(Shirou's pov)

About three years have passed since my new life began. During that time, I was going to school, training, cooking, and so on. I also get letters from Truck-chan once a month. Most of her letters are just stupid, but sometimes they do cheer me up. Before I realized it, I started awaiting them.

Besides training with Cu, I was doing some light exercise on the side using my magecraft every single day even though I was tired, but I needed to be ready because soon troubles would come knocking on Illya's door, and as her older brother, I'm planning on helping her.

There are a few problems with that, though.

The first thing is that while Illya wants to become a magical girl because of the different magical girls' anime she is watching, but after she confronts reality, she would want to have a normal life, and I'm part of her normal life. If she wants to give up, that's alright. I'll be there to clean up the mess.

The second and main reason is The Holy Church.

One should never fuck with the Church unless you are prepared for war. These guys are crazy. The last thing I want to is for the Church to go after me. They could mistake me for a Dead Apostle because of my regeneration or something like that. Now that I think about it, the same could be said about the Mage Association if they know about my projections and even things I learned from Lancer.

That's why I bought a mask, to hide my identity while acting as an unknown magus. Adding the Archer attire and changing my hairstyle should do the trick.

Now that I had formulated a somehow primitive plan that can be summarised about avoiding the organizations while working near people in said organizations.

It sounds like a dumb plan when I think about it that way, but it should be enough for now. I'm confident in my stealth capabilities, at least, so they shouldn't be able to track me. I have a few tricks up my sleeves.

I woke up not so long ago, and after light exercise in my room consisting mainly of pushups and situps and a shower, I went downstairs to start making some breakfast and bento boxes for Illya and me.

As I was walking down the stairs and entered the kitchen after a turn shortly after, I heard a familiar voice.

"Good morning, Senpai!"

She was smiling brightly as I took my hanging apron and started working with her.

"Morning, " I said and yawned immediately after.

I really need to fix my sleep schedule. I sleep 4 hours a night because I train in my room until I go unconscious. In other words, until my body fails me. It not only helps me know my limits, but by doing it constantly, I create 'immunity' to fainting, or should I say, I'm getting better at resisting passing out.

Some would call me insane for doing what I do. I would call myself determined.

I think Lancer and his crazy training are rubbing off on me. The scary part is that he says that this is nothing compared to his master's training sessions. Half of me believes him, but the other half thinks that he is exaggerating and trying to brag, but he did teach me a lot. He even tried to teach me runes and not any runes but primordial runes. They deserve their reputation for being powerful and versatile but also incredibly difficult to learn. It's also practically lost art. I think I remember someone using recreated primordial runes.

I can't quite remember who did it, but I recall that only 3 primordial runes were recreated, and the rest were lost to time, or at least they are supposed to be.

I managed to learn a few simple runes in these three years or so, but he sucked at explaining. He can train people physically, but he can't teach something more complicated. It's a miracle that I even could learn the runes that I did. But it's not the number of runes that are important but mastery of them that matters. Quality over quantity which is both ironic and hypocritical of me to say.

As I was making food for the whole family, minus Kiritsugu and Irisviel since they weren't home, Sella was glaring at us the whole time.

She doesn't like when we cook. She says that I shouldn't cook as the oldest son of this household, but after tasting my food a few times, her attitude changed into a rivalry of sorts. She said that she would allow me to cook in turns with her.

I also noticed clear hostility towards Sakura at the beginning. They were observing her every move, ready to jump on her if she did something suspicious. I think the surname Matou made them very wary of her, but with time they realized that Sakura was just a sweet girl... with brutal tendencies if left unchecked. Small details. But Sakura really came a long way to who she is today. She can show emotions like an ordinary girl, but I know that she is still hurt underneath, although I also know that she doesn't fake being happy around me.

"Good morning Onii-chan, Sakura-onee-chan!"

And there comes my cute little sister. During these years I lived as Emiya Shirou, I started to genuinely care about her well-being and even think of her as my little sister. Strangely enough, it didn't take that much time for it to happen. That was also one of the reasons I decided to act even if my intervention would cause more problems for me and possibly other people, but what kind of brother would I be if I backed away because of that?

Illya became close to Sakura as well and even started calling her Onee-chan, which Sakura enjoyed hearing. Every time Illya called her that, she smiled warmly. Maybe she misses the family atmosphere more than I realize. I still can't do anything about her situation, but as soon as I learn primordial runes that will help me with her situation, I'm getting her out of that terrible house.

After a quick breakfast, Sakura and I walked Illya to her elementary school and then went to our high school.

Classes weren't that interesting, and nothing important happened.

During the lunch break, I planned to have some quiet time in the student council room, eating my homemade food, but my plans were changed because the teacher asked me to fix the electric kettle.

I looked at him, hoping that he was joking, but I reluctantly agreed to it in the end, not like it would take a long time anyway. Also, they allow me to go to the rooftop when it's not allowed to other students, so I owe them at least that much. I'm not an ungrateful bastard. You scratch my back, I scratch yours.

After school, I had club activities that I like to call relaxation time.... when Shinji is not around, which is more often than one would think.

I am part of the Archery club. At first, I thought that I would just use it to train my Archery, but I quickly realized that it was incredibly relaxing to train with a bow and arrows. It was just... fun.

No fighting, no killing, just me, the bow, and the target.

After that, it was time to return home.

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END

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