Title: My Villainess Little Sister Is Just Too Cute

Summary: Curse my inability to abandon my little sister, even if she was the villainess.

I bleary took in my surroundings. Everything felt as though it was on fire and my body ached terribly.

It was to be expected though. I had taken poor care of myself in lieu of finishing that stupid Otome game. The fall down the stairs likely did my bodies no favors.

I noticed a pitcher of water next to me and tried to grab a drink of water. I grimaced as I realized I was too weak to do such a simple task.

"Gil, you're awake!" a happy, but worried, voice rang.

Gilbert? Who was... Oh right. My name was Gil... Wait, that wasn't right. What was my name again? It was... Gilbert. My head began to pound harder as the confusion got to me.

"Gil?" the woman asked hesitantly.

"Mom?" I croaked instinctively.

Mother? Taking a look towards the voice, I saw a blonde pregnant woman. Even though my vision was weak, I recognized the woman who had taken care of me for as long as I can remember...

What's happening to me? Why was my mind clouded with all of these memories that weren't mine? It's as though I had two sets, but why would I have these memories of a child? Or alternatively, was it that the child had my memories?

Regardless, I needed to parse through them to figure out what was going on.

"Yes, dear?" she urged gently as my silence must have scared her.

"You shouldn't be here. You might get sick," I said slowly as I took the time to figure out the strongest details that stuck to me.

"It's a mother's duty to look after her children when they are sick," she said with a laugh.

"And what about Angie?" I said while looking at her belly.

"Such concern for your little sister already? She'll be so lucky to have such a thoughtful brother."

"Mmm," I said weakly as I felt overwhelmingly tired.

It was not long before I fell asleep again.

It took a few days to recover enough to get out of bed. During that time I had a lot of free time to assess my situation. I, or my body, was Gilbert Rapha Redgrave, the heir of the Redgrave Duchy.

What's more, I was Angelica Rapha Redgrave's brother. The true significance of this was that I was the elder brother of the villainess to that accursed Otome game. Even in death, it haunted me.

How cruel this game was. One would normally think being born of such high rank would be a boon, but I knew the inevitable fate of the Redgraves. We all died. The only exception to the rule was if the protagonist got hitched, and even then, it was only Angelica who would be spared... only to be forced to wed an ugly baron on the frontier.

Somehow I felt death would have been preferable to her. Knowing who this game catered to, I had no doubt the husband would follow all the worst tropes for ugly bastards. The shitty game even tied her to the guy regardless of the route. She literally would be tossed aside even if the protagonist did not pursue Julius.

I sighed in frustration. What a shitty hand I've been dealt. The question was whether...

Oh, it looks like remnants of Gilbert still existed in me. The thought of leaving Angelica to the wolves rankled my senses. But those were the emotions of a child. Well, it still rankled my senses as an adult since I was sacrificing a child. But as an adult, I knew it was one family against the lives of the entire Kingdom.

The pit in my stomach grew again. I suppose imagining my current blood family dying was worse. But alas, it was fated to be in every route.

I tried to kill my childish emotions by reminding myself how cruel Angelica could be towards the protagonist. I tried to remind myself how terrible the parents must have been to condone such vile pettiness. The only recourse to me was to look out for myself.

As I was lost in thought, I felt someone fretting over me.

"Gil?! Why are you crying," Mom said desperately as she tried to get me to calm down.

I couldn't convince myself that my parents were cruel. I had too many memories to convince me otherwise.

Mom had gotten sick. I blamed myself. Part of me had a feeling that I was the cause. She tried to assure me that she had fallen weak when she had me, but I was sure that she caught whatever caused me to be sick.

The helps' gossip needled the back of my mind. Dad's also seemed to act... subdued around me. Everyone knew it was my fault. Only Mom denied it, and she only did so because I was her son.

She was unconvincing. As I sat next to her, she often talked on and on how I would be such a good older brother to Angelica. She never mentioned doing anything with her herself though.

I stared at the swaddled baby sleeping peacefully. The room felt so empty. Mom should have been here , either to sleep next to her daughter or to coo over her. Instead, she was no longer with us.

Dad should have been here to gaze upon his daughter. He should've been happy for the life brought into this world. Instead, he was locked in a room with the dead.

Gilbert should've been here to stare in awe at the miracle of life. His precious baby sister was born. Instead, a ghost from a bygone era was all that remained to stare in despair for his hand at tearing apart the family.

To think the girl who was supposed to have it all truly had nothing, and even with such a start, she was to end up with less in the end.

After a few hours, she began to cry. Without a thought, I picked her up and held her close to me. It didn't take her long to settle down.

The only thought that went through my head was that she deserved to have some happiness, no matter how small it was.

