(Alice POV)

Every mission it's difficult in its own way, some of them have the threat of death while others need endurance and the will to move on. This is what my perspective of a mission was before... before this. Lapis didn't tell us about the details of the mission, as Lapis said it was highly confidential, but her displeased expressions gave us the necessary information. Fast forward to our current location we have arrived at the meeting place after walking through the entire capital... three times!

Thanks to our forced tour across the capital we learned a lot about the Holy kingdom. Matching with its name everyone and everything in this kingdom, with the exception of the royal family and some nobles, are heavily influenced by the religious aesthetic.

Learning about a different culture is always surprising, but seeing the citizens wearing religious clothes was more shocking than I thought, although for some reason those clothes looked very comfortable. Not only that, when I saw how the buildings were entirely white with the light church symbol in every door made me think of how would it be to keep the buildings clean.

Anyway, with our destination in front of us, we went inside the building where we saw the witch waiting for us while drinking her usual cup of coffee. To our surprise, there were two more people in the room, one of them was my mom while the other was wearing a black cloak.

"You finally arrived, It took you more than I thought." (Witch)

"Don't be so petty. It's your fault we had to walk across the capital... three times." (Alice)

"Well... It was something necessary. Anyway, you are here now, so let's talk about business." (Witch)

With our little bicker over, the witch signaled the cloaked person, seeing the witch's signal the cloaked person proceeded to take off the cloak. It took us one glance to recognize that person and send our minds in disarray, we could understand why she was here. I looked at the witch for answers only to see her smug smile.

"I believe everyone here knows who she is, but for the sake of formalities I will introduce her. She is princess Talia Hol, she will be under your care for a week." (Witch)

"It's a pleasure to meet you. As miss Fayna said my name is Talia Hol, I will be under your care for the next week. Please treat me well." (Talia)

My first reaction was to make sure my mask was in its place, I don't know if this is coincidence or fate, but it seems that the world wants to keep me involved with that family.

"Principal, it’s a great honor to have a mission that involves princess Talia. But, can you give us all the details?" (Rine)

"Of course, but first. Orie, be ready, there are two tasks left." (Witch)

"As you wish master." (Orie)

Hearing the witch order my mom took out a pocket watch while looking at it. I wasn't the only confused by her actions, as Fari didn't understand it either, but it seemed that Rine, Lapis, and even the princess were able to understand the meaning behind her actions.

"The first part of your mission is to hide and protect the princess Talia during the first three days of the festival. The second part is not different, but after the three days you need to protect her during the formal party that will be held at the end of the festival."(Witch)

"In short, this is an escort mission right? Who is targeting her?" (Rine)

"The prophets." (Witch)

"Miss Fayna! That's classified information!" (Talia)

Hearing that the princess is the prophet's target was bad news, but knowing we needed to protect her from them made this mission impossible. All of us were sweating without knowing how to respond, but the witch didn't seem to care, as she continued the conversation without a problem.

"They need to know who is the enemy." (Witch)

"They aren't supposed to know. In fact, this is a very dangerous mission even for an A-rank mercenary party, why did you choose them instead of the strongest team of your academy or any other capable team?" (Talia)

The words of princess Talia were rash, but at the same time, she was telling the truth. If this was someone else, that person would assign the strongest party they could get or pay to princess Talia. But this was the witch we were talking to, she isn't going to do something without being certain of her actions.

"Principal, I think we need to clarify everything about this mission. Otherwise we will return to the academy even if it means to fail the mission." (Lapis)

As our strategist, Lapis knew she needed to determine if we were able to complete this mission with our current skills, otherwise, we would suffer heavy losses.

"Ok, I'll tell you why your team was chosen. For this mission, we needed a group of young people, preferably students, to blend princess Talia with them. Your team passes these requirements because of your team's age and identity as students.

We also need a team strong enough to protect the princess in case of an assault. Although your team isn't the strongest in the academy I know each one of you has enough strength to protect the princess, or at least to help her flee.

There is also one final reason but I'll keep it for myself, the only hint I'll give you is because of a peculiarity on your team." (Witch)

"So that's why we were chosen! Then we have no problem with it!" (Fari)

"Are you ok with that Fari?!" (Talia)

Of all people, I didn't expect Fari to be the one accepting the explanation of the witch. But since Fari said we could accept the mission then none of us said anything.

You could say this was a strange course of events, but surprisingly Fari has the best intuition when it comes to uncertain situations, she was surprisingly "sharp" when it comes to "feeling" the situation. You could say it was her guts most of the time, and most of the time she was right.

"Of course! After all... I feel this isn't going to be the last time we are going to get involved with the prophets." (Fari)

Hearing Fari last sentence sent a chill in my back, as she rarely wore a heavy expression. Both Rine and Lapis nodded at Fari's words with the same expression.

"With everything settled then Orie will proceed with the cleaning." (Witch)

Nodding at the words of the principal my mom lifted her hands and snapped her fingers, after her snap two black-dressed men fell from the ceiling.

"You have to clean this mess Orie, they said we need to return this place as clean as we got it. You kids need to leave this place now, there are still some things we need to take care of. And before I forget it, Orie, give to princess Talia the wig, mask, and uniform she will use." (Witch)

My mom also reacted as if she forgot that as well and took the things out of her storage device. I Could feel how my eyebrows were twitching behind my mask as princess Talia received the wig mask and uniform. The wig was an exact copy of my hair color and the mask was the same mask I was wearing. Together with the uniform, I was able to see how difficult is going to be for anybody to identify who was who, for a second I believed that the witch did this to screw with me... But soon I discarded that idea, as she wouldn't play with my identity in this situation.

With everything settled my mom helped princess Talia to wear the wig and mask before leaving the building. With nothing else to do we decided to return to the inn first to let the princess change her clothes before deciding on doing anything else.

"Hopefully, this mission would end without an incident"(Alice)

"Wait Alice, don't jinx-- and it's too late"(Azazel)

What is Azazel talking about? Did I say something wrong?