The sixth episode of Attack on Titan aired the following week.

There was no reversal. No comrade cut Eren out of a Titan's stomach. No prosthetic limb scenario. An entire episode passed without a rescue. He had most likely been digested.

The suspense that had been keeping many viewers in a holding pattern finally broke.

Most of the sixth episode focused on Mikasa, her quiet feelings for Eren, and her despair upon hearing the news. The audience's mood sank alongside hers.

Strangely, despite the volume of negative commentary and anti-fan activity online, the viewership ratings were slowly rising.

The protagonist was likely dead. The world-building was genuinely compelling. Nobody understood why Shirogane-sensei had structured the plot this way in episode five, but the author was Shirogane-sensei.

Was there something coming that nobody had anticipated? Even if the protagonist role shifted, did he have the ability to keep pushing the story forward and make it more engaging under these conditions?

"I have a degree of blind faith in Shirogane-sensei that I cannot entirely justify. If any other author had done this I would have dropped it the same night. With Shirogane-sensei I somehow still have confidence."

"Same. The anti-fans have been suppressed for seven or eight years and slapped in the face repeatedly and they still come out every time. Anyway, I do not believe Eren is actually dead. I cannot explain how someone with severed limbs who was swallowed survives, but I do not believe he is dead."

"Chekhov's Gun. If something is not going to be used it should not appear. Shirogane-sensei knows this better than any of us. How many flags did he set for Eren across the first four episodes? He spent that much time on his childhood, his growth in the Cadet Corps, his friendships. Eren just dies like that? Only a fool believes it."

"Am I the only one who thinks Eren really is dead? Is Shirogane-sensei planning to shift the protagonist role to Armin and have Mikasa transfer her feelings accordingly?"

"This is a battle anime, not a different genre entirely. Even if Armin becomes the lead, that is not a direction this series is going."

"The situation in Attack on Titan is genuinely chaotic. The second wall has been breached, the city is in crisis, Eren was eaten, and Armin has lost his ability to function from shock.

If Shirogane-sensei really intends the main trio to spend the next arc running away to the third wall with no ability to turn the tide, this work is finished. A protagonist who only runs is not someone I want to follow regardless of whether he survived."

The early stage of Attack on Titan was full of controversy, exactly as it had been during its original serialisation in Rei's previous life. Setting aside everything after the Marley arc, before that point the work was undeniably high quality, but its reputation had only genuinely gained momentum in the middle stages.

The very early sections were defined by a sustained atmosphere of despair and a protagonist with limited presence.

The current ratings and discussion heat were products of the production quality the budget had produced and the fact that the author was Shirogane-sensei. Nothing else.

Mid-May arrived.

Rei and Miyu both passed their graduation defences without difficulty. The remaining time at university was essentially free.

Classmates were securing employment, returning home to get married, entering family businesses, or sitting examinations for graduate school and civil service. Rei was preparing for the graduation trip.

In seven years in this world he had devoted everything to anime creation. In all that time in Tokyo he had not visited the surrounding areas even once for pleasure. The only times he had left the city were for promotional schedules with no rest built in.

"Finally. A gap to actually enjoy myself."

He walked through the sunny campus holding Miyu's hand. Alumni they passed pointed and whispered, recognising him clearly. Miyu was still slightly uncomfortable with this, adjusting her hair and clothes periodically. Rei's expression stayed level. Two prominent mangakas dating could not expect the same anonymity as ordinary people. They would adjust to it.

"Are you really not worried about Attack on Titan's reputation?"

The warmth of his hand was making her flustered. She found a topic to prevent the atmosphere from becoming stranger.

"It was the same when Demon Slayer first aired. A cluster of media outlets were pessimistic about it. You know the final result," Rei said.

Miyu was quiet for a moment.

"Does the current anime world feel a bit boring to you."

"You cannot even find an opponent."

Rei was briefly surprised by this.

Opponent. Strictly speaking, the works he had produced over the past two years had no rivals in Japan, and even during their original serialisation in his previous life they had been difficult to match at their peaks. Each work had its own peak period. He had never felt that any native creative talent in this world could genuinely compete with him.

This was not contempt for his peers. It was understanding a simpler truth.

"Humans have limits. Something that could actually be my opponent probably should not be called human."

He said it half-jokingly and put his arm around her shoulder.

Miyu and Rei stood by the artificial lake on campus, looking at the water catching the light. Her head rested lightly against his shoulder.

"Time has passed so quickly. Seven years in a moment. From being unknown in Japan's manga world to where we are now, and we have even ended up together."

"We are twenty-two. Save those reflections for when you are seventy," Rei said.

"What will you be doing at seventy?"

He thought about Hayao Miyazaki, still on the front lines of creation at eighty in his previous life.

"Probably still making anime."

Rei smiled.

This was the first time the two of them had agreed to simply walk around campus together. They both knew the next time they came back would be to collect their graduation certificates, and both felt a trace of melancholy about it.

Over the following days they went sightseeing around Tokyo, occasionally recognised by fans they happened to encounter.

In Japan's anime market, Attack on Titan continued to dominate discussion among all works of the same period.

After the seventh episode aired, the work received a flood of positive reviews.

The episode centred on Mikasa. With Eren gone, the light had left her eyes. Beneath her calm expression there was no longer any fear of the Titans or attachment to survival.

She fought with a combat capability that seemed unreasonable. The fifteen-metre basic Titans that had driven Eren into a corner were nothing under her blades. The animation team's production displayed this fully.

