The falling debris had been annoying to deal with, even with Mantis, but Kageura knew that it was something meant to help him.

He could feel the pricks on his body as Shigenaga jumped up and onto some of the falling debris. Above him he could feel the wave of admiration hit him once more.

Which one mattered more here?

You!

Shigenaga was moving closer, so she was the priority here.

As for Ariake...

"!"

A sniper shot reached him.

There was no time to look back and see if Ariake had been hit or not. His opponent had reached him in three more leaps.

"You've got guts!"

"Someone has to have them!"

Her word were followed by another set of volley shots. Those had been fired rapidly and were created quickly. This told him that she only meant for it to divert his attention away from her real attack.

Using what he knew of the battlefield here, he combined his two Scorpions together to create Mantis before releasing it into the air. Multiple angles were covered by the slash as it struck down each volley shot. Some of them had even been hit simultaneously, giving him a few more seconds of freedom.

Then she reached him.

Shigenaga's Kōgetsu was already in motion. The swing form it held an extra light to him, letting him know of her next attack.

He reached out his arm to grab hold of the destroyed building and pull himself out of the way.

Senkū was released, but it only cut the air and the debris above Shigenaga.

Next should be...

His thoughts stopped as something grazed his cheek.

"!?"

Kageura forcibly turned himself to look into the air.

From there he saw Ariake falling, Ibis aimed directly at him.

"How the hell did you do that!?"

Even if it was from that close, Ariake's shot should not have hit him. There was no admiration or prick, yet the attack had been aimed at him.

There's no way he's at those monsters' level to hit me like that!

It was only a light scrape, but the meaning behind it hit him hard.

If he could manage a scrape, who was to say he could not manage an actual hit against him?

Kageura grinned as he thought about it.

The ground was coming in and he would have his footing back. While in the air he would be more susceptible to attacks, but there was something he had already figured out from his time with people like Yuki.

Midair fights were not difficult if you knew what to do.

.

Shigenaga clicked her tongue as gravity began to take over once more.

Kageura held onto the side of the destroyed building with Scorpion as she and Mitsuteru continued to fall. This left him with the high ground and the possibility to attack them from any angle he wanted.

She had thought about firing on him again, but that might only change his location for a moment. Nothing she could do at a distance would matter against him in this position.

But she had verified something that would be the point of this battle.

Shige-ko: "Nice going there. You figured it out, didn't you?"

Daybreak: "I took a guess. I'm glad it paid off though."

Shige-ko: "You really do know how to harass people."

Daybreak: "Not this again!"

If she had been thinking like she had during the start of the match then she would have scowled. This time she only chuckled in her heart.

His answer had been perfect and she knew what to do now. There was no losing in this situation.

Feeling Alive: "What did you do? How did you get the shot that close to Kage-san?!"

Does he want to explain it or is he going to need my help here?

Mitsuteru took the initiative this time as he prepared his landing.

Daybreak: "It's the opposite of what I had done before."

Mom: "The opposite?"

Minoru understood Yasuko's confusion. Even to him, someone who knew these fighters, it felt like an odd statement.

That was why he waited for Mei to explain her words.

Rampage Dress: "Kageura's Side Effect lets him know when someone is feeling something towards him. Mitsuteru showed how that could be used by throwing waves of emotions at him at the very start. This time he didn't focus on Kageura at all."

She must have calculated that her answer wouldn't make sense to most people with the way she opened her mouth again.

"You see," she said with an oddly smug tone.

Rampage Dress: "Kageura had said before what kind of people can get around his Side Effect. The only ones able to do so without a problem have been me, Azuma-san and Tamakoma's Kuga. That may be because we tend to view opponents as just another obstacle to get over instead of holding any malice for the people we are attacking. There is nothing to feel towards someone who is only doing what they have to do."

Myth: "Are you saying that Ariake-kun has gotten to the point of not viewing Kageura-kun as an opponent?"

Rampage Dress: "Not at all. He is still too inexperienced for something like that."

