Chapter 56

Sorry for messing up the schedule time earlier this day, apparently scheduling chapters at 2AM might lead to malfunctioning of brain circuits _(:3」∠)_

TLC: Lilies & Jie

Editing: Whiteflare

Qi Jing froze, his hand subconsciously stopping partway through the action of helping Shen Yan up. Because he couldn’t predict how big of an impact the words Pu Yuzhi was about to say would have, he didn’t know whether he should still get Shen Yan stand up or if it was the wrong time for that.

Yet, Shen Yan shook his head and chose to stand up himself. “Don’t worry, it’s what I want to hear.”

Qi Jing took a look into his eyes as those wouldn’t lie about his current frame of mind. But in reality, that pitch blackness was way more steady than he imagined. He never forgot the sea that was hidden within Shen Yan’s eyes. Every river would return to the sea—no matter how rapid or how turbulent the river, they would all revert into calmness after entering the sea.

Shen Yan… he’s really stronger than Qi Jing thought him to be.

Qi Jing agreed with short “Mhm” and took his hand away from Shen Yan’s back, holding his hand instead.

If Shen Yan didn’t need support, then keeping him company was just as good.

At that time, through the faint noise of background static, Pu Yuzhi’s voice could be heard; it reverberated in the room. “First of all, I want to talk about my feelings regarding what you said before the audition.”

Not only were her words unexpected for the listeners, Qi Jing was also plenty surprised by it. He thought she was about to criticize Shen Yan’s voice acting techniques, but looking at where it was going, it didn’t seem to be the case.

“Just as many of our listeners had said before, it feels as if you’re out of place in this competition. And that’s right, I also feel the same—I think you treat voice acting very seriously. And that’s very good, being earnest and meticulous in what you do should be highly praised in any field or occupation. But I don’t know if my intuition is right… I feel like your meticulousness stems from some kind of sense of duty, not from the love for what you’re doing.”

Shen Yan’s expression changed.

Out of sudden… he felt as if he was laid bare. It was as if he had suddenly been jerked awake, and he subconsciously moved to lightly cover his mouth.

—Shen Yan, don’t speak, don’t say a word.

—But I can talk if I play “someone else”

It was a psychological suggestion that took root in his mind for twenty odd years. Even though its literal meaning was gone, his subconscious was still being influenced by it.

His initial motivation behind getting into voice acting was to forget himself, to break away from the pressure of being “Shen Yan”. Later, he gradually used it as a means of treating his selective mutism, to gain the freedom and courage of talking through the acting.

Then, his friends talked him into helping them with run-throughs and also playing some minor roles in audia dramas as requested by the producers who reached out to him…

Behind his conscientiousness of answering every plea, he didn’t feel any sense of fulfilment. In fact, for him it simply remained a kind of “means of treatment” and “duty”, nothing more.

“I think that… you actually don’t derive any pleasure from voice acting.” Pu Yuzhi’s voice wasn’t loud, but the power in her words could not be ignored, hitting hard at his very heart, “You’re here just to finish your duty, to complete your understanding of the role, the same way you said you wanted to commemorate your grandpa. As for the final outcome, what the reaction would be like—I guess it didn’t cross your mind at all, nor did you care about it.”

It really was like that.

But with how Pu Yuzhi broke it down all the way to that point, Qi Jing couldn’t keep himself from sighing inwardly. Indeed, Shen Yan had exactly this kind of mentality—as if he was completing his assignment by going on the stage and playing diligently until the curtains closed, only to leave the scene without either saying anything nor seeing the outcome.

In fact, Qi Jing was just about to say this to him, but he didn’t expect Pu Yuzhi to also see through that.

Actually… voice acting shouldn’t be just a duty, it could also hold a deeper meaning.

“I have already expressed my evaluation of your acting skills. I assume that everyone could see that what you showed this evening was a brilliant performance and can imagine how much time you usually spend practising and put a lot of effort into analysing and understanding the role. But if you choose to continue voice acting, unfortunately, your choice of the characters would get more and more limited, and the room for improvement in your performance would be just as small.” Pu Yuzhi seemed to sigh with regret, “Moreover, you seem as if you can quit at any moment.”

“Ah…” A short exclamation escaped the depths of Shen Yan’s throat as his fingers trembled a bit.

Qi Jing felt that he was on the verge of turning away.

Pu Yuzhi continued speaking, “It might be perhaps my instinct as a teacher—I believe talents like you are very precious and letting such a talent go on waste would be a great pity; however, the final decision is still up to you.”

Qi Jing quietly nodded to her words.

