Prologue
“Trash.”
Smack!
The sharp crack echoed like a whip.
A silver-haired woman slapped me across the face.
I turned my head back toward her, and for a second, I thought tears might spring to my eyes from the sting—but of course, I didn’t cry.
I couldn’t.
This body wasn’t mine to begin with.
The man I had become—Winter Winslet, famed for his cold and lofty nature—would never shed tears just because his fiancée slapped him.
Instead, this man did something far worse. He caught the woman’s chin with his fingers and uttered, in that insufferable tone,
“An angry face suits you well, Josefin.”
“Don’t you dare change the subject.”
She immediately slapped his hand away, glaring at me with furious determination.
“How can a person behave like this? You got caught last month already, and now you’ve been rolling around with another woman? And this time, the partner was…”
Josefin’s face flushed redder and redder, her expression twisting in disbelief.
“Forty-two people? You were with forty-two women?”
Meeting those furious blue eyes, I finally accepted the grim reality of my situation.
Professor Winter Winslet.
I had transmigrated into the body of the worst villain in Judgment of Candela.
And, apparently, I’d also inherited the title of the academy’s most notorious womanizer.
1
Over 10,000 hours of playtime.
As a seasoned veteran of Judgment of Candela, I understood the situation instantly.
Winter Winslet got caught cheating again.
Got slapped by his fiancée again.
And in the middle of a party, no less…
Josefin de Azeta.
A member of the Royal Guard, a noble knight, and one of the heroines in Judgment of Candela.
Not my heroine, though—she was supposed to be the protagonist’s heroine, not the villain’s.
She was a woman scarred over and over by a cheating fiancé who had forced an engagement upon her, until she was finally saved by the main character.
That heroine, that beautiful woman, was now standing right in front of me.
What kind of lunatic cheats on a fiancée like this?
…Oh, right. That lunatic was me now.
“Say something, won’t you?”
Josefin’s blue eyes glared at me, burning with anger.
The party had nearly ground to a halt thanks to her sudden arrival and the slap she’d delivered, but she clearly didn’t care about that right now.
I gave the most classic excuse in the book.
“It’s a misunderstanding.”
“A misunderstanding?”
Of course it was a lie.
I knew Judgment of Candela inside out. If anything, Winter Winslet’s number of flings was well into the triple digits.
Forty-two? That was unusually low for him.
Honestly, it was a miracle he hadn’t been stabbed to death yet…
“Wow. How the hell is he still alive?”
“What was that?”
“Nothing.”
“Are you saying you’re too tired to even make excuses now?”
Josefin’s jaw tightened. I now had firsthand experience of what it meant when someone’s eyes “blazed with fury.”
I looked around, hoping someone would step in.
Winter Winslet was a famous socialite and the most handsome man of the century.
There were plenty of young nobles here who would gladly side with me under normal circumstances.
They just wouldn’t be any help.
“Oh my, who’s causing all this fuss?”
“Look at her hair. Silver. That must be her. Baron Winslet’s fiancée.”
“Oh, that girl? The one shameless enough to cling to the Baron?”
“Careful, she might hear you.”
“So what if she does? What kind of woman loses her dignity like this?”
“I heard her family’s immigrant stock. Figures.”
“Why did the Baron even get engaged to someone like that?”
“Obviously she schemed her way in. Probably wanted his money.”
“Poor Baron. Honestly, isn’t it partly her fault if he cheats? Maybe she’s just not attractive enough to keep him.”
“Bet she’s a frigid doll in bed.”
The snide whispers were unbearable.
Usually, people who train in swordsmanship develop strong mental resilience.
Unfortunately, Josefin wasn’t one of them.
She was a knight blessed with S-rank talent, but her personality was fragile.
And that’s my fiancée.
As a veteran player, I knew better than anyone how dangerous this situation was.
The more timid a person, the harder they explode when pushed.
Josefin was already mentally cornered. Who knew what she might do?
