I’m a Villainess, Can I Die?

Eunji disappeared, and I drifted back into sleep.
In this strange space, all I ever seemed to do was sleep endlessly.

At this rate, wouldn’t I just die before even fulfilling Eunji’s wish?
Ah, well… if that happened, there was nothing I could do about it.
If Eunji heard me say something like that, she’d probably scream at me to get up immediately. But that was my last coherent thought before my hazy mind started to regain clarity.

Faint shadows flickered before my closed eyes. My eyelids felt unbearably heavy, impossible to lift all at once. Instead, I focused on moving my fingers, managing only the slightest twitch.
Even that small movement sent a shock of pain rippling through my body.
A sharp gasp escaped me.

An unexpected, searing pain clawed through my entire being.
Was this hell? Had I fallen into some fiery inferno? Was that why my whole body burned like this?
Every inch of me ached. The more I moved, the worse it got, yet the pain itself made me move instinctively. My limbs twisted as I gasped for air. My mind was blank, but agony drilled through me, unearthing every bit of suffering my body had endured from the fall—pain I hadn’t even registered at the time.

“Selina!”
“Selina!”
“My lady!”

Muffled voices called my name from all around me.
But I couldn’t answer.
Even my tongue was numb from the pain.

My eyes still refused to open.
At this point, I almost preferred slipping back into unconsciousness, trapped in that strange space again.
Someone touched me.

A burning sensation spread across my already raw skin, as if they had pressed fire against me.
Eunji… you did make that wish for me, right? You don’t secretly hold a grudge against me or something, do you?
Even her well-meaning prayer felt like pure agony right now.
“A… ah… ah…”

My own ragged breathing rattled in my ears.
For some reason, a scene from that exorcist show Eunji had binge-watched came to mind.
I must have looked exactly like one of those possessed souls, writhing in torment.

“…Just… wait… soon… priest…”
A fragmented voice reached me, but I couldn’t make out the words.
“K-keugh… keugh…”

This was it.
This time, it really felt like the end.
I had jumped from a building, yet it was only now that death felt real.

What the hell was this?
When I had wanted to die, I kept surviving. But now, when I thought I might as well live, I was actually dying.
The world had granted Eunji’s wish but refused to side with me.

What a filthy world. What a cruel god.
As the unbearable tension in my muscles drained away, so did my strength. My body felt limp, like all my tendons had melted.
The pain slowly ebbed.

With its absence, I finally managed to take steady breaths again.
Ah, so this is how it ends.
A bitter taste lingered on my tongue.

…Wait.
No, really.
It physically tasted bitter.

It wasn’t just a metaphor—I had something disgustingly bitter in my mouth.
I had been too consumed by pain to notice earlier, but now that the agony was fading, the acrid taste was unmistakable.
What was this?

More importantly… wasn’t I supposed to be dying?
For the first time, I forced some strength into my heavy eyelids.
The effort made my muscles tighten painfully, but I kept pushing. Through the faint tremble of my lashes, vague shapes wavered before me.

I still couldn’t make out who they were.
It wasn’t just one person, though—there were several.
…Was this another dream?

Would another new face appear like before?
“…Who… are you?”
“S-Selina?”

The moment I spoke, my vision sharpened.
The room was dim, making it hard to distinguish the figures, but their trembling voices gave them away.
My mother.

This wasn’t a dream.
Even without seeing her face clearly, I could already imagine her expression—furrowed brows, teary eyes barely holding back sobs.
I wanted to correct her misunderstanding, to say something reassuring.

But it seemed I had already used up my last bit of strength.
Well.
It figured.

“Oh gods… our Selina… she’s lost her memories again! Ohhh!”
No, I haven’t.
I remember everything, crystal clear.

This translation is the intellectual property of .
Yet just as I overcame physical pain, I was now met with a new kind of torment.
The moment I opened my eyes, I wished I could close them again.

The situation spiraled further out of control.
The doctor approached, checking my condition.
My mother sobbed loudly beside me.

My father, attempting to console her, looked utterly drained.
And amidst all the chaos, my voice refused to come out, leaving me unable to deny her assumptions.
Aaron hovered by my side, restless with worry.

Lukas and Aiden stood near him, just as tense.
Even that priest from the plaza was here, quietly muttering a prayer.
Well.

Thanks, I guess.
In this absurd mess, the doctor tilted my head back and checked my eyes again.
I sighed internally.

It’ll work out somehow.
After his examination, they made me drink an entire bottle of a foul-tasting medicine.
It must have been the same bitter taste I noticed earlier.

“It’s alright, Selina. Everything’s going to be fine.”
Aaron’s words were oddly confident for someone talking to his supposedly amnesiac sister.
I nodded weakly in response, then succumbed to sleep again.

