“See, kitten?” she murmured, and the vibrations of her voice traveled through my body like an electric current. “Now you can truly feel your Mistress.”

  The darkness surrounding me and Lilith’s words were the final blow. In that thick, impenetrable void, my only point of reference was Lilith’s smooth, wet body, which I clung to with the desperation of a drowning man.

  Suddenly, something inside me snapped.

  All the humiliations of the st two days - the degrading clothes, the ck of underwear, being bottle-fed, the constant debasement in every possible way, and now this sudden blindness - it all surged into one massive wave of grief. I didn't care anymore if I died or if I was punished further.

  “Why?!” I exploded, my voice fractured by sobs, echoing off the jade walls of the bathhouse. I didn't even think to call her Mistress. “Why are you doing all this to me?! Why do you humiliate me like this?! You made me half-woman, half-man, some kind of cat... You dress me in this idiotic pink maid outfit and make me a ughingstock at every turn! What did I do to deserve this?! Why are you doing this to me?!”

  My body shook in her embrace, hot tears mingling with the pool water as they streamed down my cheeks.

  Lilith remained silent.

  In my blindness, I couldn't see the expression on her face. I only felt her body stiffen for a moment as she tilted her head back, letting out a deep sigh.

  In Lilith’s mind, for a brief moment, images from a month ago flickered to life. She saw a young, terrified, and confused man screaming as he stumbled into the very center of the sacred ritual circle she stood within. She saw how his intrusion caused the complex runes to tear apart with a roar, and the ethereal throne - which was just then forming from pure mana - shatter into a billion tiny shards.

  It was a moment that had nullified years of preparation to create something this world had never seen. Even though a month had passed, Lilith still felt that same unquenchable fury, the kind that made her want to burn entire kingdoms to the ground.

  She looked at Neko - at the blind, weeping kitten who was now only a shadow of that man.

  For a fraction of a second, a pure, murderous hatred burned in her golden eyes, an intensity she had never shown him so openly before. But seeing his trembling body and utter helplessness, she took another calming breath.

  Her hand, now strangely cool, rose to gently wipe the tears from my cheeks.

  “Perhaps you don't remember because of your memory loss, but you did something absolutely inexcusable by interrupting my ritual,” she said in a cold, emotionless voice, looking up at the ceiling. “I was so furious with you then that I deemed death too great a mercy. I took you to the dungeons of my castle, where I tortured you for the next two weeks without pause, personally ensuring you didn't know a second of peace. Only when you were on the very brink of a total mental and physical colpse did I decide that you might actually still be of some use to me.”

  Her grip became slightly stronger, almost possessive.

  “I used you as an experimental subject for my new spell: the Halo of Ethereal Transfiguration. To my unexpected surprise, I managed to use it perfectly for the first time on your miserable body. And that is how you were born, my sweet Neko. At first, I intended to just throw you away after a few days, as soon as I grew bored of you... but unexpectedly, you became much more pleasing to the eye than I ever imagined.”

  I listened with mounting horror. My previous life... the dungeons... the torture... All because I interrupted some ritual? An icy shiver raced down my spine. Though I was paralyzed with fear, my own frustration, confusion, and inner morality pushed more words out in a whisper:

  “Isn't that... too merciless? Too selfish? To exploit and abuse another person just because you felt angry? To satisfy your own emotions at the cost of someone’s entire life?”

  Lilith went still.

  I felt her heart speed up against my chest for a moment.

  She was genuinely surprised - no one, absolutely no one in this castle, perhaps in the entire kingdom, had ever dared to challenge her reasoning or call her selfish to her face.

  She looked deep at me, at her kitten, who despite his blindness and total dependence on her, still held that spark of rebellion.

  Suddenly, to my astonishment, she ughed. It was a sweet, almost joyful ugh, as if I had told her the best joke in the world. She patted my head tenderly, her fingers resuming their massage of my ears.

  “Sweetling...” she whispered into my ear. “I am one of the Demon Kings for a reason. Selfishness and ruthlessness are but two of my many names. Do you think morality has any meaning for someone who rules over the lives and deaths of thousands?”

  I flinched. Those words hit me harder than the icy water. A long, crushing silence fell, broken only by the steady dripping of water somewhere in the distance and my own ragged breathing.