That's right, Minoru thought. No one from our group has been able to get around that.

People like Yuki, Ōji and Arafune felt too much when they were fighting. Even the thrill of a fight was there when they attacked came clearly to Kageura. Even the stoic Senshi tended to have some sort of feeling for Kageura to follow in their fights.

If they had been unable to feel anything when attacking Kageura then someone of Mitsuteru's still level would have no chance of doing it.

Rampage Dress: "I'm not completely sure if this is how it works, considering I have never spoken to Kageura about his Side Effect but, Mitsuteru was likely paying more attention to something else when he fired."

Kiyome: "Oh. I see now."

There was a collective "Eh!?" in the hall that Minoru found himself joining in.

For Kanzaki to figure it out before them stung a bit, but no one said anything. The only one to properly do anything was Jinsei, who was not being held in a headlock from Arafune. They really don't miss a beat...

The comedy routine their group had was amazing in all the worst ways.

Kiyome: "It is similar to when you focus more on where your speed is taking you than where you wish to go, right?"

Myth: "That has happened to me before too."

Rampage Dress: "There's no need to compete with Kanzaki when she has already won ten times over."

The sad sight of Ketsueki lowering his head hit Minoru surprisingly hard. Knowing that it had been Mei to inflict the damage was only that much more sad.

"She really isn't letting up here..."

"Is that because of that idiot up above?"

"We should rally against him."

"Wasn't that the point of what happened a few days ago?"

Some of them clicked their tongue, but Jinsei spoke up from within the headlock.

"Why don't we just blame the other two in there?"

The response was terrifyingly immediate.

"Yeah!"

"Down with Inukai!"

"Down with bad puns!"

"Down with Inukai! Down with bad puns! Down with Inukai! Down with bad puns!"

They were able to turn the chant into a song in record time. Must be Jinsei's entertainment ability. To do such a thing right away was scary, but not something he wasn't used to at this point.

Everyone else seemed to want to join in for some reason too, so he let them be.

Rampage Dress: "Disregarding the pointless song over there."

So she sees it like that too...

That made sense.

Rampage Dress: "I suppose that would be a good way to look at it. He may have been aiming for what was beyond Kageura instead of Kageura himself. In which case, it would make sense that he could manage to graze Kageura."

It was a stretch, but Mei had likely calculated out the probability of that being the case. She would not have said it otherwise.

Everyone came to the same conclusion with the way they crossed their arms and nodded their heads. No one doubted her words and instead only looked to the screen with a new light in their eyes.

If this was the truth, then...

This just got even more interesting.

The first to land was Shigenaga. She tucked into herself and rolled along the ground a few times.

A shot that had been fired missed by a slight margin. The one to fire the shot gave a hum a she began to move away from the building he was on top of.

...Why do these two have to be like this?

Ema sighed in his heart at the thought of having to fight Mitsuteru and his teammate. Kageura would be the one confronting them head-on while Kitazoe was providing mass assistance from wherever he was.

As for Ema...

The moment I target Kotowari-senpai he will fire those beams at me. Even if he's running low on trion, he can still fire pinpoint attacks against others.

He had been able to catch a glimpse of the fight between Kotowari Squad and Azuma Squad. The Attacker duo had been held back by the forward-backward stepping Taiyōko while Kotowari was firing on them from a distance. Some of those attacks had reached Kageura's fight, but none of them had hit.

The more interesting thing he had been able to see was the way Awdry had been rushing in a particular direction. It was somewhere in the middle of the two separate fights going on right now.

With the way he's going, making sure to continuously move is my best bet.

Outrunning that kind of speed was only someone an Attacker would be able to do after fighting against it. A Sniper like him stood no chance when faced with such tremendous speed.

And then there's him...

Mitsuteru had been found out and had been hunted down by the entirety of his squad. From his own sniper shots to Kitazoe's grenades, everything had been aimed at Mitsuteru. The onslaught had led up to the current fight between Mitsuteru and his teammate against Kageura. The three of them had their own styles, but Ema was certain that Kageura would be more than capable to deal with both opponents.

