A few Knights of the Round Table officers walked toward the criminal, who had already fallen to the ground, slapped handcuffs on him, and then began a simple inspection.
Whether it was his imagination or not, Shirou always felt as though he had been surrounded as well.
"Thanks for the heroic help from this gentleman—did you think I was going to say that? You're under arrest, too!"
Swire looked at Shirou with a smile, only Shirou felt as though he had seen it somewhere before.
It looked just like the expressions he had seen on the faces of the Penguin Logistics crew that morning, that half-smiling, terrifyingly looking sort of expression.
"Um... could I ask why?"
Shirou raised his hand weakly to ask; surely he hadn't done anything that warranted getting arrested, right?
"Do you even need to ask? A civilian suddenly launches an attack on an Infected person—did you think you were playing some kind of hero game? You could've died if even the slightest thing went wrong, you know! Look at your right arm! If the Knights of the Round Table hadn't stepped in, that blast could have given you third-degree burns over a huge area directly!"
Upon hearing Shirou's question, several hash marks appeared on Swire's forehead. She then walked up to Shirou, pointed a finger at his face, and stepped closer with every word she spoke, forcing Shirou to lean backward.
"Uh, I got it. I'll be careful next time."
Shirou looked at Swire before him, raising both hands high to signal that he understood.
"Anyway, head to the Knights of the Round Table to make a statement, and have a doctor check your condition."
Seeing Shirou holding up his hands with that I'll-do-it-again-next-time look, Swire withdrew her hand and sighed as she spoke.
26 Knights of the Round Table
Lungmen, Knights of the Round Table interrogation room.
"Name."
Swire held a cup of coffee, sipping it as she questioned the Shirou sitting before her.
"Shirou Emiya."
Shirou, sitting across from her, felt somewhat nervous. This was his first time ever entering a place like this. How should he put it? It didn't feel as terrifying as he had imagined.
"Gender?"
Swire tapped on the tablet in her hand and continued her questioning.
"...Male."
Shirou didn't understand why she had to ask something so obvious at a glance, but he replied with the mindset of answering whatever the Knights of the Round Table people asked him.
"Age."
"Ten... twenty."
He had originally wanted to answer seventeen, but then Shirou remembered that the identity his boss had set up for him seemed to be twenty years old, so he answered according to his fake ID to avoid running into more problems.
"Race."
Swire didn't mind Shirou's momentary hesitation. In her opinion, it wasn't strange for someone at the dividing line of nineteen and twenty to get their own age wrong.
"Siracusa."
There weren't any obvious physical traits to Siracusans, and Shirou happened to fit the bill, so Emperor had simply assigned him the Siracusa race.
Mainly, there really weren't any obvious traits on Shirou, and Emperor hadn't known what race this guy was, so he could only pick something relatively close.
"First of all, why were you at Dagu Mall?"
Swire didn't pay too much attention to Shirou's race. After all, there were indeed no obvious traits on Shirou, and he wasn't the criminal, so naturally, there was no need to dwell on it.
"Um... I went to buy things."
Shirou had thought she would directly chew him out and ask why he had confronted the criminal, but her first question was about why he was at the mall.
He truthfully stated his main purpose for going to the mall.
"Bought a backpack? Do you have a receipt?"
Swire's eyes glanced at the brand-new crossbody bag on Shirou's body. She recognized that brand; it was from a shop inside Dagu Mall.
"I do, right here."
Shirou rummaged through his backpack, took out a receipt, and handed it to Swire.
"Mm... it checks out."
Swire casually snapped a photo of the receipt with her phone, then handed the receipt back to him.
"Then why did you charge straight at the criminal back then?"
Swire placed the tablet in front of Shirou. On it was a security camera footage showing Shirou charging directly toward the criminal, just as the criminal happened to throw a burst of flames.
"Because I happened to see him lock onto a mother and child and charge right at them."
"So you charged at an Infected person bare-handed? Should I call you bold or ignorant? There's a limit to how fearless of death you can be, you know!"
Hearing Shirou's answer, Swire felt a headache coming on. She always felt that this guy must be the type to put himself last behind everything else.
She had seen plenty of people like that, and most of them didn't live long.
"Uh... I'll pay attention next time."
Shirou knew he was in the wrong; after all, he had meddled in Knights of the Round Table business, and as a civilian at that.
"You're still hoping for a next time?"
Swire stood up, slammed her hands hard onto the desk, and spoke loudly at Shirou.
"Ow."
Shirou's ears hurt a little from Swire's sudden PA-system mode.
"Hmph, anyway, you saw the criminal trying to grab a hostage on the second floor, so you jumped down from the second floor, right?"
Swire sat back down in her chair, leaning her body back against the backrest.
"Yes."
Shirou rubbed his still-aching ears, inwardly complaining that Swire had a really loud voice.
Naturally, Swire had no idea what Shirou was thinking inside. She merely tapped her fingers on the tablet and turned the screen around to show Shirou.
It was the exact moment Shirou had taken the flames head-on with his bare right arm.
"Although the checkup showed you're fine, you're pretty brave to dare to take magic head-on like that. Are your brains stuffed with muscles? Don't you know how to dodge?!"