"Cordelia, where is Father?"

"He is preoccupied with running the territory, My Lord," she said apologetically.

I sighed. Another excuse. It was one thing to treat me coldly at a distance. It was another thing to treat Angie similarly. I could sympathize with the fact that the woman he loved died, but to take it out on the baby was wrong.

As it stood, I had a more influential impact on her life than Father did. Her first words were Gil. As it was, I was playing the role of both brother and father.

Eyeing the maid, I was relieved there was someone else who took care of Angie as though she were her daughter. I was more glad that she was the one maid who had not deemed me as the one responsible for Mom's death. As much as I knew it to be true, I also needed a respite from such accusations.

"My Lord?" she queried.

"You know you can call me Gil."

"I can't possibly," she stammered cutely.

"Gil!" Angie chanted when she heard my name. It looks like she had woken up from her nap.

"Yes, yes," I chuckled as I picked her up.

I sighed as I received the results from my latest round of examinations. I had scored perfectly, but it brought me no joy. As silly as it was, the childish side of me wanted to be praised. It was praise that would never come. It didn't come in the last five years.

At best, the only words I heard were, "As expected."

Part of me wondered if this was the result of Dad's cold attitude bleeding into others, my generally growing feelings of apathy, or something all talented individuals underwent. I certainly knew actual talented people, and I recalled saying similar words at some point.

As I wandered back towards my room, I saw Angie pouting. That's right, her evaluations were scheduled at the same time as me. Judging from her reaction and posture, she had not scored as well as she would have liked.

"I take it that you didn't do well," I said gently.

She only shook her head in response. I heard a crinkling sound. Looking more closely at her hand, I saw a letter grade. She was crying over an A-. Good grief.

"An A-? That's quite good," I mused.

"Not good enough," she pouted.

"Not good enough?"

"I wanted to eat ice cream with you."

Ah, right. I did promise that, but I didn't recall specifying she needed such a high score.

"An A- is good though."

"But you always get perfect scores," she whimpered.

I stilled at that. She had used me as a standard to compare herself to. I had never had that happen before. In my previous life, my little sister was the talented and beloved child while I was the afterthought. It made me just wrap my arms around her.

"Gil?"

"You did good you know. You should be proud of how well you did," I said.

"Really?"

"Yes, and as a reward, how about we get that ice cream."

"... But I didn't get a perfect score," she whined.

Her pride was cute.

"Then how about we look over what you got wrong? That way, you can learn the correct answer and get that perfect score next time. Then we can go get ice cream after studying."

"Really?"

"Of course, Angie."

I was supposed to be practicing my etiquette skills, but Angie barged in to play tea party with me. Truth be told, I was rather thankful for her presence. Practicing alone was weird, and I had enough vultures vying for my attention for the purpose of drawing an offer of an engagement. The very thought that these children were trying to squeeze out a marriage from a preteen was disturbing.

"Why would anyone want to drink hot leaf juice," Angie asked while sticking out her tongue.

I laughed at that. Hot leaf juice was an adequate description for my skill level.

"Apologies, Princess. My meager skills can't draw out the true value of these leaves."

And how expensive those leaves were.

"You're not good at brewing tea, Gil?"

"It is my greatest weakness. I guess I never had a truly good pot before. If only I knew what I was striving for," I said jest-fully.

"Isn't that a problem for you? Cordelia said that men were supposed to be experts in this matter."

"It is what it is."

Angie took on a determined look before asking me to teach her what I knew. With a shrug, I went over the steps. Embarrassingly, I was unable to explain why certain things were done the way they were.

I stared at the steaming cup before me. Looking up, I saw Angie stare at me expectantly. She had brewed me a pot of tea.

Without much fanfare, I sipped on her tea. Then I took another, and another. Before I knew it, I had drunk the whole thing. I looked at my cup in confusion.

She quickly poured me another cup.

"This is a quite good," I said as I began to drink again.

She had the cutest smile and giggle as she began to excitedly explain how she brewed the leaves.

My tutors commented on my improvement soon after.

"Gil? How come your explanation for magic is so different than what the tutor tells me?" Angie asked me as she sat on a barrel to watch me blow up targets at a distance.

"Because he's wrong," I said as I turned a steel cube into an orange glowing mass.

"But he consulted another tutor and a book. None of them match what you said."

"Did they take points off your exam?"

"Yes," she pouted.

"Do you blame me?"

"No, I'm just wondering why everyone stupidly doesn't agree with you."

"You know I could be wrong."

"But you're never wrong," she pouted.

"I am from time to time."

"Nuh-uh."

"Cute... but I am right in this case. I'll go fix that score up for you."

