From left: Rosalyn Beryt and Emperor Kahir
Having just resigned from her miserable job as a secretary, a young Korean woman spends her first night free reading a novel called Taming A Tyrant's Heart. Instead of relating to the lovable heroine who changed the ways of the titular tyrannical emperor, she feels sympathy towards the emperor's overworked secretary, and falls asleep muttering how the emperor reminds her of her horrible ex-boss. But when she wakes up the next morning, she finds herself in the body of a young girl from a viscount's family. She tries to commit suicide to try and get out of this dream, only to realize she cannot die properly, and that this is no dream; she's really stuck in the world of Taming A Tyrant's Heart. She decides to make the best of things, becoming Rosalyn Beryt and living a comfortable, easy life with her new family. After all, she's just some extra that has no involvement in the original novel, right?
Wrong! Turns out her clumsy, softhearted brother has been "selected" (read: forced) to become the emperor's newest secretary. It's then that Rosalyn remembers that in the future, the emperor is set to execute an entire family after one of his secretaries makes a mistake; that family happens to be Rosalyn's. Now faced with her family's eventual demise, Rosalyn decides to change the course of the this story, by using her old secretarial skills to become the emperor's new secretary herself!
Despite initial opposition from the stubborn and immature emperor, Kahir, Rosalyn excels at her new job and becomes one of his closest confidantes. Everyone comes to see her as the tyrant's tamer, and rely on her to the point of exhaustion. Five years later, she is ready to resign and move on to find a marriage partner. But Kahir refuses to let her go, and even tells her the only way out of the job is to die. Rosalyn wants to live a life of peace, but why does she feel sad about leaving? And why is Emperor Kahir acting so nice around her now?
I'm the Tyrant's Secretary started as a web novel by Lee inhye and Feelyeon Management. It was adapted into a webcomic
, with art by Kio and the story by Jay. The English translation is available from Tapas.
I'm the Tyrant's Secretary contains examples of:
- Abusive Parents: Kahir's father and stepmother were physically abusive to Kahir, pushing him aside in favor of Caron, his half-brother. Caron is also beaten by his mother when he ruins his marriage talks, which is what prompts him into running away.
- Alpha Bitch: Azalea is like this, using her position as the former emperor's favored woman to get what she wants.
- Ella (or at least the reincarnated Ella) also is this. She sees herself as the true heroine of the story and wants to throw Rosalyn out of the competition.
- Bait-and-Switch Tyrant: Kahir seems to be a bloodthirsty, unforgiving tyrant who strikes fear into the hearts of nobles and citizens alike. Once Rosalyn gets to know him, however, he turns out to be just stubborn and immature with no real knowledge of how to be diplomatic without a sword at hand. Her taking charge is what helps Kahir become a kinder, more benevolent ruler.
- Big Brother Instinct: Roy is extremely protective of Rosalyn when it comes to Kahir. Somewhat justified, as he was supposed to take the secretary job, and he fears what Kahir might do to his sister if she ever got on his bad side. It takes until close to the end of the story for him to finally accept Rosalyn and Kahir as a couple.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Ella Paulos was the beautiful, kindhearted protagonist of the original novel, who saved Kahir of his loneliness and became his empress through her empathy and love. The Ella of this story is a transmigrated Korean woman who cannot be authentically kind to save her life, and just sees Kahir as a means to fulfill her fantasy of being the heroine of a romantic story.
- Cain and Abel: Averted. Despite Kahir and Azalea being at odds with each other concerning the throne, Kahir and Caron don't actually hate each other. Caron doesn't want to be emperor, and Kahir pities Caron for being used by his mother. After Azalea's death in the finale, Kahir and Caron take the first steps towards acknowledging each other as family by the former allowing the latter to be the ring bearer at his wedding.
- Cruel Mercy: Rosalyn chooses to stay in the novel's world rather than return home. This forces Ella to return instead, as only one transmigrator is allowed in the world at a time. Since Ella spent her time in the novel's world believing she could do whatever she wants because she's the novel's heroine, sending her back to her mundane reality is worse than death to her.
- Declaration of Personal Independence: Caron does this when he declares that he will not get married and continue being a pawn for his mother's personal gain. He then has to run away after she whips him for disobeying her.
- Devoted to You: Kahir is so obviously in love with Rosalyn that he finds it difficult to imagine life without her. The same is true for Rosalyn, although it takes a while for her to come to terms with that.
- Elective Monarchy: Kahir succeeded his father for the throne, although Azalea almost had Caron on the throne instead. But selecting an empress proves to be a challenge, mostly due to Azalea trying to interfere with the selection process in order to put her candidate (Ella) in first place. Rosalyn is able to win in the end thanks to Ella and Azalea’s attempt at brainwashing Kahir backfiring and disqualifying the former from the throne.
- Foil: Rosalyn and Ella are this to one another. Both reincarnated into the world of a novel they read the night before, and both adapt to their new surroundings quickly before meeting Kahir. However, Ella is a narcissist that only desires a romantic fantasy with Kahir, not the responsibilities of the throne or being a mother, and proving to be so terrible at both that the only reason time rewinded was because her ally begged the world's goddess for it. Rosalyn, as Kahir's secretary, understands how important being the mother of the nation is, and is well-equipped in handling the empire's affairs, as well as Kahir's more unsavory tendencies.