But there was still something to think about.

Mitsuteru was someone who had always been average in what he did. All of his ideas and all of his scores had been average to a certain point. At some point, Ema noted, that had changed.

Something had happened to start giving Mitsuteru ideas that seemed to not be average, but felt like they were out of place for who he was. Ideas that were crazy in theory, but ended up working against his opponents.

Everyone had called it harassment, himself included. But there was something there.

Maybe it has to do with his reconnection with his former squad?

It was an easy answer to come to, but there was no telling if that was true or not.

But...

...This isn't the first time he's had these kinds of ideas.

There had been times before where he had given out these sorts of ideas.

First, they would be told to his mentors. The ones who rejected them on the basis of them being strange and unlike what Snipers usually went for. His motivation would go down after that.

Second, they would be told to his teammates. They had gone over those ideas themselves and allowed him to try each one, but those teammates had been at such an advanced level that it felt like it did little to help them.

Ema was always the third person he went to. Someone who would view those ideas, call out their absurdity, but not reject them. Each idea had some basis that he could see and found to be interesting. In that way, Ema found himself admiring his thought process at times.

And last, it had always been their shared mentor who would be told. The one who would not reject those ideas, allow him to test out each idea, and give her own thoughts on each one of them. Unlike everyone else, she encouraged this and enabled him with each one.

Once she was gone, he had stopped thinking of those ideas.

But now, in this battle and one of earlier ones, he had come up with strange ideas that had managed to work against people much stronger than him. They did not take anyone out, but they managed to show their effectiveness against those people.

That did not change here.

"...Oh, so that's it."

As he jumped to the next rooftop, Ema thought about everything concerning Mitsuteru and found the answer he was looking for. The answer as to why all of those ideas had worked now.

...That guy is the antithesis of anyone who is strong.

Strong people would tend to forget about his presence - Kageura being the exception. All of the plans that Mitsuteru had come up with were to use against anyone stronger than him.

His strength lied in not having any. The ideas and strategies he could come up with her ways to counter or bounce back the strength others had to use it against them.

In that regard it was perfect for him.

But now he was facing people who could not forget about him, no matter what he wanted.

Neither he nor Kageura could forget someone like him. Both of them were strong in their own right, much more so than Mitsuteru, but neither one of them could ever forget him or not notice his presence. There was something there that had the both of them always aware of his presence.

That would be what they used against him here.

.

Zoe: "Are you two ready?"

Yuzu: "In a moment. Let me get to the next building and I can properly help out Kage-san here."

Kage: "Just make sure to keep up here. Ariake aside, Shigenaga can keep up with me for a bit. Make sure not to mess up."

Zoe: "Don't be so harsh to Yuzuru! I'm sure he's read to fire, regardless if it's against Ariake-kun."

Yuzu: "That gives me more of a reason to fire."

Kage: "Looks like we're on the same page then!"

Yuzu: "Just make sure-"

.

Ema stopped the moment something came into view.

The battlefield down below was begging to look like the final area for his squad. The two Meishō Squad teammates were already moving to intercept Kageura as he was reaching the ground. Mitsuteru was moving back while facing Kageura and Shigenaga was rushing forward.

But neither of them were what he was focusing on.

His attention was dragged away as he saw something off in the distance.

In the direction Kitazoe was in.

Zoe: "Whoa!?"

An arrow pierced the air and shot into the sky.

The color of it was gray and it reached high above the tall buildings surrounding it.

Another look showed that the arrow had arms and legs. A head of hair was also there, the color being brown. A grin was under that.

It was the body of Toby Awdry.

As he shot into the air, Toby turned himself around to look down at the building below him.

From that spot he could see Kitazoe looking up at him with a gun in hand. It was not a grenade launcher anymore.

He continued to grin as he opened his mouth.

"Found you! Hiro!"

"Eh!? You were looking for me!?"

"Let's end this here so I can actually get to my teammates!"

The arrow of speed pierced the air once more. It transformed into something else.

