Chapter 4

Once Elara was done, she subtly glanced at the comments, and I followed her gaze.

The comments were buzzing with heated discussion.

"Looks like we finally have someone smart. I remember someone from the previous batch tried the same strategy, and it almost worked."

"Why is no one trying to join King Ragnar's consorts? He's never killed one before."

"Is anyone making a group chat to share these videos? I've got tons saved, and I'm happy to trade."

I mulled over the comments. If it almost worked for someone, what exactly went wrong?

Elara's idea seemed to have a higher chance of success than the previous attempts, but I couldn't shake the feeling that this still wasn't the right path to take.

When I realized that she'd spent all her merit points on an amnesty token, ready to bet everything on it, I quickly stopped her. "Give me a little more time. Let me think this through."

Elara shook her head and pointed at the countdown timer. In the blink of an eye, only three minutes remained.

"We're running out of time, so we have to decide now." Then, turning to the rest of the class, she said, "I'll take the role of a laundry maid. Would anyone like to come with me?"

A girl in the crowd, Julianne Hayes, slowly raised her hand. "The comments said King Ragnar never killed a consort, so I'll take that role."

I shook my head at her and said, "We can't trust the comments."

She gave a bitter smile. "We don't have a choice, do we?"

While I was at a loss for an answer, a few more classmates picked their roles. In the end, six of them entered the game—three girls and three boys.

Elara and one girl became maids, while Jullianne selected the role of a newly appointed noble consort. The three boys were either chamberlains or castle guards.

With that, the game resumed.

All six of them threaded carefully, knowing that King Ragnar was paranoid. One wrong move, and he would decide they were Atoners and execute them on the spot.

As laundry maids, Elara and her partner rarely saw King Ragnar, so they could act more freely.

The downside was that their atonement score progression was painfully slow. The only slight boosts came when delivering freshly washed clothes to King Ragnar.

After spending her merit points on redeeming a consort's survival skills, Julianne occasionally sent King Ragnar confectionery and curried favor with other consorts.

Her progress was the highest among the six, recording an atonement score of 25%. King Ragnar hadn't shown the slightest suspicion toward her.

As for the three boys, they progressed faster than the maids, but their positions were so low that they had few chances to earn meaningful gains.

After three months, Julianne's atonement score reached 55%. The maids reached 27% and the boys 36%.

Everyone exhaled in relief. It seemed Elara's strategy was working steadily, though it was slower.

Even so, unease gnawed at me, so I texted her again. "Always be careful."

Three more months passed, and all their atonement scores reached over 50%. Julianne's had climbed to 72%, but it never progressed after that, just like what had happened with Isolde.

Several days later, we finally learned why her atonement score wasn't increasing. It was because she'd died five days ago.

When Julianne's corpse was sent back to our side, it was already beginning to rot.

I stared at the system in complete disbelief. "Why didn't you immediately report her death?"

The system replied in its usual cold voice, "Because she'd just died. She still had a faint breath for the last few days, so she could not be declared dead."

My eyes fell on the wounds and maggots covering her body.

She'd always been delicate, someone who whimpered over a paper cut. But now, she'd endured five full days of torture before finally dying.

I couldn't bring myself to imagine how much pain she must have suffered.