Chapter 102

Chapter 102

unedited

As the only person who had finished all three scenes, “Two’s” response was out of everyone’s expectations, including Qi Jing’s.

No.30 – Gimme a proper dub, dumbass: No.

Audience 1: Σ( °△ °|||)︴Eh? He said no...

Audience 2: Σ( °△ °|||)︴He actually said no!!

Audience 3: Σ( °△ °|||)︴Buddy, are you for real?? You have the best score yet you still say you say no, it’s such a waste!! 【At first I really supported Gorilla Teacher’s idea TAT】

Audience 4: Old Macaque Teacher even asked so openly, yet he still got turned down so offhandedly? That voice acting was clearly so incredible, I’m feeling like I lost any hope in the world...

Audience 5: _(:з」∠)_ Feeling like I lost any hope in the world +1

Audience 6: _(:з」∠)_ Feeling like I lost any hope in the world +2

Qi Jing stared stupefied at all those cries of woe in the chat. He didn’t expect “Two” to be so quick to reject this offer; according to Two’s ability, it shouldn’t be hard for him to survive in the professional sphere of voice acting, even more so with a recommendation from a veteran of the industry. An occasion like this was hard to come by, yet he still stubbornly refused to appreciate it.

As he was still bewildered, Yuan Zhengming had already started shouting, aggrieved, “I just knew it! I just knew that this seedling grew crooked! —That won’t do, management, bring this kid over to me, bring him!”

Hearing this, Qi Jing cocked his brow, “Oh...”

It was the first time for a judge to face the contestant directly during the feedback—how interesting.

No one expected it to become like this. The atmosphere momentarily grew tense and everyone watched excitedly as “Two” got brought up the mic sequence by the management. The person in question had yet to react; the sound of munching on the crisps ceased suddenly and only then did he realise that he was currently on the mic and said, annoyed, “...What is it all about?”

Yuan Zhengming’s grinning expression could be heard from the sheer tone of his voice. “How about becoming a professional VA?” He asked once again.

“No.” Even the crunching sound of crisps couldn’t conceal the resolution in “Two’s” tone.

“Why not?”

It wasn’t only Yuan Zhengming who wanted to know, Qi Jing and the other listeners were also very curious, each and everyone holding their breaths in anticipation.

“Two” chewed on another few crisps in silence, yet his chewing wasn’t as unbothered as usual—he gnawed at the chips ruthlessly with his teeth, clearly about to pulverise them to vent. But when he spoke, his voice was unusually calm as he said, “Professional voice acting is all about acting while looking at other people’s faces—I’m not interested.”

Having worked in a TV channel for so many years, Qi Jing nodded his head instinctively. Although his own job wasn’t voice acting-related, he had already seen multiple cases of people working in this line of job. Usually, the right to make calls in the professional voice acting is in a director’s hand, sometimes also in the investors’ hands, especially within the film dubbing industry. The investors would always have their own ideas and a lot of the time, they wouldn’t be professionals themselves, making suggestions only according to their personal taste—whatever they want you to act like, that’s how you have to do it. The lack of freedom of the voice actors is too great, so it’s hard to not get frustrated and tired of it.

People like “Two” are too headstrong, if they were to survive in the professional circle... they probably wouldn’t do as good as Bronze Sparrow Terrace at getting what they want to make it.

“Hehe,” Yuan Zhengming neither admitted nor denied as he said calmly, “There’re many lousy and unreasonable directors in our industry, but I’m not one of them at all. If you don’t believe me, you can go ask Longbow or Yuzhi.”

The sound of “Two” snacking on the crisps ceased, as he hesitated for a moment, but he still went back to eating.

“No,” His stubbornness made Yuan Zhengming’s head hurt. That fellow was really unyielding, appearingly leaving no way to talk him into it, “If I said no then that means no, I’ll do my online voice acting, but if it’s professional, then I’m not getting into it.”

Who knew that Yuan Zhenging would suddenly scold him angrily, his yell scaring every listener, “Number 30! You’re looking down on me thinking that I’m not qualified enough as a director, aren’t you!”

Probably not expecting the other man to scream like this, “Two” also got dumbfounded. “I didn’t say that...”

But Yuan Zhengming was unforgiving, his tone like that of a fierce street hoodlum’s when he asked, “Then you’re looking down on my acting skills being too low and think that I’m not as good as you, aren’t you!”

