I’m a Villainess, Can I Die?

At my words, my family stared at me, dumbfounded.

My mother’s eyes turned red, and she clamped both hands over her mouth. The tears that had been welling up finally burst forth, streaming down her face like a waterfall.
Her wailing set off a chain reaction—my father and Aaron’s eyes also reddened.
Instead of crying himself, my father simply patted my mother’s back, clenching his lips tightly before finally speaking.

“…Never. Never do that again.
That day… The day I came to find you… Do you have any idea what I felt when I saw you lying on the ground?”
He was trying his best to stay composed, but by the end, his voice was shaking.

Lying on the ground…
So he had come to the clock tower himself to retrieve me.
It must have been quite the shock.

“…I’m sorry.”
“If I ask you why, will you tell me?”
Aaron asked cautiously, his gaze trembling.

Father, too, was looking at me with pleading eyes.
Why, huh.
I couldn’t exactly tell them the truth.

I just didn’t want to die as pitifully as Selina originally did, so I tried to die on my own terms—but it turns out, her wish wasn’t for me to die, but for me to live happily instead. So… uh, yeah.
Even saying it to myself, it sounded completely absurd.
I needed to come up with a reasonable excuse—one that would explain both my actions and why I wouldn’t do it again.

But I wasn’t ready for that yet.
So, for now, I simply shook my head.
My mother, who had been sobbing with her head down, slowly raised her face at my silence.
She glanced at my father, clutching his sleeve, before giving him a small nod.

Then she turned back to me with a soft smile, though the pain still lingered in her eyes.
“It’s okay if you’re not ready to tell us. You can take your time, and if one day you feel like talking about it, then you can tell us.
But… you have to keep your promise. Never do anything like that again, alright?”

“…Alright.”
The moment I gave my answer, my mother pulled me into an embrace.
At first, it was a light hug, but I felt her arms tighten around me, as if afraid she might lose me again.

It made me feel even guiltier.
I had known they would suffer if I died, but I hadn’t truly thought about what it would be like to see it firsthand.
After all, I hadn’t jumped expecting to survive.

“…Selina. My Selina… I love you.”
As my father spoke, he wrapped his arms around both my mother and me.
He held me so tightly that it was suffocating.

Even my mother, struggling to breathe, patted his arm and murmured, “Our Selina can’t breathe!”
Aaron, who had been watching, finally stepped in, grunting as he tried to pry Father off me.
In the midst of this little commotion, I felt, for a brief moment, a strange sense of familiarity.

I still didn’t know what it truly meant to have a real family or how I was supposed to act around them.
But maybe—just maybe—if I kept getting swept up in moments like this…
Maybe one day…

I still couldn’t bring myself to smile.
I still couldn’t name this feeling.
But strangely, my mouth felt sweet—like I had a small piece of candy melting on my tongue.

After that, we had a few more conversations, and through them, I learned a few important things.
First, why I was still alive.
Even I thought it was bizarre.

Falling from that height should have killed me, so I asked directly.
It was an uncomfortable question, but ever since I met the doctor, it had been nagging at me.
I had my suspicions.

The last person I had seen before I jumped—the one I had spoken to before everything went black.
Aiden.
And, sure enough, I was right.

Apparently, Aiden had used magic as I fell, deflecting my body toward the trees in the forest behind the tower.
That lessened the impact, allowing me to survive.
Then, the priest I had met in the plaza had healed my head injury.

I nodded, making a mental note to thank them both.
Especially Aiden.
Since he had revealed a power he had kept hidden for so long, I owed him.

The second thing I learned was about Vivian and a few others.
The salon owner. The Tower Keeper.
How worried they must have been.

The moment their names came up, I felt the urge to rub my temples.
To be honest… I hadn’t even thought about them.
I had been so focused on executing my plan, on slipping through the watchful eyes of others, that I had completely neglected the people who had been involved.

How selfish.
“I deceived them intentionally.
They didn’t do anything wrong.”

“…Yes, that’s right.
When the young lady of the house gives an order, what choice do they have but to obey?”
Aaron let out a heavy sigh.

“So we only gave them a light warning.
The security around places like that is too weak, anyway.”
A light warning…

I supposed that was fortunate.
Still, from their perspective, this was trouble they never should have had to deal with.
The whole situation had spiraled into a mess, but I had no one to blame but myself.

Once I recovered, I would have to apologize to them personally.
If I was ever allowed to leave this estate, that is.
“Oh, and I should send a letter to Lady Vivian.

She must have been startled when I disappeared so suddenly.
And I won’t be able to attend the tea party she invited me to…
I’ll write it myself—can you have someone deliver it for me?”

“…Of course.
But for now, stop worrying about everything and just rest, Selina.”
Aaron took my hand, his fingers trembling.