A wolf going for prey.

Unlike the time he had flown into the air, he moved in a downward motion towards the top of the building.

He crashed down and began to fall forward.

Without anything preventing his speed, he moved forward with purpose.

To devour all of his opponents.

Kōchō watched in anticipation as Toby was seen tearing through the air with great speed. The distance between him and Kitazoe was closed in an instant.

Each step Toby had taken covered more than a rooftop's worth, so he had made half steps in order to control his own movement and speed. Such an action was what she had expected from him, but she still found herself being awed by such a thing.

She was not the only one.

Du-Sis: "That guy is still something else."

Grumpy Cat: "He's a mad dog."

Decoy: "The dog part is true, but I don't know about the mad part."

Yoshi: "Leave it to a dog to defend one of their own."

Decoy: "That's not true at all!"

Simple Boy: "Hisato does enjoy when I scratch behind his ear. But, Hanzaki, you tend to spread out your body over my lap whenever we are in a casual setting. Would that then make you a cat?"

Decoy: "!"

Yoshi: "!"

Grumpy Cat: "Thank you for the material."

Kōchō dared to look over at the other group. Both Sasamori and Hanzaki were covering their faces while Girikage was looking over Wagner's shoulder as he typed something on his phone. He would point to something at times, but that may have been to correct whatever was being typed.

As for the others...

"Should we be worried about his special technique with that kind of speed?"

"I can't even deal with it right now! If he goes faster then I might die!"

"Hey, hey, doesn't the start of his rush kind of look like...?"

Wondering what they were talking about, she turned back to the screen for a moment.

She saw it happen so easily that it felt like it couldn't have been real.

Toby fell forward in his rush. The target was Kitazoe and the distance was easily covered in a moment.

Speed was necessary here, but controlling that speed and making sure you didn't overshoot the target required knowing many minuscule things that she knew she could never keep up with. For Toby to keep those things in mind while performing these actions showed his mental skill.

It reminded her that he really was a genius.

But the moment he was a single step away from Kitazoe...

He jumped!?

She knew what he was doing now.

It was that special technique that a lot of people had already fallen victim to.

Instead of overshooting his target, he purposely went past Kitazoe with his jump.

Without slowing his speed, he turned around and performed a speed-filled tackle that forced Kitazoe forward as he fired.

"There it iiiiiiiiis!" came the chorus a moment later.

The hall was filled with noise as one of the commentators spoke up.

Rampage Dress: "And there is Toby's special technique: Run, Jump, and Hope to Not Break Any Bones."

Noise could be heard up above as well, but those were only muffled yells to her.

Kiyome: "A truly splendid move! I have been hit by that a few times as well. The timing changes each time, so it is hard to counter."

Myth: "He has gotten me with that as well. Each time you think you can get away from it, he finds a way to come back around for the tackle."

Mom: "He does this often? How many times has he broken a bone?"

The noise that continued to fill the hall began to slowly die down, but there was still a small din that blanketed her area with her own group speaking to each other.

Rampage Dress: "There have only been three instants where bones have been broken. Two of which had not been his doing. Unlike what others say, he knows what he's doing when it comes to moving his body."

Kōchō nodded along with Takato's words. People would view Toby as a wild animal, but those who know him understood that he was careful so as to not actually hurt anyone.

.

"You seem pleased, Kōchō."

"Do I? I suppose I would. What about you, Asanocchi? You seem to be enjoying yourself in that scarf."

"...I am too."

She's changed, Kōchō thought with a smile.

Asano would not have responded like that before, but now she was embracing her own response while lifting the scarf to cover her blushing cheeks.

So cute!

The response was enough to stop her from continuing with her teasing.

"That's good. And I'm pretty pleased because of Toby looks like he's enjoying himself again."

"He does seem like that. Then again, he enjoys fighting in general."

"And how are you liking things right now, Rokkun?"

Wakamura's jump in his seat was interesting, but it only got the attention of the others around them.

Wanting to get an answer from him, Kōchō decided to save him for the time being.

