Roxana
Chapter 5
Chapter 5
The Way to Protect the Female Lead’s Older Brother
Chapter 5
Returning to my room, I was in a terrible mood.
Having confirmed directly from his own lips that the boy locked away in the dungeon was indeed Cassis Pedelian, there was no way I could feel good about it.
Damn it. How am I supposed to survive this crisis?
Of all the places to be born, why did it have to be such a hopeless villain family?
To explain why I cared so deeply about that boy, I have to talk about the novel first.
After all, the future of Agriche—and my own fate—was written in that very book.
In my past life, before dying in a car accident, I read a certain romance novel.
It happened back when a college classmate recommended it, saying it was wildly popular, just before we got swamped with graduation theses.
I never had a habit of reading romance novels.
Yet at that particular time, I happened to be free and utterly bored, so I decided to read the book my friend lent me.
The title was The Flower of Hell.
Yes, as the title implies, it was an angst-ridden, dark romance novel.
With every page I turned, I had to fight the urge to throw the book against the wall.
Because it was an R-19 reverse harem novel where the female lead, Sylvia, engaged in intense abduction-and-confinement romances with multiple male leads.
The world-building of this book was rather unique. Roughly speaking, the five ruling families of Blue, White, Red, Yellow, and Black dominated the world, and Sylvia belonged to the Blue Pedelian.
The story began during the female lead’s girlhood.
Sylvia was a lovely, radiant girl with mystical silver hair touched with blue and brilliant golden eyes like warm sunlight.
Born into a wealthy and harmonious household, she grew up thoroughly loved, wanting for nothing.
She had an older brother, and the bond between the two siblings was exceptionally deep.
Usually, siblings don’t get along all that well, but the brother and sister in this novel were not like that at all.
To exaggerate a little, they cherished and loved each other so fiercely that they would gladly surrender their very organs if the other wished it.
Well, to be honest, when I read that, I merely scoffed, thinking, ’Pure fiction, obviously.’
Anyway, getting back to the point.
The female lead’s tragedy began the day that precious brother of hers suddenly went missing.
At the time, the female lead was fifteen, and her brother was seventeen.
Yes. As you’ve likely guessed by now, that abducted brother of the female lead is none other than Cassis Pedelian, who is currently locked in our basement.
As the heir to Pedelian, one of the ruling families, he had earned the title ‘Young Lord of Blue’ early on and was already participating in official family affairs.
That day, Cassis set out to investigate suspicious movements detected near the border, only to vanish without a trace.
Naturally, the female lead and her family grew desperate to find him.
They had a strong suspicion. It pointed toward the Black Agriche, who had long been at odds with the Blue Pedelian.
No wonder this clan is rotten to the core through and through—they even call themselves the Black Agriche.
It was truly a name that suited my family all too well.
The Pedelian, guardians of justice, and the Agriche, who routinely engaged in despicable acts, could never get along. Moreover, around that time, the head of Pedelian and the head of Agriche had gotten into a major conflict.
So Sylvia’s family believed Agriche was the one who had taken Cassis.
They were right. However, they only had suspicion; no physical evidence ever surfaced.
The Black Agriche stood on equal footing with the Blue Pedelian, so they could not make a reckless move based on mere suspicion alone.
Still, unable to sit idly by, they secretly sent spies infiltrating Agriche, but time and again, they returned only as corpses.
Three years passed like that.
Of course, even by then, Sylvia had not given up on searching for her brother.
Upon turning eighteen, Sylvia resolved to track down her brother’s whereabouts herself.
However, this novel wasn’t an R-19 dark reverse harem for nothing…
The places Sylvia visited to gather information were the other White, Red, and Yellow families, and the male leads residing there were absolute lunatics.
In my view, none of them were in their right minds.
Falling head over heels for the female lead, they each staged their own dramas of kidnapping and confinement.
After finishing the book, I could only think of it as a gathering of madmen.
Even within the Black Agriche, there was a lunatic who fell for Sylvia.
Sylvia ended up getting kidnapped by this lunatic as well.