The corners of “Two’s” lips twitched a little and unable to sit still, he yelled back, “You must be joking! I heard about Teacher Yuan’s name, how can an amatour like me compare with a professional of Your calibre!”

One was yelling louder than the other, like they were about to have a fight on the spot, so that the scared Yang Chunqu’s “Both of you, please calm down” became a mere background noise and the audience could only comment with the “=口=” emoji. Stunned, Qi Jing listened to them arguing, starting to worry about the situation getting out of hand.

But at that time, Yuan Zhengming suddenly laughed coldly, actually using the same words “Two” said to Qi Jing to reprimand him, surprising everyone and getting an upper hand. “You’re clearly quite good at voice acting but your attitude is so casual, doing whatever you feel like, it might look like you’re free like that but there’s actually no benefit in doing so for you. Online voice acting is voice acting, just as professional voice acting is as well, so why won’t you just do both of them together?”

“Two” got completely put off his stroke—only his heavy breathing could be heard, but he had no word of rebuttal. Those were his words he used to scold other people, so how could he possibly try arguing against it?

“Hahahaha!” Hearing this, Qi Jing bursted out in a sly laughter—it truly was a prime example of judging people by their own standards! Wonderful, wonderful, Teacher Yuan, I’m giving you all my likes!

And Yuan Zhengming continued to copy Two, full of himself beyond any measure. “No.30, you better listen to me carefully. Your current skill isn’t bad, but sorry, it’s not good enough for you to only play handsome while only having fun yet. You thought that you already don’t have anything to improve, nothing to better, and are already satisfied with just getting first place in an ‘online’ voice acting competition? What a joke.”

Then came the main point. “As for whether you consider voice acting as a professional or not, better wait till you can outdo me to decide&#k2014;”

Audience 1: o(*&#k2267;&#k25KB;&#k2266;)&#k30A4; Hahahaha!! Teacher Yuan is just so!! He really doesn’t hesitate to use any means for digging up his seedlings!! &#k3010;Thumbs up&#k2190;Oi&#k3011;

Audience 2: o(*≧▽≦)ツ Hahahaha, Teacher Gorrilla also “dug up” man’s opening!! What’s happening tonight, a chain of continuous counterattacks??

Audience 3: o(*≧▽≦)ツ You! Love! To! See it! No.30, don’t you be so hard-mouthed anymore, this opportunity is so good! We all want to hear you voice acting~ 【It doesn’t matter if it’s online or professional, as long as you dare to voice act, I dare to listen to it! The scene just now was really acted so emotively, aoaoawooo!!! 】

Of course, the current “Two” had no way of getting better of Yuan Zhengming. No matter how skilled he was, before Yuan Zhengming’s tens of years of experience as a professional voice actor, it was plain to see who was better. And with the endless encouragement and urging from the listeners, he had no way but to yield.

“Let me think about it first...”

“Hehe,” After all this trouble, Yuan Zhengming finally managed to tug one of his seedlings in the direction he desired. It may have still been crooked, but at least it was a bit better than before, so he all beamed with smiles. “If you’re still first when you finish the competition, then you can go and think through it well.”

Striking the steel when it’s still hot on while egging the man on—hopefully Teacher Yuan would use less foul means to play his mind games in the future.

At that time, Qi Jing heard “Two” spit out a muttered sentence under his nose. “Tsk, that bastard Five... he must have done it on purpose!”

This sentence would probably go by not understood by anyone else, but Qi Jing understood it, even freezing for a little as his previous smile collapsed.

Five? On purpose?Could it be that the appearance of “Two” had something to do with “Five”? Then, did they actually know each other?

...In that case, was Yuan Zhengming’s appearance also related?

Instantly a wave of questions and suspicions surged over his mind.

“Ah, since No.30 is here already, then I can as well go in reverse order with the feedback.” With the time getting closer to the end, Yuan Zhengming finally went on to give the proper commentary, “About No.30’s performance, I believe that even without me saying anything, every listener present had already experienced it, otherwise I wouldn’t be urging him to enter the professional circle right now—him getting the first place can be said to be a matter of course.”

His commenting style was completely unlike that of the earnest Longbow or the strict and meticulous Pu Yuzhi. He didn’t comment on the details, but on all the overall aspects with the focus on the contestant themself.