"Between then and now, do you think any of them have gotten better?"

"Oh, that's what you were talking about..."

It really wasn't, but that would only cause some trouble for them. Things like that were meant for later.

Right now she needed to be careful.

"You have fought against those guys before, right?"

"Not Meishō Squad. And I only really know Mittsun and Shigeko."

"She lets you call her that? Are the two of you closer than I thought?"

He shrugged his shoulders, but it was clear that there was more to it than most of them knew.

True Hero: "Shigenaga said, 'He's as pathetic as Mitsuteru, so I feel like he's fine enough.' I'm pretty sure that means she likes him fine enough."

Lyrical Luscinia: "That's a pretty harsh way of saying that..."

But if that was how she expressed herself then there was nothing more to say about it.

"I don't know if the two of them can take on Kageura Squad like that, though. I guess they need to hope that their captain can do something here."

"I doubt they're as needy for their captain as you are."

"Hey now, calm down Katori."

"Not going to happen."

"Want me to get Somei here?"

No one knew who had said it, but they were all thankful for it being the factor to get Katori to stop.

Kōchō looked back over to Asano and saw her moving closer into the scarf as the fights went on.

Then there was Wakamura again. The conversation topic had been brought out as a general one, but she was more curious about his thoughts on one particular fighter.

Kuma: "I hope Hoshi's fine in this fight. Between her and Kotowari, it might not be the best fight for them until Toby gets there."

Talented Yoke: "Why would you care about that dumb girl?"

Spear Idiot: "I'm pretty sure you're the only one who doesn't like her."

Talented Yoke: "What's there to like about her?"

Rokkun: "A lot of things."

That had been the breaking point.

Kōchō shook her head with the thought, He did this to himself.

"Is that sooooooo!?" everyone said.

There was no more of a reason to look to Wakamura when he self-destructed that quickly.

This is bad!

It was the only thing Kitazoe could think as he forcefully turned himself around.

Toby had reached him by performing his personal favorite technique. He could feel a blade pierce his body, but the angle must have been off since it only went through his side instead of his chest or head.

It turned out to still be bad with Toby clinging onto his body.

I need to force him off before he can really get me!

...But why did he jump?

Even if Kitazoe had managed to fire some shots beforehand, Toby could have ran by them instead of jumping. The amount of space to his right and left had been more than enough for him to run around. It would have added a few more seconds to the rush, but not enough to where it should have mattered to someone like Toby.

So why would be choose to jump instead?

He tried to think more about this as he turned and moved to slam Toby against the roof of the building.

The action would throw him onto the ground, but it would bring him closer to the edge of the building.

The open air would leave him more vulnerable, but it would give Toby less of a footing to work with. Making an explosion in the air would cause him to move further back and even less footing, so it was his only option here.

...Why can't I stop thinking about it, though!?

Even as he slammed himself against the roof and made Toby let go, he still thought of that jump that should not have happened in the first place.

I need to get it out of my head! Toby-kun is a very strange person, so maybe he just wanted to jump.

...

Now that I think of it, that does make more sense.

But it did not sit well with him. A gut feeling alone told him that it was for a different reason.

"Ah..."

.

Kitazoe's rolling body came to a sudden stop as a black object was shot into him.

A weight had formed on his stomach, stopping him from moving anymore.

While a short distance away, Toby saw this and clicked his tongue.

"Don't you dare!"

He went into action with sign frames forming in front of him before shattering to push aside anything in the way of his speed.

Kitazoe had brought up his gun and began firing, making Toby move faster.

The bullets were not aimed at him.

Kitazoe remained on the floor, unable to move with the weight now placed in his body. His gun was raised to the side as he wiggled around to try and fix himself.

From the direction he fired came another set of Lead Bullets.

All of them had hit Kitazoe's body.

Toby moved in at this. Anything slower than this pace would make him lose his target.

A shield had formed in front of him and a body began to move out from the door leading to the roof of the building.

