I Became A Framed Villain – Chapter 5

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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Vine
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The day after I was barely rescued by Dice from the intense initiation I experienced as soon as I opened my eyes.

Having recovered enough to get out of bed and move around, I decided to introduce myself to the executives who had returned to their respective rooms.

“If anything happens, I’ll step in, so shout loudly.”

“…If anything happens?”

“Just kidding. I gave them a good talking to yesterday, so nothing should happen.”

Dice’s meaningful expression as she sat on the lobby sofa made me slightly uneasy, but I couldn’t avoid meeting the people I would be working with.

“You know that the executives of our Dominating Hands are assigned positions based on the suits of playing cards, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then, go to the ‘Heart’ room closest to you first. Don’t get eaten, okay?”

“…?”

So, with Dice’s recommendation, the first executive I visited was the third-in-command, ‘Heart.’

“Oh my, hello.”

“Hello…”

Villain name: Twin Sister.

With a rather mature image, according to my information, she was the ‘Fallen Nun’ who caused a large-scale riot in the Vatican.

“Come inside.”

And that information seemed to be correct.

Because behind her, smiling and inviting me in, were quite a few suggestive devices.

“Oh my, just a moment.”

Seeing my stunned look, she turned around, her eyes widening, and closed the door.

“…Hehehe, please pretend you didn’t see that.”

And when she opened the door again a moment later, the previous scene was nowhere to be seen.

All that was there was a Bible and a computer.

“Are you… broadcasting?”

“Yes, I do religious broadcasts. Since I’m the leader of a religion.”

The YouTube Silver Play Button on her desk shimmered.

“As Pandora recommended, I tried internet broadcasting? and the number of people following my teachings has increased. There are also many strange people who send numbers? while using words I don’t understand…”

‘…Streamer?’

I couldn’t shake the feeling that she was misunderstanding something, but I buried the thought, knowing it would only lead to trouble if I pursued it.

“Um, anyway… It’s nice to meet you. I’m…”

“Excuse me.”

Just as I sat down on the chair she pulled out and was about to introduce myself, she suddenly leaned in close.

Her face is too close, I can feel her breath.

Do villains here have no sense of caution, like Paradise?

“You’re rather cute, aren’t you?”

“Huh?”

As I averted my gaze and scratched my head, she stared at me and suddenly smacked her lips.

“Do you have any dating experience?”

“…?”

“I guess not? You seem quite inexperienced.”

Then, she started stroking my hair.

“Why are you hiding your right eye with your hair?”

“…My right eye has been sensitive to external stimuli since I was young, so I usually cover it.”

“Oh dear, how pitiful.”

Her voice suddenly sounded gentle.

“I’m the same way, sensitive to stimulation.”

Come to think of it, I feel like a strange scent has been spreading through the room.

Is it just me?

“Um… that’s strange…”

After having my hair stroked for a while, Heart, who was smiling, muttered with a slightly puzzled expression.

“It should be working by now.”

“Um… never mind.”

I tried to explain to her, but stopped.

That mental abilities didn’t work on me.

Because of the nature of my ability, I had never struggled against mental abilities.

By the way, what was she trying to do to me?

“Say, do you feel any different?”

“Um, I feel a little warmer…?”

“Hehehe… is that so?”

I couldn’t figure out her intentions, but since I wasn’t particularly harmed, I sat still, and Heart, who was staring at me intently, whispered in a low voice.

“Say, I have a favor to ask.”

“A favor?”

“Hypnotize me, please.”

Hypnotize her? What was she talking about?

“I’ve been having severe insomnia lately.”

Heart said so, gently holding my hand and whispering.

“So, I think I need a slight alteration of common sense…”

Aha, so that’s what it was.

Then I’m the expert.

“Now, look here.”

“…Okay.”

I took out my smartphone from my pocket and showed it to her, and she focused on the screen with an expectant expression.

“Slowly… slowly… just drift away.”

“…”

Thus, she was instantly hypnotized.

‘…What?’

I was honestly a little surprised.

Actually, my hypnosis isn’t foolproof.

To hypnotize someone,

I need to know a certain amount about them.

It’s only natural.

Hypnosis isn’t forced, like it’s often depicted in the media; it requires interaction with the other person.

Even during the last incident, such a large-scale hypnosis would have been impossible if I hadn’t used ‘Insight’ to learn about the guards beforehand.

“Excuse me.”

“…”

“Heart?”

“…”

Therefore, if I don’t know anything about the other person, there’s only one way to hypnotize them.

The other person has to willingly want to be hypnotized.

“…Strange person.”

Naturally, such people are extremely rare.

It’s about completely giving up your mind, shouldn’t there be at least some resistance?

But this person has absolutely no resistance.

