Project Necro is an official initiative by Re:Library.

—Who am I? Where is this?

You might think this is some moldy old gag, but right now, I’m dead serious. Totally serious. Like, write it as “serious” and read it as “for real.” Wait, that’s wrong.

No, really. Who am I?
Because inside me—there are two of me.

My name is Yukimura Rina. A corporate slave software engineer in her early thirties.

“Labor Standards Act? What’s that, is it tasty?” That’s the kind of black company I worked at. Day after day I battled absurd spec changes that came flying at me. Every day was a storm of busyness. Getting just three hours of sleep was the norm. In fact, spending the night at the office was standard, so if I actually managed to go home and sleep on a real bed, I’d count myself lucky. Such was my life.

For better or worse, the work itself felt worthwhile. I was the one called in to rescue projects that were “oh crap, we’re not gonna make it,” and my job was to get them done just in time. Nobody praised me, but I thought at least I was being appreciated.
Yeah, in retrospect, they just worked me like a horse. Boo, I’m an idiot. A corporate slave, boo-hoo.

I knew I should’ve switched jobs ages ago, but I got too comfortable being a corporate slave. When I finally thought, “this is bad, I’m way too swamped in work,” I came up with this weird idea:

I’m gonna play Otome Games for refreshment!

Yeah, no, go to sleep, genius. Thinking about it now, I should’ve just rested, even a little.
But I was too overworked to think straight. I picked some random otome game on my smartphone, downloaded it, and started playing it on my commute. And then, I got hooked—in a really weird way.

Trying to capture a prince in a fantasy magic academy setting just made my back crawl. The sweet proposal at the happy ending felt like torture. I’ve always liked action series over romance, even in manga and novels. Why on earth did I think an otome game would be a good idea?
But then, unexpectedly, I found a favorite.

Apparently, villainesses were a staple of otome games, and the game I randomly picked even got one. Well, to be fair, the whole game was pretty trope heavy. It’s a Fantasy Magic Academy and your main capture target is the Prince, go figure. Actually, I think it’s an “Imperial Prince.”
The slightly unusual thing (I think) was that the villainess had a brother stuck to her.

Looks-wise, he’s exactly my type. More than the imperial prince, more than any other capture character—he was dead center of my strike zone. Light blue hair, light blue eyes, ice magic. Super handsome but with a sharp mean gaze, expressionless and cold. He even wore a monocle, looking super smart. And in fact, his setting was: top of his class, a genius, and ruthlessly cool.
And he was a Duke. Not an heir—already a duke. Even though he was still a student at the magic academy, his father had died young and he’d inherited the title at seventeen.
Though honestly, he looked like he was in his twenties. He’s old-looking…no, I mean, mature-looking.

And let me tell you, this guy! He spoiled the villainess rotten!
All his lines were him doting on his sister!

*“You are more beautiful than anyone, my sister. You alone are fit to be Empress.”*
*“I will stake all of this ducal house to fulfill your wishes, my jewel.”*
*“To make you sad would be a crime even God cannot forgive. Even if he is the prince, I will not permit it!”*

He was a minor side character, so the one behind him was probably not a famous voice actor, but his voice was low and really good. And all he did was pamper his sister. Where did that “ruthless and cool” go? You’re such a siscon, Onii-chan. LMAO.

But honestly, the sister seemed like a total airhead. She kept harassing the heroine and making off-target appeals to the imperial prince—why did she think that would make him fall for you? She poured ridiculous money into dresses so extravagant you couldn’t even see her face. What, is she Lady Gaga at the Met Gala?

And yet, the brother spared no expense on her dresses. When her harassment plans failed, he’d say, “Forgive me, this was my failure,” taking the blame on himself. Dude, you only found out afterward. Make her take responsibility herself. Isn’t that what they call “gentle abuse”?

So I kept mentally quipping at them, stifling my laughter, and watching the villain siblings warmly as I played, cornering them step by step. Uhh, sorry imperial prince, I know you’re the main target and all but you just had become irrelevant to me. And then I reached the condemnation event; The sister’s plot to kill the heroine was exposed, and the siblings were stripped of their title, their house dissolved, their assets seized—they were cast down to commoners.

And even then, the brother, though stunned, held his crying sister in his arms.

It should’ve been refreshing to see evil purged, this is just heartbreaking. He wasn’t scheming to make her Empress to grab power—he was just a doting brother who adored his sister. Mature-looking or not, he really was just a seventeen-year-old boy.

I finished the game to the end after that, but honestly it was mostly painful.

Maybe it was because I worked unappreciated labors in a black company with nobody to ever accept me for who I am. Watching this slightly unhinged older brother completely affirming his little sister no matter what, though maybe overdoing it sometimes, was strangely soothing.

I wish he’d been a capture target. But even after I searched online, there was no hidden route—you couldn’t capture the brother. So after finishing the main character once, I just kept replaying the same route to watch the little moments where the brother would say something next to his sister.

…I’ll say it again. Just go to sleep, me.
Then again, I just couldn’t fall asleep by that point. Maybe it’s stress, with a side of depression. And escapism as the cherry on top.
So I lay down on my bed at home, unable to sleep, kept playing the game—my hands started trembling, I couldn’t operate my phone anymore, and then everything went black.
I probably died then. Ding-dong!

…What an utter idiot.