Reincarnated Without a Cheat, I Adopted the Former Hero as My Mom

"What are our next orders?"

Uriel stood by the window. Fine rain hissed against the glass.

He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, gazing out at the rain as if he had everything under control.

The pose only worked because Galatina and Lumina were behind him—and the glass was too dark to reflect his face.

He had not thought that far ahead.

The "we found her" update had landed less than fifteen minutes ago. His brain had split itself four ways. One part was handling Lumina’s report. One was trying to process the news about the tunnels beneath the academy. One was suppressing the embarrassing reflex Galatina’s cuddling had triggered. The last was desperately trying to figure out what the hell they were supposed to do next.

None of them had any room left for long-term planning.

Rush in blind? No idea how many hostiles were inside.

Alert the Royal Knights? The cult might have moles in the Order.

Wait for Estella to make a move? He still had no idea how Seraphina’s yuri-obsessed cousin made decisions.

Uriel looked at Lumina. Lumina looked at him.

The silence stretched for a beat. Uriel fell back on the oldest trick in every senior officer's playbook.

He passed the decision back to her.

"What is your plan?"

Lumina's eyes widened by a fraction. A flicker of genuine surprise crossed her face.

The Scribe wanted to hear her plan before giving his own.

To Lumina, that mattered almost as much as the question itself.

She lowered her gaze. Her lashes cast a thin shadow across her cheeks. She drew a slow breath, and when she looked up again, she looked like a different person.

"Step one. Information lockdown."

Her voice was steady, clipped, and surgical.

"The cult must not know we have located their stronghold. All Brigade members with knowledge of the operation go dark immediately. We station two surveillance teams around the academy and rotate them every two hours to prevent lapses in attention from exhaustion."

She did not pause for breath.

"Step two. Keep Estella’s search party under observation. Estella is currently assembling a search party through the Adventurer's Guild. Regardless of her true objective, the manpower she is concentrating represents our largest variable. I recommend embedding operatives into her team as freelance adventurers or mercenaries. She put out an open call, so infiltration is trivial. This gives us real-time intel on her movements and allows us to steer her search party away from our actual operational zone if necessary."

Uriel gave a low, neutral hum. He did not interrupt.

If the cult realizes the academy is being watched, they may move Seraphina—or kill her before we can reach her. Until we are ready to strike, no one can be allowed to disturb the area.

He was starting to wonder whether Estella really required that much attention.

"Step three. Deal with the Knight Order. The Scribe was interrogated for three days and released only because Estella intervened. This implies two possibilities. Either the Order has cult assets who intended to pin the suspicion on you and Estella disrupted their plan without realizing it, or the Order is clean but simply incompetent. Either way, we cannot rely on their cooperation. I recommend sending Kira to Knight headquarters with fabricated intelligence, claiming suspicious activity in the abandoned mining district on the west side of the capital. That should divert their patrol assets for at least half the night."

By this point, Uriel was struggling to keep up.

Does it really need to be this complicated?

"Step four. Stronghold assault…"

"Step five. Seraphina extraction…"

She laid out both phases in granular detail, but Uriel had already started to tune her out. His brain had run out of room somewhere around step three.

She finished and stood still.

Then she looked at him, waiting for the Scribe's verdict.

Uriel nodded.

That one was not faked. From intel lockdown to multi-front diversion, down to the specific assault composition and retreat routes, every variable was accounted for.

She had probably only just reached Orichalcum rank, but the tactical plan she had just delivered would qualify her as a field operations strategist at any Adventurer's Guild chapter. More critically, she had conceptualized and articulated the entire operation in under five minutes. The speed at which she had put the whole plan together was honestly terrifying.

Lumina watched him nod. Her expression barely shifted.

But the tips of her long ears were burning red. A dead giveaway of how thrilled she was to be praised, the color creeping steadily upward from her earlobes, the color deepening at a visible rate. Perhaps it was an elven physiological trait.

Her eyes flared bright for a single instant before she clamped them back down to her usual ice-sculpted composure. But her fingers twitched against the edge of her sleeve, betraying the excitement she could not fully contain.

Uriel caught the tiny movement.

Then he noticed something else.

Lumina's plan was comprehensive. Almost absurdly so. Every detail was locked, every role assigned, every phase staffed with the right operative. Fenria led the assault. Lumina herself handled barrier support and rearguard. Kira ran the disinformation op against the knights. The Magical Girl Brigade managed surveillance and infiltration.

Galatina had not been assigned a single task.

From step one to step five, there was no slot for the Witch. He knew Lumina assumed the Scribe and the Witch did not need to dirty their hands.

That was a problem. First, the Witch's reputation still needed a proper debut. Second, he had already written the script, and he had personal investments in the staging. The cool parts belonged to the Witch.

He let the silence hang for a few seconds. Then he spoke.

"The plan is solid." He paused. "But it is missing one element."

Lumina's expression tightened by a hair.

"Wherever the most critical action is," Uriel raised his right index finger, "that is where the Witch goes."

A soft, questioning hum drifted from Galatina behind him.

"Therefore." Uriel tilted his head, fixing his gaze on Lumina. "The Witch personally leads the extraction. She handles the breach, clears the way, and extracts Seraphina. You provide support and coordination. Everyone else stays on your original assignments."

