- The morning after the banquet, everyone thinks it's snowing in June—turns out it's just cottonwood seeds swirling around though.
- The seeds make Cassia think of her favorite of the Hundred Poems, "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening." Apparently there are only one hundred songs, poems, paintings, and such because society was too "cluttered" with culture.
- Cassia goes to work. Her job is sorting things, and she's excellent at it—hasn't made a mistake in three months. Today, her boss Norah gives her a sorting test, and her score on it may determine her future career.
- Upon returning home to Mapletree Borough, Cassia finds herself alone, so she eats her individually-allotted nutrition for the evening all by her lonesome. Apparently they "eat for health and performance, not taste" (3.3). Nom nom?
- She takes advantage of this rare alone time and decides to read the microchip on Xander. But when she pops the chip into her family's port, something weird happens—it's not Xander's face on the screen.