How peculiar.

‘Well, it works for me.’

I looked at Heart with a slightly puzzled look and then scratched my head, starting to operate my phone.

“Fatigue initialization, deep sleep, muscle relaxation… and if I adjust the sensitivity to this level…”

Because Paradise and Pandora had consulted the wrong materials, the hypnosis app only had all sorts of bizarre options.

“Okay, with this, you’ll be in top condition within a few days.”

However, after repeated trial and error, I succeeded in combining various options to create a suggestion specializing in ‘fatigue recovery.’

– *Snap!*

“Heart, it’s done.”

Snapping my fingers to end the hypnosis, I started explaining to her with a confident expression.

“…Ah, this is driving me crazy.”

Then, Heart started muttering with dead eyes.

“Hypnosis for… fatigue recovery? Is he insane?”

“…Huh?”

“I even sprayed aphrodisiac just in case… and he still didn’t make a move? Why? How…”

What was I hearing right now?

‘This is so different from yesterday.’

Yesterday, when she visited me with the other executives, she looked more like a ‘nun’ than a ‘fallen nun,’ with a pious demeanor.

With a calm expression and tone, she spoke softly about her teachings, even resembling a devout church sister.

“Is he… impotent?”

But why was she so different now?

“Say, are you…”

As I was staring at Heart, who was rambling on with dirty jokes, feeling the huge gap,

“Don’t have anything down…”

“Heart?”

I was startled and jumped up when she suddenly lost consciousness with her head down.

“Um, are you alright?”

I hypnotized her with a ‘deep sleep’ suggestion so that she wouldn’t wake up easily, but I didn’t hypnotize her to suddenly faint like this.

Was it a side effect of the hypnosis?

Then it’s a big problem.

“…Ugh.”

Just as I was about to help Heart up, filled with worry, she suddenly opened her eyes wide and sat up as well.

“I-I’m so sorry.”

“Huh?”

“I apologize. I’m truly sorry…”

Then, she suddenly started bowing to me.

“As someone who serves God, to dare try to seduce a man…”

“Uh, um.”

“Please forgive my transgression…”

“What’s going on?”

I asked, blinking my eyes, unable to understand what was happening.

“Ah, well…”

Only after hearing her explanation, spoken with a downcast expression, did I understand everything.

“…I have Dissociative Identity Disorder.”

“Aha.”

She had multiple personalities.

‘There was a reason her villain name was Twin Sister…’

“Eek!”

Just as I understood the meaning of her villain name and nodded, Heart noticed something and darted off somewhere.

“T-then… see you next time…”

Then, she quickly shoved the Silver Play Button on her desk into a drawer and glanced at me.

“…”

I decided to pretend I didn’t see the suggestive devices from when I entered the room.

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The executive I visited after Heart was the fourth-in-command, Pandora, in charge of ‘Club.’

> Sup?

As soon as I entered her room, filled with countless computers and monitors, she sent me a message on my smartphone.

> Hey.

> Hey you.

Honestly, I thought introducing myself to her would be the most difficult.

The top hacker of the generation, also known as the Master of the Network, who always communicated through text and whose voice I had never heard, looked even younger than the academy students.

Sleepy eyes, a face half-buried in her clothes, always frizzy hair.

Despite all that, she had stunning beauty, enough to gain a fanbase even as a villain, if her face were ever revealed.

All of these factors combined created a cold, aloof aura that made it difficult to approach her.

> Help me.

“Huh?”

However, I was mistaken.

> This is hell.

“Hell?”

> Everyone here lives in the real world. Shouldn’t people use the internet and browse online communities?

Pandora, the top hacker of the generation, even known as the Master of the Network, was

“Don’t you get along with the others?”

> Heart and Spade scare me, I don’t know what they’re thinking. Diamond Gramps keeps trying to make me exercise. He’s my nemesis.

“…What about Dice?”

> She at least talks to me. But she’s such a social butterfly, we’re not on the same wavelength.

…a hardcore introvert thrown into a group of social butterflies.

> Hey, do you play any games? Do you watch anime? Do you know how to program?

“Uh, well…”

> Or do you at least visit the Hero Minor Gallery? Please tell me you do at least one of these.

At her desperate questions, practically dripping with earnestness despite being typed, I cautiously shifted my gaze towards her.

Then I saw her, her fingers fidgeting with anticipation and worry.

> Don’t lie. I don’t want to be fooled by the social butterflies’ games anymore…

“Um, well…”

I couldn’t betray her like that.

“I know a little bit of… programming.”

“…”

Pandora’s eyes widened slightly.

“I play games too.”

Pandora’s eyes widened further.

