Post Dungeon Crawler Carl I’ve been looking for some new things to read. Post Wandering Inn I’m still in a mindset that isn’t allowing me to read anything that I might consider slop. I’ve completely dropped Manga as something I read and have started many a webnovel and dropped it after one chapter. At the start of this month I stumbled across Super Supportive on Royal Road. It came recommended from some of the people in the Wandering Inn Discord server and was rated very highly.

Now I don’t like super heroes. It’s never been a concept that’s resonated with me nor is urban fantasy something I enjoy. Of course there are exceptions. The Sandman is adjacent to superheroes at the very least, though adjacent is doing a lot of heavy lifting. And of course I’ve read perennial classic of all webnovel fans Worm. Both series being up there in my top 10 reads of all time.

So to say that I was a bit reluctant to give Super Supportive a try is an understatement. A young boy gains super powers and goes to Super Hero School? Sounds incredibly boring. I don’t know if I’ve read anything with a school setting and enjoyed it. I didn’t want to read My Hero Academia fanfiction.

Super Supportive instead blew me away. Lets talk about why…

Super Supportive follows Alden, a teenage boy with a history of trauma. The story starts with his parents being murdered in front of him and Alden being saved by a duo of super heroes that includes Hannah. Hannah is a battlefield support hero who can create stasis fields to save buildings, or in this case, people. Hannah and her partner Arjun are devasted and Hannah opens up when Alden asks her for support. When Hannah dies after being summoned to an alien planet (more on that later) Alden is confused about what to do. Adding to his confusion is his recent offering of a super hero contract by Earth.

This is where the series gets interesting. Similar to worm the most interesting part of this series is how people gain powers instead of super heroics. In the 1930s an Alien race known as the Artonians made contact with Earth. The only known race with a natural affinity for magic, they choose to gift Earth with the contract. The contract is some form of magical super AI that manages humans growing foundation (that they are unable to feel or connect too) by affixing it into a set of magical abilities. In exchange any person who accepts this contract becomes an Avowed and agrees to be summoned at the Artonians convenience for any manner of jobs that they magical affixation would work for.

You might be asking yourself, “What that’s not super heroes at all, that’s magical girls, or just magic!” and yes it is. It turns out that Earth is viewed as a strange planet because its the only planet that has set out the guidelines of super heroes in villains. When the contract was formed the United Nations decided to create a island nation called Anesidora and for everyone with super powers to be evicted there and claim citizenship. The avowed who chose to hide their powers or stay behind became super villains and other governments hire avowed from Anesidora to hunt down these other super powered humans and forcefully bring them to Anesidora or kill them.

This is a dynamic more closely examined in the book and a recommend you give it a gander but it’s not the main focus. In fact I don’t know if Super Supportive is even close to a Super Hero book outside of Alden attending a Super Hero training school sometime around chapter 120. The webnovel is actually a cultural exchange and slow burn character driven trauma fest.

After Alden claims his powers he is summoned immediately to the triplanets to work as a lab assistant. There he makes a deal with a college professor to save some people from a condemned research lab in exchange for tutoring about his skill. Here he goes through an intensely traumatic 6 months with an alien girl named Kibbie. After the fact he earns a commendation from one of the highest members of Artonian society and is sent back to Earth. The following 200 chapters deal with Alden going through therapy, making friends, and dealing with who he will become.

I deeply love this part of the book. I think the conversations involved between characters and the budding relationship between Alden and Stuart are some of the best character writing I’ve ever read. I don’t wish to spoil too much but know that it’s changed the way I think about myself in some ways. And given me more than a little to think about.

You can read super supportive here: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/63759/super-supportive