【All About Zentreya】- TTS, A New Model, And Redebut

The commander-turned-dragon-turned-cyborg Zentreya may have one of the most exciting paths to VTuber fame. While she is known today for using text-to-speech to communicate with her viewers, and as one of the first talents of the popular group VShojo, her beginnings are a bit more unconventional than most.

If you’d like to know more about her, read on!

Who is Zentreya?

Zentreya is an American VTuber who currently resides somewhere in the state of Texas. You wouldn’t think she’s from the United States at first glance because the synthesized voice she uses gives her a different accent.

She has been with VShojo since its inception in November 2020, making her debut alongside Nyatasha Nyanners, Apricot, Projekt Melody, Hime Hajime, Silvervale, and Ironmouse. Her origin story, though, dates all the way back to 2017.

Her Beginnings in… VRChat?

Zentreya first started out as a prolific member of the VRChat roleplaying community, with most of her early content coming from there. During her time in VRChat, she formed the group known as the A.L.A. or the “Anti-Lewd Army”. She was its leader until September 2020, when she announced its disbandment and her subsequent retirement from the community altogether. Her exploits are immortalized, and she is one of its most notable figures, with a wiki page highlighting her story and relationships. 

She created her own YouTube channel at the end of March 2017, then did her first ever Twitch stream at the end of November 2017. Her activity picked up significantly around the middle of 2018 due to her troubles with her job as a video producer, which caused her to stream more.

She also started uploading clips of her Twitch streams to her YouTube channel around this time. A whopping 51 percent of Zentreya’s stream hours from 2016–2018 were dedicated to VRChat, but she slowly branched out to other games. She didn’t originally think of herself as a VTuber; instead, she just happened to be a streamer who used a 3D avatar.

The Three Zens

Zentreya’s character has gone through three major iterations, and the lore surrounding it has swung wildly.

Zentreya As A Military Commander

In her first iteration, she was born into a wealthy family. Her father was a military general, and her mother was a doctor who put the needs of others above her own. However, she lost her mother to a disease when she was 7, and her father disappeared too. She tried joining the military on her father’s side but abandoned it after falling into a bottomless pit of loss and despair.

At her lowest, she pleaded for help and got an answer from a sinister presence, something that hadn’t awakened yet. She once again enlisted in the military with a newfound purpose, but she also grew to absolutely hate anything lewd. This development led to her being thrown out of the military due to being unfit for combat.

She began raising her own military power, with her cold and calculative nature proving effective. Even her own military personnel were executed for any signs of lewd behavior. This, along with her glowing red hair and blood-soaked clothes, earned Zentreya the nickname “Red Devil.” Seeing all the lewdness in VRChat to the point where she found herself doing lewd things, she decided to begin a crusade against it. Her forces were large enough at this point that she flew her own banner and formed the Anti-Lewd Army.

A Half-Human/Half-Dragon

Her military commander outfit, and backstory, would go through some updates until October 2020, when she debuted a new persona – a half-human/half-dragon sort-of rockstar. She kept the same persona when she re-debuted as part of VShojo.

The lore for this character was much simpler—as explained in her dragon lore video, she was a dragon lord who ruled the world and feared nothing. She stood atop the world, gathering wealth, power, fame, and glory. She had lived, fought, destroyed, rocked out, conquered, and taken whatever she wanted for 2700 years, yet she felt unsatisfied. Her heart felt empty, having not experienced any sort of warmth. She wanted to change, and change she did. A mysterious force from above turned her into a half-dragon living on Earth.

Zentreya As A Cyborg

Zen had her third rebrand in May 2022. Out went her half-dragon form, and in came a cyborg in a red body suit. Her lore would receive yet another dramatic overhaul with an equally dramatic video to match. Here, she was known as Project Zen, thrust into a world where machines and artificial intelligence took over the world and sent humans underground, driving them to near extinction.

Funnily enough, these machines were led by an alternate, evil version of Projekt Melody named Melware. Zen was the savior of humanity, working with the Professor, one of her creators, to deliver a hard drive that contained crucial data that could potentially take their world back.

