The Voice Work Where Confessing Your Love Gets You Screamed At

It's not quite the feeling of being "refreshed," but more like—after getting flushed and dizzy from all the passionate, sweet words in typical voice works—my head suddenly snapped back to sobriety. Even while fully understanding that the whole concept of this work is to experience heartbreak, it was a short story collection that vividly confronted me with reality. The other person treats you pleasantly enough—whether to avoid friction as a fellow member of the same community, or simply as part of a business relationship—and there are moments, depending on the situation, where you mistake that for being treated specially, or where they even end up looking wonderful to you. The romantic feelings that sprout from the accumulation of such exchanges get utterly crushed, without leaving even a shred of hope. It's almost refreshingly thorough. I listened in order from the beginning, and content-wise the office worker situation really hit me hard (in the sense that I feel like I'm causing someone trouble every day). In that short conversation, the inoffensive sense of distance, the roundabout reserve, the completely forced smile, and the atmosphere of wanting to end the conversation all came through vividly in the voice acting, making it more than clear there was no chance at all. The line "Is this something we need to talk about right now?" was the final blow, and personally, that kind of attitude might be even more painful than hearing a clear word of rejection. Little by little my heart grew cold, creaking and groaning, until it actually ached. So rough… As for the host and the idol, they probably have all sorts of feelings about it on a daily basis, but depending on their line of business, it's a world where drawing a clean line isn't easy—I found myself praying it wouldn't turn into some kind of incident down the line. For every single one of them, I listened with my heart pounding, waiting for the moment their true feelings would slip out from behind their public face. Being "dealt with" one after another was fairly painful, but even more than that, I got to enjoy performances full of the kind of insults and full-force disgust you don't normally get to hear. Thank you very much.

In every single pattern (track), I had to reflect on how conceited I'd been! Each story is under 10 minutes, but more than half of it is spent getting furiously yelled at!! The way the voice actor's tone and manner of speaking change... I got to hear lines you'd never normally hear (or say), and in a way it gave me chills. Thank you for such an interesting work! If I could ask for one more thing, I would have liked to hear a post-recording talk session.

You get thoroughly rejected by all 5 characters, but each one's genuine anger feels completely different, so they can crush your heart again and again—it was amazing. The senior coworker played by Mitsuhashi-san calmly and logically shoots you down, then at the very last moment unleashes an intense, menacing outburst of anger. The junior coworker played by Flat.-san teaches you that you're at the very bottom of the hierarchy. The host played by Sandan Aruta-san hammers into you the reality of being a broke, annoying customer, while the older step-brother played by Kusakabe Issa-san screams at you about how gross it is, unlike some step-sibling romance manga. The underground idol played by Kashimiya-san abandons you with a cold, composed response, the idol's calculatedly cute face completely gone—as expected of Trauma Bargain, the merciless, heart-gouging expression pushes your sanity past zero. You get hit with your exact weak points so precisely you think, "Can rejection really get this bad!?" and you let out a "guhhhh...", but gradually part of you starts waiting eagerly for the next torrent of abuse. It felt similar to that mix of excitement and anxiety on a roller coaster—like "here it comes, here it comes... IT'S HEEEERE!!"—as the insults hit. Even if you think you want to fix your flaws and start over to face them properly, you've already been completely rejected, so no matter how far you go it's just death!! destruction!!—it was so utterly hopeless that it was amazing! Thank you for opening a new door for me!!