I May Be A Villainess, But I Won't Live My Life That Way - Chapter 98

Chapter 98

My eyes hurt.

The tips of my fingers tingle.

My lips had long since dried up.

“This can’t be…”

The book still hadn’t changed.

As if mocking my desperate wish for a single ray of light, there was no sign of any transformation.

How much time has passed? It feels like a lot. Or is it just my anxiety making it seem longer than it actually is?

I lifted my head and glanced around. I saw nobles engaging in leisurely conversations.

I felt a mixture of relief that no bad news had been delivered yet, and anxiety, fearing that something could happen at any moment.

‘Should I speak to the secretary again…’

Just as I was about to rise from my seat.

From the edge of the forest, I saw something rustling in the bushes. Suddenly, a horse emerged, carrying its owner slumped over, bleeding.

“Oh my!”

“Who is that? I see the First Knight Division’s insignia on the saddle.”

“Look at all that blood! He seems badly injured. What should we do?”

The murmurs of those around me filled the air. But I could only stand there with my mouth agape, unable to utter a sound.

I couldn’t breathe in or out. All I could hear was the pounding of my heart in my ears.

As if in a trance, I staggered toward the horse, my hand already reaching out toward it.

“Get a physician quickly!”

“No, bring a stretcher first!”

A group of people rushed out from the tent and carefully pulled the bloodied knight from the horse.

“Haa…”

As the knight was lifted from the horse and placed onto the stretcher, I collapsed to the ground.

It wasn’t Ricardo.

The knight had a completely different appearance. His hair wasn’t black, and he wasn’t as tall as Ricardo. The color of his clothing was also different from what Ricardo had worn earlier today.

But when I saw the knight bleeding, I saw Ricardo’s image in him.

Maybe it wasn’t him this time. But the thought that it might be him ‘next time’ weighed heavily on my mind.

“This can’t go on…”

The book still didn’t glow. It didn’t seem inclined to do so.

I glanced back at the forest with a desperate look, hoping that the man who had left earlier would find Ricardo and bring him back quickly.

But all I saw was the now-silent forest and the unmoving trees.

“Ricardo.”

His name, which I could not call out, drifted on the wind, lost in the air.

Perhaps, it was a name I would never be able to call again.

No, I could still call it. I could call it endlessly, shout it until my throat gave out, and mutter it aimlessly. 

But no one would answer.

“What do you want?”

Despite my thoughts, my voice came out calm.

Though my heart was aching and boiling, my voice was eerily quiet.

“What is it that you want? Why have you appeared before me?”

Even knowing that no answer would come, I asked.

I asked over and over again. Despite never receiving a reply, I couldn’t help but ask, for fear of losing my mind if I didn’t.

And I already knew the answer.

“Right. In the end, you want death to bring the story to a close. You need to see blood, don’t you?”

I knew what this cursed book wanted, what it was driving me toward.

It was something I had known from the very beginning.

“If I don’t die gracefully, you’ll kill the people I love instead, won’t you?”

Lara, Panya, Maria… all of them were precious to me.

And Ricardo was the one I loved most of all.

“Fine. You win.”

Fixing my gaze on the book, I slowly stood up.

Then, as if putting on a show, I walked around the table. I stopped in front of the chair Maria had been sitting in.

It was in this very spot that an arrow from the forest had pierced Maria’s chest.

“But just because you win doesn’t mean I lose.”

Without a sound, I pulled out the chair and sat down.

I pushed my hips deep into the chair, straightened my back, tucked in my chin, and stared directly ahead.

Just as I had been taught, the posture of a proper lady.

“I’m not surrendering to your threats. This is the choice I’m making to protect the people I love.”

Before I had even finished speaking, the book began to glow at last.

As if satisfied with my decision.

Quietly, I reached out and pulled the book toward me. When I opened the page, which had changed so many times before, I saw the letters dancing as though they were performing a waltz.

