Chapter 109: The Nohara Family Returns To Lay Out Plans! Hiroshi Nohara Is Also Laying Out Plans!
At the end of July, Tokyo’s summer heat was like an invisible giant beast, swallowing the entire city into its belly, even making the asphalt roads seem slightly softened from the baking.
Four or five days had passed since the Nohara family’s sudden “Tokyo Adventure,” and that noisy warmth belonging to the family, like waves receding from the tide, quietly faded away, leaving only circles of warm ripples in Hiroshi Nohara’s heart.
In front of that icy cold ATM machine, Hiroshi Nohara wore a duckbill cap pulled very low and a pair of sunglasses, slowly entering a string of numbers on that small electronic screen, long enough to suffocate any salaried worker.
Twenty million yen.
This huge sum, enough to buy several hectares of good farmland in Omagari City, Akita Prefecture, was thus transferred into Elder Brother Hiroshi Nohara’s account by him as if it were nothing.
The convenience of the mobile phone was fully demonstrated at this moment. Almost the next second after the transfer was completed, the brand-new Panasonic P100 vibrated.
The screen displayed “Brother Hiroshi.”
“Hey, Hiroshi? The money… I got the money!” From the other end of the telephone, came Elder Brother Hiroshi Nohara’s voice filled with shock, even somewhat stammering: “You… you kid, you’re too extravagant! So much money, what if… what if it loses?”
“It won’t lose.” Hiroshi Nohara’s voice was calm, carrying a power that could steady the heart: “Elder Brother, you just need to remember, now we’re using the bank’s money to make our own money. This is merchant thinking; you have to learn it slowly.”
There was a moment of silence on the other end of the telephone, followed by Hiroshi Nohara’s helpless bitter laugh: “Merchant… I’m just a farmer. But you know, those guys at the Agricultural Cooperative have been looking at me differently lately. Yesterday at the meeting, they even held me up as a ‘return-to-hometown entrepreneurship model,’ praising me in front of the whole village. Saying I’m a model farmer who ‘doesn’t forget his roots’ and ‘takes responsibility.’ I was so embarrassed, but isn’t this all your credit?”
“Then keep being this ‘model.'” Hiroshi Nohara chuckled lightly: “How’s the land purchase going?”
“Very fast! Lots of young people in the village are running to the city now, leaving their land fallow. As soon as they heard someone wants to buy, they all scrambled to sell to me. Prices are cheap too. The government side heard it’s to set up a stock company, so the procedures are all green lights. They even said they could approve a low-interest loan for me; I… I didn’t dare take it.”
“Take it! Why not?” Hiroshi Nohara’s tone was beyond question: “Remember, Elder Brother, using other people’s money to make money is the smartest business. The loan interest is negligible compared to our future revenue.”
After hanging up, Hiroshi Nohara looked at the still astonishingly long string of account balance on the ATM screen, his mouth curving up even more.
《World of the Strange》 and 《An Shizhi·True Season 3》’s advertisement revenue share, like two never-ending golden rivers, were continuously flowing into his wealth territory.
He roughly estimated that once 《Super Change Change Change》 officially aired, just the naming rights and various product placement revenue would easily push his monthly income past the five million yen mark.
Five million yen.
In this era, equivalent to being able to easily buy a brand-new mid-range Toyota sedan every month.
Converted to future purchasing power, it would be enough for any urban white-collar to achieve financial freedom.
But this was far from enough.
Hiroshi Nohara’s ambition had long surpassed this small pond, aiming for the vast star sea named capital.
What he wanted was monthly income in the tens of millions, even… billions!
After all, those famous film and television investors or even movie stars from Huaxia in his previous life, whether their companies or studios, whether investing in films or founding variety shows, money flowed into their pockets like water.
Of course, there was a lot of trickery involved.
But who says…
Neon doesn’t have trickery?
Anyway, making money is making money however you do it.
And that upcoming 《Super Change Change Change》 was the first fulcrum he used to pry the leverage of this era.
