Ace of Capes [Superhero LitRPG] [Isekai] [Card Crafting]

Dewie had been having a seventy percent good day.

Most of the things that had happened were good. He woke up early before the general alarm and practiced some of his magical meditation. He performed mana cloud exercises until he could feel the mana tingling at the tip of his fingers. Push, pull, push, pull.

However, the exercises still didn't help much in controlling his mana output.

He was usually alright with simple spells.

But the second he tried anything other than rudimentary spells, or even, heaven forbid, unbound magic, his mana would backfire, twist things around, or blow back into his pathways.

Sometimes, it hurt. Other times, it was just embarrassing. But it didn't matter because he was going to keep at it.

Too many people had too many expectations of him now to stop.

His mom had told everyone she knew that he was an S-Rank, and they all said he was going to be a great mage.

He didn't want to disappoint them. He also couldn't disappoint his parents or Jace, who thought that Dewie would be an excellent mage, too.

Everyone was working so hard to make Dewie great. Stein, despite being busy, always sent him books to read on channeling his power. His mother had gotten him extra tutors from all around the world, all teaching him different techniques he could use. He'd practiced all summer, and he'd thought maybe he was getting better? Maybe?

He had been slightly better the other day, when he'd been practicing a levitation spell. That was typically an intermediate spell, but he'd somehow managed to make it work, lifting a pencil off the floor. It felt like his magic had flown more easily that day, and he was ecstatic.

But then he'd started seeing things again, and he realized he hadn't taken his medicine. Once he took it, his magic was back to being haywire.

Anyway, it didn't matter that his practice was disappointing today, because he was going to keep working at it until he was good. He might never reach Lexie's level, or Xena's, but he at least wanted to be good enough not to hold them back.

Dewie didn't truly know what he wanted to do with his life. He'd let his parents decide for him, because he didn't have strong convictions one way or another.

He wasn't sure he wanted to be a Hero.

But he did want to protect his friends, even if it was only as a helper. So that was his goal.

After practice, Dewie took a shower, somewhat disappointed by his lack of progress.

Sometimes, when he started the day badly, he was tempted to be sad for the rest of it. But Jace taught him to split up his days and compare percentages of goods and bads.

Lexie was in a good mood this morning, so that was a good. She said she would play games with him and Xena later, which was also another good.

He'd failed to levitate the pencil today, but that was only one bad thing compared to two good things. And the bad thing wasn't even that bad.

So today was a seventy percent good day.

He got breakfast with Jace, who kept telling him the story about a big fish he caught on vacation. Then he had class (Hero and Helpers with Cecilia Love), and a meeting with Stein right before lunch with Xena.

Then they got called into the Journeyman's office. Dewie thought it might be about his pills. Maybe they were going to change his dosage, so it didn't mess up his magic too much.

When he walked into the office, brain full of seventy percent goodness, he didn't have any expectations of what would happen. He didn't think about the fact that there were way too many people in the room, and barely noticed that Xena grew stiff beside him. He also wasn't thinking about Stella and Torin Firebringer being there, looking sick to their stomach.

He didn't think anything was wrong until Journeyman said the words.

"Lexie Sparrowfoot is dead."

Dewie blinked.

And blinked again. Did he hear that right?

It couldn't be right.

It must have been wrong.

Journeyman phrased it wrong, or maybe Dewie just heard it wrong, the same way he sometimes saw things wrong.

Maybe it was a... what's the word, when you said one thing but meant something else? Euphemism?

He glanced at Xena, hoping maybe she could explain it.

She wasn't saying anything. She wasn't moving. It was like she'd turned to stone.

He turned to Torin, who wasn't looking at him, then to Stein, who also wasn't looking. Journeyman was the only one looking at him, but he also wasn't explaining.

"Huh?"

Dewie's expressed confusion was a whisper in the still air, sounding louder than it should have.

