"How'd it go?" Tsubaki asked, walking up to Mutsumi when she spotted her standing by the entrance. The sextuplet simply smiled, turned around and hugged her.

"Thanks again, Tsubaki-chan. I have to make it up to you somehow." She said, leaning her weight against the member of the broadcasting club. "But... maybe another day. I'm kinda... tired..." Yawning as her eyes struggled to stay open, Mutsumi leaned her head against Tsubaki's shoulder, using her as a pillow as she tried to take a nap standing up. The girl with the side ponytail looked at her face curiously, Mutsumi's eyes were red and they had bags under them.

"At least it's over now, right?" She chuckled, pushing Mutsumi back to her feet gently. The sixth sister shook her head, slapping her cheeks a few times.

"Not yet... there's still..." Mutsumi muttered, looking at the school building before she walked into the last few moments of the festival. "I'll talk to you later!" Using her phone, she quickly found one of her sisters walking around by herself, hovering around the pancake stall while checking in on the rest of the class before they went to the afterparty.

"Who do you think he'll pick?" Mutsumi asked, tapping her sister on the shoulder. "I mean, it could be anyone, right?" She added, playing with her sister's ribbon as Yotsuba leaned against one off the tables.

"I don't know." She replied, looking at her sister with a somber face. "Fuutarou-kun... it's all coming to a close, isn't it?"

"Yeah. To think that you, getting lost six years ago, would bring about all this." The sixth sister sent a playful jab her way, but Yotsuba only continued to have a thousand-yard stare. "But I guess that doesn't matter now, does it?"

"Yeah..." Yotsuba added, pushing herself off the table. "After all, we can't keep living in the past. This time, I'm sure, that this will change everything, no matter what happens." She added, placing her gently balled hand against her chest.

"You've been watching too much anime, Yotsuba. You copied that scene from somewhere, I just know it." Mutsumi laughed, walking away. "But you're right. Are you scared?"

"A little."

"Me too." The two of them walked together, finding Ichika, Nino, and Miku sitting on one of the benches while Itsuki kept profusely thanking them.

"Mutsumi, Yotsuba... t-thanks!" Itsuki said, dropping her formal speech yet still bowing apologetically. Mutsumi took a few steps toward her, raising her arm in the air.

"What are you doing? Come on, you don't need to thank me..." Mutsumi said, getting Itsuki to raise her head. The fifth sister felt Mutsumi's finger push against her forehead. "Boop." She said taking her finger back and tapping her sister on the nose. She then turned toward the others, tilting her head curiously at them. "So, what do we do now?"

"I know, how about we yell out what we want to do on the count of-"

"No... that never works for us." Nino complained, standing up from the bench.

"Even though we're sextuplets?" Yotsuba asked.

"It's because we're sextuplets."

"... I wonder how long we'll stay sextuplets..." Ichika left those words in the air, letting them ruminate on it before Mutsumi snapped her fingers.

"Forever..." She said, putting her arms behind her head as she started marching away. "Come on, let's go have fun" She turned around, leaning forward a bit as she placed her hands behind her back. Giggling as she continued deeper into the festival, she skipped away with her sisters in tow. "Ichika-nee! You pick first."

The eldest sister brought them to the concert that the students set up; the current band playing was the group that asked Yotsuba for help. The boom from the speakers reverberated through the air as the audience started to scream out to the music. The six of them merged with the crowd, nearly getting lost amongst the sea of people. "Nakano Ichika-san! I heard you helped my little brother out on the first day. It isn't much, but take this as thanks. I think our stall is open, so you can use the voucher to get some popcorn." A person walked up to the eldest sister, handing her a coupon for one of the stalls. "My brother said that he's rooting for you. Do your best."

"Who was that? A fan of yours maybe?" Nino asked, walking up to the eldest just as the concert came to a close. With the last few notes flittering in the air, and the lights slowly fading away from the stage, Ichika looked at her sister with a smile on her face.

"Who knows? But I guess this is what people mean when they say that it was all worth it..." Shutting her eyes with a content smile on her face, she felt a sense of fulfillment unlike any she's ever felt before. They dispersed along with the crowd, Nino directing them to the unmanned pancake stall.

"I guess everyone went to see who got the most sales." Yotsuba said as she absentmindedly walked around to the back to check if there were any ingredients or bits of trash leftover. "Wow, you guys sure made a lot of sales." She exclaimed when she found nothing in storage.

"Yeah... We should probably go, nobody's here." Nino scratched the back of her head, walking away when a voice reached her ears.

"Nino, I heard that it was you that brought father here. Thank you." Itsuki said, filling the silence with another apology.

"I couldn't have done it without those two." Nino pointed over her shoulder toward the third and sixth sister. "But he's been opening up to us all, little by little. One day, I'm sure, that you girls will be able to talk to papa like that too." She smiled, walking away as Miku thought of what she wanted to do with her pick. In the end, Miku was also curious about the result of the sales contests.

