Reborn As An Overpowered Villain

Lucien was growing impatient with each passing second, because the girl had not uttered a single word except "no," or offered anything beyond a shake of her head.

He had initially assumed that she had come to his office to request that her mana-restricting bracelets be modified to allow only fifteen percent mana circulation, much like what Mark had requested, since Judy always hung around Mark and, seeing him do it, she must have decided to follow suit. But he had been wrong, so utterly wrong, because the girl had shaken her head and said no.

And here he had thought, just moments ago, that he had begun understanding the characters a little better and the way this world worked a little more clearly. He had assumed the world would be filled with clichés, playing out like every predictable story he had ever known, but he had been wrong again, because unlike his expectations, the girl seemed to have come to visit his office for an entirely different reason.

If the world were truly following the rules of a cliché story, she would have stormed in here convinced she was being overlooked, that she was equally strong and brimming with potential, and that she deserved the same treatment as the other top rankers. But no, he had been wrong, and she had yet to tell him the real reason she had appeared before him.

Lucien began tapping his fingers quickly against the wooden surface of the desk, unable to contain himself any longer, because the academy classes had finished and he too wanted to leave his room and go train. Ever since his memories had returned to him, he had grown lax compared to his previous self, and he needed to find a way to break through his bottleneck and reach a new rank soon.

"Are you mute?" Lucien cut in sharply. "Tell me what it is you want to ask or request."

Judy, who was sitting opposite him, had her eyes wide and her lips pressed firmly inward as though she were biting down on them. She gave a slow nod of her head, and Lucien stopped his tapping, realizing it was making the girl even more tense than she already was. She was trembling with tension, so visibly that all the color had drained entirely from her face, leaving her looking as though someone had drawn every last drop of blood from beneath her skin.

"...I-I want to know how to become strong," Judy began, then paused, her hand gripping tightly at the edge of the desk as though drawing strength from the solid wood beneath her fingers, and she added in a quieter voice, "How to become strong like you."

"Huh." Lucien tilted his head slightly, turning his ear toward her. "Did I hear that right?"

He pointed a finger at himself. "You want to know how I became so strong?" he asked, making sure that what he had heard was correct and that the girl was not simply phrasing herself poorly.

"Yes." Judy nodded, her green eyes shining brilliantly beneath the evening light pouring in through the windows. "I want to become strong. Extremely strong." She suddenly jolted up from her seat, joined her hands together, and bowed low before him. "Please train me and make me strong like you."

Lucien found no words coming to his mouth. What in the world is happening right now? The girl was asking for his help. A main heroine who was supposedly destined to stand beside the protagonist and ultimately bring about his ruin had walked into his office to ask the very villain she was meant to oppose to make her stronger.

What in the world is happening to the plot and the original story?

This had never happened in the story as he remembered it, or perhaps it had happened while the point of view had been fixed solely on the main character Mark, and Judy had slipped away without ever telling him. In the original story, Lucien, wrecked by the grief of losing his mother, must have ridiculed her beyond reason just to release his anguish, and the girl must have started resenting him quietly and never revealed it to the protagonist Mark that she had requested Lucien to train her.

But even if something similar had happened in the original story, he still could not find the reason why the girl was coming to him specifically. His affinity and hers were not the same, and even if she truly wanted to be mentored by someone, the academy had plenty of elective classes where duels were frequently held and the body was pushed to its absolute limits.

So, coming to him did not fit at all, because Lucien was ruthless, he never showed his emotions, and he spoke without any reserve or softness, which made him someone any sensible person would be better off avoiding. Yet the girl had come to him, out of all the people she could have chosen.

As a matter of fact, even if he wanted to train her personally, he would have to reject her at any cost, because the headmaster of the academy would soon return and would take the protagonist Mark in as his disciple. And Mark, being the kind of protagonist who never left Judy behind, would request that the headmaster take the girl along with him, and the headmaster, recognizing Judy's potential, would decide to take both of them on as disciples. So it was a straightforward matter for Lucien to reject her. He had to, otherwise the few plot lines that were barely holding together would become hopelessly tangled, and he would have no storylines left to rely upon.

Lucien quickly made his decision, he leaned back and replied evenly, "Sorry, but I cannot train you personally. If you truly want to become strong like me, then you would need to train harder than anyone else, and you should have begun training from a young age."

The girl lifted her face with a sullen expression and looked thoroughly defeated, but she was listening to him, wearing a strange look on her face as though his words were not quite sitting right with her. He paid it no mind and continued regardless.

"Even though you did not train as hard as I did from a young age, you still have a long life ahead of you to train and reach the place where I now stand." Lucien let the words settle before adding, "So keep training, and one day you will become just as strong, if not stronger. And, I truly mean it."

He truly did mean it. She was the main heroine, the childhood sweetheart of the protagonist, and in a world where they were quite literally the children of destiny, born to protect the world from ruin, there was no chance in hell she would not become formidably strong.

The girl, rather than showing any appreciation for his words, clenched her fist at her side and narrowed her eyes with something that looked very much like wounded pride. "Is it because I do not have the same potential as the others?" Judy murmured, her voice small and fragile, like she believed he was merely consoling her to spare her feelings. "Is that why you will not train me?"

Lucien shook his head slightly. "You have exceptional potential, student Judy." He paused, letting the words settle in, he added, "It is simply because I am not the right person for you to train under."

She still looked crestfallen, so he added, "With the kind of potential you carry, you will soon find someone even stronger than me who will be willing to take you under their wing."

"You are lying," Judy whispered. "Can’t you train me?"

Lucien shook his head again, worn down by her relentless persistence, and even more so by the surreal absurdity of a main heroine standing in the office of the story's villain begging to be trained by him. "I cannot train you," he replied, "but if you ever find yourself struggling with a particular aspect of your growth, you may come to me for pointers. That much I can offer you."

For the first time, Judy brightened ever so slightly, and with a small, slow nod, she murmured, "Thank you."

She bowed one final time and quietly slipped out of his office. Lucien breathed a long sigh of relief the moment the door closed behind her. He had barely managed to send her away without creating any death flags for himself, and he knew, without a shred of doubt, that he would have taken her under his wing without hesitation had the headmaster not been destined to claim her as his disciple in the not-so-distant future.

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