Journeyman was the one who spoke again. He sighed deeply, rubbing his temple. "Lexie Sparrowfoot went on an unsanctioned training exercise that happened to be near a dungeon. The dungeon appeared stable at first, but then it turned unstable and sucked her and her mentor, Torin, in. Lexie apparently sacrificed herself to save Torin, and the dungeon closed on her. That's the story we were able to piece together. Is that accurate, Torin?"

Torin nodded blankly. Xena's breath hitched, then started rushing fast, like she was on the verge of hyperventilating.

Journeyman was still speaking. "So, that's the story. I have to say I was not expecting this. Mercury was not in retrograde, and there were no indications of trouble on the horizon; hence, I'm very shocked and dismayed by the turn of events. I'm especially shocked by you, Torin." He gestured to the boy. "You've been a model student so far, and your lack of foresight here is so very unexpected and disappointing. You should never have taken her there. You know that you'll have to be punished for that, right?"

Torin nodded again. He didn't look like he cared about the punishment. He didn't look like he was all the way there.

Dewie wasn't all the way there either.

He thought maybe he was dreaming. He pinched himself, and it hurt, but that didn't mean it wasn't a dream.

Nothing felt real. Why were they saying Lexie was dead?

That was impossible.

He'd seen her this morning. Just a few hours ago.

She said she would play games with him when she came back.

Xena and Lexie were supposed to make up after their fight yesterday, and things were supposed to go back to normal.

Today was a seventy percent good day.

Nobody was saying anything. Everyone was staring at everyone else, and the silence was deafening.

Dewie inadvertently began to listen to the sound of his own heart. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.

He pinched himself again. It still hurt.

The quiet was giving his brain time to think. The words floated in his mind, but his mind resisted.

It wasn't true. There was no way it could be true.

There was no way Lexie was dead.

People didn't just die. Not like that. Not without warning, or without….

It couldn't be happening.

He'd seen Lexie this morning. She said she would come back. They were going to play games together. It was Dewie's pick.

It was a seventy percent good day.

She couldn't be dead.

If she were dead…

If Lexie were dead…

He should have known. He should have seen it.

But he made himself not see it. He took pills that suppressed his visions. He couldn't warn her in time.

It was his fault.

A high-pitched scream split the air and shattered Dewie's world into pieces.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

***

Stella wanted to crawl into a hole and hide from the world.

She wanted to go under what her therapist called her 'safety blanket' and not come out for a year.

She didn't know how much more of this she could take.

Just tragedy after tragedy. Disaster after disaster.

It felt like history was repeating itself in the most horrific way possible.

The looks on the kids' faces were all too familiar.

It was the same way Stella herself had looked when she'd gotten the news that Lara was dead. It had been an average day, with average problems.

The news had been dropped on her like a bomb.

And now Lexie too was gone, in the same cruel fate that had met her mother.

Was it a curse?

Was someone trying to take out Lara's bloodline?

When Aiden warned Stella that someone was targeting Lexie, she thought maybe it was one of the villains that Aiden had caught. She was confident she could keep Lexie safe against that.

She didn't think it would happen like this.

Torin flinched when Xena screamed. The girl screamed, loud and high, the sound bouncing off the walls.

Dewie dropped to his knees, cupped his hand over his ears, and shook his head. His eyes were wide and unaccepting. Stella knew that look. He was stuck in the denial phase.

Meanwhile, her son was dissociating.

Stella was so exhausted. She didn't have time to sort through her own emotions because there was so much else that she had to deal with. District 4 was still a mess. There were whispers of conflict spreading to District 3.

Her goddaughter was dead.

Her son was in severe agony, even if he couldn't show it. He'd told them the entire story in a flat, deadpan tone, but his eyes were haunted.

Stella couldn't cry. She didn't have time to cry. Right now, she had to be a rock.

She tucked away all the emotion and helped the rest of the crew calm the distraught kids.

Later, she stepped out with Torin, still holding his hand. It was steady, like hers, even though inside they were both breaking.

