As the people rebel against the royal line that lead to famine and suffering, first princess Mia Luna Tearmoon is imprisoned and eventually publicly executed. After her death, Mia wakes up several years prior when she was still just a child.
At first, she thinks it was all just a terrible dream until she finds the blood-spattered diary she kept in her cell next to her. Using the knowledge of the future, Mia seeks to escape her fate by preventing the poor governance and economic strife that is to come. However, tireless efforts are not something this pampered princess is used to or particularly good at.
Not every villainess redemption story need be in an otome game, and this series proves it can be just as good if not better. If you are looking for more anime recommendations like Tearmoon Empire, head on down below.
Anime Like Tearmoon Empire
For Fans of Avoiding Impending Death Through Strategies and Kindness
My Next Life as a Villainess – All Routes Lead to Doom
At eight years old, Katarina Claes, the only daughter of a duke, hits her head and suddenly remembers she was once a seventeen-year-old otaku that got isekai’d.
She realizes that she is now in the world of Fortune Lover, the otome game that she had been playing before her death.
Unfortunately, she is not the heroine, but rather the villainess who usually ends up dead or exiled at the end. As such, she endeavors to change her fate and avoid all doom flags.
As Tearmoon Empire isn’t in an otome game, it isn’t a villainess anime. However, it lives in that same space like the original trend-starting villainess anime, My Next Life as a Villainess.
Both of these series are about women who will die unless they make changes to how they act and treat people. They are given the chance to make those positive changes by waking up as a younger version of themselves who still has knowledge of future events. Watch them avoid their death by being as nice as humanly possible, so much so that everyone starts to absolutely adore them.
While both series are about helping the characters around them with their problems, Tearmoon Empire is also about making positive changes throughout the kingdom that would otherwise fall to rebellion. Although they also both have serious death looming over the characters’ heads, they both maintain a pretty light-hearted and silly atmosphere. Mia is comedic by being a bit scummy in her inner monologue while Katarina is comedic by being a bit air-headed and dense. The frequent comedy makes them both quite fun to watch.
The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen – From Villainess to Savior
In the To a Beam of Light With You, the final boss and villainess Pride Royal Ivy committed a number of atrocities against everyone around her to the detriment of her nation.
However, one day a student from Japan wakes up in the body of Pride Royal Ivy when she is eight years old, just after she awakens the power of precognition that gives her the right to inherit the throne.
Not wishing to meet a grisly fate or to see her subjects suffer as they would if she were the villainess, this new Pride uses her knowledge of the game to change events that would lead to suffering in an effort to instead become a benevolent ruler.
You know My Next Life as a Villainess and how Tearmoon Empire is just a villainess anime without the otome game? Well, The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen is pretty much a more serious version of My Next Life as a Villainess.
While Mia is a princess and not a villainess, she acted the same as any villainess did and is now trying to avoid the consequences by being nice. So, too, is Pride in The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen. However, the difference is that Pride is legitimately nice and still believes that she may someday become evil, thus she is laying down plans for the characters to kill her if she does to prevent the pain she caused them. That is in stark contrast to Mia in Tearmoon Empire who is still comically scummy on the inside, but is growing as a character by pretending to be good.
While Tearmoon Empire has its moments, The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen is a more serious anime that only has a few light-hearted moments. It chooses instead to focus more on fixing and preventing character drama.
Why Raeliana Ended Up At The Duke’s Mansion
After being pushed off a building to her death, office worker Rinko Hanasaki is reborn as Raeliana McMillan, a minor character in a novel she had once read.
While Raeliana is the eldest daughter of a nouveau-rich baron, Rinko knows that her new life isn’t exactly blessed. Having knowledge of Raeliana’s fate in the novel, she knows that her fiancee, Lord Francis Brooks, kills her to kick off the plot of the book for the actual heroine.
Determined not to die, Raeliana makes moves to break her engagement and save her life. This leads her to the mysterious Duke Noah Wynknight, the male love interest in the novel and general manipulator of politics among the nobility. She ends up blackmailing him, threatening to reveal his secrets, if he does not pretend to be her fiancee so she can break things off with Brooks.
However, while this saves her life for now, Raeliana’s relationship with the Duke grows more complicated by the day.
Both Tearmoon Empire and Why Raeliana Ended Up At The Duke’s Mansion are not “villianess anime” in the traditional otome game anime sense, but still live in that same space.
While Tearmoon Empire fully takes place in its own fantasy world, Why Raeliana Ended Up At The Duke’s Mansion is an isekai about a woman reincarnated into a novel as the character that is supposed to be murdered in the beginning. As such, both main characters are doing everything they can to not die. Tearmoon Empire is about avoiding death by being nice and a good ruler, Why Raeliana Ended Up At The Duke’s Mansion is about avoiding death through blackmail and manipulation despite the main character being actually nice.
For Fans of Improving the Kingdom
Maoyu – Archenemy and Hero
After fifteen years of warfare with the demon world, the Hero is unsatisfied with their advance and rushes forward to the Demon Queen’s Castle. There, he not only finds a beautiful woman that is the queen, but she needs his help.
