Chapter 70: The Bond Between Human and Cat

Xu Chujing has a dedicated place for recording songs at her studio in Shanghai.

At this moment, she is sitting in the lounge, memorizing lines for "Cat Demon."

Her expressions change according to the script, which counts as immersing herself in the lines.

The ragdoll cat that Xu Chujing once brought to the recording set of "Creating Idols" is lying in the distance, occasionally swaying the tip of its tail slowly.

It has now been completely handled by Xu Chujing.

If Xu Chujing calls it over, it will come. When she hasn't called it, it doesn't dare to approach.

As mentioned before, this diva has a mild allergy to cat fur, so she cannot have prolonged contact with cats.

Honestly, for her right now, there is no need to learn the state of a cat like before.

Ever since that night, she feels that playing a cat is incredibly easy for her.

She even... enjoys this process very much.

Because in her daily life, she must act like a proper human. Only on set can she feel at ease acting like a cat.

It is as if she still has another personality—no, a "cat-ality"—that can be briefly released.

Today, Xu Chujing is wearing a simple white short-sleeved shirt and a pair of black straight-leg trousers, dressed very casually.

She puts down the script and glances at her straight, slender legs under the straight-leg trousers.

Ever since that night, the part of her body she is most satisfied with is these long legs.

The reason is simple: the cat named Baibaibai in her dream was a munchkin cat.

It was that kind of corgi among cats, with legs short as hell, jumping around blindly all day long, the kind whose cat paws couldn't reach anything.

Doesn't this highlight the difference?

At this moment, there is a knock at the door.

"Come in," Xu Chujing says.

Assistant Liu Jingjing opens the door, brings Luo Mo in together, and says, "Jing, I've brought Luo Mo here."

Xu Chujing puts down the script and looks up at Luo Mo.

For some reason, she feels that looking at him from this angle gives her an indescribable sense of familiarity.

It is as if she had looked up at him like this countless times before.

Xu Chujing casts aside these distracting thoughts and says, "Do you want to rest for a bit first, have some water, and get your voice into state before we go to record?"

Luo Mo nods; he indeed still needs to warm up his voice.

Liu Jingjing goes to get a bottle of mineral water to hand to Luo Mo, then leaves the lounge.

Xu Chujing points to the small sofa beside her and says to Luo Mo, "Sit."

Luo Mo sits down generously, twists off the cap to take a gulp, and his gaze lingers on the very fat ragdoll cat not far away.

Seeing Luo Mo, the ragdoll cat remembers this man, and also remembers his god-like cat-petting technique.

The fat cat glances at Xu Chujing, and seeing that Xu Chujing is ignoring it, it tentatively walks toward Luo Mo.

"It seems to be very afraid of you," Luo Mo says to Xu Chujing, looking at the fat cat.

Xu Chujing nods without denying it, her aura remaining powerful.

Every time he sees a cat, Luo Mo misses his own Baibaibai.

Luo Mo waves at the ragdoll cat and says, "Come, come, come."

As he speaks, he glances at the cat teaser wand placed on the coffee table and picks it up.

Many cats cannot resist a teaser wand; they are born to grab it with their paws or even bite it with their mouths.

Then, a magical scene happens.

He has only just flicked the teaser wand, and before the fat ragdoll cat has even had time to run over and reach out its cat paw to grab it, a fair palm slaps down onto the teaser wand.

It is Xu Chujing's hand.

After her reflexive slap, she immediately wakes up and grabs the teaser wand.

Luo Mo turns his head to meet her eyes, and the two stare at each other.

After two seconds, Xu Chujing says, "Stop playing, let's go to the recording studio to prepare."

Luo Mo: "???"

My butt hasn't even warmed up the seat yet.

And I was just playing with the teaser wand; it's one thing that you grabbed it, but why did your body lean in closer too?

What, do you like the teaser wand too?

………

………

The poor fat cat ultimately doesn't get petted by Luo Mo.

With one look from Xu Chujing, it doesn't dare to approach.

The two do not stay in the lounge for long and head to the recording studio.

Luo Mo drinks some more water and then begins to warm up his voice.

In the lounge, the two had simply divided the lyrics, and some harmony parts had also been discussed.

As for the Opera Singing, Xu Chujing will give it a try, but it will mainly be Luo Mo's responsibility.

Luo Mo glances at Xu Chujing, very curious about the strength of this diva in the recording studio.

Simply put, he wants to know what state she is in before pitch correction.

Recording a song with a diva is, in a nutshell, equivalent to listening to a live performance by a diva without buying a ticket.

As for the song "Red Actor," Luo Mo has at least heard the version by the National Team's "Big Demon King" Tan Jing.

This woman is someone who, on the stage of the variety show "Singer," suppressed the suona.

Therefore, Luo Mo also had a mindset of wanting to compare the two's singing skills.

Once Xu Chujing opened her mouth to sing, Luo Mo's eyes immediately lit up.

This woman's style was not the same as Tan Jing's, but her singing skills were equally remarkable!

Although the part Xu Chujing was currently test-singing did not belong to a very high pitch, Luo Mo could feel the solidity within it, and thus inferred that this woman's vocal range might be very wide.

