I’ve always like Noella for some weird reason. Honestly, all three siblings including th...

I wonder if all this effort to get the successor position is so that MC would finally acknowledge and look at her? In that scene in the bedroom, she seemed to be genuinely bitter about receiving less attention than Kayden

She’s genuinely so obsessed with MC and barely interacts with anyone else in the family that I wouldn’t be surprised if she views only MC as her actual family (not just nominal)

I think so too. I also think she thinks that she doesn’t have anything to call hers like her family aren’t affectionate, he fiancé was in love with her sister and her dad didn’t placed her anywhere in the family business unlike her siblings which makes her think that she doesn’t have a place in the family. Noella doesn’t understand that the family dynamic is just like that (unaffectionate but there for each other in times of need) while her siblings understand that perfectly.

That makes a lot of sense. I wonder if also, she’s manipulative in the way she is because she has nothing to her but her face? MC and the dad definitely didn’t seem to try to nurture any strengths in her, or it would have been mentioned by now. If anything, she seems to have lived in an (supposedly) unstable position dependent on her ability to appeal to other people’s pity. Maybe she feels that the only way she can get anything (including attention) is with it and lying, since she pretends even around her own family, who definitely seem to have made it obvious that they can see right through her. She seems to have not gained any goals or skills of her own outside of trying to get that acknowledgement, too.

I wonder (given the society in that type of setting) if she thought she was going to be raised only to be used (perhaps by her sister) as a pawn in marriage? I can’t help but feel that she thinks there’s not a single bit of familial affection given to her. Specifically, I’m thinking of that part where MC talks in the bedroom about feeding her, clothing her, etc. With MC’s own money (dick move from the dad tbh). Noelle didn’t seem to be surprised, so maybe she didn’t seem to see it as an altruistic act and thought that like everything else (since she doesn’t know the novel), it was for some monetary gain or to prevent rumors of abuse in the Sergio family

I agree. As you have said, she might’ve been thinking they’re housing and feeding her to use her. The thing is even the FL has a distorted image of her own father, we can see this at the first chapters where her supposed fiancé to be got stolen by her sister. She immediately thought that the father will be think twice of letting her be the successor and will be impressed by Noella when in actuality, he was a bit mad at the guy for doing that to his daughters and he’s resolute at letting the FL be the successor because it’s her rightful place as a legitimate child. Even the FL thinks that the father only see them siblings as pawns and she was only allowed to be the heir because he thinks she’s the most capable but the thing is the father cares for all of them in his own twisted way. Noella is not unreasonable if she thinks her family is only tolerating her to use her as a pawn, they never let her do anything in the family business when it’s clearly their kinda way of bonding and they don’t interact with her the way they interact with each other. She does seem the odd one out in the family and even in the high society, she always gets compared to her older sister as she’s extremely capable and beautiful while she’s only beautiful and kind (which is only a trait that she wants them to think)