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

A birthday gift from me to you. Wait...

Time to put that whole "being a villainess" thing to use


You rack your monkey brain for a solution. Should you drag her into your carriage? You and Bridgette might not be strong enough to lift her up. Call Chiaki...Autumn? You can't rely on her for everything forever, plus you're worried what the crowd will do to Lily if you turn your back on the crowd. Try healing her? You don't remember any of your magic except the basic cloth enhancement magic you wheedled out of your magic teacher.

You scrunch up your face and tap your ruby ballet flat-clad foot.

<Flashy> "Dahling, you're a Claudius. Make use of it."

That's it!

You face the crowd with fierce eyes. "Get me a physicker!"

The bloodthirsty crowd brings its pressure upon you. You push back with all the majesty your little form can muster.

With your family name, your booming voice, and your now free-flowing locks forming a lion mane around you, you can muster a hell of a lot.

"Did I, Grace Claudius, stutter? A physicker, now!"

The crowd falls back, the ugly muttering about you and Darklings turns to fearful supplication. A single cry for help turns to a wave of desire to serve from the hoi polloi.

"As you wish, Young Mistress."

"Forgive us, Young Mistress."

"We live for your command, Young Mistress."

<Flashy> "Now that's what I want to hear, dahling!"

<Sporty> "Whoa, when did we become Coach?"

<Sensible> "...I could get used to this."

<Emo> "Until the mob turns on us..."

<Artsy> "That'd be poetic, no? A little hackneyed, but still powerful imagery."

You turn your nose up at the audience with a cheeky little smile. "Such charitable hearts."

"Whoa," Bridgette whispers behind you. "That's the first time you've been like the old you since the accident."

You look back. "Really?" You put your hands up in a conciliatory manner. "I just wanted to get the crowd to move," you whisper back.

She pauses. "...I believe you, Sis. The old you wouldnt've told me to think about whether or not to destroy something. She'd tell me to smash it all, Sophia damn the consequences."

"Someone very important to me taught me to think before I smash," you say with a giggle. "And besides, it's more fun to get stuff without smashing."


As you chat with your soon to be sister, the broken doll on the cobblestone road lurches to life and screams.

You turn to her, your hair forming a protective cocoon around you. "Holy crackers!"

Bridgette jumps out of her seat. "S'blood, she's awake?!"

Bridgette's sentiments are shared by the members of the crowd that haven't dispersed by now.

Acting quicker than you think, your hair moves to cradle Lily to you. You catch a few murmurs of your potential witchcraft, but they're silenced by the weight of your title

"This girl has miraculously survived," You say, staring down the crowd. "Sophia has blessed her on this day. Speak not ill of her!"

The crowd bites their collective tongues.

Lily rests her head on your chest, the screams replaced by ragged breathing. Thankfully, your dirt repelling enchantments keep her blood from messing up your clothes. She looks up to you with awe in her undead doe eyes.


You hold her close on instinct, protecting the weak was written in your DNA. Yeah, she's your meal ticket and Grace's death sentence, but that doesn't matter right now.

The crowd doesn't know what to make of you two. Bridgette doesn't seem to, either; the normally rambunctious girl is quiet and still behind you.

Eventually, a motherly looking medic in white robes moves through the crowd like Moses. She kneels down and asks you if Lily is the patient. You nod, and she takes a look at Lily.

<Brainy> "If a physicker uses magic instead of medicine in this universe I'm going to vomit."

The physicker hums as she appraises Lily. She brushes black hair from her porcelain face and places a hand on her forehead. A gentle silver light envelops Lily, its cool energy washes through your hair.


<Artsy> "I can feel it, the silver paint of creation!"

<Brainy> "I can feel it, the gastric acid rising in my gullet!"

"Sophia Levanah," you mumble, memories spurred on by your Artsy side.

The physicker turns to you as she strums Lily's pain with her finger. "Hmmm? You know of the Seven's gifts, child?"

You smile awkwardly. "I've learned a lot recently."

Bridgette watches the willworker work. "Physickers can heal hellspawn, too?"

"Sophia's grace is in all things," the physicker says, as Lily finally relaxes in your arms.

It's at this time Chiaki makes her presence known. "Is everything alright, Young Mistress? Forgive my tardiness, I had matters to discuss with Lady Claudius and-"

She sees you with Lily in your arms (and hair), Bridgette at your back, the physicker at your front, and a trail of blood running down to the cobblestone below.

"Welp."


[What do you do?]
[ ] Panic
[ ] Explain the situation and...
-[ ] Ask her to see Lily off
-[ ] Ask her if you can let Lily ride with you
-[ ] Ask her what she was talking to Justine about
[ ] Be very smug about handling this situation yourself

Cheeky Monkey


As the retinue of guards guide the crowd back into their designated admiration zones, you realize something.

You've defused a situation! Without Chiaki! Holy shit!

