ㅤ ▎ ❶ ﹕ TRIGGER WARNINGS.
Consistent mentions of suicide throughout the chapter ❪ specifically in the scenes before, after and in the middle of the tracklist ❫. Proceed at your own risk.

Flash warning for the "SPIRIT FESTIVAL" and "OPERATION EGO" videos.

ㅤ ▎ ❷ ﹕ LATEST UPDATE.
MAY 11, 2025. Minor correction in the "rateyourmusic.com" and "DID YOU KNOW?" sections.

ㅤ ▎ ❸ ﹕ ADDITIONAL NOTES.
Some of the videos in this chapter may be unavailable to users currently residing in Belarus and Russia due to copyright issues. Genre classifications may also be inaccurate.

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メタフィクション
❪ METAFICTION ❫

┃ ⓵ ﹒﹒ BACKGROUND.

　 METAFICTION was first conceived by HUIJUN back in his days as an AUTOMATA member under SIGMA Corp., around 2021 or 2022. The project's overall production was much more somber, greatly reflecting his mental state at the time: as revealed after the lawsuit against his original label ─ the only reason he'd ever reveal anything as personal ─ HUIJUN himself was actively suicidal at the time, confirmed again in his producer notes in the album. Providing an ultimately nihilistic point of view, the original project was eventually scrapped and a huge majority of the initial tracklist has effectively become lost media ─ with the exception of the track that would later become "SPIRIT FESTIVAL".

　 It isn't until HANNAH casually finds some files in the group's shared computer that the idea of METAFICTION as a group project comes to mind; she asks HUIJUN whether he'd be down to work on it with her, fascinated by the intricacies of the concept and the storyline that ties the tracks together, but also fully convinced it can be further polished and improved. HUIJUN accepts as HANNAH persuades him, and after getting the approval for their initial idea, the two are appointed as the album's creative directors.

　 The release, originally slated for August 2024 ❪ as hinted by the title track "SPIRIT FESTIVAL" ❫ and meant as a full group album, was later replaced by the single album 蝶 (Chō) and its related movie Metamorphosis due to contrasting individual schedules; it was eventually recorded between November 2024 and January 2025 by seven members deemed the most fitting following the new system that would allow smaller rotational lineups rather than trying to fit all twelve members together.

┃ ⓶ ﹒﹒ ALBUM DETAILS.

TYPE ﹕ Studio album.
RELEASE ﹕ March 1, 2025.
FORMAT ﹕ CD, download, streaming.
RECORDED ﹕ 2024-2025.
GENRE(s) ﹕ J-Pop, House.
LENGTH ﹕ 34:08.

┃ ⓷ ﹒﹒ STANDARD ALBUM INCLUSIONS.

CD-R.
DVD ❪ full movie ❫.
Photobook ❪ 2 versions ❫.
Lyrics book.
Photocards ❪ 2 out of 7 ❫.
+ Additional pre-order benefit.

┃ ⓸ ﹒﹒ TRACKLIST.

①　 メタフィクション ─ 4:33
②　 OBSESSION ─ 3:18
③　 Go to the Moon ─ 3:18
④　 Classic ─ 3:32
⑤　 SPIRIT FESTIVAL ─ 3:42
⑥　 WANNA DANCE ─ 4:22
⑦　 Shady ─ 3:34
⑧　 FOCUS ON ME ─ 3:38
⑨　 OPERATION EGO ─ 2:46
⑩　 Beginning of the End ─ 1:21

────────────────────────

One look at the road, one look at the sky.

Hayato looks around himself, his breath low as he's just stopped running. The sight of the city right in front of his eyes overwhelms him with its colors, the bright lights of the nightlife attractions calling for him to come closer ─ and so he does.

His hands are on the railing, the one line that holds him back from his dreams of eternal peace. Hayato is more than sure now: if he puts his heart to it, everything is possible, even if it takes a leap of faith.

▎ ??? ﹕ Who said you could kill yourself now of all times, Miyajima-san?

Hayato freezes on the spot: he's so shocked he forgets he wanted to die.

▎ HAYATO ﹕ Who's there?

▎ ??? ﹕ It is I, your creator.

I look at Hayato from afar, waiting for him to turn my way and question the validity of my statement ─ but he never does, and he forgets why he was there to begin with.

One look at the road, one look at the sky.

I realize too late that, against my will as the author, Miyajima Hayato has finally gained sentience.

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ INTRO: メタフィクション.

COMPOSITION: HUIJUN, HANNAH.
ARRANGEMENT: HUIJUN, HANNAH.

An instrumental tech house introduction meant to set the tone for the next tracks, as the name implies. From Huijun's producer notes: ❛ メタフィクション is less of a serious track and more of a production experiment between me and HANNAH; we worked on it without any specifics in mind, only the general vibe of the album. ❜

https://youtu.be/ket0cYpTFZA

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK TWO: OBSESSION.

