Loneliness and Rock and Roll with Band Observer

She played the melody fluently, which was supposed to be played on the keyboard and she had only read the score twice, as naturally as if she had practiced it many times.

"This is amazing... How should I put it? It feels like it was meant to be played this way..."

Even though it was her own instrument that was replaced, Akie still evaluated it objectively.

Su Shi glanced in Qiu Hui's direction and didn't say much.

Gao Songdeng raised his head unconsciously and stared intently at the white-haired girl in front of him.

"...Haruhi Kage has changed."

She sighed in a voice so soft that only she could hear it.

Chapter 40: The gap in technical capabilities

After finishing the performance, Le Nai smiled slightly, put down the guitar, and reached out to tug at the corner of Li Xi's clothes.

As for Shiina Riki, she was still immersed in the shock left by the performance just now.

He was only a high school student... maybe even younger, but he could play the piece of music he had just read twice so easily. There is no other more appropriate word to describe someone who can do this except genius.

Although the performance was enough to win the applause of the whole room and would not be inferior even in a real solo performance, the reaction of the people in the recording studio was not so positive.

Rather than being passive, it's more like being quite repulsive. Akie could feel the alienation and alienation that permeated the recording studio. It was like a blond, blue-eyed, shirtless German punk suddenly appeared in a mountain village in a certain county in Kansai, isolated from the world, with nothing but mosquitoes and retired old men and women.

Although Su Shi didn't say anything, she just rubbed her fingers nervously. No one knew what she was thinking about, but Qiu Hui always felt that it was probably not a good thing.

And Aine… Aine’s appearance made me worried. Rather than being nervous, she looked as if “her tense nerves had broken”, so she was in a state of not caring about anything.

Just now she was evaluating Rakuna's performance with an objective attitude, but seeing Aine's current state, Akie felt that she could no longer remain objective.

Ai Ne, who was hugging her guitar tightly and had a stiff expression like a robot, gave Akie a strong urge to say something.

“Aine.” Akie subconsciously trotted over to her side, “I think…”

The second half of the sentence was not uttered for a long time, because Qiu Hui didn't know what to say.

Le Na's playing skills cannot be denied; the gap in level between her and Aine exists objectively, as obvious as the Great Rift Valley in East Africa.

Therefore, statements like “Aine isn’t bad either” are obviously meaningless platitudes for both the speaker and the listener.

If even Aine herself is aware of this, then my insincere denial will only make her more convinced of her own low level.

Then, how about changing your mindset? How about using this feeling to comfort yourself: "Although Aine is a little bit inferior, she's good enough for this student band"?

…If you think about it for a moment, you should know that this won’t work. If you admit that Aine is terrible, then whatever you say afterwards will feel wrong.

Whether it is comfort or encouragement, in such a delicate atmosphere there is a possibility of turning into ridicule and humiliation.

Because of this possibility, it seems impossible to acknowledge the gap between the two or not.

If you don't act carefully, it will only have the opposite effect. So...

As she became uneasy because of these issues, Akie's expression became no longer calm.

She lowered her head slightly due to nervousness and subconsciously adjusted her glasses several times.

"I think... actually..."

As a result, it was Aine who was supposed to be the one being comforted who spoke first.

She forced a smile and nodded.

"She's quite good as a guitarist."

Qiu Hui felt that she was almost about to agree, because that was indeed what she thought.

But she also knew that she should never do this now, so she could only force her head to focus on nodding downwards and remain silent somewhat unnaturally.

“…I think I know what you’re trying to say.” Aine said with a wry smile, “How should I put it? Rakuna’s appearance made me realize…I’m probably still a long way from achieving that. I have to keep working hard.”

"No, this..."

Akie wanted to say, "It's not a matter of hard work."

The reason why Rakuna, who looks like a junior high school student, can play like that must be because of his overwhelming talent.

That is definitely not something that can be equated with a word like "effort".

However, such words cannot be said directly to the other person's face.

"……come on."

Akiie, who said this in front of Aine, felt exhausted like never before.

She recalled what she had said to Aine during the previous night talk. For example, "The level requirements for student bands are not that high", "It's okay if we just play together", "As long as we can keep up with the ensemble, it's okay", and so on.

In the context of the time, these statements could not be considered wrong in any way.

But the existence of Rakuna, who is still a student no matter how you look at it, yet has demonstrated such an astonishingly high level of skill, can be said to have emptied the foundation of these arguments.

Therefore, apart from the empty words "come on", Qiu Hui really didn't know what else to say.

Aiyin smiled bitterly as she stared at the distraught Akiie in front of her, wondering what she was thinking.

at the same time.

As the cause and center of the subtle atmosphere in the recording studio, Lenai himself seemed to be completely out of it and unaffected by it.

She just looked at her guitar on the ground and smiled slightly, as if she was satisfied with her performance.

Beside her, Li Xi, who finally remembered to make a comment, let out a belated and brief sigh.

"……Amazing."

Such a brief statement generally corresponds to two situations: either one has no thoughts and can only do a perfunctory job, or one has too many thoughts and does not know what to say at all.

She looked at Le Nai as if waking up from a dream and asked, "Stray Cat, are you really going to play with us?"

"Yes." Lenai replied briefly and clearly.

Her eyes swept over the band members in the studio one by one.

Starting from Riki beside her, to Suyo who seemed to want to say something but never opened her mouth, followed by Aine who was holding a guitar, and Akie who was in a depressed mood beside her.

