"Thank you all for attending today's ENN 1st 'LUVlive' event. Next, we would like to invite the representative of the organizer to give a speech." Holding the microphone, the host's voice spread throughout the entire venue through the sound system. He bowed slightly and turned to make an inviting gesture toward the backstage direction.
The stage lights shone softly beside the host. After waiting patiently for a good while, he finally saw a young girl with a face full of reluctance, her hands stuffed in her pockets, sluggishly shuffling her steps toward the center of the stage with dragging feet, even keeping her head slightly lowered.
She had silver-gray short hair that reached just down to her chin in a sharp bob style, the ends curving inward slightly, with neat bangs smoothly covering her forehead, making her entire face look clean and refreshing.
If one were to say the girl had any special memorable feature, it would probably be her eyes.
They were a rare pair of heterochromatic eyes: her right eye was a light golden-yellow with a bright, transparent pupil, while her left eye was a dazzling bright silver, standing out exceptionally under the backdrop of her cool-toned hair color. Her facial features were small and delicate, her round face carrying a bit of slenderness, with a touch of yet-to-fade childish innocence still showing between her brows.
"Eh?" Asakura narrowed his eyes slightly, his gaze fixed on the stage, a hint of confusion in his tone.
"What's wrong?" Beside him, Momoka didn't even raise her head, her fingers still sliding rapidly across her smartphone screen—she originally had no interest in speeches anyway, and had been keeping her head down browsing through other live schedules and contents, most of those descriptions being written in a very exaggerated manner.
"Look on stage." Asakura raised his chin slightly, indicating toward the direction of the stage with a subtle glance.
"What?" Momoka stopped her finger movements, put down her phone and raised her head, looking over in the direction Asakura indicated, her gaze pausing on the girl in the center of the stage.
She then raised her eyebrows, an expression of realization mixed with a bit of surprise appearing on her face, as she said in a low voice: "It's the cat girl."
"I didn't expect Raana to actually be able to host such a large-scale live at such a young age." Asakura retracted his gaze and shook his head gently, his tone carrying a few hints of heartfelt admiration.
"No matter how you think about it, that doesn't seem like something that kid would do, right?" Momoka rolled her eyes. Thinking of how every time the other party came to Rabbit House, she would only hold her guitar and play to her heart's content, Momoka couldn't help but complain, "Her family probably just had her stand on stage and speak as the organizer's representative on purpose to build up her credentials."
"What if she has a persona of a cold, aloof loli career woman when outside and at work, and only acts like a pure little cat during her personal time off, running to other places to play guitar happily and vent herself?" Asakura pulled a serious face, asking with a straight face while tilting his head slightly, "Don't you think there's a slight possibility?"
"Not a chance. If she were really a career woman, she wouldn't even leech a matcha sundae for free." Momoka waved her hand, the complaining tone unhidden, even curling her lips slightly.
On stage, Kaname Raana held the microphone with both hands, her eyes downcast as she remained silent for a long moment, her cheeks slightly taut. Under the gaze of hundreds of eyes, she sniffled gently and spoke slowly:
"Meow."
Right after the words left her mouth, she crisp and cleanly handed the microphone back to the host beside her, with no expression on her face. She turned gracefully and walked off the stage unhurriedly, her steps still dragging.
On stage, the host froze in place holding the microphone, while the audience below looked at each other, facing one another in awkward silence, plunging the venue into a brief quiet spell for a moment.
Fortunately, the host reacted quickly, coughing dryly after a moment to clear his throat, raising a professional smile once more as he continued: "Alright, thank you to the organizer for the speech. So next, based on the anonymous votes collected from the audience by the staff after the live ended, the most popular band selected for this live is—"
Probably thrown off by Kaname Raana's speech, the host, who should have built up suspense in this part, didn't delay for too long and directly announced the answer.
"It's Chiba's Supernova! Kessoku Band!"
The moment the words fell, thunderous cheers instantly erupted below the stage. Glow sticks formed a shimmering ocean in the darkness as audience members waved their arms, shouting out Kessoku Band's name (with someone shouting 'Bocchi-sama!') loudly, applause and cheers intertwining together, nearly drowning out the sound from the speakers.
In the backstage break area, the four members of Kessoku Band heard the result, delight showing on all their faces.
Nijika stopped her movement of tidying up the instruments—looks like there was no need to tidy up, since there was still an encore song—her eyes brightening as she turned to look at the three beside her, her tone carrying a bit of excitement: "We won the award!"
"That's so awesome!" Kita Ikuyo lightly covered her cheeks with both hands, her face full of happiness, before knitting her brows slightly and saying softly, "But who should go up to accept the award?"
