ISIWBYA Chapter 23

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Chapter 23 — Maryjun Vahan (メアリージュン・ヴァーハン)



Maryjun froze, unable to answer the unexpected question. It was obvious that her thoughts were not catching up, and she was desperately trying to understand Violette’s question.

Were those who disagreed with her justice considered evil?

“You can’t, right? There are also those who believe in a different justice than you, and for those people… at least they themselves think that they are not wrong.”

The enemy of justice, was a justice in another form.

They were not evil. Both might be correct, and both might also be wrong. No one could decide on which was the best, so everyone could only believe in their own form of justice.

“However, we are different. We are nobles, who have the privilege to decide which sort of justice prevails. And it sounds like you have decided on yours.”

There wasn’t anyone who would ask for a just reason as to why nobles, and the Duke family in this case, deny that justice. 

For Maryjun to shout out loud that the one who was different from her was wrong, how would other people look at it? If her form of justice won, would the loser be considered as evil?

Maryjun was not wrong to fight back. It was necessary for her to clash and understand each other. But that was as long as she knew the important line of handling other people, even in the middle of her anger.

“Please consider it. You have to understand that your speech is accompanied with responsibilities. Think before you act.”

Those responsibilities were what made nobles worthy of their social status.

She shouldn’t forget her responsibilities and obligations, because she was in a position where she could fulfill her wishes and gain even more benefits than ordinary people.

“Broaden your horizons. Compromise, even if just a little. If even that is still unacceptable, just smile on the surface and spit poison inside your heart.”

If Maryjun insisted on forcing her beliefs and concluded that she was not the one in the wrong, then it would be the end for her. By painting  the people who were different from her as the villains, she would end up alone one day.

“You don’t have to love them. Just forgive them enough to allow them to stand in front of you.”

Advancing recklessly would just make her end up being crushed in the future. Being pricked by a beautiful rose was not something that was beautiful to experience.

Maryjun should sharpen her weapons, and be prepared to wield them if it was necessary. This was an essential skill that Maryjun needed to learn in the high society from now on.

“After all, you are now Maryjun Vahan.”

Now that Maryjun carried that name, she couldn’t escape anymore. Her status was like a chain, shackling her behind a gate that she couldn’t escape out of anymore. No matter how much her father loved and protected his little princess, the moment she appeared in the public, she had to cross over to this world by herself.


Violette couldn’t confirm what Maryjun’s expression was, she had been looking down since who knows when. There was no objection or crying after Violette finished her monologue. Maryjun also didn’t rebuke Violette for her unwarranted harsh scoldings.  

Violette finished throwing out everything that she wanted to tell Maryjun. What was left depended upon Maryjun herself.

“…Excuse me.”

If Violette stayed there, she might get in the way of Maryjun’s thoughts. Thinking so, Violette turned away from Maryjun. After she walked for a while, the scenery completely changed back into a bright courtyard which didn’t have much people, just like when she first arrived here.

There were not many people, meaning… there was someone else there.

“Welcome back.”


Yulan leaned against the wall while he waved his hand to Violette. Yulan was laughing cheerfully and his eyes, which were sparkling with the sunlight reflecting upon them, seemed to melt even more sweetly than usual.

Yulan approached Violette with long strides, and he stood in front of her in no time. He touched her hair with his soft and warm hand.

“Your hair is cold.”

“Ah… Maybe it was because I was standing in the shadows of the school.”

Now that she recalled it, because the sun doesn’t reach that place, it made the air a little chilly. Although it wasn’t that cold to drastically changed her body temperature, but hair, which didn’t have nerves or blood vessels, immediately lost its heat.

Yulan’s hand was a little hot. Violette didn’t know how long he had been standing here for, but it should be long enough for the heat to reach the tip of his fingers.

He probably also heard the conversation between the Vahan sisters.

Violette should be more careful, even if this place was not popular, they were still talking in an open place. It’s not like it was Yulan’s responsibility to watch out for other people, and yet…



“…Nothing. What are you doing at this kind of place?”

“I was looking for you, Vio-chan. Let’s go and have our lunch now!”

It seemed like Yulan was aware that Violette realized what he did, but he pretended to play dumb, so Violette just accepted it and contented herself with this situation.

The distance between the two was just like the usual. Yulan’s laughing face was still cute no matter how much he had grown up.

