Virturia Royal Palace. Royal Inner Chambers. Five days later.

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For some reason, I was on the Royal bed with a young woman crying on my lap.

"I don't want to be Queen!" Callisto, or [Queen] Callisto as the System insisted she was called, cried. "And where's my father?"

"All in due time, niece," I said as I caressed her long hair. "You don't want me to rush it and botch the job. There's still a lot I don't know. I will bring him back to life. I just need to... purify him."

She huffed and hissed. "It is so frustrating! Why can't I know the secrets of my family? I don't know why my father died!" Then she rose her head and her gaze met my eyes. She was supplicating. "Please. Tell me."

"It is better if you don't know. They did something very bad, very evil."

She clicked her tongue, "The same excuse, always. I know! Why don't you become Queen? You are Ackerton's rightful heir! This town, this country, it is all yours."

"Don't wanna. I have everything I could ever want from Ackerton's legacy in my possession already," I replied. Including the ledgers and journals of his [Assassin] organization, now that I had the time to read some of the books. Sleeping only ten minutes a day gives a person a lot of free time.

"What should I do?"

"Whatever you want."

"Except hand over the crown on you."

"Except dump the crown on me."

"I wish I was a mermaid. You live such idyllic lives!" She wondered.

I pushed her head up and made her look at the dining table in the room. The one that was full of meat, fruit, bread, and pastries. "Do you see that? A year ago, any mermaid would murder her mother and sisters for half the food that's on that table. We were starving and split into two factions. Trust me, our lives may be good now, but we suffered a lot."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"It's fine, niece," I went back to caress her hair. "Hang on for a little while longer. We need to help the new girls get back on their feet."

"Another mystery. Why would uncle have so many young and malnourished girls captive in the palace?" She asked. I could see the fear of the truth in her eyes. I think she thought she knew, but she was getting the wrong idea. I would let her think they were for sexual pleasure instead of the truth. For some reason, it was better that way.

I put a finger on her lips, "You are too innocent, Callisto. Stay that way."

"I'm a grown woman. I know everything about..." She trailed off, embarrassed.

"About?" I teased her and poked her waist.

She blushed and jumped off my lap, burying her face in the pillows, "Nevermind!"

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I was in the ballroom of the palace. Sitting comfortably in the main hall, the former demonic sacrifice girls had a tea party and lessons with a couple dozen tutors. I had all of them partied up with me, and all of their notifications were set to not show Exp messages.

When I gained "improved privileges" with the System after my stunt with the Demon Lord, I got the ability to lock some features for party members. It was better if they didn't know where the Exp was coming from.

With that in place along with the best privacy wards, my two contracted [Archmages] could cast, I listened to my current interviewee.

"I had no idea what I was marrying into," Eleonora, former Queen of Virturia, or her ghost, told me. "But there was no coming back. I did the rituals, I sliced my share of throats."

"Are you sure you want to forget it all?" I asked her.

"Yes. A clean slate, with your blessings, seems excellent."

I nodded at the spectral woman. "I'll grant you three Perks, and raise your level to eighty once you come back to life."

"My sons as well. All of them."

I nodded. "All but Romulus. He is with the Gods. He was too willful for me to keep under my reins."

"So be it. Do what you must."

I wove her a silk body. With internal organs made of silk, an exact copy of a human but everything was cloth. As it was an item made with Living Silk, it would level up and obtain Perks as I shared Exp with it. I tried to make it resemble her old body but not as look-alike to be recognizable. Speaking of which, I took it out of storage and rejoined it with the soul, killing her immediately after.

I made it as painless as possible, giving her a quick death.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

> Soul Shepherd

>

> Last Chance

>

> Death Contract

>

> Champion's Challenge

>

> Assassinate

>

> You killed level 117 Queen. Exp deferred.

I looked at the ghost. "How was it?"

"Unpleasant, painful, scary," she said with a spark of determination. "But not unbearable."

"Do you remember the demon summoning rituals?"

"Unfortunately, Yes," she replied with a sad sigh.

"Focus on that. Try to push these evil deeds to the fore of your soul as I purify you. I'll try to do the same. Think how heinous it is. Shed these negative experiences."

Each death took eight levels away from her. Fourteen deaths later and a few million Energy spent, I asked her ghost again.

"What? Which Demons? I don't... Was I even the Queen?"

"Yes. Each time you were purified, you lost part of your memories. Eventually, little of you will be left out. I won't promise the next one will be the last, but I am getting the gist of it."

"I don't care. I'll forget everything anyway."

"You are brave."

When I brought Windemere back as silk-folk, I was hacking my way through. This time, I had a proper channel to do that. Soul Shepherd allowed me to reincarnate someone in a proper vessel. I stored the Queen's dead body for the last time and pointed at the silk one.

"I heard about the Silk-People of Windemere. This is exquisite."

"This is the new you. All your memories will be lost and you will become level one again. Are you ready?"

"I am."

