The Legendary Fool : A Deckbuilding LITRPG

Tom found himself gasping for air as he awoke back in the physical realm. For a moment still, he imagined the heft of the spear grasped in his hands, expression solemn as he stared down Caldris Andiroh with determination in his gaze.

Only to realize that the weight of the weapon he had come to intimately understand could no longer be felt.

The echoes of the dream-like fugue he had just experienced faded away, the confusion in his gaze replaced by a growing clarity as he blinked in quick succession. The world ceased to be a liminal space existing between two incompatible psyches as Tom’s own sense of self won out.

Only then did he realize that he was panting. Physically, he knew himself to be in peak fighting condition, yet it took his mind a few long moments to accept that the rigorous training he had believed himself to have undergone was merely a mirage— an illusion yet not necessarily untrue.

Hurriedly, Tom shifted his gaze towards Jayce’s receding figure.

“Damn it,” whispered words slipped his mouth as he confirmed his suspicions. Once again, the jester icon along with the numbers that were placed adjacent to it, were gone.

He silently watched Jayce and his squad mates until they rounded a corner, seemingly done with the revelry for today. For tomorrow, a new day would dawn and with it, there would be new adventures and challenges to accompany it.

At least until Jayce achieved the goal he had been building towards.

Tom couldn’t help but wistfully sigh when he thought about the other Lunar Silver stars he had foregone to pick the Spear Art. Those were forever out of his reach now, secrets that would never likely become his.

Then he lowered his gaze and began to retreat inwards with deliberate, cautious steps; determined not to let any sound escape the wooden roof he tread on. Once he was certain that he was safely out of the line of sight of any dungeoneers, Tom relaxed.

His right hand gingerly swept across his visage, not surprised to find a facial structure that was completely different from his own. Maya’s Active Shroud perfectly copied the appearance of his target for the next twenty four hours but Jayce was far from the ideal candidate for bluffing his way into the Noble’s District.

The dungeoneer’s reputation preceded himself at this point and those in the know generally saw him as someone to be avoided, a man to be steered well clear of unless one was left with little other choice. Assuming Jayce’s identity was more trouble than it was worth and in all honesty, there was something about the man’s methods that made his skin crawl.

[Are you sure that you wish to discard False Status and Active Shroud (Jayce Andiroh)? This action is irreversible.]

“Yes.”

The second dungeoneer that Tom had singled out was a young woman that seemed to be in her early twenties. Her lithe, diminutive frame silently weaved through the crowd, while her eyes seemed to be in a constant state of flux— shifting from person to person, weapon to weapon, wares to other wares in more permutations than Tom had cared to keep track of.

While she didn’t seem to have any artifact that diverted others attention from her person like Aleph now did, the way she moved through the crowd of distracted dungeoneers was so effortlessly stealthy that even Tom had to focus to keep a track of the contours of her pixie-cut black hair.

He had needed to act fast, for the woman’s gait was too rushed for her to stick around main street for too long and indeed, he had.

It had taken Tom only 18 Soul Power to cast Maya this time around, so he wasn’t all that surprised when he broke out of the web of illusions with far greater ease.

Nyxine’s Yul had but a single Lunar Silver star sight and naturally, Tom had expended three fourths of his mental reserves in an attempt to reach it. To his dismay though, it hadn’t been enough.

His sub-skill, [Moh-Maya] didn’t activate this time either. It was like the description had stated, he would be offered a chance at the Lunar Silver stars, but only a small one.

Confronted with the option of reaching for a distance he no longer had the distance to traverse or accepting the simple fact that he had been bested and settling for what was within reach, Tom had ultimately chosen the latter.

It was only after two more attempts and almost every last ounce of his Soul Power did Tom finally understand.

Nyxine had a single Lunar Silver Star, Valiar ended up having only Shimmering Bronze Stars and Arenev, who he had considered the weakest among the bunch, surprised him by also possessing a Lunar Silver Star.

His final Yul delve served to confirm a hypothesis that he had been building upon. While his [Moh-Maya] skill hadn’t activated a single time since his acquisition of the Spear Art- Titan’s Sequitur, Tom had come to realize that it was equally as difficult, if not harder to extract the Lunar Silver stars from Nyxine and Arenev than it had been from Jayce.

As far as Tom understood, or rather, classified the information he had on hand, Maya was an attack on his psyche, which was why his Mental Stat played a key role in assisting him and especially why he was having an easier time breaking through the web of illusions cast by those with weaker Soul Power requirements.

Yul, though, was a reward for his success. But at the same time, it was also an attack on another person’s psyche. His own mental stat accomplished little in the mind of another— which was why Tom was certain that it was his own willpower and his willpower alone that he had been relying on to make his way through it.

Which meant that his own willpower, despite the myriad experiences he had lived through since arriving at Artezia, still didn’t quite match up to any of the four dungeoneers he had tested himself against.

Logically, it made sense. He had been forced into this life, while most dungeoneers seemed to have left their relatively peaceful hometowns, trading it for a life of wandering through the stifling murkiness of dangerous dungeons in search for adventure and glory.

That didn’t mean that he could accept it.

He wasn’t angry at the revelation, no. Past him would have been. Now? It was just a challenge that he had to surmount.

And he would, step by step.

Although he had failed to acquire any more Lunar Silver stars before running out of SP, he had still had some gains.

[Basic Lock Picking Proficiency] from Nyxine. Limited to non-magical locks, it wouldn’t allow him to assist Aleph as of now but the foundational habits and tricks he had picked up on wouldn’t, by any means, be going to waste.

[Basic Dagger Proficiency] from Valiar. Or atleast, what Valiar considered to be a basic understanding of wielding daggers. Tom found the Dagger Movements choppy and forced in places, especially when he compared it to Titan’s Sequitur, but then again he supposed that it wasn’t really a fair comparison.

Then, there was Arenev. A man in his late twenties, he sported rugged brown hair that was roughly combed over. He was decently well muscled, yet the man only had a finely crafted metal hammer tied to his leather belt. There was no weapon to be seen on his person, yet the man’s movements were as carefree as they were casual.

Then, it had clicked.

A blacksmith.

[Basic Weapon Repair Proficiency] all in all, was likely the most useful of the three memories he had recently obtained from his Maya Ability. More importantly, Arenev’s guise would serve well enough for his purposes.

The twenty four hour limitation on Active Shroud meant that he couldn’t use Arenev’s disguise for the actual ‘heist’ but he hadn’t planned to. A blacksmith such as the man in question was highly valued in a cut-off area like the Nameless District, which meant that he was likely under the protection of one of the District’s old guard.

Only a fool would allow a weapon’s expert to roam around unprotected, especially considering how scarce they seemed to be in these parts.

Even more ideally, Arenev lived on the district’s outskirts, the day spent hammering away on weapons both new and old, his hut placed a comfortable distance away from the nearest accommodation so as to not aggravate any neighbors. The night, very much like the one today, was for offering his services for good coin— repairing a weapon, crafting a new hilt and even forging a blade, provided that he was supplied with decent quality ingots, was all within the realm of possibility.

He couldn’t work with anything but common ranked weapon artifacts but as the saying went, ‘Better a well-maintained common than a half-broken uncommon’.

Tomorrow, Tom would venture onto the streets during the day and see just how far his acting prowess could take him.

A rehearsal, so to speak, before his big performance.