I find Resetting Lady utterly captivating. After so many mangas and manhwas exploring the "villainess" / "shoujo isekai" trope, it's getting harder to be surprised, amazed, or even entertained. Here though, I genuinely cannot predict where the story might go. And that fascinates me.
So, what's it about? Resetting your life over and over upon death – oh joy, you can do everything perfectly during your next attempt, you can find new love, you can go against the plot, you can do great deeds! Yeah, well... that elation will probably last half a dozen restarts. A dozen at most.
But Carynne has been doing this for 100 one-year-long loops - 100 lives - each of them ending with a gruesome death that, unfortunately, fails to be her final. What she seeks now is the ultimate end breaking the cycle of restarts.
And, if that's not possible, a few new experiences at least.
She's been a genuinely good person all this time, mostly going along with the novel's plot and receiving her true love as a reward, and she has also been killed by nearly every named character at one point or another. True, taking revenge against them in this life, where they haven't yet done anything wrong, doesn't seem fair... but fairness isn't exactly this accursed world's strong suit.
That's why this time, Carynne decides to be a murderer herself, and if it comes with a few "butterfly effect" plot deviations, maybe it might even help her break out of the loop.
Having a legitimate (and understandably deranged) villainess in a genre that predominantly uses this word to kickstart a deconstruction/redemption plot is ironically refreshing. Carynne has lost all connection to this world and treats it as an impermanent testing polygon, but, as if to offset that, the author gives us many more insights into the supporting characters' viewpoints.
It is so utterly unusual to see the narrative focusing on the characters that are usually treated as stepping stones for the heroine to shine brighter; most of them are morally gray, too, including the rival heroine Isella. And that's what makes them feel much more real than you'd typically expect of a "villainess isekai" that just strings together a bunch of scenes solely for the protagonist to display her intelligence, kindness, or modern sensibilities.
Maybe I'm just hyping myself up. Maybe it's wishful thinking.
But trust me, after reading so many same-ish stories with beautiful heroines with impeccable morals and boundless knowledge, ready to reform yet another fictional world with the power of love and superior Asian cuisine, I, too, feel like I'm finally breaking out of the loop.