“Woo-. The late one’s here!”
“Our glorious senior is already here and you dare show up twenty minutes before we start?”
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”
“This little bastard.”
Everyone except looked close with each other. Criticism rained down on the voice actor who had entered last through the door. I quietly looked around the interior.
Back during 〈No Interest Whatsoever〉 and 〈Youth Disqualified!〉, narration had been recorded separately too, but this felt different.
The space behind the glass window was far bigger, and even the microphones were different.
It felt as though the room itself was saying: this is what real dubbing looks like.
“Then before we start recording! Shall we all introduce ourselves first?”
The self-content production team holding caras spoke up. As always, the protagonist got the first opportunity.
“Hello-. I’m Joy from ! Jeon Ujeong. Everyone, are you ready to et the rabbit diva?”
As expected from a veteran voice actor, she was different.
She introduced herself in her natural voice first, then imdiately switched into the lively voice of rabbit Joy.
“Hellooo-. I’m the trendiest trendsetter of this era, the perfect CEO of . Richard! Wanna beco a singer? Then co to ! I’ll make you amaaaazing!”
Next ca Richard the tiger, who had the second-largest role after Joy. His booming voice echoed through the recording studio.
‘That projection is insane....’
I’d thought I’d spent quite a long ti in theater, but this was the first ti I’d t soone with this kind of volu. And every syllable landed perfectly.
“Hiiii-. I’m Kim Seongeun, the greatest black panther musician of this era. Everybo~dy~. If you want to hear my songs, you’ll have to watch , okay? Woo~.”
Starting with Richard, all the other voice actors focused entirely on imrsing themselves in their characters. As [N O V E L I G H T] if they wanted to introduce the characters more than themselves.
‘Their nas will probably appear in subtitles anyway....’
And if soone had even the slightest interest in voice acting, they’d probably heard these nas before at least once. The lineup was stacked.
All eyes turned toward .
Finally.
At last, it was my turn.
‘If everyone else is speaking through their characters instead of their own nas, then I should too.’
I walked toward the wall being used as the filming background and briefly cleared my throat.
Then I opened my mouth toward the cara in front of .
“Unni! Unni! I’m Lala. I’m in , so you haaaave to co watch it, okay?”
For a mont, the sa silence from earlier settled over the room.
‘But this ti it’s different.’
I could feel it.
Those weren’t rejecting gazes anymore.
“Wow! You’re pretty good?”
Richard the tiger burst into hearty laughter. Right. This expression, this atmosphere—I knew it well.
“She’s good. Really does sound like a squirrel.”
“Seriously? She’s adorable!”
It was the uncompromising kind of approval that could only be felt on-site.
* * *
Now that the introduction shots were done, it was ti to record.
I stood in front of a silver condenser microphone that ca up to chest level. The pop screen filtering out plosive sounds looked unusually dense.
I placed my script on the stand in front of .
Inside the recording booth right now were , Joy the lead character, and veteran voice actors playing the panther, tiger, zebra, penguin, and others.
They would record several scenes like this first for the recording-site video that JC ENM and Disney planned to release as original content, then afterward move on to solo recordings.
‘Today I need to get as many usable shots as possible.’
Since my role was small, today’s recording would be all I had.
“Aren’t you nervous? Though I guess after how well you did earlier, maybe you aren’t?”
The voice actor playing the villain tiger asked . I answered honestly.
“No.... I’m extrely nervous....”
The voice actors around stopped halfway through putting on their headphones and laughed.
Good. Even I thought that sounded cute.
This scene involved Joy and her flying squirrel younger siblings Lulu, Lala, Kiki, and Pipi together. Except for Lala, the other siblings didn’t have many lines, so apparently one person was voicing two roles.
‘Everyone here except is a veteran.’
I absolutely couldn’t ss up. If problems started because of , there would be complaints from the beginning. The second I slipped up, both the recording and filming would need to be redone.
I rembered Professor Geum Bitgang’s teachings.
Strength filled my lower abdon.
“We’ll begin now. Please let us know when you’re ready.”
My eyes t the audio director’s through the glass window, his headset already on. Then I spotted Team Leader Seong filming my self-content.
“Ready?”
The voice actor playing Joy beside asked. Her tone was slightly prickly.
“Yes. I’m ready.”
After giving a quick once-over, she faced forward and nodded toward the audio director.
“00:18. Joy and siblings scene, starting.”
The animation began playing on the large screen in front of us.
