You call this a projection?

Even though the current Jotaro Kujo didn’t yet fully realize just how abnormal Joseph’s ”Vehicle Killer” attribute truly was—considering that in the original timeline, even DIO, who only sucked a significant amount of Joseph’s blood, couldn’t be saved by the three lucky moles on his earlobe and was ultimately counter-killed by Jotaro—it didn’t stop him from factorizing ”metaphysics” into his planning ever since meeting Shirou Emiya.

Given Joseph’s unnatural frequency of aviation disasters, Jotaro wouldn’t believe it for a second if someone told him there wasn’t some mystical ”plane crash” element attached to the old man.

Thus, at Jotaro’s forceful insistence... actually, even without it, Shirou Emiya was already planning to find a place to land.

After all, Shirou had only solved the problem of keeping the plane in the air. Professional issues like how to actually pilot it, or more specifically, how to read the flight charts for the route to Egypt, were things he hadn’t mastered yet.

Additionally, a major flaw of Projection Magic is that the grade of the projected object automatically drops by one rank from the original. For example, since Joseph’s [Hermit Purple] has a Precision of D, Shirou’s projected [Fake Hermit Purple] has a Precision of E.

This was why, even though he could ”spirit-write” to the electronics himself, Shirou still called Joseph over to help. It was the reason he would have suggested Joseph take over communications even if Jotaro hadn’t spoken up.

While the final counterattack by Gray Fly and Noriaki Kakyoin failed to harm the group, their goal of forcing the private jet to land was indeed successfully achieved.

Rumble!

As the private jet carrying Shirou and the others was forced to descend from the absolute safety of 10,000 meters, DIO’s Stand users would be able to resume their pursuit and ambushes.

-

-

-

”In other words, now that we’re back on the ground, we could encounter enemy Stand users at any time?”

By transmitting a distress signal to the airport tower and having it verified, search and rescue teams had been dispatched to their maritime coordinates. Shirou and the group hadn’t reached Egypt; they had successfully left Japan but ended up in Hong Kong.

They were currently gathered around a table in a restaurant.

Analyzing their current situation, Shirou said, ”Yes. If Mr. Joestar hadn’t booked out this entire restaurant, DIO’s Stand users would probably be sitting right next to us.

After all, as a former subordinate of DIO, Kakyoin, you likely have the most insight into this.”

Turning to Noriaki Kakyoin, who sat nearby, Shirou continued: ”Mr. Joestar’s decision to use a private jet was a last-minute idea based on my suggestion. Not to mention the secret background checks on the pilots. Yet, our precautions were still seen through, and you were able to successfully infiltrate the plane.

Based on your experience, Kakyoin, do you think DIO’s Stand users will still choose to infiltrate this restaurant to attack us?”

To be honest, Shirou’s words seemed directed at Kakyoin, but Joseph felt them most deeply. Even he hadn’t anticipated that his [Hermit Purple] could be so powerful. DIO, possessing a similar Stand, could use Spirit Photography to reveal every sudden decision they made.

In other words, their every move was laid bare before DIO.

If not for the inclusion of Shirou Emiya—this ”prophet” who had predicted DIO’s location and the details of most of his Stand users—they might not be in their current state: slightly disheveled, but uninjured. Even the pilot who was caught in the crossfire was found to have nothing worse than a common cold after a hospital check-up. There had been no large-scale loss of innocent life.

Had they followed Joseph’s original plan of taking a commercial flight, he couldn’t imagine how high the casualties would have been upon encountering Gray Fly and Kakyoin in that environment.

Unfortunately, even knowing DIO could use a Stand similar to [Hermit Purple] to spy on them, Joseph didn’t know how to use his own Stand to jam or counter DIO’s vision.

Thinking of this, Joseph looked over curiously. ”Kakyoin, do you know how DIO does it?”

”Emiya, Mr. Joestar... you all think too highly of me,” Kakyoin replied, feeling a bit helpless under their intense gazes.

”While I did receive orders from DIO to attack, I didn’t even know Gray Fly was a fellow Stand user until we made contact.

Many orders were one-way communications from DIO. If Mr. Joestar hadn’t mentioned your destination was Egypt, I might only have been able to guess that DIO was there.”

True to the choice made in the original history, once Joseph explained that DIO used vampire flesh buds to brainwash people into service—and that because these buds were living, sentient organisms, even the most brilliant surgeons couldn’t remove them without the

parasite killing the host—Kakyoin was saved. Only the high-precision

To repay this life-saving debt, and as a natural Stand user who longed to befriend others like himself, Kakyoin joined the ”Egypt Tour” to defeat DIO.

However, the more he interacted with Shirou’s group, the more curious Kakyoin became.

Logically, as someone who was an enemy just moments ago, the claim of being ”controlled by DIO” could easily be a ruse.

Why did Shirou and the others trust him so implicitly?

[Star Platinum]

could perform the extraction.