  In this forced blindness, every sound felt like an accusation. I could feel her heart - as she spoke those words, it beat so calmly, so steadily, while mine felt like it wanted to burst from my chest.

  It was sinking in that for her, I wasn't even an enemy. I was... a resource. An obstacle she had repurposed into an ornament.

  I felt my new cat ears, the smoothness of my skin, and my new petite breasts. I tried to remember my human face, my voice, my past, but it all dissolved under her soothing touch.

  That was the worst part - the fact that the monster who had destroyed me was now washing me so tenderly.

  I tightened my hands on her shoulders, my nails digging slightly into her skin. I swallowed hard, feeling a hard lump of grief form in my throat, which eventually sank lower, turning into an icy, pure foundation of hatred.

  “I understand...” I began, my voice unnaturally quiet, stripped of the earlier hysteria and filled with a terrifying calm. “I understand that for you, this is just a game. That you’re a god in this world, and I... I’m just a mistake you fixed according to your own whims.”

  I let out a shaky breath, allowing my head to fall limply onto her shoulder. I couldn't see her, but I felt every cell in my body register her presence.

  “But regardless of your motives, your power, and what I supposedly did in that life...” I raised my voice slightly, though it was still only a whisper. “I will never forgive you, Lilith. You can feed me, you can dress me, you can even make my body purr with pleasure under your hand... But inside, where your magic can't reach, I will never forgive you for taking away my right to be myself and turning me into your pet. I will never forgive you...”

  Lilith flinched.

  For a brief moment, I felt her embrace stiffen, and the vibration of her breath on my neck stopped.

  I expected her to ugh at me, to crush my decration with a mocking comment about my "situation." But she only remained silent, allowing my words to ring out through the vast, empty bathhouse.

  Finally, to my surprise, I felt her hand resume its slow, soothing motion across my back.

  “I understand,” she replied seriously, and there was no anger in her voice, but something like... recognition? “Though it doesn’t matter to me either way. You are my pet. My sweet trophy. You will do as I command, whether you like it or not. I do not need your forgiveness to enjoy you.”

  I cmped my mouth shut, tasting the sour fvor of defeat. Lilith, without interrupting the bath, gently sat me on her legs and turned me so I y against her, cradled by the warm water.

  “The sooner you accept your new reality, kitten, the less pain and suffering you will endure,” she added, starting to wash me again as if our entire conversation had been just a brief intermission in her py. “Now, be good. I still have so many things I want to teach you.”

  My decration of non-forgiveness still hung in the humid air of the bathhouse when I suddenly felt Lilith’s hand, previously almost tender, turn into a vise.

  Without any warning, her fingers cmped onto my nipples and twisted them with such force that a loud, pained yelp tore from my throat.

  “Ahhh!” I arched in the water, the pain piercing my chest like white-hot needles.

  Lilith didn't let go. She pulled me even closer, whispering directly into my ear in a voice that sent shivers down my spine:

  “One more time...” she began slowly, the pressure of her fingers only increasing. “If you dare address me without my title one more time, I promise you that these lovely little breasts I am so carefully cultivating will be adorned with steel cmps. And I won't remove them until you learn the very first word that should leave your lips in my presence. Do you understand, kitten?”

  I grit my teeth, fighting back tears and the pulsing pain.

  The blindness made her threat sound ten times more powerful. I nodded frantically, not trusting my own voice.

  ***

  While the process of Neko's "education" continued in the Royal Bathhouse, a completely different atmosphere reigned in another part of the castle.

  Elene sat at a massive ebony desk in her office. Even though she was alone, her maid uniform was fwless - every ruffle was perfectly pced, her corset tightened with military precision. Before her y stacks of parchment, supply reports, and magical contracts that allowed this enormous castle to function without a hitch.

  A knock at the door broke the silence. Another maid entered. She was dressed in an outfit that was exceptionally provocative even by succubus standards - the skirt barely covered her hips, and numerous cutouts in the fabric exposed almost every inch of her pale skin. However, what stood out the most was her chest. Unlike most women in this castle, her breasts were completely ft, almost masculine in their build, giving her appearance a strange, androgynous harshness.

  The maid stopped before the desk and gave a deep, respectful bow.

  “Mistress Elene,” she spoke in a cold, businesslike voice. “I report that the messengers of the Demon King of Greed and the Demon King of Pride have just departed the castle grounds.”