A new enemy makes their debut, demonstrating a powerful and oppressive presence during the battle, and at the end, the Servant's true name is also revealed.
In particular, the appearance of the new Servant, Heracles, has sparked quite a heated discussion.
In fact, in many past works, there have been quite a few characters named "Heracles."
However, most works only borrow the name and some settings of Heracles, having no connection to the Heracles of greek mythology.
But this time, the situation with "Fate/stay night" is different.
In the manga's setting, Servants are heroes from the past, and Illya has already confessed that Berserker is the Heracles of greek mythology!
greek mythology is undoubtedly the most well-known mythology worldwide, and Heracles is the most famous hero in greek mythology, possessing extremely high popularity himself.
To the extent that in this week's online topics, discussions centered around Heracles took up the majority, while the cute Illya ended up being relegated to the second tier.
Of course, after all, Illya is an original character with no prior popularity base, and she's a villain with not much character development yet; it's normal for her popularity to be lower than Uncle B's for now.
Moreover, in his previous life, Illya was a popular character capable of carrying her own series, so Akira wasn't worried about her future popularity.
In short, with the support of these many factors, the fact that this week's shōsei results reached the top wasn't a particularly big surprise for him.
Additionally, the second and third places this week were "hikaru no go" and "One Piece," respectively.
Meanwhile, "The Prince of Tennis" is still hovering in the middle, but its performance seems to be gradually stabilizing.
On the other hand, "zombie powder"'s ranking dropped to 15th this week, looking indeed precarious.
However, besides the ranking, what caught his attention more this time was that Hisashi's attitude toward him today seemed a bit different again, as if things had returned to how they were at the very beginning.
Not like being strangers, but close and inseparable as they were at the start.
So, he tentatively said, "Speaking of which, Mr. Sasaki seems to be in a very good mood today."
Hisashi smiled and asked back, "Of course, shouldn't I be happy when the work I'm in charge of gets first place in shōsei?"
"Uh, that's true. But I mean, that—"
"I know."
Hearing Akira's cautious voice on the other end of the phone, Hisashi was both annoyed and amused, then sighed and said, "Your music group 『Tsukirin』 appeared on a variety show a few days ago, right?"
"I've seen it; the song 'Marigold' is indeed beautiful, and the girl you're partnered with is also excellent. Her name is Rin, right? Her performance was great."
Akira was a bit surprised to hear this, not expecting the other party to watch that show, let alone see Rin's performance.
Regarding Hisashi's praise, he responded somewhat uncertainly, "Um, thank you for the compliment?"
"You're welcome."
Hisashi continued, "Anyway, as long as it doesn't interfere with the manga serialization, you can handle things in other fields yourself."
This was what Kazuhiko had said to him before, telling him not to act rashly against Akira for the time being.
But now that he was saying it to Akira, it carried another meaning.
Akira also immediately grasped the underlying meaning of Hisashi's words, blinked his eyes in surprise, and then smiled, "Yes, I understand!"
"But there will still be many things I'll need to trouble you with in the future, please look after me!"
It would be great if you really could trouble me more.
Hisashi smiled bitterly in his heart, but then added:
Of course, limited to manga-related matters; it's better to trouble him less with other things.
Besides that, Hisashi thought for a moment and reminded Akira, "Also, it's best not to be too high-profile. Staying behind the scenes like 『Tsukirin』 is very good."
"Otherwise, some people might criticize you for 'neglecting your proper business,' and even the Shonen Jump side might want to have a talk with you."
"In that case, things might get a bit troublesome."
Actually, the current Akira wasn't too afraid of being criticized for neglecting his proper business because he had achieved quite brilliant results in both fields, so he could be described as multi-talented and flourishing on both sides, and might even receive more attention and wonder.
But if one side didn't do well later, the criticism of "neglecting proper business" would be fatal.
So it's best to keep a low profile; as long as he's not under public attention and scrutiny, no major problems will arise then.
Of course, if Akira really could gain a firm foothold in both fields, that would be a completely different situation.
"I understand."
Knowing that Hisashi was indeed thinking of his best interests, Akira nodded seriously.
Then, he couldn't help but ask, "But, you just said the Shonen Jump Editorial Department side also—"
"Is it really okay to say such things?"
As a Shonen Jump editor, the other party was instead telling him to be careful of Shonen Jump; this was equivalent to being completely on his side.
To this, Hisashi smiled frankly, "Isn't that what the 'deep cooperation between editor and author' promoted by Shonen Jump is all about?"
"Moreover, 'as long as the manga is interesting, it's fine' is the motto of our current Editor-in-Chief."
"As long as you can continue to produce interesting manga content, there won't be any problem with my choice."
"So for any problems in the meantime, I will find a way to solve them."
That's right, between the editorial department and Akira, he ultimately chose Akira.
He was gambling, gambling on Akira's talent and ability, gambling that Akira's future achievements would be worth his efforts to protect him now, even if it meant potentially standing in opposition to the editorial department.
And he believed the odds of winning were high.
Having spent so much time with Akira, no one knew better than him how terrifying the other's talent and ability were!
And even if he lost the bet, his ultimate end would at most be no hope for promotion, only being able to be a staff member for a lifetime.
But if he won the bet, he would gain Akira's friendship and trust!
Just like Toriyama Akira and Kazuhiko back then.
Honestly, which editor wouldn't want to become the Editor-in-Chief?
And Akira was his greatest hope for whether he could become the Editor-in-Chief in the future.
On the other side, after confirming Hisashi's intentions, Akira took a deep breath and nodded heavily, "I understand."
Regardless, since the other party decided to support him fully, he naturally had to repay that trust.
"Please rest assured, 'Fate/stay night' and I will definitely not let you down!"
"Yeah, I believe you."
Hisashi responded with a smile, but then he thought of something and said helplessly, "Also, if you have any other big moves later, I hope you can notify me in advance so I can be mentally prepared."
"Well—"
Hearing this, Akira scratched his head a bit awkwardly.
Then he thought about it carefully; there shouldn't be any other moves lately.
So he nodded vowed, "No problem."
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