Ancient Imperial Calendar Year 1798
Two years had passed. After the death of Zelfhaya and her sons, assassinations and intrigues had decreased in the Kislaveyn Palace, and a temporary silence had prevailed. However, deaths were still occurring behind this seemingly calm environment. The last victim was a child… but this time it was not a boy, but a girl.
The killing of a girl was a strange situation. It was natural to kill boys in order to reduce the number of rivals for the lord position. However, the killing of a girl suggested a very different reason behind it. The incident had caused whispers not only within the palace, but even among the nobles outside the palace. However, no one except the girl's mother had sought this death.
At that time, Ricardo had just turned three. Thanks to his memories of his previous life, he was considered extraordinarily intelligent by those around him. He had learned to read and write and basic mathematical formulas at a speed that was beyond his age. However, his mother, Seliarnevre, had learned from previous events and had made her servants take a blood spell to keep silent.
This oath would exact a heavy price for betrayal. The person taking the oath would take a drop of blood from a small cut in his jugular vein, bring it to his lips, and murmur incantations on his tongue. If he broke his oath, his tongue would dry up and fall out, and he would lose his mind. Thus, it became impossible to spread gossip about Ricardo's intelligence and extraordinary abilities.
But Seliarnevre's mind was fixated on the murdered girl. The victim was the daughter of Helgeya, the first wife of Orsman IV. She was an extremely beautiful, affectionate and friendly child for her age. Everyone in the palace thought that she would grow up to be a noble and elegant lady. But now she was gone.
Seliarnevre was determined to uncover the secret behind the incident. She contacted an anonymous but extremely effective assassin organization operating within the Kislaveyn Palace. This organization only contacted the wives and concubines of lords, providing child assassinations and espionage services. Before Zelfhaya died, Seliarnevre captured one of the assassins from this organization and instead of killing him, made him swear his loyalty. This gave her a chance to establish direct contact with the organization.
But the deeper he went, the more complicated the incident became. So much so that even the spies and assassins within the organization did not know each other, so even if someone from the organization committed the assassination, it was almost impossible to reach him, but if they reached the leader of the organization, it was possible because the leader of the organization had all the assassinations carried out by the organization, espionage activities, the identities of all the assassins, including those who retired from the organization, their lives, relatives, pasts, in short, all kinds of information about the assassins, but reaching the leader was beyond impossible. Seliarnevre was officially in a dead end.
Ricardo's Intervention
Ricardo didn't want to remain indifferent any longer when he saw his mother was so concerned about the incident. After all, he was once an emperor who reigned over an ancient empire.
In his previous life, he was known as Harloumen VIII, and one of his wives was Aherlenna, a Spirit Mother. Spirit Mothers were spirit beings with a special ability. When they made a contract with a pure-hearted person among humans, they would give birth to a spirit every year.
VIII Harloumen had created countless powerful spirits through the contract he made with Aherlenna. However, Aherlenna had done something forbidden as a Spirit Mother, she had fallen in love with Harloumen and married him.
This type of marriage earned the title of "Spirit Father" and strengthened the bond with the spirits immensely. However, if a Spirit Mother became pregnant as a result of a true marriage, she had to sacrifice her own existence in order to bear her child. Aherlenna had taken the risk and died after giving birth to Harloumen's child.
Her death had filled his brother Ahamenna with rage. With all his fury, he stormed the magnificent Palace in the Capital of the Ancient Empire, burned and destroyed the place, massacred everyone in front of him, and rushed into the throne room. Ahamenna shouted with a voice full of anger, hatred and sadness.
"My sister died because of you!" Ahamenna had shouted. "You knew that the child would cause her death, but you still had sex with her!"
But Harloumen responded to these words with astonishment:
"Do you hear what you're saying? Your sister died in childbirth. What does that have to do with me? This is something that can happen to any woman!"
Achamenna was even more enraged:
"Spirit Mothers cease to exist if they have children through marriage! You knew that... or even if you didn't, you should have! I will kill you!"
Achamenna, enraged, attacked Harloumen. But the result was the same; Harloumen defeated him but did not kill him. Tears streamed from Achamenna's eyes as he left the palace.
Remembering those moments, Ricardo took a deep breath.
"A thousand years have passed... Is Achaemenna still angry with me? One day I will have to face him."
But for now, he had to put that question aside. First, he had to solve the murder. For that, he performed a spirit summoning ritual and summoned a shadow spirit.
His name was Giskar.
This spirit was one of the highest ranking spirits, born through the contract of VIII Harloumen and Aherlenna. Ricardo's eyes widened as he recognized his spirit essence.
"Harloumen… you've reincarnated?" he whispered in surprise.
Ricardo was also surprised.
"How did you know that?"
Giskar smiled slightly.
"Even though the appearance changes, the spirit's essence remains the same. Besides, I've contracted three people who reincarnated before. So it's not that big of a surprise to me."
Ricardo nodded.
"Three? Actually, that makes sense... If it was me, it could have been others too."
But that wasn't why he called Giskar. He told him about the murder case and asked him to investigate.
A month later, Giskar returned and revealed the terrible truth:
The person who carried out the assassination was a perverted nobleman named Baron Eduard. He was old, fat, and sadistic. He was known for his perverted tendencies towards little girls, but since he was of the Kislaveyn lineage, no one could touch him. However, no one had guessed that he would target the Lord of the House's daughter.
The Baron had gone crazy because he thought the little girl would grow up and lose her beauty. At first, he wanted to defile her, but he did not dare to do so for fear of the Lord of the House's anger. Instead, he wanted to end his crazy desires by taking the girl's life. He carried out the assassination himself.
Learning this terrible truth, Seliarnevre presented the evidence to Helgeya. The little girl's mother went mad with rage at what she heard. Baron Eduard was publicly executed after 40 days and 40 nights of severe torture. His mansion was set on fire, his entire family was massacred and his lineage was wiped out, his property was burned, and his name was erased from history.
This incident brought loyal friends to Seliarnevre and Ricardo, and changed the balance in the Kislaveyn Palace. But this was only the beginning...