“But before you make this decision, you should first see how the audience was moved by your voice acting.” At that moment, Pu Yuzhi chuckled gently and raised her voice, “There’s a lot of professional voice actors among my pupils. When they’re in school, they gain joy from winning the teachers over with their performance, and when they start to work, they’re happy to influence the audience with their acting and take pride in that. Once you recognize the enjoyment you’re bringing to other people, you will also start to feel this joy. Only this way you can keep walking the path of voice acting.”

“Only this way can you truly recover.” Suddenly, Qi Jing added another phrase.

Shen Yan froze momentarily before turning abruptly to look at him. Qi Jing turned his head to meet his eyes, the light of the screen reflecting in his eyesk2014;those radiant and honest eyes watched Shen Yan with a gentle smile.

So… just getting used to performing and talking before numerous strangers still doesn’t count as true recovery?

At that moment, Qi Jing motioned with his chin towards the screen, guiding the other party with his glance. Shen Yan seemed to understand something, blinking blankly before he finally shifted his gaze to face the source of that light.

The screen’s light appeared to be even more blinding and intense in the darkness. He felt compelled to take a step forward and after some hesitation, slowly moved his gaze to the public chat in the channel window.

Audience 1: ~\(≧▽≦)/~ Do your best, Kitty’s Papa!! I really love your voice acting!! It really can move the listener, I hope you can continue!!

Audience 2: Teacher Pu is right, Kitty’s Papa made me feel he was about to disappear once the task was done. Here, here, here, look here, look here!! I just want to say I really appreciate your acting, it’s truly a pleasure to my ears and I swear the angst hit me right in the feels【*sobbing* It’s all because that part just now was too sad】… Cough, cough, I mean, what I wanted to say is—please, you have to continue voice acting, you’re amazing, really!

Audience 3: Hahahaha, what Teacher Pu meant to say to No. 28 is, he’s very good and very conscientious, yet he limits himself to small roles akin to a passerby who’s only here to buy soy sauce. To be honest, CVs like him should have a much bigger audience~ I’m raising my paw as well, I hope No. 28 can continue voice acting and give more roles a try, as well as let himself feel more joy doing it. I promise that I will certainly be among your audience!!

Audience 4: I agree with the commenter above!! I was the one who said that he felt mismatched for the competition, hahaha~ At that time I didn’t really know why that was a case, only now Teacher Pu’s words made me realize the reason behind it【I am just too stupid _(:з」∠)_】… Kitty’s Papa, you should be proud your performance made us covered in snot and tears!! It’s neither a bad thing, nor tall talk but a demonstration of your abilities!!

Audience 5: 〒▽〒What? Can quit voice acting at any time? Come, I’ll show you my tears now! I just hope that my face full of tears will make you think it through thoroughly! I really love your voice acting, although we’re already satisfied as the listeners, it’s obviously best if you yourself are happy as well!!

Audience 6: Hm, I also have a feeling that you’re not voice acting out of love for it, but out of sense of duty. I might not know the reason for it, but I hope you can derive pleasure from voice acting, just as how we feel pleasure listening to it~ ≧ω≦

That’s right…

Before, he had always hid behind the curtain. Even if he occasionally appeared at some corner of the stage, it would be just him willingly resigning himself to serve as a stage prop.

Today, he had overcome his psychological barrier and arrived at the centre of the stage—but the light there was too strong, too dazzling, rendering him afraid. He wholeheartedly wanted to do his job earnestly and finish the performance he had to show before turning away and heading back into the darkness.

But that wasn’t recovery.

Just standing on a stage and finishing his performance still couldn’t be counted as a full recovery yet.

He would attain a full recovery only if he made one more step ahead and passed through the spotlight, breaking away from the fear and blindness brought by that dazzlingly white light, persevering in walking towards the frontmost part of the stage. Only then would he be able to look down towards the auditorium, see the pleased smiles of the audience, hear their prolonged applause.

Only by realising this would he be able to understand that his voice could bring joy to other people and that it wasn’t like how the woman always admonished—that it would only bring troubles.

Only by realising this would he finally be able to… wish to open his mouth, wish to speak up.

Shen Yan stared fixedly at everyone’s encouragement on the screen. He suddenly felt his throat throb and couldn’t utter a word for quite a while.

Qi Jing only smiled as he lightly scratched the palm of his hand.

At the same time, Pu Yuzhi’s commentary was also reaching an end, “I never gave any contestant a full score of 5.0 points in any of the《Order to End the Heavens》competitions. That means that the highest score I will give out is 4.5—everyone may think of it as my personal ‘full score’. And that’s because I believe that everyone has room for improvement. That deduction of half a point isn’t because I’m dissatisfied with any of you—it’s just me placing hope in your future, hoping that you can take to heart the principle that there’s no best—there’s only better.”

