Villains Are Destined to Die

Chapter 4

The pink-haired man was shouting in the direction of the doorway. Soon enough, the butler and a few of the servants came running.

“My lord! What is the matter?”

“Lock this girl away,” the second son demanded.

“M-my lord! I’m sorry! My lord, please!” The maid that had been harassing me all morning was dragged away, just like that.

I could take no part in these proceedings, however. I was busy trying to get my lurching stomach under control. I still had a hand over my mouth as I lay limply against the back of the chair. The pink-haired man reached out, shaking my slim shoulder carefully.

“Hey. Are you all right?” the second son asked.

“...”

“Why’d you eat that swill anyway? You should have flipped the table and screamed like you usually do, idiot.”

I wasn’t sure if he was consoling me or making fun of me. He was faithful to his original spiteful rendition in the game.

If I hadn’t eaten it, I’d have died from a fork in my neck, which you would have knocked, as it happens.

I suddenly felt irritated. I wanted to spit out a sharp comment, but I couldn’t speak without a damn dialogue box.

Phew... That part’s over with, I hope?

I hadn’t expected at all that he would be so helpful in getting rid of the maid. Not that I felt grateful to him in the least. My arm was covered with puncture wounds. I doubted that one maid was the only servant responsible.

Of course not.

My maid was probably the tip of the iceberg. The entire household was probably out to get me, with the man currently in front of me at their lead, giving silent encouragement. That was the basic setup for any villain’s story.

I’d only woken up moments ago, but I felt drained already.

“Hey. You look really sick. Should I call a doctor?” he asked. He seemed disturbed that I wasn’t saying anything; he wasn’t really worried enough to call a doctor. He was bent over me and studying my hand-covered face like he was actually worried.

It was at that moment the white window appeared again.

1. None of your business.

2. What do you care? Get out of my room!

3. Don’t act all nice. It doesn’t suit you.

The terrible reality of my situation sank in. I had to choose carefully, even now, if I didn’t want to die a premature death. None of the dialogue choices written by the developers were sane, but I chose the least offensive one.

“None of your business...” I wanted to make it sound as sincere as possible, as it most closely reflected my feelings at this moment. My voice was weak from trying to keep from vomiting.

“You...” the pink-haired man frowned after hearing my reply, but only for a moment.

When I glanced at him again, his face was icy cold. Maybe I’d been mistaken in thinking he’d looked concerned.

“All right. It’s none of my concern what you eat even if it kills you,” he said, straightening up. “No doctor in the Eckhart estate that has time to spare for the likes of you anyway.”

Thud, thud.

His footsteps sounded hostile as he walked away. White letters glowed above the man’s head.

[Affection Score -3%]

The affection score had gone up. I was certain it had been at -10% yesterday. This was a huge increase, considering that even bumps of a couple of percentage points were difficult to accomplish in hard mode.

If I’d known the rewards were so huge, I’d have started with this episode...

But I didn’t care that the affection score had improved. It was still in the negative, after all.

* * *

After emptying my stomach, I got up and rinsed my mouth at the sink. I looked up and saw a beautiful girl in the mirror.

“Penelope.”

Not a single unscripted groan had escaped my lips earlier, but now that I was alone, I could talk all I wanted. I opened my mouth, and the girl in the mirror did the same.

Her blue-green eyes shone like emeralds. She was a beauty, her azalea-like, dark pink hair rippling attractively every time she moved.

It was definitely not my face.

“Penelope Eckhart. Eckhart... Damn it.”

The House of Eckhart was the only dukedom in the Empire of Eorka inside the game world. The episode I’d experienced yesterday, which had led the first son to confine me to my room, had been the de facto beginning of hard mode. I’d died many times before clearing that episode in the past.

Trying to stay true to the villain’s character, I’d only selected the insolent dialogue choices. I’d been indignant that I’d died at the very beginning and attempted it multiple times. I was now glad that I’d done so, and not just fallen asleep right away. The thought made me sigh.

“Ugh... She really is beautiful...”

