127 You Need to Surrender Yourself

As they stared blankly off into the distance, Aida finally snapped out of her trance when Lucifer made a comment about their surroundings, "How odd. Where did all the Enraged and Reapers go?"

The two of them had been so immersed in their conversation they forgot to continue fighting the infected. Aida's first reaction was to look down at her precious RV for any scratches. Fortunately, there were none. However, this outcome was also concerning as well, making Aida frown.

They had stopped fighting for a while yet no Reaper or Enraged had appeared to attack their RV. Alarm bells immediately went off in both of their heads. Aida crouched down, preparing for the impending company. Who knew if they would be the good or bad sort.

The mountain was already in sight at this point in time. While this area was semi-remote as compared to the city, it was still a popular tourist destination that many people would frequent around this time of year. It's impossible for such a popular location to have so few infected. The only reason behind this is that a team of humans or Variants had deliberately gone and cleared it out.

She told Lucifer to go down and warn the others, who were still in class, to prepare for battle. Aida inwardly scolded herself for being careless. She had grown too reliant on the system's psychic scan. When the system woke up, it would surely send her into a punishment simulation for her carelessness. Fortunately, it wasn't conscious nor recording her current actions so at least she would be safe from that.

Doing a quick visual scan of the area, she was unable to observe any obvious signs of tracking. She suspected the people were lying ahead in ambush. There was only one clear path in this area to get around the mountain. If vehicles chose not to take this route, it would take a full extra day in order to circumvent the mountain.

Heading downstairs as well, she told Ace to turn the RV around. They wouldn't enter the mountain range anymore. Regardless of whether the group up front was hostile or not, it was simply safer for them to avoid contact with others given how unique their group was and with the bounty on Lucifer's head. Now that she fully understood the significance of the information Lucifer had, it wasn't worth the risk.

Ace complied and turned the RV around, as they backtracked roughly 10 miles, they encountered a random group of cars. Seeing this, Aida felt an ominous feeling creeping up. She quickly told Ace to turn the RV back around and drive away from the group of cars.

Everyone in the RV tensed as they saw the couple dozen cars following them from behind. Rin and Yukio even wanted to pre-emptively attack them, but Aida ordered them to stand down. Although they were stronger than average, there was no way they could defeat so many while they were within the safety of the cars. She was 90% sure that cars were hostile, but until they engaged in a fight, it wasn't worth confronting them yet.

As they continued to drive towards the mountains, the cars following behind them suddenly stopped. Seeing this, Aida told everyone to go on high alert and prepare for battle. It seems the cars had been purposely shepherding them towards this location for a reason.

As if answering Aida's call, a group of 10 armored tanks suddenly appeared in their field of vision. Aida smiled grimly, it was just as she suspected. This was a very elaborately designed ambush that was designed specifically to capture them.

A man with a microphone who seemed to be the leader of the group appeared and said, "This is your government. Lay down your weapons. We just want one person from your group and will let the rest of you go. Please hand over Randy."

Lucifer opened his mouth to speak, but before he could, Aida spoke with a glint in her eyes, "It seems like we're going to have to fight our way out. Just the way I like it."

"Yay!" Rin said cheerfully. He had been on the edge of his seat this entire time, incredibly eager to fight. Asking him to sit and watch patiently was the hardest request for him ever.

Lucifer looked down, knowing Aida and the others wouldn't allow him to simply surrender, and said, "I'm sorry I dragged you all into this mess."

Nobody accepted his apology though, they all just went off to prepare for battle. They didn't feel that he was the one to blame for them being caught in this predicament. Having fought together for the past couple weeks, they had developed an amount of tacit trust and understanding towards each other. It only felt right that they would support a comrade in arms when in need.

Lucifer was extremely touched by their response. He never thought he would have new and reliable comrades so soon after his previous ones were killed in City A. Knowing it was going to be a tough fight, he quickly removed all excess thoughts from his mind and focused on the impending battle.

The opponents had armored vehicles. Lucifer's telekinesis couldn't pierce from the armor nor was the vehicle made of conductive material so Aida couldn't shock it either. The only way to defeat them was to attack from the inside with an element of surprise.

Light ran through many plans in his head before finally settling on one. Light proposed his plan, "Lucifer, you need to surrender yourself."

Having been through multiple life and death situations, they all had a deep seeded trust towards each other. Nobody was bothered by Light's first demand as they were confident that he had no intention of truly leaving him behind.

Aida smiled wryly as she saw their reactions. She knew that Light's intention for this dramatic statement was to test how much they trusted him and each other. The plan would only work if they were able to coordinate perfectly with each other. She was extremely gratified by their response.