Transmigrated as the Villain: I Will Destroy Fate

"You’re a fast learner."

Victoria’s voice cut through the quiet concentration of the Runic Arts Club. Ronan glanced up from his paper, meeting her expressionless gaze.

She wasn’t looking at him as much as she was looking at his work.

"Thank you."

He kept his tone polite, neutral. Around him, the twenty runic symbols he’d memorized in the first hour sat neatly arranged across the page. Victoria’s platinum hair caught the light as she tilted her head slightly, studying him with clear detachment.

"Is this your first time seeing them?"

Ronan paused. The original Ronan had likely touched runic theory at some point – most noble children did – but how much? How well had he retained it?

"I studied a little before coming here," he lied easily.

Ronan had entered this world knowing nothing about runes beyond what appeared in the novel.

But his memory had always been sharp, and learning new material was always easy. Even in his previous life, before the knife, before Spencer, before the transmigration, he’d remembered textbooks with near-perfect clarity.

Back when he lived with his parents, when he was 6 or 7 years old, he had read a countless number of books. They weren’t anything a child would be interested it, but they were all his parents had in the library. Law, psychology, science, etc. Still, he could draw information from those books even now if he wanted to.

Of course his memory wasn’t perfect. He couldn’t remember what he ate on a specific day two years ago, for example.

But if he consciously wanted to remember something, he would.

Grades and schoolwork had been effortless as well.

The beginning stages of runes, from what he could see, was just memorizing and understanding patterns. That much he could do easily.

Victoria’s gaze lingered on him longer than expected. For the first time since he’d entered the room, something resembling interest flickered across her face.

"Your penmanship is very good."

Beside him, Sapphire shifted slightly and nervously in her seat as Victoria moved. Ronan caught the movement in his periphery but didn’t acknowledge it. Victoria stepped closer, placing a medium-sized textbook on the table in front of him.

"Finish the textbook before our next meeting in a week. I expect this much from you as my brother."

"Sure."

He assumed that meant she had high expectations. She was the greatest talent in terms of runes seen in the last century, perhaps even longer.

Ronan opened the textbook. The format was simple: they would explain the concept, offer examples on how it is applied, then ask questions testing the reader. He flipped to the beginning and scanned the first section.

Pairs.

Runic symbols in pairs created small-scale effects – sparks, embers, minor elemental reactions.

Drawing them wasn’t difficult. The challenge lay in channeling mana to accommodate the structure.

When most people used runes, they simply poured mana into pre-programmed pathways. But a runesmith had to program the pathway in the first place, thread mana through the symbols with specific intent. From what he could tell, in the beginning stages, everything was already understood. There wasn’t much creativity in terms of pairs.

Ronan instantly compared it to chess. In chess, openings were heavily studied and for the most part, the first few moves were almost always going to be by the book. There wasn’t much creativity when it came to openings, as almost everything had already been discovered and studied.

It was the same with runes. Almost all pairs that did something were discovered, along with their most effective pathways for configuration.

Ronan glossed over the material once, then closed the book.

Victoria moved toward Sapphire, who had spread several sheets of complex seven-fold runes across her workspace.

Ronan glanced at them briefly.

Far beyond his level.

Victoria began offering corrections in her flat, emotionless tone, and Sapphire listened with the kind of reverence reserved for gods.

Ronan stood.

The two blonde siblings sitting near the front stiffened as he approached. The dark-skinned girl with green hair looked up from her book, mild surprise crossing her features.

Ronan walked past them and stopped beside Princess Seraphina.

She scratched her head, frowning at the cheat sheet in front of her. She tried drawing a symbol again. Checked the reference. Wrong. Again.

Ronan sighed and sat down next to her.

"Need help?"

Seraphina’s head snapped toward him, eyes wide with brief shock before her expression changed into irritation.

"I don’t need any help."

She tried the symbol again. She channeled mana into it, but it didn’t activate. Wrong again.

Seraphina looked back at him. The irritation almost made her look cute, kind of like a cat.

"I don’t get this at all, they all look the same. How the he– how did you get it so quickly?" She said, quickly correcting herself.

"I studied the material beforehand. I consider myself very diligent"

Her skeptical look made it clear she didn’t believe him. He didn’t know if the suspicion came from the first part or the second, however.

She sighed, dramatically. Then accepted.

"Fine. Help me."

She pointed to three runes on the page. All looked similar – nearly identical strokes, subtle variations in angle and length.

"I’m stuck on these. They all look exactly the same. Every time I try drawing them, they either activate the wrong one or don’t activate at all."

Ronan placed his thumb on his chin, studying the symbols.

To him, the differences were obvious.

Sure, they were similar. But each had one distinct stroke that made them easy to tell apart.

Seraphina deadpanned.

"You’re looking at me like I’m an idiot."

Ronan tilted his head, feigning confusion. "Who? Me?"

Instead of getting angry or irritated, Seraphina smiled, clearly enjoying being treated like a person instead of royalty.

"Well? Any ideas?"

Ronan made up an analogy on the spot. The first symbol looked like an elephant with its trunk cut off. The second, a slightly rotated version with an extended base – a limping elephant, maybe. The third looked nothing like the first two once you stopped forcing the comparison. More like a giraffe.

"Think of the first two as an elephant whose trunk has been cut off. The last one’s a giraffe."

Seeing her confused, he tried to explain what he saw.

Her face scrunched up for a second, before she started looking at the three symbols on the cheat sheet.

She stared. And stared. And stared.

Then Seraphina’s eyes lit up. Her excitement was almost childlike.

"I get it!"

She closed the cheat sheet and drew all three in order. Then she channeled mana into them, testing whether they’d activate correctly.

They did.

Her face brightened further.

"Thank yo–!" Her eyes widened, and everyone was looking at them now. She coughed into her hand. "I mean, thank you for your help Sir Ashbourne."

Ronan pinched the bridge of his nose.

"You’re very welcome," he said. "You could have just asked Victoria by the way."

Seraphina pouted. She leaned in and whispered.

"I did. She just said ’you’ll get it in time.’ How is that even supposed to help?"

Ronan didn’t reply.

Internally, he agreed with Victoria’s teaching method. Struggling built better understanding than being handed solutions. But Seraphina was looking at him with stars in her eyes now.

She pointed to her paper.

"Now show me everything else!"