Finally, under the well-meaning invitations of Hoshiguma and Sir Swire, Shirou abandoned the idea of walking back to the dormitory and got into the Knight Bureau car.
Shirou never expected his second time riding in a Knight Bureau car to involve this kind of scene.
"You don't need to worry about those people; I'll handle things on my end."
Sir Swire said from the driver's seat as she drove.
Aside from those who had sustained injuries and were sent elsewhere for medical treatment, everyone else was being escorted in another vehicle.
As for Sir Swire, she was in the same car as Hoshiguma and Shirou. Hoshiguma sat in the front passenger seat, while her large shield occupied the back seat right alongside Shirou.
"Got it. Sorry to trouble you, Sir Swire."
Shirou nodded obediently. He didn't dwell too much on the accident, choosing to treat it like a farce.
Such matters were best left to the professionals.
"Just call me Swire. We aren't in a superior-subordinate relationship anyway—though don't call me Miss Swire! My last name isn't Swire! Make that clear to those people from Penguin Logistics when you get back!"
Seeing that Shirou still seemed somewhat reserved around her, Swire decided to take a cue from Hoshiguma and use Hoshiguma's social approach when interacting with him.
"Understood. I'll make it clear to them when I get back."
Faced with Swire's strong correction regarding her name, Shirou realized that the other woman cared quite a bit about it.
Therefore, he would definitely deal with Exusiai properly when he got back.
"Heh heh, good! Speaking of which, Hoshiguma, who was that Jie you mentioned?"
Unable to sit still while driving, Swire started looking for topics to chat about.
"Huh? You should have had some contact with him—the owner of that seafood stall. He looks menacing, but he's actually just an ordinary person."
Hoshiguma picked up on Swire's topic and explained.
"Longmen Curses Seriously? When I saw him earlier, I thought he was the mastermind behind the whole thing."
Faced with the seafood stall owner's true nature, Swire almost crashed her head into the steering wheel.
She felt like she had experienced far too many shocks today; for quite a while afterwards, it should be difficult for anything else to shock her.
"Ha ha, true. That guy Jie often gets misunderstood because of his appearance, but anyone who spends time around him realizes he just looks a bit scary."
Anticipating Swire's reaction, Hoshiguma smiled as she recounted most of Jie's past dark history stemming from his looks.
She had heard those rumors of his dark history back then and gone to investigate for herself; only after long-term observation did she confirm that the man was genuinely just an ordinary person.
To this, Swire could only remark that one truly cannot judge a book by its cover.
"Shirou, where is your sword?"
Noticing through the rearview mirror that the black and white dual blades Shirou had been holding earlier were nowhere to be seen, Hoshiguma wondered where he had stowed them. Those swords should have been too large to conceal on his person, and Shirou's shopping bag couldn't possibly fit them either.
This piqued Hoshiguma's curiosity. She had arrived rather late and hadn't seen where Shirou produced the blades from.
"Must be Originium Arts?"
Swire remarked. Casually prying into someone else's Originium Arts was impolite, but Hoshiguma was likely just asking where Shirou had put his weapons, which was why Swire briefly brought up Originium Arts.
"Yeah, it's Originium Arts."
Shirou didn't mention Projection Magic, mainly because it was too difficult to explain, and secondly, since even the people at Penguin Logistics didn't know about it, he had no reason to give anyone else a detailed explanation.
When it came to trustworthiness, currently no one could compare to the crew at Penguin Logistics.
Although magic wasn't really anything worth hiding, Shirou wouldn't go blurting out all his secrets unprompted if nobody asked.
"Well, that certainly is convenient, being able to pull out weapons on a whim."
Originium Arts sounded reasonable enough, so Hoshiguma didn't dwell on it too much.
Originium Arts across this vast land were bizarre and varied, and it wasn't as if she had never seen special types before.
"If I had that kind of ability, I wouldn't have been in such a sorry state today!"
Thinking of her bedraggled appearance earlier, Swire grew angry.
She, the dignified Senior Superintendent of the Longmen Knight Bureau, had actually been chased around by a bunch of thugs!
Even so, having witnessed Shirou's Originium Arts with her own eyes, Swire still found them quite incredible.
Especially after he picked up the dual blades; Shirou seemed like a completely different person, which also left her deeply curious.
"Ah, haha..."
Faced with the two women's remarks, Shirou could only offer an awkward smile.
Amidst this slightly awkward atmosphere for Shirou, the free ride eventually brought them to the Knight Bureau.
"...Missy, weren't you supposed to take Shirou back?"
Gazing at the familiar building of the Longmen Knight Bureau, Hoshiguma turned her head to question Swire.
"Ahem... Didn't I bring you back first on the way?"
Only then did Swire remember her intention to drive Shirou home. She had been preoccupied with other thoughts the entire drive over and completely forgot.
"It's fine, I can just walk back. It's not very far from here..."
Shirou politely declined Swire's offer to drop him off at his doorstep and prepared to walk back himself.
Pushing open the car door and stepping out, Shirou spotted a familiar vehicle nearby, and he began to wonder whether this was the Penguin Logistics dormitory or the Knight Bureau.
"Yo, looks like the Penguin Logistics folks got hauled in again. Want to take them off our hands while you're at it, Shirou?"
Seeing Shirou's stunned expression, Hoshiguma also spotted the Penguin Logistics vehicle. She didn't even have to guess; the Penguin Logistics crew had definitely been busted again and were probably inside the Knight Bureau right now making their statements.
"Oh? The Penguin Logistics people are here too? Well then, Shirou, you can just take them back with you. Make sure you don't end up like them in the future!"
Upon seeing that Penguin Logistics was involved yet again, Swire abandoned her plan to drive Shirou home.
