I Want to Be a VTuber

“Oh, what’s up with Seo-yeon, and why is she alone?”

Nova Entertainment’s president, Kang Chan-yul, was in a great mood these days.

Well, it’s no wonder, considering that Seo-yeon has been on a roll lately, causing Nova Entertainment’s stock to soar.

Since Hwang Min-hwa’s departure, there hadn’t been any significant actor, so when Hwang left, there were rumors floating around saying, “Nova Entertainment is finished.” Talk about a complete turnaround!

“Joo Seo-yeon went to learn singing.”

“Singing? Oh, is it because of the OST work coming up?”

Kang Chan-yul replied casually but paused for a moment.

Something felt off about Ji-yeon’s words.

“Is she working with our company’s vocal trainer?”

“No.”

At first, she had asked Han Da-young, who is a Vtuber colleague of Lee Ji-yeon, for help, but it seems Seo-yeon suddenly remembered something and disappeared.

Rumor has it…

“She said she’s learning from a friend.”

“…Friend?”

Wait, Ji-yeon had a friend?

Kang Chan-yul’s mind wandered off with this surprisingly rude thought.

Seo-yeon’s relationships were insufferably limited.

“But what about our company’s vocal trainer?”

Kang Chan-yul muttered in disbelief.

Come on, Nova Entertainment isn’t some run-of-the-mill shop; of course, it had vocal trainers!

It wasn’t even primarily a talent agency for actors; it was also running idols!

Naturally, they had plenty of talented vocal trainers…

“I don’t know about that either.”

With Ji-yeon’s reply, Kang Chan-yul felt perplexed and amused at Seo-yeon’s decision.

“Ji-yeon.”

“Yes?”

“Are you sulking?”

“….”

Seeing Lee Ji-yeon glare at him, Kang Chan-yul burst into laughter.

Having known Ji-yeon for a long time, her thoughts were crystal clear to him.

“Sometimes, they both look the same, you know.”

Seo-yeon would occasionally squint at Ji-yeon’s many friends, but the truth is, the usually cool Lee Ji-yeon was quite similar.

“…Still, when she comes back, make sure to tell her we have a vocal trainer here.”

“Okay.”

Aside from that, he was also worried about whether Seo-yeon was causing trouble somewhere else.

After all, Seo-yeon always had a unique way of thinking.

*

Around the time that conversation was happening at Nova Entertainment.

At Hoyeon Studio, the agency of the Summer Girls, an eerie silence was hanging in the air.

‘Joo Seo-yeon?’

Rabin swallowed hard as she looked at the girl in front of her.

Of course, she knew who it was.

She was the actress who appeared in Dream Future alongside Cha Na-hee.

‘The one from The Chaser.’

Moreover, she was the actress who played the murderer in the recent film The Chaser, which had just hit ten million viewers.

Thanks to that, she had skyrocketed to stardom and had joined the current trending competition.

‘Why is she with Cha Na-hee?’

Cha Na-hee was undeniably the most popular girl in the Summer Girls.

But in their eyes, Cha Na-hee was just a boring person.

They couldn’t understand why the public adored someone who had no real strengths besides being pretty and singing decently.

Now that boring Cha Na-hee brought over Joo Seo-yeon as a guest.

‘No, wait. What am I worried about? Joo Seo-yeon is just a rookie too.’

Even though she had a childhood acting history, she had been absent for 10 years.

Essentially a rookie.

If they considered the time spent in the entertainment industry, the Summer Girls had been active longer.

What good was it to be intimidated by someone like her?

“….”

As Seo-yeon stared at them, Rabin swallowed again.

That girl looked frighteningly fierce.

With her dry gaze, she resembled a doll, coming off quite inhuman.

‘B-but.’

There was no way she could just let herself be dominated like this.

“Oh, um. You’re cute.”

“Are you a high school student?”

“You must be having a hard time, but I admire you~.”

As Rabin broke the ice, the Summer Girls chimed in with similar comments.

Here, the remark of being “cute” was their way of establishing a superior-inferior relationship with her.

In other words, it was a strong appeal that proclaimed, “I can call you cute.”

“….”

Seo-yeon silently stared at them.