Violette wondered when she realized that Yulan’s steps were always walking alongside her and had always stayed right by her side. It might have been after a long time since Yulan’s height exceeded hers. He was a head taller than her and because the length of their legs were also different, his walking pace was surely faster than Violette’s. Still, everytime Violette looked next to her, Yulan would surely be there.

“There’s not much time left, though… You didn’t eat first?”

“I want to eat with you after all.”

“We didn’t make any promises, right? So you should prioritize yourself and eat your lunch first.”

“Got it, I will make sure I can find you faster next time!”

“That’s not what I meant…”

Violette puffed her cheeks out a little, making her appear defenceless. Perhaps it was because she was just in a place filled with tension, and it might have affected her mind even more than she thought.

Even though there was her younger sister before her who’s from a different mother yet still blood-related, the one who Violette could actually act as an older sister to was a complete stranger, a friend that she treated like her younger brother who could always ease the tension out of her shoulders. It was similar to when Violette was with Marin, the feeling of security was like being wrapped in sea bubbles.

That’s why she didn’t notice it.

A sharp look directed towards Yulan was hidden behind those golden locks.

And Maryjun whose cheeks turned red as she stared at the back of the departing Violette.


✿Consider buying me a coffee?✿


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13 thoughts on “ISIWBYA Chapter 23

  1. Thanks for the chapter! 😘

    Golden locks…….did the novel say that Maryjun had golden hair? Because remembering the manga, she didn’t, only the prince did………gotta get my facts straight before making any conclusions 🤔

  2. I find Yulan a little boring, honestly. He’s very static compared to Vio, Maryjun and the prince. I guess it’s supposed to be the appeal of his character but I hope it doesn’t go like the manga where he’s just always the one scolding people and never reflecting on himself.

    That chapter ending… Is Maryjun jealous of Yulan for having a closer sibling relationship with Vio than herself? That would be a little interesting. Because a sharp look at Yulan and a blush at Vio implies she does understand that Vio is just trying to help her and can appreciate a scolding, but also really wants some acknowledgement and support.

    And thank you for the consistent updates. I read a lot of villainess isekai but this one always stood to out to me for how much Vio’s personality shone through in the narrative. Her sheer lack of hope and inability to believe that anything will get better is not comfortable to read, but is interesting in how well you can get into her head. So it was a shame that the previous translator didn’t have time to do much with the series.

    1. Thanks for the chapter!

      I don’t like Yulan because part of the tragic situation of Violette is that she was all alone. Except for Yulan, whom she mostly forgets about all the time. Which undermines Violette’s character. Having a best friend who is willing to stand up even to the prince for you is not what being all alone is like. I understand that the author is setting him up as a love interest for Violette after she gets over herself, but I would have preferred if it was a different character that hadn’t known her perhaps that took that role, instead of a devoted childhood friend.

      Something else that I can understand the manga skipping is the whole “raised as a boy” bit in the backstory. It doesn’t seem to add much and didn’t leave her with any consequences, so why include it at all? We are told Violette is the very image of femininity, and until the story started (and before her downfall in the first timeline) was looked up to by other ladies of society. You would have expected her to have been more of a tomboy, or at least to secretly be chafing under the need to behave like a girl and having to constantly put up an act. At the very least she should have had calloused hands from the sword training or something. It seems to just be there as something else that she suffered through growing up, but it’s wasted if it doesn’t add anything to the ongoing story.

      Still, the bit I love the most about this story (in a tragic sense that fills me with despair, which is why I read stories like this and “my fiancee is in love with my little sister”) is that the MC has given up on life, and that’s what turns her life around. It’s just such a horrible, hopeless situation. The first time around, being herself and chasing after the things she wanted ended with her being executed. This time around she completely gives up, wanting only to quietly disappear (the title itself says it perfectly), and everyone sees that as a positive change in her. Not saying her personality the first time around was any good, but from the person’s perspective, how horrible would it be to realize that everyone likes you better after you abandon everything you cared about?

      1. I tend to forget the raised as a boy thing because it’s just so irrelevant. It doesn’t even seem to bother her much, so why? I do appreciate the differences between this and the manga as well because both tell different versions of the same story. Vio in the manga doesn’t have nearly the same feeling of despair but on the other hand the rest of the cast is tied much more strongly to everything going on and you can see their opinions changing.

        I could not stand going through that one personally. There’s getting inside the head of an unhappy person and then there’s sheer unrelenting misery porn. I think the difference is that with Vio you get the feeling that she will eventually get her happy ending. I don’t know if it’ll be with Yulan or the prince or whatever, but her life WILL brighten up eventually. With the MC of that one it was just constant nonstop misery that didn’t seem like it would ever end happily.

