Futaba is chosen as a program-reg, a voice actress who regularly voices bit parts, in a western anime starring Ryoko Shiraishi. After the first day of recording, Futaba's throat starts acting up from the intense bit part she played, and has to miss a week of recording after getting a cold. While walking home with Futaba the week afterwards and hearing about her determination to keep up with Ichigo and Rin, Shiraishi explains how she got vocal cord nodules from pushing herself too hard and needed throat surgery. Later, as Earphones gets its first solo concert booked, Ichigo takes on the task of choosing and choreographing cover songs to fill the concert's runtime, while everyone also has to try and promote the concert in order to fill their venue. Just as things are progressing, Ichigo ends up spraining her ankle.

A month after Earphones' concert, Futaba faces an assessment to determine whether she can stay at Aozora Productions. While pondering how she will be assessed, Futaba meets up with some of her friends from training school, some of whom went on to different career paths, before being asked to think about where she wants to be in the future. On the day of her assessment, Futaba faces harsh criticism due to her lack of work but manages to work up the courage to state her desire to work as a voice actress for a long time. Although not able to move up to a higher position in the company, Futaba is given a deferral, allowing her to work at Aozora for another year in order to prove herself as a voice actress who can work for a long time.