The Summer Girls who were once so chatty fell silent in her calm gaze.

It felt as if they were mice staring down a snake.

‘This, this energy is no joke, sis.’

‘Then, go ahead and challenge her.’

Their eyes exchanged thoughts like that.

Meanwhile, unlike them, Seo-yeon thought to herself.

‘…Compliments from strangers are a bit embarrassing after all.’

It was merely a sense of awkwardness.

After all, it was the first time an idol had called her cute.

Should she have worn something other than a school uniform?

But changing clothes sounded too bothersome.

‘By the way.’

Looking at the awkwardly frozen Summer Girls, Seo-yeon tilted her head.

‘Na-hee unnie said it might be hard to chat, but…’

Maybe these girls were also shy like her.

Thinking so, Seo-yeon subtly nodded.

Doesn’t that mean she should take the lead in this somewhat active situation?

“I came here to learn singing from Na-hee unnie.”

Learning to sing.

At those words, the Summer Girls narrowed their eyes.

An actress singing?

“Um, then. I’ll borrow the practice room a bit. I’ve already gotten permission from the president.”

Na-hee sighed inwardly at their reactions.

While shooting the drama together, she had realized that Seo-yeon was genuinely a soft-hearted person.

In this ruthless entertainment industry, she worried about how Seo-yeon would cope because of her incredibly gentle nature.

If she were any kind of breed, you’d think of a Pomeranian or a Retriever.

So she was already worried about what kind of trouble Seo-yeon would end up in among these fierce, strong-willed members.

‘At least since her impression is strong, they won’t mess with her easily.’

Seo-yeon didn’t show much emotional fluctuation.

When gazed upon quietly, people generally flinched or found it hard to approach her.

And she also had that actor’s unique aura, right?

‘Plus, even her manager…’

There had been many worries since they brought her into the agency.

First and foremost.

“Seo-yeon, come here, and we’ll treat you well. You signed with Nova Entertainment not long ago, right? So, you can switch agencies now.”

An actor from their team approached and began to speak subtly.

Even the manager had hinted that Hoyeon Studio was better than Nova Entertainment.

‘…What on earth are they doing?’

While she knew Hoyeon was struggling lately, wasn’t this quite rude?

Cha Na-hee was already blushing out of embarrassment at this awkward situation.

“Anyway, let’s go.”

With that, Cha Na-hee led Seo-yeon towards the practice room.

Since Hoyeon was an idol-specialized agency, the facilities were definitely better than those at Nova.

They had way more sound equipment and proper installations.

Of course, they didn’t have much use in a regular vocal training session.

Thus began the training with the members sitting at a distance.

Surprisingly, Cha Na-hee turned strict once the training started.

“…You’re definitely lacking in technical skills.”

Cha Na-hee was among the idols known for her good singing.

So she frowned at Seo-yeon’s unaccompanied singing.

“It seems like you can express emotions in lyrics pretty well… is it because you’re an actress?”

With Cha Na-hee’s words, Seo-yeon awkwardly smiled.

‘It’s actually been a problem that I can’t convey emotions in singing.’

In truth, Seo-yeon’s singing skills were fairly okay.

Sure, that was only by karaoke standards.

But because her singing lacked emotion, it became something hard to describe.

‘Now it’s reversed.’

She realized just how much adjustment had been done to her singing in Dream Future.

No wonder viewers accepted the storyline of ‘Joo Ha-rin’ dropping out and ‘Song So-ha’ rising so readily.

Objectively, Song So-ha had far surpassed Joo Ha-rin in the idol’s skill level.

“First off, Seo-yeon, you have a nice voice, so it’s best to make the most of it…”

And thus began Cha Na-hee’s singing lessons.

‘Head voice? Chest voice?’

Various terms whizzed past Seo-yeon’s ears.

Thinking back, she remembered hearing similar words during her time at the voice acting academy with Han Da-young.

Of course, that time, since Da-young knew Seo-yeon generally wouldn’t understand, she phrased everything in a very simplified manner.

“Let’s give it a try.”

“Sure.”

Cha Na-hee was unforgiving in her training.

Of course, Seo-yeon didn’t mind at all.

