I Want to Be a VTuber

Seo-yeon’s video of participating in the street event spread like wildfire.

It first blew up on YouTube Shorts and then snippets started circling through various communities.

– LOL what is she doing over there? LOL

– I didn’t know Joo Seo-yeon looked so cute like this.

– Is that Joo Seo-yeon’s sister? Ha, looks like the sister is just a lesser version of the older sister.

└ ???

It seemed like the younger sister wanted a toy, so she dragged Seo-yeon into it.

At first, there were lots of rumors that the event was a publicity stunt from the planning company or that it was manipulated.

– They could call in actors for promotional purposes, right?

– But honestly, doesn’t she look way too embarrassed for it to just be a publicity thing?

– For real, LOL I’ve never seen Joo Seo-yeon this embarrassed before.

Seo-yeon’s acting skills had been shown on broadcast several times.

During the filming of Dream Future, it was done externally, so many clips circulated.

Even back then, Seo-yeon never changed her expressions during embarrassing scenes.

But now, anyone could see the genuine embarrassment she conveyed.

In other words, the emotional expression Seo-yeon always relied on was now vividly showcasing her embarrassment.

– Su-yeon is just too cute! T___T

– I want a younger sister or daughter like Su-yeon.

– Me too… I heard my sister always gets the good roles because I always play the bad ones.

– Really?

– Yeah, the event manager even asked later. But she said she actually likes Zero-ro! LOL

Suddenly, the event managers were summoned back to headquarters to explain the whole situation.

The Magical Girl Harara production team quickly uploaded related videos to the company’s YouTube.

In just three days, this whole series of events unfolded.

It was literally in the blink of an eye.

“How about a toy commercial featuring Joo Seo-yeon and her sister?”

“Oh, I already contacted them beforehand.”

Seeing that they had reached out for a new ad so quickly shows how fast the trend has become.

Of course, the person who received the news…

“How about it, Seo-yeon? Since we did it once, can’t we do it again?!”

“…….”

While looking at the YouTube Shorts video trending towards 5 million views, Seo-yeon hung her head.

The much-desired image improvement.

She never thought it would come so anticlimactically.

“Image improvement isn’t something you can just aim for.”

Still, her steady efforts had indeed brought some improvement.

But it hadn’t been as dramatically positive as this.

Joo Seo-yeon as an actress still felt somewhat unfamiliar to the public.

She was strongly perceived as an actress specializing in villain roles.

No matter how much she played Joo Ha-rin in Dream Future, people tended to fixate on the most memorable roles regarding an actor’s image.

Of course, those who watched Dream Future first might remember Seo-yeon as the actress for Joo Ha-rin.

But still, Joo Ha-rin’s significance was…

“Thinking about it, she has played quite a few intense roles.”

Lee Yoo-joo, while not a murderer, also doesn’t give off a particularly benign vibe in her roles.

Despite that, Lee Yoo-joo’s popularity was quite high.

Since she portrayed a victim who was forced into education by her parents since childhood, with her consistently flawed display, viewers felt a blend of tension and worry as if she were a ticking time bomb.

“And on top of that, her personal abilities are outstanding.”

In the story, there were no characters stronger than Lee Yoo-joo.

However, despite her incredible abilities, she was still an incomplete protagonist.

Mainly on the mental front.

It was consistently mentioned throughout the plot that Lee Yoo-joo doesn’t have a particularly strong mental state.

“Anyway.”

Lee Yoo-joo is Lee Yoo-joo.

The issue lies with the current Magical Girl Harara.
Magical Girl Harara was facing a dilemma.

“How about it? If you do a toy advertisement, you’ll have a good image among moms!”

“But it’s a toy promotion?”

Magical Girl Harara, as I later found out, had so many transformation types that they jokingly called her “Bankrupt Girl Harara.”

Her popularity wasn’t just among little kids; even middle schoolers liked her.

Even the character designs were so good that there were adults who loved her.

“Come on, that’s just a joke.”

Is it?

But when it came down to it, she wasn’t the only one being offered the gig.

Her younger sister, Joo Su-yeon, got the same advertisement offer.

So when she returned home, she casually brought it up.

“I want to do it!!!!!”

With a shout nearly loud enough to make a “BANG!!” noise, Seo-yeon covered her ears.

Being strong and sensitive to sounds, Seo-yeon thought she might burst her eardrums from the sudden loud volume.

“I want to go on TV with my sister!!”

Of course, her eardrums weren’t so weak that they could break from this.

