Chapter 4

I hate bullying.

Well, I guess there aren’t many people who actually like it, anyway.

In my previous life, I grew up in a quiet countryside town where bullying was practically nonexistent, and every school I went to was peaceful. After I was reborn, I didn’t attend kindergarten because I was already signed with a child acting agency. Even on weekdays, I had work, and honestly, spending time at the agency taking lessons was way better than playing around in kindergarten.

That’s why, by the time I became a popular child actress, I didn’t think going to elementary school would be much of a problem — even if I was someone who appeared in dramas and TV shows and was now attending school alongside normal kids.

But from the very first day, I always had a line of people following me around in the morning, even though we didn’t have group walks to school. During breaks, I’d get surrounded by girls, endlessly pestered to talk about filming and the entertainment industry, begged for my co-stars’ autographs, and even dragged into ridiculous arguments over who got to call themselves my “best friend.” Apparently, I was expected to play judge and decide which one of them deserved the title.

The boys, on the other hand, rarely joined my little entourage, but they constantly messed with me instead. Well, they were just lower-grade elementary school boys — basically all idiots. I used to be one of those idiots in my previous life too, always doing dumb stuff and getting scolded by my parents.

But still, I’d really appreciate it if they didn’t make me their target. I can’t even count how many times they flipped my skirt. In the end, I started wearing spats under my uniform for protection. …Or, wait, do people call them leggings nowadays?

Anyway, back then, it didn’t really bother me. Everyone was mostly friendly toward me, and if I treated it as fan service, I could deal with it. Sure, I was constantly stressed out at school and felt like my hair was going to start falling out, but it wasn’t that bad.

Until one day, all that friendliness flipped into outright hostility.

It happened when the mega-popular shoujo manga 『Boku to Kimi de moderato』 got adapted into a drama, and I was cast to play the villainess — a girl named Mirei.

The story was a classic: a commoner heroine transfers to a private academy for the elite, falls in love with the heir to a wealthy conglomerate — nicknamed “the Emperor” — and the villainess, Mirei, consumed by jealousy, relentlessly bullies the heroine to tear them apart. Pretty textbook stuff.

At first, I was actually cast as the heroine. But apparently, they couldn’t find anyone suitable for the villainess role, so they came to me with a proposal to switch.

Obviously, I refused. Getting “demoted” to the villainess? No way. There was no upside to it — plus, playing a villain could damage my image. Up until then, I’d been typecast as a pure, graceful “Yamato Nadeshiko” type. Taking this role would ruin that.

The pay for the heroine was higher too… or so I thought.

"Huh? If I take Mirei’s role, the pay doubles? Hmm, nah, not worth it unless it’s at least four times more."

"…Three times, you say? Ugh, fine, I’ll do it. I’ll take the role."

That little behind-the-scenes negotiation directly with the drama’s producer and director earned me an earful from Shinozaki-san, my manager. Even though she tried to reverse the deal, the heroine’s role — Yui — had already been reassigned to another girl, and the filming schedule was locked in.

When Shinozaki-san looked ready to blow her top, I tried my best to plead my case:
"Isn’t it a problem if I only ever play goody-two-shoes roles?"

"Shouldn’t I broaden my range by trying different characters?"

"Adversity is an opportunity, right?"

She said nothing… and instead ground her knuckles into my temple. Painful.

But when shooting finally started, I was shocked to find out my pay had actually been quintupled. Shinozaki-san must have… persuaded them. Very forcefully.

Since I was being paid so much, I decided to go all out and properly study the villainess role. I devoured the original manga, binge-watched old Western films featuring elegant aristocratic ladies, bought dresses similar to what Mirei would wear, and practiced my refined “O-hohohoho!” laugh until it came out naturally. I even trained my smile into a perfectly villainous smirk — the kind of expression that made me want to punch myself. By the time I perfected it, my little brother had started avoiding me out of fear.

"Sorry, sorry! Look, see? When I smile like this, it’s not scary, right?"
…Nope. His trembling just got worse.

"Huh? Mom, I’m not bullying him! …What do you mean, check the mirror? …Oh wow. Yeah. That’s nightmare fuel."

By the time I’d traumatized my three-and-a-half-year-old brother, I had fully mastered the art of being a villainess. I went all in on playing Mirei.

In the manga, Mirei’s countless misdeeds eventually get exposed to the Emperor, and she’s condemned, expelled from both the academy and her family, and left to wander the streets in disgrace. The more hatred Mirei could gather from the audience, the more satisfying that final punishment scene would be.

That said, in the original, Mirei’s downfall happens after high school graduation. The drama was supposed to be a 12-episode, single-cour adaptation, meaning my part — covering the heroine and Mirei’s elementary school years — would only last for the first six episodes. From episode seven onward, the story would skip ahead to the middle and high school arcs, with a completely different cast. Mirei’s expulsion scene would be handled by a different actress.

