"Mm..." Yu Luo groaned as he regained consciousness and slowly opened his eyes. White walls and white sheets came into view, while the smell of disinfectant filled his nose.
"Where am I?" Yu Luo looked at the layers upon layers of bandages wrapped around his right hand. Pulling back the covers, he found that his clothes had vanished, and his entire body was covered in bandages, making him look exactly like a mummy.
"Whoosh!" The door opened, and a voluptuous woman walked in. Her wine-red hair was especially eye-catching, and every movement she made carried the stern, chilling air of a soldier. It was Murata Himeko, who had just finished her report with Theresa.
"Yo, you're awake." Murata Himeko leaned against the door with her arms folded, looking at the conscious Yu Luo. Yu Luo studied her and found her vaguely familiar. After searching his memories for a long while, he finally remembered.
"You're the one on the battleship who got beaten up while wearing power armor!"
"Crack..." With a crisp sound, the pristine white wall caved in. Murata Himeko withdrew her clenched right fist and said with a smile, "That was unnecessary. My name is Murata Himeko."
"Got it." Yu Luo looked at the dent in the wall and swallowed. Intimidated by the killing intent in the air, he obediently nodded.
"All right, ask whatever questions you have now. We should also get our stories straight. If you let something slip, that little shorty will be a real headache." Murata Himeko sat down carelessly beside Yu Luo's bed and looked at him, wrapped up like a mummy.
"Uh..." Yu Luo pondered for quite a while but could not think of what he wanted to ask. He finally gave up helplessly. "Forget it. You explain it. There's too much I want to ask."
"You're a grown man. Why are you being so wishy-washy?" Murata Himeko grumbled, then organized her thoughts and began explaining.
"Mm, let's start here. I'm the captain of the Fifth Squad of Schicksal's Far East Branch, and the captain of the Hyperion battleship you're currently aboard."
"Schicksal?" Yu Luo remembered hearing Kiana mention the term before and could not help asking curiously.
"Schicksal is a special organization dedicated to fighting the Honkai. It is kept hidden from ordinary people. The Far East Branch was only established by Principal Theresa in the last two years, so we were the ones responsible for this Third Honkai Eruption."
"Let me guess, your Principal Theresa must be a young girl, and she has connections to Schicksal's top brass. There's an eighty or ninety percent chance she's someone's daughter." Yu Luo spoke with complete confidence.
"Why would you think that?" Murata Himeko asked curiously.
Yu Luo pushed up a pair of nonexistent glasses, adopting the bearing of a sage. "The wisdom of mortals. A secret organization like yours, practically reeking of shadowy puppet masters, definitely wouldn't have much humanity, right?"
"Going by movie logic, I should have been locked in some prison and tortured by now. Since that didn't happen, the person in charge must be some inexperienced little girl."
"And for a little girl like that to become your leader, she must be related to Schicksal's biggest boss somehow. Judging by her age, she must be his daughter or something!"
Yu Luo smiled smugly. At that moment, he felt bathed in the light of wisdom. He was no longer alone. Conan, Light Yagami, Kindaichi, and Chu Xuan had all possessed him. He had seen through every mystery of the world!
"Oh my, the current Archbishop of Schicksal isn't my father. He's my grandfather." A cute voice jolted Yu Luo out of his self-satisfaction and back to reality. A little girl barely taller than the bed was looking at him happily, her azure eyes filled with admiration.
"Principal Theresa!" Murata Himeko was startled. Yu Luo, meanwhile, curiously examined the little girl before him and could not help nodding. "Just as I guessed."
Murata Himeko looked at Yu Luo's expression and opened her mouth to say something, but Theresa merely gave her a discreet glance. Murata Himeko helplessly swallowed her words and could only watch as Yu Luo basked in his own self-satisfaction.
"My adorable niece Kiana told me your name is Yu Luo, right?" Theresa cutely poked her cheek with her right index finger, instantly striking Yu Luo's endlessly throbbing lolicon heart.
The system in his mind said helplessly, "Hey, hey, can you be serious for once, you damn lolicon?"
The system's words restored a sliver of Yu Luo's reason, making him slightly clearer-headed. At the same time, he noticed the important information in Theresa's words and stared at her in shock.
"Zour... Kiana is your niece?!"
"My seniority is simply higher." Theresa nodded, her azure eyes meeting Yu Luo's as she said seriously, "Kiana said you're a new teacher at Senba Academy, but Schicksal's intelligence network could not find any information about you at all."
"I..." Yu Luo's heart sank. Only then did he truly realize that the little girl before him was not some girl next door, but the core ruler of a massive organization hidden behind the entire world. Before the atmosphere could grow tense, Theresa smiled and interrupted him before he could come up with an answer.
"I don't want to know your exact identity." Theresa's words surprised Yu Luo, and he blurted out his confusion. "Why?"
"Schicksal has only one enemy: the Honkai. As long as I know you're not a Herrscher, what exactly you are has nothing to do with me." Theresa's small body spoke with extraordinary grandeur. "I want to invite you to join St. Freya Academy."
"I absolutely cannot go back to school! Asking me to go back to school would be worse than asking me to die! That place is hell! Even though I often reminisce about my student days, that's only reminiscing! Absolutely, absolutely no way am I going back to school!"
At that moment, Yu Luo instinctively mastered the skill of rapid-fire speech. A barrage of words poured from him with barely any thought at all. His resistance to school had been carved into his DNA.
"Uh... uh..." Theresa was left dizzy by Yu Luo's uninterrupted torrent of words. She let out two cute, meaningless sounds and raised her tiny right hand, signaling him to stop.
"I never said I wanted you to attend school! The St. Freya Academy I founded is a girls' school. What, do you want surgery so you can become a girl? Schicksal's technology can grant that wish."
"No, no. I think being a guy is pretty good." Yu Luo solemnly rejected Theresa's proposal.
"Don't be like that!" The system joined in to stir up trouble, snickering. "Look, if you became a girl, you could get up close and personal with all kinds of cute girls. You could share dorms, bathe together, and even do this and that..."
"Hiss..." The system's words were like a demon's whisper. Yu Luo was nearly tempted, but at the last moment, he still preserved his dignity as a man. He wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth and righteously refused.
"Tch..."
"What I mean is, come to St. Freya Academy as a teacher." Theresa said something Yu Luo had not expected. "Our academy has male teachers. As long as you're a teacher, there won't be any problem."
Yu Luo was silent for a while before asking, "What if I refuse?"
"The laboratory and those old men are all very curious about how a man with no Honkai Energy compatibility can possess the power to fight a Herrscher." Theresa lightly spoke words that were anything but light. Yu Luo could only raise his hands in surrender. His previous impression of Theresa as an innocent little princess had long since been thrown to Reach.
"All right, all right, I agree. What subject will I be teaching?"
"Originally, I wanted you to handle combat training, but I have a feeling my adorable students would be in danger. We'll discuss it after we arrive at St. Freya Academy tomorrow." As she spoke, Theresa's face took on a mischievous, ill-intentioned smile.
"And some people have been waiting for you for a long time. They've nearly argued my head off, so you should think carefully about how to calm them down."
With that, Theresa walked out, leaving Yu Luo and Murata Himeko staring at each other in utter embarrassment.
"Well, Principal Theresa may be young, but she's unexpectedly formidable. As expected of the Archbishop of Schicksal's granddaughter, hahaha..." Yu Luo laughed awkwardly twice, only to see that Murata Himeko's expression had become extremely strange, her features twisting.
"Actually, the principal is already over forty..."
Before you continue