……
Tokyo Television Station, Studio Number Three.
This place was less like a studio and more like an abandoned massive warehouse.
It was a huge auditorium capable of holding over a thousand audience members, with a dome ceiling so high it seemed to touch the clouds, rows of audience seats covered in white dust cloths standing silently like tombstones in the dim lighting.
The air was filled with a unique scent mixing aged wood, dust, and metal; every breath seemed to carry the forgotten glory of the previous era.
This place used to be Tokyo Television Station’s exclusive venue for large galas and singing competitions, but with the completion of newer, more modern studio buildings, it gradually fell into disuse, becoming a forgotten corner only occasionally used in certain variety show proposals.
And now, this forgotten corner was revitalized by the arrival of one person.
“Section Chief!”
When Hiroshi Nohara’s figure appeared at the auditorium entrance, Kei Tanaka, who had been waiting, rushed up like a soldier seeing his backbone, his face, now free of all dejection, full of irrepressible excitement and fanaticism.
Behind him, the once-scattered variety team, along with the over twenty Kanto Faction Actors personally selected by Hiroshi Nohara, stood like a fully assembled army, gazes burning as they watched their new commander, who was a bit too young.
“Good afternoon, Section Chief Nohara!”
The neat and uniform greeting echoed through the empty auditorium.
Hiroshi Nohara nodded calmly, his gaze sweeping over the group with a completely renewed spirit, his eyes like an experienced general reviewing his troops.
“Is everything prepared?”
“Yes! All props, lighting, camera positions have been set up according to your manuscript!” Kei Tanaka’s voice was full of vigorous loudness.
“Good.” Hiroshi Nohara wasted no words, patting Kei Tanaka’s shoulder, his voice carrying an unquestionable power: “Then let’s begin. Let everyone see what level our Kanto Faction’s variety show really is.”
With the order given, the silent auditorium instantly came alive.
The massive stage backdrop was slowly raised, revealing the pitch-black curtain below that could swallow all light.
Dozens of high-power stage spotlights, like giant sleeping eyes, lit up one by one, casting beams of light that were bright or dim, full of dramatic tension.
The actors quickly took their positions, their faces showing no nervousness or unease, only the confident ease unique to absolute clarity from the script.
They were too familiar with this feeling.
They had experienced it once on the set of 《World of the Strange》.
They knew what they had to do was not improvise or adapt on the spot.
But to perfectly replicate every punchline, every gag from that young man’s mind, exactly as designed.
“Scene one! 《Bowling》! Action!”
With Kei Tanaka’s order, that variety show debut, which seemed full of unknowns and challenges to outsiders, officially began with an almost industrialized, assembly line-style precise operation.
……
An hour later, when the last creative short film “Humanoid Typewriter” lens was completed, the entire film crew was still immersed in that smooth and efficient flow, unable to extricate themselves for a long time.
“Too… too fast…” A young script supervisor looked at the timer in his hand, murmuring to himself, his eyes like witnessing a miracle that just happened before him: “One hour… we actually shot a full ten creative short films?”
“Not just fast!” The old worker in charge of lighting nearby was also flushed with excitement: “You didn’t see it! That ‘pouring beer’ segment earlier, with lighting from below upward, combined with dry ice effects, that image was simply perfect! I’ve done lighting for twenty years and never seen it done like that!”
“This is all thanks to Section Chief Hiroshi Nohara! We strictly followed his manuscript for filming! I didn’t expect the effect to be so good!” Others were also full of emotion.
Including Kei Tanaka.
At this moment, Kei Tanaka watched the playback on the monitor, his face full of undisguised ecstasy and excitement.
He quickly walked to Hiroshi Nohara, his posture like a student eager to show his teacher a perfect exam paper.
“Section Chief! Look! This effect… it’s simply… simply ten times better than we imagined!”
Hiroshi Nohara just watched calmly, a satisfied arc curving at his mouth.
“Very good.” Hiroshi Nohara praised.
This was the effect he wanted.