“Honestly speaking, I’m not the type to pay that much attention to whether the actor’s voice ‘fits’, as long as it overall matches the character settings, it’s actually more beneficial for it to not be too flashy, because this way, it would let the listeners focus on the lines instead.” He assessed, “No.30’s voice can’t be said to be particularly characteristic, but it’s very masculine and upright, so it’s quite close to the description of “Qin Tuo”. But what I admired the most was how No.30 portrayed the difference in age and experience with his voice in these three scenes.”

Qi Jing had also noticed how “Two” handled these details. At first he was a barely twenty years old youth, later he slowly shifted towards a more deep and steady tone and at the end, it was already full of the leader-like bearing. There were three flavours that evolved in his voice, each with its own emphasis, but they all were kept within one character’s scope.

“In terms of expressiveness, No.30 has one skill that no other contestant could compare to, and that is creating the illusion of a conversation.” When speaking about voice acting, Yuan Zhengming actually had some of that teacherly manner to him.

“Although the majority of people know that most of the time, voice acting is in the form of dialogue, without another person to accompany the performance, it’s not easy to create the sense of conversation without anything there to aid. A moment of carelessness can make one feel as if it’s only reciting a script.” Saying this, he grumbled sorrowfully, “I know that these days, people like to go back to their places to record the voice acting and hand it over when it’s finished, but honestly, this isn’t very beneficial to making the dialogue feel genuine.”

“For example people like me, whose rest time is always incompatible with others’...” Qi Jing had no other choice but to raise his own hand, embarrassed.

“The voice acting circle a few years ago wasn’t quite like this. We liked to meet up to communicate, we liked to exchange our experience with each other—contestant No.30 gives me the vibe of someone polished through this type of long-term shared acting. Am I right about that?”

Hearing this “Two”, who had stayed silent dejectedly for all that time, suddenly chuckled softly with a hum.

Seeing this reaction of his, all of a sudden Qi Jing thought of something, suddenly enlightened.

After laughing, “Two” only tossed out lukewarmly, “It can be said like that. But it’s all a matter of the past... To this day, some of the pack went their way, some of them got busy, some got lazy, and now I’m also just like everyone else, only looking at the script while playing a one-man-show.” His tone was unbothered, but one could still hear a hint of desolation in it.

“That’s why, come to act professionally, come to us and we will accompany you in having the fun.” Yuan Zhengming laughed cunningly— it wasn’t hard to imagine him waving his hand enticingly at “Two”, his mouth drooling behind the screen.

“Are You a loach sir, squeezing your agenda in every crevice possible...”

When Yuan Zhengming continued his feedback, Qi Jing’s mind was wandering. He got caught up in his thoughts before his computer, not even able to focus on listening to his comment about “Two”.

He could more or less guess who those voice acting buddies of “Two’s” were. But listening to his tone, it seemed like they hadn’t gathered for a long time already... He also didn’t know what the reason was either. As one of them, Shen Yan had told him that they slowly each went their own way, but he didn’t explain exactly what happened. But from how “Five” to that day kept repeating that Shen Yan blacklisted him like a broken record, it was obvious that something else happened at the time.

I really want to ask about it... Qi Jing sighed and flopped silently on the keyboard. If “Two” wasn’t happy about it, then Shen Yan and “Five” were probably feeling bad about it too. It would be nice if they could go back to their previous relationship...

He didn’t know “Two” all that much, so about this matter... maybe it would be better to ask “Five”—but the problem was, the guy himself was nowhere to be seen.

He was in the middle of mulling over the whereabouts of Five when suddenly, he heard Yuan Zhengming’s calling. “No.12.”

So it’s my turn now? Qi Jing raised his head in a hurry.

“No.12.” Yuan Zhengming repeated the number once again and without waiting for its owner to sit up completely, he already chuckled shortly, saying in a drifting tone, “Now that I think about it, among all of the contestants who performed, No.12 reminds me of my young self the most... fufufu.”

Qi Jing’s brow twitched violently.

Without waiting for him to roast it, someone in the chat had already pulled the rug from under him.

Judge – Pu Yuzhi: He’s fooling you people. ╮(╯__╰)╭

Audience 1: o(*≧▽≦)ツ Pfft! Teacher Pu’s roasts just keep coming tonight!