Torin squeezed her hand. "Mom…"'

"Yes?"

"There's something else I need to tell you," he whispered. "It's about Theo."

***

It was a bright afternoon on a busy street, and Aiden Sparrowfoot was standing outside the weapon shop in Old Moulding.

It took him a second to recall why he was there.

Last night, he'd come here to meet the Alchemist. The roads had been empty, and the night cool. He'd walked into the store and then…nothing.

He couldn't remember anything that happened after that.

Alarm jump-started his heartbeat. His bones grew cold. Warning bells blared in his head.

Someone had tampered with his mind.

Everything from then to now was a blur, and that scared him.

What the hell had happened to his memories?

He probed around his brain with alchemy, but found nothing unusual there.

Maybe whatever had been done to him was more subtle.

He stormed back into the weapons store, which now had people in it.

They gave him odd looks, but once their eyes rested on the tilling band, they averted their gaze.

Aiden walked to the back of the store, where Tate told him the portal to the Alchemist's hidden world was. He rested his hand on the brick wall, rapping softly. Nothing happened. It didn't shift, and he couldn't feel the power pulsing from it.

Was it gone? Why? Because of him? What happened in there?

It was killing him that he didn't know.

"Yo, my man!"

Aiden turned around to acknowledge the store attendant who hadn't been here last night.

The man had a mohawk and piercings on both sides of his ears, and he cocked an eyebrow from behind the counter. "Can I help you with something?"

Aiden raised his eyebrows. Did this man know? Did he know that an Alchemist was lurking between his walls? Probably not.

"No," Aiden said. "I'm fine."

"You sure?"

Aiden bobbed his head.

"Then do you mind?" He jabbed his chin toward the door. "You're making some of my customers uncomfortable."

Aiden had to smile.

This store sold weapons, sometimes illegally, and they typically served a more unsavory clientele.

But it was one powerless mage who was making everyone uncomfortable.

"No problem," Aiden said as he left.

He released a breath as he walked, trying to guess what might have happened.

Did he meet the Alchemist? He had to have. Who else would have tampered with his memory? Unless he'd somehow triggered some memory-wiping trap.

Well, at least he was happy to be alive.

Last night, he wasn't sure he would be.

He didn't know what it meant that the Alchemist left him alive. He certainly wasn't too weak to kill Aiden, so the fact that he hadn't meant that he needed something from Aiden. Perhaps they'd struck a deal.

Then why wipe his memory? To avoid being detected by Vacek?

Aiden had to figure it out.

He was determined to recover the memories somehow.

He would probe his brain some more when he got home. Maybe meet with Naem tonight for the latter to scan if there was something different about him.

Aiden searched for an empty spot in the alley and disappeared. He appeared in the middle of the forest in Hovelton, greeted by a wolf's howl. After being caught one too many times by Emma, he no longer portaled into his own house, instead choosing to do it here.

No one ever came into this forest. It was reportedly haunted because there were frequent wolf howls, but no one had ever seen any sign of a wolf.

As he strolled, he wondered if Tate was still asleep or if he was attempting to make breakfast again. He also wondered if Lexie was awake and if she'd read his messages.

Aiden opened up his SI, expecting to find a response from her.

Instead, he found several missed calls from Stella, Mane, Journeyman, Stein, and Vacek.

He was instantly on alert.

He called Stella back first.

She answered instantly. "Aiden?"

Her voice warned him that something was wrong.

Emotions twisted inside him, fear lodging in his throat.

No.

Horrific memories clouded his brain. He fought back, even as his body shook.

It can't be happening again.

"What is it?"

"Aiden…" Stella couldn't seem to get it out, choking on the words. "I'm so sorry."

No.

DO NOT tell me that!

For system's sake, I can't go through this again.

He forced himself to say the words. "What is it, Stella?"

"Lexie, she…she's lost in a dungeon."

And just like that, the pain tore out of him.

"NO!" The sound exploded from his chest at the same time as a pulse of energy ripped straight out of his veins.

