Lucien Ashborne was supposed to be a nobody — an early-game villain who existed only to be crushed by the protagonist. After provoking the wrong person, he vanished from the story without even a dramatic death scene.

When a player named James dies and wakes up in Lucien’s body, he inherits every bit of the villain’s broken reputation and zero of his privileges. Bullied, scorned, and abandoned by his own noble family, Lucien now stands at the bottom of the academy hierarchy.

To make matters worse, the world he knew as a game has no guaranteed happy ending… and the protagonist’s party treats him like a criminal.

But James isn’t the Lucien they think he is.

With fragments of meta-knowledge, a half-broken system that barely works, and a determination to avoid becoming cannon fodder, he chooses a different path.

He doesn’t seek glory.
He just refuses to disappear.

This is the story of a former villain trying to rewrite his role — not as a hero, but as someone who survives on his own terms.

"Ah!" Merle slapped his forehead. "The Platinum Knight Commander, Samantha? The 'Steel Rose'? That makes perfect sense. If she was there, even a Count-Rank would be sliced into sashimi."


I kept my expression neutral. It wasn't entirely a lie. Samantha had finished off the remains, after all. Just… very small remains.


Merle, Kael, and Elisha nodded in agreement, accepting the convenient explanation. They immediately dove back into the discussion.


"If the Order of the Dawn is involved, we must be careful," Kael said, his face grave. "We need to find this demon worshipper hiding in the capital before the ritual is completed."


"Agreed," Elisha added. "But scanning the entire city for a mana signature is impossible without the Imperial Mages."


"And we can't trust the authorities," Merle muttered.


I leaned against the dusty shelf, checking my watch.


Chapter 127 - P2P Combat Training