Audience 2: o(*≧▽≦)ツ Pfft! Teacher Pu can actually use emoji to mock people! Too cute! 【Looking at Teacher Pu with worship in my starry eyes】

Audience 3: o(*≧▽≦)ツ Hahahaha! Turns out that both Teachers had met back when they were young, why do I suddenly start daydreaming??【But my family’s sweet Return Date is nothing like that hoodlum Old Macaque Teacher, humph ╮(╯▽╰)╭】

“Humph, I was also very handsome in my younger days.” The sourness in Yuan Zhengming’s tone could rival a jar of pickles as he refuted resentfully.

Qi Jing cocked his head and thought, does it mean that my performance was very handsome?

He was still thinking about it, when all of a sudden he heard Yuan Zhengming spurring the management, “Get him on the mic, get him on the mic!”

Again? Qi Jing got caught completely unprepared. Clearly aside from “Two”, Yuan Zhengming didn’t call any of the other contestants to the mic during his feedback. But there was nothing he could do about it at that point, so Qi Jing had no other choice but to brave himself and open his mic and press F2, thinking of what to say before laughing politely. But he didn’t even have time to say “Good evening Teacher” before Yuan Zhengming already started securing his high ground, speaking first.

“Tsk tsk tsk, contestant No.30 doesn’t want to enter the professional circle, but you don’t even want to continue staying in the online one.”

So he got scolded.

Qi Jing knew how he was wrong, but he also wasn’t anxious about it, so he chuckled quietly. “Yes, originally I indeed thought like this. But... after being admonished by the senior like contestant No.30, I got won over by his acting. Even if I didn’t forfeit, I would still lose completely to him, and I also recognised the problem with my attitude towards voice acting.”

He took a deep breath, “Now that I calmed down, I think that I can give it a second thought.”

Audience 1: ┭┮﹏┭┮ Aaaaah, I’m so relieved!

Audience 2: ┭┮﹏┭┮ Don’t ask for my return date, buddy... you finally got over it?? Comrade Two really should get scolded!! 【Oi】

Audience 3: Awoooo!! My beloved Return Date agreed to stay!! I’m so happy hearing you say that you calmed down, I hope you can continue voice acting and continue staying in the circle and voice acting in ⟪Trap⟫... 【The last one can be a bit hard, but I’m a fan of the og novel. If that’s too awkward then please, ignore me..._(：з」∠)_】

...

Of course, there was also no lack of antis in the audience, playing a completely different tune in response.

Audience 4: ╮(╯▽╰)╭ It really is so expected of Don’t ask for my return date to go back on his words, isn’t he colluding with that whatever Two?? Sparrow, let’s not mind them and leave them upturn the truth themself, we’ll just play whatever we want~

Audience 5: That’s just too shameless!! If you scram then scram for real, how do you still have a cheek to come back!! Don’t you dare to even think of continuing that ⟪Trap⟫ or something, it’s Bronze Sparrow Terrace-sama’s work!! If you dare to continue playing in it, then we’ll bully you back into leaving the drama, mark my words!!

Audience 6: （╯‵口′）╯︵┴─┴ Fucking—! So there really are people this shameless in the world! You better take those tacky fans of yours and retire! Ungrateful bastard! Scammer! Sissy!

...

Of course, Qi Jing ignored those comments completely. With the matters coming to this point, no matter how the great god’s fans cursed him out, his heart was calm like still water, with nothing breaching its peace.

Yuan Zhengming made no heed of them too, “Heh, I didn’t expect the seedling No.12 to be more sensible than seedling No.30. But no matter what you say, you can’t take back your forfeit, after all, it’s already a done matter.”

“I never intended to take it back,” Qi Jing smiled confidently, “As long as I can hear what You would comment about my performance and let me know my weak side, it would be enough.”

“Weak side...” Yuan Zhengming rubbed his chin while laughing like an old wily fox, “There are two ways in which the voice acting may end up weak. One of them is a lack of authenticity, weak acting skills, lack of comprehension—those that require honing acting skills over a long time—but you’re not this type. The other type is the abstract weakness and it depends on the situation whether it’s a good or bad thing.”

“Oh?”

“Your weak side is your voice.” Just as Yuan Zhengming finished speaking, the chat momentarily exploded. Qi Jing’s flirtatious voice was the reason for numerous people to take a liking to him, so it being pointed out as a weakness now made it hard to accept for them.

