Lucien Ashborne was supposed to be a nobody — an early-game villain who existed only to be crushed by the protagonist. After provoking the wrong person, he vanished from the story without even a dramatic death scene.

When a player named James dies and wakes up in Lucien’s body, he inherits every bit of the villain’s broken reputation and zero of his privileges. Bullied, scorned, and abandoned by his own noble family, Lucien now stands at the bottom of the academy hierarchy.

To make matters worse, the world he knew as a game has no guaranteed happy ending… and the protagonist’s party treats him like a criminal.

But James isn’t the Lucien they think he is.

With fragments of meta-knowledge, a half-broken system that barely works, and a determination to avoid becoming cannon fodder, he chooses a different path.

He doesn’t seek glory.
He just refuses to disappear.

This is the story of a former villain trying to rewrite his role — not as a hero, but as someone who survives on his own terms.

"I will accompany the Master," Alicia stated.


"I am getting incredibly bored. My joints are getting stiff. If I do not get some action soon, I might accidentally set the house on fire."


I agreed. She had a point. I had been buying her plenty of fire spell books, but she lacked real combat experience. Having her along would be a solid asset.


I opened her status panel to check her current capabilities.


When the glowing blue window popped up in my vision, my jaw practically unhinged.


I stared at the floating text, completely dumbfounded. Internally, I was screaming.


Chapter 168 - The Ashen Labyrinth