Ainz sat on his throne as Leinas Rockbruise knelt in front of him. He held the missive that the emperor had dispatched on the attempted and failed trial public abuse of Neia Baraja (*AN: Mentioned in the story 'Memory & a Message C8 and happening in the story 'God Rising: The Cult of Ainz C20), and he read through it calmly.

"I will thank the emperor for this information, but...he could have dispatched a common servant for that, why did he send you, one of his finest knights?" Ainz asked.

"My lord has dismissed me from his service, and sent me to you in the hopes that I may serve you as I have served him." She said, not without some hint of nervousness.

"Did you displease him?" Ainz asked, a hint of danger in his voice that shook her to her core.

"Never my lord, in fact he dispatched me with a recommendation for my service, if my lord will permit me to provide it." She asked, keeping her head deferentially bowed.

Ainz gestured to Sebas, who approached the armored knight and held out his hand, she quickly fished through her pack and took it out, then handed it to the butler, who broke the seal and read it aloud.

"This servant has served me loyally for many years in exchange for a boon I was never able to grant, by my sacred duty and honor as the emperor of the Baharuth Empire and vassal of the Sorcerer Kingdom, I cannot retain her while I continue to fail her. It is my fervent hope that my lord will accept her service with my warmest thanks to her for her service, and yourself for your studious lordship, and do for her what I could not, that she may be made whole." Sebas's noble voice carried perfectly the spirit of the emperor's message, and Ainz nodded Sebas rolled the recommendation back up.

"It sounds like a ringing endorsement." Ainz said, "But what precisely is the problem.

Leinas grimaced as her head was lowered. "Would my lord like to see...it?" She asked.

"Do so." Ainz said.

She held her grimace, and reached up slowly, with some hesitation, and swept her hair out of the way, revealing the gaping pus filled wound that constantly pooled and dripped down her face. She looked up at him boldly, without even permission to raise her head, prompting instant outraged reaction from the denizens of Nazarick who moved to 'correct' her breach of protocol, when Ainz snapped out "Stop!" anticipating their actions, they froze, and repositioned themselves as they were. "She is caught up in her agony, I will forgive her transgression." He said with a noble sweep of his hand as if wiping away the stain of her brief misconduct.

"Thank you my lord." She said sincerely. "I received this curse when I was a lone adventurer, though I slew the monster, it cursed me to suffer this, and I would trade anything...anything, to be free of it. If...you wanted even my body...it would be yours. No price is to high." She said with a blush of embarrassment on the clean area of her face.

"Will you excuse us Lord Ainz." Shalltear and Albedo asked daintily.

"As you wish." Ainz said to them, and they walked out of the room at an unhurried pace, and down a hallway, then briefly before it cut off, several shrieks of rage echoed back to the throne room, and a few moments later the pair returned as if nothing had happened.

"You are well?" Ainz asked.

"Yes my lord." Shalltear said.

"We simply had a brief disagreement." Albedo added, leaving off whom it was with.

Ainz shrugged it off and gestured for them to reclaim their places.

"Come closer, Leinas Rockbruise." Ainz said, and she stood and walked step by step towards the face of death, when she was a few feet away, he held up his hand, and she held stock still as his skeletal finger swept her hair aside again, and he said, "Identify curse." He waited in silence, and she stood breathless, looking at the skeletal face that had killed over two hundred thousand humans, fearing for that moment that even he might not be able to solve this problem.

"Easily cured." He said.

Leinas wanted to cry.

"Will you...my lord?" She asked.

"If I command you to reproduce with another strong figure, to create strong heirs to my service?" Ainz asked.

She froze for a moment, and he thought she would refuse, but though she blushed when she answered, she said, "If what I bear never sees this on my face, I will obey." She said with conviction.

"Will you die for me?" He asked.

"If it means dying without this on my face, I would die for you ten thousand times." She said passionately.

"If I tell you to become a vampire?" He asked.

"Then I will bare my fangs for you and live off the blood of your enemies, if only my face no longer bears this taint." She said without hesitation.

"If I order you to execute your own family, would you do it?" Ainz asked, curious as to the lengths she would go.

"My lord, when my family saw my curse, they cast me out, my own father said he'd rather see me abused in a brothel than see me as his daughter ever again. My mother wept and said there was nothing hideous permitted in her house, my fiance cast me off like trash, saying no noble could be married to something he was ashamed of. I traded my life to Emperor Jircniv on two conditions, that he strive to find a cure for me, and that he avenge the cruelty done to me by the family who abandoned me. He fulfilled the second condition, but he was never able to fulfill the first, and now here I stand, ready to do your will, even if it leaves me broken and ground into dust...as long as I can see my face 'clean' of this hateful curse before the moment of my demise." She said, her eyes unflinching, desperate, hopeful.

