A Tale of Heroes

Blog of Juan Cuevas (Full of heart and dumb of ass) for development of A Tale of Heroes, an IF novel. Also, my avatar was done by MaryMewt on Twitter!

[juantheashura]

Hello! My name's Juan, and I created this blog for my current choose-your-own-adventure WIP story called "A Tale of Heroes".

It's a cape story, about a group of superpowered beings who must defend Giga City against villains, crooked politicians, natural disasters, and the most dangerous enemy of all...

Their past.

If this has caught your attention, please check out the demo here: https://forum.choiceofgames.com/t/a-tale-of-heroes-wip/93292

A Tale of Heroes (WIP)

Hello, everyone! My name’s Juan, and I’ve been working on a story for one of my ideas in the past few months. 🙂 <details><summary>Summary</

If there's anything else you would like to know (or feedback you'd like to share), please send me an ask or message! I love talking! :D

[juantheashura]

Another little snippet!

Still writing, been averaging out at about 1,000 words every day. I think I know exactly where this update’s gonna end - I’m gonna take y’all all the way to the dinner with Ignis’s parents, and all the awkwardness therein! :D

Here's where I'm ending things for tonight:

[juantheashura]

Heyo!

I’m working on the next update, trying to get something out for you all. This one’s definitely going to be longer than the last one, I think. I’m planning to include the first ‘big’ Aki romance scene, it’s one I’ve had in mind since I more or less started actually picturing the ROs in my head.

In the meantime, here’s a couple of screens from some of the scenes, just to show you a little bit of the work:

Gonna keep working on it over the next few days! No promises on when exactly it might be out, but I’ve been feeling pretty confident, so here’s hoping that continues.

[juantheashura]

Hello there!

First off, I do want to say that I absolutely loved the demo and played it several times, thinking about the implications of the Other Me and trying to consider how I felt about them within the framework of the team that clearly needs therapy and love.

Secondly, silly little thing (which is my ASK): would it be possible to make Forlorn a RO because I unleashed chaos, which was my own fault. I, in my hubris, decided that my superhero name was going to Valkyrie, only to be punched in the face in the hotel scene when I found out this man has a tattoo of one.

Only to realize that he is not in the current line-up.

I was not going into planning to be a Forlorn girl (Seeker was here!), we punched him in the face, and he is within his rights to take that personally. Man is giving me Adam from Wayhaven Chronicles vibes and I did not know I needed that in the superhero stories that I stumbled upon.

Oh wow, that's hilarious. It's like it was meant to be! :D

Not a silly little thing at all, by the way, though I will need to ask for a tiiiiny bit of patience! Forlorn is slotted to be a RO, but only from Book 2 onwards, after the MC and the team have had a bit more of a chance to get to know more about him.

I do promise his romance in Book 2 won't be... quite as slow-burn as A's - though it's absolutely gonna be jampacked with angst.

Thank you for the love!

[juantheashura]

Do superpowered criminals get treated criminals get trialed like regular criminals or are their specific requirements that require a higher judicial power to convict them?

Is there a special prison meant to hold them?

That's actually something of a debacle I'm having, ngl. Humans don't really have a way to 'nullify' powers - they manage an equivalent of this by simply keeping powered people stuffed with tranquilizers and the like.

Of course, having your defendant be high as a kite during a trial is hardly conducive to fair justice - how can they defend themselves if they barely even know where they are?

There are definitely special prisons for powered criminals, or at least criminals that commit crimes with their powers. It wouldn't exactly be safe for most inmates if you forced them to share a jail with a guy that can turn his skin into steel or something, would it? Though because of the drugging, these jails tend to be more similar to psych wards than really traditional jails.

[juantheashura]

Is becoming a "seeker" more like being born the chosen one or something like a martial arts master choosing you as their disciple?

It's not something you're born to be, no. It's more a matter of conviction, principles, and a frankly superhuman level of stubbornness. The title isn't destined to be passed down a set line of successors or anything.

In theory, if things were even a little bit different, Kratis might not be Seeker right now - the title would still be Victoria's.

[juantheashura]

How can Seeker really hold up to the ideals of all the previous Seeker's with the way he acts and issues he has?

Some would argue he doesn't uphold the ideals at all. After all, how can a drunkard anti-authoritarian with a penchant for snarking at every figure of authority around him and pissing off a bunch of states manage to live up to the tales of the old Seekers, who freed slaves and were vital in defeating the Axis of Evil?

