Guide to tamming vilanesses

Eva watched as Shin and Kaho departed in his private jet.

As she saw them off, she couldn’t help but wonder if she should have gone with them, if she should be by her king’s side at that moment. Even so, she had made her decision. She wanted to stay behind and investigate Kaho’s family a bit.

"Am I doing the right thing?" Eva asked herself as she looked down at her phone.

She had found Kotoha’s profile, Kaho’s older sister. The account was private, but after Eva sent a follow request, the girl accepted.

Analyzing the photos, it was easy to tell they were sisters. They had similar faces, but while Kaho was cute with a breathtaking beauty she kept hidden, Kotoha seemed much more confident. That said, she clearly hadn’t been as blessed by genetics.

Even with all the makeup she wore, her skin was far from as beautiful as her younger sister’s, and her facial features made her average at best. On top of that, her chest was noticeably more modest.

But what the queen wanted wasn’t a full evaluation of the woman’s appearance. What really mattered was her personality. Kotoha seemed extroverted, liked fashion, and was probably quite vain.

Several of her highlighted photos showed her going to karaoke with her friends, who were also very attractive. And she paid special attention to the friends who were prettier and, likely, more popular.

"So she is a tier B queen..." Eva murmured to herself.

All her life, she had been the most popular girl wherever she went, and this elicited two types of reactions from other girls.

Either they would gossip behind her back, constantly waiting for her downfall, or they would become followers, hoping to gain some of her popularity.

Kotoha clearly fell into the second type, so it should be easy for someone like Eva to get close to her.

She opened Kotoha’s stories and began typing a reply to a post where she was showing her summer outfit.

[Eva: Hey! Girl, I love your style!]

[Eva: I’m still in high school, but I’ll also be joining the Harajuku Style & Fashion College after I graduate]

[Eva: And I was looking up my senpais, and you’re, like, super cool!]

[Eva: I would seriously love it if we could be friends...]

"I think this should be enough..." Eva murmured, setting her phone aside.

Feeding a bit into Kotoha’s ego would be enough, and a girl like her would definitely want to be Eva’s friend.

But why would Eva do all of that?

Simply put, it was because she wanted to better understand how Kaho was doing. And she had a feeling her friend was having problems in her family.

However, her best friend would never tell her anything. The girl was terrified of ever being a burden, so she always kept everything to herself.

Still, the queen let out a long sigh when she saw that Kotoha was already replying.

"I wonder if this is the right thing to do?" she asked herself.

Poking her nose into someone else’s life felt wrong, but she also couldn’t just watch Kaho without doing anything. She needed to know the truth.

Besides, manipulating Kotoha to get what she wanted reminded her a lot of her old ways. She didn’t know yet whether Kotoha was a good or a bad person...

Eva wouldn’t hesitate to manipulate her if she were sure she was bad, but as things stood, she felt conflicted.

Still, in the end, it was against Eva’s nature to just stand by and do nothing. She was a queen who took what she wanted.

But just in case, the girl quickly dialed the number of the only person she could ask for advice at that moment.

Shin probably already had too much to deal with, so the only option left was Rika.

She told the older woman that Shin seemed a bit down. She didn’t go into details, only mentioning that he had traveled to New York. But she wanted to plan something to cheer him up when he returned.

Beyond that, she explained what she was doing and asked for Rika’s advice.

However, the poor woman didn’t quite know how to respond. Rika wasn’t used to being treated as a mature woman... She didn’t even think of herself as someone worthy of giving advice.

That said, she still offered the best advice she could think of.

"I think your heart is in the right place... you might make mistakes along the way, but I think Kaho will understand that you wanted what was best for her."

Eva nodded, even though Rika couldn’t see her.

♡♡♡♡♡

Shin couldn’t understand what he was seeing. Why was Liza’s grave right in front of him?

It didn’t make sense, especially because it was exactly the same as the one in his dimension. Of course, he had never visited that specific area in the game, but even so, it didn’t make sense. He knew for a fact that the famous people who appeared in the game were different from those in his world.

So this should be clear evidence that the people in this dimension were different from the ones in his own. It wouldn’t make sense for Liza to exist in this world, and it made even less sense for someone to have given her that very specific grave.

But Shin needed to investigate the phenomenon further. To begin with, he looked around.

He had visited that place multiple times, and his memory was sharp. He remembered many details about the surroundings.

And while some things were still similar, most of it was a bit different from what he knew.

Besides, he checked his phone for all the celebrities he could remember from his dimension, and as expected, none of them existed in this world...

With the exception of Messi and Sydney Sweeney, who had appeared as easter eggs in the game and existed here as a consequence.

Even YouTubers were completely different, so he was almost certain that the people in this dimension and his own were not the same.

But just for a final confirmation, he walked around looking for anyone familiar.

He didn’t leave his house often, but he had lived in the neighborhood, so he would recognize people if they were the same.

The clerk from the store he used to go to was different. The old man selling food on the street was also not the one he remembered.

And even if the place looked somewhat like the New York he knew, many buildings and smaller details were different.

So could it be that Liza was a special case? Maybe because he had come to this world, something about it was unique.

That said, for Liza to have lived and died in this world, and to have been buried that way, he would have had to exist here as well.

Could it be that somewhere in this city, there was another version of him?

Shin stood still for a few seconds after that thought crossed his mind.

Another "him" walking through the same city.

The idea seemed absurd... but at the same time, everything about the situation was already absurd enough that he couldn’t dismiss anything.

"If I really exist here... then there should be some record," he muttered.

He started with the obvious. Opening his phone and searching for his own name. He was a war veteran and even gained a medal in his ’past life’ so if he existed in this world, something should show up.

But he didn’t find anything. He also tried social media, but there was nothing.

Going for the next most obvious thing, he checked his house. Lilel invaded the place, but only a normal family lived there.

He was almost sure he didn’t exist in this world, but he still wanted to check for a few things. First, Lilel entered several neighboring houses, but didn’t find anyone even remotely resembling him.

Then he went to his old school, and used Lilel to access their system. There was no registration for him. Same thing for the hospital they visited, and for other public records they were more or less able to access.

And the same went to Liza. Even if her grave existed in this world, Shi wasn’t able to find her family, register of her, or any registry of her death. However, he did find a record of a 24 year old woman with her name, however she didn’t live in the USA.

"So, do you have any idea what is the cause of that?" Shin asked his fairy as their returned to the graveyard.

They had spent a really long time trying to find any proof that Shin or Liza existed in this dimension, and they couldn’t. So could it be that the goddess had added that grave just to mess with him?

"I don’t know," Lilel admitted. "But analyzing your memories, that goddess doesn’t seem meticulous enough to do something like that."

"I know..."

Shin fell to his knees, looking back at the grave. He had been so worried about uncovering the truth that he forgot to talk to Liza.

It didn’t matter what the reason was, he should say something to her. He wanted to suppress his feelings, but looking at her name written on that grave, tears began to well up in his eyes.

And it was around that time that Kaho was approaching the place. She had waited so long for Shin at the hotel Eva had rented for them that she began to worry about him.