Ainz raised his hand and brought his chin down to it as if in contemplation, as if considering her request, when he had already decided to grant it as he remembered the absence of his own father and the abuse of his mother, and the words of Touch Me..."Helping the weak is just common sense", plus this was a particularly strong human, worth winning to him, but at the same time giving for nothing was often seen as suspicous in this world, he made up his mind in a moment.

"I will accept your offer, serve me in this life, agree to any resurrection of your body, any transformation or experiment I dictate, and any task I give, even should it mean becoming a vampire and serving me in unlife, and I will cure your curse this very moment." Ainz said, it was a lot to ask from his perspective, but when Leinas heard these terms it was as if she were being offered the world for mere pocket change.

"I am yours to command to live or die, my lord." Leinas said with absolute certainty.

"Then descend the stairs, kneel, and take the oath I give you." He said.

She rushed down the stairs like a child on Christmas day, and knelt immediately with her head raised adoringly to his face.

"I, state your name." Ainz said.

"I, Leinas Rockbruise," She said.

"Vow to serve the Sorcerer King in life and unlife." Ainz said.

"Vow to serve the Sorcerer King in life and unlife." She repeated.

"To enforce his will, his justice, and his codes." Ainz said.

"To enforce his will, his justice, and his codes." She repeated.

"To defend his people, land, and rule from all enemies both foreign and domestic." Ainz said.

"To defend his people, land, and rule from all enemies both foreign and domestic." She repeated.

"By my god, I take this oath." Ainz said.

"By my Lord Ainz Ooal Gown, I take this oath." She said, deliberately replacing god, with the Sorcerer King's name.

It gave him pause, but as he saw the guardians present nod in approval, he let it pass.

"I in turn promise to treat you justly, that you will retain a place in my ranks, never want for the needs I may provide, so long as your oath is true." Ainz said formally.

"And now the oath is made." Ainz said, then he stood descended the stairs, and then struck her across the face as soon as he came close enough. "And that is so you remember it." He said, remembering something he remembered from medieval knightly tradition that seemed appropriate. He pulled his strength back in striking her, but it clearly hurt, yet she said nothing as her head returned to its former position, and her gaze back up to him.

"Now then," he said, "Cure greater curse."

He then reached into his pocket dimension and pulled out a mirror, which he held up for her.

She held still for a moment, hardly able to believe what she'd just heard, a few words was all it took, and she was cured of her torment of years? She almost didn't want to believe it could be so easy, yet after that hesitation, she slowly reached up as hope began to grow inside her, and touched her hair, she looked again at the Sorcerer King, who nodded encouragingly. She swallowed hard, then moved her hair to one side, and for a moment, just a moment, it seemed it wasn't gone, and then she realized what it was, she wiped her face with her glove, clearing the dripped out pus away, and saw her face clearly. It had worked, her face was clean and clear as if there had never been any problem at all, she was whole. The tears fell like a spring rain and she collapsed forward with her face to the stone, the top of her head on the foot of the Sorcerer King, she froze, then clasped his foot at the ankle, and he for a moment felt deep confusion as he felt her start to lift, was she trying to topple him? But the slow way she did it, made him think otherwise, so he allowed her that, and then she placed his foot over her neck, and lowered her hands to the floor, sobbing joyfully.

The guardians, though initially surprised at what she had begun to do, saw how the motion ended, and they could not help but approve, thinking it the proper gesture of submission to a supreme one.

"My sword, my life, my everything, is yours until there is nothing left of myself to give to you, you are now just my lord, you are my god, and there is nothing you cannot ask of me, because your request, is my holy command, and the only way I will fail, is if I die before executing your will, and I will die as often as you wish me to, for as long as you'll have me." She choked out through her sobs of joy

He let the posture remain as she spoke, but it was, for him, quite awkward. He felt himself quite uncomfortable with this much emotion and the kind of submission that was uncomfortable enough from the NPCs, let alone from other humans. When she finished speaking, he removed his foot and placed it back on the floor.

"As it happens, I do have an order for you Lady Rockbruise." He said.

"Anything my lord." She said, still staring at the floor.

"I'm going to visit the empire...and a few other places, and I'd like you to be my guide and my bodyguard while I travel, the company of a famous human would be of considerable value." Ainz said.

"As my lord commands." She said firmly.

"Only one thing first." He said.

"My lord?" She asked.

"Perhaps, Lady Rockbruise, you'd like to wear your hair 'back' now." Ainz said, his noble voice conveying a degree of warmth.

She froze for a moment, then an enormous smile filled her face as she rose back up to her kneeling position and lifted it to his red glowing eyes free of fear and filled with joy. "YES my lord, I require only a moment." She said and began to adjust her hair, baring the whole of her face for the first time in years.