…Or so I thought.

Then I received the final scripts, and for some reason, the entire drama — all 12 episodes — only covered the elementary school arc.

Wait, what? Isn’t that weird? If they cut the high school part, wouldn’t the plot fall apart?
"Oh, the original author rewrote the script specifically for the drama? …And it was their request, so we can’t refuse?"

Well, whatever. I was fine with it. But if they were extending my filming schedule, why wasn’t my pay going up too?

"Producer-san? Care to explain?"

"It’s already five times your original pay, isn’t that enough?"

I muttered, “I’ll discuss this with Shinozaki-san,” and the man bolted like a rabbit. Not that running would help — Shinozaki-san would be contacting him soon anyway.

And so, I officially became Mirei, the perfect little villainess. In the end, I even managed to push my pay up to ten times my original rate, so I was thrilled.

…Or at least, I thought I was.

But taking on the role just for the money was a mistake.

Because a few months later, I came to regret it deeply.

In the drama, Mirei was… insidious. She wasn’t the kind of villain who bullied the heroine Yui directly. Instead, she manipulated her entourage into doing the dirty work, pretending to be Yui’s ally on the surface while secretly laughing behind her back.

If Yui’s indoor shoes were dirtied, Mirei would “happen” to have a spare pair of her old ones to “generously” lend her. If Yui’s gym clothes disappeared, Mirei would conveniently provide a replacement. By creating these little staged situations, Mirei earned Yui’s trust, drew out personal information, and used it to subtly drive a wedge between her and the “Emperor.”

She even tried to use her family’s wealth to crush Yui’s parents’ flower shop. Honestly, for a grade schooler, Mirei was trash on a whole other level.

But eventually, as the Emperor and Yui talked things out, they started to realize something was wrong. Add to that the betrayal of Mirei’s own entourage, and all her schemes were exposed.

From there, the story snowballed: under the Emperor’s direction, strings were pulled behind the scenes, and Mirei was “publicly executed” in front of the entire school. Well, not literally executed — it was basically a massively scaled-up class trial.

With her reputation and influence completely destroyed, Mirei was forced to transfer to a strict Catholic all-girls boarding school, effectively being locked away and cut off from her family. Meanwhile, the Emperor and Yui officially became a couple, ending the story on a happy note.

Filming went smoothly, and the drama finally began airing. There were promos everywhere, with headlines like:

"Child actress Hanasaki Nana takes on her first villainess role!?"

Thanks to the manga’s existing popularity and the added buzz, the ratings were sky-high. For the first few weeks, everything was peaceful.

But as the drama progressed… school became hell.

People stopped hanging around me. When I came in each morning, I’d find my indoor shoes smeared with dirt or worse. And before I knew it, the exact same bullying Mirei inflicted on Yui in the drama was being acted out on me in real life.

Well, I guess it couldn’t be helped. We were just elementary schoolers — it’s only natural some kids couldn’t separate fiction from reality. But this… was chaos.

They’d cry and shout things like, "Stop bullying Yui-chan!" while collectively bullying me.

I tried explaining over and over, “It’s a drama, she’s just a fictional character,” but they wouldn’t listen. I even went to my homeroom teacher for help, and all they said was, “Apologize to everyone.”

…Apologize? For what exactly?

I couldn’t take it anymore, so I stopped going to school altogether. Yep. Congratulations to me, I was now officially a truant kid.

Sure, it’s compulsory education, but no one was forcing me to suffer through it. I figured I’d wait until things calmed down, then go back when the whole mess blew over.

But I was wrong. Things escalated.

This time, the harassment reached my home.

Our garden was trampled, graffiti was sprayed on the walls, and somehow, TV crews from gossip shows started staking out the front of our house like we were involved in some kind of scandal.

I mean, why? There wasn’t even a scandal to begin with!

I started thinking maybe I should just quit acting altogether to stop causing trouble for my family. But Shinozaki-san stopped me, telling me to hang in there a little longer — she’d handle it.

Thanks to her, we relocated before the drama ended. We moved into a new apartment with top-notch security, and the agency covered the entire rent. Considering apartments in that area cost several million yen a month, I couldn’t believe they agreed… but hey, I wasn’t complaining.

At the same time, Shinozaki-san also pulled some strings with Sayuri-chan’s grandfather — the chairman of the Rokujō Group, one of my sponsors — and secured a transfer recommendation for me to Sakuranagi Academy.

Thanks to that, the chaos in my personal life settled down almost overnight.

But my image as a child actress? Completely ruined.

The gossip shows had a field day with it:

"No way an elementary schooler could act that well — she must naturally be that nasty."

"The lead actress supposedly cried for real during filming — must’ve been terrified of Nana-chan!"

