Chapter 1444: Come on out, Naruto!

Translator: Legge  Editor: Legge

One Piece continued its explosive breakout.

The comic.

The cartoon.

The merchandise.

They were so popular it was terrifying!

Zhang Ye’s plan to break into the enemy ranks was proceeding smoothly and quietly. But perhaps because it was too quiet, the people and media at home could not get used to it.

…

On Weibo.

“Has Teacher Zhang really gone on break?”

“Yeah, there’s really no activities from him this time.”

“I’m so not used to it.”

“Lord Zhang, come out and show your face!”

“Face-smacking Zhang has not been smacking faces for so many days, and it’s leaving me with no gossip to read about.”

“There might always be major incidents happening in the entertainment industry, but when compared to having Zhang Ye around, all of that is no big deal.”

“Isn’t Teacher Zhang trying to reach the status of Asian S-lister? Is it really OK to rest for so many days? His Asian popularity hasn’t dropped yet, but it’s also not moved for some time as well, isn’t that so? At this rate, his goal of reaching the summit of Asia will get further and further away. At the very least, he can’t do it within this year.”

“I don’t think that Zhang Ye will ascend to the summit of Asia. Although I like him a lot, compared to those celebrities who’re already at the top of Asia, Teacher Zhang is still too eccentric. He can’t possibly be thinking of reaching the top with scolding, can he? It might sound interesting, but there’s no way he can deliver on that. On the Asian Celebrity Rankings, the higher you go, the more difficult it becomes. It’s already a miracle that he advanced to this point with his fighting. Right now, Lord Zhang has got a terrible, terrible reputation in Asia. Although his way of earning popularity was very effective in the past, that is such a fucking self-damaging strategy to execute!”

“I feel that Lord Zhang is already at his limit.”

“Zhang Ye, stop cooking. Hurry up and make your comeback!”

“Do you still wish to get to the top of Asia? Come back already!”

The people were discussing.

The experts joined in.

This topic was discussed with great relish by everyone.

In the Asian S-list rankings, there were a total of fifteen spots.

Five Chinese celebrities were on it, while Japan had one representative. The other nine spots were taken by Korean celebrities.

This was the ceiling of the Asian entertainment industry. Those who could reach the top were people with the best reputations, with influential works, and had a large and wide-spanning fanbase. Historically, these three factors were indispensable when one was making an attempt at the top, but what about Zhang Ye? He wasn’t too bad in China, but be it his reputation, his works, or his fans in the Asian region, none of them were good enough. He could not account for any of these three factors, and you could even say that he had nothing on it at all!

If he could still reach the top this way?

Then how many people would vomit blood over it!

But for some reason, despite knowing that it was unrealistic and impossible, many Chinese citizens still felt a hint of unexplainable anticipation deep in their hearts. They truly hoped that Zhang Ye would surprise everyone. Perhaps, this was because everyone just wanted to have something to look forward to, especially when it didn’t affect them at all!

The media was also joined in the buzz.

“When will Zhang Ye return?”

“Chinese citizens looking forward to Zhang Ye’s return!”

“Asian S-list rankings this year may not see any changes!”

“Who will be the next Chinese celebrity to ascend to the top of Asia as a Heavenly King (Heavenly Queen)?”

…

Later that afternoon.

At home.

Old Wu went to take a nap.

Zhang Ye was in the study holding a video conference call with his studio’s staff.

At the other end of the call, Ha Qiqi said: “Director Zhang, we’ve received the money. It’s the payment from the comic series, animation, and merchandise of figurines and illustrations. I didn’t dare to give them our bank details in case they find out who we are, so we routed the payment through Little Sun’s elder sister and another person’s bank accounts before we transferred the money back to China.”

Zhang Ye laughed and said: “Is it a lot of money?”

Ha Qiqi said happily: “Now that you mention it, it’s quite a bit.”

Zhang Zuo joked: “It’s time to hand out bonuses, Director Zhang.”

“That’s of course,” Zhang Ye approved.

Little Wang suddenly asked: “Director Zhang, have you gone online yet? There’s a lot of talk today about whether you stand a chance of reaching the summit of Asia. A lot of people are not optimistic about your chances.”

