My takeaway after thinking it over was that the Three Stooges wanted to beat Naofumi to the Tortoise so they can get more EXP than him, which is why they acted like it didn't matter to them.
Fitoria keeps acting like it's important for all four Heroes to work together when Naofumi does fine just basically carrying everything with his shield. Was it like this with the original Shield Hero and she just doesn't remember
?