But Yuan Zhengming explained unhurriedly, “I’m saying this, because your voice quality is quite unique and it leaves a strong impression, so strong even that it makes people forget about the character you’re playing—that’s why there’s a limit to what character you can play, or at least compared to No.30’s voice, your is much more limiting.”

...Correct.

“I could hear the effects of you suppressing your voice when acting as “Qin Tuo”, this way of thinking is quite good, but it wasn’t able to cover that faint sexiness in the voice...”

...Correct, I had also heard that before from the producers who wanted me in their dramas.

“Listening to the first scene, it was still a bit too flirty, but you had a good grasp on all the turns in emotions, good job with that.” After this comment, Yuan Zhengming also didn’t forget to add an explanation, “I’m not saying that having a unique voice isn’t good, it just adds to the difficulty of integrating with the role. And this shortcoming would disappear naturally when playing the second scene. Ah, speaking of it, I also used to be quite a flirt when I was young...”

...Correct, but Teacher, could You skip that last sentence?

“As for your second shortcoming,” Among the pitch silence of the audience, Yuan Zhengming coughed slightly and returned to the main point. “It’s just as you said before—your attitude.”

Qi Jing raised his brows. This one he really wished to hear more about.

Yuan Zhengming didn’t make his point immediately, asking him instead. “Do you know why you got cut?”

Qi Jing said slowly, “Because towards the end of the second scene, I only saw the character’s surface-level accusation of the other person, but didn’t understand his internalised self-blame.”

“Hehe, just look at you, now you clearly got this, but at that time you were no good.” Yuan Zhengming seemed very pleased with Qi Jing’s reply, taking on a “this child can be taught” tone as he spoke, “At that time, you couldn’t comprehend the role in-depth, and that’s because you were distracted by other thoughts—I’m guessing it was the matter you mentioned in your concluding remark.”

Indeed.

That time, he did it all just to give Bronze Sparrow Terrace a good slap, and his motive in getting into the competition wasn’t all simple since the beginning—but he didn’t expect it to become a shackle in the end, keeping him unable to figure out the role fully.

“It’s up to you whether you believe it, but us, professional voice actors, meet with much more grievances everyday than you, online actors—disagreements with directors, disagreements with investors, with colleagues, and numerous other unpleasant experiences. But voice acting is a profession, we need to face those problems; how good it would be if we could just speak of leaving the circle freely like you.” Yuan Zhengming showed a rare sign of seriousness, “That’s why adjusting your own attitude is the most important—it’s not getting distracted by the negativity from outside that makes a good VA.”

After saying this, he still tossed his bait with a beaming smile.

“So how about it, wanna become a professional?”

“Pfft...” He was even a bit moved at first, but hearing this broke him. Qi Jing laughed helplessly, “Please wait for me until I harden myself up in the online circle, polish my acting skills, then I will consider it.”

No matter if it was online or professional, he still had a very long way ahead with his love towards voice acting.

He still made a choice, not wanting to abandon it.

As for Bronze Sparrow Terrace, now when he looked back at it, it wasn’t really worth it to retire because a person like him. As long as he doesn’t speak of defeat, that guy will never win. He still needs to see who will be the last one to laugh.

That was even more so with a judge like Yuan Zhengming. “Next, we’ll talk about No.10. The deepest impression No.10 gave me was...”

Saying this, Yuan Zhengming got stuck for a moment. He seemed to try and think harder for a couple of seconds, and after a long while, he finally found a single highlight. “Oh, my deepest impression... It’s probably him being the one to be cursed out the most in other contestants’ comments.”

A/N:

The longer I write, the more Old Macaque Teacher reminds me of a trafficker, one specialised in human trafficking...

He really is a devout enthusiast of collecting his seedlings ¯\( ´∀｀)/¯

PS: As for the feedback section, since there were already plenty of details described in the course of voice acting, Yuan Zhengming needed to start from the general appraisal and from the contestants themself. Those who prefer to read the detailed commentary on acting, going back to the previous chapter should be enough (or at least I think so).

T/N:

Lucilla: Teacher Yuan is such a boss, so unrelenting in recruiting new members to his professional VA cult circle ✨(And I swear, it’s been the longest chapter since a quite long time, RIP)