Though this was within his expectations; after all, the manuscript was drawn directly from the previous life’s 《Super Change Change Change》, which itself was edited perfect lenses from the variety show.
Plagiarized by him once over.
Could the effect now be bad?
However, amid this atmosphere filled with victory and joy, two figures carrying discordant notes appeared uninvited, like two flies smelling blood.
“Yo, isn’t this our Kanto Faction’s variety show genius, Director Tanaka?”
A voice full of contempt and disdain came from the auditorium entrance.
Takashi Yasui and Ito Chōan, these two Tokyo Faction variety show aces, walked in with hands behind their backs, like two kings inspecting their territory, unhurriedly.
Their gazes contemptuously swept over this somewhat outdated venue, over those defeated soldiers still flushed with excitement, finally landing on Kei Tanaka, who was excitedly reporting to Hiroshi Nohara.
That look was like watching a ridiculous child ignorantly playing house in front of adults.
“What? Finished shooting so quickly?” Takashi Yasui shook the shiny Rolex on his wrist, a playful smile on his handsome, unrestrained face: “I thought you’d at least dawdle here for a week. Looks like this kindergarten-level playtime really… has no technical content.”
“Yasui! You—!”
Kei Tanaka’s face instantly turned pig liver red; he spun around, his eyes that had just burned with hope now erupting with towering rage from public humiliation by his arch-enemy!
He could never forget how these two guys had teamed up in front of the higher-ups to trash his blood-and-sweat-filled 《Saturday! Let’s Charge!》 project as worthless!
It was these two who used their connections in the Variety Department to trip him up everywhere, dealing devastating blows to his program’s promotion and scheduling!
This grudge, this resentment, had seeped into his bones!
However, before his erupting rage could fully burst, a hand gently pressed on his shoulder.
Hiroshi Nohara had somehow stood beside him.
He didn’t even glance at those two clowns, just calmly said to Kei Tanaka: “Let’s go, Director Tanaka. We’ll go back and edit the film.”
He paused, a flash of icy cold indifference in his clear eyes, like a deity overlooking ants.
“After all, next month it’s officially airing. Then, let’s use the ratings to have a real showdown with certain self-important guys.”
These words were light as air, yet like an invisible slap, fiercely landing on Takashi Yasui and Ito Chōan’s faces.
The smiles on their faces instantly stiffened.
They watched that young man who couldn’t be bothered to give them a proper look, watched his upright and composed back, and that absolute confidence of an ace involuntarily stirred a faint shake in them.
“Hmph, bluffing.” Takashi Yasui snorted coldly, his voice carrying a trace of bluster he himself hadn’t noticed.
Ito Chōan just pushed up the gold-rimmed glasses on his nose bridge, his sharp eyes staring deadly at the direction Hiroshi Nohara left, a hard-to-grasp sharpness flickering in his eyes behind the lenses.
He always felt that things were sliding crazily toward a direction they couldn’t foresee at all.
“Let’s go.” He said in a deep voice to Takashi Yasui beside him: “We need to see Deputy Director Takada. This Hiroshi Nohara… might be trickier than we imagined.”
……
When those two figures full of wariness disappeared at the auditorium doorway, Hiroshi Nohara’s mouth finally curved into an icy arc.
Of course he knew that old fox Toshihide Takada had already started his praise-kill plan.
In the past few days, major media had been pumping out articles fawningly calling him “variety show savior” and “cross-boundary god,” one after another, as if they were free.
That momentum seemed intent on immediately pushing him onto a guillotine named “myth.”
Unfortunately, they miscalculated.
They thought they were facing just a fledgling, arrogant young man.
They had no idea their real opponent was a dimensional reduction striker with another world’s full thirty years of variety show development history.
Praise-kill?
Hiroshi Nohara let out a disdainful cold laugh in his heart.
With their petty tricks not worth the stage, they dare to praise-kill?
A bit ridiculous.
Next month, when the national carnival named 《Super Change Change Change》, personally directed by him, officially pulled back the curtain.
They would know what true despair really is.
