"Hey, hey! What were you two doing just now?!"
Sato hadn't exactly tried to hide what had happened. After returning to his spot, he heard Ritsu's astonished voice from behind him.
"Nothing. I was just trying to help Mio relax a little."
Sato adjusted the tuning pegs on his guitar without looking back.
Ritsu's eyes immediately widened in disbelief.
"Are you sure you weren't just taking the opportunity to cop a feel?!"
"What if I said I was?"
Sato turned around and looked at her with a calm smile.
Ritsu choked on her words for a moment before muttering,
"So what if you were? It's not like I'm the one getting taken advantage of."
"All right, get ready."
Sato looked out through the recording studio window. Beyond the glass, Kibe Sakura was already seated in position.
He turned to glance at everyone in the Light Music Club, and the girls all signaled that they were ready.
He then gave Kibe Sakura an OK sign through the window.
She nodded, held up three fingers, then slowly folded them down one by one. The moment the last finger lowered, music filled the recording studio.
As the familiar melody began to play, that vast, distant sky seemed to appear before them once again.
The members of the Light Music Club knew this song inside and out. They had even spent their spring break practicing it diligently.
Soon, the first take came to an end.
Surprisingly, the result was quite good.
After listening to the playback, Sato took off his headphones and thought for a moment before turning to the delighted club members.
"Let's do one more take."
"Huh?"
Everyone looked at him in confusion.
After speaking, Sato took a USB drive out of his pocket and handed it to the equally puzzled Kibe Sakura.
"There's an additional intro on here. Senpai, could you add this section before we record again?"
It was a violin intro he had asked Asuna to record. Compared to that recording, the band's performance just now had been a little too fast.
Kibe Sakura frowned slightly as she plugged in the USB drive, opened the audio file, and listened to it. After a moment, her furrowed brows gradually relaxed, and she nodded at Sato.
"All right. Since you say so, we'll do it your way."
Sato nodded, then looked at everyone.
"We were a little too fast just now. Let's slow it down a bit this time."
"Okay!"
The second recording session soon began.
It turned out that the success of the first take had been due in large part to luck. The second and even the third takes both had some fairly noticeable flaws.
It wasn't until the fourth take that they finally got it right.
That wasn't to say their performance had become perfect. After all, the members of the Light Music Club were still just amateurs, so perfection was impossible. It was simply that the remaining flaws were minor enough that no one would notice them without listening very carefully.
"The rest of the mixing is in your hands, Senpai."
"Mm, those are all minor issues."
Kibe Sakura nodded, then looked at Sato curiously.
"By the way, did you write this music yourselves?"
As a music enthusiast, there was no way she could overlook such an outstanding piece.
So this was probably an unreleased song.
Although these juniors had only said they were taking on a commission, after thinking it over, she figured it was probably a music production commission.
Otherwise, no matter how good the song was, the producer would never ask a high school club to perform it.
No matter how broke the producer was, they wouldn't go that far!
Kibe Sakura was both right and wrong.
She was right because that was exactly the excuse Sato had come up with.
She was wrong because it was actually just Sato's own personal idea.
"You could say I wrote this song."
"You?"
Kibe Sakura looked at Sato in surprise before clicking her tongue in admiration.
"What an incredible junior."
"You're flattering me, Senpai."
"Come on, stop being modest. I couldn't write a melody this beautiful. I couldn't in high school, and I still can't now."
She waved her hand.
"You've all been playing for quite a while, so take a break before we continue recording. Come to think of it, the melody is so good that I'm suddenly looking forward to hearing the lyrics."
After resting for more than half an hour, Mio entered the recording booth.
Seeing how nervous she was, everyone began encouraging her.
"Mio, you can do it!"
"Don't be nervous!"
"You've got this!"
Watching them, Sato rubbed his forehead helplessly.
"The glass in the recording booth is soundproof. She can't hear a single word you're saying."
Everyone immediately froze.
A moment later, Ritsu's expression turned solemn. She gazed at Mio inside the booth and said in a low voice,
"Even if she can't hear our voices... she can still feel our hearts!"
"No matter how many mountains and rivers separate us, our hearts will always be connected!"
Ritsu stared straight ahead with a profound look in her eyes.
"Wow!!!"
Yui and Tsumugi clasped their hands to their cheeks and cried out in admiration.
So cool!
Thunk!
Without changing his expression, Sato brought the edge of his hand down on top of Ritsu's head and glanced at her.
"Do you think you're acting in some TV drama?"
Mio was so nervous she was practically falling apart in there, and they still had the mood to put on a performance!
He couldn't help shaking his head lightly, silently lamenting Mio's poor choice in friends. How had she ended up with someone like Ritsu?
"Ow..."
Ritsu held her head with a whimper, then looked up at Sato with dissatisfaction.
"You're hurting me when you hit me that hard!"
Hey! Don't say something that sounds so suggestive!
Sato's eyelid twitched.
"I didn't hit you that hard, okay? I barely tapped you. You're the one exaggerating how much it hurt. I'm not taking the blame for this."
"I don't care. You hit me, so you have to take responsibility!"
"Take responsibility for what?"
"Treat us to a meal later!"
"...All right."
"Really?!"
An indescribable gleam instantly appeared in Ritsu's eyes, and she dashed over to Sato in a flash.
Sato nodded.
"Yeah. My treat."
"Yahoo!"
Ritsu jumped into the air.
"You're paying!"
"What?!"