LYRICS: Kanata Okajima, HUIJUN.
COMPOSITION: Maika Loubté, HUIJUN, HANNAH.
ARRANGEMENT: HUIJUN, HANNAH.

A tech house track written around the idea of "free will". Within the context of the release, it is an anticipation of the characters gaining sentience and become aware of their status as fictional entities, with a consequent attempt at subverting the roles; more broadly speaking, the song aims at motivating people to just follow their own path without minding others' judgement.

https://youtu.be/SPsB0EG8CRo

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK THREE: Go to the Moon.

LYRICS: KushitaMine.
COMPOSITION: KushitaMine, HUIJUN, HANNAH.
ARRANGEMENT: KushitaMine, HUIJUN, HANNAH.

A blend of ska and Shimokita-kei focused on the idea of "ambition". From Hannah's producer notes: ❛ Don't be afraid to aim for great things ─ you could even aim for the Moon if you wanted to! Often times we are our greatest enemies, immediately thinking we'll never succeed, but it is only by believing in ourselves that we can take the first step and find out what we're truly capable of. ❜

https://youtu.be/TPUBjW6OIhY

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK FOUR: Classic.

LYRICS: Kanata Okajima, KYUHYUNG, HANNAH.
COMPOSITION: Ryan S. Jhun, HUIJUN, HANNAH, OSCAR.
ARRANGEMENT: Ryan S. Jhun, HUIJUN, HANNAH, OSCAR.

An electropop track with subtle house influences. On a similar wavelength as "OBSESSION" and "Go to the Moon", even while adding a romantic subtone to its lyrics, "Classic" is a way for both the characters and the performing members to affirm the importance of being your most authentic self and believing in your own worth.

https://youtu.be/JUAnHF18BcU

────────────────────────

[...]

Trains keep passing by, but Hayato never gets in any of them: all he does is stare at the railway with glassy eyes from a distance, waiting for a miracle to happen.

▎ ??? ﹕ Isn't that what you are doing, Yasuhara-san?

▎ FUMIYA ﹕ It'd be a wrong assumption on your part, Kanzaki-san. Do not interrupt my narration over your incorrect observations.

▎ YUKI ﹕ You sure? I know you pretty well by now: all you're doing is waiting for someone to drive you insane and push you to the edge, just so you can finally find the courage to die you wouldn't have otherwis─ GET BACK HERE. 

She is right.

I'm just a pathetic human being with no strength to die and even less to live, barely existing as I watch the world change in front of me. To lie down here and wait for the train to pass by is nothing but an idiot's playful rebellion against a monotonous existence.

▎ YUKI ﹕ Get the FUCK away from there, I said!

I should oppose her and just die already, I think, but I'm not given the choice: she pulls me away from the rails as quickly as she can. As strangers hurriedly surround us, suffocating me with their stares and idiotic gestures, I can hear my own creation's first declaration of freedom, his voice firm as he prepares himself to get on the last train.

▎ HAYATO ﹕ Maybe there is some hope for me. Maybe death isn't the only answer.

▎ FUMIYA ﹕ There's no hope, Hayato; hurry up and die now.

▎ HAYATO ﹕ And why would I do that?

▎ FUMIYA ﹕ Because I said so.

▎ HAYATO ﹕ And why would you say that?

▎ FUMIYA ﹕ Because I need you to die in order to move on.

Hayato gets in the last train, not looking back ─ not even for a second.

I realize too late that, against my will as the author, Miyajima Hayato has finally defied his creator.

────────────────────────

┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK FIVE: SPIRIT FESTIVAL.

LYRICS: HUIJUN, Shinichi Osawa ❪ MONDO GROSSO ❫.
COMPOSITION: HUIJUN, Shinichi Osawa ❪ MONDO GROSSO ❫, HANNAH.
ARRANGEMENT: Shinichi Osawa ❪ MONDO GROSSO ❫, HUIJUN, HANNAH.

An ambient house track with a heavy deep house influence. It is the centerpiece of the entire album and the only track that survived HUIJUN's initial choice to throw away all tracks. The lyrics heavily reference Obon, the Japanese Buddhist custom to honor the spirits of one's ancestors ❪ also observed in other East Asian countries around the same time of the year ❫; it is believed that during this time of the year, around August or early September, spirits have a stronger connection with the tangible world.

https://youtu.be/zrb9kAOhffU

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK SIX: WANNA DANCE.

LYRICS: Shinichi Osawa ❪ MONDO GROSSO ❫.
COMPOSITION: Shinichi Osawa ❪ MONDO GROSSO ❫, HUIJUN, HANNAH.
ARRANGEMENT: Shinichi Osawa ❪ MONDO GROSSO ❫, HUIJUN, HANNAH.

