Isolde stepped into the game before I could even continue to dissuade her.

At first, everything went just as the comments had predicted.

The moment King Ragnar saw her, her atonement score jumped to 95%. After a few sweet, affectionate lines between them, it rose to 99%.

Everyone was thrilled. We were one step from victory.

Meanwhile, the others were doing well too.

Asher, who played the chancellor, managed to raise King Ragnar's atonement score to 80% by speaking blunt truths. Another classmate, playing King Ragnar's biological sister, gained 50% just by acting cute.

The others who'd stayed behind and not entered the scenario block began to regret it.

"I would've joined and played if I'd known it was this easy to have King Ragnar atone."

But the unease in my chest only grew. A nagging feeling told me that we'd overlooked some detail.

We waited from day until deep into the night. While Isolde's atonement score stayed stuck at 99%, the others had increased a little.

We guessed that maybe we had to wait for King Ragnar and Isolde to get married to fill the atonement score.

Some of us grew tired and lay down to rest.

I pulled out my phone and texted Isolde, just to check in on her. But she never replied.

The next morning, we saw her body.

The comments kept pouring in.

"LOL. Isolde picked the deadliest role. She might have saved King Ragnar once, but she only took him home to vent her anger on him. King Ragnar had never stopped searching for her because he hated her.

"And the chancellor? King Ragnar has never wanted a blunt minister. The fact that he embarrassed King Ragnar in court meant he was doomed for death.

"As for the princess King Ragnar kept alive… It wasn't because of their biological ties, but because he resented her for being born into comfort and wanted to slowly torture her."

That was when I saw a text Isolde had sent me in the middle of the night.

It was just one word. "Run!"

Before anyone could react, the system's voice rang out again.

A 90-minute countdown timer appeared in front of us, glowing with intensely unsettling stark red digits like a death sentence.

Someone finally snapped and shouted at the system, "What do you want from us? Why did you trap us here?"

The system didn't answer, but the questioning shouts continued, "Why did they die? Why are they dead? You only said we'd die if we fail the game, but you never said King Ragnar would kill us!"

Still, the system said nothing.

"I quit! I'm done! I'm going home!" another yelled.

That was when the system finally responded, "Player 18, do you confirm to exit the game? Your body outside the game world is dead. Exiting before the atonement is completed will result in immediate death."

Some classmates tried to warn him not to act rashly, but he'd reached his limit and roared at the system, "I'm sure!"

The next second, his body split cleanly in half. An eyeball hit the floor and rolled away.

He slowly reached out toward the nearest classmate, but his body was shredded into pieces before he could even make a sound, and chunks of his limbs were flung away.

The classmate standing closest to him was splattered with blood. After standing frozen for several minutes, they seemed to finally process what had happened and screamed.

The comments exploded with wild excitement.

"Beautiful! The blood splatter pattern is chef's kiss. Looks like the system's punishments keep getting better."

"Look! Someone actually wet themselves! This is nothing; the longer they wait to enter the game, the harder their atonement routes get."

"King Ragnar knows the Atoners exist now. I can't wait to see what will happen to the players next."

I frowned. The viewers behind the comments sounded no different from sadistic killers.

When no one else spoke, the system's voice returned.

"Please select the next participant to enter the game before the timer ends. If no one enters, the game will be deemed a failure, and I will punish the remaining players."

We exchanged glances and all saw the fear reflected in each other's eyes.

The system continued, "Current death count totals 21. The remaining 195 merit points will be evenly distributed among 15 survivors."

With that, my phone screen popped up with a notification showing that I'd just received 13 merit points, which brought my total to 25.

"Would you like to spend 75 merit points on redeeming memories of the deceased?"

We looked at each other again. After everyone nodded, each of us contributed five points to redeem the memory fragments.

When the scene flashed, Isolde's memory was the first to appear. It featured King Ragnar strangling her by the throat and carefully studying her face.

"You are not Isabella Thorne, are you?" he asked. "Who are you, or rather, who are all of you? What's your purpose in trying to approach me?"

Isolde must have discovered the truth about King Ragnar's first love by then. She glared back at him and choked out, "I-I'm Isabella Thorne… I'm here because…"

He leaned closer, trying to hear her last words. Isolde seized the chance to bite down hard on his ear and tear off a large piece.

"You have a death wish!"

King Ragnar's expression darkened. He tightened his grip around her neck, loosening only when she was on the brink of death. That cycle repeated several times before he finally tossed her onto the floor.

Barely alive, Isolde grabbed her phone and sent me a message.

Just after she hit send, King Ragnar drew his sword and chopped off all her limbs. Then, he skinned her face and watched her die in agony.

The others' memories were just as brutal. Each one showed a different form of torture.

King Ragnar discovered the existence of the Atoners, but not knowing how many there were, he simply killed anyone he suspected.

Overnight, Aethelburg became a mountain of corpses, yet King Ragnar smiled innocently. Lying among the bodies, he hugged his sword tightly like a child desperate for a sense of security and comfort.

None of us felt even a shred of pity for him. The remaining 15 of us stared back at him with rage or loathing.

In Aethelburg, the people lived in terror and grief.

Beyond Aethelburg, hordes of refugees swarmed the roads and resorted to cannibalism, with corpses littering the land.

All of it was born from King Ragnar's reign. Why did such an incompetent and ruthless man, who slaughtered the innocents, deserve a chance to atone for his crimes?

My eyes burned red as I fixed the system with a deadly glare.

It seemed to notice and asked in a cold, electronic voice. "Player 26, would you like to enter the scenario block?"

Before I could answer, our class representative, Elara Vance, stepped in front of me. She was the only remaining student council member.

After adjusting her glasses, she announced, "I'd like to enter the scenario block."

Shocked, I shook my head at her, but she smiled at me. "As the class rep, it's my responsibility to protect everyone. Besides, I have an idea, though I'm not sure if it'll work."

She began to explain. "The 20 people who last joined the game chose roles tied to power or status, and they all failed. Maybe that's the key we've been missing.

"Important figures draw King Ragnar's attention, but what if I choose to be a maid? The system never said we have a time limit, so we could try the slow, patient approach to reform King Ragnar over time.

"Since he was born into a tragic background and had a miserable childhood, maybe he'd show compassion to maids and commoners."

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.