Lumina blinked once. Then she nodded immediately. "Understood."

"Timeline?" Uriel asked.

"Tonight." Lumina did not hesitate. "We have already mapped the guard rotation pattern. A night operation gives us the full daylight window to prepare."

"Good. We move tonight." Uriel retracted his finger and slid his hands back into his pockets. "External contingencies, knight response, guild interference, cult reinforcements, all of that falls to you and the Brigade. Lumina, you are field commander."

"Mission will be accomplished."

The six words left her mouth with a rising cadence she could not suppress, entirely different from her usual flat declaratives. She did not bow. She executed the Brigade's internal salute, right hand pressed to the left breast.

Then she turned and walked to the window. She pushed it open, and fine rain immediately drifted through the gap, spotting the windowsill. Lumina braced one hand on the frame, vaulted through in a single fluid motion, and dropped into the yard below.

The entire sequence produced zero unnecessary sound. Her shoes touched the ground with the softness of a cat landing on carpet.

Uriel stared at the open window. Rain blew across the floorboards, leaving a scatter of dark droplets. He walked over and shut it.

"...Someone should really tell her to use the door."

Before the words fully left his mouth, a weight settled onto his shoulders.

Galatina rested her chin on his shoulder and wrapped both arms around his chest. Her silver hair brushed his cheek, still carrying the warm scent of soap. She clung to his back like an oversized koala, her shoulders trembling with suppressed laughter.

"Little Uri is so reliable." Her voice floated in from behind his ear. "You looked so cool giving out orders."

Uriel exhaled. He patted her arm and tried to shrug free. She did not budge. He tried again. She loosened her grip, but only by a few centimeters.

He shuffled around, peeled her arms off him one at a time, and faced her directly. Her eyes were bright, luminous, absolutely brimming with barely contained energy.

"Oh!" Galatina clenched both fists and pumped them up to her chest, her voice vibrating with the reckless enthusiasm of a rookie adventurer on her first quest. "Saving Little Uri's girlfriend! Leave it to me!"

Uriel raised his hand without changing his expression.

Flick.

He rapped her forehead with his index knuckle. The force was gentle, closer to pressing a doorbell than delivering a strike. But Galatina let out an exaggerated yelp, clapped both hands to her forehead, and tilted her head at him with a devastatingly wounded expression.

"Work on your expressions," Uriel said, withdrawing his hand.

"Uuu."

Flick. Same spot. Same feather-light force.

"Go practice your lines."

"Uuu…"

"I’m still not steady after three days in custody. If I go with you tonight, I’ll only slow the operation down." Uriel stepped back and crossed his arms. "Do not forget the Witch's character sheet the moment you step on stage. The way you normally treat me, gentle, nurturing, perpetually patient, all of that gets shelved. The Holy Sword Witch does not do any of that."

Galatina rubbed her forehead, blinked twice, and slowly lowered her hands.

Her expression shifted. The pouting mother melted away, replaced by something quieter, something closer to a calculating stillness.

"Mm."

One syllable. That was all.

The response settled Uriel's nerves by a marginal degree. At least she knew when to flip the switch.

The rain outside was thinning. Afternoon light bled through gaps in the cloud cover, throwing vague bright patches across the living room floor. Uriel pulled his notebook closer and started sketching out a rough operational flowchart in jagged handwriting. Halfway through the first line, he stopped.

There was one errand he had not handled. The custom rapier. He had planned to pick it up himself, but the current tactical situation made wandering around the capital a terrible idea.

Send Lumina? Not a good fit. The girl was too rigidly professional for a casual errand.

Send Fenria? She would probably rip the packaging open on the way back and start swinging the blade in public.

Send Kira? Kira was already booked for the disinformation run.

He thought for a moment, then pulled a paper bag from the envelope. Inside was his rented-boyfriend bank card and a blacksmith's order slip.

"Mom."

Galatina poked her head out from the kitchen doorway. She had taken the honey milk cup to wash, and water still beaded on her fingers.

"Go pick something up for me. The Witch's sword." Uriel held out the card and the order slip. "Old Locke's Smithy, back alley off the commercial street. I commissioned a rapier, and it should be ready today. Just show the order slip to the owner."

"And Mom," Uriel added before she reached the door. "Go as Tian. Keep your head down, grab the package, and come straight back. Do not, under any circumstances, manifest the Witch’s outfit in the middle of the commercial district."

She tucked the envelope away with meticulous care and turned to grab her coat from the rack.

Galatina dried her hands, took the items, and glanced down. Her attention immediately locked onto the bank card.

"Oh? Is this a bank card? Is Little Uri investing now?"

"That is not the point. The point is the sword. The sword." Uriel yanked the conversation back on track.

"The Witch's sword." She looked up, and her eyes reignited with that crystalline sparkle.

"Yes."

"Got it." Galatina tucked the envelope away with meticulous care and turned to grab her coat from the rack.

Uriel stood in the living room and watched her leave.

The lock clicked shut. The house fell silent, filled only by the occasional whisper of wind outside and the slow drip of a kitchen faucet someone had not fully tightened. He walked back to the desk, turned to a fresh page, and sketched out a rough operational flowchart. Arrows ran left to right, top to bottom, linking every phase of the night's operation.

Tonight. Beneath the First Academy. Act two.

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