour series. The real winner, she wrote, would not be decided until December.
The next day, the premiere ratings for The Man in the Mirror and Dragon's Flame Breath were finally released.
The Man in the Mirror, episode one:
4.38.
Dragon's Flame Breath, episode one:
4.97.
Just as Sora had expected, the quality of the first episode of Dragon's Flame Breath had simply been too high. Its ratings were far ahead of every other anime airing in the same period.
Still, that 4.97 made his gaze sharpen slightly.
Just a little more, and it would have broken five.
On NatsuYume, the seasonal opening scores were also published.
Naturally, first place belonged to Dragon's Flame Breath, with a premiere score of 9.2.
Behind it, from second through fifth, were Re:Zero with 9.0, The Man in the Mirror with 8.9, Detective's Night with 8.7, and Natsuoto with 8.6.
A 9.2.
Inside the office of an animation company in Tokyo, Touga Kuze looked at Dragon's Flame Breath's opening score in silence.
It was the highest premiere score for a TV anime first episode in Japan that year.
And yet, even so, it still had not surpassed the opening score of Natsume Yuujinchou's first episode from the previous year under Sora Kamakawa.
In the end, a faint smile appeared at the corner of his lips.
"Forget that young director. Don't let your competitive streak run wild all the time. At least this season, he's lost to you across the board."
With Re:Zero's opening rating sitting around 4.27, there was basically no chance left for it to challenge the five-percent average mark later on.
Compared to Dragon's Flame Breath, the two anime no longer seemed to exist on the same level.
At that point, Touga Kuze no longer felt any need to keep watching Sora Kamakawa or Re:Zero at all.
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