Complete Projection Continuous Layering.
A skill that consumed a tremendous amount of mana. Under normal circumstances, Shirou would rarely use it unless absolutely necessary.
However, this time he was not projecting Noble Phantasms, so the consumption could basically be ignored. In a way, he had exploited a loophole.
Originally, he did not want to do this... but Swire had stepped perfectly onto a landmine.
As he shouted a declaration worthy of a villain and swung his hand downward, countless arrows behind him poured down like a torrential storm.
Every arrow fired left behind a pale blue magical afterimage, and immediately afterward another arrow would replace it and fire again.
Angry as he was, Shirou still controlled the strength very carefully.
After all, this was only a exercise.
"?????"
Watching the massive number of arrows rushing toward her, Swire no longer cared about the loudspeaker in her hand. She immediately threw it away and ran for cover.
"You damned—!"
Even while fleeing, Swire did not forget to curse.
What kind of nonsense was this? This firepower was stronger than every sniper squad in the Guard Department attacking together.
Even adding the caster squads might still not compare.
So she had basically jumped repeatedly on Shirou's trigger point, danced around on it twice, and even shouted insults while doing so, completely enraging him?
She could not fight him. Surely hiding was acceptable, right?
Using her legs, Swire burst out with even greater speed than usual as she sprinted toward cover. After entering and slamming the door shut behind her, she immediately felt an overwhelming sense of safety.
Of course, that feeling of safety was false and temporary.
"Hiding is useless, you know?"
Since the communication channel was still connected, Shirou naturally heard Swire's yelling from the other side.
Had she not been cheering and provoking him enthusiastically just now? Why was she folding so quickly now?
Besides, hiding... was useles.
"Meowaaaaaaaah!"
Controlling the arrows to shatter the windows and make sharp turns midair, Shirou soon heard Swire's scream through the headset.
The gloomy mood he had been in suddenly improved by more than half.
"Hmph FUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!"
At this moment, Shirou let out a Uruk style laugh and combined with the suction-cup arrows continuously firing behind him, he finally experienced what it felt like to be the golden Archer.
He was only missing a line about mongrels. However, thanks to his strong and refined character, Shirou still did not walk down that path.
In the eyes of everyone else, though, Shirou looked as though he was gradually starting to break down, specifically in the sense that he was becoming increasingly strange.
"It is over, it is over, this Shirou has completely broken!"
Even without the communicator, Exusiai could hear Shirou's laughter from the rooftop. Combined with the plungers... no, the toy arrows continuously raining downward, Shirou truly looked like a final boss right now.
This was the first time both Exusiai and Croissant had ever seen Shirou like this. No matter how much trouble they caused in the past, Shirou always maintained that gentle appearance at most saying terrifying things with an extremely gentle smile.
But now, he was practically like a Demon King from a game or novel.
Calling him the Great Demon King Shirou had always just been a joke before.
Now he had genuinely become a Great Demon King.
"Just look at how far you people pushed him..."
Watching the scene before her, Sora sighed.
The three of them were hiding far away, directly staying on the opposite side from the Guard Department, afraid of getting dragged into the chaos.
The Guard Department side had become something like hell.
Countless arrows fell like raindrops. Even hiding behind cover was useless, because Officer Swire had already demonstrated perfectly that these arrows could turn corners.
"Number Seven, Number Twenty-Four, Number Fifteen, Number Thirty..."
The referee group stared fixedly at the screens. Whenever they saw an arrow stuck to someone's head, they informed the person that they had been eliminated.
As for Swire... there was no need to specifically remind people to finish her off.
There were already densely packed suction-cup arrows surrounding her.
What Swire needed right now was some quiet time alone.
Meanwhile, above them, Shirou controlled the arrows as they traced elegant blue arcs through the air, accompanied by the screams of the Guard Department...
Leaving Texas beside him staring with a face full of question marks. Why did Shirou suddenly seem a little violent?
Only when she heard loud impacts coming from the rooftop door she had locked earlier did she snap back to reality.
The Guard Department had come up!
The screams coming from the communicators on the other side must have been so tragic that Chief Chen chose the fastest possible method, smashing through obstacles to get up here in such a short time.
"Shirou! They are here!"
Texas called out to warn him. Fortunately, even though Shirou was having fun, he was still paying attention to his surroundings. The moment he heard Texas's voice, he immediately turned his head.