        I don’t think OG Vio was really a worse person, though, at least not fundamentally. The difference here is that her stress made her lash out there and began a negative spiral. No one wanted to listen because she just seemed like an evil bitch. Now that she isn’t lashing out and being more her normal self people are more willing to approach her and see what she’s actually like and why she’s the way she is. Attacking a girl she never met isn’t her normal state but rather a highly abnormal one. But only Yulan bothered to see and understand that without prompting.

        1. Well, things for the MC in “my fiance” do eventually get better, but I stopped reading at the inflection point temporarily to take a break from it. If it was just pointless suffering I wouldn’t like it, it’s the catharsis at the end that’s the real payout. I haven’t quite gotten to that part, but I was banking on that part being there 🙂 But yeah, it’s painful to go through it. It’s like going to see a horror movie, you wouldn’t normally want to feel scared, but it can be fun to experience it in a safe context (for some people). But that one is misery dialed to 11. This one is more of a 7, and quickly drops off as things start to look better for the MC. The only character (at least from what I’ve seen ahead in the manga) that continues to feed her misery going forwards is the father. Everyone else, even the most hostile ones, seem to take a more ‘wait and see’ approach after her character changes.

          It’s hard to tell about OG Vio since we see so little of her, most of it is left to the imagination. Still, aside from her bullying, there was also her unrelenting pursuit of the prince, which is what turned him off about her in the first place. That was going on for a while before Maryjun entered the picture. I hate the prince in the manga for actually feeling lonely after she stops stalking him, but hating her when she was stalking him. Looking forward to that bit here and how that plays out.

          1. Personally, I get where the prince is coming from. While part of it is probably the not very admirable feeling of losing someone that propped up his ego, I think a lot of it is just that she didn’t show any of her more complex and likable traits to him. He didn’t see that she was well mannered, responsible, possessing of many talents and so on, so he just kind of tuned her out as ‘annoying stalker #16.’ The strong implication is that he’s realizing he never actually hated her, he just didn’t take her seriously and found her kind of annoying. And now this very interesting and capable person suddenly seems to be avoiding him and he doesn’t understand why.

            As for My Fiance, I did hear that things get better eventually, but also that it was wayyy into the story.

      2. I think the “raised as a boy” part, demonstrated how twisted her Mother had become, that she was willing to make her daughter act out her fantasy, who knows the reason, unfortunately for her, she only birthed a daughter…The man she was obsessed with, her husband, thought so little about her that once she was dead his mistress immediately moved in, while Vio was cast aside to make room for his youngest daughter…

        Vio was unloved by her family, Vio was used by her Mother because she looked like her Father, while her Father sees her as an eyesore reminder of her Mother… she was not born from love nor did she grow up loved but craved it nonetheless…

        It’s no wonder the OG Vio turned out like she did… I also think this was how she and Yulan first met… probably while she was pretending to be a boy? from the way Yulan describes Vio… she was very protective of him and loved him like a brother, I can imagine that they had a childhood spent with her looking after him, he was an unwanted child of the King, while she was also unwanted.

        Yulan was a sad lonely boy, palmed off to another family branch, facing all kinds of abuse, then Vio appears, a tomboy who is so kind and gentle to him, giving him a place to be loved and cared for, the original Vio did not seem to be a cruel person at the start, this only developed overtime due to her family situation and her warped sense of what love is, but she did manage to love another person, its sad that she did not realize the truth of her feelings for the Prince at that time…

        I think Yulans story still has to be told, we know so little about him, and the manga really does not clarify anything, only reinforcing that he hates his brother and all that comes with him…

    2. He is static for a reason, because of Vio he limits his movements and actions, They have implied that he is not acting like his usual self, which is to avoid them, but due to this confrontation with Vio vs the Prince, he stepped forward to protect her…

      With this chapter, the Prince gave Yulan freedom to speak his mind, while he was full of accusations towards the Prince, he did, however, give a perspective on the question he was asked.

      If the world encompassed everything related to Vio it would be his paradise, but unfortunately for him it is not… he has to plot this course through troubling waters while supporting the one he loves. Which brings me to the original story, I wonder where Yulan was during this drama that escalated to a point that Vio would attempt murder?

  3. I find Yulan a little boring. He’s very static compared to Maryjun, the prince and Vio.

    The chapter ending… Is Maryjun jealous of Yulan because Vio has a closer sibling bond with him than herself?

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