Swire looked at Shirou and smiled as she spoke. Everything before that had been a minor issue; Shirou's behavior right there was the most dangerous part.
"Ahahaha..."
Shirou didn't explain and could only offer an awkward smile, which caused the number of hash marks on Swire's head to multiply significantly.
"And that cloth wrapped around your right arm—you said it's something very important, right?"
Swire took a deep breath and continued her questioning.
When Shirou was undergoing his checkup, the cloth on his right arm had caused a minor commotion. Shirou had briefly been treated as an Infected person hiding his identity. Fortunately, there was nothing underneath his right arm, and the reason it was wrapped was simply because he claimed it was an important item that he had to carry with him at all times.
Longmen Curses, put it inside your bag! Don't you know wrapping it on your body easily causes misunderstandings? Swire desperately wanted to roar that at Shirou, but she held it back.
"Yes, I'll find a way to carry it properly afterward. I won't wrap it around my right arm anymore."
Shirou hadn't expected things to become this serious. He had merely been carrying the Holy Shroud with him in the way that felt most natural to him.
At home, it mostly interfered with his chores of cleaning, cooking, and the like, which was why he kept it in his room; when he was outside, he basically always kept it wrapped around his right arm.
Even the Penguin Logistics crew and the others didn't know about this point to this day. If they had known, they probably would have suggested a different way for Shirou to carry it.
"Good. Then the questions are just about done."
Swire pulled the tablet back and tapped it a few times, confirming that there were no major problems. Next, she just needed to handle some simple cleanup.
This whole thing was just a matter of going through the motions to begin with, so Swire didn't dig too deeply into many things—for instance, why his landing posture from the second floor had been a squat like using a toilet; didn't his legs hurt landing like that?
And why a strip of cloth was able to block magic and things of that sort.
There were actually still plenty of questions she could ask, but Shirou wasn't a criminal, so Swire respected the other party's privacy.
"Is it over?"
Hearing that it was finally over, Shirou relaxed slightly.
Even though Swire's attitude earlier felt more like chatting than an interrogation, Shirou was still somewhat unaccustomed to this kind of atmosphere.
"Not yet, we just need to finish filling out the basic records."
Swire tapped her fingers on the desk a few times to draw Shirou's attention back.
"You came to Lungmen about a month ago, right? What made you, a Siracusan, specially run all the way to Lungmen?"
Swire placed the tablet aside and asked.
Shirou had been specially warned about this by Emperor: if anyone asked why he came to Lungmen, he should just say it was for work, and they would handle the rest on their end.
"For work."
"Oh? Then where are you employed?"
Swire's gaze turned quite sharp because Shirou's profile didn't mention his occupation.
So either there was a problem with Shirou's occupation, or he was lying.
"I am currently employed at Penguin Logistics."
The moment Shirou finished speaking, he noticed that the gazes of the Knights of the Round Table personnel responsible for recording and Swire herself had all turned toward him, and their looks were quite complicated.
27 Only This Much Is Unforgotten
"Penguin Logistics, of all places?"
"He clearly looks so normal."
"Such a waste of a bright young man."
The three Knights of the Round Table personnel doing the paperwork whispered among themselves.
"???"
Shirou wore a face full of question marks, not understanding why the Knights of the Round Table people reacted this way.
Could it be... everyone at Penguin Logistics was actually very familiar with the Knights of the Round Table?
It was just that why did their tone sound a little wrong?
"You're with Penguin Logistics?"
Swire looked at the Penguin Logistics work ID Shirou handed her with a bewildered expression.
She looked again at Shirou's clear gaze, untainted by the cruel beatings of society, and felt a sense of pity.
Presumably, it wouldn't be long before this guy became just as crazy as the rest of those people at Penguin Logistics.
"Sigh."
Thinking of this, Swire let out a sigh of regret.
Such a good person? Although a bit impulsive, that righteous urge to help others—if only he were part of the Knights of the Round Table, how great would that be?
Why did it have to be someone from Penguin Logistics, of all places?
"Um... is something the matter?"
Seeing Swire first ask if he was from Penguin Logistics and then follow up with a sigh, Shirou, no matter how foolish he was, could tell that Penguin Logistics' reputation within the Knights of the Round Table didn't seem very good.
It was just that he didn't even fully understand Penguin Logistics' job duties yet; how could he possibly know about the love-hate relationship between Penguin Logistics and the Knights of the Round Table?
"Penguin Logistics, oh Penguin Logistics... you'll understand later. Rather, you'd better hurry up and leave Penguin Logistics while you still can."
Swire muttered the name Penguin Logistics a few times, then patted Shirou's shoulder and said with a serious expression.
Shirou felt as though he could see her grinding her teeth slightly as she said those four words.
"That's probably not going to work."
Shirou could only awkwardly refuse Swire's suggestion. After all, the people at Penguin Logistics had helped him with so many things; he couldn't just say he was leaving and quit. That simply didn't fit his personal style of doing things.
"It seems you have your own ideas, too. But whatever you do, absolutely, positively do not turn into people like them, understand?"
Swire didn't forcefully demand that Shirou quit either. After all, the two of them were meeting for the very first time, and she had only said so much because Shirou's actions had made her rather appreciative of him.
Before you continue