The Villainess Turns the Hourglass

[Dilsad]

@MerriLee3s Thanks for clearing that up.

 

[MerriLee3s]

Everyone! Please read what I said below this is just a misunderstanding! An uploader on Mangago dropped it (explicitly stated they weren't going to continue uploading it to the site) and another person was literally BEGGED to pick it up. And also posted it on here.

Here's the convo and the literal begging haha:
http://www.mangago.me/home/mangatopic/6656034/

This is just a misunderstanding, both scanlators are doing a really, really great job and don't deserve to be critiqued in such a mean way. I hope this can be resolved peacefully quickly without feelings or time being hurt.

It's a misunderstanding.

@belindato @doomtc @eightpointfivetails
@xama04

@Dragons33- 'no groups' represents ANY uploader or Scanlator that doesn't belong to an official Scanlating group.

 

[Cyro11]

This manhwa was indeed dropped by a group on mangago but y'all braindead dumbasses think that only mangadex exists.
People need to just stop bitching and just start reading.
If there's any problems the translation teams will work it out between themselves, they don't need children working it out for them by badmouthing the groups involved with this manhwa.

 

[mfrkzm]

Just to clear it up
AFAIK, there isn't any official scanlating group in mangadex, especially not this series, could be wrong with the other series. THIS IS ALL UNOFFICIAL.

Stop spouting nonsense about who's dropping who, seems like yall want an exclusive monopoly on which group doing this? Its a free unofficial translation, stop bitching, if you want to bitch about a grammar or something then point it out, in which line, which page and what's the correct grammar, so the TL can learn from it.

 

[Forfirith]

@Helen_Brite Oh she'll get what she deserves. 😉
Romance bits are very few and in between plot development.

Spoiler

For me, the MC becomes a simp later on, and just turns me off. Let's see how the manga portrays him.

 

[orth0dox]

Boys angry at each other: "Lets break each other's faces and then become best buddies till the end of times".
Girls angry at each other: "I'll pretend to be your BFF just to provoke and manipulate you from the shadows, making you do stupid decisions. I'll build years long schemes to set you up for things you didn't do. I'll take everything from you, poison your family, win over your lover, ruin your live, make you so miserable you'd rather die, and then, when you're on death door, i'll reveal i was behind it all to watch you suffer."
Seriously though, its refreshing to see plot that is different, villainess that isn't just misunderstood, but actually doing something evil for once. But why am I expected to root for MC here? She's trying to dispense vengence to Mielle, but since she's back in time, Mielle didn't even do anything to her yet. So basically Aria behaving exactly like Mielle in her past life, ruining her life out of grudge alone, manipulating kind souls around her for her own benefit, including her best friend Sarah. Trying to win over Oskar, not because she likes him, but because she wants to steal him away from Mielle. And Mielle in this reincarnation is somehow hit with strong autism case, transfroming her from cunning schemer and smarter one of them 2 into complete simpleton. It's not nice to bully autists you know, especially when they didn't do anything to you yet :/
So all in all i'm rooting for Mielle here because she's a true victim of this story (there are implifications here and there that she wasn't even mastermind for all the schemes in her previous life, which makes Mielle even more pitiful). Go-go Mielle, win Oskar back and show this cheating scumbag Aria her place.
P.S. Forgot to mention whole hourglass plot gimmick. Aria is depicted so smart, but she completely fails to use most OP artifact in the world, which is hourglass to her benefit. Instead she uses it to eat more cakes, and lash out on her surrounding and then reverts time... She could obtain so much information with it, disclose her secret suitor's identity so easily, but she completely fails to use it right. At least she managed to cheat herself money in casino with it (srsly, that's how you decide to use it after all?).

 

[RosaPos]

#mfrkzm exactly actually if we ignore all the haters; it is a Good opportunity to recruit a new member ‘cause s/he did an excellently job translating. Instead of saying rude words you should compliment the good job and suggest to join the group if s/he want it and help to release sooner. What we are doing is reading something illegal that it doen’t help the author To continue working. Why not help each other and suggest more freelancer and work together to complete a scanlation. It would be ideal.