“Anime… um… I don’t watch…”

I told her the truth, thinking it wouldn’t be right to include the children’s anime I watched when I was younger.

“…”

Then, Pandora’s eyes wavered slightly.

“…H-Hero Minor Gallery? I visit that.”

Her message about not wanting to be fooled by the social butterflies’ games flashed before my eyes, but seeing her eyes, I couldn’t help but lie.

> Heyyy.

“Huh?”

After finishing the Q&A, she sent me a chat message, making a typo from being so nervous that her hands were shaking.

> Wanna be friends?

And so, I made my first friend after becoming a villain.

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“Ah, boy! You’ve come!”

“Hello. Um, Diamond?”

“Haha! Just call me Gramps!”

After being finally released from Pandora’s room after listening to her complaints for a while, I headed to the room of the second-in-command, ‘Diamond.’

“Now, let’s start by checking your weight.”

I knew this old man’s information well, with his muscles and bald head, as he was quite famous.

His former villain name was Boogeyman. Once a respected top hero, now a serial kidnapper targeting only ‘children.’

“U-ugh…”

“P-please spare me… I won’t do it again…”

“H-help…”

Seeing the corner of the room, filled with exercise equipment, piled with bloodied people, the information seemed to be accurate.

“Huh huh, haven’t I explained my ability yet?”

Gramps, who lifted me onto the scale and recorded my weight and height on a sheet, chuckled and started talking.

“My ability is to turn trash into trees.”

Glancing at my weight and height, he cracked his knuckles after recording them and started walking towards the bloodied people.

“That’s a little different from the ability I know.”

“Hmm, is that so?”

What was going on?

As far as I knew, the concept residing within him was the concept of ‘Muscle.’

Since his past as a former top hero was so clear, he was the one with the clearest information even within the shrouded Dominating Hands.

Could it be that, like me, he was also hiding his ability?

“Now, watch closely.”

Lost in thought, Gramps picked up one of the bloodied people and spoke to me in a low voice.

“This one has been using his unreported concept for theft. Mainly targeting elderly people living alone and orphans with lax security.”

“F-forgive me…”

“Those over there ganged up on a powerless person and drove him to suicide.”

“Ugh!”

“The one at the bottom sexually assaulted three female students with his ability.”

Saying so, Gramps punched the guy he was holding in the stomach.

“There are still plenty of juvenile delinquents to turn into trees!”

“Ugh…”

“Thanks to advancements in science, even people in vegetative states can be revived these days! Hahaha…”

It seemed his ability really was to turn ‘trash’ into ‘trees.’

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“Ha… ha…”

Around the time Kang Haneul was rummaging through the airship.

[Test Complete: 10.52 seconds]

“…Tsk.”

Spade, the first-in-command, who had destroyed all one hundred dummies in the training ground with her yo-yo, frowned slightly at the record displayed on the screen.

“Your record is quite slow today.”

“…?”

“Is something bothering you?”

Dice appeared behind her and asked with a smile.

“…I told you not to appear behind me suddenly.”

“Sorry, but I really wanted to see you surprised just once.”

Spade, who had been on guard with her yo-yo tightly gripped, sighed and walked forward at her words.

“Kang Haneul will be coming to greet you soon, are you sure you’re in the right state for that?”

“What does it matter?”

“You’re covered in sweat.”

Hearing that, she sighed and started taking off her sweat-soaked vest.

“…I still don’t acknowledge him.”

Spade, revealing her body covered in scars that contrasted with her fair skin, muttered with a glint of murder in her eyes.

“An executive without even taking the entrance test? His qualifications haven’t been verified yet.”

“…”

“And for some reason, there was no rampage during his Villainization.”

“That’s…”

“And the strangest thing is you, Paradise.”

Hearing that, Dice scratched her head quietly.

“You weren’t hypnotized, were you?”

“I told you, I wasn’t.”

Then, she muttered with a slightly distant look in her eyes.

“…We just had a connection in the past, a long, long time ago.”

Spade continued to stare at her with a dissatisfied expression.

“Are you going to tell him all the secrets of our organization too?”

“After his first mission tomorrow.”

At her question, Dice answered in a serious voice, wiping the smile off her face.

“That will be his entrance test and qualification assessment.”

“…”

At those words, Spade stared at Dice quietly, unable to argue further.

“Honestly…”

– *Creak…!*

“Excuse me.”

Just as she sighed and was about to head to the shower room,

“I came to say hello…”

…Kang Haneul burst through the training room door.

“…Ah?”

A brief silence ensued.

“…Fuck.”

Spade, belatedly covering herself, took out her yo-yo with a cold expression.

“I’m going to kill you.”

“…Why? We’re both guys.”

Kang Haneul, glancing at Spade, muttered with a puzzled expression.

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