"Kids from successful acting families tend to turn out troubled. Wouldn’t be surprising if her parents were misusing her earnings. No wonder Nana-chan’s personality’s warped."

And on and on they went, spouting baseless nonsense like they were being paid by the word.

One greasy-haired host in particular kept repeating garbage with absolute confidence.

Okay, fine — my personality’s not great. But come on, I’m nowhere near as bad as Mirei! That was acting. Acting! Granted, I used to play pure Yamato Nadeshiko roles, so I guess people thinking I was fake isn’t entirely wrong either. Not surprising, considering I’m actually an ex-middle-aged man inside.

And yeah… it’s true the actress playing Yui cried for real during filming. I thought she was amazing at tearful acting, only to find out later she was just genuinely terrified of me. Sorry about that.

As for my “troubled home,” that part only became true because of all this drama. And for the record, my parents have never touched my earnings. They always told me to save it for my future. When I tried giving them expensive gifts — bags, cars, you name it — to make up for the trouble I caused, they gently scolded me and said, “Kids shouldn’t worry about these things.”

So yeah… about half of what they’re saying is technically correct. But still, it pisses me off.

If I ever get invited onto that bald host’s program, I swear I’m stealing his wig and chucking it like a frisbee. Bet it’d fly pretty damn far.

While the “Hanasaki Nana” image I had built continued to hit rock bottom, Shinozaki-san brought in my next job.

"Reincarnated as a Villainess!? — Striving to Live Modestly and Honestly"

The story was about a former office worker who reincarnates as Mirei in the world of Boku to Kimi de Moderato. To avoid the kind of ruin she suffered in the manga, she tries her best to live modestly and honestly, steering clear of both the Emperor and the heroine as much as possible.

At first, I wondered if it was okay to do such a derivative-sounding film. But it turned out the original author was writing the screenplay.

It was treated as a spin-off, with the same director I’d worked with on the drama. Casting was the same, too. And the comics were scheduled to be released alongside the movie.

Even though the drama was still airing, Shinozaki-san had hurriedly organized this project to wipe out my villainous image. …That’s way beyond a manager’s duties — it’s basically the work of a film producer.

I worried that such a straightforward project might not be enough to restore my image, but since Shinozaki-san was moving heaven and earth for me, I kept my mouth shut. Still, without saying a word, she flicked my forehead.

“You were thinking, ‘Is a project this simple really enough?’ weren’t you?”

“Are you an esper!? Hah! Wait… am I being read somehow?”

“Everything’s written on your face. And anyway, simple is better. Most of the people who got a bad impression of you because of this mess are idiots anyway. If your image got tarnished because you played ‘Mirei,’ then playing ‘Mirei’ again is exactly what’ll fix it. Trust me.”

Shinozaki-san said that with absolute certainty. Half-believing her, I started filming. The schedule was brutal: the movie was set for a nationwide release just one month after the drama’s finale. Talk about crunch time.

The drama had achieved record-high ratings even as my popularity plummeted, so the movie drew huge crowds. And my negative image? It recovered in a V-shaped spike almost instantly. In fact, my popularity soared even higher than before — it broke through the roof.

I couldn’t help but mutter, “Ehhh…”

All I did was play a villain and got hated, then played a lovable character and got max popularity. The hand-flipping was so extreme it was almost comical.

“I’m never playing a villain again,” I said in a falsetto to Shinozaki-san.

“I can already picture you being lured by the paycheck next week and taking on another villain role anyway,” she replied sarcastically.

I did reflect, though, and swore never to casually accept villain roles again. At least, not casually — if the paycheck’s high, I might still take it.

“This was my fault for underestimating you, so you don’t need to feel responsible, Nana,” Shinozaki-san said gently, patting my head.

Feeling a little embarrassed, I said, “Oh, so it wasn’t my fault. Guess my reflections were wasted. You really need to pull yourself together, Shinozaki-san.”

She pinched both my cheeks with a straight face, stretching my face comically. Painful.

In that way, my period of being bullied lasted only a few months. And since I didn’t go to school much anyway, the actual duration of harassment was short. Still, during that time, both my mind and body were completely exhausted.

I was able to handle it quickly because I had already been an adult once and understood: “If it’s too much, it’s okay to run away.” I consulted those around me — my homeroom teacher (useless as ever), my parents, and Shinozaki-san — and immediately stopped going to school. And if I didn’t like that school, I could transfer. There are always ways to escape, and plenty of people who will protect you.

But ordinary elementary schoolers, still pre-adolescents, have a narrow perspective. Their school and home are their whole world. They can’t possibly turn to their parents for help with bullying.

If they’re being bullied, they have no one to consult. No one to protect them.

That’s why I want to help the child crying, locked in the janitor’s closet.

I thought that.