So You've Become a Villainess: an (Otome) Isekai Raising Project

"Chi-I mean Autumn do you really think I'm making more progress towards raising my stats?" You ask during your morning rituals where she brushes your hair.

"Your magical teacher certainly thinks so, Young Mistress," Chiaki informs you. "She believes you show 'great promise'."

You haven't quite figured out how to enchant your fists yet, but you're sure you'll get it!

"And you seem more poised and confident recently," your maid continues.

You preen from the praise. It seems the magic of your new frillier gown was already having an impact. Clearly, the grace and confidence of Justine were already beginning to flow through you!

"It's only to be expected from the heir of the Claudius family," you say, trying your best to emulate a haughty tone. But you can't keep a straight face and break down into giggles, Chiaki joining it too.

<Flashy> "Ohohoho~You're well on your way to becoming an elegant young lady indeed!"

<Brainy> "Why do I have a foreboding sense?"

<Emo> "I always feel that way, death awaits us all in the end…"

After she finishes brushing, Chiaki pulls out a new dress for you to change into.

You clasp your hands together excitedly. "Is that…"

"It is indeed, Young Mistress," your bespectacled friend confirms. "The tailors have already finished adjusting the first of your dresses per your request." So fast! This was what you called personal service.

You recognized the lime green dress as the one you'd spotted earlier in your closet. It's been modified to have the additional frills and fuller skirts and train in the style Justine wore.

Chiaki helps you into it, and you can feel yourself smile. You feel more regal and confident already! Now that's a great way to start the day.

"Any plans for what we'll do today, Young Mistress?" she asks you.

"Since I've already seen some improvement from improving my Flashy stat, why not keep at it? Better than wasting time on grinding Sensible," you answer.

<Sensible> "What's wrong with trying to have some common sense! Someone has to keep the other personalities on track!

<Sporty> "Hey! I'll have you know I have a one-track mind!"

<Sensible> "That's not meant as a compliment!"

"A wise deduction, Young Mistress," Chiaki admits, "It wouldn't be good to force things and raise your stress level."

Brainy stares disbelievingly at the conversation between the two of you.

<Brainy> "Wise, how can it be wise if it's going to make me even dumber! At this rate, I won't be able to understand the majesty of the heavens!"


As you and Chiaki look through your walk-in closet, you find yourself hard up for coming with ideas for how to improve your appearance.

"Is there anything you'd like to try on Young Mistress?" Your maid inquires. Glumly you shake your head. You suppose that's to be expected when you're mirroring Justine's awesomeness already.

Still, that gives you an idea. You tap your chin thinking. If there aren't any dresses that are any better than what you're wearing, you can at least bring the others up to match it.

"Autumn, have the tailors alter these dresses to have the same improvements as this one," you instruct her.

"All the dresses, Young Mistress?" Your maid confirms.

"All of them, "You nod. "With the win conditions set so high, there's no way half measures will succeed." You grin confidently. "You know my motto. FULL EFFORT, FULL THROTTLE!"

Chiaki can't quite stifle a giggle. "I'll issue the necessary instructions, Young Mistress."

You were already planning on dressing like this again, after all when you could look awesome like Justine why wouldn't you-This way you can feel graceful and confident all the time!

Hmm. Still, you should look to improve your style. If you can't improve the clothes, maybe some accessories?

"Do you think some accessories might look good on me," you ask your maid.

"Perhaps a bracelet or a necklace?" Chiaki suggests.

You shake your head, you weren't a particularly big fan of jewelry, all too likely to get lost on a run, but something like a hair scrunchie was something else entirely.

"Maybe something to do with my hair," you mused.

"What about a ribbon or two?" Your fellow reincarnate offers. "It would go well with the ribbons you wear on your dress."

You nod. "That helps, but I'd like to do something more…" Your hair was one of your best features, what could you do to make your hair stand out more. The Claudius were well known for their golden blonde hair, fitting considering how much gold your family commanded, particularly the ringlets on the female side. Why Justine's hair felt in elegant ringlets past her knees-

"That's it!" You say excitedly. Since you already felt empowered by echoing Justine's gowns, then it only made sense to draw on her inspiration from her hair too. "I can grow out my hair like Mother's and…and…" Reality sets in and you slump a bit.