Her stage presence should also be the explosive kind; if she were to step onto a stage like "Singer", she should be able to stir the entire audience.

For some reason, several songs that were exceptionally suitable for Xu Chujing flashed through Luo Mo's mind all at once, and they were of different styles.

"Strange, why am I thinking about these?" Luo Mo shook his head.

It should just be that he felt they were suitable, which was why he had such a feeling.

But he didn't intend to do anything about it.

After Xu Chujing test-sang a few lines, she looked at Luo Mo, seemingly waiting for an evaluation from him, the songwriter.

In terms of seniority, he didn't have much qualification to evaluate a diva.

What's more, strictly speaking, the two of them currently belonged to a semi-teacher-student relationship; Xu Chujing was a star mentor on "Creating Idols".

But Xu Chujing was just very much looking forward to Luo Mo's evaluation.

Luo Mo looked at her and said only two words: "Perfect."

No flaws could be picked out, absolutely no flaws could be picked out.

Upon hearing this, a very faint smile appeared on Xu Chujing's face.

Next, it was time for Luo Mo to test-sing in the recording room.

For some reason, a desire to win surged in Luo Mo's heart.

In "Creating Idols", he had never had much of a desire to win. He didn't have a strong desire to win; he just hated losing.

But in front of Xu Chujing, he just wanted to show off, at least not to be outdone by her.

This kind of rivalry was a bit like a struggle for status in the household.

The state of master and dog is generally quite clear. But the state of human and cat is relatively mysterious.

Regardless of whether it was Xu Chujing or Luo Mo, neither could figure out why their mindset had changed, but today, at least, they were enjoying it.

Luo Mo cleared his throat and started test-singing directly from the Opera Singing in the chorus.

Just like on the public performance stage, although the earlier parts of this song were divided among his teammates, Luo Mo had also been singing along softly, so that he could complete the chorus part more smoothly.

Now, starting to sing opera directly, it was somewhat of a show-off.

Having practiced opera for 19 years, wasn't it just a matter of doing it whenever he wanted?

Xu Chujing glanced at him, just nodded slightly, and didn't say much.

This woman's aura was as strong as ever, and she didn't talk much in private. Although she never acted like a diva, she always gave people a sense of distance.

In her view, Luo Mo's Opera Singing and singing skills had always been very stable; he was the kind of Singer who wouldn't mess up even when singing fully live.

The official recording started right then.

Xu Chujing didn't hire any professional producer because she was one herself.

The entire song recording process was very efficient, and not too much time was wasted.

After a few hours, both were very satisfied with the final formed song.

From the listener's perspective, this version of "Red Actor" was definitely better than the live version.

"With a little bit of pitch correction, it should be about right," Xu Chujing said after listening.

Pitch correction was inevitable; this was like adding flowers to embroidery. For example, for some harmony parts, the volume of the two needed to be adjusted slightly, as well as some breathing sounds and the like.

It's just that for a pitch correction engineer, some Singers' work requires working overtime; it's time to show real skills!

And some Singers' work is extremely easy, with not much for them to do.

There was no need for the two of them to do this kind of work, so up to this point, the work they could do was basically completed.

After Xu Chujing took a sip of mineral water, she said to Luo Mo: "Luo Mo, this song is expected to be released on Penguin Music in five days."

"So fast?" Luo Mo was a bit surprised.

Xu Chujing nodded and said: "I've already greeted all the platforms, and the resources and such have already been arranged. The pre-heating will start in these few days, so the efficiency will be very high."

Luo Mo nodded; this was one of the benefits of collaborating with a big shot. Otherwise, if you wanted some promotion on the platforms, you might have to wait in line.

At the same time, when a diva like Xu Chujing releases a new song, she certainly wouldn't be like Chen Shanqi of Xinyu, who still has to pick a day and choose a time period when the competition isn't very fierce.

She can release it whenever she wants, killing whoever she catches!

Randomly picking a few lucky Singers to bully.

When Luo Mo left this place, Xu Chujing saw him to the door.

Before parting, Xu Chujing took the initiative to reach out a hand and said: "Happy collaboration."

Luo Mo looked at her and shook her hand, saying: "Happy collaboration."

The shadows of the two overlapped under the sunlight.

If this scene appeared in some anime works, it might be a man's shadow holding the little meat paw inside a little Cat's shadow.

Once, it was also a hot summer.

A litter of kittens was born to a Cat at a friend of Luo Mo's, and he was given one, which he named Baibaibai.

The bond between the two was thus formed.

Among animals, human lifespan is actually considered relatively long.

Many people raise Cats and dogs; to them, these pets only accompanied them for a dozen years or even less.

But for the pets, master, you are our whole life.

Many people should have seen the movie "Hachi: A Dog's Tale".

Many people say that most animals have no concept of time, and they don't know what Departure is.

After parting, all they know is to wait, waiting for you to return.

I also don't know if Baibaibai is still waiting.

Xu Chujing stood inside the door, watching Luo Mo get into the van and leave. For some reason, she felt a bit distracted.

After returning to the lounge, she picked up the Cat teaser with her right hand and tapped it gently with her left, playing by herself.

"Pat, pat, pat."

……

(PS: Second update, there is more today.)

(End of chapter)