“I’ll just live as a villain.

Prologue

One day, I woke up and found myself in someone else’s body.

I won’t go into detail about how absurdly shocked I was. After all, nobody’s going to be curious about my endless inner monologue.

To put it simply, I had become “Ibria Oberon.”

Ibria Oberon.

A painfully typical villainess from the novel Lady Catherine. Not a real person—just a character trapped inside the pages of a book. It was ridiculous enough to wake up as someone else, but to wake up as someone who only exists in a scrap of paper? Ridiculous doesn’t even begin to cover it.

At that moment, I thought: What the hell is happening to my life?

The novel Lady Catherine was a romance about Catherine, the only daughter of a poor but loving baron’s family, whose bright personality captured the hearts of the most eligible men in the kingdom.

• Cassian, the crown prince who would later become king.

• Ridon, the first prince who, despite being the eldest, was displaced from the crown prince’s position.

• El, the royal knight commander, said to be the finest swordsman on the continent.

• Mason, a genius scholar of commoner origin who rose to the position of chancellor.

• Luke, the head of an information guild who had crawled through the kingdom’s underworld.

Catherine received the love of all these men while skillfully managing her “harem” and, as typical romance novels go, eventually married the crown prince and became queen. The four other men, who had loved her, gracefully stepped back and wished for her happiness.

Wasn’t this a beautiful world? This world had been designed solely for the happiness of the heroine, Catherine.

In this world, Ibria Oberon was the duke’s daughter, the crown prince’s fiancée, and a woman consumed by jealousy who committed all sorts of misdeeds against Catherine.

At first, her actions were petty: spreading rumors, spilling wine at balls, publicly mocking her—small annoyances. But as Catherine became the center of the kingdom, Ibria’s harassment escalated, eventually leading her to plan Catherine’s murder.

Of course, the plan failed. The head of the information guild, loyal to Catherine, had ears everywhere in the kingdom.

“Besides, how well do you think a naive duke’s daughter could execute a scheme?”

It wasn’t even surprising. That’s just how villainous plans usually go.

“An essential virtue of a villain is to fail spectacularly mid-plot.”

As expected, Ibria was discovered before she could properly carry out anything.

Compared to her clumsy scheming, the consequences were severe. Minor annoyances could be brushed aside thanks to the duke’s influence, but attempted murder was a serious matter—especially since the target was Catherine, beloved by the entire kingdom.

When the five men in Catherine’s orbit united against Ibria, even the renowned Duke Oberon couldn’t protect his daughter. Following this incident, Ibria was broken off from the crown prince and forever banned from high society.

Until then, she had lived a dazzling life as the youngest daughter of the duke’s family and as the crown prince’s fiancée.

“She probably thought that shining life would last forever.”

But an unexpected downfall came. Naturally, Ibria couldn’t accept it.

Eventually, after much despair, she took her own life. That was the end of the villainess, Ibria Oberon.

But.

“Do I really have to end up like that?”

I wasn’t Ibria. Well, I was Ibria, but none of the misdeeds in her past had been committed by me.

If a person had died, I might have felt guilty for inhabiting her body. But Catherine was perfectly fine, and the world still revolved for her sake. There was no reason for me to feel guilty and try to “fix” the past. Catherine would be happy no matter how I lived.

No matter what Ibria did, the love of the people was always destined for Catherine. The original Ibria didn’t realize this, and she ended up living a miserable life.

But I didn’t have to. People could call me a villain—it didn’t matter.

As a duke’s daughter, Ibria could live a luxurious life without ever leaving her home. Did I need more than that? Just because fictional characters in a book didn’t love me didn’t mean my life had to be unhappy.

So I came to this conclusion: since things had turned out this way, I would just live freely, without worrying about anyone else.

“I’m disappointed, Ibria. I thought you were a sensible, considerate woman. Murder… I never imagined you could do something so terrifying.”

What did I care about the fish in Catherine’s pond—coming at me in a frenzy?

“Do you think such behavior is acceptable for a member of the duke’s family, or for someone who is to become the crown princess?”

Catherine wasn’t dead, so my “crime” was attempted murder, not actual murder.

“Attempted murder, not murder.”

I sighed, correcting the fish’s—no, the crown prince Cassian’s—words.

‘Finally, this is the fifth and last one.’

First came the first prince, then the knight commander, then the genius scholar, then the head of the information guild…

The fish had come one by one, hurling curses and ridicule, and now the male lead of Lady Catherine, the crown prince himself, had made his grand entrance.

‘Final boss appears.’

In other words, if I handled this fish, no one else would bother me.

“Anyway, you tried to commit murder—”

“Yes, I regret that I even did such a thing.”

I smiled lightly and cut off the fish’s next criticism.

“As a sign of my repentance, I will quietly stay out of high society from now on. Of course, you’d like me to annul our engagement, right? Fine, I’ll do that too. Satisfied?”

The fish—no, Crown Prince Cassian—went completely silent. Apparently, he hadn’t expected Ibria to say something like that. His face was utterly speechless.

“Why? Isn’t that why you came here? I’ll do as you wish. Fine, annulment it is.”

No point in dragging it out if the annulment was inevitable. The original Ibria would have been shocked and clinging to Cassian, but I had no interest in that.

‘From now on, Ibria will escape being the pathetic villain who hits rock bottom.’

I had no desire to meddle in things I didn’t do. My goal was to be a villain who accepted everything and left gracefully.

“Alright. You’ve had your say. Now leave. Don’t block my way anymore.”

But the fish blocking my path didn’t move. At this rate, the night would be over before I left.

“Fine. I’ll just go myself. The road isn’t only in front of me, anyway.”

I shrugged and turned away. The open view was refreshing.