 

[Helen_Brite]

@Forfirith

Spoiler

You mean the prince becomes simp? Let me guess: he only has Aria on his mind and stop thinking about anything else. Is this? I truly hope the manhwa makes the right changes to improve the story then.

 

[WarpspeedSCP]

It's ntr... It's just plain ntr... So why am I enjoying this so damn much?!

 

[meijune]

@orth0dox i want to point out a few things here.

first, mielle's wanted to kill aria since she first stepped into house roscente. aria entered when she was like 12, so that means mielle's wanted to commit murder ever since she was 11. horrible thoughts for a child of that age, especially one that's never faced hardship her whole life. it's not even exaggerated, she literally wanted to stab aria and watch her die.

second, i do agree that mielle hasn't done anything bad so far. however, her hate for aria is unfounded. she hated the countess because she took her mother's place. however, aria is neglected by both her mother and the count, and despised by cain and the maids. she doesn't have a reason to hate aria, yet she wants her dead more than the countess. this is obviously a mental issue when aria hadn't even done anything to her. aria only started disliking mielle after mielle bullied her first. she had wanted to be like real sisters with her.
mielle was not autist lmao. she was just a kid who was bright for her age, and therefore called a 'genius' and 'prodigy' by the people who looked up to her status. she was smarter than aria, and that's why aria had looked up to her as well. however, when aria returned, she suddenly discovered that mielle was actually 'stupid'. the reality was that mielle wasn't stupid, she was smart for her age. you can't compare a 25 year old woman to a 13 year old child. it's like asking a middle schooler to pass college exams, then call them autist when they couldn't recognize anything on the test.

i can see why aria wants revenge so bad. being a child on the streets, where your mother doesn't even care for you and left to fend for yourself, suddenly being brought into a noble family who hates you, having to survive in such a hostile environment, being tormented and bullied by the siblings you'd fantasized would love you. then, chasing beauty for attention, finding men who promised you a future, only to abandon you just like your family, being framed for no reason by the girl you looked up to, over and over again, until everyone hates you and wishes you dead, before finally being killed by your brother. then realizing that everything from 14 onwards was caused by the girl who hated you without cause, your own sister, of course you'd want to make her suffer the same harm. because, even at 13, she was someone who'd do anything just to watch aria harmed.

spoilers from the novel below.

Spoiler

aria gains recognition as 'investor A,' a hope for young businesspeople. mielle, overtaken by jealousy, tries to frame aria by pushing the count down the stairs. yes, you heard that right. her father, the one who loves her most and pampered her with everything he had in his life, was used as a chess piece to try to kill aria. the count falls and even when she sees his bloody body at the bottom, her first reaction is to laugh at aria and scream accusations at her. her father never did anything wrong to her. she genuinely tried to murder her father, and she was in shock and disappointed when she heard he was in a coma rather than dead, and even thought of trying to kill him again. she only stopped after realizing that it wouldn't be pinned on aria if he died in coma.

spoilers from the end part of the novel below.

Spoiler

aria is revealed as the crown prince's lover, and with the fall of house roscente, she moves into a new home with her mother. in a scheme, aria rescues cain and mielle from beheading. mielle is brought to aria as a 'guest,' and from mielle's point of view, the girl she tried to murder multiple times is saving her from death. her first reaction isn't "thank you for saving me aria, i'm sorry for everything and i want to repay you by being a loyal servant." her reaction is to mock the maids who laughed at her when she arrived at aria's home covered in dirt, and to use aria's name as investor A and future crown princess as a point of defense and as a way to raise herself above everyone else. she doesn't humble herself in front of aria, like anyone else who'd been rescued by their nemesis. she openly asks aria for revenge against the maids and ways to make them suffer. mielle is unchanging in both timelines. i hope you remember that.

 

[YourTipicalMangaDexAccount]

@forfirith @helen_brite i really cant trust the word simp, they use to describe literal bootlickers to someone who compliments so i dont know what it means here.

