The Popularity Keeps Soaring!
“Atlas, yesterday’s Japanese box-office report is in.
Ring made another ¥108 million.” The Vance Studios executive barely paused before continuing, “The worldwide numbers are also updated.
Yesterday’s global gross was a little over $2 million.” Atlas Vance leaned back in his chair and nodded with satisfaction.
It had been almost a month since Ring opened in Japan, yet its daily performance remained remarkably stable.
The Japanese cumulative total had already climbed to roughly ¥1.2 billion, while its worldwide gross had reached approximately $42 million.
Compared with the enormous totals earned by major Hollywood blockbusters, those numbers were hardly earth-shattering, but for a horror movie produced by a nearly bankrupt studio with no international reputation, the result had already attracted serious attention throughout the film industry.
Ring had started its conquest in Japan before gradually spreading across the international market.
South Korea, India, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, and more than a dozen other territories had successively acquired the movie after watching its Japanese performance and online popularity.
Yet while audiences throughout the world were already watching Sadako Yamamura crawl out of televisions, the country where Vance Studios was actually based still hadn’t received a theatrical release.
American horror fans were becoming furious.
“Atlas Vance, are you seriously an American director?
Japan got Ring first, half of Europe has it, and we still can’t buy a ticket here!”
“I already watched a terrible bootleg online.
The picture looked like it was recorded with a potato and Sadako still scared the hell out of me.
I want to see the actual 5D version!”
“Vance Studios deserves to go bankrupt if this is how you treat your own audience!”
Atlas calmly scrolled through the increasingly hostile comments beneath Vance Studios’ social-media accounts.
He wasn’t offended because this reaction was exactly what he had expected when he chose an overseas-first strategy.
The stronger Ring performed internationally, the angrier American audiences became about being denied access, and all Atlas needed to do now was redirect that anger toward the real reason for the delay.
He opened the official Vance Studios account and began writing.
“Dear horror fans, we sincerely apologize that Ring has still not received an American theatrical release.
Vance Studios originally intended for the United States to be the film’s first market, but the current cut received an NC-17 rating through the MPA rating process, and our distributors and major theater partners would not support the wide 5D rollout we planned at that rating.
To prevent the company from collapsing while we appealed the decision and continued pursuing an R-rated release without removing Sadako’s complete television sequence, we were forced to begin distribution overseas.”
Atlas reread the statement before adding the final paragraph.
“We are still working to bring the complete version of Ring to American theaters without removing its most important scene.
If you want to experience the movie domestically, please continue supporting Vance Studios and let distributors and theater chains know that audiences want the original version.” Satisfied, Atlas pressed Post.
Less than a minute later, Emily Brooks hurried into his office.
She was now not only one of Vance Studios’ contracted actresses but had also voluntarily taken on the role of Atlas’s assistant whenever she wasn’t filming.
“Atlas, there are horror fans gathering outside the studio again.
Security says the crowd keeps getting bigger.”
Atlas glanced toward the sofa.
Sadako was lying there with her legs stretched out while intensely staring at the smartphone in her hands.
After returning from Japan, Atlas had bought her a high-end phone partly because letting a supernatural ghost entertain herself seemed considerably safer than allowing her to wander around looking for people to frighten.
Unfortunately, Sadako’s learning ability was absurdly fast, and within days she had discovered mobile games.
Now she was addicted to Wild Rift.
“Sadako, could you go downstairs and deal with the crowd?” Atlas asked.
“After this match,” she replied without looking up.
“I’m about to reach Gold.”
Atlas rubbed his forehead.
Buying Sadako a smartphone had still produced one unexpected benefit.
Her favorability toward him had climbed again, eventually reaching 50, and the system had immediately issued a new notification.
[Sadako Yamamura Favorability: 50]
[New Ability Unlocked: Seven Emotions and Six Desires]
[Current Emotional State Toward Host: Like]
Atlas still wasn’t entirely sure what the newly unlocked ability would ultimately mean for Sadako.
Judging from her increasingly human habits, stronger emotional reactions, love of milk tea, irritation when Emily got too close to him, and current obsession with ranked games, however, her personality was clearly becoming more complicated.
A few minutes later, Sadako suddenly sat upright.
Her expression became frighteningly cold.
The word DEFEAT appeared across her screen.
Sadako slowly placed the phone on the sofa, cracked her fingers, and stood up.
“Zed.”
Atlas looked at her.
Sadako’s eye twitched slightly.
“Don’t let me find out who that player is.”
She walked out of the office with an atmosphere far more terrifying than anything the protesters downstairs were prepared to face.
At almost the same time, Daniel Mercer was lying inside his rented apartment with absolutely nothing productive to do.
It had been nearly a month since Ring opened overseas, and although his international recognition was increasing, Martin Hayes’s old blacklist still made many American producers reluctant to hire him before the domestic release proved how valuable his name had become.
With no production currently requiring him, Daniel had also discovered Wild Rift.