The last one is Takamatsu Deng who has been immersed in his own thoughts since a while ago.

Lenai's gaze lingered on Deng for the longest time.

“…Huh?”

Noticing the other person's gaze, Deng jumped in fright like a frightened little animal.

"What's next?" Le Nai turned to look at Li Xi, "Since it's a band, I want to play together."

"...Yes, ensemble."

Li Xi looked as if he had just woken up from a dream and showed a very serious expression.

"If there are stray cats around, I can arrange it... No, maybe I can just use the original score. The guitar part and the keyboard part... and..."

Looking at Shiina Tatsuki who was immersed in it, Akie instinctively felt that something was wrong.

"Shiina-san! Um, I think..."

Akihime, who was a little nervous, paused for a moment, looked in the direction of Lena, and continued.

"...And Rakuna. Right now, the level gap between everyone is quite large. I don't think it would be appropriate to rush into playing together. Can you wait a little longer?"

Motoyo turned her head and noticed what Akie was doing. She then put on a gentle and friendly smile and agreed, "I think Akie-senpai is right. Although Rakuna-chan's performance was indeed very impressive, she didn't seem to fit in with us. I think it would be better to wait a little bit..."

"Yes! And, and..."

Aine seemed to want to say something, but she quickly realized that this was not the right place for her to speak, so she smiled bitterly and closed her mouth.

Chapter 41: Newcomers?

"Can't we play together now?" Le Na asked. She didn't seem to want to dwell on the specific reason.

"I'm sorry, but you can't do that yet." Su Shi came in front of her, leaned down slightly, and said.

"That's it."

Lenai then took his guitar and walked to the corner of the recording studio, separate from where everyone else was.

"That's great." Su Shi smiled, "It's really great that Xiao Le Na can cooperate..."

Her words were quickly interrupted by the melody of Kasuga Shadow.

Le Nai retreated to the corner and began to play the melody he had just learned.

"Hey, stray cat, what's going on?" Li Xi turned around and glared at Le Nai, "If you play next to us, it will disturb us!"

"Because she said we can't play together." Le Nai paused playing and replied, "So, I played alone."

"That's true, but if Lenai is around, it'll disturb us, right?" Su Shi reminded.

Le Na ignored Su Shi's reminder and just played Kasuga Shadow by herself.

In a sense, it was like a protest against not being allowed to play together.

"Since we couldn't play together, I played it by myself," Le Nai repeated.

The reply sounded natural, but it was totally against social common sense, and it made Lixi's face turn very bad immediately.

"Don't worry about her for now. She should stop after a while. Let's continue practicing." She sighed, "Use the music sheet I brought today..."

The four band members, plus support keyboardist Akihi, found their respective positions and planned to practice with the new music that Riki brought.

Following Su Shi's suggestion, everyone decided to start today's practice with other slightly simpler exercises besides Kasuga Kage.

However, the melody of Haruhi Shadow that would sound from time to time would always interrupt everyone.

Le Nai's infectious performance has a strong presence that cannot be ignored. Whenever the melody over there sounds, it will mess up the performance here.

"Ah... Damn it! Stray cat, what on earth do you want!?"

Li Xi glared at Le Nai. The good first impression he had made due to his superb skills seemed to have been worn out at this moment.

"Since we can't play together, I played it by myself." Le Nai remained calm and repeated his point for the third time.

"Ah, I really can't stand you!" Li Xi hit the drum hard, "Then you come along, too, that's all right, right?"

This proposal caused an uproar among other members.

"Wait a minute, Li Xi, do you really want to let Xiao Lenai join in?" Su Shi asked.

“Hmm… As expected, it would be better if she comes along too? Haha.” Aine said with a wry smile.

“Aine…” Deng looked at Aine worriedly, but didn’t know what to say.

Akie frowned, hesitated for a long time, and then said, "…Runa played the keyboard score just now, right? The current score is for five people, so it's impossible for six people to play together. I think, let Runa take my place first, and then let the other five people play together once to try, how about that?"

Qiu Hui thought this was the most appropriate solution, so she decided to express this idea before Li Xi or anyone else came up with other options.

If Shiina-san or someone else suggested that Rakuna replace Aine, then...

...To be honest, Qiu Hui doesn't dare to imagine that kind of situation, so she can only try to rule out this possibility first.

"I think Togawa-senpai's proposal is fine." Having calmed down a little, Riki nodded, "Well, let's try this first?"

She also knew that this was a stopgap measure to temporarily keep the stray cats settled, so she didn't take it too seriously.

"Wait, where is Akihime-senpai?" Deng looked at Akihime uneasily.

"Light?" Li Xi was surprised.

"As for me... well, it depends on the situation." Akie responded, "It's just a temporary arrangement now. If Lena is determined to join the band, then there will naturally be music scores for six people to play together. After all, adding a guitarist won't affect the original keyboard player's arrangement."

This was indeed a temporary solution without any major problems, but unexpectedly, Akie's words caused a strong reaction from Su Shi.

Her eyes widened slightly in surprise: "Wait a minute! When did you decide that Lenai-chan would join the band?"

She then turned to look at Lenai and asked anxiously, "...Little Lenai, do you really want to join our band?"

Le Nai ignored Su Shi's anxious attitude, and just nodded slowly, and answered at his usual pace: "Yeah."

Seeing Le Na's statement, Qiu Hui suddenly remembered what she had said before in STARRY.