Prologue
Prologue
It was a trash novel.
A genuine, absolutely breathtaking piece of garbage.
Believability had long since shattered into pieces, and coherence had been nailed into a coffin with each passing chapter. The characters turned stupid whenever the author needed them to, and clever whenever convenient. The worldbuilding twisted and bent out of shape without surviving a single scene transition. It was supposedly a medieval fantasy noble academy story, but some arcs featured court intrigue while the next chapter devolved into misunderstandings straight out of a third-rate romance.
The male leads were all equally pathetic in their attempts to look like saviors.
The Crown Prince handled someone else's wounds as if they were his own, wearing a mask of justice and kindness. The knight candidate acted stoic and sincere but was always late at the most crucial moments. The rest of them weren't even worth mentioning. They weren't there to serve the heroine—they were paper dolls existing solely to put her through the wringer.
It got to the point where I couldn't tell if the author genuinely cared about the heroine or just loved watching her suffer.
And yet, I read that novel to the very end.
There was only one reason.
Roseline Vellois.
She was the only person in that godforsaken novel who felt truly alive.
A woman who was composed, kind, and far too accustomed to enduring. A woman who was always pushed around by others, always misunderstood, always wounded, yet never completely broken. A woman who wobbled on the verge of collapse but held on with that last fragment of strength—her face stuck in my mind in such a strange, stubborn way.
That's what pissed me off even more.
Why put someone like her in such a garbage story?
Why use such a compelling character as decoration to prop up the male leads' redemption arcs?
Why was she the only one who felt like she belonged in a completely different genre?
I sat slumped against my bed, frowning as I flipped through the final chapter. On the screen was the so-called climax—Crown Prince Adrian embracing Roseline. The background had moonlight, the sighs of nobles, belated regret, and utterly pathetic emotional dialogue.
I genuinely felt like throwing up.
"What the fuck."
The curse slipped out.
At this point, it was a talent. How could anyone ruin something so thoroughly, all the way to the end?
It got worse with every page I turned. Suddenly a conspiracy, suddenly the truth, suddenly the villain's downfall, suddenly the heroine's forgiveness. A plot stripped completely bare of cause and effect, held together by nothing but the heroine's face.
Still, I read to the end.
Because I couldn't fall asleep without seeing how Roseline would smile at the end, how much she would endure, and who she would eventually forgive.
Annoyingly, I hated watching Roseline get hurt—yet I couldn't stop staring.
The face she made when biting her lips through injustice.
The face she made when lifting her head after enduring humiliation.
The face she made when pushed to the wall by someone else's hand, refusing to crumble.
Every single moment like that made me angry.
At the same time, I couldn't look away.
It was strange. I clearly liked her, but the scenes I remembered most vividly weren't her happy smiles—they were her expressions at those breaking points.
Especially the scenes involving the villainess, Serena Val Edelhardt.
The author wrote Serena as the most cliché villain imaginable. The haughty Duke's daughter who tormented the heroine out of unrequited love for the Crown Prince. Obsessive, jealous, humiliating, and ultimately destroyed—a textbook role.
But something felt off.
The way Serena went after Roseline was too persistent for simple hatred.
She struck exactly where it hurt. In the most humiliating way possible, in front of others, yet never using outright violence. She dismantled Roseline's pride, dignity, composure, and breathing, one by one—like someone who wanted only that woman to crumble before her.
I often found myself thinking.
That's not just about the Crown Prince.
Of course, the author probably never intended that. There's no way someone writing such crappy plots had that level of calculation. They probably just threw in whatever looked dramatic.
But strangely, I could never skip past the scenes where Serena cornered Roseline.
Because they were disturbingly beautiful.
And even more disturbingly—I understood them. Just a little bit.
"Crazy bitch."
I muttered under my breath.
Not sure if I meant Serena, or myself for reading those scenes.
The final chapter ended.
On the screen appeared a happy ending epilogue that absolutely nobody asked for. The Crown Prince was still righteous, Roseline was still kind, and Serena was neatly written off as a defeated villain. The comment section was flooded with people saying they were moved, they were sad, they were happy for the heroine.
I was just annoyed.
"Happy my ass."
I rubbed my eyes and let out a hollow laugh.
Who could possibly be happy with that kind of writing? Someone like Roseline should have been pulled out of that novel entirely and given a better story. She was far too precious to be kicked around by dumb male leads and a hack author.
My head felt foggy.
