A Villainess with a Story?
A crimson droplet fell from my fingertips and soaked into the damp earth.
The illusions that had tormented me were gone. My wounds had already healed, my unique ability had deactivated, and my mind was unusually clear.
That was a relief.
When I thought about the two months of suffering under that damned self-harm prohibition magic and the illusions it forced on me… the fact that I couldn’t even suffer when I wanted to had made everything feel far more wretched.
Still. It was my karma.
“What are you doing here?”
A sharp voice cut through the air.
Shing.
Metal rang out behind me.
I slowly raised my head.
Despite the gloomy weather, the silver blade gleamed far too brightly.
“Big-chested senior?”
Bella Staren?
“Ah.”
My thoughts and words had come out completely reversed.
Her expression had already been plenty fierce… now it twisted into something outright vicious as she glared at me.
“Performing some kind of evil ritual?”
What?
Evil ritual?
Ah.
An evil villainess bleeding in front of a grave.
Hmm.
Yeah…
It is a scene that could easily be misunderstood… haha…
“If I say no… will you believe me?”
She shook her head, expression still rigid.
“Not at all.”
At the same moment, the tip of the sword drew closer.
A cold aura brushed the nape of my neck.
Decisive, isn’t she.
I was used to this kind of treatment.
But…
This sword.
If it sank into my neck, it would feel so good…
The sharp blade parting my soft skin, cutting deeper until it reached the carotid…
Pshhk!
Ah, the fountain-like spray you see in movies and anime is a little exaggerated… more like a water gun, really?
The despair of the brain being damaged the instant blood supply is cut off.
The hot pressure tightening around the throat.
The tinnitus gnawing at the eardrums.
The sense of alienation as reality itself seems to pull away.
Thoughts growing hazy, and the insanely ecstatic sensation that comes at the exact moment a living being’s most precious life is severed.
Swoosh.
Unable to suppress the desire, I slowly—very slowly—tilted my neck toward the blade.
“What are you doing?! You crazy bitch!”
Bella recoiled in horror and hastily withdrew her sword.
I smirked and tilted my head.
“What. Weren’t you trying to kill me?”
A playful smile curved my lips as I whispered softly.
“Hmm. Our senior~ is more of a coward than I thought?”
Anyway, this body wouldn’t die from a little cut to the carotid.
I’d already done it several times. Hehe.
So just a little… a little more…
With that sword, my neck—
“I’m not a murderer.”
She still didn’t lower her guard, quietly sheathing her sword as she continued.
“My sword does not exist to cut people down.”
“Unexpected. Are you treating me like a person too?”
Humans connected to contamination were almost always sentenced to extreme punishment. My case was merely the exception; not being treated as a person was the natural order of things.
Especially those who had served on the front lines. They had suffered not only from monsters but from the Cultists of Contamination as well, so even with the difference in status, most of them made no effort to hide their open hatred toward me.
Thud.
Suddenly her hand settled gently on top of my head.
“If you want to be treated as a person, stop touching things like contamination. If you fulfill your duties as an academy student and as a noble… even if the past can’t be erased, people who will acknowledge you will appear.”
“Yes, yes~ I’m sure they will.”
What kind of lecture was this? Boring.
I considered provoking her a little more, but it didn’t seem like she would give me what I actually wanted… so I decided to drop it.
Boring.
“And if you’re going to mourn, do it properly.”
The moment the words left her mouth, Bella gripped her still-sheathed sword firmly with both hands and slowly raised it to her chest.
A simple gesture created to mourn the dead on battlefields where people died every single day.
It was nothing special.
Yet I could clearly feel that she was sincerely mourning them.
I was grateful, but…
I didn’t think I could repay it.
I looked down at the graves and snorted.
“Ha. Why should I mourn these guys?”
I jerked my chin toward the graves and sneered.
“Then what are those?”
Bella pointed at the white wildflowers laid in front of the graves and looked at me.
“As you said, materials needed for an evil ritual, I suppose.”
This was getting annoying.
Duke Bennet had used the media to spread my notoriety into every corner, so the faith of malice was being supplied without any trouble. The real problem was the Cultists of Contamination who were hunting for the seal of the evil god with burning eyes.
I didn’t think she was connected to them, but you never knew.
“I don’t know what your story is, but putting up thorns against others like that won’t benefit you. The release procedures are complete, so stop by the village and head to the academy with me.”
“Huh? Suddenly? Do you have something you want to scrape off me? Admirable, but this is a safe zone. I don’t think I need an escort knight.”
“Ha. I’m not so hard up that I need to suck up to a delinquent duchess. I simply have business at the academy myself. The warden asked me to keep an eye on you.”
Haa, I’d rather be alone.
“For a baron’s daughter, you’re quite arrogant.”
I frowned and glared at Bella.