Little Zhou giggled and said: “That’s because they don’t know how amazing Director Zhang is. Who would’ve thought that during this time while Director Zhang is on a break from work, he has actually taken hold of Japan silently.”

Zhang Ye smiled and said: “What do you mean by silently? This is called attacking when they least expect it.”

Ha Qiqi thought about it and said: “The problem right now is that they don’t know that One Piece was drawn by you. We had a glance earlier and saw that our Asian popularity is no longer growing. It’s stuck in the middle of the Asian A-list rankings. Now that One Piece is on fire, don’t you think that it’s time we make the announcement? Shouldn’t we quickly redirect this wave of popularity back to us? It’s accumulated by quite a bit.”

Zhang Zuo said: “But the restriction orders have not been lifted yet.”

Ha Qiqi said helplessly: “That’s true.”

Zhang Zuo said: “With the restriction order still in place, if we were to announce that the comic was drawn by Director Zhang, who knows what actions the Japanese authorities would take against us? They might just halt our comic series indefinitely.”

Everyone expressed their views.

There were those who agreed with announcing it.

While others objected to that course of action.

Zhang Ye did not participate at all. When they finished talking, he laughed. “It’s not the right time to announce it. We aren’t even close to doing that.”

Everyone was stunned. “What do you mean?”

Zhang Ye smiled. “This is just the beginning.”

Nobody understood. “Just the beginning?”

After the video conference ended, Zhang Ye sat in the study room and sipped on his tea. Everyone at the studio thought that having One Piece become popular throughout Asia was the ultimate goal. But in reality, no one knew that this was only the first step of Zhang Ye’s plan!

How much popularity could a comic get him?

Enough to advance two places on the Asian A-list? Three places?

That wasn’t minor at all, but it was still far from enough!

His goal was to reach the top of Asia, one of the 15 spots at the summit of Asia. Causing such a small stir was obviously not enough to satisfy him. Furthermore, with the restriction order still in place, if they were to announce the truth at this time, he might be able to gain a huge increase in his popularity, but there would be nothing left for him to achieve after that!

He had to do something greater!

Something that would astonish and shake the world!

One Piece was on the right track, and many chapters were stockpiled. He didn’t have to worry about any other things. So then, he could now move on to the second step of the plan.

Through his observations and understanding in recent days, Zhang Ye had become much more familiar with the Japanese comics industry. He also read many of their classic works and discovered many things through them. Actually, the One Piece in his previous world was not a comic that took off as soon as it appeared and became super popular everywhere. It only slowly became popular as it went on, and Zhang Ye was quite sure that he didn’t remember this detail wrong. However, in this world, One Piece had garnered a shocking amount of praise and enthusiasm right off the bat. It was only after he gained an understanding of the industry here that he discovered that this world had much worse comics and cartoons. It wasn’t that there weren’t enough comics, but rather, there weren’t enough quality works to speak of. To find a publicly acknowledged national cartoon, one had to go back to six years ago to identify it. So as long as you could come up with a quality work in this market that was hungry for a successful series to appear, there was practically no need for any reputation buildup. It would immediately stand out from the rest of the series.

What a time!

What a market!

If he didn’t try to pull off a big one here, how could he forgive himself?

One Piece’s popularity was guaranteed, and it wouldn’t fade easily. In fact, it would grow even further, so he could cash in on the popularity from it at any time. What Zhang Ye needed to do now was to release as many comics as possible to round up as much of the popularity that he could muster from them. He needed to cause the biggest wave that he could before collecting all of the popularity at once!

What sort of a concept was that?

What kind of a situation would it be like?

Just thinking about it, Zhang Ye was almost unable to get ahold of himself!

As for what would happen at that time, Zhang Ye did not care about it. This fellow was still thinking that the commotion would not be loud enough. How the situation would be wrapped up at that time was none of his concern!

What should he draw?

Which comic series should he bring out this time?

Zhang Ye naturally did not bother with the average comic series that he knew about. He only wanted something that was among the most popular ones.

In the drawing studio.

Zhang Ye circled around the room with his hands behind him.

Five minutes.

Ten minutes.

Alright, I choose you!

Suddenly, with an idea in mind, he went over to the computer and sat down. Then he took a deep breath and narrowed his eyes before picking up the stylus and slowing drawing onscreen.

Come on out!

Naruto!

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