I took her soul and curled her into a ball, weaving my Energy around her. That allowed the soul to resonate with the living silk body I made. I lowered the soul into the solar plexus of the body and felt the moment the living silk latched on the spirit and dragged it to fill a metaphysical void in the body. The silk was "living" but wasn't "alive". Something was missing from it and now it found what. Greedily taking the Queen's soul for itself, the silk shuddered and breathed for the first time.

> Level 0 Silk-Folk.

The new silk-woman gasped as she rose. "It's okay. You are alive," I soothed her using my social Perks, then added her to the party. "Set your Exp allocation to manual. You might want assistance picking your Perks and Paths later."

"Who are you?" She asked me, confused.

"A friend. Your {Fairy Godmother}," I gently told her. I felt the Perk click as I "adopted" her. Since I didn't grant any Perks, there was no cost in permanent Energy to do so. The living silk body had more than enough perks for her already.

"I need clothes," she told me when she noticed her nude state.

"Here. Put on this dress," I gave her something comfortable from my storage. Once she was decent, I laid her on the bed. "Now sleep. Sumsar?"

"As you wish, master," he said and put a spell on the former Queen.

I did the same with the princes, refining my technique with each repetition. To them, I made younger bodies, according to their order of birth with one exception. Rhenius had the body of a young adult.

I didn't add them to the Exp sharing feast. That they would be alive again without going through the Gods was already too much. I also didn't bless them. I let the new zero-level Silk-Folk kids lie next to their mother. May they have better luck this time.

Next was Callisto's father. I summoned his soul from the silent host of thousands floating near me. The ghosts following me usually stayed quiet and oblivious of the world around them. Only if I interacted with them or something exceptional happened was that they stirred into a semblance of attention. Those with high Ego scores were different, but there was none there. Ego was still a locked Attribute for the vast majority and most Classes and Species didn't grant points in it. The rule of thumb was that you needed to have Ego unlocked if you wanted to get a Class that gave good Ego gains.

A contradiction, but that was the System for you.

"Did you see what I did to the former Queen?"

"I did, milady," he replied without much emotion.

"I need you to do two things for me. First, you'll forget everything about diabolism. That might include the Royal family since it was so ingrained. Second, I need you to treasure your memories with Callisto. Only when the former is achieved is that we can see how much of the latter you managed to save. Work hard. The intent was everything in the spiritual world."

For Duke Arlington, it took five tries before I could purify and bleach out his diabolism Skills and memories. I had Sumsar put him to sleep and placed him on another bed.

Finally, came the icing on the cake. Leaving my reincarnated and resurrected test subjects behind, I went to another room and dragged King Romulus IV, level 200 diabolist down. His soul, I mean.

This room had only a table. On the table, covered by a thick canvas, was a rectangular box two meters tall by one wide.

"You have two choices. Unconditional cooperation or an eternity of torment. Not even the Gods will save you."

"What would you have me do."

"I have only one question. Tell me the secret to unlocking {Fifth Path}."

I tried to use one of the quest rewards to pick it, but the System denied it saying I didn't have the requirements.

The wicked King chortled. "Just that?"

"Just that," I deadpanned.

"It is so easy. You must have {Fourth Path}, and {Path Fusion III}. Then you need to have all paths and species levels be the same and a multiple of twenty. Only then you'll be able to purchase {Fifth Path}. I only found it out because mine were all two hundred," he kept on laughing.

"But could one pick it at level forty, for example?"

"If they can get all these prerequisite Perks, yes. Is that all?"

"As far as what I needed to know from you, yes. Now, you are a tasty morsel, being level two hundred. You'll die to my blade until you are down to level zero. Then I'll let you go."

The ghost flinched. The eviler a person grew, the more attachment its soul had to physical feelings and emotions. The extreme was spontaneously-generated undead born of great villains. The subject in front of me would be one of them, were his soul not under my control.

"No! You promised I wouldn't suffer eternal torment!" The ghost tried to flee. I infused it with Energy as {Soul Shepherd} trapped him and started the purification process.

"And I will deliver on that promise. Your torment won't be eternal. Just a hundred deaths. Scream all you want, diabolist. Think of your victims as you die over and over."

I removed the canvas. Romulus IV's body was there, completely restrained by heavy steel bindings all over his body and even around his forehead. He could only blink. Differently from his wife, I made sure to make it hurt as much as I could. It was a lot, given my experience in dealing death.

> Second Chance

>

> Death Contract

>

> Champion's Challenge

>

> Assassinate

>

> You killed level 200 King. Exp deferred.

Rinse repeat. Let's make sure to bleach this soul thoroughly. The people outside can surely use the Exp.

> You killed level 192 King. Exp deferred.

>

> [...]

>

> You killed level 48 King. Exp deferred.

>

> You killed level 40 King. Exp deferred.

A lifetime of Exp, gone in a few minutes. By the fortieth death, he was level zero. Sixty to go. Now that we didn't need to bother with properly assassinating him, I got creative. You see, the diabolists had a thing for tormenting the living. Their torture manuals were as detailed as they were disturbing.