It was probably a side effect of the medicine.
The next morning, by some miracle, everything did turn out fine.
When I woke up—though my throat was dry and scratchy—I could speak again.

As I lay in bed, I glanced around.
The same group of people from yesterday stood clustered together, their eyes bloodshot from lack of sleep.
I sighed.

The scene looked like something straight out of a horror movie.
“…Mo…ther.”
At the sound of my voice, my mother covered her mouth with her hands and nodded.

“Father.”
“Yes, yes, Selina.”
The word still felt foreign on my tongue.

My voice was hoarse, but its tone was calm, even to my own ears. There was no hint of joy at meeting my so-called real parents.
Not that I expected there to be.
Even if Selina was another version of me, the past I remembered was twenty-seven years of being Eunji’s older sister. How was I supposed to accept everything all at once?

If anything, it felt even more awkward now than before.
Back then, when I thought of myself as merely borrowing Selina’s body, I could treat these people as strangers, playing along as if I were acting in a role.
But how was I supposed to treat my so-called real family?

My mother grasped my hand tightly.
Her fingers were cold, stiff with worry and exhaustion.
Even so, I didn’t pull away.

I could only stare at our joined hands in silence.
This…
This was the new me.

This was the best that Selina could do.
“Are you in any pain?”
“My whole body aches. It feels like I’m being torn apart at times…”

I shrugged as I answered the doctor’s question, but a small jolt of pain made me let out an involuntary gasp.
My mother flinched harder than I did.
I was the one in pain, but she looked like she was the one who needed comforting.

Well, considering it was because of me, I couldn’t exactly complain.
“It’s possible you have some fractures. The trees might have softened the impact, but the height you fell from was considerable…”
The doctor trailed off, glancing around at the others in the room.

Their faces darkened instantly.
He hesitated, as if debating whether to continue, so I gave him a slight nod to encourage him to keep going.
Though, even that small movement made my throat ache.

“There could be muscle damage or minor fractures. And, well… there are bruises all over your body. Do you feel any particularly sharp pain anywhere?”
“…Left elbow, maybe?”
It felt numb and tingling.

Hearing my response, the doctor rolled up my left sleeve and gently moved my arm around, pressing along different spots to check.
Just as he had said, my left arm was covered in bruises.
There was also a long, jagged wound stretching down the side, scabbed over with dried blood.

What a sight.
Had I instinctively tried to break my fall with my left elbow?
I had lost consciousness the moment I jumped, so there was no way for me to remember.

As I made idle observations about my arm, the others’ faces turned paler and paler.
For someone actually experiencing the pain, I felt fine—but for everyone else, it seemed unbearable to even look at.
I supposed none of them had fully examined my injuries before this.

The doctor and maids must have changed my clothes while I was unconscious, but in all the chaos, they likely hadn’t paid close attention to each individual wound.
Now that they were finally seeing the extent of the damage, their reactions were… extreme.
I found it strangely unsettling.

I had once had family who had inflicted pain upon me.
And now, I had family who looked like they might faint just from seeing my wounds.
There had been people who despised my very existence.

And now, there were people who were relieved simply because I was alive.
Was this how things would be from now on?
Would I ever truly adapt?

Would there ever come a day, as Eunji and my other self had said, when I would suddenly find myself happy?
The pain in my wounds throbbed.
I had promised Eunji, but I couldn’t picture myself truly laughing among these people.

It felt as distant as trying to recall the face of my past self—the one who had died.
How absurd.
Even now, I was still me.

The doctor concluded his examination, stating that my left arm had a long cut and a possible hairline fracture near the elbow, but aside from that, there were no serious injuries.
Honestly, considering the height I had fallen from, this was a lucky outcome.
At least it meant I could survive the next four years in this body.

I nodded, offering my thanks.
Once the doctor confirmed that my condition was stable, the crowd that had been hovering around my bedside finally dispersed.
The room, once crammed with people, felt instantly lighter—like an elevator emptying all at once.

Now, only my parents and Aaron remained.
The air in the room was refreshing in one sense… but suffocating in another.
“…Um.”

At the mere sound of my voice, the three of them tensed.
I was the one who should be feeling guilty, yet they flinched as if they were the ones who had done something wrong.
It reminded me of my engagement day.

Would I really end up living like a princess locked in a tower from now on?
As my thoughts wandered, I let out a quiet sigh.
That was all it took for them to flinch even harder.

“…I’m sorry.”
“Selina?”
My father’s voice wavered in surprise.

His expression seemed to ask—Sorry? For what?
What for?
Everything.

All of it.
I couldn’t say it out loud.
I hadn’t ignored the consequences of my actions when I made my choice, but facing them in reality was different from imagining them in theory.

People who had once shone so brightly now trembled before me, looking utterly worn and exhausted.
“…I’m sorry. I won’t think about doing something like that again. I’m sorry for making you worry.”