Others would argue that's literally all those motherfuckers have ever been good for.

But something that's important, and which gets highlighted in Chapter 5, is that a lot of Kratis' actions aren't necessarily his own, but reconstructions of how he thinks Victoria would have acted if she was present. Now, that doesn't mean he gets it right, of course, but no one knows Victoria better than Kratis.

So the question is: was Victoria a bad Seeker herself? Or is Kratis actually doing the Seeker stuff right?

[juantheashura]

Let's say it was BK that was dead instead of BQ, would she go on a everlasting journey to revive him like he is now?

Oh, 100%. There's no doubt in my mind, she'd be as dedicated to a revival as he is.

... If anything, she'd probably be worse about it. I've spent a lot of time talking about how the BK is obsessed with his Queen, but the same also applies in reverse. The BK was her biggest cheerleader, and the one source of infallible support. Suddenly having that connection 'severed' would do a lot of harm to her psyche, and there's a lot of... baggage, as well. I've mentioned this before, but the BK greatly coddled her, to perhaps an unhealthy degree. Having that dynamic flipped on its head, as the BQ now has to be the one taking care of him as he slowly wastes away (which from her pov would mean her being a failure, because he took care of her but she can't do the same for him) would cause her a lot of emotional damage.

There'd be stark differences outside of that, as well. While the BK is an isolationist that doesn't really care about the outside world, the BQ was a 'proud' Roman who is significantly more headstrong. It's not unlikely that if she was the one to live, the Byzantine Empire (greatly changed, naturally - maybe with Crete as its new heartland?) might have survived to the modern day.

There are a lot of fun hidden things in the Hero-Monarchs' relationship. Much as they are country-shattering figures of legend, they are also emotionally-stunted lovers. Their love may be eternal, but there are a lot of things they did wrong, and I look forward to showing at least some of it.

[juantheashura]

Was the program that gave Darkstar his powers originally just sor super soldiers that are just enhanced humans? Or were they going for something further like forlorn or ignis type of abilities?

The former! It was a very early program intended to see if the US could manage to increase the abilities of regular humans, and mostly for prestige/battlefield applications than any realm arms race with regular-born powered people.

Think of it kind of like a proof of concept test, just them trying to see if it's possible.

The government wouldn't even know how to approach Ignis' whole "I'm just a breathing living nuclear reactor, and my heart would put the Tsar Bomba to shame :)", and frankly, I don't think they even know that's what's going on.

Thank you for the ask!

[juantheashura]

What are the governments around the world response to if any of the hard hitters like the league just decide to flip allegiances?

Allegiances to... a different country, you mean?

That'd cause a severe diplomatic crisis, I think. While the max capabilities of the League members aren't really known (they've not been pushed to their limit yet), they are absolutely considered WMDs, and there is significant prestige to them.

It's a little variable in places like the British Commonwealth, where it is possible for a Commonwealth hero to be invited to the UK team, but if a League member just went "hey, I'm leaving to join the Chinese team, don't follow me!", then that's absolutely a real cause for concern and would heavily increase tensions in the world, it might even kick off a minor bush war somewhere.

If you mean "what if a League member flipped allegiance to the bad guys", well... We'll just have to see, won't we? 😃

[juantheashura]

Update is out early!!!!!!

It’s about 7,500~ words, more or less. Short, but mostly to get back into the swing of things. It continues Chapter 6, and leaves us with only two more scenes in it to go before we are officially finished with it. This update has a lot of Romanced!Aki content, so I would recommend you go down that route if you want to explore it. There’s also some special content for you Mars aficionados.

In any case, here’s what this latest update includes:

“Wait, Stratton’s 74. How come his granddaughter’s only 16?”

Several chats with the Red Planet.

The Return of the Queen (not that one).

A Promise of a Meal.

A Heart-to-Heart with a Mountain.

What the FUCK is a Founder?

As always, remember there's a thread on the CoG Forums, a Discord server you can join, and a Ko-fi, if you have the ability and the wish to support my writing.

Without any further ado, here's the link.

Please enjoy, and let me know what you think!

[juantheashura]

Updating on Jan 31st.

Hey y'all! Just passing by to give you a heads-up, I'm going to be posting an update at the end of the month to 'welcome in the new year'.