His hands shook so badly, like a leaf in the wind, that I almost felt like he was the one who needed to rest more than I did.
Still, I nodded and slowly lay back in bed.
The three of them bid me goodnight before leaving the room.

With them went the lingering warmth in the air.
The now-empty space felt slightly colder.
I pulled the blanket up to my chin and closed my eyes.

Maybe it was because my body was so exhausted, but I drifted into sleep almost immediately.
By the time I woke again, the sunlight from earlier had disappeared.
The sky outside my window was streaked with the deep hues of sunset.

“…What time is it?”
“6:20 PM, my lady.”
A response came almost immediately to my half-conscious mumbling.

A voice that, though slightly exhausted, was still unmistakably familiar.
“Aiden.”
At my call, the figure sitting beside me rose from his seat and began lighting the candles around the room, one by one.

He didn’t reply.
If this were the usual, ever-professional Aiden, he would have already responded.
Was he… sulking?

Come on. Really?
As the candles flickered to life, their glow mixing with the sunset hues, the room took on an eerie, almost blazing appearance—like everything was burning.
“Aiden.”

I called again.
He lit the final candle, then stood still, back turned to me.
Silence stretched between us.

Like a stone statue, he just stood there.
I sighed.
Fine. If the wronged person had to crawl, so be it.

He had tried to stop me.
He had watched me jump right in front of him.
That must have been quite the sight—one that likely still haunted him.

Was that why he had used magic on me? Out of sheer desperation?
I pulled back the blankets and swung my legs over the edge of the bed, intending to walk toward him.
Thud.

Yeah, that was never going to work.
This translation is the intellectual property of .
I had spent days rolling around in bed like a newborn fawn—why would my body suddenly cooperate now?

I should have expected this.
I knew better than anyone how utterly useless my body could be.
I had said the guilty one should crawl, but I wasn’t planning to take that literally.

Lying flat on the floor, staring at the ground, felt oddly surreal.
Should I just crawl, then?
Walking didn’t seem like an option.

But before I had to resort to that, Aiden moved.
He must have heard the loud crash, because in an instant, he was beside me, supporting me.
“You shouldn’t be getting out of bed so suddenly.”

His usual reprimanding tone.
He helped me back onto the bed, then stepped away, his gaze fixed downward.
“Thanks.”

At that, he finally looked at me.
His wide green eyes caught the reflection of the crimson sunset, making them look like a burning forest.
…Creepy.

“I was only doing my duty.”
His eyes returned to normal as he forced a professional smile onto his lips.
Still, his expression remained stiff—far from his usual self.

“This isn’t about duty.
Thank you… for saving me.”
His head dipped downward again.

I stared at the crown of his head—so neat and tidy, as always—and opened my mouth once more.
“And about the magic—”
Knock, knock, knock.

A firm rapping on the door cut me off.
Even after nearly dying, familiar sounds weren’t so easily forgotten.
Aiden, who had been staring at the floor, wordlessly straightened and turned toward the door.

The knock was familiar to him, too.
After all, he must have heard it as often as I did.
It was unlike Aiden to open the door without my permission, but given everything that had happened, I let it slide.

“Sir Lukas.”
Aiden bowed slightly before stepping aside, watching as Lukas entered the room.
Then, without another word, Aiden left, the door shutting firmly behind him.

Lukas smirked.
“How are you feeling, Selina?”
“I’m fine.”

He walked past me and yanked the curtains shut.
“I’m not fond of sunsets.”
“…Okay. Do as you like.”

Not a fan of sunsets, huh?
That wasn’t something I remembered reading in The Crown of Dawn.
Not that I had committed every little detail to memory.

I set the thought aside and turned my attention back to Lukas.
He maintained his ever-present smile as he dropped into the chair beside my bed.
Compared to everyone else who had visited today, he was by far the most relaxed.

“So, you really weren’t lying when you said it wasn’t because of me.”
“…You’re still doubting that?”
“It’s hard to tell what you’re thinking.”

“Right. And you’re so easy to read?”
Silence.
Not exactly the warmest conversation for someone recovering in bed.

I knew Lukas had a habit of hitting people with brutal truths, but I hadn’t expected him to be so indiscriminate about it.
Then again…
I understood.

He had been watching over me.
That, in itself, had been an annoyance—one I had no interest in entertaining.
Still, I had to admit that for someone as high-ranking as the vice-captain of the duchy’s knights, tailing a noble lady around all day must have been its own kind of hassle.

And given his track record—saving me when I nearly fell from the bell tower, protecting me from those thugs—he had quite literally kept me from dying twice.
And then, on the one day he wasn’t there, this happened.
I supposed it made sense for him to be upset.

And I wasn’t heartless.
So, just this once, I decided to take a step forward.