The data was the last piece necessary for time travel. Zen was able to secure the hard drive despite Melware’s interference and deliver it to the doctor, also one of her creators.

She was sent back in time, to June 15, 2022, with the objective of saving humanity by stopping Melware from taking over the world. And so she joined VShojo, hoping to change the future. Conveniently, her cyborg persona fits better with the text-to-speech system she uses.

Zentreya The Person

Despite the multiple evolutions of her model and her lore, Zentreya’s personality has remained pretty much the same. Her VShojo profile describes her as someone who loves meeting new people despite being headstrong and having a tendency to yell at people. She also loves pranks and memes. 

She’s known to banter a lot, and there are frequent back-and-forth exchanges between her and her own chat, to the point where she is affectionately “bullied.” Her chat also loves to use voice clips and text-to-speech responses. The interactions had not changed when she went from military commander to dragon; you could say they got even wittier.

Back when she was still roleplaying in VRChat, the A.L.A. community she built thought of her as someone who had a cold, manipulative exterior but was actually warm-hearted.

She is known to be very affectionate towards her chat as well as her friends. Her strength and straightforwardness are also well-known among her peers. She’s not afraid to speak her mind and is very transparent with her viewers, even sharing a story of what happened to her mother and how that gives her a reason to stay strong.

Her initial lore alludes to her being against anything lewd, and in a sense, this has held up. While VShojo, in general, is unique for letting their talents do almost anything they want, Zen has always been consistent in the fact that she only occasionally says or does anything considered lewd.

A Unique “Voice”

A unique thing about Zentreya is how she speaks. Nowadays, people know she uses text-to-speech, but she didn’t always start out like that. Early on, Zen was a “mute streamer” in the sense that she streamed without using her voice. Her earlier streams were set up so that when she spoke, what she said would go through speech recognition software and be displayed as text on a speech bubble. It was in 2020 when she revealed her ability to speak through text-to-speech, crediting Com Dos with setting it up for her. It opened a new dimension to her interactions with chat. However, there was a bit of a misunderstanding regarding her newfound “voice,” with some people thinking she was actually mute.

Zentreya’s Apology Tweet

The confusion was cleared up once Zen posted a tweet addressing this:

“I need to make this clear, as I fear people have the wrong idea about me.

I’ve never claimed a disability.

I am not “Mute IRL.” I’m “Muted.” I would not and will not take advantage of a disability. I sincerely apologize for not clearing that up. And if you feel that I’ve wronged you or deceived you in this way, I’m truly sorry. I did hope to show that even without talking, you could do so much. I should have stated this sooner with my growth. It is my fault. I chose TTS in today’s times cause I’m absolutely scared of someone recognizing my voice. Of being stalked or Doxxed. I wanted to live my IRL life without fear of someone recognizing me.

I love what I do and making people laugh, but at the same time, people are also unpredictable.

I’m sorry if there’s been any confusion at all, and again, I wish I had stated earlier that what’s done is done. If you choose not to support me anymore, I understand, and I, by all means, wish you such an amazing life. Thank you for watching, and I will be going in a new direction with this.”

It’s completely understandable that she’d resort to text-to-speech as this allows her to talk to thousands of people without compromising her real-life identity. There is that one moment where she reveals her real voice for a bit by laughing in a Phasmophobia collaboration with Apricot (known as Froot), but that’s about it.

Growth, Rebrands, and The Future

Zen’s YouTube, Twitch, and Twitter accounts are all in the 300k follower range as of this writing. Her growth started to take off once she joined VShojo and has kept up since.

The cyberpunk rebrand has also been a significant success, with her May 20 reveal stream peaking at over 25,000 concurrent viewers, the highest in her entire streaming career.

We may not know yet whether she can stop the apocalypse that is Melware from occurring, but with the way she’s growing as a VTuber, she may be able to pull it off. 

Let’s hope for the best and wish our favorite cyborg a bright future ahead!