Chapter 26: The Nepo Baby

The morning meeting ended, and Kaji Keiko walked out of the conference room holding a manuscript.

Just then, a bald, middle-aged man hurried over and stopped her.

“Kaji, wait a minute!”

Kaji Keiko turned around and asked in confusion, “Editor-in-Chief-san, what are your instructions?”

Ono Tomohiro waved his hand, then pointed to a small meeting room on the side. “Chainsaw Man is one of your works, right? Let’s go over there and talk.”

The Editor-in-Chief mentioning Chainsaw Man immediately energized Kaji Keiko.

In the morning meeting just now, she had shown the original manuscript of Chainsaw Man to all the editors and introduced Sakamoto Ken’s creation speed.

Last week’s reader poll data for new works had also come out, showing a clear and significant lead.

Upon entering the small meeting room, Kaji Keiko noticed the Editor-in-Chief had a worried look on his face.

“Editor-in-Chief?” Kaji Keiko asked, “Is there some trouble?”

Ono Tomohiro sat down in a chair, pondered for a few seconds, and then said, “Just now, listening to your introduction of Chainsaw Man, I was moved by your attitude, betting your career and all… To be honest, in all my years in this industry, I only had such passion when I first started.”

Kaji Keiko bowed slightly to the Editor-in-Chief and said, “Saying that in the morning meeting was actually rash of me…”

“No, you said it well. Actually, I’m also optimistic about Chainsaw Man and want to make it our next flagship new work,” Ono Tomohiro said.

This sounded like good news, but when Kaji Keiko heard the word “actually,” she already realized there would be a “but” following the Editor-in-Chief’s sentence.

Sure enough, Ono Tomohiro continued, “But… the higher-ups have specifically mentioned to me that I should take extra care of another new work.”

“The Miss one?”

“That’s right.” Ono Tomohiro nodded and said, “I don’t know the origin of that author either. I’m afraid she has some connection to the company president…”

“Shueisha’s president?!” Kaji Keiko exclaimed in surprise.

They were the Shonen JUMP editorial department, and Ono Tomohiro was only the Editor-in-Chief of Shonen JUMP.

And Shonen JUMP was just one magazine under Shueisha. Besides it, there were publications like Weekly Young JUMP, Ultra JUMP, the shojo manga Margaret, the entertainment magazine Weekly Playboy, the literary magazine Subaru, and many others.

It was only in the last two years, due to the launch of JUMP+, that there had been some communication between the editorial departments of various manga magazines; otherwise, they were basically independent entities.

If that manga had connections from the president of Shueisha, it was likely that all new works would have to make way for it.

However, Ono Tomohiro sighed lightly and shook his head again.

He said in a very helpless tone, “President Horiuchi is also in a difficult position, because the one who brought this up with us was the president of the Hitotsubashi Group…”

“Hito…tsubashi?”

Kaji Keiko was a bit unfamiliar even saying this name.

As editors of Shonen JUMP, the highest level they could usually reach was the management of Shueisha.

Horiuchi was just the president of Shueisha.

But the Hitotsubashi Group was Shueisha’s parent company!

The president of Shueisha could be named Horiuchi, Yamaji, Taniyama, Chiba… they were just high-level employees.
But the person in charge of the Hitotsubashi Group always had only one surname—Aiga.

Hakusensha, Shogakukan, and Shueisha all belonged to the Hitotsubashi Group.

This was one of the oldest publishing groups in all of Japan.

On par with it were the Otowa Group, centered on Kodansha; the Kadokawa Group, which excelled in light novels; and the heavyweight in the literary world, Shinchosha.

Kaji Keiko had never even met an executive from the parent company level.

“Chainsaw Man can only make way for her…” Kaji Keiko didn’t ask about the author’s background anymore. Perhaps it was just the daughter of a high-level executive’s relative or friend, drawing manga for fun.

Kaji Keiko had heard of similar examples of people from wealthy families creating things out of interest, such as Makoto Shinkai, whose father owned a century-old construction company, and Hayao Miyazaki, whose family ran an aircraft factory…

Although she didn’t know how much of their own careers were related to their family connections, this Sangatsu Haru was definitely trying to take a shortcut using the Hitotsubashi Group’s connections.

Editor-in-Chief Ono’s fingers tapped lightly on the table. He said, “Right now, the support for Chainsaw Man on the JUMP+ platform is very high, and our new work voting results will eventually be announced to the readers. If we insist on letting Miss serialize first, I’m afraid many readers will be dissatisfied.”

“Social media is too hot right now. Perhaps the entire JUMP will be flamed, right? Then sales will be greatly affected, and readers will run to competing magazines…” To make the Editor-in-Chief take it seriously, Kaji Keiko deliberately exaggerated her words.

“Mmm… that’s how the higher-ups are. They just need to look at the business reports periodically, while our editorial department has to consider many things…”

Editor-in-Chief Ono said, “JUMP’s sales are not what they used to be. Especially Kodansha’s two magazines, Weekly Shonen Magazine and Bessatsu Shonen Magazine, their combined sales can already be compared to JUMP. Fairy Tail, Attack on Titan, are all topic-worthy works that are hard to ignore. And now everyone is competing for new authors.”

Kaji Keiko pulled out a chair and sat down. Hearing the last few sentences, she knew the Editor-in-Chief was on her side.

“Then what should we do?” Kaji Keiko asked.

Ono Tomohiro said, “I’ve already scheduled a meeting with Sangatsu Haru-sensei this afternoon. I’ll ask about her creation situation then. I’ll use the reason that the intensity of magazine serialization is particularly high to let her continue to accumulate more manuscripts before publishing. This way, we can stagger the publication times.”

“Good idea…” Kaji Keiko nodded and said, “On Sakamoto-sensei’s side, there’s no need to worry about the creation speed at all. He can draw three chapters a week and has already completed the manuscripts for the first seven chapters, and the quality hasn’t dropped at all.”

“That’s what I value about him,” Ono Tomohiro said. “An author who can guarantee both quality and quantity is too rare. You know, it’s actually the norm for authors like Togashi-old-geezer… ahem, like Togashi-sensei to always delay their manuscripts.”

“Coincidentally, I also have a meeting scheduled with Sakamoto-sensei this afternoon. I’ll get a detailed understanding of his creation plan then, and I also need to discuss the color pages with him,” Kaji Keiko said.

“Regardless of the outcome on Sangatsu Haru-sensei’s side, the color pages and posters for Chainsaw Man can start being prepared. They’ll be used eventually,” Ono Tomohiro thought for a moment and added, “Also, have him plan out some famous scenes and famous lines. Streaming video promotion has become popular recently. If the popularity is high enough in the next few weeks, we can also produce a motion comic for promotion.”

“Yes, I’ll discuss it thoroughly with Sakamoto-sensei,” Kaji Keiko replied.

Ono Tomohiro stood up and walked out of the meeting room in a hurry.

As the Editor-in-Chief of the JUMP editorial department, he had too many things to be responsible for.

For example, when a big-name author delayed their manuscript and the editor couldn’t push them, he had to step in.

There were also some old authors whose old works had ended long ago. He had to go and greet them regularly to prevent them from jumping ship to other companies.

Or, for various collaborations and activities of the company’s big IPs, he had to negotiate with the investors.

And now there was a nepo baby…

What a headache.

(End of Chapter)