♪————!

♪————!

Alright, this seems like a good place to take a break...

Okay. Great work, everyone!

We've already been singing for two hours.

Oh, you're right.

Time really flew by us there.

That means we were just that focused, right? You and Toya even seem more motivated than usual, Akito!

Yeah.

(Sitting down to talk with Tono and his partner was huge.)

(We have a much better understanding of each other now, and it's become clear that we're all after the same dream.)

(Well, to be fair, there are still some loose ends...)

(Look at this city...?

I've been thinking about it ever since but still don't have a clue.)

(Still, Tono seems a lot better, so right now, we gotta think about making our event a success.)

(The last time we all practiced together, we didn't do nearly as well as we'd hoped we would. So next time...)

Shinonome...?

Everything okay? What's got you bothered?

Hm? Oh, my bad...

I was just thinking about our next practice together.

Each team's having no problem giving a quality performance...

But we're still not synergizing.

Remember how we all felt after our last full practice?

True...

At our current rate, we'll put on a “decent event”, but hardly an “event that surpasses that night”.

Exactly.

My guess is that every team's gonna have to push each other higher and higher if we really want to recreate the crazy atmosphere from that night...

I mean, RAD WEEKEND was nuts from start to finish, right?

Well, duh! Aunt Nagi even kicked it off with a solo performance! Of course it was nuts!

Yeah, she really just grabbed a hold of the crowd's hearts and made them go absolutely wild.

But the biggest surprise was how that energy never faded. It just grew and grew as the night went on.

Yeah. It was like Shinonome said.

Every team competed to be the best and pushed each other higher and higher.

I agree.

As such, it makes sense to try and emulate that synergy, but...

That's not the whole story, right...?

Yeah...

I hate to say it but are we just not good enough...?

We all know that we're nowhere near their level, so that's probably the wrong place to look.

After a lot of discussion, we decided to keep the order of our performances the same too.

Yeah, I really think EVER needs to lead things off for us.

They've been performing for pretty long now and have way more stage experience than us.

Which is why we need them to immediately warm up the crowd with the first song.

At the same time, Mita's also been very impressive considering how he has to carry the baton from EVER to Tono.

Yeah, I thought so too! I sorta couldn't believe it during our rehearsal the other day.

Me neither. Not only is he singing really well, but he's also great at interacting with the crowd as the MC.

Apparently, he's been thinking about how to give a performance that suits him while also acting as a bridge.

That makes sense. He was definitely doing his best to get everyone excited for the next act as the MC.

Seriously, when did he learn to do all this...?

And Tono... Well, I think this goes without saying...

Yeah. We're just practicing, but he's performing like it's the real thing.

Right. It's like he was able to wrangle up the entire place the second he started singing.

From there on out, he just let his presence grow stronger and stronger.

Yeah, I bet the crowd would've been bouncing off the walls! But we're also supposed to go right after him and he's raising the bar sky high for us...

And that's exactly what we want.

Totally! We aren't gonna surpass that night unless we all push each other as hard as possible.

Yeah!

We have to take whatever energy that's there, mix it with our own and change it into something even greater...

We may not have been able to find the synergy we were looking for this time, but I believe we're on the right track.

Yeah, same.

So, what we're missing is...

Pancakes...

Wait, huh? Are you hungry or something?

No.

I was reminded of something KAITO said.

Hehe. You aren't guaranteed to end up with delicious pancakes just because you gathered up some good ingredients, right?

Yeah. We aren't gelling as well as we want because we still don't have a good understanding of each other.

If that's the case, let's talk some more with Mita and the others. For example, we ask them about why they decided to start singing.

Hey, great idea! I wanna ask them that too!

Yeah, me too!

Alright, let's bring it up during our next practice.