Prologue.

Everything was perfect.

Even the half underground house for one person which is the size of the bathroom of the house I lived before.

The fact that I had to work starting next was also not a matter to me.

I’ve finally escaped from that hell-like house and got my freedom. I could live happily just from that one thing.

But…… .

“I’m pretty sure I told you to live as quiet as a mouse without any fuss, with not even your breathing sound could be heard.”

A man opened his mouth.

His hateful gaze on me seemed as if he was seeing a hideous bug.

“I heard that you acted like an mad dog at the crowned prince’s return ceremony banquet.”

Those icy deadly gaze seeming like it wants to kick me to death was familiar to me.

It was the kind of gaze I always got from that house.

However it didn’t mean I was fine even though I had experienced it a lot.

“What was your purpose for acting like that?”

I couldn’t breathe right at his aura. My lips started to tremble in fear.

It was then.

A white chart appeared in front of my face.

And I could see the words written line by line in the chart.

How do I know?

I didn’t have a purpose.

(With a pitiful tone of voice) Well…… Um, that’s…… .

‘……What is this?’

I was going to ask what this was, however as if something was stuck in my throat, I couldn’t let out a sound.

The man’s voice threatened me when I just stood there without speaking a word.

“You better speak.”

I felt the deadly aura to the point it hurt my skin. I’ll die when I don’t give an answer.

I unconsciously pressed the number 3 on the white chart.

“Well…… Um, that’s…… .”

The same words on the chart automatically came out my mouth without my wills.

‘What the. What’s this?!’

My mouth opened idiotically, still not believing what I just said.

I couldn’t take guess what kind of situation I was in right now.

I was in an unfamiliar place when I woke up, and came to face these unfamiliar people whom all held deadly aura.

I couldn’t think a thing as if I just woke up from sleeping.

“Well um that’s, next.”

The man didn’t seem to like the incomplete answer as he commanded me for the actual answer with a scary face.

It was then when the new sentences eventually appeared in the chart.

I’m sorry. I’ll act properly next time.

A stupid maid was the one to start all the fuss.

The lowly ones treated me low. The me who is the only daughter of Eckart!

I didn’t have time to sit around, thinking of what was going on right now.

I hurriedly picked an answer while taking hint of the mood here.

Even though I know nothing, I must speak of something in this situation. This was the result of my reaction from all the painful experiences back then.

“I’m sor…… .”

“We wouldn’t have met each other like this in the first place if it was something that’d all be solved with a simple apology.”

My line was cut by him right away.

My heart reached the bottom from the stabbing tone of voice he used.

I curled my body up instinctively. Then the man spoke in an icy tone.

“Penelope Eckart.”

‘Penelope Eckart?’

“We’ll withdraw our name ‘Eckart’ from you for some time.”

The line and the name was very familiar.

I raised my head in a lightning speed.

Then I could clearly see the face of the man I couldn’t see well before.

The man who was some distance away from the bed was not one of the ‘people of that house’, but a foreigner who I’ve never seen before.

The blue eyes that reflects the ocean, and the black hair that reminds me of obsidian.

Above them was a long bar that was similar to the phone’s battery sign, with the white word that sparkled.

‘In…… terest……?’

If my eyes are perfectly fine, then the white sparkling words above the man’s head definitely said ‘Interest’.

“Definitely no parties or banquet during that time, and your absolutely not allowed to leave the room. You think over what you did wrong, and think of what you’d do from now on during…… .”

“…… .”

“Where are you looking at?”

The man’s emotionless face turned to a frown as if he was unpleasant with me staring at something else than where I was supposed to look.

However I couldn’t react to that and only kept on checking the bar above the man’s head.

[Interest 0%]

‘No way…… .’

I unconsciously shook my head couple of times.

It was really unbelievable.

Really.

“The rumours saying that you went insane was true.”

The man glared at me for a moment from my weird actions before turning away from me.

He walked toward the door with big and fast steps as if he didn’t want to stay in the same place with me for even a second more. [Interest 0%] Is moving away from me.

‘What did I do wrong?’

It was the time I think about what this situation was about while staring at the back of the leaving figure.

I felt someone’s eyes on me with the aura seeming to mock me with a smirk.

I turned my head to see another person with pink hair, standing with his arms crossed in the shadow by the door.

He had the same blue eyes as the person who just left. His face held a smile that seemed to ridicule.

[Interest -10%]

The white word sparkled above the boy’s figure.

It’s even a negative.

“Fool bitch. Serves you right.”

Unlike how he has a pretty face, he swore some nasty bad words and left the room following the man who previously left.

Thud-! The door slammed.

I stayed seated with my head blank for a long while in the room where only I existed.

My head didn’t work well and I still couldn’t figure out the situation I was in currently.

I thought for a while and realized that the place I was in and the two people I just saw were both somewhat familiar to me.

“It’s a lie, right……?”

I could finally speak what I wished to speak when I was left alone.

But I didn’t have time to notice that.

I couldn’t believe this. This was not something that happens everyday for me too.