The shield was not a forceful one like Shigenaga's, but it was put in place to halt his movements and make things more difficult for him while moving forward. The speed he had was forcefully slowed just before he could shift to keep up that speed.

Kitazoe and Seiji must have seen this with the way their began to move their bodies as best they could.

"That wasn't fair, Seiji-kun!"

"Sorry, Zoe-kun. I need to contribute before I'm not able to."

The two spoke as Kitazoe continued to fire and Toby leaped over the shield that appeared in front of him.

A few seconds would not feel like much to others, but to people who relied on the amount of time it took to attack and move, it felt much longer than it was.

"At least I know why Toby-kun had to make that jump."

"For me? Really?"

"That was my Side Effect! The two of you are terrible!"

"We are two of the better ones, thank you," the two of them said at once.

Toby clicked his tongue as another shield formed in front of him.

Seiji had moved out into the open, but neither Kitazoe nor Toby could reach him in this state. It left him to do whatever he wanted.

He took that for what it was.

Keeping a distance form the two of them, he switched his ammunition to regular bullets and fired.

Kitazoe's head was destroyed by the barrage with cracks running all along his body, starting from his head.

Bail Out

.

Toby saw it happen for a second time in this match. His point had been taken from him by someone else. This time Kitazoe had been taken out by Seiji. The irony of the Meishō Squad captain taking a point form him was not lost on him, but he could not focus on that.

He now had to make up for two points lost.

That would start here.

Using the created shields a springboards, he performed a midair fall to hit the roof once more and increase his speed even more to reach Seiji.

The distance was covered even faster than when he had been going to Kitazoe.

My speed doesn't mean anything if I can't get anywhere with it!

He was not complaining about himself and he was not feeling down. The only thing happening was determination.

Everything he had lost os far would be gained back here.

"—!"

But...

"Now!"

Feeling his Side Effect activate again, he made a snap decision.

Instead of waiting to reach Seiji to attack him, Toby formed a Scorpion blade in his hand and threw it. His target was Seiji's head and his aim was perfect.

But it was too late.

A light came in from the side.

Toby's body reacted to the light by lowering him closer to the roof and forcing him to start turning so that he would end up behind Seiji.

Then the attack landed.

The shot reached Seiji's head, pushing him a bit and cracking his head. The Scorpion blade came after, chipping at his check before embedding itself into the roof of the building.

"Ah... I really do feel bad for you, Awdry-kun. I didn't think there was anyone else focusing on this battle."

Seiji's words ran out with his body beginning to turn into light.

Bail Out

He had lost another point.

Well that isn't good.

Two lights had flown into the air, but Suzume knew that neither one of them was due to her teammate's attacks.

Takeshi and Hoshi were holding back the Azuma Squad Attackers, leaving Toby to be the only other person who could be fighting.

But she had not been told of him scoring any points.

Lobo: "...I'm heading over."

JK: "This is bad."

Shooting Star: "Toby-kun?"

Lobo: "I'm heading over."

Suzume hummed as she heard Toby repeat himself. He was not yelling or being loose with his speech.

The lack of emotion was a bit concerning. Not for us, at least. It meant that he would be holding things in until he thought it would be fine enough to let everything out.

I haven't honestly seen this in awhile. The last time he did this was when we were still under Yuki-san's care. That sure was a sight to see.

Others had thought something like that was unhealthy, but they had learned that, with the way Toby was, it was something to look forward to.

Even if he is like an animal, he still has a working brain. I honestly doubt he will be lashing out at someone personally, so he will save it for when he thinks it's fine to do so.

It was something she felt he should fix, but something she thought to fix.

If that was how he had wanted to go about his own emotions and energy then she would only watch from the side and step in when it would be needed.

Speaking of being needed...

Looking through her score once more, she saw Ema moving around the rooftops. The battle under him had started, but she had no intention of interfering with that. There was something else she needed to do.

"Heh heh. Let's see who can last out here. With Toby back in the open, Azuma-san honestly has no need to be worried about being targeted by him."

Still...