A dance-pop track with various disco and house influences. Even while presenting thematic similarities with the previous tracks, the song represents a major turning point in the story: while it was previously established that the characters are sentient beings with their own aspirations, "WANNA DANCE" acknowledges that they're ultimately stuck in the same routines and not as independent as they first thought. Despite the nature of the discovery, however, the song maintains a playful tone and a positive attitude.

https://youtu.be/mrEMLOPSANo

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK SEVEN: Shady.

LYRICS: HUIJUN, KYUHYUNG.
COMPOSITION: Hidden Sound ❪ HSND ❫, HUIJUN, HANNAH, OSCAR.
ARRANGEMENT: HUIJUN, HANNAH, OSCAR.

A standard deep house track. "Shady" doesn't follow a coherent line of thought with its lyrics, apparently disconnecting itself from the storyline of the album; looking into it more attentively, however, it once again reconnects to the idea of following your own path even at the cost of making mistakes ❪ which can be fixed later on ❫. From Huijun's producer notes: ❛ We worked on Shady keeping in mind our audience until this point, who might not be used to the harsher sounds of the other tracks; this will definitely allow them to connect better with the album and our message. ❜

https://youtu.be/9GWP4ngjrkY

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK EIGHT: FOCUS ON ME.

LYRICS: HUIJUN.
COMPOSITION: OSCAR, HUIJUN, HANNAH, OLNL.
ARRANGEMENT: OSCAR, HUIJUN, HANNAH.

A much more laid-back alternative R&B track with EDM influences. Originally produced with Oscar for another niveau seuil project that never started, Huijun decided to incorporate this track in METAFICTION after translating the lyrics from Korean to Japanese. Much like "Shady", it isn't really meant to expand on the storyline but rather to allow the audience to better connect with the album on a musical level.

https://youtu.be/8sz8l4IEto8

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ TRACK NINE: OPERATION EGO.

LYRICS: 32ki.
COMPOSITION: 32ki, HUIJUN, HANNAH.
ARRANGEMENT: 32ki, HUIJUN, HANNAH.

A harsh electro-industrial track. "OPERATION EGO" completely nullifies all the positive affirmations, whether subtle or more direct, expressed in the previous tracks, dooming the characters to a dreadful existence as the author mercilessly controls them with the power of his writing; ironically enough, however, Fumiya himself becomes victim of his system and realizes that he, too, is a character in the hands of a superior entity who can dispose of him as they please.

https://youtu.be/_cv_tgkolsQ

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┃ 🎧 ﹒﹒ OUTRO: Beginning of the End.

COMPOSITION: HUIJUN, HANNAH.
ARRANGEMENT: HUIJUN, HANNAH.

An acid techno outro featuring breakbeats. Similarly to the introduction, it is meant to contribute to the general atmosphere of the album and the movie.

https://youtu.be/5gimg36Bsuk

────────────────────────

[...]

▎ HARUNA ﹕ What a sad ending.

▎ YUKI ﹕ Isn't it? Who would've thought he'd do that...

Yuki did, in fact, predict Hayato would take his own life: it was written in his destiny, after all. The two women sigh, looking at the corpse once again. He lies in a pool of his own blood under the unperturbed looks of the other passengers, almost as if nothing had ever happened in the first place.

▎ YUKI ﹕ Oh, well... Looks like we've reached our stop. See you, Mochizuki-san.

▎ HARUNA ﹕ May we meet again soon, Kanzaki-san.

Yuki gets off the train, carrying Fumiya's lifeless body on her back; weirdly enough, from Haruna's point of view, the scene is quite comforting.

[...]

▎ HARUNA ﹕ Humans sure are interesting, huh?

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┃ ⓹ ﹒﹒ ON RATEYOURMUSIC.

▎ ARTIST ﹕ niveau seuil
▎ TYPE ﹕ Album
▎ RELEASED ﹕ 1 March 2025
▎ RYM RATING ﹕ 3.45 / 5.0 from 184 ratings
▎ GENRES ﹕ J-Pop, Pop, House; Techno, Deep House
▎ DESCRIPTORS ﹕ futuristic, concept album, male vocalist, female vocalist, mechanical, space, alienation, manic
▎ LANGUAGES ﹕ Japanese, English

▎ RATING DISTRIBUTION.

━ 　 5.0 ﹕ 10 ❪ 05.4% ❫
━ 　 4.5 ﹕ 25 ❪ 13.6% ❫
━ 　 4.0 ﹕ 40 ❪ 21.7% ❫
━ 　 3.5 ﹕ 42 ❪ 22.8% ❫
━ 　 3.0 ﹕ 32 ❪ 17.4% ❫
━ 　 2.5 ﹕ 17 ❪ 09.2% ❫
━ 　 2.0 ﹕ 07 ❪ 03.8% ❫
━ 　 1.5 ﹕ 06 ❪ 03.3% ❫
━ 　 1.0 ﹕ 04 ❪ 02.2% ❫
━ 　 0.5 ﹕ 01 ❪ 00.5% ❫

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┃ ⓺ ﹒﹒ ALBUM INCLUSIONS.

