One of the light novels I am currently reading and enjoying a lot is Ore wa Seikan Kokka no Akutoku Ryoshu (俺は星間国家の悪徳領主), written by Mishima Yomu (三嶋与夢) and illustrated by Takamine Nadare (高峰ナダレ).

The story follows Riam, a man who gets reincarnated as the child of a noble family in a spacefaring human empire thanks to the intervention of a mysterious being known as “The Guide” (案内人). Riam’s previous life had been a complete wreck due to a chain of misfortunes: his wife left him, his daughter rejected him, and everything spiraled downward from there.

What Riam does not know is that all of this misery was orchestrated by The Guide, who feeds on human despair as a source of energy. Completely unaware of this, Riam declares that in his next life he will become an “evil lord,” because in his eyes only evil people get to enjoy life. Meanwhile The Guide is planning to ruin his second life as well for further entertainment.

The problem for The Guide is that Riam somehow ends up succeeding. He tries his absolute best to act evil, but due to his limited imagination, the absurd level of corruption in the empire, and the help of his AI-powered maid Amagi, everything he does is interpreted as benevolent. 

He becomes beloved by his people despite himself. One early example is when he boldly requests 100 concubines thinking it is outrageous, only to panic afterward. Amagi and the staff then say things like “only that many?” and comment on how merciful and restrained he is. Apparently the average noble keeps thousands.

This drives The Guide insane and he begins sending swindlers, killers, and troublemakers to ruin Riam’s life. Unfortunately for him, Riam unknowingly dodges every single trap, often turning the situation around in ways that make The Guide even more miserable. To make things worse, Riam’s gratitude toward The Guide keeps increasing, which is incredibly harmful to The Guide since he relies on negative emotions to survive.

One of the funniest moments in the first volume involves his “sword master,” Yasushi, a complete fraud who tricks students with fake sword techniques. He teaches Riam the foundation of a bogus style called issen-ryuu (one-hit style), where the swordsman supposedly defeats the enemy with an invisible strike. 

Yasushi is clearly faking it with simple sleight of hand, but Riam trains so earnestly that he ends up creating a technique that actually works. Even then he still says things like “it is not as good as master’s, since I could not see his movements at all.”

As the story progresses, Riam’s influence and power grow while he continues to accidentally foil every scheme The Guide throws at him. He gathers allies, accidentally inspires loyalty everywhere he goes, and eventually gains a lover and future wife in Rosetta, even though he only intended to role-play his idea of being an “evil lord” with her.

Rosetta is an incredibly nice girl and tries her best to support Riam as well as she can and is well accepted by Amagi and the other people around Riam. Hopefully in the coming volumes she can manage to make him become a bit more soft towards her.

The novel is essentially a long string of ridiculous, entertaining scenarios tied together by The Guide’s increasingly desperate attempts to sabotage Riam’s life. It is genuinely one of the most fun series I have read in a long while. I am eight volumes in, out of the eleven currently available, and I am looking forward to reading the rest soon.