In a sense, thanks to him, she managed to effortlessly infiltrate the enemy’s den she had so desperately sought to enter without lifting a single finger.
And right here in Agriche, she discovered the horrifying truth: that her brother, Cassis, had died a gruesome death.
Afterward, Sylvia succumbed to darkness, joined hands harmoniously with the other male leads of White, Red, and Yellow who were smitten with her, and utterly destroyed Agriche.
And then they formed a reverse harem and lived happily ever after… or so it would go, if this weren’t a dark novel.
In the end, the female lead Sylvia became the plaything of the other male leads, living caged like a bird—that was the actual plot of The Flower of Hell.
Damn it all.
Sylvia’s fate was one thing, but in this novel, Agriche was completely wiped off the face of the earth.
The Pedelian’s fury was so immense that they slaughtered every last soul of Agriche without leaving a single trace behind.
The male leads of the other families also took the lead in annihilating Agriche to help their beloved Sylvia.
To add one more thing, Roxana Agriche, the person I reincarnated into, was also a villainous supporting character in this novel.
Curious about her role?
It was a rather clichéd character, all things considered…
Under her father’s orders, she attempted to seduce the female lead Sylvia’s men, failed miserably, and was brutally slaughtered alongside the rest of the family on the day of Agriche’s massacre.
“Ah, seriously. Can’t I just reincarnate again…?”
I muttered under my breath, letting out a lament I had lost count of.
Truly, wasn’t this the most fitting end for a villain belonging to a villainous family?
Even so, to slaughter everyone simply for being part of Agriche felt a bit excessive.
Now that I was actually a member of Agriche, this collective responsibility felt rather unfair.
Yet in truth, it was only right to uproot this household the first chance one got.
From living here myself, every single person in this clan was twisted in at least one way or another.
This damned family had a special talent for driving even sane people mad.
If you failed to adapt here, only one ending awaited you.
Disposal.
Treated as a defective product and killed, just like my older brother, Asil.
For a moment, the memory of the day Asil was executed flashed through my mind.
It wasn’t as though the thought of simply running away from this rotten household had never crossed my mind.
Yet even as a promising talent of Agriche, I lacked the confidence to completely evade the watchful eyes of the terrifying monsters crawling all over this family.
Knock, knock.
Just then, the sound of knocking on the door echoed in my ears.
“Lady Roxana. It is Emily.”
“Come in.”
Soon the door opened, and a woman with an expressionless face entered my room.
She was my trusted subordinate, who visited me every day at this exact hour.
Emily carried a tray in her hands. Resting upon it was a glass of water and a twice-folded piece of white paper.
“Report.”
“As you have entered Stage 5 of Netarium immunization, the dosage has been increased by 0.2 perons starting today. It has now reached 4.7 perons, which is a lethal dose. You may experience side effects absent in the previous stage, such as abdominal pain, temporary paralysis, and hemoptysis.”
Nonchalantly, I picked up the paper packet and emptied the white powder into the glass of water.
To someone else’s ears, the explanation might sound chilling, but this was nothing out of the ordinary.
Anyone belonging to Agriche ingested small amounts of poison from a young age to build immunity.
Because the dosage was meticulously measured according to each individual’s tolerance, no one died during this process.
Thus, even if the amount I took today was considered a lethal dose for an ordinary person, there was no danger of actual death.
I had already completed the basic immunization process long ago, but I was currently consuming poison for personal reasons.
“What is Jeremy doing right now?”
“He is in his room.”
When I asked casually before Emily could take the tray and leave, an answer came immediately.
Jeremy was the half-brother who, along with Charlotte, had coveted Cassis Pedelian.
I had been keeping tabs on his whereabouts since yesterday, and I figured it was about time he came looking for me.
“Sana noona!”
Speak of the devil.
The moment Emily opened the door, a resounding shout erupted from just outside. He shoved past Emily and marched right into the room.
The face of a pretty boy with black hair and blue eyes came into view.
He was none other than the villainous second male lead from the novel—the one who kidnapped the female lead to Agriche and ultimately brought about the clan’s ruin, Jeremy.