“Oh, did an advertisement come in for Suah?”

“Yeah, it seems that way.”

Suah was just laughing at the whole situation, finding it amusing.

‘Mom has actually turned down all the advertisement offers.’

She said she might die if she got recognized by people, so she refused them all.

But since Su-yeon kept saying she wanted to see her mom on TV, the possibility wasn’t entirely gone yet.

Suah was hesitating, appearing perplexed, but somehow it felt like they had to do at least one.

“This one got a good response, right? Just try it again. Seo-yeon liked stuff like this when she was younger.”

“Well, that’s true…”

At that moment, wouldn’t any girl naturally want to play with such toys?

In the beginning, she felt like that was exactly how she played with them.

Her parents probably thought it was weird if she didn’t.

‘But thinking back, I think I did like it.’

Back then, she couldn’t grasp her emotions well, so she didn’t know what feelings and thoughts she had for it.

But if she thought about playing with them alone, it felt like she ended up enjoying it quite a bit.

She just fooled herself with the obsession that she couldn’t look weird in others’ eyes.

“…But, what’s Mom doing?”

“Huh?”

Suah was currently organizing something with Su-yeon in the living room.

There were many old items among them.

Some related to Seo-yeon as well.

Things like clothes Seo-yeon wore when she was a child or toys.

And even older items.

Like old CDs or photo albums.

“I just thought of something while watching a variety show lately.”

These days, if she mentioned a variety show, it had to be about “Masked Singer.”

Suah wasn’t the type to watch a lot of variety shows anyway.

Recently, Suah had been showing a peculiar expression more often.

Sometimes staring off into space.

Or whimsically searching for “Masked Singer” related videos.

“What’s this CD?”

Seo-yeon pointed to a particularly eye-catching CD.

After all, CDs were almost a rarity nowadays, and it didn’t look like something you could buy in a store.

Seeing that, Suah smiled and said, “It’s a game CD.”

“A game CD?”

There wasn’t even a title on it!

“This is the very first game CD mom and dad made. Of course, their friends from the club helped out too.”

Ah, so this was that game.

Dad, Joo Young-bin, would boast about it all the time.

They won a big award at a competition with the game they made in high school.

And because of that experience, he got scouted by a game company.

That was the kind of statement that would pop out whenever he came home after drinking, so Seo-yeon had nearly memorized it by now.

“Do you want to try it? But now there’s no way to play a CD game.”
“I mean, there’s really no way to play CD games anymore.”

“That’s true.”

These days, computers don’t even have CD drives.

The only place you could see a CD like this is probably in console games.

“This is?”

“Oh, this is the album that got me tangled up with Dad back in high school.”

“Album? It has a cartoon name written on it?”

“Back then, they made albums like this by adding Korean songs to imported comics.”

“Not on public broadcasting, right?”

“That’s right, it was on cable broadcasting.”

Soo-ah laughed shyly as she said that.

“Back then, actually, Mom only knew the original Japanese OST for that cartoon… So when Dad said he liked the cartoon songs, I thought they were the originals. So I played him the Japanese songs… Er hem. Let’s just leave it at that.”

But later on, she learned from Young-bin that what he mentioned was actually the Korean remake of the OST.

“Mom used to be an otaku.”

Well, you could tell just by looking at the art style.

She didn’t particularly show it to Seo-yeon, though.

And since becoming an adult, it seemed like she didn’t really watch that kind of stuff anymore.

“A cartoon OST, huh.”

The song Soo-ah pointed at had a title that Seo-yeon somehow recognized.

It might be a classic that has been subtly remade and released on the market.

“You see, Mom dreamed of making games. In that sense, she fulfilled that dream back then.”

“Then why didn’t you go work at a company like Dad?”

“Because I wouldn’t be able to make what I want to make.”

Soo-ah said with a child’s smile.

“I’ve done freelance work as a programmer and helped your dad with planning… But that was all pretty unrelated to my dream.”

After all, with two daughters, she didn’t really have the luxury to work.

Soo-ah was the type who believed that children need their parents.

She believed in having plenty of conversations and spending time together.

“Of course, Dad was a bit different.”

He wanted to build his experience, increase his recognition.

Once the conditions were right, he hoped to become independent and finally achieve his childhood dreams.

“Mom asked me once.”

Feeling Seo-yeon’s gaze on her, Soo-ah continued.

“She said it seemed like Seo-yeon wanted to do something else when she was younger.”

“…Did it look like that?”