Her knuckles whitened as she gripped her sword hilt.
“At this point… I’d rather cut you down here and die myself to at least salvage my family’s honor.”
Her sudden declaration made my stomach drop.
Then, the familiar system alert popped into view:
[Warning]
[Death Flag Updated]
Great. I was about to get murdered over a love scandal the moment I transmigrated.
A thousand thoughts ran through my mind in an instant.
First, who the hell lets someone bring a sword into a ballroom?
Second, Josefin’s swordsmanship was S-rank—she could slice my neck before I could blink.
Third, how did this scene play out in the original game again?
The memory surfaced almost immediately.
Josefin had vented about this exact incident countless times if you got close enough to her in-game.
This was one of her “absolute worst” memories.
I could even remember the villain’s line:
“Go on, draw your sword. See how your parents and sisters look hanging from the gallows.”
Winter Winslet, eldest son of a prestigious count family, had that kind of power.
Josefin, on the other hand, was the granddaughter of an exiled knightly house.
The difference in status and power was like heaven and earth.
Winter’s words were a blatant threat.
And Josefin wasn’t strong-willed enough to ignore a threat to her family.
When she backed down, Winter would whisper in her ear:
“Remember this. After our wedding, I’ll be your master. Seems your father neglected to teach you proper manners, but don’t worry—I’m a patient man. I’ll carve the virtue of obedience into your body myself.”
Yep. That line earned Winter Winslet the number one spot for “Most Hated Villain” in official polls.
A true sociopath who crushed anyone who resisted, stomped on their pride, and exploited every weakness to get what he wanted.
That was Winter Winslet.
If I followed his example, I could probably escape death right now.
But I didn’t want to.
…Why bother, when there was an easier way?
I stepped closer to Josefin.
“Josefin.”
“I don’t want to hear it.”
She turned her head away, but I didn’t waste words.
Instead, I grabbed the wrist that was holding her sword hilt and pushed her back until her spine hit the statue behind her.
Then, I kissed her.
“Mmph?!”
Josefin’s eyes went wide.
She seemed shocked at first… but didn’t push me away.
“Mmh…”
When the kiss finally ended, I looked into her eyes, still close enough that our noses nearly touched.
“You’re the only one I truly love.”
Josefin lowered her gaze, her cheeks reddening.
“…Liar.”
“Look me in the eyes.”
She did. And with the softest, most honeyed tone I could manage, I said,
“Do these look like the eyes of a liar?”
“…”
It was absolutely insane—grabbing her and kissing her out of nowhere, then asking her to believe me.
And yes, it was insane, but I was certain it would work.
Because this fiancée… was an incurable sucker for good looks.
And Winter Winslet was the most handsome man of the century.
“T-this is really the last time…”
Josefin stepped back, wiping her lips with the back of her hand, her cheeks flushed scarlet.
“I won’t disappoint you.”
And with that final promise, my life expectancy just got an extension.
[Notification]
[Death Flag Cleared]
[Achievement Points Gained]
[Open Achievement Shop? (YES/NO)]
***
After calming Josefin and sending her home, I disbanded the party and was left alone in the empty hall.
I’d driven away the lingering onlookers deliberately—no one needed to see what I was about to do.
To them, it would just look like I was standing around, staring at nothing.
[Winter Winslet]
Strength: D
Endurance: E
Dexterity: A
Wit: B
Intelligence: A
Talents: [Mana S] [Magic A] [Elemental Ice S] [Black Magic B] …(omitted)…
Traits: [True Aristocrat] [Innate Pride] [Lack of Humanity] [Aesthetic Eye] [Always Elegant] [Gourmet] [Obsessive Cleanliness] [Heroic Will] [Glass Cannon] [Prodigal Son] [Archetypal Mage] [Alluring Genes] [Most Handsome Man of the Century] …(omitted)…
Unbalanced stats paired with two S-rank talents—something only a handful of people in this world possessed.