Nijika immediately looked toward Hitori in the corner, reaching out to gently pat her shoulder, her eyes carrying a gentle smile: "I think we should let Bocchi-chan go up. Bocchi-chan performed super amazingly today, playing the guitar extremely well, and the backing harmony humming was even more perfect than usual."
Although she almost caused a big problem by making eyes at Asakura, if categorized by contribution, Hitori was still the highest in the band.
Hitori shook her head desperately.
If standing on stage as a member of the band, that would be fine, since she was already somewhat used to it.
But if she were made to run up alone to receive the award, she was afraid that halfway there, she would melt into an indescribable pink gel under the gaze of everyone's attention, and her ultimate fate would be flowing into the sewer system from the indoor drainage facilities...
To the side, Yamada Ryo heard this, crossed her arms in front of her chest, raised her chin slightly, and said with a bit of casualness: "As expected, I should still be the one to go. It's less trouble for me to go on stage, no need for so many pleasantries."
Kita Ikuyo tilted her head. It was clear she was desperately suppressing herself from saying 'Ryo-senpai is the best!', and said seriously: "I think it should be Ijichi-senpai who goes on stage." She paused, looking at the gazes directed by everyone, and hurriedly added, "Ijichi-senpai is not only the leader of Kessoku Band, but has also always been quietly taking care of everyone and coordinating band affairs. This award should rightfully be picked up by you."
Hitori also hurriedly nodded vigorously, a faint smile appearing on her face as she said softly yet firmly: "I, I also think it's better for Nijika-chan to go, you've worked really hard."
"Hard work sleeping on Asakura's thighs?" Yamada Ryo said out of nowhere.
"Ryo! What are you talking about!" Nijika glared fiercely at Yamada Ryo—the latter holding both hands high in a surrendering stance—and then looked guiltily at Hitori, only to find that the other party was still showing a silly smile.
This made Nijika unable to help feeling a strange exhaustion in her heart: Girl, what on earth are you smiling silly for?
"Just kidding," Yamada Ryo's mouth curved slightly, her tone softening a lot: "Alright, alright, consider what you guys said to make sense. Nijika, you indeed have done great service, so this award is handed to you."
Nijika froze for a moment, looking at the three before her as a trace of warmth welled up in the depth of her eyes, her nose feeling slightly sour, while the corners of her mouth couldn't help rising into a brilliant smile: "Thank you everyone, then I'll go up on behalf of everyone to receive the award!"
After saying that, she tidied her clothes slightly, took a deep breath, and with a face full of smiles and a bit of excitement, walked in the direction of the stage. The cheers below the stage remained loud, and the lights fell upon her, reflecting her smile to be exceptionally dazzling.
A moment later, Nijika returned backstage.
"Um," she said with a dry, somewhat embarrassed laugh, "the staff said there's no award ceremony segment; the band that won first place can just go straight up for the encore."
"Ah..."
In an instant, a subtle, awkward atmosphere permeated through the band.
In the end, everyone could only pretend to be very busy tuning their instruments, putting on an appearance of preparing to take the stage once more for the encore.
☆ Girls in Encore ☆
Although covering some currently popular songs for the encore would have been fine, Kessoku Band still chose to perform one of their older songs—looking at it from their current perspective, it was slightly crude, and back then, the song was mainly written for Hitori's humming convenience with rather casual lyricism, so its level naturally couldn't be compared to their official track, "Blue Planet."
Even so, as long as they used Bocchi's hum on the audience, everything would be fine.
And that was indeed the case; the encore song received remarkably high praise from the audience.
Although they didn't know how the other bands felt, at least Kessoku Band's first out-of-town performance was a fairly successful conclusion.
Backstage on stage.
Everyone else in Kessoku Band had run off to store their instruments in the vintage car, with Momoka serving as a temporary worker standing by over at the vintage car's side, leaving only Asakura and Nijika here—after all, a drum kit was obviously not something easily disassembled and packed.
"Where did Asakura-kun get that hat?" The girl looked curiously at the baseball cap on Asakura's head.
Hearing this, Asakura reached out, took off the cap on his head, shook it gently, turned the logo on the front of the hat toward Nijika, and said in a natural tone, "SICK HACK merch."
"Asakura-kun, even you betrayed us!" Nijika immediately uncrossed her hands from her hips, lightly clasping her hands over her chest, pretending to look incredulous with a tone carrying feigned, exaggerated grievance.
"I was wrongly accused; I voted for Kessoku Band, you know," Asakura hurriedly raised both hands in a surrendering gesture, a helpless smile on the corners of his mouth as he explained. "Besides, even if I wanted to support Kessoku Band, there was no way; your merch is just plastic zip ties."