"But that'll take months and months." Sure you had that long until the events of the game, but there's a part of you that was hoping to see results today. There were times when not being able to speed up events in-game was really frustrating.

"There are ways to grow your hair out faster, Young Mistress," Chiaki notes.

"Really?" You ask enthused. Come to think of it, there were options during character gen for the heroine in the main Our Bloody Valentine series to customize appearance. But you weren't aware of any way to do it in-game.

"For someone who spent so much time on the game I'm surprised you don't know about it," she informs you. "There are options in the game store you purchase with real money to modify your hairstyle after game start."

Bleh! Pay to win nonsense. After having spent way too much on a gacha minigame on another video game you always steered clear of anything requiring money after purchase. Loot crates were the worst money sink!

"It actually does exist here, as expensive herbal treatments," Chiaki continues.

"You're so knowledgeable Chiaki! You're my best maid ever!"

"I'm the only maid you've had, Young Mistress," she notes, though you detect a hint of amusement in her tone.

"So the only competition for best maid is yourself," you observe, and she chuckles. "Still, will it take long to gather it? I take it's some rare mountain herb that only grows in a particular meadow?"

"It's expensive, not rare," Chiaki explains. "Please wait a minute."

She goes to a cabinet and returns with a familiar glass bottle, you think that's the shampoo she uses to wash your hair with. "A highly diluted version is used to promote healthy hair," she continues, passing the container to you.

Glancing at it, you notice it's a light blue color but seems otherwise unremarkable.

"So we'll need to use a lot of it when washing?" You guess.

"Easier than that actually, it's usually sent to the mansion as a powder that we dilute with water to make it last longer," Chiaki informs you. "Just applying it directly to your hair should have the desired effect." Returning to the cabinet she takes out a small vial of dark blue almost violet powder, no more than an ounce or so. "This would usually be enough for half a year or more."

"Half a year for my shampoo?" You question.

"Oh, Young Mistress, your father, Lady Claudius herself as well as some members of the staff." That sounded …potent. "I can issue a request for a restock, and we should get it within a few days." That was quick!

You nod, trying to not let your surprise show.

"If Young Mistress wishes, we could handle it now."

"Yes please!" You say breathlessly.

Chiaki titters and then leads you through the mansion to a nearby bath. This one has one of those deep sinks next to a recliner like you see at a hairdresser's. You lay down, and let Chiaki run your hair under the hot water to get it good and soaked.

"How much would you like me to apply, Young Mistress?" Chiaki asks you. "I'm not sure how much to use."

"I'm not one for half measures, so all of it!" You tell her. Diligently your maid empties the vial of green dust into her hands, making a kind of paste before massaging your scalp.

"It tingles!" You laugh, as she works.

"That's how you know it's working, Young Mistress," your personal maid tells you.

It's a very relaxing experience and you can feel yourself begin to nod off. You hear quiet giggling in the background before sleep takes you.


You eventually wake up, feeling like something soft and fluffy is wrapped around you. Rubbing your eyes you realize that you're on your bed, Chiaki no doubt having moved you there while you slept.

You let out a little yelp when you realize that the soft and fluffy material isn't a blanket, it's your hair! Lifting it with one hand you're amazed at how soft and silky it is, but most of all how much of it there is!

You knew your hair would grow, but it's wrapped around you like a long silken cloak. As you make to stand up, it seems like your hair is now at easily as long as you are tall, probably more!

"Sorry Aachan, I didn't know it'd be this potent," Chiaki apologizes. "We can cut it down to a more manageable size-"

"It's not your fault Chiaki," you interrupt her. "A-after all I meant for it to be this long!" She gives you a dubious look, but you double down. "You know how I think anything worth doing, is worth overdoing. If long hair is better, then even longer hair is even better! "

"That does something like you'd think of, Young Mistress," she says with a long-suffering voice. She bought it-Wait Hey, I'm not that bad you want to protest! But you fight down that urge if it means Chiaki believed you.

"Besides, it'd be a sin to cut hair that looks this beautiful," you insist lifting some of it up in your hair. Your hair, usually a pleasant golden blonde is practically shimmering in your hand like spun gold. It felt so silky soft-it even felt it had more volume than before. You were sure this definitely had to have raised your Flashy stat a bit with this!