I stared angrily at the many drafts for the new magical text to be taught. It was only a half point on Angie's exam and now I had to rewrite the curriculum as the only expert in the methodology.

I sighed as I recalled how overjoyed she was seeing the correction. Remember, who I was doing this for.

I gave Dad a dead look. It's been years since he deigned to properly sit down and talk, and he chose to drop the bombshell that he was in talks with other families to find me a partner. He didn't sit me down to ask for my preferences or my opinion. It was a simple statement, and we were only sitting down to talk so that he may answer any questions I had.

Instead of asking him anything pertaining to my future fiancée, I asked something else more important.

"Have you talked to Angie yet?"

It was obvious that I wasn't referring to the idea of him making sure Angie was okay with the idea. He had been a shitty dad to both of us. The only reason why Angie didn't cry out for him was because she didn't realize she didn't have a real father.

Rather than answer me, he scoffed at me and sent me away.

I perused the many dossiers collected of potential women. Apparently, rewriting magical doctrine had drawn in more interest than expected, and Dad could not legitimately filter out so many requests without stepping on toes.

As I sipped on Angie's tea, I eyed my sister using a red pen(she had recently graduated from crayons and pencils) to cross out the pictures of the women on the dossiers that I had looked over and handed to her.

Obviously, every girl I had handed to her was rejected. No one was good enough for her big brother as she said.

Though I suppose I didn't help the matter since I really only handed her the documents which I was already considering rejecting. The girls I would at least entertain were kept away lest Angie just rejects everyone wholesale.

Cordelia just giggled as she watched Angie try to keep her brother all to herself.

"How was she?" both Cordelia and I asked each other.

"Angie was rather belligerent and locked herself in her room," Cordelia said with a sigh.

"Sounds about right. Glad I picked up some sweets from the food stalls."

"You shouldn't be giving her such things. What will happen if she likes them too much and tries to sneak out to the capital to buy some more?"

"That's silly. She'll beg me to take her out, and I'll just go out with her on an inspection and sample the local goods. It is our duty to ensure that what there is to offer is of the finest quality," I said as I pressed a hand over my heart.

"... You are a bad influence on Angie," Cordelia said with a light chuckle.

"I'd like to think we are supporting and promoting the businesses that we tax."

"Oh stop you."

"But nothing I said was false."

"In any case, I believe I asked you how your wife hunting is going," Cordelia said with a worried expression.

"Better than the last, but complete disinterest isn't much better than blatant greed," I said as my shoulders sagged. She had been one of those nobles that simply went through the movements. It was like talking to a puppet. To think Angie was supposed to be raised to be like her, though unsuccessfully so far.

It was still a far cry better than what lower nobles underwent.

"A dog collar," I asked with an unamused expression towards the disinterested girl.

I didn't know why I even entertained this one. She was noted to have broken a few boys.

Oh right, Dad had put his foot down on this one. He had not taken kindly to my dawdling and picked someone from a family he would much rather prefer to have as an ally rather than neutral.

Considering whatever this was, Dad never had a chance. This was plain disrespect.

Well if this was a bust anyways, I saw no harm in venting my own frustrations.

"I think this collar looks much better on you, Bitch."

I got engaged with a girl who was a little too familiar with BDSM. I feel unclean. At least there was no signed official documentation. Only a draft was written up and set to be signed when she entered the Academy. For some odd reason, this was the only thing Dad compromised with me on.

I sighed as I wandered the garden. Angie had been particularly unhappy with me when she found out I would be marrying Dorothea. As a result, she had been avoiding me during her débutante party.

It was something inevitable, given how zealously she occupied my time. Perhaps it was for the best it happened now. She was supposed to meet the other nobles her age at this party... even if I disagreed with the notion that these parties were meant to scout out potential marriage partners.

Now if only I could find Cordelia. It would be nice to talk with someone I didn't need to put up pretenses. But like Angie, I had not seen hide nor hair of her all day.

"Cordelia, what's up with Angie?" I asked as I saw my sister sigh longingly.

"She found her Prince Charming," Cordelia giggled.

Fuuuuuck. That little ingrate was going to break her heart and...

I totally forgot about that.

AN:

1) After writing Leon reincarnating as Olivia, I asked myself who else he could reincarnate as. Then I saw The Coffin of Andy and Leyley pop up on YouTube recently. Obviously this is not a horror thing, but it's how I came up with this.

2) I really wouldn't know where to go with this since this could go in any direction tbh.

3) If I were to make this a full story, I would probably have to rewrite it significantly to focus more about Gilbert coming to terms about his belief that he is responsible for his mother's death. Sounds more compelling than making the story focus on Gilbert either fixing or maintaining the game's plot.

4) Also, did the novel give any official age for Gilbert? I just set a five year difference arbitrarily.