"That doesn't mean he is just going to go at it and fire whenever he feels like it. He just isn't the type of person."

As someone who was that type, she could say that it was fun to do things like that, but it was not optimal to do so. Azuma's abilities and experience was not something any of them could overlook.

The situation had left her in a position where she could not move too much without getting sniped at and she could not stay hidden for too longer or else she would be the only one left on her squad.

"These are some honestly hard conditions. But they aren't the worst ones around."

There was still something that could be done here.

2Truths1Lie: "Sorry for getting taken out like that."

Daybreak: "It's fine, Seiji-san. You at least took out Kitazoe-san with you!"

It may have been a bit much to say that, but Shigenaga let the two of them be for now.

There was something else she needed to do.

"—"

"Tch! These damn shields!"

Kageura was moving around the battlefield while dodging her Hikigane Shields.

Each one of them had been fired bak-to-back with the full intent to strike him and only him. All of her emotions were directed towards Kageura and held in place by firing her Hikigane Shield here. The wave of emotions seemed to be hitting him hard since he had been moving as if predicting her movements.

As for Mitsuteru...

"Let's see, let's see. Maybe over there?"

He was tossing his weight around while firing.

Let's see how much we can keep this up.

While she was flooding Kageura with emotions, Mitsuteru was not focusing on him at all. The only things he was focused on where the things around them as he fired. The direction of each shot was towards Kageura, but none of them were meant for him.

Those shots had been managing to graze him and make small holes to his sides, but none of them had hit in full.

Daybreak: "Hey, hey, how did the last match for Kageura Squad go again?"

Feeling Alive: "Tamakoma ended them pretty well. Zoe-san and Kage-san got taken out by Kuga-kun and their newbie."

Daybreak: "Was it a breakthrough or was it something like what we did?"

One: "I hear they got harassed by Escudo."

Mitsuteru's immediate attention to her was annoying.

Even if he said nothing to her, she understood what he wanted to say. That only made it more annoying.

Fine, fine! But you better be ready to follow up on that or I'm going to smack you.

She moved forward once more.

In response, Kageura began his own assault.

"Should we be worried about Toby-kun?"

"He will be fine. Dogs like that tend to just end up being filled with too much energy."

"I see. But isn't Toby-kun not a dog?"

"He just likes to think so."

"I see!"

Hoshi's attack was deflected, forcing her to move backwards. A white light beam cut through the air in front of her, keeping Okudera at a distance from her.

Takeshi's trion was reaching its last limit and she was starting to lose ground against the Azuma Squad Attackers. Each time she figured out how they would move, they changed their patterns slightly. This threw her off and made Takeshi come in to give her a chance to right herself.

Unlike her, Takeshi was moving steadily closer while firing his white light beams. Each of them tried to push forward, but the overall numbers and power of them had lowered to something that could be stopped for some time by a concentrated shield.

It was a bit embarrassing.

There was just no time to think of that embarrassment or the reasons for it.

Izumo: "Firing one through three. Hoshi, make sure to stay closer to the right. Koarai-san is less trouble when he's distracted. Okkun-senpai isn't as forward, but he's more careful, so we can leave him to the dog."

Shooting Star: "Understood! Should I prepare some shots as well?"

Lobo: "No, that's fine. I've finally gotten to where I want to be. Please be ready for a dangerous rush."

There was no longer any time to stall things out or prepare large attacks. Everything now would be reliant on if hey could manage a fight against these opponents or not. If they were unable to do even that much then they would get nowhere else in this match.

Toby would be their strongest teammate and Suzume was keeping an eye on everything. For the two of them, ones who relied on others, this fight alone would be difficult. It was for that reason they needed to be in constant contact with each other.

Both of them had their own thoughts on the matter before them. Their opponents were ready to fight their strongest member, leaving them in a situation where they needed to be as strong as him to fight here.

They had tried to do that, but it just could not happen. Their fighting styles were too different from his and their movements were not optimized for fighting like this.

But...

We can do something about that, right? Hoshi thought.