The illustrations of her had been really pretty, and in real life Penelope’s beauty bordered on the impossible. If I’d been sucked into this game before getting an apartment of my own to live in, I’d have been excited by this. Maybe I’d have even gladly accepted this stupendous development.

I bet I’d have thanked my lucky stars for granting me a chance at a new life...

But I had endured life in that hellhole and succeeded in striking out on my own. The environment had been anything but friendly, but I’d gotten accepted to a prestigious university. Though it was tiny and dirty, I’d also had a living space all to myself. All that remained for the future, after escaping the clutches of my dastardly brothers, was to continue on an upward trajectory to success.

Life as Penelope was hardly superior to my own life, as the smallest mistake would immediately lead to death. If I’d reincarnated as the protagonist of normal mode, it would be different, of course. She could do anything and still get a happy ending.

“But why?”

Why now, right after I’d finally gotten out of that awful house!

“Why!” I slammed my fist down on the sink and wailed. The pretty face in the mirror contorted with despair. There was a nasty look about her face even though I was crying in anguish. This was the greatest villain in the game, all right.

“Ha...” I exhaled deeply and ran a hand through my long hair, some of which had gotten in my face. I tried to remember what I could about Penelope.

Penelope Eckhart. She was the villain in the dating sim and the protagonist of hard mode. She had originally been a commoner with no last name.

[Penelope was raised by a single mother who was a poor, wandering peddler. One day the duke, who’d been searching desperately for his long-lost youngest daughter, discovered her.

When her chronically ill mother died, she was adopted into the House of Eckhart.]

There was only one reason she was chosen to replace the sole daughter of Eckhart: she greatly resembled the duke’s lost daughter. The duke’s dead wife had also had pink hair, and all members of the Eckhart family had blue eyes. I recalled the second son of the duke, who’d been in my room earlier. His hair had been a lovely shade of pink.

The dark pink hair that I saw in the mirror now was closer to red than pink, however. And the eyes were blue green, slightly different from the Eckhart blue.

“He should have looked harder for his own daughter. Why involve someone else?”

As Penelope grew up, she began to resemble the duke’s lost daughter less and less. The duke quickly lost interest and neglected her. No longer favored by the duke, Penelope’s new lot was abuse from her two stepbrothers and the servants.

“The setting is so similar, it’s disturbing...”

The story of Penelope’s life prior to adoption was very similar to my own. I hadn’t realized this while I’d been playing the game. My heart sank.

The fake.

Every servant in the house called her a fake. Penelope, though undeniably gorgeous, was nothing more than a half-assed imitation to the people here. Perhaps if her personality had been more loveable, things would have been different. Despite being an adopted daughter, her behavior had been questionable.

As the game’s prologue put it, “She was hostile toward everyone and continued in her perverse ways with no mind for time or occasion.”

“No wonder the dialogue choices were all so hostile.” I nodded to myself, recalling the pieces of insane dialogue I’d seen so far. Everything about the girl pointed to her terrible personality, even her name. Unlike the innocent and pure protagonist of normal mode, Penelope looked like a vixen. But I found that I sympathized with the girl. After today, though it had only been a few hours, I could picture the kind of treatment she’d received in the duke’s house.

I mean, even if she’s a fake, this was going too far.

How could a maid poke needles into the arm of a girl who’d been officially adopted by the duke? I doubted that maids did something so crazy even to each other.

Penelope had been adopted when she was only 12. If this kind of abuse had been happening since then... A child like her didn’t have many options against adults who were deaf and blind as far as she was concerned.

“So she’s a villain molded by her environment.”

Not that it justified her behavior up until this point. But all the characters in the game had been especially harsh on her and had shown no hesitation when killing her.

“I pity her a little,” I said, touching Penelope’s pale cheek. Her dark pink hair made her look beautiful and plaintive. I soon pushed aside any feelings of sympathy, however.

“I’m in no position to be pitying anyone.”

I had no time to get lost in such thoughts.

I was Penelope now.

In other words, just as Penelope had died countless times as I played the game, so could I at the hands of the male protagonists.

The thought filled me with sudden fear.