Awakening as Olivia Lapa Ashtar

When I opened my eyes, the ceiling was completely unfamiliar. A perfectly flat, spotless surface. Antique furniture that screamed old money. Walls covered in delicate rose patterns. Just where the hell was I?

I still had every memory right up to the moment of death. My stomach had been punched clean through, after all. So what was this place? The afterlife?

No. Something felt off.

“Obviously if your guts get blown open you’re supposed to die. Huh?”

My voice sounded way too high. I told myself to stay calm. I was Noah—the guy who survived the absolute worst difficulty hero party, the one full of a brainless hero and women who only cared about luxury and pleasure. I’d swung a sword well enough to be called Sword Saint, shot a bow well enough to be called Divine Archer, and healed well enough to be called High Priest. Someone who’d collected every title except Archmage wasn’t going to lose his shit over something like this.

The one thing I knew for sure was that I was alive. If that was all, I could have assumed Pascal—the necromancer among the Four Heavenly Kings—had dragged my corpse back from the dead. But this voice was unmistakably female no matter how you sliced it. Besides, I’d launched a full frontal assault precisely to keep the Four Heavenly Kings from interfering, and the Demon King’s castle had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠been on the verge of collapse. Even if I died, that lunatic couldn’t possibly have turned me into… this.

And the hero would probably manage to handle the Four Heavenly Kings. He was strong, at least in title. If I died, he’d feel the danger and actually try to fight them.

“Yeah. I’m not denying reality or anything.”

Right. So I died and woke up as a rich family’s daughter. As a woman. Or maybe it was just the voice. I tilted my head down slightly. Two rather prominent mounds filled my vision.

What the fuck. Something a man could never have, yet every woman possessed regardless of size, was now attached to my chest.

Just to be sure, I slid my hand downward. Sure enough, nothing. The treasured possession of every man was gone. There was only a smooth, unsettling groove.

“Pfft.”

Laughter burst out before I could stop it. The man named Noah, who had been fighting on the front lines against the Demon King until recently, had become a woman with huge breasts.

Yeah. Stay calm, Noah. You’ve crossed the line between life and death more times than you can count. When the hero was busy visiting brothels and the women were drowning in luxury, you were the one left behind protecting villages alone and fighting the Four Heavenly Kings.

Something like this wasn’t enough to rattle me.

There was no need to check any further. For whatever reason, I had definitely become a woman. Yeah. After all, I was someone who had been dumped into the Land of Destruction from birth and only ever handled magic. Gender had always been nothing more than a shell to me.

The real question was why I was in this situation. I’d had my stomach blown open, then woken up as a rich young lady with breasts. Who the hell was messing with my soul?

“Hm?”

There was a bandage wrapped around my left wrist. I had no memory of injuring my hand—only my stomach. So it wasn’t that my body itself had transformed into a woman. A mage capable of healing a fatal abdominal wound and changing bodies wouldn’t have any reason to leave a wound on the wrist.

A polite knock sounded at the door. I froze for a second.

Was it the person who had put me in this body? Or someone else?

Honestly, with zero information to work from, I had no way of knowing who was outside. That idiot Eugene wouldn’t be this considerate toward me.

“Who is it?”

The door flew open. A black-haired maid stepped inside. The gaze she fixed on me was ice-cold. Not exactly contemptuous, but clearly reluctant, like she’d been forced to come.

Then get lost. My mind was already a mess. Seeing that sour face only made me feel worse.

The cold-faced maid took a breath and spoke.

“Miss Olivia. Are you awake now?”

“Yeah. Olivia?”

My name was Noah. Olivia? For now, I needed to collect every scrap of information I could.

“The master left you a letter. He was furious. He said never to do anything so tragic again.”

“Tragic? Letter?”

Even if you’re talking to me, is killing the Demon King considered tragic?

“If you wish to rest longer, I will take my leave.”

The cold-looking maid left the room.

Olivia. From the current situation, it didn’t seem like my body had been physically transformed. Nor was this a resurrection. Which meant I had somehow entered the body of a girl named Olivia.

Olivia. Olivia. The name sounded vaguely familiar.

For now, I decided to read the letter.

The sharp, biting sentences were actually pretty satisfying to read. Still… your daughter tried to kill herself and you don’t even show your face? What kind of garbage father was this?

“Is this a notebook?”

On the desk lay a single notebook. It clearly belonged to the owner of this room. The name written on the cover was the same as the one the maid and the letter had used.

Olivia Lapa Ashtar.

So Olivia was the owner of this notebook, this room, and this body. It finally clicked. Ashtar was one of the Empire’s ducal houses.

Putting the pieces together, it seemed I had possessed the body of a woman named Olivia. Then what happened to the original owner?

“Unless she’s…”

My eyes drifted to my left wrist. I carefully unwrapped the bandage. A straight, thin scar ran across it. She must have slit her wrist. It didn’t hurt, but the sensation was strangely uncomfortable.

So the original owner was dead?

I suddenly remembered fragments of old conversations.

It looked like my wish had come true after all. Or rather, the moment I banished those parasites, I had been set free. I didn’t know the full story, but since I had this body now, I might as well use it. I wasn’t in any position to be picky about warm rice or cold rice.