We need to be able to do something about that, Takeshi thought.

The two of them came to an agreement without vocalizing it.

If their opponents were prepared to fight their strongest member then there was no choice.

Even for just an instant - a single moment in time - they would need to reach that point until he reached to them.

.

The first one to move forward were the white light beams.

Three of them fired towards Okudera without giving room to move around or in between them. They covered that single portion of the area.

The next to move was Okudera, followed by Hoshi.

Okudera moved to the side while focusing his shield to defend against the white light beams. As the fight when on the easier it was to block those attacks.

Hoshi lowered herself so that her upper body was lower than the white light beams. Kōgetsu was already in the motion of striking something.

Something that both side shad figured out by this point was that their fighting styles meshed oddly well with each other.

The twin attacks from Koarai and Okudera gave them freedom on the battlefield and moved them in positions their opponents would be less expecting. Their defenses were each other and the reliance on each others' assistance was not something others could take advantage of without risking their necks.

Takeshi and Hoshi's combination was not as powerful as that. Their relied on a simple communication and understanding form that could easily be broken if someone were to get in between them. While one provided support fire, the other moved out for an instant. Even so, the space between them would open and close before anyone could have the chance to get between them.

That was why it was things shifted when one of those two sides changed their formation.

With Hoshi moving forward and Takeshi directly behind her it created no gap to use, but it left the two of them more defenseless than ever.

Koarai was left alone to deal with the two of them since Okudera had chosen to defend against the white light beams.

Hoshi moved first with a striking action. It was a simple one that Koarai reacted to by side stepping it and bringing up Kōgetsu to block the second strike.

He brought the blade back closer to his body while making a backwards leap.

"...!"

A white light beam passed by the space he had been in.

Takeshi moved in from there.

"You're coming at me yourself!?"

"I need to make some decisions. Please help me here, Koarai-san."

"I said to call me...Senpai!"

Koarai's shout was followed by a downward slash onto Takeshi.

As soon as he began his swing, something appeared in front of him.

It was a cube of trion.

"Crap!"

The cube did not slit up, but it was properly fired.

When attacking with a regular Shooter Trigger it was required that the user create the form they wanted, decide if they wanted to split it, aim, and fire. From there it was up to which type of bullet was being used.

This was a careless form of shooting.

The form had been a cube, but it did not split, it was not properly aimed, and it was fired without a care.

The cube of trion flew upwards, towards the downwards moving Kōgetsu.

"Crap!" Koarai repeated.

An explosion took up the space.

Takeshi did not move back and he did not wait. Another cube of trion formed by his side before being fired once more.

"I'm pretty pathetic. I can't aim or even split it up in the middle of a real battle. Sorry for the sloppy fighting style."

"It's cool! This make sit more interesting!"

Koarai spoke from within the smoke as another cluster shot was fired.

A noise filled the space behind Takeshi, but he did not look behind himself.

Okudera had already gotten past his white light beams and was not locked in place by Hoshi's hand.

"My apologizes as well, but I will be keeping you here."

"That isn't-"

Okudera's words were cut off by a cluster shot being brought down directly onto where he was held in place.

Hoshi felt the struggle against her hand, making her let go while Okudera moved back to create some space.

She could see that he had taken some damage from the attack, but not enough to stop him from moving.

From in front of both Koarai and Okudera, Takeshi and Hoshi could see cubes of trion form by the two Attackers.

This was the next action for the fight.

Their frontal attacks had been pushed back, even if they were still effective. It was a matter of waiting for Takeshi lose his trion instead of holding out against an attack.

But...

"I've at least dealt with proper Shooters."

White light beams tore through the two cubes of trion. Force was not needed when even the simplest of hits could interrupt a Shooter-type Trigger from activating.

Takeshi was not good at the requirements to be a proper Shooter, but he knew well enough the time it would take for even an A-Rank Shooter to finish them all.

Attackers with less experience felt like easy targets in that case.

"Right," Takeshi said, fixing his scarf. "I won't last much longer, so we should move things along now."