Clarissa Beheads The Villainess

[1] Clarissa Doesn't Smile

   
There was a castle far from town, still part of the golden capital which got its name from the royal family whose members all had golden hair. Astaroth had taken Clarissa to this place, home to many nobles who would rather live away from the eyes of armed men that failed their duties.

Here, the heroine lived together with Astaroth and most other important characters from the story.

"Is this the girl?" A man well dressed questions upon their arrival, Astaroth responds with a nod. Clarissa immediately knew who this one is, since he is the webnovel's male lead. The oh so attractive, oh so strong, mister perfect casanova duke—

"It's a pleasure to meet you, fine lady. My name is Orias Viertel."

"Nice to meet you too Orias. I'm Clarissa Wains."

He extends his hand out but she ignores it. The urge to get down from the horse and stretch must be tended to. But she hadn't noticed the shy, soft-spoken, rather short girl hiding behind the duke, gently gripping on his vest.

Her short height matched with long wavy chestnut colored hair and micro bangs, round face and large round eyes did not help with how she looked like a child at the age of 19. She was essentially a reader insert and Clarissa couldn't help but to question why the author couldn't have given her a stronger personality and older looks.

She's so nice it's almost infuriating.

"I'm... Katherine Horak." The heroine. Fights off evil with her tears! The power of having two multiple hot guys at her aid!

Clarissa almost slipped a grossed out look. For sure she disliked how badly a bunch of the characters in the webnovel were written, but boredom had her in a chokehold and she read it anyways. How she ended up here?

Karma came to bite her in the butt.

"Ahh alright now let's save the icebreaker for later and head inside to get some grub." Vixen places his hand on Astaroth and Clarissa's shoulders and starts pushing them forward to the entrance.

The first room as they entered was a wide sunroom, light splashing onto the furniture and beckoning for all to look at the nude sculpture of Orias in all his glory.

"Clarissa, sweetest! Would you like to hear the origin of this magnificent sculpture of me?" The duke asks proudly.

"Shut up or I'll demolish that sculpture myself. No one wants to hear about what made you get a nude art piece of yourself." Astaroth shoots a glare at him.

"I think it's quite wonderful..."

"Why thank you Katherine!"

"Do not flatter him Katherine."

Vixen seemed disappointed in the quarrel, occasionally glancing at Clarissa whose face ever since the execution appeared unnaturally neutral.

"You alright?" He whispered to her.

"Yes."

Astaroth and Orias continued their quarrel up until the dining area where food was already prepared. Salad, cupcakes, roast turkey, ham, Clarissa's stomach had smiled. Being a commoner in this world meant the best thing she could have was the fresh bread from the commoner bakeries.

And then she remembered.

All of that was cooked by a rat.

This castle's chef is a rat. Fiction logic, and fantasy, a rat can talk and cook.

Clarissa crept closer to the table, the chef rat sat by the large roast turkey staring at the girl.

"Feel free to dig in!" The rat spoke before a sudden hand grabbed him and brought him close to her face.

"Hello Peter. You and I? We're best friends now, got it?"

Peter looked almost mortified, and Clarissa was just waiting for a reply.

"I think she likes rats." Vixen whispered to the three.

"Ok! Best friends! You and I!" The rat began panting until the lady put him back down. Because of her lack of facial expression, instead of appearing happy she was the most menacing woman Peter has ever seen. "I hope you like my food." He mumbled.

Clarissa sat down to eat, overjoyed by the presence of food and her favorite character from the story, the rat. Simply because in the real world she had three pet rats and rodents were her favorite creatures. Overjoyed as she was, no one could tell and Katherine was worrying that she was not enjoying her time so far.

"Miss uhh... Clarissa? I heard you are a bladesmith? There are barely any female bladesmiths, you're amazing."

"Just call me Clarissa."

"Ah." Katherine smiles awkwardly. Clarissa's short responses made it difficult for her to get a conversation going. "Are you enjoying the food?"

"Yes."

"If you umm... Need anyone to talk to I'm here! You've probably gone through so much."

"Ok."

"Just eat your food Katherine, give Clarissa some time. A lot has happened." Vixen reached over to get a serving of the meatloaf. He could already tell that Clarissa wasn't the type to say much, and Katherine had low self esteem and tends to overthink. Orias is overprotective of Katherine and if the conversation kept going like this he might even get angry at Clarissa instead.

At this point he could already tell things in the castle are going to get complicated.