Given her immense stamina, she would never tire out no matter how much she sang.

Watching Seo-yeon, Cha Na-hee was secretly amazed.

‘She’s got a great voice and good stamina.’

As a result, the more they practiced, the stronger her performance became.

It seemed like the person who taught her initially had done a thorough job of building a foundation.

She was just someone who couldn’t express her learned knowledge when needed.

‘She seemed to perform even better when acting than now.’

During the shoot of the 14th chapter, Seo-yeon had showcased an overwhelmingly greater performance than Cha Na-hee.

That made Cha Na-hee’s pride as an idol take a hit.

‘What an innate talent.’

Seo-yeon was nothing less than a manifestation of talent itself.

“Think of singing as a kind of acting.”

Cha Na-hee explained to Seo-yeon, who was staring at her intently.

“The more you immerse yourself in the lyrics and understand them, the better your song will be. Just like how you focus on the dialogue when you act.”

If she could do that routinely, her singing would improve immensely.

‘The person who asked Seo-yeon to sing the OST probably didn’t have high expectations in the first place.’

After all, she was an actress, right?

Just nailing it without flubs would earn compliments.

They probably chose a song where the difficulty wasn’t very high, too.

However, Cha Na-hee couldn’t settle for that.

After all, she had seen Seo-yeon’s talent during the 14th chapter.

“Oh, wow, it’s already this time? Take a quick break. I need to attend to something.”

After some time passed, Cha Na-hee recalled the idol planning team’s head had summoned her.

It sounded like it was about the upcoming activities of the Summer Girls.

Probably due to Cha Na-hee’s rising popularity from Dream Future, they had additional things planned.

“Hah.”

A bit tired, but having popularity was always better than not.

While thinking that, as she walked out of the practice room, she spotted.

‘It seems Hoyeon’s situation isn’t as good as I thought.’

She recalled that Hoyeon had been around for a long time.

But it was an agency known for many incidents.

They were known to dismantle without hesitation if things weren’t profitable and there had been excessive favoritism controversies.

It was likely that favoritism’s target was clear…

“Huh? All alone?”

Suddenly, she spotted people heading toward Seo-yeon.

It was the Summer Girls members who had retreated earlier.

They were all slim and had decent appearances, but they weren’t particularly distinguished compared to other idols.

The outstanding one was Cha Na-hee’s case.

“What about Na-hee?”

“She went out for a bit.”

“Oh really?”

Rabin chuckled at Seo-yeon’s words.

“Well, look, you’re still the star here.”

With that muttering, Seo-yeon squinted her eyes.

Thinking back, she recalled the rumors about the Summer Girls’ disbandment.

“I couldn’t really talk earlier because of her. What was she so flustered about?”

“Clearly, she didn’t want to share the spotlight, did she?”

“Seo-yeon, right? What do you like to do?”

The Summer Girls members started chatting amongst themselves, tossing questions at her.

Some of them were rude inquiries, like asking about her specialties or what she excels at.

At that, Seo-yeon gently smiled.

“I’m good at magic.”

“……Magic?”

“Do you have a coin?”

At Seo-yeon’s question, the members looked at each other.

A coin? They actually had one.

It was surprising to hear that she was good at magic, but it wasn’t uncommon for an entertainer to have such a hobby…

“Here.”

As Rabin quickly handed over a 500 won coin, Seo-yeon accepted it and stated, “From now on, I’m going to turn this into 250 won.”

“250 won?”

How on earth could she turn 500 won into 250 won?

As they stared at her, Seo-yeon held the 500 won bill in her right hand and pressed it with her thumb and index finger.

As a result, the 500 won folded in half.

“? ”

The Summer Girls stared blankly at the scene before them.

And then, turning their heads awkwardly, they saw Seo-yeon smiling brightly.

With her red eyes.

Those calm, red eyes staring at them didn’t seem to hold any smile.

“Isn’t it amazing?”

If you don’t want to be folded in half, better behave yourself.

That was essentially the meaning she conveyed.

Seo-yeon was feeling quite ill-tempered at that moment.

Anger.

This was also an emotion quite unfamiliar to Seo-yeon.

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