To his surprise, she offers a way to not only help his country, but hers as well. Together, they join forces to make that dream a reality.
Both Tearmoon Empire and Maoyu are both fully dedicated to improving a kingdom. Tearmoon Empire is about a princess doing it to avoid death while Maoyu is about an actually kind-hearted Demon Queen doing it to stop a never-ending war that is propping up the economies of the demon realm and many human kingdoms.
Unlike Tearmoon Empire, Maoyu goes into much greater detail in how the changes in the kingdom are made and what effect they have. However, both series keep things pretty light, though Maoyu does have a few more dire moments.
Perhaps the biggest difference is that Maoyu has an element of romance to it between the Demon Queen and the Hero, but it is not as much of a focus as you’d think. People often go in expecting romance and are surprised when they get kingdom-building instead.
How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom
Kazuya Souma is summoned to another world rife with adventure. There, the king cedes his throne to the young hero and Souma finds himself saddled with a kingdom in decline.
Now, he shows the true might of his heroism by rehabilitating the country, not through adventure or war, but through rigorous economic administration.
Both Tearmoon Empire and How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom are about improving a floundering kingdom. However, while Tear Moon Empire has Mia highly motivated by her impending death, How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom is a little less dire and a lot more typically isekai.
Both series are fully dedicated to the main characters exploring ways to make things better for, not just “the people,” but everyone they interact with as well. However, How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom is still an isekai anime, and one that loves isekai tropes like having a harem.
The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt
With his father ailing and the responsibility for his small poor kingdom falling to him, genius prince Wein is ready to commit treason. He desires to auction off his kingdom and retire in luxury.
However, his treasonous schemes always conclude with dire consequences, for him, anyway. His plans to fail instead constantly succeed and his kingdom begins to flourish.
Both the Tearmoon Empire and The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt feature a member of the royal family making improvements to their kingdom – and both doing it for not noble reasons.
Mia and Wein are both the sort of comical two-faced sort of protagonists that act nicely to others in order to look good, but their inner monologues show how scummy they truly are. They do the things they do for the kingdom, not for the people, but for their own selfish reasons.
However, Tearmoon Empire is about avoiding the guillotine while The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt is about a prince comically failing upwards as he tries to lead his kingdom into decline so he can believably sell it off without being labeled a traitor. Instead of doing that, his genius plans often lead to unwanted success that causes his kingdom to thrive.
For Fans of Selfish Female Main Characters (Who Are Actually Nice)
Saving 80,000 Gold in Another World for my Retirement
After accidentally falling off a cliff, Mitsuha wakes up in a fantasy land.
Upon saving a girl from a wolf attack, she discovers that she didn’t die in her previous life, but rather accidentally ripped away a piece of a God’s power that lets her transport herself between that world and modern Japan.
With this magnificent power, she decides to take items from modern Japan to sell in the fantasy world. She has calculated that making 80,000 gold in the fantasy land will be enough to retire if she were to get trapped in either world forever.
Now begins her money-making schemes!
Tearmoon Empire and its kingdom-improving plot seems pretty different from Saving 80,000 Gold in Another World for my Retirement which is about a girl making money by selling modern goods from our world in a fantasy world – but its actually not that different. While Saving 80,000 Gold in Another World is about being a merchant, her goods are actually improving the fantasy world she is in. As such, you will find that there is actually quite a similar sort of plot progression between these two series, Tearmoon Empire is just about being a ruler and not just a merchant.
What Tearmoon Empire and Saving 80,000 Gold in Another World also share is a passion for main characters that seem quite nice, but are motivated by entirely selfish reasons. Mia is trying not to be executed while Mitsuha is trying to make as much money as she can. They are both actually nice girls, Mitsuha a bit more-so since she lacks the same chip on her shoulder, but they are both also quite shrewd.
Romantic Killer
All high schooler Anzu Hoshino loves is video games, chocolate, and her cat, Momohiko. She has shunned everything else, especially a romantic life.
However, one day a magical creature alters her reality where she can’t have any of those three things that she adores and is told that in order to return to her normal life, she must indulge in the dating sim situations that have been set up around her involving the new troubled transfer student Tsukasa Kazuki, her childhood friend Junta Hayami, and a wealthy sheltered student named Hijiri Koganei.
As Romantic Killer is – essentially – about being forced to play a dating sim in our modern world by a magical fairy, it doesn’t seem as applicable to Tearmoon Empire, but the similarities lie with the main character and how the plot unfolds.
Both series follow women who are confidently independent and pretty selfish. However, as Anzu in Romantic Killer is just a teen girl who wants to play games and eat snacks, she is significantly more harmless with her selfish desires compared to Mia, member of the ruling class devastating a nation.
Both series feature those selfish girls being forced away from the things they like to do better if they want to either be able to do what they like again or not die miserably. So, they play along and play pretend until they reach their goal. In doing so, they actually help improve the lives of almost everyone they interact with in a very wholesome way.
Both series also enjoy setting up romantic pairings, but never actually progressing any romance.
Do you have more anime recommendations like Tearmoon Empire? Let fans know in the comments section below.