That was the price of coming home from overtime, not even washing up, collapsing onto the bed, and confirming the ending of a trash novel until the very end. My eyes were burning, my shoulders were heavy. Just as I was about to put down my phone—
My vision swayed.
At first, I thought it was just exhaustion. But soon I realized something was wrong. It wasn't just that my vision was blurring. It felt like someone was twisting my brain from the inside.
"Huh?"
Strength drained from my fingertips.
Thud.
My phone hit the floor.
My heart sank. I couldn't breathe. Air wouldn't go into my throat. A ringing sound echoed inside my ears. The ceiling stretched and shrank, over and over.
No way.
For real?
Now, of all times?
Right after finishing that goddamn novel's final chapter?
The last thought I had was unfairness.
And then I blacked out.
When I opened my eyes again, the first thought that came to me was this:
The ceiling is high.
I blinked in a daze.
It wasn't my ceiling. There was no fluorescent light, no yellowed wallpaper, no messy piles of laundry. Instead, a white canopy canopy, intricate molding, and excessively gaudy gold decorations filled my field of vision.
A dream?
It felt too vivid for that.
The feel of the blanket against my skin was strangely unfamiliar. My body felt too light, and at the same time, too sensitive. Everything was clear—my fingertips, my toes, the air touching the back of my neck.
A bad feeling crawled up my spine.
I slowly sat up.
And froze.
Long hair flowing down over my shoulders.
Unfamiliar curves beneath my loose sleepwear.
Pale, slender hands that were clearly not mine.
"...What the hell?"
That wasn't my low, husky voice.
It was softer, clearer—and unmistakably a woman's voice.
My heart started pounding like crazy.
I stumbled out of bed almost weakly. A soft carpet met my feet. The room was wide, extravagant, decorated exactly like something from fiction. A vanity, perfume bottles, ornate candlesticks, dresses that looked casually draped but were obviously expensive.
Anyone would recognize this as a medieval noble's room.
No way.
I didn't want to finish that thought. But denial always lags behind confirmation.
Holding my breath, I walked toward the full-length mirror.
A woman stood in the mirror.
Black hair.
Pale skin.
Cold, sharply upturned eyes.
A face that anyone would describe as arrogant, beautiful, and more suited for wariness than closeness.
I knew that face.
There was no way I wouldn't.
Serena Val Edelhardt.
The young lady of the prestigious Edelhardt Ducal family of the Arsenia Empire. The villainess of the original work who relentlessly pressured Roseline Vellois at the Imperial Astrea Academy, only to destroy herself in the end.
"Hah."
A sound resembling laughter escaped my lips.
I couldn't believe it. It made no sense. But the face in the mirror was too clear, and the skin beneath my fingertips was too vivid.
This wasn't a dream.
The body I had entered was—of all people—Serena.
The flat, convenient villainess who seemed to exist solely to torment the heroine. The arrogant Duke's daughter the author shoved in to fuel the plot. And the woman who was obsessively fixated only on Roseline.
The moment I recognized that fact, something in my head throbbed strangely.
Flashes of unfamiliar memories surged.
Roseline standing at the end of the hallway.
The way her shoulders stiffened for a moment when her name was called.
Her profile as she held her breath and endured in front of others.
Her ears flushed with shame.
Her breath trembling softly.
And the feeling of someone watching that and quietly smiling.
A thrill.
Superiority.
A strange satisfaction.
A twisted pleasure—that this woman alone would be shaken so much by just one word from me.
I pressed my hand against the mirror harder.
"...Crazy."
Was that a chill? Or was it resonance?
Did the original Serena hate Roseline?
Or did she want to believe she hated her?
Knock. Knock.
A knock came from outside the door.
My breath stopped.
"Young-ae-nim. It's time to wake up."
Young-ae-nim.
That title nailed down reality.
This wasn't my room. This wasn't my body. This wasn't the world I had lived in.
The place I had entered was clearly inside that damn novel.
And now, my name was that villainess who most obsessively cornered the heroine and most miserably collapsed.
My mind was a mess.
I wanted to run away immediately.
It was so absurd I felt like crying.
But in the middle of all that chaos, one thought rose with strange clarity.
Now, I would see Roseline again.
The only person who was truly alive in that wretched trash novel.
The reason I had read until the end. The woman I couldn't tear my eyes away from.
And now—I would face her through the eyes of that villainess.
The moment I realized that, a sliver of indescribable heat seeped through the fear and bewilderment.
I was screwed.
In so many ways.
Completely. Thoroughly.