“You didn’t seem very interested in becoming an actress at all.”

If you kept watching Seo-yeon, you couldn’t help but notice.

Where her efforts were directed.

And what she was interested in.

Soo-ah couldn’t pinpoint that clearly, but she knew for sure that it wasn’t acting.

At least, not at first.

“I think you’re serious about acting now. It seems like you decided to become a ‘great actor’ right after the filming of The Moon That Hid the Sun.”

That’s right.

The moment Seo-yeon resolved to become a ‘great actor’ was around that time.

“But you haven’t given up on what you wanted to do before, right?”

“Well…”

She wanted to say no, but Seo-yeon struggled to articulate it.

She hadn’t really given up.

But it seemed like something was bothering her.

“Why did you start working so hard at acting in the first place?”

“…”

Soo-ah smiled at the quiet Seo-yeon.

“I think that’s definitely what’s making you hesitate.”

Seo-yeon, who was never the type to procrastinate.

She was the type to finish one thing before moving on to the next.

Seo-yeon was that kind of child.

“Your childhood dream that you absolutely must achieve.”
Of course, the one who should put an end to it wasn’t the ‘actor.’

Probably something else.

Suah clearly thought that Seo-yeon had something like that.

What exactly it was, even her mother didn’t know.

*

Even after Episode 6 of [Sky Garden] aired, the ratings didn’t change much.

The popularity was still leaning toward [Grand Game], and the community was still buzzing about that show.

However, from the point when Episode 4 of [Sky Garden] aired, the advertisement for Aids chairs had officially begun.

Episode 4 depicted the main characters, Lee Yoo-joo and Lee Min-seo, fervently preparing for their exams.

The chair they used while studying was an Aids chair.

– How’s the Aids chair? It looked nice watching [Sky Garden].

– I’m not sure about the previous models, but the kids’ version seems good.

Such conversations were quietly circulating.

No major issues had arisen yet.

Well, [Sky Garden] hadn’t gained that much hype just yet.

“Seo-yeon? Are you tired today?”

“Pardon?”

“Your acting seems a bit lacking today.”

Was it?

Seo-yeon tilted her head at Director Kim Il-soo’s words, but she thought it might be plausible.

“Take a break after today’s shoot. It will get tougher from the next filming.”

“Yes.”

Once they start filming Episode 10, there will be more outdoor shoots.

And from that point, Lee Yoo-joo will start to waver significantly.

It’s the starting point where the events truly begin to flow.

‘Childhood dreams…’

Seo-yeon returned home and watched [Sky Garden] from the beginning.

The character of Lee Yoo-joo felt extremely one-dimensional.

It wasn’t that Seo-yeon acted that way; the character was originally designed like that.

After all, Lee Yoo-joo’s mannerisms ultimately just mimic her father’s words.

Even if you deny it, the viewers know.

In the end, Lee Yoo-joo is just a character who behaves and speaks like her father.

A child who couldn’t even find what she wanted to do.

An immature kid.

That’s who Lee Yoo-joo is.

‘An actor.’

Perhaps, in the sense that everything started with their parents’ suggestions, Lee Yoo-joo and Joo Seo-yeon are similar characters.

They both chose this path based on that.

However, they are surely different.

Lee Yoo-joo did it because ‘there was nothing else.’

But Joo Seo-yeon had something else she wanted to do.

So, why did she think she had to be an actor first?

‘In fact, I vaguely know.’

The girl met this time, Han Yoo-na.

A girl with a name strikingly similar to her past self.

They differ in age and background.

Unlike herself, who received harsh education from her parents from a young age, Han Yoo-na was happy.

She had no emotional problems and was just a pretty and cute girl.

Seo-yeon didn’t feel any negative emotions about that.

She only thought it was a good thing.

However.

Thanks to this, she learned something.

What she had mentioned to Writer Min Se-hee this time was also part of that.

And what Seo-yeon wants to pursue moving forward.

Before realizing her childhood dreams, there’s something she must do.

‘Being an actor is the only channel of communication.’

Perhaps that was what she wanted to show.

No, it definitely was.

If she became a famous actor and a household name, her former parents would see her.

So…

“I messed up a bit in my acting as Lee Yoo-joo.”

After rewatching the drama several times, Seo-yeon realized.

All along, Seo-yeon felt a bit lacking while playing Lee Yoo-joo.

Only today did she feel she understood that.

In some sense, Lee Yoo-joo was clearly a character who resembled herself.

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