It's not a particularly big one, but it does change a bit about Chapter 6 - I really didn't like how the Nova stuff was coming out, so I've decided to scrap it for something else. Instead, you get to spend a little time with Mars, and... you get to witness one of Aki's bi-yearly traditions.

[juantheashura]

How were the power dampener cuffs invented?

'Power dampening cuffs' is kind of a misnomer. An intentional one by the state of course, but there isn't actually a way to 'dampen' someone's powers with the current existing technology.

The cuffs are just a bit of an engineering marvel. They include an auto-injector and are loaded up with vials of tranquilizers and other drugs so powerful that they could knock a blue whale out on the spot.

They were invented in the late 60s, during the heights of the counterculture movement in the USA where political and racial tensions were at an all-time high.

Thank you for the question!

[juantheashura]

Hello there, is everything alright? You're alive right?

I am very much alive! I just am also in the last six month stretch to get my law degree, so I have been quite busy for the past while. I'm really sorry about that, both to you guys and to AToH itself, which has had to take a step back for a short while. But I live still, and I still dedicate as much time as possible to AToH- whether it's sneaking in time to write, answering questions, or endlessly scrolling through discussions about it in the forums, the subreddits, or the various discord servers. The League lives on!

[juantheashura]

Holaaaaa, me gustó tu historia!! Está cool la trama y los libros de superheroes siempre son mis favoritos c: tengo 2 pgtas, la primera es ¿cuantos libros van a ser? Y la 2da es ¿está confirmado que Forlorn será un RO en el 2do libro? Bueno besitos para ti autor muak

<3 Me alegra mucho escuchar eso! Que bueno que hayas disfrutado la historia, es un cumplido gigantesco.

En total van a ser tres libros. Hasta ahora estos son los subtitulos:

"Return of the King", "The Lost World", y "The Founder's War" (ojo que no están en orden).

Y segundo, sí, Forlorn va a ser un RO en el 2do libro, está confirmado. Pase un buen tiempo considerandolo, pero mientras más... bueno, mientras más me metía en su cabeza para escribirlo y eso, me fui dando cuenta de que un romance con Forlorn sería muy, muy bonito (y triste con cojones. Ese pobre hombre necesita muchos abrazos...).

[juantheashura]

Merry Christmas! Decided to read your new update this morning after a big Christmas party last night, and I have to ask… has Lat always been a domme and we haven’t noticed? Is she just making this up as she goes along?

I guess more importantly, will we be able to talk to her about it and formalize our relationship dynamics?

Heyo, happy holidays! Sorry about the late response, I took a few days off from everything to be with family and stuff.

Lat is 100% making all of this up on the spot. She likes being a top, sure, but it's not something she has super set herself on for years or anything like that. She's doing all this stuff because it's turned out to be something she enjoys, it wasn't planned.

As for formalizing the relationship, I think that might be something that happens in Book 2, once some time has passed and you've all had... time, so to say, to focus on stuff that's more personal and such. Maybe there'll be a Valentine's Day scene where Lat can gift a sub MC something very very special!

[juantheashura]

Chapter 6: Part One, is now out.

It’s 21,018 words long, bringing the grand total to 218k words including code. The next update should be around the same size at least, so… there go my original expectations of this book being only 300,000 words long. 🤧

Anyway! Here’s a short run-down of what you can expect in this chapter:

The United States’ reach exceeds its grasp.

God. Damn. Papparazi!

A dinner with a chance for escape.

Lore for you! Lore for the world! Lore for the buildings you live in!

Are we meant to be the baddies ft. Latooni Kitamura.

Seeker likes passing out there, guys… ft Latooni Kitamura.

Mama, going to kill a man…

Also, pay attention in Chapter 2, and you’ll see something neat!

Also, also, there’s a neat new choice if you go with Nova and Mars at the start of Chapter 4!

Also, also, also, if you play a trans or enby MC, there’s a little extra in chargen that I would like feedback on, if possible.

As always, remember I have a Discord you can join if you’d like to talk somewhere else: https://discord.com/invite/qbqr6RmSdV

And, if you’re willing and capable, I do have a ko-fi which helps support my writing, so if you’re ever in a position in which you can spare a few bucks: https://ko-fi.com/juancuevas0168

Now, with all that out of the way, here’s the link!

Please, have fun!

https://moody.ink/play/jjcb/a-tale-of-heroes/mygame/