After a few minutes the old lady and a woman in a simple dress comes out from the room.

"She's going to be your guide young 'un. She's kind of shy so don't scare her too much. It's a pain to find her after she hides herself." The Innkeeper says looking at me straight in the eye.

I just nod as the old lady encourages the woman to come towards me.

She slowly comes towards me and looks at every inch of me.

"Hello. What is your name?" I say as I look towards her.

(Gotta get the basics out of the way, as usual.)

"Ch...Charl...Charlotte..." Says Charlotte, who's trying to make herself look as tiny as possible.

"Thank you for being my guide today Charlotte." I say as politely as I can.

(Ok... Shy woman in a city like this means something either happened in her family or she's being bullied by someone.

And I'm placing all my money that somebody is going to come up to us whilst she is giving me a tour and demand her to go with him.)

Charlotte nods and walks out of the door and I follow her.

We walk around the lower section of the city as she shows all the important stores and shops and notably good food spots.

We eventually get around to the middle section of the city.

"That store over there... It's the cities most famous weapon shop... The one next to it... The most famous armor shop..." Says Charlotte with a prideful voice but still silently.

We walk forward a bit, about ten or so meters.

(I just won the lottery. Guess why.)

"Oh! Ain't that Charlotte? What'cha doin here? Finally came to become my woman? And who the hell is this scrawny baby?" says a completely random bandit-looking person coming towards us.

(Here comes the side-character to help me understand Charlotte better. I called it!)

(Now... Brute strength, magic or just calling a bunch of my own knights to handle this...)

"You baby get away from Charlotte, she's mine." says the completely random bandit-looking person while being up in my face.

"Brute force it is then." I say as I hit him straight in the face with an uppercut sending him flying up into the air about ten meters until he plummets down again.

Charlotte silently watches from the side, seemingly quite frightened about what just happened.

"Boss!" says a person from a group that ran out from the alleyway next to us.

(And here's the usual line with the usual group of angry bandits. Actually... How did they even get here looking like that?)

"How dare you hurt boss! With a surprise attack as well! You coward!" says another from the bandit bunch angrily.

(Yeaaah... I ain't bothering to do much with these guys anymore...)

I stamp my foot against the ground creating a small crater.

"Ice Magic: Frozen Prison" I say to invoke the spell.

The bandits immediatly freeze into sculptures who all look very weird.

"Well Charlotte, anything else I should know about in this city or is that all the interesting points?" I say kindly to Charlotte trying to make her feel safe.

"N..No... There are more..." Charlotte anwers, still trying to become smaller than possible.

She starts walking and I follow her and the guards shortly arrive to only find the bunch they were actually searching for.

Charlotte shows me a few more interesting shops but I notice there aren't any landmarks she's brought attention to.

I ask her about this when she finishes explaining about why there are shops almost everywhere in the city.

"That is... Because... The upper level has all of them... But only aristocrats get up there..." Charlotte answers my question and isn't as shy as before.

I nod to notify her I understand and then I escort her back to the Inn.

"Thanks for keepin her safe. I heard what happen'd in the middle layer of the city. Damn bandit idiot still tryin' to kidnap Charlotte." says the Innkeeper while being slightly furious.

"Well, I'm going to go and stroll around the city, maybe search for my friends." I say to the both of them whilst leaving.

I immediatly head for the upper level of the city just for laughs but the moment I reach the gates I see about ten guards just guarding a door leading to the gatekeepers room.

"Wind Magic: Flight. Light Magic: Invisibility" I invoke two spells in a row and become basically a phantom.

I'm not transparent but I'm hard to see so it's good for silently getting into places before being noticed.

I land in the middle just to see a whole bunch of statues surrounding the castle.

(Wow... A guard party every twenty seconds passes me. Impressive.)

I fly to the tip of the castle and look at the entire city and eventually jump down and land in the middle layer of the city.

I dispel both of the spells and start my 'stroll' around the city to figure out the promiment spots for a HQ.

(I should first look at the location near the Adventurer's Guild since well... It's a place where many go.)

I wander around the Adventurer's Guild for a bit, trying to figure out if this is a good spot to place my HQ near.

(Yeah it is not... No traders at all. I would've guessed people would've traded with the Adventurer's Guild but nope. Well... Time to go to the Merchant's Guild since that's a 100% chance of having a decent HQ spot near it.)

I head to the other side of the city but all I see is residences, no shops.

(All the people living here are heading towards the Merchant's guild...

I'm guessing the guild is sort of a supermarket and it is dominating the commerce in half the city...

This city does not have a suitable beginning HQ location at all. Maybe for an already known merchant's new base but not for a new beginning merchant's.

This city is a failure... Luckily this city isn't L'Aminne yet. We still have a chance for this half of the continent.)

I head to the inn as I saw Silan already going there with a few other members of my small band of 'merchants'.