"They're character wristbands!" Nijika knitted her brows, leaned half a step forward, and corrected him dead serious, her tone carrying a bit of petty insistence.
"As merchandise, it's a bit too cheap." Asakura curled his lip, roasting without holding back, his eyes carrying a bit of banter.
"What else can we do? Making merch costs a lot of money." Nijika lowered her eyelids and sighed softly, her tone carrying a little bit of helplessness as her fingertips unconsciously tugged at the hem of her clothes.
Right after, as if suddenly remembering something, her eyes brightened, and she looked up at Asakura again, her tone carrying a bit of fox-like, sly expectation: "By the way, what about the promised gift?"
"Of course I'll give it to you after we get back... although I'd like to say that, I actually did prepare one." Asakura smiled and blinked, intentionally building up suspense, and as he spoke, he pretended to rummage through the baseball cap, quickly pulling out several small silver ornaments from inside.
Nijika hurriedly leaned closer, looked intently, and a look of delight instantly surfaced on her face—they were actually miniature figurines of Kessoku Band. Although mainly composed of spheres and cylinders, each character's features were distinct and cute, and the complete set was enough to make anyone want to treasure it.
"Asakura-kun..." She spoke softly, her voice carrying a trace of barely perceptible softness.
"Don't be too touched." Asakura raised an eyebrow and said with deliberate pride, his tone carrying a bit of tsundere—though a boy being tsundere is not cute at all.
"No, I wanted to ask if these can be used as merch?" Nijika blinked, her tone carrying a bit of expectation, her eyes tightly fixed on those small figurines.
"They can't be mass-produced, so don't even think about it." Asakura spread his hands and said cleanly and decisively.
"What a pity." Nijika nodded gently, a slight hint of disappointment showing on her face, before quickly regaining her composure, quietly hiding the warmth and emotion filling her eyes.
What a bad guy, pulling this kind of sudden attack every time, catching people off guard, she thought quietly in her heart, her cheeks warming up slightly.
No, no, I can't overthink this, he's already Bocchi-chan's boyfriend...
Nijika took a deep breath, subtly raised her fingertips, gently wiped the corner of her eye, lowered her head again, and continued packing up the drum kit, though the corners of her mouth couldn't help rising slightly.
Her fingertips holding the drumsticks paused for a moment. Catching Asakura's gaze falling over to her side out of the corner of her eye, she stopped her hands from packing the drum bag and turned her face slightly. At this moment, a gentle smile involuntarily appeared between the girl's brows, and she asked in a soft tone, "Is Asakura-kun very interested in the drum kit?"
Asakura nodded, scratched the back of his head with his right hand, and answered in a natural tone, "Well, after all, what I learned before was either the suona from the wind section or the erhu from the string section. Seeing a drum kit, which is so rare, naturally makes me a bit curious." His words implied tacit agreement with this point.
Nijika lowered her eyelids, curled the corners of her mouth slightly, and muttered under her breath in a low voice, "I actually think those two things you mentioned are much rarer over here." Having said that, she turned around to face Asakura, a subtle smile rising on the corners of her mouth, spreading her hands as she continued, "If you're curious, it's okay to touch it, you know."
"Really?" Asakura's eyes lit up, his body leaning forward slightly, a clear look of pleasant surprise on his face.
"Percussion instruments aren't something that breaks easily, after all." Nijika smiled and made a "please" gesture toward him, her fingertips pointing gently at the drum kit.
"Then I won't stand on ceremony." Asakura responded with a smile, subconsciously raising his hands to make a rolling-up-sleeves motion (even though he was wearing short sleeves), his fingertips curling slightly with a bit of anticipation.
He reached out his hand, his fingertips touching gently, then feeling gently, and then fondling it as if playing with a treasure, unable to put it down.
"Um... Asakura-kun?" The girl knitted her brows slightly, pursed her lips, her tone sounding a bit strange—if one had to describe it, it carried a feeling of powerlessness and helplessness.
"What's wrong?" Asakura blinked, asking with a deadpan face, while the movement of his hand showed zero intention of stopping, his fingertips still gently rubbing against it.
He rubbed gently again, the touch at his fingertips feeling a bit different from what he imagined, making him pause involuntarily.
"When I said you could touch, I meant you could touch the drum kit," the girl sighed helplessly, reaching up to rub her temples. "Not that you could touch my head."
"Honto?!" Asakura widened his eyes, his mouth slightly agape, his face full of astonishment as he subconsciously pulled back his hand.
"Why are you making such a surprised expression! Given the context, it would be weirder to get it wrong in the first place!"