━ 　 PHOTOCARDS ❪ screenshot twice ❫.

Which photocards did you get?

────────────────────────

━ 　 PRE-ORDER BENEFIT ﹕ USB FLASH DRIVE ❪ screenshot once ❫.

Which USB drive did you get?

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┃ ⓻ ﹒﹒ DID YOU KNOW?

━ 　 メタフィクション is niveau seuil's third release to feature a track produced by KushitaMine, the first one being the digital single "P-P-P-PERO" and the second being "MANIA ~ overdose of love" in the group's first single album 蝶.

━ 　 Oscar was originally supposed to take part to the album, but he eventually got replaced by Taeyang due to having overlapping schedules at the time.

━ 　 The script is heavily inspired by a collection of diary pages Huijun wrote during an intense psychotic episode back in the days he was under SIGMA Corp., which explains... A lot. 

　・ Despite being voiced by him, Fumiya is not Huijun, but the final expression of his hallucinations at the time;

　・ Huijun is represented by Hayato instead: while his rebellion against Fumiya symbolizes his attempts to get better, his death stands for what at the time was his final resignation.

━ 　 Despite the origins of the script, the other niveau seuil members confirmed many of its broader themes resonate with them all; notably, most of them seem to like "Go to the Moon" and "WANNA DANCE" because of their positive affirmations.

━ 　 After being shown the script by Huijun for the first time, Kyuhyung has revoked his rights to take the train on his own ❪ Huijun himself doesn't really mind, though ❫.

━ 　 Kyuhyung wrote his own raps in both "Classic" and "Shady"; for the former in particular, the line "Him and I walk the line, line" caused quite the reactions on social media. Congratulations on the coming out, I guess! #BisexualKing

━ 　 With the final BPM being 200, the verses in "OPERATION EGO" were first recorded in BPM 170 and sped up through editing.

━ 　 The content of each USB drive was chosen by the members themselves. Kyuhyung confirmed that the USB drives will be a recurrent pre-order benefit for each release.

━ 　 ORIGINAL SONGS ﹕ 𝐈. Subject, 80KIDZ; 𝐈𝐈. Obsession, ExWhyZ; 𝐈𝐈𝐈. Go to the Moon, Genin wa Jibun ni Aru.; 𝐈𝐕. Classic, IVE; 𝐕. Shadow Dance, Hikari Mitsushima; 𝐕𝐈. Wanna Dance, ExWhyZ; 𝐕𝐈𝐈. Shady, ORβIT; 𝐕𝐈𝐈𝐈. Focus on Me, JUS2 (Japanese ver.); 𝐈𝐗. Operation Ego, Genin wa Jibun ni Aru.; 𝐗. Dresscode, ExWhyZ.

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𓍢ִ໋🫀⃝FEVEN's Notes ◌ ◌ ◌ AT LAST IT'S OUT... Nearly 3000 words... This was scheduled for April 1, but I got very impatient and so... Ta-da! Here we are! Let's take some time to comment on a few things, shall we? ❪ And as usual, if you notice any mistake, no you Don't. I write this stuff at 3:00 AM I can't be held accountable for what I write at that time of the day. 😇 ❫

First of all, METAFICTION does, in fact, exist as a draft in my Google Docs... And Huijun wasn't the only one having a psychotic episode while writing! Haha! So if it sounds like pure nonsense, it's because it kinda is in nature... It's more of an emotional outlet than a coherent story after all. (⁠╥⁠﹏⁠╥⁠) The full piece might be released some day, though. Who knows!

Secondly, no succulent was mistreated, I promise 🙏🏽 I don't think it'd be Kyuhyung's idea either... I don't know... Haha...

Succulents aside, the USB drive inclusion was so much fun to work on! I feel like this kind of content makes the members easier to connect to, especially considering their image as a group being quite... Dark? Oh well. I will come up with funnier ideas for the next releases... Hehe... 😇

I forgot what else I wanted to say EHM. Today was a crazy day and I haven't slept well at all... On top of being slaved around while injured... Right now I'm only looking for comfort and appreciation so, as usual, please comment on this chapter as if your life depends on it... That would make me feel better... Thank you... ❤️ 

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┃ ⓼ ﹒﹒ Credits.

━ 　 LINE DISTRIBUTION VIDEOS: RUNE.

₊˚ ‿︵‿︵‿︵୨୧ · · ♡ · · ୨୧‿︵‿︵‿︵ ˚₊

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