"So they have already arrived... then let us head down first!"
Hearing the impacts against the door, Shirou quickly came up with a response.
If they came up here, then they would go down instead!
Without hesitation, Shirou directly reached his hand toward Texas.
"Mm."
Looking at the hand Shirou extended and hearing what he said, Texas quickly understood what he intended to do.
This place was nearly ten stories high. There was no way Shirou planned to jump first and then have her jump afterward. Since he was this confident, he definitely had his own method, but Texas was very certain that if she jumped down wearing her current equipment, she could go straight to the hospital afterward.
The kind where she would lose all her vacation time and bonus money and might even have to pay extra just to recover.
So the hand he extended...
He was definitely planning to bring her down with him.
To be honest, in the current situation Texas actually felt somewhat tempted to give up and let Shirou go down alone and have fun by himself while she simply watched.
But in the end, she abandoned the idea.
After all, this building did not have an elevator.
Which meant that if she got eliminated here, she would have to walk down the stairs floor by floor herself. Just thinking about it sounded troublesome.
She might as well go down together with Shirou.
With that thought in mind, Texas grabbed Shirou's outstretched hand.
"Hold tight."
Shirou, who had completely gotten into the spirit of things, no longer paid as much attention to propriety as usual. He directly pulled Texas closer to him.
Then he lowered his body, let Texas climb onto his back, and jumped straight off the edge.
Directly holding Texas around the waist while jumping probably would have been more effective, but considering Texas's usual image, Shirou chose a relatively gentler method.
As for carrying her in a half-princess carry...
That was impossible. Shirou might have loosened up a lot right now, but not to that extent.
As he leaped downward, countless magic circuits instantly spread across his legs, strengthening his lower body enough to let him land steadily.
After all, Shirou already had experience jumping around the slums. A height of less than ten stories was basically nothing.
Texas's side of things was much more dramatic.
She had not expected that the moment she grabbed Shirou's hand, he would immediately move her onto his back and leap downward.
Everything happened in an instant. By the time she reacted, they were already in free fall.
The shock even caused the Pocky in her mouth to fly out.
Fortunately, the building was not very tall. Before Texas could even mourn the loss of her flying Pocky, Shirou had already landed smoothly.
"I hope next time you can at least say something before jumping..."
That was the first thing Texas thought after being set down.
"Next time for sure."
Shirou answered rather perfunctorily. The chances of there being a next time were incredibly slim anyway.
After all, in most situations, Texas definitely would not be the first person he needed to help.
"Damn it!"
At this moment, the people mostly on the verge of collapse were undoubtedly Chen and the others, who had just kicked open the rooftop door.
Imagine this:
At first, in order to save expenses, you chose a slower method to clear away obstacles. Then your teammate was both weak and loved talking trash, provoking the opponent into getting angry and revealing his real strength while mercilessly crushing your teammates.
Even that would have been fine.
After all, it was Char Siu Cat. None of it was fatal, though the screams had sounded rather miserable. Nobody knew exactly what Shirou had done to make Char Siu Cat scream like that...
Overall, though, she deserved it.
But what angered Chen the most was this:
After she led her squad through countless difficulties to reach the rooftop—
Shirou simply jumped down with someone right in front of them!?
And the people stationed below seemed to have mostly been eliminated by Shirou already, which meant...
They now had to rush downstairs immediately.
"Even a pet would make a more reliable teammate than that Char Siu Cat."
Feeling like all their effort had been wasted, Chen blamed everything on Swire before immediately leading her squad rushing downstairs.
Meanwhile, after landing, Shirou stopped his barrage and first confirmed which of Exusiai's traps were still active. Then he planned to work together with Texas in this district, fighting a guerrilla battle until time ran out.
The plan sounded good, but Yith commented:
"I suggest you adjust your state a little and directly face Chief Chen's squad later."
When giving these suggestions, Yith used an encrypted channel, so neither the referees nor Wei Yenwu's side could hear him.
Besides suggesting that Shirou directly confront the Guard Department squad, Yith also specifically reminded him to appropriately show signs of exhaustion and eventually lose.
Many eyes were watching this exercise. Shirou's earlier performance had been too outrageous...
It was easy to attract attention.
Being noticed by Wei Yenwu was acceptable, since few things in Lungmen escaped that man's eyes. But being noticed by others would become troublesome.
Yith's suggestion was mainly to create the impression that Shirou possessed explosive strength, but poor endurance afterward.
