Vol 1 Chapter 37 – Pirate Band【Vol 1 – Turning Point】

Singing practice, streaming, and Michiru Mama’s stream—these days continued for a month. The violin was harder than the guitar. First, it was difficult to produce a clean sound. For the first three days after I got the violin, I practiced solely to produce any sound. But the violin, which lets me adjust its pitch by 1‑Hz increments depending on where I press, turned out to be the best instrument for me. It required little tuning for a song and allowed me to freely change the pitch with my fingers. In other words, if I tried, I could create beautiful harmonies even without tuning.

The number of channel subscribers easily surpassed 10,000. Right now, I have about 16,000 subscribers. Considering that some viewers don’t even subscribe, the actual number of fans is even higher. And there are even more fans who only watch my singing videos. So I had to come to terms with the fact that my singing voice was famous.

And today, I had plans to go out. And those plans were this.

“Teikun, long time no see!”

“Good to see you again, Michiru Mama! Is that Rin-kun over there?”

Today is the recording day for a song sent by Teikoku-san. The song’s title is SingingSea. It seems we’re all gathering our instruments and recording while playing live.

Teikoku-san was, at first glance, a kind-looking man with black-rimmed glasses. He didn’t give off any pirate vibe at all. However, he was quite tall—taller than Michiru, probably over 175 cm.

“Hello, I’m Akihaba Rin. On Mama’s advice, I’m keeping quiet while out today. Please take care of me.”

I wrote that in my sketchbook and showed it to Teikoku-san.

“Ah, so you’re a VTuber with your natural voice, Rin-kun. Then it’s best not to let it out. Let’s head to the studio right away! My pirate band is waiting!”

I arranged to meet Teikoku-san at Ochanohi Station, and we went straight to the studio as planned. Ochanohi had many music shops—walking around, I saw countless stores selling guitars and drums, which made my heart race. I was completely in love with music.

When I arrived at the studio, it was very spacious—probably about 18 tatami mats in size—and there were several men there. They all had instruments I’d never seen before, and I felt a bit excited.

“Listen up, you bastards! The songstress has arrived! Greet her properly! Get into pirate mode!”

Suddenly, Teikoku-san’s demeanor transformed into that of a rough pirate captain.

“Alright, alright, alright! I’m Takakatsu—responsible for a kind of Kluse friction-string instrument! Cheers to our songstress!”

“Hey, I’m Yoshitada, handling the guitar used in Buzuki Celtic music! Pleased to meet you!”

“I’m Takeyoshi, in charge of the Celtic harp. Everyone, don’t be scared—he’s a really nice guy.”

“Hey, that’s cheating!”
(The voices all joined in to protest against Takeyoshi.)

But the rough vibe was so infectious that everyone fell completely into character, as if we had really boarded a pirate ship.

“And now, I am Captain Teikoku, handling the accordion!”
Saying that, Teikoku-san sat down and placed the accordion on his knees.

“I will be your vocalist—I’m Akihaba Rin!”
“And I’m your accompanying partner, Akihaba Misan!”

After the two of us introduced ourselves, everyone in the Pirate Band cheered. These were people who shared the pirate worldview at a high level.

By the way, it seems that all the names in the Pirate Band come from the Murakami Navy. When you join the band, you receive a navy name, which serves as a badge of membership.

“Alright, you guys—set sail!”

“Ho!”
(All together, they shouted.)

Using that as their rallying cry, the Pirate Band began to play. Their performance was even more impassioned and expressive than what I’d heard on the recording.

Then, over that came Captain Teikoku’s rough, commanding singing, and the baton was passed to me. I gave it my all and tossed the baton into the mix. It first went to Takakatsu, then back to me, then to Yoshitada, and then to Takeyoshi, before finally reaching the part where we all joined in with a unified voice.

“Ho! Ho! Ho! Ho! Ho!”
(This call is even incorporated into the song itself—it’s classic pirate lingo, along with variations like Yo-ho and Ahoy.) The more we sang, the more fun SingingSea became, and it made me want to dance. It’s truly a great song.

“You guys! Port ahead!”

“Ho! Ho! Ho! Ho!”
Getting carried away, I joined in with the call.

I thought the song was really well made. But what we just did was only a rehearsal.

“Great job, you guys! Now, it’s showtime—set sail!”

We let the moment carry us and sang a second round. It was really fun—I could clearly picture jolly pirates singing and dancing. Even though everyone was in casual Japanese clothes, in my mind they were donning medieval Irish attire, dancing around barrels and drinking together—wine, ale, and whiskey. I’ve never had any of them, but I’m in the mood to drink.

“Kyaa! Awesome!”

When the song ended, after waiting for just the right moment so as not to disturb the recording, Michiru clapped and bounced around with excitement.

“Hey! We’re pirates—jolly pirates singing and dancing freely!”
With that, Teikoku-san raised one hand.

After checking the sound recordings and cleaning up, the entire session lasted about two hours. Since we had only booked three hours, it was pretty tight.