At the end of the episode, with her ODM Gear out of gas and Titans closing in, she faced death calmly, and then instinctively resisted anyway. Because as long as she was alive she could still feel the sadness of remembering Eren. If she died, she would not even remember who he was.

An Abnormal Titan that appeared and began fighting the other Titans attacking Mikasa's position closed the episode.

"So Eren's death existed to bring about Mikasa's awakening."

"It would not be bad to make Mikasa the protagonist."

"Mikasa is the protagonist I always wanted."

"If Shirogane-sensei's goal in depicting Eren's death was to build Mikasa's character, I can accept it. Watching this episode late at night got my blood pumping."

"Blood pumping? Mikasa was killing Titans in grief, avenging Eren. How is that hot-blooded."

"It just is. The framing, the look in her eyes."

"Lord Mikasa."

"Has everyone really accepted Mikasa as the new protagonist this easily."

"Plenty of viewers have not accepted it. It does not matter. As long as the subsequent plot holds up, those who refuse now will come around later. There is only one Shirogane-sensei in Japan. If you drop Attack on Titan you will not find another work of this quality to replace it."

"Mikasa should have been the protagonist from the beginning. Eren was fine in every way except being too weak. A protagonist cannot be weak."

The reputation of Attack on Titan shifted every week. The anti-fans were active for two weeks, then by late May their space had been compressed almost to nothing.

The real decisive moment came in the eighth episode at the end of May.

From the mother's death in episode one, the flight to the inner city in episode two, the Cadet Corps training in episodes three and four, to being swallowed in episode five: Eren had not had a single praiseworthy moment across the entire run.

Courage without ability was recklessness. Oaths that could not be kept were empty words. His reputation had suffered precisely because of this.

The eighth episode showed the Abnormal Titan from episode seven fighting desperately against the Titans surrounding the building where Mikasa, Armin, and the others were trapped. Fans had begun to wonder whether this was a convenient plot device. Why would a strange Abnormal Titan appear at exactly the moment Mikasa was in danger? Why would it fight its own kind? Was this not too coincidental?

Then the end of the episode revealed the greatest single piece of worldbuilding in Attack on Titan.

The Abnormal Titan defeated every opponent, stood in the street, and collapsed exhausted. Its flesh vaporised and evaporated.

What remained was a youth.

Unconscious. Limbs fully intact.

Eren.

Dead from episode five to episode eight. Now back. And his severed limbs had regrown.

Japan's anime audience sat in stunned silence.

Then the reaction arrived.

"Why did the Colossal Titan and Armored Titan appear in episode one with apparent intelligence and kick through Wall Maria deliberately? Why did the Colossal Titan vaporise and disappear in episode four? They are the same as Eren. They are transformed humans."

"Humans can transform into Titans? This is the setting of this anime?"

"Shirogane-sensei held this back until episode eight. What are you doing."

"Something is wrong. Why can only Eren transform into a Titan after being eaten? Were all the others who got eaten simply eaten?"

"Is there something special about Eren specifically?"

"I spent a month trying to imagine how the foreshadowing for Eren's survival could possibly be laid. I could not picture it. The ability to transform into a Titan, to manifest a body of that mass, and to have severed limbs regenerate in the process: it is completely logical once you see it."

"But now there are more holes to fill. Humans transforming into Titans. The world-building of this work keeps expanding."

"Shirogane-sensei is genuinely Shirogane-sensei. The anti-fans are not sleeping tonight."

Looking back at Attack on Titan's performance across May, it had the structure of a baited hook. Eren's death in episode five drew out the anti-fans. Eren's return as a Titan in episode eight made them a complete laughingstock.

Many Japanese media outlets had followed the negative trend across the previous month. After episode eight aired and the plot explained how Eren had survived, those same outlets were mocked extensively by Rei's fans. Several news agency official accounts enabled comment restrictions because they could not manage the volume.

The eighth episode's viewership was 6.68 percent. But the overnight reversal of Attack on Titan's reputation gave many in Japan's anime world a familiar feeling.

Demon Slayer last year. Also spring. When episode nineteen, Hinokami, aired in early May, every anime discussion thread on the internet had been about the same thing.

This year, after Attack on Titan episode eight aired at the end of May, every anime forum was discussing the same work. It had not reached the scale of last year's Hinokami moment, but the feeling was close enough that the anti-fans in Japan's anime world sensed something was wrong.

Was last year's miracle repeating itself?

Had Shirogane-sensei simply been playing with everyone in the early stages? Baiting the hook, drawing out the criticism, and then laying his cards down?

The seemingly dead-end plot of a protagonist killed in episode five had been reversed in episode eight. And it was not a careless reversal. It had done two things simultaneously: revealed the core worldbuilding of the work and provided the first clear look at the nature of the two intelligent Titans from episode one, while also bringing Eren back as a protagonist in the true sense.

Nobody wanted a powerless protagonist.

A protagonist who could transform into a Titan. The setting was immediately compelling in a way that nothing in the early episodes had been.

The audience who would respond to Eren transforming into a Titan was essentially the same audience that had grown up with Ultraman and Kamen Rider.

A different expression of the same fundamental theme, one that had been popular for decades in Rei's previous life. In Japan, no equivalent works existed, but the acceptance level among anime fans was clearly high.

The reputation of Attack on Titan across news media and fan communities reversed quickly.

"All right. The genuinely controversial period of Attack on Titan's plot ends here," Rei said, and closed his laptop.