She stopped for a moment, then softly chuckled behind the mic, “I’ve just specially checked the list of contestants and it seems that number twenty eight, you’ve also applied for other contests, so I believe that we’ll have another chance to meet. If by that time you can still maintain your current standards and also let me feel that you started to genuinely enjoy voice acting itself, then I’ll be more than willing to give you 4.5. I’m looking forward to that day—”

The moment those words were heard, the public chat got so spammed with red flowers, they seemed to merge into one.

Audience 1: 〒▽〒Crap! From today on, I’m Teacher Pu’s brainless fan!

Audience 2: 〒▽〒Teacher Pu’s brainless fan +1!

Audience 3: 〒▽〒Teacher Pu’s brainless fan +2!【I have to say that Teacher Pu feels just like my previous class teacher, both are strict but treat their pupils very well 】

Audience 4: 〒▽〒Teacher Pu’s brainless fan +3! Ah, right, right, count me in as Kitty’s Papa’s brainless fan as well!

Audience 5: 〒▽〒I didn’t think I’d chance upon such a good harvest while listening to ⟪Order to End the Heavens⟫ voice acting contest, it was worth it!! Five stars for Teacher’s Pu feedback style!! And five stars for Kitty’s Papa’s performance!! Looking forward to seeing other scenes in the finals!!

Audience 6: Hearing Teacher’s words, I immediately ran to check the official page, Kitty’s Papa is actually signed up for Bai Ke and Marquess Shun!! I was so surprised!! And so hyped!! I’ll make sure to come and cheer for you, best of luck!! ~\(≧▽≦)/~

“Thank you… Teacher Pu.” Even though he was aware that the other person couldn’t possibly see him nor hear his words, Shen Yan still bowed before the screen as he voiced his most sincere thanks in a low voice.

“Thank you, Teacher Pu.” Qi Jing also gave his thanks with a light smile.

“Qi Jing,” Shen Yan’s gaze left the screen and turned towards him as he said in the same, husky voice, “thank you too, for accompanying me all the way here.”

“It was you who first made me happy, don’t you remember?” Qi Jing cocked his head childishly, raised his brow and said with a smile, “At that time, I’ve just come back after having a car accident. You contacted me online, and we chatted about that first time we acted together. Do you remember what I said then?”

He remembered.

They enjoyed acting together—Qi Jing said so and so did he.

Turns out he already had those feelings, it’s just this time, it wasn’t just Qi Jing, but thousands upon thousands of people that… that gave him the joy of approval and recognition.

But this wasn’t the biggest joy voice acting brought him.

“Having been able to meet you… I’m so happy.” Shen Yan said in a low voice and slowly brought Qi Jing’s hand to where his heart was, putting it on his chest as if declaring some kind of sovereignty. He closed his eyes, a soft, choked sob escaping his throat as he leaned his head against Qi Jing’s shoulder to slowly sort out his bittersweet emotions.

“Me, too.” Qi Jing murmured in his ear.

Looking past Shen Yan’s shoulder, he saw that bustling YY channel window. It wasn’t long before the final list of qualified contestants appeared on the screen.

1st place: Number 28 Kitty の Papa, total score of 17.092 points.

2nd place: Number 19 Went off with a bang, total score of 14.761 points.

He believed it was just the beginning.

No matter if it was for him or for Shen Yan, their road as voice actors was still long and broad—merry things were bound to happen, just as unknowns were bound to appear.

As for Qi Jing, the unknowns started to crop up even before the start of his contests, their number snowballing with the time.

The next day was his first working day of that week, and it would be just as packed and busy as the previous weeks. Shen Yan went to the clinic to work as usual while he took Little Return Date out to carry on the undercover investigation of the veterinarian clinics.

Even though he had listened to two competitions in a row the day before, he could still have a good night’s sleep by that person’s side, so his fatigue disappeared completely, his spirit fully restored. Not to mention getting up in the morning, he could even eat that person’s piping hot breakfast! Qi Jing felt that today, no matter if it was for work progress or quality, he could take it all to new heights.

“Man’s spirit is invigorated after chancing upon a joyous occasion.” One of his colleagues sized him up from head to toe during the lunch break and made quite a fair conclusion.

“You can think of it like that.” Qi Jing responded, his eyes curving up in a smile.

He had personally witnessed Shen Yan take a step out of the shadows, even earning the first place and advancing in the ranks, it could be said that merriment arrived at their home—of course he would feel happy for Shen Yan.

“Did your request for the job as a news anchor go through?” His colleague seemed to be well-informed—the director was a blabbermouth, so it seemed like everyone in the whole channel knew about this matter already.

“No,” Qi Jing laughed as he shook his head, “I still don’t know anything about that one yet. We’ll see. I’ll do my best to try it if I get a chance, but otherwise, I can only continue working towards it.

