#2: The Elegant And Perfect Butler — I’ll Become an Elegant Villainess! (Wn)

Two years later, by the time I turned seven, I had succeeded in completely winning over the maids assigned to care for me.

They all adored me deeply, and gave me sweets as presents at every opportunity.

Ciel especially, the maid assigned to me, would tell the other maids with intense devotion, “Lady Mythia is so precious and so lovable.”

What truly terrifying villainess talent.

Even while burdened with the handicap of being a child, I possessed overwhelming charisma that could not help but captivate those around me.

I might have opened the door to some utterly extraordinary potential.

Satisfied with progress beyond my expectations, I crossed my legs and swirled my tea.

(I’ve gotten pretty good at villainess-like mannerisms too.)

After glancing at the mirror beside me and nodding, I thought,

(It’s time to move the plan into its next phase.)

To become a villainess who operates brilliantly behind the scenes in noble society, I needed companions who sympathized with my purpose and admired me.

Excellent allies who would become my hands and feet, help me with covert operations, and assist in bringing down my enemies.

I had already picked out that important first companion.

The butler who oversaw the entire House Lumiore—the one called Vincent Velvet.

Because he mainly served Father as his master, he had little involvement with me, but since he always performed perfect work with beautiful grace, I privately called him the “Elegant and Perfect Butler.”

Everyone in House Lumiore knew how capable he was.

“How are you feeling, milady?”

A soft smile, and movements overflowing with intelligence and dignity.

The maids all said in unison, “That man is incredible. He’s so cool,” and watching him work, I also thought, ‘What an amazing person. He’s so cool.’

A tall grown man with an excellent figure.

There was not the slightest opening in the way he walked, like an agent straight out of a spy novel.

If it was this man, the most capable worker in the count’s household, then he would surely do excellent work as the right hand of a villainess operating from the shadows.

He served Father now, but I had to approach him skillfully and make him my ally no matter what…!

From that day on, I began a top-secret operation to bring Vincent-san into my ranks.

First, I began by gathering information about him.

Curiously enough, there were several parts of his background that had been falsified.

A clever falsification so carefully done that no one would ever notice unless they verified it with extreme care.

No one else had realized it at all, but my eyes—always thinking all day about cool covert operations and schemes worthy of a splendid villainess—could not be deceived.

Why would a butler serving a count’s house falsify his background?

Brilliant as I was, I quickly realized the reason.

(There’s no doubt about it…! This man loves spy-novel covert operations just as much as I do!)

After all, every single one of the falsifications had been carried out as thoroughly and skillfully as if by a real agent.

Something like that would be absolutely impossible unless he was a devoted fan.

(To think that the “Elegant and Perfect Butler,” who ranked first on my list of people I wanted as my right hand, was actually a kindred spirit who shared the same admiration as me…!)

What a miraculous coincidence.

I could not suppress the pounding of my heart.

(If he’s a kindred spirit, then he’ll surely sympathize with my dream too. I absolutely have to make him my right hand…!)

I decided to put my feelings into a letter and send it to Vincent-san.

I wrote down every detail of the falsification work he had carried out without omitting a thing, and decided to include an outline of my dream and ambitions as well.

Good, it’s done.

Since Vincent-san was a kindred spirit who shared the same admiration, he would surely understand the rest if I wrote this much.

I added, “I want to speak with you alone,” and slipped the letter into Vincent-san’s bag.

(At last… at long last, I’m going to have an ally…!)

Including my previous life, this was the first time I had ever found someone I could share my hobby with.

With springing steps, I prepared to meet Vincent-san in secret.

(Why…?)

Vincent Velvet could not help but tremble at the contents written in that letter.

The falsified background he had constructed in order to infiltrate House Lumiore.

Its details had all been brought into the open, down to the finest and most microscopic points.

(Even my superiors in the Imperial intelligence agency could not see through my cover…)

He had been a former agent belonging to the Imperial intelligence agency.

A member of the finest secret intelligence organization on the central continent, he was known even among elite operatives as the greatest masterpiece of them all—the legendary agent known as “The Nameless Man.”

A genius who had escaped countless hopeless situations through unparalleled composure and judgment, feared as the “Machine Doll.”

The reason he had decided to quit being an agent was because he had grown sick of the organization’s warped sense of justice and its entire system.

The reason he had become an agent after losing his parents in war.

He wanted to reduce, even by one, the number of children who had to feel lonely as he had.

For the sake of his own justice, he had thrown everything away and fought.

He trapped executives of hostile organizations, exposed the corruption of nobles who promoted military expansion, and ran about by every possible means in an attempt to stop wars.

And yet, no matter how desperately he tried, war never disappeared.

When he realized that the force orchestrating the wars had been the Empire itself, and the organization to which he belonged, he came to despair of everything in the world.

(I’ll destroy it all and bring it to an end.)

He compiled a detailed memo of the Empire’s and the secret intelligence agency’s crimes and sent it to every newspaper company.

The intelligence agency was dismantled, and too many people to count were arrested.

The members of the former intelligence agency searched for him with bloodshot eyes.

If they caught him, he would almost certainly never return alive.

