About Being Picked Up and Adopted by Talula

Faust walked to the roadside and held out a hand to stop a private car.

"Sir, I'm hijacking your car. Please cooperate."

As he answered Lumen, Faust stopped a car by the roadside in a humble, polite voice.

"Kid, are you out of your mind?!"

Thud!

"...?"

Faust tilted his head. The other man had no intention of stopping; after cursing at him, he simply floored the accelerator and sped away.

"Was my approach wrong? Teacher Orson clearly said that when asking someone for help, you had to be polite..."

"That probably doesn't count as asking someone for help anymore... Let me handle it."

Faust seemed rather airheaded too. Lumen snarked, then stopped the next car.

"Sir, lend me your car."

"Girl, are you out of your mi—Aaaah!?"

The owner had just been about to curse when he saw Lumen smiling as she hefted a spear bigger than his head and pointed it at him. He immediately fled in a panic.

"...Please let me drive."

Faust blinked and took the driver's seat, while Lumen looked at the unlucky owner she had scared off with complicated feelings.

Father... I'm afraid your humble and elegant daughter can never go back to how she was.

"Come to think of it, Faust, can you drive?"

Lumen shook her head, casting aside those pointless sentiments, then asked Faust after getting into the car.

"Yes. Teacher Orson took some time to teach me before, and he gave me a very high evaluation."

Faust straightened up so his head could rise above the steering wheel, then released the handbrake and slammed the accelerator all the way down.

Vroooom—!!!

"Urgh!?"

The car tore down the road like a rampaging beast. The force of acceleration, comparable to that of a fighter jet, nearly flung Lumen into the back seat.

"Wait, ugh—Faust, is this how Orson taught you to drive? What did he say?"

Lumen felt like a piece of laundry thrown into a washing machine's spin cycle.

"Teacher Orson said I was 'already a qualified road killer.'"

Faust replied as he spun the steering wheel with gusto.

"That wasn't a compliment, was it—ugh!"

Before Lumen could decide whether to jump out of the car, a crossbow bolt suddenly smashed through the rear window and lodged itself inside.

Thanks to Faust's overly rushed driving, the private car's tires had already become a complete mess. The Third Army Group was about to catch up.

"Damn it—Faust, try to keep it steady! Give me the crossbow bolts!"

Lumen frowned, then gritted her teeth and smashed open the car's sunroof, leaning outside with her siege spear on her shoulder.

The young noblewoman took several explosive bolts from her quiver, tore the straps from her clothes and tied them together, then stuffed them into the barrel of the steam siege spear and aimed at a car approaching them.

Boom!!

With a thunderous blast, the crossbow bolts blew straight through the road. Several cars failed to dodge in time and crashed into one another.

"Uncle Seca from the Traffic Management Bureau is probably going to curse me to death... But it can't be helped."

Lumen continued making "improvised RPGs," repeatedly using the siege spear to hold back the pursuers drawing close. Although a crossbow bolt had struck her shoulder, under the effects of adrenaline, she did not even notice the wound.

"We're out of ammunition, Faust!"

"The second checkpoint is just ahead. We're almost there."

Faust coolly spun the steering wheel, only to accidentally hit the windshield wipers. When he tried to turn them off, he sprayed windshield fluid everywhere instead.

"...I feel really sorry for the owner of this car."

Lumen silently wiped away sweat, then loaded the final siege spear itself into the barrel. The pressure gauge was already nearing empty.

If there's only one shot left, how can I maximize the damage... Ah.

A towering humanoid statue in the distance entered Lumen's sight.

Lumen decisively pulled the trigger. The siege spear embedded itself in the marble statue nearby, and she immediately threw the steam spear launcher itself toward the chassis of a high-tonnage dump truck passing alongside them.

Creeeak—!

After a teeth-grinding sound of stretching, the dump truck tore the launcher away. The massive siege spear connecting them yanked the entire marble statue down, laying it across the road and blocking the pursuers from more than half the street.

"Sorry, Mr. First Mayor..."

Lumen pressed her palms together. The public safety damage she had caused today would probably cost the equivalent of five Orsons to compensate for.

I'm Just an Old Man Out Walking His Bird. Remember That!

The car swayed its way into the commercial district at last. Other than the airbags, almost nothing on the entire vehicle remained intact.

The commercial district, which should have been bustling with voices, had been shut down early by Reunion. Only a few Ursus troublemakers unafraid of death had come to film videos and livestream.

"We've reached the second rendezvous point. Crossbowmen and casters are stationed here."

Faust took out a flare gun of another color and fired it into the sky. At the same time, dozens of armed drones suddenly surged up behind them, and dozens of red laser sights settled directly on the two of them.

"Take cover, Faust!"

Lumen grabbed Faust and tried to find cover, but just as the drones cast their red targeting dots over them, before they could fire, Originium Arts and crossbow bolts suddenly poured from the windows of the high-rises lining both sides of the commercial street, shooting down every drone.

"Sasha, are you okay?!"

From a distant window, Ino, the white-haired Liberi boy, leaned half his body out and continuously waved his arms at Faust.

"Idiot... Call me by my codename during a mission."

Sasha frowned with slight embarrassment, then headed toward Ino's location with Lumen.

"Are you Miss Natalia? Teacher Orson mentioned you to us—there, it's bandaged. Please be careful when moving."

In a room somewhere in the commercial district, Lumen sat in a chair and rested briefly while Ino chatted as he bandaged her wound.

"You're so skilled... Um, thank you for helping me. Orson is your teacher?"