Spoiler

Does it mean that he has her as a trusted aide? He believe what she says? That he falls in love and tries to accomplish whatever she says? That he compliments her everytkme they meet, as goodwill or as chasing? I rrally dont know what to think because simp is such a stupid fucking word personally hate it

 

[orth0dox]

Ok, you convinced me. Apparently author decided to make Mielle irredeemably rotten to the core, making it very hard to commiserate with her. I don't know why they can apply "not bad, just misunderstood" trope so well to MC, but every antagonist in every shoujo manga is hopelessly evil for 0 reason, just for the sake of it. It just makes very dull characters that are hardly believable and you can't really relate with any of them.

It is completely unreasonable for Mielle to hate Aria like that right from the get go. Other characters need some development too, you know. If i wanted to make her character believable i would go like this:
First we need to make her love someone strongly. Since she's a kid its naturally should be parent, there is only 1 left, perfect, it should be her dad. She loves him with all her heart, but suddenly this new stepmom appears (of lowly origin to boot). Her dad's attention starts drifting to her new wife, and Mielle strongly rejects this new "mom", believing she's trying to steal the place of her real mom, and worst of all, her daughter, this Aria, is stealing her own spot! She naturally ends up jealous of dad, and since step mom is out of reach being adult, she trying to settle the scores with Aria instead. But every time she bullies Aria, her dad pities her more and starting to give even more attention to Aria, which aggravates Mielle even further, till she hates Aria to the bottom of her heart.
This would be very simple and credible explanation of all the hate going on, but it clearly shown that Mielle doesn't care for her father in a slightest, which is baffling.

Also i would very much prefered to see some battle of wits, with 2 schemers fighting for an upper hand, but both before reincarnation, and after, its one of them completely overpowers other in terms of plotting.

 

[marikonen]

Very refreshing take on the reincarnation trope! Nice to see a villain behave like an actual villain, instead of being portrayed as someone who's a nice person who's just being treated badly by the rest of the world.

I like how pragmatic the MC is, but still clearly prone to making mistakes. I mean, she was a commoner in the past and only really took her education seriously now, so her only advantage is really her acumen and knowledge of the past/future. She also clearly has a chip on her shoulder about being born poor, and I love how the author lets it shape her personality and actions even now.

Mielle is a bit shallow, but it makes sense considering she's supposed to be an ordinary teen girl with slightly above average intelligence, but who's really just getting nudging from her maid. So a battle of wits against Mielle and MC doesn't really make sense.

The manhwa is lovely and I'd recommend it! It's a good take on an overused trope. MC is an underdog, but the author makes it clear that she ISN'T a nice person so the reader gets a little dilemma on whether or not they should actually support the MC. It makes it a tense read, so you just keep wanting to read more. I also love how women are being given roles with power and how the reader can see that MC is struggling under the patriarchal system.

Spoiler

I also love how the author is portraying MC's use of the hourglass! It would have been completely unrealistic to see her use it to gain so much information because it would have been out of character for her. It was nice to see a realistic take on it -- that she would use it indulge in her anger and such! Besides, how much information can she even get even if she asked the right question? She's a 15 (?) year old girl who just became a noble. Why would anyone tell her the truth? Plus, the hourglass is limited to rewinding time to 5 minutes so it's not as if she could conduct a full on interrogation.

Although I question how she would have been able to win that much from a casino without being caught. Someone must have noticed her turning her hourglass or something and a streak like hers would have just been impossible.

Spoiler

I wish there'd be more of Isis (?) though, rather than Mielle already. Mielle is clearly just supposed to be the evil step-sister and it's getting boring at this point.

 

[orth0dox]

@marikonen
ways of using hourglass for information gain i can think of top of my head:

Spoiler

1. Bluff + bruteforce. Just go and say your mysterious suitor something like this: "I uncovered your identity after all, why didn't you tell me you're X?" Then she just tries to guess his identity/role by going all plausible variants and reversing time each time she's wrong. Given how much credit that guy gives to her sharp mind, he won't suspect that she's bluffing and would most likely fall for a trick. And respond something like: "alright, you got me, how did you figure it out"?
2. Bribery without actually spending resources. Just arrange meeting with one of dudes that attend those meetings. And then attempt to bribe him with all the funds she cheated and possibly some stolen wealth from family treasury. She doesn't need to spend them anyway, just give them, get all the information you need and then revert, all that can realistically be made in 5 minutes. In case they don't need money she can promise them whatever and even swear on her royal name, she can revert all that back.

