I Became the Villain's Only Friend
The world I possessed was straight out of a novel.
A trashy web novel filled with every cliché you could imagine—class discrimination, obsessive yanderes, and a tragic ending that left no one happy. And I had the misfortune of reincarnating as a nameless orphan boy who barely scraped by on the streets.
At first, I thought I could just keep my head down and survive. But no matter how carefully I lived, the story's gears kept turning, dragging me toward the predetermined catastrophe.
The villainess, Claire Artifare, would be executed for her crimes. The obsessive saintess, Heste Meliard, would go mad and burn the empire to the ground. And the hidden beastkin princess, Runyang, would die protecting the very people who despised her kind.
I couldn't let that happen. Not if I wanted to live.
So I made a choice. If the story couldn't be stopped, I'd rewrite it from the inside. And the first step was getting close to the one person everyone feared most—the villain at the center of all this misery.
His name was Reyan.
A cold, ruthless prodigy with a talent for compressed swordsmanship that could cut through steel like paper. In the original novel, he was the one who personally beheaded Claire after she tried to assassinate the crown prince. But if I could become his only friend, maybe I could change his fate. Maybe I could change everyone's fate.
It started small. Sharing scraps of food when he was still just a starving street kid like me. Teaching him how to read by firelight. Standing between him and the nobles who looked at us like we were vermin. I was just trying to survive, but somewhere along the way, something shifted.
"You touched Reyan? Then die."
The words came from Claire one day, her voice dripping with murderous intent as she glared at a group of academy bullies who had cornered me. Her silver hair caught the sunlight like a blade, and her crimson eyes burned with something far more dangerous than simple anger.
I blinked. This wasn't how the story was supposed to go.
"Why do you need anyone else but me?"
Heste's whisper came later, in the quiet of the academy chapel. The saintess who was supposed to represent purity and light had cornered me against a pillar, her fingers tracing the line of my jaw with unsettling tenderness. Her golden eyes held a hunger that made my skin crawl.
"Please... don't abandon me."
Runyang's plea was the last straw. The beastkin girl who should have been hiding her ears and tail in shame was now clinging to my sleeve, tears streaming down her face as she begged me not to leave the academy without her.
I had only wanted to be Reyan's friend. To steer him away from the path of becoming the story's final boss. To create a small pocket of safety in this cruel world.
But somehow, I had become the center of their obsessions instead.
And Reyan... Reyan was starting to look at me with eyes that held something far more dangerous than friendship.
Hidden Route Unlocked: The Villain's Only Friend
📍 Warning: All capture targets have begun showing extreme yandere tendencies toward you.
🎁 Penalty for Failure: Bad End — Death by Obsession
I stared at the blue window only I could see, my heart sinking.
What the hell have I done?
This wasn't survival anymore. This was a nightmare wrapped in silk and obsession. The villain I'd tried to befriend had become something else entirely, and the heroines who were supposed to fall for him were now fixated on me.
Reyan stood in the distance, watching our little gathering with those sharp, unreadable eyes. His hand rested on the hilt of his practice sword, fingers twitching like he wanted to cut down everyone around me.
Our eyes met. For a moment, the cold mask slipped, and I saw it—raw, possessive hunger mixed with something almost like fear.
"Don't look at them like that," he said softly, too quietly for the others to hear. His voice carried the casual tone he only used with me now. "You're mine, aren't you? The only friend I'll ever need."
I swallowed hard.
I had become the villain's only friend.
And now, it seemed, I had become everyone's everything.
The story had changed. But whether it was for better or worse, only time would tell. All I knew was that if I wanted to survive this new, darker route, I'd have to navigate a minefield of obsessive love, political intrigue, and the constant threat of a very sharp sword at my back.
God help me.