1. Web Novel Context
2. Here are some details from the equivalent web novel chapters by Chise to help give some context for the first three chapters. These notes do not spoil future plot developments, but serve as more information to fill out the story.
3. • The name of the otome game is "Wings of the Heart" (Xin zhi Yi).
4. • The story points out that unlike other reincarnated villainesses, Yvonne's past life never got to finish the game she was playing, since it was a gacha game with microtransactions. She helped beta-test it for three weeks, so she's familiar with the setting and the initial storyline, but everything else is very sketchy to her.
5. • The "villainess system" primarily activates when Elsa is in close proximity to Yvonne. The system usually gives Yvonne three options of bullying, of which Option 3 is always the most benign. Not wishing to actually hurt Elsa, Yvonne always picks Option 3.
6. • The system pops up once a day at most.
7. • The only time Yvonne actively went against the system was in saving Elsa (ch. 1), as there was no benign Option 3. and simply doing nothing would result in Elsa's death. That act of rebellion resulted in her parents being exiled to the frontier and herself being placed in a border town, where she enrolled in a new school for her senior secondary years. This is the "exile ending", but the game's endings are not exclusive of each other, and apparently multiple/worse endings can still happen after it.
8. • Yvonne is secretly okay that she got exiled to the border town initially - since that allows her to stay out of court politics and most importantly, away from Elsa and the system.
9. • When Elsa says "Yvonne had disappeared from my world without a trace..." (ch. 1), she's referring to Yvonne's exile. In between chapters 1 and 2, Elsa tracks Yvonne down to the border town and transfers to the same school as her, much to her surprise and consternation (ch. 2).