“There’s no way though.”

It can’t be that the scene from a game I was playing before falling into sleep was replaying like it’s reality.

And with me as one of the characters in the game.

“I’m dreaming right now.”

There didn’t exist another case for this other than that.

However no matter how much I pulled on my hair and pinched my face, I still couldn’t wake up from this dream.

“N, no…… No, no! No! I say no-!”

Penelope Eckart.

She was the villainess of the most popular game for girls these days, and the heroine of the difficult mode.

_______

like ,vote, subscribe

Them feeling regret that they bothered their sisters and the protagonist attacking their hearts little by little was enough for me to dive into this game and drown in it.

Me, who once chose to take a look at the game, was now drowning into the game.

Reaching the ending was easy even though it was my first playing these kind of game.

It was fun, I agreed on that, however the normal mode was way too easy even for a beginner like me.

From the start, all the male lead’s interest towards the heroine started with 30%.

It was to the point it could be called easy mode, and not normal.

I saw every character’s ending within 3 hours of time.

Then a card popped on the screen which said the ‘Hidden Ending’ with a drawing of lock on it.

“A hu, hundred dollars? Are they crazy? Why is it so expensive?”

To see the hidden ending, you needed to either pay a crazy high prise for it or finish the hard modes of each characters.

“Shit…… It’s already midnight though.”

I thought about the class I had early in the morning. However that didn’t go for long.

“Ah, whatever! Let’s get it done with!”

I was insane, being controlled by the game. I wouldn’t have done anything like this usually.

My fingers excitedly clicked on the hard mode button.

The different prologue video played, this time, with a grand BGM.

“Ooh. The heroine changed to her.”

It was unexpected that the heroine changed in this mode.

She was the villain from the normal mode, the fake mistress of the duke family.

The story was set before the heroine of the normal mode appeared so it felt like a whole different story from a different game.

“Maybe this is why this game’s so popular.”

The detailed illustration of the heroine in the hard mode appeared on my screen that woke me up for good.

The unique system of this game was not like any other game. This made me be more interested in this app.

The villain who was evil to the angel-like heroine was the one who was winning the hearts of the strictly love-barriered male leads now.

That gave me the excitement and heart flutters that I couldn’t quite explain.

I proceeded to the main story of the hard mode. I was overly confident about this since I finished all the normal mode routes.

Even though it was called a hard mode, I expected that the choices of lines would be just a bit more difficult to choose.

However, that was just my mistaken guess.

“Ack! Ack! Why did I die again!”

Hard mode was extremely difficult.

The heroine who was the villainess from the first place. It was set that raising the characters’ interest was freaking hard.

It wasn’t only that.

The interests raised with my hard work all dropped down to ‘game over’ after just one smallest mistake.

Not just a normal game over thing, but very disturbing ‘death’ of the heroine.

“Why did this have to be so extreme.”

The illustration was also so realistic and cruel.

I frowned at the illustration of the heroine getting sliced on the neck by the crowned prince.

“This mad game…… .”

I died several times due to the hard choices I made sincerely in the game. Frustration filled my heart at this horrible system.

What was the producer thinking, making the difficulty setting like this?

I died so many times that I started to feel the stress playing this.

“Please let me live for once, please!”

My goal was to unlock the ‘Hidden Ending’, however it was long ago since that goal was forgotten.

I will have to see this poor pitiful villainess not die and live happily with at least one of the male leads.

‘What makes the villainess the guilty one? Honestly it was the author who made her the villainess!’

Unlike the heroine from the normal mode who’ve gotten everyone’s love no matter which choice I made in, the villainess who was only abused and mistreated no matter how much she begged for love reminded me of my life before.

“I’m seeing the endings to this no matter what.”

I was killed again due to the older bastard brothers. The sound of me gritting my teeth was heard in the room.

I don’t remember how much I died here now.

My two hands which clenched my heated up phone, trembled.

I thought that I was getting too emotional to this, but I couldn’t stop my fingers clicking the reset button.

I started all over again, from the start.

I chose the lines, slowly raised their interests, and gotten fame, glamour, and money to open up the new route.

“Ack! Why! Why!”

But I died again.

I was annoyed to the point I had a thought of just buying the interest using money.

If the producer’s goal was to make others pay for the damn thing, then they succeeded greatly.

Since they made me, who treasures money like no one else does, want to use up my money for this.

I didn’t use my money ’till the end, but I was on fire the whole night to see the ending of at least one of the characters.

Die, and start over.

Die again and start over.

Die,

Die,

And die again.

I only died until the sunrise.

However, I wasn’t able to see the ending of any of them ’till then.

“Fuck…… Again…… .”

Me, who was going to press the reset button again, couldn’t handle it anymore as I fainted to sleep with my phone in my hand.

And when I opened my eyes.

“Penelope Eckart"

Said the man with the blank gauge bar above him with the sparkling letters written ‘Interest 0%’.

“We’ll withdraw our name ‘Eckart’ from you for some time.” 

I was the villainess in the game which I never got to see the ending of.