From what the maid had said, the original owner of this body seemed to have been the despised daughter of this house. If I was going to act the part, I should probably read this diary.

I opened the notebook the woman had left behind. Sure enough, it was a diary. And the contents left me utterly speechless.

“Damn it. So what if she’s the duke’s daughter? In the end she was just another idiot who got swept up in a love affair and even considered suicide.”

This woman, Olivia Lapa Ashtar, had been the fiancée of the Empire’s Crown Prince. Well, former fiancée now. The Crown Prince’s heart had completely left Olivia and settled on the Ashtar family’s illegitimate daughter instead. At that point, the family no longer needed to protect her.

The diary was filled with such obsessive, stomach-turning love and clinginess toward the Crown Prince that I wanted to gouge out my own eyes. Ah, wait. These weren’t my eyes. Fuck. In that case, I’m selling the eyes that never read this diary.

Women really were incomprehensible creatures. Since she was born into a noble house, she should have known love was never an option. Yet she clung to it so hard that she disgusted the Crown Prince, who then grew more interested in the family’s bastard daughter.

“Well, that works out for me.”

Since I was going to live in this body, marrying a man was out of the question. The original owner might return ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠someday, but I just had to live well until then. She had gone so far as to slit her wrists in front of the Crown Prince, and according to the diary, a new engagement was already in motion. It seemed her so-called parents cared more about the family’s prestige than anything else. Now that their daughter was useless, they had completely washed their hands of her.

For now, I decided to test magic. I unwrapped the bandage and cast a healing spell on my wrist. The scar gradually faded until the wound disappeared completely.

“Not bad at all.”

I still needed practice to manipulate mana properly, but the body itself held a considerable amount, and for some reason I seemed able to use my previous power without issue.

Maybe I should just leave the house. No. This was still the Ashtar ducal family. From the diary, it looked like the father had already torn into her pretty badly. Running away now might lead to consequences I couldn’t predict. I had no idea when the original owner might return. Slitting her wrist could mean she was dead, but who really knew?

“The date is March… and the academy is Attelina Academy.”

The woman named Olivia Lapa Ashtar had entered Attelina Academy last year. Right when she was about to enjoy a dreamy academy life with the Crown Prince, her father had officially adopted the illegitimate daughter Lily Lapa Ashtar into the family and sent her to the academy as well. At first the Crown Prince, who disliked Lily’s special treatment, got angry. But he gradually fell for her hardworking attitude. Olivia, who had initially tried to accept Lily, became blinded by jealousy and began harassing her. In the end, she had slit her own wrist.

All the related events were recorded in the diary. Of course, the diary claimed that harassing Lily was completely justified. Typical of a woman consumed by jealousy. Not that it was any of my business.

Now that I was using this body, the original owner wouldn’t have the chance to ruin herself any further.

I decided to check the wardrobe. I needed clothes I could actually wear.

“Why are they all dresses?”

She was a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠noble lady, so I understood, but this was ridiculous. Everything was frilly and extravagant. There was no way I could wear any of this. Even if I shouted that I was a man in this body, people would just call me crazy. After the suicide attempt, I definitely couldn’t walk around declaring “I’m a man!” while wearing men’s clothes.

Wearing women’s clothes was now an established fact. Cross-dressing was impossible with this chest. Supposedly binding it would be bad for the body. Which meant I had to wear a skirt. For mobility, a long skirt was out of the question.

“At least the uniform isn’t a dress.”

The academy uniform was the most practical option. The skirt was a reasonable length, and since Attelina Academy taught everything from combat to academics, the uniform was designed for practical training, including magic.

Even if I escaped this place, with the person called Noah already dead, there wasn’t much I could do in Olivia’s body. For now I needed to build up strength, so I might as well play the part of the duke’s daughter.

“Information is the priority right now.”

Tuition wasn’t an issue—I could secure a scholarship from the academy. Once I graduated, I wouldn’t need to stay in the Empire. For the moment, I had to get used to this body and gather information about the Demon King’s army. I had killed the Demon King, but I needed to see how the Four Heavenly Kings would move. I couldn’t afford to stay trapped inside the Empire.

“Now that the Demon King is dead, I don’t really have a reason to step forward, but…”

The uneasy feeling wouldn’t go away. The same went for that hero. I wasn’t sure if he could defeat the Four Heavenly Kings.

I had visited this academy several times as the mage of the hero party, so I knew the layout. The academy was in the imperial capital, and not far away was a market district. If you headed west from the market and took a certain alley, you would surprisingly find a slum.

I arrived there wearing the academy uniform.

“I used to hang around this slum quite a bit.”

Back when the hero was being wishy-washy, I had nearly died gathering information here. As expected of a country larger than a kingdom—the slum was massive.

As I ventured deeper, rough-looking men naturally began to surround me. I hadn’t considered what my current appearance might mean and had walked in exactly as I would have as a man.

“Whoa~ Little lady, you shouldn’t come to a place like this alone.”

“Want us to show you the way?”

Typical thugs you’d find in any slum. And I looked like a noble young lady who had been carefully raised since childhood, someone who had never even held a sword.

It was painfully obvious what would happen next.