Though it could not entirely be called a false impression either...
According to Shirou himself, using Noble Phantasms already consumed enormous amounts of energy.
In any case, the most important thing was to mislead those people into reconsidering whether it was worth falling out with Penguin Logistics just to recruit Shirou as combat power.
"...The adult world really is troublesome."
After Yith's reminder, Shirou finally calmed down somewhat. At the same time, he felt embarrassed and ashamed of his earlier violent behavior.
At that moment, Shirou suddenly understood Archer's thoughts a little. That feeling of wanting to go back to the past and strangle yourself...
Of course, the two situations were fundamentally different.
Shirou wanted to hide his embarrassment, while Archer's situation was much more complicated.
"Then I will drag a few Guard Department members down with me. Shirou, you focus on dealing with Chief Chen and Chief Hoshiguma."
Texas, who had listened the entire time, quickly understood Yith's intentions. She decisively took the easiest part for herself and left the two most troublesome opponents to Shirou.
"...I truly never imagined there would be a day like this."
After confirming their next course of action, Shirou let out a sigh.
He truly never expected there would come a day when he would have to face the two great pillars of the Guard Department at once.
Or perhaps three of them?
After all, he had only just eliminated Swire himself.
The whole thing made him feel as though he were some kind of vicious criminal...
"Do your best. This is the necessary path to becoming a member of Penguin Logistics."
Yith, who could roughly guess what Shirou was thinking and offered verbal encouragement.
"I do not need something that weird, alright!?"
Shirou complained.
What kind of bizarre rite of passage was that? He absolutely did not need it.
"Sigh, the child has become rebellious. Anyway, just try your best to follow what I said earlier. Mr. Wei and the Boss will handle the rest."
Hearing Shirou's complaints, Yith sighed before falling silent. At the same time, a burst of static came through the communication channel.
He had probably switched back to the original channel, leaving Shirou with a retort stuck in his throat and nowhere to direct it, making him feel deeply frustrated.
Who exactly was the child here!?
Beside him, Texas seemed to think of something amusing, because the expression on her face was beginning to crack slightly.
"Stop laughing... they are already here."
Shirou naturally noticed it too, but too many things had happened today. He still had to face the two giants later, so he was not really in the mood.
After Chief Chen and Chief Hoshiguma led their people down, he casually reminded Texas that it was time to get to work.
"Ahem... your legs should be fine now, right? Chief Chen and Chief Hoshiguma are yours."
Knowing she actually needed to do her part, Texas drew her two Originium swords and asked.
Shirou: "?"
Sorry, he genuinely did not understand why Texas suddenly said that.
"You two seem pretty relaxed. Instead of running away, you actually waited here for us?"
After running up and down everywhere, Chief Chen had already prepared herself for the idea that the pair had escaped far away, leading into another tedious search operation.
Yet the two of them had no intention of fleeing at all and were instead waiting here for them directly?
That was way too confident.
Oh, but it was Shirou.
Then it made sense.
If it were anyone else, Chen probably would have already drawn her blade and physically subdued them. But the man before her was a heavyweight opponent, someone who had single-handedly eliminated most of the Guard Department personnel moments ago.
One of her former nightmares.
Back when Shirou had acted as her swordsmanship instructor, she frequently dreamed about being chased down and cut apart by him.
Things only improved after she gradually got used to it, though after the incident where Shirou pulled out the twin-bladed weapon and attacked, the nightmares had continued for several more days.
It had practically become psychological trauma.
"Ah? This? ...My legs went numb from jumping down earlier."
Looking at Chen's expression and hearing what she said, Shirou suddenly understood what Texas had meant earlier.
"Your legs went numb..."
Hearing Shirou seriously claim that his legs were numb from jumping down, Chen thought that if she had not personally seen him leaping around the slums before, she might actually have believed him.
"Old Chen! Strike while he is weak and finish him off!"
Hoshiguma instantly understood what Penguin Logistics was trying to do. However, getting Old Chen to understand it immediately would be difficult, so she simply encouraged Chen to charge in with her blade.
"...Indeed. Everyone! Prepare to attack!"
After hearing Hoshiguma's words, Chen stopped caring whether Shirou's claim was true or not.
Right now, the only thing they needed to do was eliminate him and bring this farce to an end.
Yes, a farce.
After all, the Guard Department had already lost enough face.