I Became the Master of the Villain

I was standing in the middle of a sea of blood. Mutilated corpses were strewn at my feet, and horrible screams battered my eardrums. The ballroom was filled with the stench of blood, shattered chandeliers, and people fleeing in screams. In the midst of this pandemonium, I bumped into someone and fell, and something thumped against my foot. The moment I looked down at it, I stopped breathing. The severed head of the Emperor. Terror surged up through my entire body as I blankly raised my head. The throne, soaked in blood, and the knights who had been slaughtered so cruelly. And stepping over those corpses, he was approaching.
In a world soaked completely in blood, as if red paint had been splashed everywhere, he alone was white-haired and beautiful. That man, so beautiful it sent shivers down my spine, looked bizarrely calm compared to the horrific scene around him. Even though this massacre had all begun with him.

I had to run. I had to run, but I couldn’t move. My body, as if cursed, had gone stiff and refused to budge. Before I knew it, he had come right up to me and slowly reached out his hand. His lips curled into a smile, as if he were enjoying himself. All I could do was stare at the silver-haired man soaked in blood, my face completely pale.
Finally, when his hand, approaching like the scythe of a reaper, gripped my neck…
“Gasp…!”

The carriage jolted roughly, as if it had hit a rock. Gasping for air, I sat up, and the maid asked worriedly,
“My lady, are you alright? Did you have a bad dream?”
“Ah…”

So it was a dream.
I wiped the cold sweat from my forehead and slowly exhaled.
“Your face is very pale. Shall I tell the coachman to turn around?”

“No, it’s fine.”
Her sincere concern was appreciated, but I couldn’t return to the estate. There was something I absolutely had to do tonight.
Four years ago. I transmigrated into the world of a fantasy novel, The Rebellious Mage. I became Olivia Ashford, the only daughter of a duke. That was my new identity.

From a twenty-five-year-old unemployed woman struggling with job hunting, I became a noble lady overnight, but I couldn’t be purely happy about it. Because the Ashford ducal family would be annihilated by the protagonist, who despised the imperial nobility.
The main character and villain of the novel, Kian. He was born with the kind of genius magical talent that might only appear once in a hundred years. Unfortunately, before awakening as a mage, Kian spent twenty years as a slave.
He awakened as a mage right before he was about to be stuffed alive by a noble who collected beautiful slaves. Kian tore that noble apart on the spot and blackened. Afterwards, during the banquet celebrating the Emperor’s birthday, he massacred the Emperor and all the imperial nobles.

By now, you’ve probably guessed. Yes, the dream I just had was a scene from that massacre.
It’s the nightmare that’s plagued me ever since I transmigrated—and in one year, that nightmare will become real and devour me.
I absolutely have to stop it from happening.

With that single thought, I searched everywhere for Kian’s whereabouts, but by the second year, I had to give up. It was like searching for a needle in a haystack.
In the novel, Kian’s time as a slave only appeared in brief flashbacks—barely a few pages. The author had originally covered that past in chapters 1 through 20 during free serialization, but those were deleted in the published version. The reason? Readers were leaving because the protagonist just kept suffering.
The author said on their blog that the deleted chapters still existed, but I didn’t have the energy to go looking for them.
I should’ve kept going back then.

I scoured hundreds of slave markets across the empire like a madwoman, but never found Kian. Now, only one year remains.
If I don’t find Kian and stop his blackening within that year, I’m dead meat.
“My lady, we’ve arrived.”

The coachman’s voice snapped me [N O V E L I G H T] back to my senses. The carriage had stopped in front of the opera house.
Tonight, a secret auction was being held here, open only to invited nobles. There were no limits on what was being auctioned. In other words, people were also for sale. Mermaids and beastkin on the verge of extinction, and slaves with rare and beautiful appearances, were the main offerings.
The catalog I secured in advance included: a beautiful silver-haired slave (male). Kian was officially described by the author as the most beautiful character in the novel. There was a chance this slave might be him.

Please, this time…
I prayed desperately and entered the theater.
The theater was already packed as the auction was about to begin. The moment I sat down in my reserved second-floor box seat, the auction started.