"Ah! There she is! Miku-chan! Miku-chan! Do you have anything you want to say?" Tsubaki ran up to the six of them the moment they reached the ceremony. Mutsumi gave Miku a gentle nudge, urging her to give a speech.

"Ah! I'm very grateful for everyone's hard work. In the beginning, the class had a few fights, but it all worked out in the end. So thank you for all your hard work!" Miku bowed as her voice came through the speakers.

"Why'd you even ask for a..." Mutsumi paused, looking at the large display that was currently showing the total sales of each class, with theirs at the top. "I see! Congrats guys!"

"I was a bit scared that everyone was going to hate me, but I'm glad that I did it in the end." Miku smiled, looking at the trophy her classmates held in their arms.

"Yeah, it's nice to leave this off without any regrets tying us down, right?" Yotsuba smiled, having let go of her regret some time ago. "I don't really have a place I want to go; Itsuki, what about you?" They didn't even need to hear Itsuki's voice to know where she wanted to go since her stomach answered for her.

"Why am I not surprised?" Mutsumi sighed, laughing to herself as they looked for an open food stall. It was then that Ichika brought out the voucher for the popcorn stall, directing everyone to that one stall before they encountered one of the most difficult problems in their lives.

"Oh no! There's more than one flavor option!" Itsuki said, reading the menu that was written in chalk. Five of them huddled up to discuss their options while one walked around the area.

"You should pick Itsuki," Miku said bluntly, wanting to get this over with to start snacking.

"But Ichika obtained the voucher," Itsuki argued, looking at her sisters with a prideful look. "And I simply cannot look over everyone's opinions. We're all in this together." She added, a sparkle in her eyes.

"Even if you say that... I can only see this ending in another argument." Yotsuba and Ichika muttered. "Actually, where is the voucher?" The fourth sister asked as a loud crunching sound reached their ears.

"How long are you going to stand there? Come on, dig in. They only had salted popcorn left though." Mutsumi chewed, walking up with a bucket in one hand and some popcorn in the other. The sixth sister handed over the rest of the popcorn bucket to Itsuki as she walked to where she wanted to go, back to the stage where the band used to play.

"There's nobody here now..." Ichika muttered, walking onto the stage as their footsteps resonated in the silence. Mutsumi walked around to the back, finding the controls of the lights and speakers.

"Exactly!" Mutsumi yelled from behind the scenes, switching on a few lights and pulling up the curtains, revealing that the band left a few instruments behind. "I asked Tsubaki-chan to talk to the band. Do you want to play something?" She said, her voice coming through the speakers as she moved the spotlights around to where Ichika was standing. The eldest apprehensively reached out for one of the guitars, slinging the strap over her shoulder as she walked up to the mic. Yotsuba quickly jumped onto the stage as well, running behind the drums and picking up the sticks as she softly tapped the hi-hats. One by one, each of the sisters found an instrument as Mutsumi fiddled with the lights and sounds from the controls backstage.

"Alright... one... two..." Yotsuba started off with a strong hit on the snare drum as they played their first song. It was... a horrible performance, so much so that Mutsumi was rendered speechless after twenty seconds. After three minutes of the most monstrous instrumentals ever created, Ichika suggested that they play a song with vocals, one that they all knew.

Their singing helped masked the atrocity of their instrument playing, but it wasn't enough. They were thankful that nobody was around. Once they had their fun, Miku walked backstage. "Mutsumi, how was it..."

"..."

"Mutsumi?" Miku walked around a bit more, finding her sister sitting behind the lighting controls in a trance, her body unmoving due to the torture that reached her ears.

"This... you five are never allowed to touch any other instruments, ever..." Mutsumi groaned, stumbling to her feet as they looked at the time. "We should get going."

The six of them entered the school building, the silence only made them nervous as they prepared for what was coming. "No matter what happens, I'm happy that we're sextuplets," Mutsumi said as they arrived at their location. She held out her hand, extending her thumb and pinky as her sisters did the same. They linked their fingers together, silently wishing each other good luck as they all went their separate ways to wait for the end.

Mutsumi went up the stairs, waiting up on the roof while having a view of the entire outside area of the school. She looked down at all the students dancing around the bonfire, unable to pick out faces from how high she was. It took a few minutes before something happened, the silence nearly lulling her to sleep but she kept an eye on her phone to stay awake. It had been five minutes since she got there when the door opened up.

"Hello."

"Why are you here?" Mutsumi asked, looking up from her phone with a smile. She took a few steps toward her visitor, slinging an arm over their shoulder.

"It's over, isn't it?"

"Yeah..." Mutsumi played with her hair as she looked down at her phone. The thing on her screen was the map app that she made. "So it was Yotsuba, huh?" Mutsumi chuckled, placing a hand on her chest. "Huh? I guess a part of me still wanted him to pick me..."

"How do you feel?"

"It does sting, Itsuki. But only a little." Mutsumi smiled, walking through the door and making her way down to where her other sisters were. "Good luck, you two..." She muttered to herself as she resigned herself for the night, her mind wandering elsewhere for the rest of the night.