There was no doubt he would be punished in the most cruel way imaginable.

Even so, for “The Nameless Man,” who had a thousand faces, hiding his appearance was not difficult.

There were hardly any situations that made him feel his life was in danger.

The freedom and peace he had obtained.

Yet that life was a desolate one.

Pure-hearted and once believing in justice, he had fallen into despair over the ugliness of human beings after seeing the world’s dark underbelly as an intelligence operative.

A hideous reality beyond saving existed on the hidden side of the world.

No matter how hard he tried, he could not change it, and the world was made such that when one evil was defeated, another evil would only grow stronger.

Justice and conviction alike would be used by that evil and warped before one even realized it.

Deep disappointment and despair.

Nothing mattered anymore.

He lived only because dying was troublesome.

His daily life as Vincent Velvet was spent like that of a doll without emotions.

It was during such a time that he met the girl named Mythia Lumiore.

Vincent found the way she was deeply adored by the maids assigned to care for her utterly mysterious.

(How did a girl raised in the noble society of the magical kingdom become so thoughtful and compassionate?)

Magical aptitude was everything that made a person who they were.

In the noble society of the magical kingdom, there was an atmosphere that nobles with superior magical aptitude were naturally entitled to oppress commoners, who were inferior beings.

And yet, she seemed to treat the servants around her with heartfelt respect and affection.

(Even though she is supposed to be a child, she seems more adult than most adults. As if she had lived another life somewhere else as someone entirely different.)

In addition, she possessed intelligence and a hunger for learning that did not seem possible for a child.

Most likely the kind of exceptional talent one would call gifted.

(If possible, I would like her to grow up just as she is and become a kind adult.)

It was just when he had secretly been harboring such thoughts toward a girl with whom he had little interaction.

The letter that had arrived, and the many revealed falsifications.

It took him no small amount of time to understand what was written there.

Impossible.

There was no way this could be possible.

How could a seven-year-old girl see through my cover this perfectly?

A reality he could hardly accept.

(Calm down. Organize the situation coolly.)

Vincent wrote a memo on paper using a special code that only he could understand, arranging the situation.

This was something Vincent habitually did in order to organize his thoughts.

Vincent believed this method was effective for excluding as much subjectivity as possible and grasping the situation objectively.

The person calling herself Mythia Lumiore has seen through my falsified background.
She has conveyed that fact to me and wishes to speak with me alone in secret.

If he wrote down only the facts, then that was what it amounted to.

(Who was it that truly saw through my cover? And what exactly is the objective? I suppose I won’t know unless I speak with her.)

Vincent quickly gathered his belongings and prepared to disappear from the house.

It took him about three minutes.

The procedure had seeped into his body so deeply that he could perform it unconsciously.

For Vincent, disappearing himself had become an obvious and everyday act, part of the process necessary for survival.

At the appointed time written in the letter, he visited Mythia’s private room.

The maids were not there, and the only one inside the room was Mythia.

Vincent had hidden inside his coat a specially made folding knife he had used since his days as an operative.

(It is not yet certain that Lady Mythia is the sender. There is also the possibility that someone else is impersonating Lady Mythia and trying to lure me into some kind of trap.)

Pretending to have come to inspect the room, Vincent checked whether there were any magical devices for eavesdropping.

“Is there anything troubling you, Lady Mythia?”

He spoke to Mythia in an entirely natural tone.

“There is one thing.”

“What would that be?”

“I want an excellent partner. To make the plan a reality.”

“The plan?”

“The reason I asked you to come today was to invite you into the plan. Could you read that for the details?”

Mythia pointed at a single sheet of paper lying face down on the table.

(So Lady Mythia is indeed the sender, then.)

Vincent reached out toward the paper.

“Everything is written there.”

Mythia said so while elegantly swirling her tea.

“‘The Splendid Villainess (Albertine) Plan.’ Its full outline.”

(This is…)

The plan written there threw Vincent into complete confusion.

(This is the sort of embarrassing content a dreamy girl in her early teens might fantasize about…! Full of descriptions so painful that rereading them later would make one want to die from cringing at one’s past…! However, there is no way this child, who saw through my plan, genuinely believes in fantasies like these. Most likely, this content is camouflage in case someone else sees it. Her true intent lies underneath.)

Vincent carefully read into her true intention hidden beneath the words that had been written.

(A villainess who passes judgment on warped justice and rules the world from the shadows… This person knows the danger of justice and the true nature of human beings. And on top of that, as evil, she intends to judge the evil filling this world and save the oppressed…!)

At the true intention he saw there in Mythia, Vincent found himself standing frozen.

The justice his former pure self had once sought.

Within this warped world, a method that might make it real had been written there in a form he had never even imagined.

(Could it be that this lady understands my despair and disappointment…?!)

He could not help but catch his breath, but when he thought about it, it was more than possible.

This girl had perfectly exposed the cover that not a single member of the Imperial intelligence agency had been able to see through.

(And yet she is still only a seven-year-old child… what talent…)

Vincent drew in a sharp breath.

(If it is done this way, then perhaps—)

The pounding of his heart, something he had not felt in years.

The hope that had lit within his chest.

Vincent clenched his fist.