He had become frighteningly good at Zed.
Daniel looked at the results screen and smiled with satisfaction.
During the previous match, he had repeatedly hunted down the opposing Jinx until the unfortunate player barely had time to leave the base before being killed again.
“Not bad,” Daniel muttered, completely unaware that the Jinx player he had spent the entire match tormenting was a genuine vengeful spirit capable of finding people through her supernatural curse and traveling enormous distances through televisions.
A few days later, the pressure created by Atlas’s public statement spread throughout the American film industry.
The MPA’s rating decision became a major topic among horror fans, while distributors and theater chains were flooded with demands to support a domestic release of the complete movie.
Entertainment journalists also began questioning whether Ring truly deserved an NC-17 when similarly disturbing horror films had received R ratings.
Vance Studios continued using the proper appeal and resubmission process.
Eventually, the appeal succeeded.
The complete cut of Ring received the R rating Atlas needed for the wide theatrical rollout.
For Michael Carter, however, that only created another problem.
Michael sat inside his office staring at the news with an exhausted expression.
He wasn’t part of the MPA rating board; he was an influential industry executive who had previously used his connections with distributors and theater partners to make Vance Studios’ domestic release problem considerably worse.
Not long ago, both his home and workplace had also experienced what he desperately preferred to call “unexplained incidents,” and he had personally ended up hospitalized after seeing Sadako crawl from his television.
The supernatural activity had finally stopped, but now Ring had returned to haunt him in an entirely different form.
He already knew the movie had earned roughly $42 million worldwide in one month.
More importantly, nobody had actually died from watching it.
Michael understood perfectly well that continuing to obstruct the release no longer made any sense.
Martin Hayes had originally asked him to make life difficult for an unknown studio, and Michael had assumed leaning on a few industry contacts wouldn’t create serious consequences.
He had been catastrophically wrong.
Michael looked toward one of his staff members.
“Has Vance Studios secured the R rating?”
“Yes.
Their appeal went through.”
Michael closed his eyes for a moment.
Then he made his decision.
“Drop our objections.”
The employee blinked.
“What?”
“Tell our distribution partners we’re no longer opposing the release.
If theaters want Ring, let them book it.”
“But earlier you said—”
“I know what I said.” Michael leaned back and sighed.
“The film has already been playing internationally for a month without some worldwide medical disaster, and now it has an R rating.
We don’t have a defensible reason to keep interfering.”
The employee immediately nodded.
“Understood.”
News of Michael’s decision reached Martin Hayes almost immediately.
“What do you mean you’re backing Ring’s release now?” Martin demanded over the phone.
He had been monitoring Atlas’s international success carefully, and the last thing he wanted was to watch that momentum explode further once the movie entered the enormous American market.
“Michael, you know exactly why I asked you to hold it.”
Michael’s response was much colder than before.
“Martin, Ring has an R rating now.
There is no legitimate reason for me to keep pressuring distributors and theaters against it.”
“You’re backing out now?”
“Yes.”
Martin’s face darkened.
Michael continued, “This discussion is over.”
The call ended.
Martin stared at his phone with a solemn expression.
Naturally, he had been following Ring’s international box office.
Roughly $42 million in a month wasn’t remotely close to the biggest films in history, but horror operated on a completely different scale, especially in this world where the genre had been stagnant for years.
Very few modern horror productions reached numbers like that without an established franchise or major studio behind them.
Martin’s own highest-grossing horror movie had earned only around that amount worldwide.
That record was one of the major reasons people still called him one of America’s leading horror directors.
Yet Atlas Vance, a twenty-two-year-old rookie directing a relatively inexpensive film for a studio everyone had mocked, had essentially matched that achievement before Ring even opened in the United States.
Martin finally accepted reality.
Trying to challenge Ring directly would be stupid.
The Haunted Bridge was almost finished, and after principal photography ended, post-production would still require time.
Rather than release against Atlas and risk being buried beneath the excitement surrounding Sadako, Martin would wait until Ring’s American run weakened before putting his own movie into theaters.
That was the safer strategy.
On the set of The Haunted Bridge, Claire Bennett was also staring at news about Ring on her phone.
She had spent seven years married to Daniel Mercer, watching his career stagnate while her own continued rising, and she had eventually become convinced that he would never escape the obscure art-house projects he loved so much.
Yet only months after their divorce, the movie Daniel had desperately accepted was becoming an international success.
Once Ring opened in America, Daniel’s situation would undoubtedly change.
The man everyone had mocked as an unsuccessful actor was about to become recognizable.
Claire opened Daniel’s contact information.
Her thumb hovered above the call button.
For several seconds, she considered pressing it.
Then she locked the screen.
“So what if you’re the male lead of Ring?” Claire muttered while looking across the Haunted Bridge set.
“I’m still the female lead of Martin Hayes’s movie.”
She tightened her grip on the phone.
“There’s no way I’ll lose to you.”
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