Originally, she had intended to forcefully drag Shirou into the car and have a nice, thorough chat about the wonderful aspects of the Knight Bureau. Now, it seemed there was no need for that.
She would just have to try again another day; these things required patience and a steady approach.
"I never thought the day would come when I'd have to bail people out of a police station."
Massaging her temples, Shirou had actually known this day would come ever since he learned that Penguin Logistics were regular customers of the Knight Bureau.
He just hadn't expected it to arrive so quickly and suddenly.
Following Swire—who had parked the car—and Hoshiguma carrying her large shield into the Knight Bureau, guided by the two women, Shirou quickly spotted the individuals who treated the Knight Bureau like their own living room.
"Got dragged in too, Shirou?"
Seeing Shirou arrive alongside Swire and Hoshiguma, Exusiai greeted him.
"Splendid! Shirou, you've already captured the spirit of Penguin Logistics!"
For some unknown reason, Croissant also grew fired up.
"Longmen Curses Will you please take this pointless spirit and apply it to something constructive instead?"
Faced with Croissant's passionate speech, Swire couldn't help but curse aloud.
This also cemented Swire's determination to find a way to poach Shirou over, lest he get assimilated into this bizarre aesthetic style.
44 Penguin logistics is great, awesome, and top-notch
"What did you do, Shirou?"
Ignoring Exusiai and Croissant's nonsense, Sora waved at Shirou and asked.
Compared to the other three, Sora still felt a slight sense of unease about ending up in the Knight Bureau.
Though she was gradually getting used to it as the number of visits increased.
"Didn't do anything. I only came up because I saw your car downstairs."
Shirou covered his face; he really didn't want to admit he knew these people.
Just look at Exusiai and Croissant, who acted as if the Knight Bureau were their own home. Texas was sitting off to the side with a Pocky stick clamped between her teeth, and even Sora—the only one who could be called normal—was learning from Exusiai and greeting him.
Now that he thought about it, Swire's suggestion actually sounded pretty good?
"Stop chatting and hurry up and finish your statements."
A nearby Knight Bureau officer tapped the desk, drawing the attention of the Penguin Logistics crew back to the task at hand.
With their flighty personalities, even writing a statement was difficult, and now their focus had all been distracted again.
When on earth would he get to go off-duty!
"You've got a tough road ahead of you."
Hoshiguma patted Shirou's shoulder.
She didn't harbor any negative feelings toward Penguin Logistics' antics, but that didn't stop her from picturing the future scenes of Shirou caught squarely between Swire and Penguin Logistics.
Just imagining it made Hoshiguma feel like she needed a drink.
"...?"
It was obvious that Shirou failed to grasp the underlying meaning behind Hoshiguma's words, leaving him to tilt his head in a silent question mark.
"You'll understand soon enough."
After experiencing the thrill of acting like a riddle-maker firsthand, Hoshiguma felt it was simply fantastic! No wonder so many people loved being riddlers.
"???"
Subjected to riddles for the Nth time today, Shirou wanted to unleash a string of curses, but his good upbringing ultimately made him hold it back.
Meanwhile, Swire couldn't be bothered to say anything more to the Penguin Logistics bunch. She planned to simply make a brief record of today's incident and handle it properly when she came to work tomorrow.
Before leaving, however, Swire suddenly thought of an interesting idea to mess with the Penguin Logistics folks.
"Shirou, just like I said—if you ever find Penguin Logistics hard to stay with, you're welcome to come over to our Knight Bureau, you know?"
As those words left Swire's mouth, the previously noisy Penguin Logistics group instantly fell silent.
The four of them exchanged glances, then mustered all their strength to finish writing their statements, slammed the paperwork down onto the desk, rushed over, hoisted Shirou onto their shoulders, and hauled him away.
"Goodbye, farewell, hope we never see you again."
Before leaving, Exusiai made a funny face at Swire.
Everyone in the office watched as Shirou was kidnapped right under their noses, some of them even feeling a sense of deja vu from the scene.
"Missy, you really just poked a penguin nest."
Watching Penguin Logistics vanish from sight, Hoshiguma remarked with a sigh.
"I didn't expect the effect to be quite this good either."
Swire had originally intended to poach Shirou right in front of them just to provoke the group a little, but the results far exceeded her expectations—almost too well, in fact. She could only pray that Shirou would be alright.
As for Shirou? He was currently being shoved into a car by the Penguin Logistics crew.
"Let me tell you, Shirou, you must never trust those people at the Knight Bureau! Our Penguin Logistics has top-tier employee benefits, don't listen to a word they say!"
The moment they got into the car, Croissant launched into a lengthy speech about how great, awesome, and top-notch Penguin Logistics was, claiming that flashy hussies from the Knight Bureau couldn't compare in the slightest.
"Exactly, exactly! Every day is a grueling 9-to-9 schedule with tons of forced overtime, plus you have to walk on eggshells around your superiors! Penguin Logistics doesn't have any of those problems!"
Exusiai chimed in from the side.
"Uh... um... the Knight Bureau is really tiring!"
Unable to think of anything else to say, Sora offered that single sentence.
As for Texas?
She had already slammed her foot on the accelerator and sped away from the Knight Bureau. If she hadn't been worried about speeding and getting hauled right back in by the Knight Bureau, she definitely would have floored the gas pedal all the way down.
Sandwiched between Sora and Croissant, holding the groceries he had only half-finished buying earlier, Shirou endured the trio's endless stream of praise about how wonderful Penguin Logistics supposedly was.
Once the group finally quieted down a little, Shirou spoke up:
"Don't worry, I have no such intentions."
Only after Shirou finished speaking did the group finally settle down.
"Really don't?"
Exusiai asked cautiously, terrified that Shirou might actually leave Penguin Logistics.
Before you continue