"Yes! Teacher Orson is the person I admire, respect, and like most! Also, just call me Ino. I'm the leader of the caster squad and Reunion's medical operator, codenamed Mephistopheles. Since Sister Natalia is a friend, you don't need to use my codename either, Sasha."

"Ha... all right, Ino." Faust replied with a sigh.

Ino smiled as he gave his name. That innocent smile made Lumen feel as though the exhaustion and soreness from the journey had eased considerably.

"Hey, Sister Natalia, I know you still have a mission, but can I borrow just one minute of your time?"

Ino moved close to Lumen and asked in a soft voice. Sasha, beside them, wore a helpless expression that said here we go again. After sighing, he walked to the window and set up his crossbow.

"What is it?"

"Hmm~ Has Teacher Orson done anything strange lately? Like lying in bed with Sister Natalia, feeding Sister Natalia, watching the stars together, things like that?"

"Uh, I don't think so..."

Lumen thought about it and realized that she and Orson truly had not done any activities lately that could raise affection in a dating sim. She answered somewhat dejectedly.

"That's good, then. Please keep it up, Sister Natalia. Sasha and I will lead the crossbowmen and casters to stop those pursuers~"

"Mm, I'm counting on you...?"

Lumen was a little curious. Why had Ino become much happier after hearing her answer?

They had nearly reached the edge of Chernobyl, so the detection capabilities of Orson's frequency array were basically negligible now. However, the signal tower was only two or three kilometers away.

"Good luck, Miss Natalia. The engineering team will help you enter the signal tower."

Sasha placed a crossbow bolt before his eye and aimed at Duke Baikal's troops, who were cautiously approaching the commercial district in the distance. At the same time, he softly bade Lumen farewell.

"Mm, I will."

Lumen nodded, then followed the engineering team onto the road leading to the signal tower.

Thanks to the obstruction from the Shield Guards and the crossbowman-caster unit, there were far fewer members of Baikal's faction pursuing Lumen. Even so, scattered mercenary-like figures continued harassing her group.

"Fuck, that bastard Orson never said we'd run into those crazy mercenaries too!"

The captain of the temporary engineering unit—an old acquaintance, Isaac—grumbled and cursed as he used the illegally modified nail gun in his hand to force the mercenaries poking their heads out back into cover.

"Were you sent by Orson too?"

Lumen asked curiously. Nearly everyone she had encountered along the way had mentioned Orson's name.

"Yeah. He told me that if things got out of hand, we might need to contact the outside world. So I snuck here earlier and left a backdoor in the system hack—the purpose of drawing Baikal's watchers away on Club Activity Day. Take this—fuck, get away from me!"

Isaac handed Lumen an access card, then shoved aside an engineer who was violently prying open a lock. With one punch, he knocked a charging mercenary to the ground, then roared as he stomped on the man's armor, crushing the breastplate to pieces.

"Are all Federation engineers monsters...?"

Lumen, the noble girl who had just crippled an entire main road on her own, marvelled inwardly as she accepted the access card.

"This access card can bypass identity verification and directly grant access to the city's broadcast system. We'll hold this place. Get going. Leave the rear guard to us!"

"...Okay!"

Lumen had initially worried whether Uncle Isaac would be in trouble after raising such a standard death flag. But in the next instant, she saw him pull out an Originium vein laser cutter and slice the heavy infantryman's shield in half. She immediately put away her unnecessary worries.

The signal tower was empty. Lumen quickly reached the main control room at the top.

Because Terra had no fixed mobile base stations, signal transmission between city-states generally required high-powered Originium signal stations. Saint Gallant Castle, where the Emperor was located far from Chernobyl, was even more dependent on activating a signal tower to transmit information, regardless of both physical distance and political alignment.

"Authorization unlocked... Success!"

Lumen pressed the access card given to her by the engineering team against the reader. After a brief loading process, she truly bypassed the authorization stage and could directly use the signal tower to send information.

First, I need to send a message to Saint Gallant Castle. Duke Baikal and Viscount Kerk are carrying out a political kidnapping in an attempt to start a war. Then I need to notify Lungmen. If Chernobyl is really taken, no matter how I look at it, the best sacrificial offering to start a war would be that economic city.

Lumen immediately decided what she needed to do next. But before she could press the button, a nauseating chill suddenly surged through her body.

"—!?"

Lumen dodged to the side. A spear pierced through the spot where she had been standing a second earlier.

"Rostov's heir. Traitor. You shall be sentenced to the harshest punishment."

A living hell—the Emperor's Guard—stood silently before Lumen now, declaring Natalia's death in his usual deep voice.

"—"

Lumen said nothing. She had no interest in knowing why the Emperor's Guard had appeared inside the signal tower. Right now, she was only thinking about how to transmit the message before he swung his weapon.

Clang—!

A saber swung, but what rang out was the sound of metal striking metal.

"...!"

For the first time, the Emperor's Guard showed a flicker of agitation, and Lumen's eyes widened as well.

"You're... General Hegre?"

Lumen spoke the name of the man before her in disbelief.

"Not a general, eldest daughter of the Rostov family—"

"Just an unemployed old man passing by."

Hegre sheathed his katana and stood before the Emperor's Guard, reassuring as a mountain.

Thunderous General

On the wasteland near Chernobyl, a group from Reunion marched onward.

At first, the scattered members of the group still chatted and joked around, but as the march continued, more and more of them gradually fell silent.

On one hand, the high-intensity march left the rebels with no energy to open their mouths and breathe in the cold air. On the other, there was the dark mass of troops in the distance—the invincible Ursus machine known as the Third Army Group.