Chapter 13: The Golden Reconnaissance

The wooden tavern inside the inn is incredibly loud and crowded tonight.

Amiya and Meiyi are having absolute fun getting totally drunk at the corner table.

Amiya slams her empty wooden mug against her own forehead.

"Hit me harder with the barrel", Amiya begs the completely terrified bartender.

Meiyi swings her glowing staff around and accidentally spills cheap red wine all over her dark mage dress.

"I am cursed by the abyss of alcohol", Meiyi chants happily while rolling on the sticky floor.

I sigh deeply and massage my temples to stop the massive headache.

Diana completely ignores the drunk idiots and walks out the front door.

She is actively looking for a cute and harmless animal to play with at the street outside.

"Let them be useless", I say, turning to Ishida.

"We need to start to do our secret research about this massive kingdom", I remind him of our true evil objective.

Ishida nods seriously and follows me out into the busy night streets.

We walk down the beautiful paved roads lined with glowing magical streetlamps.

Suddenly, Ishida completely stops walking and stares at a nearby fruit stall.

He heavily encounters a very hot woman buying some green apples.

"Hello, beautiful angel", Ishida smirks, flexing his arms at her. "Do you need a strong hero to carry those for you?"

I cross my arms, feeling incredibly annoyed by his constant perverted actions.

"You are supposed to be researching the economy, you absolute idiot", I yell, kicking his shin.

While I am busy kicking Ishida, a random handsome guy walks right up to me.

He has sparkling silver hair and a very charming smile.

"Excuse me, little miss", the handsome guy tries to flirt with me softly. "Are you lost in this big city?"

My eyes widen in pure shock, and I feel a sudden, intense heartbeat in my chest.

I am the evil mastermind, but I am still a maiden!

"I am not lost", I stutter nervously, my face turning completely red like a tsundere. "I am perfectly fine on my own, thank you very much!"

Ishida immediately stops flirting with the hot woman and walks over to me.

He points a mocking finger at my blushing face and starts laughing loudly.

"Oh my god, the evil mastermind is actually blushing", Ishida teases me without any mercy.

"Shut up", I scream, punching Ishida right in the stomach to hide my massive embarrassment.

The handsome guy gets terribly confused and quickly walks away from our violent chaos.

I take a deep breath to calm my racing heart, and we finally go back to our main research.

We walk at the street for several hours under the bright moonlight.

We get to know with everyone from the loud blacksmiths to the quiet bakers.

I carefully study the street layout and secretly draw a map in my small notebook.

We closely study the businesses at the surrounding market square.

Unfortunately, there is absolutely nothing much to learn here.

"This place is just a very standard, boring fantasy economy", I complain, closing my notebook.

"No giant weaknesses to exploit, and the guards are too heavily armed", I mutter in pure disappointment.

"Well, at least the women here are top tier", Ishida laughs his usual perverted laugh.

We finally give up on our boring scouting mission and walk back to the inn.

As we step through the heavy wooden doors, we freeze in absolute surprise.

We are meeting with Princess Claire by pure coincidence right in the lobby.

She is wearing a beautiful casual dress instead of her heavy steel armor.

"Oh, it is the brave heroes", Claire smiles brightly, walking over to us.

Ishida immediately straightens his posture and starts having fun with Claire.

"Princess, you look absolutely stunning without your shiny metal suit", Ishida flirts shamelessly.

Claire giggles softly and playfully touches Ishida on the arm.

I roll my eyes and cross my arms over my flat chest.

Claire notices my annoyed expression and quickly walks over to tease me.

"Do not look so grumpy, little Lisa", Claire teases me with a soft pat on my head. "You need to drink more milk so you can grow up big and strong".

My tsundere anger flares up again instantly.

"I am perfectly fine with my current height", I yell, swatting her hand away.

Claire just laughs happily at my cute anger.

"You are all very amusing", Claire smiles, turning back to the door.

"Anyway, I came here to tell you something important", Claire says seriously.

She looks at Ishida and then at me.

"Please come to the royal castle and meet me tomorrow morning", Claire asks politely.

"We have a very special request for the great heroes of this kingdom", she adds with a mysterious wink.

Claire gracefully walks out of the noisy inn, leaving us standing in the lobby.

"A special request from a beautiful princess", Ishida drools happily. "My heroic harem is expanding rapidly".

I smack him heavily on the back of his head.

"It is probably just another dangerous job", I sigh deeply.

Conquering this world is taking way too much useless effort.