“Since you’ve returned to the academy, I’m also your academy senior.”
“Hmph.”
Students enrolled in the academy were required to respect their seniors regardless of status. It was one of the school rules created by our stuffy chairman, so no one dared to object.
“Follow quietly. First we’ll go to the village and secure a carriage.”
The Bastille Prison area had teleport magic sealed because of possible escapees. To use an instantaneous gate, you had to walk all the way to another city.
“Do as you like.”
Looks like I would have to travel to the academy with this annoying woman after all.
At least her looks were my type, so maybe that was fortunate.
I shook my head and walked past her toward the village.
If it was a village near Bastille Prison, I already had a good method in mind.
She seemed to have decided on her own that I was some kind of villainess with a tragic story.
I should properly betray that expectation, right?
I had seen it countless times on the battlefield.
People whose eyes held no attachment to life.
Those people usually met one of two ends before long: they took their own lives, or they overexerted themselves fighting monsters and died.
And now I was seeing those same eyes… in a mere sixteen-year-old child.
It was unpleasant.
Yeon Bennet currently represented the image of every incompetent, trashy noble. When she was bleeding in front of the graves, for a moment I couldn’t even think to check the surroundings; my hand moved first.
The way she pushed her neck into the blade without the slightest hesitation.
Those lifeless, empty eyes.
In that moment, Bella looked at Yeon Bennet without prejudice for the first time.
The wildflowers carefully placed one by one in front of the graves.
The girl kneeling in the muddy field under the rain, blankly staring at the mounds of earth.
That child had simply been mourning the dead.
According to the rumors she was a villainess who laughed and mocked the people who had died because of her without a shred of guilt. It was hard to tell which version was the truth.
She was still only a young student who had just finished her first semester of first year at the academy… perhaps there was still a chance left for her.
Or so I thought until two hours ago.
At first the journey had been smooth. She caused no particular problems until we reached the village, and Bella had begun to relax as they arrived at the entrance.
Armed members of the village self-defense force approached. A man who appeared to be the captain eyed them with open wariness.
Bella stepped forward first.
“I am Bella Staren.”
She finished speaking and showed the captain her status window for verification.
The moment the name Staren appeared, the self-defense members’ attitudes softened slightly. This was a frontier village not far from Staren territory, after all.
The captain nodded.
“Confirmed. But… that person over there…?”
Their gazes turned to Yeon Bennet.
Yeon answered shortly, looking thoroughly annoyed.
“Yeon Bennet.”
In that instant it felt as though the air of the entire village had frozen solid.
The self-defense members’ expressions hardened at once.
In truth, this situation was largely Bella’s own fault. Yeon Bennet was already infamous as a villainess even in quiet rural villages thanks to the media. Naturally, a village near the site of such a disaster would know even more about her—something Bella had completely overlooked.
Still, the older self-defense member who seemed to be the village guard captain managed a polite greeting despite his slightly awkward expression.
“Welcome, Lady Bennet. We will guide you into the village at once.”
The problem was just one person.
A young member who openly twisted his face the moment he saw Yeon.
As was typical of villainess young ladies, Yeon Bennet had terrible grades and was thoroughly incompetent—yet she was ghostly good at sensing when she was being ignored…
“You dare, you lowly bug of a commoner!”
Watching the troublemaker roughly seize the self-defense member’s collar with mana-laced hands and shake him, Bella suppressed the urge to clutch her head.
“Haa… that crazy bitch.”
“You. Want to die?”
A cold, low voice.
With that single sentence, even the air froze.
“Put that hand down. Right now.”
Bella looked down at her with icy eyes and warned in a low tone.
Yeon slowly turned her head to meet Bella’s gaze.
Bella never looked away.
A tense silence stretched between them.
Then Yeon smirked and released the collar.
Thud!
The self-defense member collapsed to the ground.
At this rate she’s not just a troublemaker—she’s a full-blown disaster.
She had to resolve this situation. If the girl kept causing problems on the journey ahead, it would become extremely troublesome.
“Yeon Bennet.”
Bella called her name in a quiet but firm voice.
“Duke Bennet agreed, as a condition of your release, that if you cause trouble one more time, every crime you have committed so far will be charged at once.”
Yeon’s expression twisted slightly.
“This is your last chance.”
Bella took a step closer, looking straight into her eyes.
“If you don’t want even your past dug up over a trivial incident like this and end up locked in prison for the rest of your life.”
Yeon’s pupils shook.
Had she finally realized this situation wasn’t a joke?
Bella added one last word, hoping the girl would not take it lightly.
“Please. Control your temper a little.”
The cold gazes of the villagers turned toward Yeon.
Originally Bella’s plan had been to prepare various supplies, rest for a night, and then depart… but—
I absolutely have to just get a carriage and leave this village.