Looking at this broken status screen, I was finally convinced.
I really had fallen into the game.
I was now Winter Winslet, one of the characters in Judgment of Candela.
A game where the player starts as a rookie knight in the Candela Order, solves incidents, rises through the ranks, and eventually becomes a hero of the kingdom.
The Candela Order itself was a secret royal task force, the kingdom’s shadow investigators.
And Winter Winslet?
Not the protagonist. Not even an important supporting character.
A villain.
A big, flashy, unrepentant villain who committed every crime imaginable, blocked the protagonist’s path, and served as one of the worst boss fights depending on the route.
The real question was—why the hell did I end up as him?
…Was this punishment for “client ripping”?
For the record, “client ripping” meant extracting game data through unauthorized methods.
I’d done it, sure, but not for malicious reasons.
I just wanted to peek at an NPC’s code.
The NPC in question, of course, was Winter Winslet.
Ironic, isn’t it?
Where should I even start…
As a hardcore player who had unlocked every element of Judgment of Candela and seen all the endings, there was still one mystery that had haunted me.
Why is Winter Winslet always dead?
He was despised by most players for being a trash human being, but his looks and powerful abilities earned him a cult following.
Given the game’s freedom, many speculated there had to be a secret way to recruit him.
I was one of those believers.
But no matter how many playthroughs I did, I never found a way to make him an ally.
Because he always died.
There wasn’t a single timeline where he survived.
Sure, villains dying was normal.
But Judgment of Candela had branching routes—if you played smart, you could avoid boss fights entirely.
I even did a full run where I never interacted with him once.
In the epilogue, his entire existence was summed up in two lines:
“What about Winter Winslet?”
“He’s dead.”
So yeah, I got obsessed. I finally resorted to client extraction, cracked the encryption, and was about to dig into his data…
But after that, my memory went blank.
Maybe I passed out.
And now here I was—inside the body of a villain with a 100% death rate.
I rubbed my still-stinging cheek. Painful. Very real. This was no longer a game.
Which meant…
I just wanted to go home, wash up, and sleep.
I was exhausted after nearly dying.
It was late at night, too.
But where the hell was Winter Winslet’s house? And how was I supposed to find it?
That was when—
Bang, bang, bang!
Someone pounded on the door.
Before I could answer, the hall doors swung open, and an entire squad of armed soldiers marched in.
They spotted me immediately and approached.
“Are you Baron Winslet?”
“…And you are?”
“We’re the military police. We received a report that you’re in danger.”
“A report?”
For a second, my heart sank—I thought they’d come to arrest me.
But no, someone probably reported Josefin after seeing her waving a sword around.
I waved them off.
“Josefin—or rather, the intruder—has already been dealt with. Go back.”
“That’s impossible, sir.”
“What do you mean?”
“The person we were warned about hasn’t even arrived yet. Kenneth the Twin Flames escaped from prison and is headed here! He’s already burned through three checkpoints and taken down a hundred soldiers!”
“Kenneth the Twin Flames? A prison escapee?”
“Yes! We came to escort you to safety—”
The soldier never finished.
A deafening crash cut him off.
BOOM!
The front doors exploded, showering the hall with debris. Soldiers were thrown aside like broken stalks of wheat.
Through the swirling dust, a silhouette emerged.
“I’ve waited for this day in the murky depths, in pitch-black darkness. For this moment of revenge…”
The man’s filthy, ragged appearance was overshadowed by the murderous fire in his eyes.
Broken chains hung from his wrists, and flames licked at both of his hands.
So that’s why they called him “Twin Flames.”
Before I could finish the thought, the flames grew larger.
No—closer.
Because he’d already thrown them.
“Take this divine punishment for your sins, Winter Winslet!”
[Warning]
[Death Flag Updated]
Day one in this body, and I’d already triggered my second death flag.
As expected of Winter Winslet—the villain with a 100% death rate, collecting fatal crises like it was a hobby.