The air shimmered, like a heatwave, and there was a loud thunderclap.

Bang!

Even in the midst of his horror, Aiden spun around to see what had happened.

In every direction, all the trees had fallen up to a few metres out. A circular gorge was dug into the ground directly surrounding Aiden, too. Everything but the bit of earth he was standing on had been blasted away.

What the hell? Aiden blinked at the damage, confused. Did I...did I do that?

***

Stein was standing in the school courtyard when Aiden Sparrowfoot arrived at Victoire.

His breath immediately caught.

He'd known this was coming. Stella had alerted them that Aiden had finally returned her call, and she'd told him what happened.

He'll be coming, she said.

Everyone was on alert. All the students had been tucked away in their rooms for a mandatory curfew, although he could sense some of them watching from their windows. The professors were standing around, waiting, just in case something popped off.

When Aiden finally stomped in, anger in every line of his body, they stopped and stared at him. Tension radiated in the air.

Even with a silver collar around his neck, Aiden Sparrowfoot was a foreboding, menacing presence.

His eyes were pure, liquid fury as he stormed across the courtyard and past Stein himself without even looking at him.

Stein followed Aiden without a word as he strode up the stairs towards Journeyman's office.

Rather than its usual gentle sway, this time, Journeyman's door was blown open. Stein was startled because it didn't feel like that was Journeyman's doing.

He glanced at Aiden.

Had he done that?

Impossible. Aiden Sparrowfoot was powerless.

Journeyman got to his feet.

"Aiden Sparrowfoot," He looked uncomfortable, gripping his hands as he spoke. "Well, I had hoped we would be meeting again under better circumstances, when the stars weren't quite as chaotic–"

"Why was my daughter in a dungeon?" Aiden demanded, his voice still. Like death.

The calm before the storm.

"Well, you see…" Journeyman waffled. "It's a little difficult to explain–"

"Why did you let her near a dungeon without telling me?!" Aiden's next statement boomed across the office, and Journeyman flinched.

"It wasn't his idea," Stein said. Aiden turned to him.

"Whose was it? Vacek's?"

"No. It was Lexie's," Stein said. "It was Lexie's idea to go on that excursion. God only knows why. While there, the dungeon sucked them in."

"Was it the same dungeon Vacek took her to?"

Journeyman hesitated. "We're not sure.'

Aiden let out a bitter laugh. "Of course it was. That was probably his plan all along. To plant a seed in her head so she would do his dirty work for him." Aiden kept laughing, and it was like nails on a chalkboard, forced and agonizing.

The sound of a man losing his mind.

"I can't believe he did this to me again. I can't believe I let him. It's my fault. This is all my fault."

"I don't think Vacek knows about this," Journeyman said. "According to Torin–"

"I don't care what Torin said!" Aiden's head snapped to him, too. "Vacek might have gotten in his head, too. Torin, Stella, they might all be in on it! They did the same thing to my wife, and now they've taken my Lexie–" His voice broke, his expression cracking from the pain.

Though Stein had nothing to do with it, he felt guilty. No one deserved this. Aiden especially didn't deserve this twice.

"Aiden," he said. "We're so sorry–"

Aiden cut him off with a hand up. He shook his head, composing himself. "I'm wasting my time. The two of you are just puppets. The mastermind is probably still in his cushy office, preparing the lie he's going to feed me."

With that, he spun around and stormed out.

Stein, alarmed, followed him. "Aiden, where are you going?"

"To find her."

To find her? That meant..."You can find her?"

"You'd better hope I can."

"Aiden, just wait a second. Don't tell me you're going to do something crazy again."

"You thought what I did for Lara was crazy?" Aiden came to a sudden stop, rounding on Stein, madness glinting in his eyes.

Stein took several steps back because Aiden advanced like he was about to pounce.

"You and Vacek had better hope I find my daughter safe and sound. Or I will show all of you the most insane, most heinous thing you've ever seen in your life."