The peaceful green scenery of Sweet Town appeared before rapidly zooming inward. A two-story wooden cabin ca into view.
[Joy’s House]
Above it was a sign.
[ Lulu Lala Kiki Pipi and our beloved mom and dad our family ho!]
The handwriting was extrely crooked. Since all the siblings had apparently written it together, every letter looked different.
In the yard, the father mowed the lawn while inside the house the mother baked carrot pie in the kitchen. Then the cara naturally moved up to the second floor.
[Absolutely
DO NOT ENTER!!!]
A terrifying warning sign hung on Joy’s bedroom door. Joy lay asleep wearing an eye mask.
This was where it started.
“Unni!”
“Unniunniunn-ni!”
“Un~ni~!”
The bedroom door burst open and the flying squirrel siblings rushed inside imdiately. It almost felt like I could hear the smack of their bodies landing.
‘My turn now.’
Lala, the last one to fly in, spoke as though pouring out her excitent all at once.
“Unniunniunni. What should we play today?”
I gave the words rhythm, lifting the ending sharply upward.
“How about an adventure to pick wild raspberries? Making the carrot jam you love sounds fun too! Or should we go to Mister Sam’s place and learn snail yo-yos?”
Then I delivered the lines quickly, almost as though fast-forwarded, while making sure none of the pronunciation got swallowed.
‘I deliberately lowered the final line by half a tone compared to my usual voice.’
To give the speech rhythm. Natural cadence ca not only from speed, but also from pitch.
“Yayyy, this is exciting!”
And lastly, to increase the volu for this part—
‘If you shout right after speaking in a high pitch, it sounds way too shrill.’
On screen, flying squirrel Lala wrapped herself tightly around her older sister’s face.
“....”
Joy, who had been lying still on the bed, suddenly shot upright. The other siblings tumbled right off the bed.
But Lala—only I remained attached to her sister’s face.
“Get ouuut!”
An overwhelming volu. The voice actor beside playing Joy shouted thunderously. Even Lala attached to her face got blown away.
Matching the timing, I cried out,
“Kyaaaah!”
* * *
Everyone was surprised by the unexpected situation.
The atmosphere outside the recording booth loosened considerably once they realized Han Yeoreum was far better than expected. They’d assud she’d be decent, but apparently hadn’t imagined she would surpass the standard this much.
“Yes. That last one, just slightly—half a beat faster. The ‘I’ll help you’ line, stretch out the ‘heeelp’ part a little more. Keep the tone the sa, just add a bit more speed.”
But there was one person who wasn’t surprised at all.
The sound director of .
At first, he’d reacted the sa as everyone else. The first thing he’d said upon hearing Han Yeoreum was joining Disney’s animation dubbing cast had been—
“Ugh.”
As soone who lived his entire life wearing headphones, his hearing was extrely sensitive. How many celebrities riding on fa had ruined dubbed versions over the years? Too many to count.
“I was wondering why they hadn’t shown up lately....”
It felt like the inevitable had finally arrived. For the past few years, thanks to several historically terrible celebrity dub disasters, the trend had moved away from using celebrities. But Han Yeoreum belonged to JC ENM.
“The whole ‘Disney personally requested her’ thing is obvious bullshit too. Seriously.”
To him, it was painfully obvious that Disney and JC ENM were pulling dia strings together.
“At least her role’s small, thank god.”
A character like Lala could probably be brushed off as rely cute. He’d seen a few clips from 〈The Great Garland〉 before. Han Yeoreum did have good projection.
Still grateful she wasn’t playing the lead, he turned on music. It was Shim Juhwan’s new song. Ever since release day he’d been replaying it nonstop, yet sohow never got tired of it.
“Oh, right....”
Han Yeoreum’s face appeared on the album cover beside Myeong Jeha. The sound director knew her appearance in Shim Juhwan’s new music video had beco a hot topic. He just hadn’t bothered watching it.
Because he was an otaku.
He wasn’t particularly interested in 3D.
Input: Shim Juhwan
But for so reason, now he wanted to see it.
Half impulse, half curiosity.
Before he knew it, he’d clicked on the video that had already surpassed five million views.
The scene transitions, the composition—everything was absurdly luxurious for a ballad singer’s music video. Knowing every second of footage cost a fortune, he listened even more intently to the sound.
And then—
-“...Why?”
Han Yeoreum’s voice rang out, and layered over it ca the instrunts and Shim Juhwan’s voice.
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