Chapter 254

Seeing Illya with her pouting lips, big teary eyes, and looking so wronged, Shinji couldn't help but think she was absolutely… infuriating!

Snapping out of his thoughts in just a second, Shinji put his hands in his pockets, cleared his throat, and spoke nonchalantly.

"Ahem! Anyway! It's not like Berserker's imminent disappearance has anything to do with me. Besides, I don't think keeping such a great hero in a state of madness is a beautiful thing. It seems more like desecration to me."

"It's totally your fault! I don't care! Berserker sacrificed himself because you were late! Because you knew everything from the beginning and didn't say anything! Compensate me! Compensate me for Berserker!"

Watching Illya, her little fists hitting him, not making any sense, Shinji remained indifferent or rather nonchalant.

Of course, if she were in her adult form, he'd… he'd still forgive her! After all, he's a gentleman with women!

But seriously, this version of Illya was so infuriating, like an insistent, biting little kitten!

Shinji glanced at Berserker, whose spirit core was half-destroyed and who would soon disappear completely, then looked at Miyu and the Great Hero beside him.

"What nonsense are you spouting? Haven't you already found someone who will protect you to the end, even if it costs their life?"

"No…"

Illya instinctively started to refute but then remembered a certain red-haired boy with an unwavering spirit of self-sacrifice.

Indeed, there was that foolish "brother" who would protect her at any cost if she called for help!

"That's one thing! This is another! It's different!"

Illya argued loudly.

"What's one thing and what's the other? Can you be more specific? I don't understand."

"You…!"

Illya clenched her little fists tighter, frustrated by Shinji's deliberate ignorance, ready to hit him if she thought she could win!

So infuriating!

Just as Illya was gritting her teeth in anger at Shinji, the Great Hero's life signs began to stabilize after taking the pure life force from the small porcelain bottle.

In a few seconds, the wounds on the Great Hero's body healed significantly. Once he regained consciousness, the small figure cried and leapt into his arms.

Like most readers watching the scene, Shinji turned away, not feeling any envy.

"Shinji-san~~!"

A shameless magic wand flew over, and Shinji, understanding immediately, pulled out a prepared external hard drive from his system space and tossed it.

In the next moment, Ruby caught the hard drive with her little wings, extended a data cable from her wand, and started transferring data.

"Hehehe~ There's quite a bit of material, Shinji-san~"

Shinji chuckled, responding calmly, "I'll look forward to it then. Just to let you know, I'm very strict! I'll point out any flaws I see!"

Watching Shinji and Ruby, who were clearly up to something shady, Illya and Luvia exchanged exasperated looks.

"Since you're here, can you be useful?" Illya pointed at Bazett and the others still fighting. "They're still in battle!"

"Exactly."

Luvia nodded silently, confused by Illya's noticeable relief since Shinji arrived.

How many secrets does this man have? And how strong is he to make Illya, a top-tier mage, relax in such a desperate situation?

Given this, the task of understanding this man assigned by her master was clearly not as simple as collecting the Class Cards!

At this moment, Shinji, having retrieved the hard drive, felt the Great Hero's puzzled gaze.

"You are… Sakura's…"

"Saving you comes with conditions." Shinji interrupted without looking back, then glanced at Dark Sakura still fighting. "Take care of Sakura."

"...Understood."

After a brief silence, the Great Hero stood up, looking seriously in Sakura's direction. "After all… it's a senior's duty to deal with juniors."

"Can you replace 'deal with' with 'save'? It's amazing how you can say something so easily misunderstood in front of someone's brother."

Frustrated by the Great Hero's lack of tact, Shinji facepalmed and sighed.

"Huh? Aren't they the same?" The Great Hero scratched his head.

"Absolutely not! Ah, enough! I'll pull Sakura from the battlefield, but the rest is up to you. You're the only one who can save her."

"I understand!" The Great Hero nodded firmly.

"Brother, I'll help too!"

"No, Miyu, this is my task."

"But…"

"Matou Shinji, Rin was taken by them…" Illya spoke seriously.

"I know, let me warm up first. I haven't fought anyone… um… a man in a long time. So I'm a bit…"

Before Shinji could finish, Illya and the others saw him disappear! They then noticed Shinji had reappeared behind Julian on a bridge raised by displacement magic in midair!

"...Rusty."

The moment Julian heard the voice, he didn't panic. A mud giant immediately swung at Shinji!

Boom!!

"My target isn't you, coward who can't even voice your true wish."

Shinji, now standing beside the defeated Bazett, spoke calmly.

"Kid…"

Seeing Shinji, the exhausted Cu Chulainn smiled weakly, feeling reassured.

"I don't want to fight a pathetic guy like you because it's meaningless."

Shinji said casually, then crouched down, placing his hand on Bazett's abdomen, infusing her with pure life force.

After doing this, Shinji created two shadow clones to take Bazett and Cu Chulainn away, then collected Berserker's nearly dissipated spirit core into a small bottle, storing it in his system space.

"Well, that was the plan. But…"

Looking at the confused Dark Sakura, Shinji continued, "I can't control the urge to kill you right now."

"Bro…ther?"

Dark Sakura tilted her head to an extreme angle, her neck making cracking sounds.

"It's troubling. I really don't want to acknowledge that I killed you, my sister."

Shinji scratched his head, dodging the rapidly growing black branches—Julian's external magic circuits.

"So, are you ready to face your death?"

At this point, Julian realized who this familiar person was—a parallel world's Matou Shinji!

Indeed, this world also had a Matou family, one of the Three Founding Families, but due to a tragedy in the Holy Grail War five years ago, only Matou Sakura survived!

Even then, she died in the first night of the previous Holy Grail War, the one the Great Hero participated in, because she couldn't use her card!

"Sakura—! Come!"

The Great Hero's call echoed.

Hearing this, Dark Sakura, still tilting her head and staring at Shinji, turned excitedly towards the Great Hero.

Shinji and Julian didn't immediately clash, while Dark Sakura eagerly leapt down to find the Great Hero.

"Senpai is calling me—!"

...

"Big brother, here's your wager."

Hearing the voice from above, Shinji caught the thrown wager—Harpe, the Slaughtering Blade said to kill immortals.

Young Gilgamesh had resumed his spectator mode, just like Gilgamesh and Rin, still in the rift.

"Ah, thanks."

As he put the sickle-shaped Harpe into his system space, Julian's mental state suddenly became unstable.

"You called me a coward who can't voice my true wish? Don't be ridiculous! One irrelevant person after another keeps showing up. Damn it—!"

Ignoring the crazed Julian and the black branches growing wildly, Shinji calmly looked at the giant black cube in the sky, continuing.

"What if I told you that box had already been opened once?"

Hearing this, Julian froze, and Emilia inside the box fell silent.

Three seconds later, Julian burst into manic laughter, a shadow of Darius appearing behind him, laughing uncontrollably!

"Hahaha! What's this guy saying? He knows nothing! He understands nothing! Hahaha!"