- Kahir and Caron are also foils to each other. The former is the unwanted child of the former emperor whose mother was abandoned by the emperor and he himself was sent off to the battlefield from a young age. He's therefore ruthless and strong-willed, doesn't know much about love until he meets his love interest, and aggressively goes after his stepmother to stop her from obtaining the throne. Caron was sheltered and coddled by his mother, having known nothing but luxury since a young age. He's timid and not able to stand up for himself, and is afraid to get on his mother's wrong side. If Azalea succeeded in eliminating Kahir and obtained the throne, Caron would be a puppet ruler Azalea would use for her own personal gain.
- Kahir and Empress Dowager Azalea are also foils. Both believed they could do what they want as a ruler, and went out of their way to make things harder for their subordinates. However, Kahir matures into a wise, competent ruler thanks to Rosalyn, learning to take care of others and consider their feelings when making decisions. Azalea never stops acting incompetent and selfish, and gets worse the more her plans go awry, even willing to throw her loved ones under the bus to ensure her goals are met.
- Married to the Job: After becoming Kahir's secretary, Rosalyn is swamped with paperwork and event planning. Five years later, she's so dedicated to her job that everyone relies on her to get things through to Kahir, and doesn't have any time for a vacation or even a day off. Once Kahir becomes aware of his feelings, he tries to get Rosalyn to ease up on her responsibilities. Her being so good at her job is actually a reason why Kahir is easily able to make her an empress candidate despite coming from a family of viscounts, since she's already gained immense respect and admiration from the majority of the nobility.
- Never My Fault: Ella blames Rosalyn for throwing the story off-script by Kahir falling in love with her instead of Ella like the original story. However, she fails to acknowledge the reason why her marriage with Kahir fell apart in the first timeline was because of her jealousy of everyone, including her own children.
- Next Life as a Fictional Character: A secretary is reborn into the world of "Taming a Tyrant's Heart", the book she was reading the night before she incarnated. After trying and failing to commit suicide, she decides to accept her new life as the daughter of a viscount, then becomes the Emperor’s secretary in place of her clumsy brother in order to save her family from certain doom.
- No Badass to His Valet: Kahir is feared as a tyrannical brute, but Rosalyn knows that's just because he thinks with his sword rather than his head. She's therefore the best person equipped to dealing with him, and has saved numerous nobles from swift execution through her intervening. As a result, Rosalyn gained enough political respect among nobility that Kahir is able to make her an empress candidate.
- Office Romance: The romantic fantasy version. Kahir develops feelings for Rosalyn, his secretary. He's able to use her good publicity with the nobility to put her down as an empress candidate, which brings out Rosalyn's own budding feelings towards Kahir.
- Peggy Sue: Ella turns out to be a villainous example. She was transmigrated like Rosalyn was and followed the novel exactly, marrying Kahir and having kids with him. However, she became extremely clingy and jealous of her own children and lashed out at female servants, ultimately ending up separated from Kahir after one too many fights. She is then transported to the past and works together with her former mother-in-law to remarry Kahir, but now Rosalyn stands in the way as a better love interest than her, pushing Ella to get rid of Rosalyn by any means necessary.
- Proper Lady: Rosalyn is able to demonstrate how eloquent and graceful she is during the empress candidate selection. She does so well that the other ladies drop their candidacies to rally behind her, on top of her resume as a successful and trusted secretary to the emperor. This infuriates Ella, as she proves that even after spending a whole lifetime in this world (and then some), she still doesn't know how to act properly.
- Sassy Secretary: Both Rosalyn and Derrick have shades of this. You have to develop a thick skin when it comes to dealing with Kahir. In fact, Rosalyn being able to successfully deflect Azalea and even make her lose her composure without stepping out of line considering their statuses is what makes Kahir become further impressed and attracted to her.
- Secret Test of Character: Ella being sent back in time was the goddess giving her another chance to do better and reflect on her mistakes. Ella ultimately proves she failed learned anything from the past and even threatens the world's balance through her trying to get Kahir to love her again, so she's sent back to her original world while Rosalyn remains as Kahir's lover.
- Self-Proclaimed Love Interest: Ella claims that she and Kahir must be together because that was how it was in the novel, but Rosalyn doesn't approve of her because of her twisted personality and Kahir also ends up despising her with she keeps persisting. It also turns out this Ella already married Kahir once and their marriage ended in failure due to her own actions, which makes Ella's attempt at remarrying him all the more pathetic.
- Trapped in Another World: Rosalyn finds herself in the world of a novel she was reading right before she fell asleep the night before. She tries to end her life several times to leave, but soon decides to settle into her new home. At least until she remembers that she's an extra fated to be executed by the male lead. She then becomes his secretary to help her family survive. She ends up staying in her new world to be with Kahir at the end.
- Wicked Stepmother: Azalea, Kahir's stepmother and second wife of the former emperor, was awful to Kahir, competing with him to put her own son, Caron, on the throne. Even after Kahir became the emperor, she's trying to put a candidate of her choice forth so she can eventually get rid of Kahir and make Caron her the puppet ruler.
- Upper-Class Twit: Baroness Bellios acts like one. As Azalea's right-hand woman, she tries to help take down Rosalyn by nitpicking her performance during the empress selection. She has a hard time doing so, since Rosalyn does a nearly flawless job while Azalea's preferred choice, Ella, is mediocre and humiliates her at one point.
- Yandere: The transmigrated Ella is this after she marries Kahir in the first timeline, not wanting to lose him to anything after achieving the book's happily ever after. She even gets jealous of her own children, resulting in their relationship falling apart. She refuses to let him go, even in the second timeline where it's clear Rosalyn is a better fit for him.
- You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Rosalyn and her family have purple hair, while Azalea has crimson-colored hair.