The 3D world matters were never going as smoothly as the 2D ones. Nevertheless, Shen Yan’s experience gave him a kind of motivation—if the other could make a step forward, then he should also advance towards his goal. Every obstacle could be overcome as long as one had confidence and perseverance.

After eating lunch, there was still an hour before the next interview.

The company driver had to take a nap, and a couple of his colleagues went to the shopping district to buy stuff in passing, but Qi Jing didn’t follow them. He sat at the back seat and played with Little Return Date on his lap while freeing up his hand to unlock his phone.

There were two pages opened up in his browser. One was the original novel for the fifth part of ⟪Order to End the Heavens⟫, about half a million characters altogether—he intended to slowly read through it today and conscientiously research all three of his characters. The other one was a newly opened, popular thread on the voice acting forum titled ⟪Everyone, let’s talk about the voice acting competition for this year’s installment of Order to End the Heavens⟫.

In fact, this post thread was opened the previous evening. At that time, he was engrossed with listening to the competitions and didn’t browse the forums, so he missed some of the live commentary and discussions.

The thread started with a discussion about the happenings of the first competition for the “Liu Suyu” role.

Because of Crossing the bridge noodles, Qi Jing couldn’t avoid becoming one of those gals’ topics. Actually, the moment he opened the forum and saw the thread name for his and Crossing the bridge noodles CP thread, ⟪Golden wind and autumn dew arriving at their tryst, envying not immortals, only mandarin ducks couple⟫, he was already aware of what he was about to see.

[Comment 24]:

It finally started!! But why did Crossing the bridge noodles have to be so unlucky and draw the first place in the line up… _(:з」∠)_

I feel very good about the MC sister, as for the three judges… I need to wait and see, I hope they’re more reliable than those three from the previous competition. There was only one judge who was serious about scoring in that competition, but I just have no strength to rant about the other two. I love both Crossing the bridge noodles’ voice and acting, hope he can smoothly advance to the next stage of the competition.

[Comment 25]:

Σ(⊙▽⊙ What the hell!! The moment he got to the mic, Crossing the bridge noodles asked if Don’t ask for my return date was there!! What’s with that blatant ambiguity?? Is Bronze Sparrow Terrace being made into a stepping stone by this liaison of his two little shous, hahahaha… What to do, I would actually love to see that.

[Comment 25]:

My God, I also heard that! (I say, Noodles’ voice when he’s sick suddenly sounds so gong, pfft…) It also looks like Don’t ask for my return date has responded! Quickly, tell me if I’m right, tell me, tell me, tell me!

[Comment 27]:

You’re right!! Don’t ask for my return date has also told him “best of luck” or something like that. I could virtually see the great god Bronze Sparrow Terrace’s utterly devastated expression!! ╮(╯▽╰)╭

[Comment 28]:

o(*////▽////*)o Crap… I’m really falling into the Time Limit CP pit, what to do! Now I’m headcanoning this “philandering gong x pure and virtuous shou” pairing… Help!! Once my head receives such an idea to work with, my brain just can’t stop!!

[Comment 29]:

The commenter above, you can go to the next door CP thread to discuss it! It’s exactly that《Golden wind and autumn dew arriving at their tryst, envying not the immortals, only mandarin ducks couple》post thread. They have given us quite a lot of working material before, but with how we’ve got more of it now, it’s enough to fill a book~ o(≧o≦)o

He just couldn’t bear to look straight at the posts related to him.

Qi Jing skipped them in silence. He flipped a page and continued scrolling until he found a reply that managed to catch his attention firmly, making him stop his breath subconsciously.

[Comment 410]:

I really, really want to know who exactly that “Kitty の Papa” is!! I bet my dignity as a producer, if that’s a smurf, then I have to sniff out the big name behind it!!（╯－＿－）╯╧╧

A/N:

It would be so good to meet someone like Teacher Pu within my life.（┬＿┬）

And as for the pace of the plot… Uhm, seems like no matter what part of the novel we’re in, there will always be readers saying it’s too slow, or that it was just fine before… I also don’t know what I should do to correct it anymore, so I think I can only stick to my original outline. The commentary in the previous chapter was indeed too long, that’s just my habit, please pardon me. As for how slow the plot of their real life was going, that’s probably also a problem with my style… (I can’t live without bedcovers and details *collapses*)

In the end, I’m the one who wants it to finish quickly!! 〒▽〒 Finish it, then jump into a new pit… (Hey, shouldn’t you fill the first pit up first!)

T/N:

lucilla: The chat… the chat was so wholesome QAQ I also want to spam red flowers for Teacher Pu!! And I absolutely love the author’s attention to details, don’t take away my detailed descriptions, please? _(:3」∠)_

whiteflare: Ahhh, love the imagery in this chapter with the turning away from the light and then going through it… The netizens were super cute, too!