Ricardo’s name flickered and then slowly faded away, as if being absorbed into the book. And in its place, a new name began to emerge.

Bianca.

It was my name.

Bianca was confused.

Why? How?

Question marks filled her mind.

Why was there an arrow sticking out of her chest? Why was her dress slowly being soaked with blood?

Why did it hurt so much?

“Ah… Ahhh…”

The moment she tried to touch the arrow embedded in her chest with her trembling hands, her vision spun, and Bianca collapsed to the ground.

Thud.

Bianca Croft, who always valued grace, collapsed onto the dirt in front of a gathering of nobles, utterly unceremonious.

“Ah…”

Red blood endlessly flowed from her chest, and her once delicate and elegant hands trembled violently in spasms.

Her radiant blonde hair lay sprawled across the dirt, and her once immaculately made-up face was now sullied with grime.

As if driven by instinct, Bianca’s hand reached for the sky.

The bright blue sky, her pale white hand, and the vivid red blood.

Her eyes, the same blue as the sky, began to lose their vitality slowly.

I was lying on the ground, bleeding, dying. No— I had already died.

After reading the final moment, I quietly closed the book. Now, all I had to do was wait.

Then the story would reach the conclusion that both the book and I desired.

I raised a hand and straightened the necklace that had shifted slightly to the side. Then, I adjusted the wrinkles in my dress.

After confirming that everything was in order, I straightened my back once more.

There was no sound, no sensation.

My hands didn’t tremble; they weren’t cold. Instead, I felt calm.

‘Ricardo…’

When I thought of him, a faint smile crept onto my face.

I was grateful to be able to die with his kiss, his love, still held close to my heart.

If the story had unfolded as it originally had, I wouldn’t have been so fortunate.

I would have been the villainess, killed by his hand, never having won even a fragment of his heart, meeting a miserable end.

But not now.

I had fought until the end, won his heart, and could reach the conclusion I wanted.

Perhaps, in this at least, I owed the book some gratitude.

It was the same death, but a different ending.

Wham!

“Ugh!”

Something strong collided with me. The impact was so intense that I couldn’t breathe for a moment.

A suffocating pressure filled my chest, making me feel as if my body wasn’t my own. I couldn’t move, as though something heavy was pressing me down.

And just like that, I was thrown to the ground.

‘So this is what it feels like to be struck by an arrow.’

The first-time shock left my head spinning. In that daze, I remembered that Ricardo, too, had once told me about being hit by an arrow.

Did you feel this suffocated and pained as well?

As my body hit the ground, I felt a sharp pain in my back and head, sharper than the arrow’s strike to my chest moments before. I shut my eyes tightly against the searing sensation.

With my back against the rough earth, I opened my eyes to see the clear blue sky.

The sky, the same shade as my eyes.

According to the book, this would be the last sight I would see.

But in my eyes, I also saw something the book hadn’t mentioned.

“Ricardo?”

His black hair fluttered in the wind.

I had thought something was weighing me down, but that “something” turned out to be Ricardo.

“Bianca.”

As if answering my call, Ricardo softly murmured my name, a gentle smile curving on his lips.

It was strange.

Though he was smiling, why did he look so sorrowful? Why did Ricardo’s face seem so fragile, as if it could shatter at any moment?

“Thank goodness,” he whispered softly.

His voice was different, too—strained, as if it took all his remaining strength to speak.

And then, with a thud, he collapsed onto me.

“Ricardo?”

I called his name, not understanding why he was here or why he was speaking with such difficulty.

“….”

Ricardo, his face buried in my shoulder, didn’t respond.

I tried to sit up, to lift him, and as my hand touched his back, I felt something wet.

And there was something long and thin protruding from his back, like a stick.

Puzzled, I raised my hand, only to see it covered in blood.

“Ri-Ri-Ric…”

Against the backdrop of the blue sky, I saw my white hand stained with Ricardo’s red blood.

“Ricardo!”

A crimson scream tore through the blue sky.