The Wrong Hero

Chapter 36 - Simmering Anger

It was quiet. Peaceful. Unsettlingly so. It didn't feel right.

With a jerk, Dante shot up. His eyes darted around, spotting the familiar decorations of his room in Siltvelt's castle. Something was wrong, he just didn't know what.

"Little Dante?" He heard Sadeena say next to him. She seemed to have woken with a start. If he had to guess, she had been holding his arm during his sleep.

"Sadeena..." Dante seemed to realize what was off. He first noticed that he and Sadeena were clothed, or as clothed as she normally was. He had on shorts and a shirt, what was basically worn under his armor. What else he realized was that they weren't the only ones in the bed. Next to either leg was Dio and JoJo, both in their human forms.

"Are you doing better now?" Sadeena asked, placing a hand against his face.

"Better?" Dante brought his right hand to cover hers. "What do you mean?"

Sadeena made a face at that question. "You don't remember? Yesterday..."

Dante tried to recall what she meant. It was the day of the wave. They fought against...clown monsters, he believed. There wasn't a wave boss, but they ended the wave. On the way back to—

"The village!" It was coming back to him.

The village in was in flames. The people were slaughtered in the streets. The knights, they surrounded a pole in the village. Gloria was tied to it, dead. Eddy and Mary were dead on the ground. Those bastards—

"Hey!" Sadeena's shout brought Dante out of his thoughts. Her other hand held the other side of his face, keeping him focused on her. "Look at me, Dante. It's...I know you aren't okay. But I need you to stay calm."

"Calm!?" Dante yelled. "How can I be calm!? Those murdering little shits killed my...my..." His breathing became heavy all of a sudden. His mind raced, unable to slow down. One thing he realized, however, was that the knights couldn't have killed his family.

They were long dead.

Dante felt arms wrap around him. Sadeena had slid behind him to hold him. "I'm sorry, little Dante. I'm so sorry that happened."

He grit his teeth. Having her hold him...it didn't make him feel any better. He wanted to run out of the room and find those knights.

No, those knights are...

"Dad?" JoJo looked up from his position on the bed. Dio had woken up too.

Dante let out a sigh. "Hey, kids." He said, as calmly as he could. "Sorry if I woke you up."

In response, the two of them moved up and latched onto Dante's sides, intertwining with Sadeena. "We can stay here all day." Dio said quietly.

Dante had a pained expression on his face. He almost wanted to move the pair off of him. "No. We have things to do."

"You can take all the time you need." Sadeena assured him.

"I said no! We need to..." Dante snapped, but cut himself short. He wasn't sure why. True, he was mad—no, furious—about the knights, but he knew the three of them were only trying to help. There was no need to lash out...

Panicked, Dante brought up his shield arm. When he looked at it, he found his shield in the same color variant form he left it in. The different colored shields he got from weapons he copied provided decent stat bonuses and they were easy enough to sleep in.

"...Sorry, I didn't mean to yell." He said, trying to calm down. "It's just...I'm having trouble remembering. Or, I was..."

He let a few more images from the previous day flow into his mind. The burning village, the knights, the fight...Yes, he remembered now. After the commander showed off what they did, Dante ordered everyone...to kill the knights. A battle broke out.