<Sensible> "I knew we could do it! Eventually!"

You turn away from the mental image of Sensible teabagging what's left of your Emo side and focus on radiating pure smugness towards Chiaki.

Chiaki gives you a bland, porcelain smile. "Everything under control, Young Mistress?"

You smile back at her. If you were a cat right now, people would use your face as an image macro for decades.

"...There's a first time for everything, isn't there?" Chiaki says.

You luxuriate in your smugness, marinate in it. Your hair wriggles tauntingly at Chiaki. She can't even tease you like normal since you have My Bloody Valentine characters around you and Chiaki isn't willing to drop character.

Bridgette makes her way past your hair to hover over your shoulder. "Rather impertinent for a maid, aren't you?" She says to Chiaki.

Chiaki is taken aback. She curtsies deeply to Bridgette. "A thousand pardons, Princess. If the rapport between myself and the Young Mistress has offended you-"

She snorts and brushes Chiaki off. "Pay it no mind. I see how you normally keep Big Sis on a leash, guess you forgot she was a noble and not a trained monkey."

"Hey!" You say, playfully noogieing Bridgette, your knuckles stirring up her (recently magically thickened) dirty blonde hair. "I'm a monkey noble!"

She playfully pulls at your cheek to get you out of her hair. "A monkey noble is still a monkey, Big Sis!"

Chiaki deftly moves to block the crowd from seeing your roughhousing, trying to save some semblance of royal face in front of the commoners. You see her shut the carriage door with her hip and hear her say placating nothings to the crowd while you tend to more important matters.

Like putting Bridgette in a Camel Clutch and making her humble.

You crank back on your grip under Bridgette's chin. "Say it! Say monkeys are cool!"

She kicks at your skirt in the general direction of your butt. "You're cool, but monkeys aren't!"

You feel her do a pushup on the plush carriage seats. Before she can buck you off, you switch to a sleeper and flatten her out. She struggles well, but goes out soon enough.

You pat her sleeping form on the back. "Good hustle, Buri."

Lily and the physicker just stare at you.

"I heard human nobles were eccentric," Lily says, "But this...is beyond my comprehension. Do all human nobles act like you?"

You grin wide and broad.


[Dialogue check! What do you tell Lily?]
[ ] Nope! I'm just built different.
[ ] When I become Princess they will! On pain of noogies!
[ ] Yep! The way of the noble is the way of the fist!
[ ] Write-in


That settled, you poke your head out of the carriage window. "Hey Autumn?"

You catch her walking away. "Yes, Young Mistress?"

"What were you talking to mom about?"

She turns to look at you. "Something fit for more private conversation, I'm afraid. You'll just have to wait with the weight of anticipation upon you."

"...Was I too smug earlier?"

She feigns ignorance. "Whatever do you mean?"

You pout and she heads back over to you. "I'll tell you later." She twirls a lock of your hair around her finger and pulls you close to whisper in your ear. "But I know suspense makes you antsy, so I'm gonna make you squirm a little, Aachan~"

"You monster~" you whisper back.

She nuzzles noses with you, then lets go of your hair. With a curtsy, she heads back to the front of the procession where Justine awaits.

Once she's gone, you gulp. It probably wasn't anything too dangerous, she'd tell you if it was, but dammit she knew you too well. Even if it was something trivial, the unknowingness of it made you itchy.

<Sporty> "Don't get psyched out! Whatever it is, we'll face it head-on-"

<Emo> "...Don't say it."

<Sensible> "Quiet you. We'll face it with full force at full throttle, and I'll clean up whatever messes that gets us into."

<Sporty> "Atta girl, Sense! Shoulda stopped at the first part though!"


After an uneventful carriage ride/two out of three falls wrestling match between you and Bridgette (you needed to relieve the tension somehow), you arrive at the Alteisen family's summer chateau. It's a gleaming white wonderland nestled behind seven massive walls of dented, ruddy iron. Golems the size of Gundams serve as gatekeepers, each holding oxtongue spears with tips as large as you.

You and Lily look up with slack-jawed awe, while Bridgette (who you beat in two straight falls) looks bored. The physicker looks like a salaryman who realized he missed his stop thirty minutes ago.

The procession stops. You smooth out the wrinkles in your petticoats and adjust your puffy princess sleeves before Justine sees you all disheveled.

A member of the honor guard opens the door for you and yours, you jump out and land with a billowing of skirt and a heavy silken wumph.

The guard kneels before you. "Good to see you in high spirits, Young Mistress."

You ruffle the red horse tassel thing on his helmet. "Get used to it, mister knight."

Bridgette gingerly climbs down the stairs, trying not to show how badly you beat her. "What should we do about the other two, Big Sis?"


[What do you do?]
[ ] Invite them in...
-[ ] As honored guests
-[ ] As your servants
[ ] Let Brigette handle it
[ ] Send them on their way