"I'm sure I can make this work!" You tell her with feigned confidence. Your attempt at dignity is ruined as your stomach growls, and you blush.

"Well, the hair had to come from somewhere," your maid muses. "How about an early lunch?"

"Yes, that sounds splendid!" You agree.

Grace is so smart, Grace is so smart: S-M-R-T, I mean S-M-A-R-T


A stray thought leads you to study for once: Chiaki had brought up stuff that was pay to win in Our Bloody Valentine (and by extension, Fall From Grace) just...existed in this world. If you studied, you could find about it for realsies! No selling your soul or emptying your PayPig account for vertical advancement, you were going to do it the old-fashioned way.

With dosh!

<Sensible> "Even when we do something reasonable I can't help but feel concerned."

<Brainy> "Reason is the hobgoblin of small minds."

<Emo> "Says miss 'bash my head against a wall because this reality doesn't make sense'..."

<Brainy> "T-That was merely attuning my mind to the backwards nature of this place."

In order to learn more about this world, you hit the books like a particularly boring punching bag. In order to do so, you headed to the family library, which is where you are now; your little legs kick air in a chair that belongs in a throne room. Around you is a book collector's wet dream; you're not a bookish kind of person, but the smell of parchment and lovingly worn leather makes you nostalgic for after-school practice.

It makes sense why this nerd haven does it for you; the Claudius estate has one of the best libraries in the land. Justine says the only thing preventing it from being the best is "fair play". You don't really get it, but you think it might be how you never went all-out until the last event during Sports Day.

Granted, you still managed to pick up a doped-up Soviet Olympic level of high school accolades, but the idea is probably there.

You're starting to wonder how Grace developed into such a shitheel with such a cool mom, but then you realize having parents with clout and money turns kids into monsters back in the real world. You can only imagine how much that gets amplified with magic and literal nobility. Also the God-Empress blood. That's probably a thing.

You look into a mythic history of the God-Imperatrix: a being who fell from the sky like lightning, with words beyond understanding and tools from a distant star. One who bent the elements to her will and could make matter from fairy dust. An invincible hero with golden hair who slayed the Witch-King and their Ebon Generals.

...It kinda reads like a trashy isekai, now that you think about it.


The more you read, the more you start to get a handle on how things work with what the magic teacher lady told you. The elemental magic is pretty standard, but you pick up on the God-Imperatrix speaking in tongues. As you do, that command line bit your magic teacher said sticks out at you. The God-Imperatrix was the first user of Enchantment magic and the one to give it to the people. She enchanted her whole body without runes, using what looks like snippets of code from how they're written out in the texts you're reading.

You know a little code from messing around with website design, but being a code monkey wasn't as fun as touching grass, so you just let Chiaki do the heavy lifting. She was way better at it than you, anyway. You think she'll be able to figure this Enchantment stuff out too, if you hand her the book. Once she does, that's one step closer to enchanted fists!

You excitedly start playing with your own golden hair, now styled into a bouquet of ojou ringlets. It thrums with magical power in tune with your heartbeat.

"I wonder if I can be a hero..." you muse to the air.

You hear someone mutter "No more heroes..." in response.

You walk over to the responder: a petite, bedraggled looking girl with her hair done in ornate, rust-colored twintails, pouring over dense alchemical tomes. She's got a school-nurse-special eyepatch on, the other eye has bags heavy enough to make her look like the wrong end of a fight. Brass tubes and vials of a grey-black powder are strewn about her table, alongside cups filled with varying amounts of a deep brown liquid you think is coffee.

The girl doesn't notice you, but you notice what she's reading: mathematics and physics that not even college you could fully grasp. It's heavy stuff, and this girl look younger than you are now.

<Brainy> "An intellectual? We must befriend her or eliminate her posthaste. No two can stand under heaven, but two minds can tear it asunder!"

<Sporty> "Where's your competitive spirit, bro?"

<Brainy> "I am not your bro. I am a woman. As are you."

<Sporty> "Bro, chill."

You ignore Brainy you's supervillain grumbling and turn your attention to the girl again.


[What do you do?]
[ ] Ask for help studying
[ ] Ask what she's reading
[ ] Ask if she needs someone to beat up whoever beat her up
[ ] Drink some of the leftover liquid