The first item was the final painting of Allen Servy, a genius painter who died young. Since powerful nobles from across the empire were participating, the price of the painting skyrocketed in an instant.
The painting was sold for 20 billion Gallons to a certain gentleman. The red curtain came down, rose again, and the second item was presented. Voices shouting out prices filled the theater.
Auction items that any rich person would covet came one after another, but none of them interested me.

I kept watching the auction for an hour, waiting only for the silver-haired slave to appear.
And finally, the auctioneer said the words I had been waiting for.
“Our next item is a young man with heavenly looks and silver hair.”

The curtain lifted, and a young man appeared at the center of the stage. His pale, slender body was draped in a translucent outfit that barely concealed his skin.
When the young man, who had been bowing his head, lifted his face, small gasps and exclamations came from all over the audience.
The auctioneer continued his explanation.

“His previous owner treated him harshly, so there are blemishes on his body, but his beauty, long limbs, and snow-white skin make him a highly attractive product.”
I lifted my opera glasses to check the young man’s face and almost screamed. My heart pounded wildly. My hands trembled with excitement, making my vision shake. Wondering if I was mistaken, I pressed the lenses close to my eyes.
His hair, like molten pure silver, reflected the chandelier’s light and glittered beautifully. His perfectly proportioned features had not a single flaw. His eyes were a transparent sky blue, like a frozen winter lake, and his skin was as white and smooth as freshly fallen snow.

The face described in the novel as Kian’s was right in front of me.
After four years of transmigration, I had finally found the protagonist.
“One hundred million!”

“One hundred fifty million!”
“Two hundred million!”
Voices shouted out bids. I hurriedly called out mine.

“One billion!”
The price jump shocked the audience.
Did I start too strong?

But there was no time for hesitation. If someone else snatched up Kian, it would be the destruction ending.
The auctioneer’s excited voice echoed through the hall.
“Such enthusiasm from the start! One billion Gallons! Any other bids?”

“1.5 billion!”
I turned toward the voice. In a box seat opposite mine, a noblewoman in a mask was smiling behind a fan.
The slaves standing beside her were all men, and every one of them was stunningly handsome. That’s when her name came to me.

Marchioness Esilla. A name frequently gossiped about in society. They say she makes her good-looking male slaves serve her every night.
It was obvious what she’d do with Kian if she bought him.
“Four billion!”

I shouted out my bid, and she countered immediately.
“Five billion!”
“Eight billion!”

“One hundred billion!”
She clung on tenaciously.
She must really want him. According to the novel, no woman could resist Kian’s looks, so it made sense.

But no matter what, I couldn’t let her take him. I raised the bid again.
“Two hundred fifty billion!”
The audience stirred again, and the auctioneer cried out excitedly.

“Amazing! We have a bid of 250 billion Gallons!”
I took out my opera glasses and studied the Marchioness. Her expression showed deep anguish. After several seconds of hesitation, she opened her mouth.
“Five hundred billion!”

Five hundred billion Gallons. Given her estimated wealth, she was going all in.
But that amount of pocket change wouldn’t beat me.
I smiled and opened my mouth.

“One trillion.”
With the price soaring to a thousand times the original, the entire audience erupted. Cries of disbelief rang out from every direction.
The Ashford Duchy was a house of unimaginable wealth. With its profits from trade, finance, mining, and countless other businesses, its fortune grew by the second. A trillion Gallons could be recouped in no time.

The Marchioness’s hand, holding her fan, was trembling. I smiled with just one corner of my mouth.
Poor thing. She must not have known who I was. If she had, she would’ve known better than to pick a fight with me.
“One trillion! Any further bids?”

The auctioneer looked around the room with wide eyes.
“One trillion! If there are no more, I’ll call it three times and close the auction.”
While the auctioneer made the three final calls, Marchioness Esilla kept her mouth shut. The sound of the gavel striking the podium echoed through the theater.

“This item is sold to Participant #36 for one trillion Gallons!”
Just before the auction assistant took Kian backstage, our eyes met for a fleeting moment.
As our gazes locked, I thought to myself:

I’ll make you happy. I swear I will.
From now on, to stop the protagonist’s blackening route, I will care for him—with love and devotion.