She can then use information she got to blackmail people. Instead she goes and uses it to cheat at casino. Most dangerous way to get money, and most likely to fail. Any casino worth its salt would never be duped like that, as soon as they would notice her winning unreasonable often, first they would change her dealer, and then would suspend her for suspition in cheating (which she does) for further investigation. And she also goes and puts her hourglass in plan view so everyone would naturally assume that it helps her cheat. Highly unlikely scheme. It also has fatal flaw, since time can be reverted only for 5 minutes, if casino suspects her unfair play and say, trail her to home, she won't notice and then window for revert would be over already.

 

[marikonen]

Don't really know how this works, but hello, @orth0dox, thank you for your reply.

Spoiler

1. She already guessed that he was the Crown Prince and told him when they met recently, but he still avoided revealing his true identity and told her to wait instead. True, she can keep trying it but she gets exhausted the more she uses it (to the point where she can even collapse, like when she rushed to meet Oscar; also she seemed to get sleepy early in the story when she was still guessing how the hourglass worked). The hourglass rewinds time, but it doesn't affect the people around her and their choices so even if she keeps looping, there's a chance their replies just stay the same. She also has limited access to information so her capacity to bluff are limited.

E.g. -
Her: "I uncovered your identity after all, why didn't you tell me you're the Prince?"
Asher: Why do you think so?
Her: "The flowers are only grown in the palace"
Asher: "I am a friend of the royal family and get access" or some other lie, if they feel like it. Or they just try to be mysterious and not say anything concrete. The same thing could happen if it's Rain that she talks to.

There's also a limit to how often she can use the hourglass per day and she's worried about it using her life force so she wants to limit her use of it. So she might not want to waste it at questioning someone over and over again. My point is that the hourglass only loops time so she risks getting the same response so for her it might not be worth the cost of using the hourglass.

2. We don't know if she can steal money from her family. She might be reluctant to do so because the staff at their mansion are mostly against her. It would also serve as ammunition for Mielle so she might not want to risk it. A Count is also a relatively low rank, so their family may not be as wealthy as we're made to think. The other people in the meeting circle seem to be nobility too, like the long-haired guy. Also, those people are loyal to the Prince, why risk his ire for an adopted daughter of a Count (though they don't even know her family name) or a newcomer (which is only what they know her as)? What information would she need from them, anyway, when her main goal is still just to ruin her sister and avoid a beheading?.

I agree that the casino cheating was honestly a bit of a stretch, she should have just gone for a one-time big time win, but that has its own risks. But this is set in a medieval society, so who knows how developed their concept of a casino is. It isn't as if they have the technology we have to monitor heartbeats and such.

For me, the hourglass seems just like a convenient tool for her to complete her main goal: screw over her sister and survive. So she only uses it for those things as those are her only priorities. It isn't as if she's aspiring to be the queen (yet?) or even to head their Countdom. She's just hellbent on revenge and is tunnel vision-ing towards that goal, which is why it makes sense for me that she doesn't use it for other things.

Her using it to just eat cake wasn't also a complete waste. She did it so she could fulfill her selfish desire to eat cake, but still look nice to her maids and the others by giving them some. It reminded me a bit of the saying, "you can't eat your cake and have it too," which honestly amused me a bit.

 

[Helen_Brite]

@YourTipicalMangaDexAccount You got there right. If it's like you said, that's not a bad thing.

 

[Helen_Brite]

@Sogno THANK YOU VERY MUCH. <3

 

[Sjadek]

Could anyone tell me what chapter 37/38 correlates to in the novel?

 

[papperless]

My most favorite along with "A Stepmother's Marchen" , we finally see the MC that acts like the title suggest, i just love the gray-area character, not just pure saint. She's not perfect in all her plan as well, like she failed to have Oscar or can't win against Mielle in terms of getting her father's favor and then choose solitude instead.

Well she could be real kind, but against Mielle it seems like impossible, so burn the entire family why not? im looking forward to how this series unfolds.

 

[luxrays]

We are on ch102 of the novel.