It all started with a dream...
The Marvelous Mateo Mandelson
is a Fantasy Adventure Web Serial Novel written by Otneimica and hosted on Wattpad.
The titular Mateo Mandelson is a simple schoolboy who's relatively easygoing life takes a complicated turn when he sleeps in for school one morning. As he hurries down the road to reach the school before he's late, he sees a shiny red object fall from the sky, landing directly on the school... and blowing it up. The shockwave of the explosion is so intense that it knocks Mateo off his feet, and he hits his head on the sidewalk and is rendered unconscious.
Mateo wakes up back home on the couch of his living room, where his Uncle Percival tells him the shiny red object that blew up the school was a bomb launched by Nocturne, a criminal organization that's been hunting Mateo for quite some time because he has something they want: The star-shaped birthmark on his left palm, which turns out to actually be a "sigil".
Sigils are mystical markings of various colors that grant those who have them on their person amazing powers. Mateo's sigil is the "Red Star", which allows him to create explosions of any size. With Uncle Percy as his guide, Mateo's determined to learn how to control his powers and use them for good, and ultimately take down Nocturne.
But little does Mateo know the story goes much, much deeper than he thinks...
Originally hosted on Wattpad, though it was ultimately completed, Otneimica ultimately ended up taking it down, stating he disliked how it turned out and wishing to start anew with something else.
The Marvelous Mateo Mandelson provides examples of the following tropes:
- Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder: Melissa started dating Cassius after she came to believe Murdoch died. Little did she know Murdoch was always close by.
- Absurd Phobia: Wilkins is deathly afraid of statues, which is likely due to his years of being experimented by the Collective, whose members sport chalk white skin.
- Adventure Towns: Mateo and his group hop from setting to setting in pursuit of Cassius after he abandons Nocturne, encountering Sigil Holders and other such colorful characters in the process.
- Arc Words: "It all started with a dream."
- Anyone Can Die: A very good deal of characters are killed over the course of the story. By the time, Mateo, Molly, and Killian finally encounter Andromeda, over 80% of the named characters are dead and gone.
- Axe-Crazy: Any Sigil Holder who's overused their powers ultimately becomes this, with Cassius being a fine example of how bad it can get.
- The Berserker: Gustavus has traces of this, but he hides it behind a veneer of affability. Once he's in battle, though—especially when he's on the ropes—he's a force to be reckoned with, capable of literally tearing people into two with his bare hands.
- The Casanova: Deconstructed with Cassius. He's quite the Kavorka Man, being able to score very lovely ladies despite his off-putting appearance and strong personality. However, most of his relationships end with the lady in question either betraying him, vanishing, or outright dying, and him getting more bitter every time in happens. Melissa being spirited away by the Collective was the last straw, and is a He-Man Woman Hater in the story proper, belittling Nancy—the sole female member of Nocturne—every chance he gets, and physically assaulting her and any other female character that ends up in his grasp.
- Color-Coded Characters: Most Sigil Holders have the odd habit of wearing clothing that's the same color as their sigil. Those who act as protégés to Sigil Holders often wear clothing that's a lighter hue of whatever color the holder's sigil is (i.e. Marcus and Killian). This in general is the major indicator that Cassius has the same sigil as Mateo, since the both of them wear red, and the former was originally going to pass the Red Star to the latter.
- Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Averted for the most part, as some of the more villainous Sigil Holders have used their powers to become quite well off.
- Deconstructor Fleet: The first and second thirds of the story pick apart the "child superheroes fight evil organization of adults" format. Mateo is a child who's deeply overwhelmed by the responsibility that's instantly thrust upon him, and as a result ends up getting corrupted by the Red Star even quicker than Cassius did. And then there's Nocturne, which is undeniably evil, but is ultimately a group of immature, reckless old people who're ultimately destroyed by a more proper example of the trop they're meant to represent (Spectrum).
- Earn Your Happy Ending: After spending the majority of their lives being toyed by otherworldly beings, fighting each other, losing their loved ones, and seeing the worst of humanity, Cassius and Perseus destroy Andromeda's original statue and mural, killing her and breaking the infinite loop of her being unleashed upon the world, and giving themselves, Melissa, Murdoch, and a newborn Mateo another chance at life, while all the sigils are now safe with Gorgophone, who means to use them to help the people of the world.
- Flat Character: Mateo Mandelson himself, oddly enough. Despite being the titular character, he mainly serves as an Audience Surrogate for the conflict between the various groups of Sigil Holders he encounters. It's even more apparent once Cassius siphons him of his half of the Red Star, as the story shifts focus from Mateo and his friends to the bigger picture surrounding Cassius and his history with Perseus and other Sigil Holders, with Mateo being a bystander. It doesn't help that, while we get to know tons about his family members, we never really get to know anything about Mateo himself. We know he's fighting to avenge his school and struggles with his sigil slowly corrupting him, but that's just about it.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Andromeda, the very goddess most of the Sigil Holders worship for granting them their powers.
- "Groundhog Day" Loop: The whole story turns out to be Cassius and Perseus stuck in one of these because Cassius always ends up ignoring Gorgophone's warning. Until Cassius rejects Andromeda, he and Perseus will always end up going through the same terrible chain of events that'll lead up to their lives ruined, Mateo and Future Mateo dying in their arms, and Future Molly sending them back in time to the moment where they found Andromeda's original statue and mural. Thankfully, Cassius eventually realizes where he's been going wrong and finally rejects Andromeda and, together with Perseus, destroys her statue and mural, breaking the loop.
- Make Way for the New Villains: Done throughout the whole story: Nocturne are introduced as the first antagonists; then Cassius obtains Mateo's half of the Red Star and abandons Nocturne, allowing Spectrum to step in and slaughter the remainder of Nocturne's operatives; then Cetus unleashes the Letters, whose leader, A, kills Longinus; then Cetus effortlessly beheads A; and lastly, Andromeda takes the Clear Conscience from Cetus, which kills him, setting Andromeda up as the ultimate threat.
- Man Behind the Man: The members of Nocturne can transform their bodies using mechanisms called Changers, which were created by Dr. Peabody, which are powered by the sigil of Cassius, the leader of Nocturne. Cassius was originally a comrade of Longinus, who is the leader of a legion of Sigil Holders called Spectrum. Spectrum's true leader is A, who's the strongest of a legion of aliens called the Letters. The Letters' leader (and "father") is Cetus, the CEO of Ceto Industries, the company Cassius and Perseus worked for long before they ever got their sigils. And Cetus is the first person Andromeda—the creator of the sigils, the mother of the Letters, and the true Big Bad of the story—gave a sigil to (and the first person she takes a sigil back from).
- Only One Name: Most characters fall under this. Considering there are characters with full names (i.e. Mateo Mandelson, Killian McCormick, Oliver Modeston, etc.), it can be presumed those who've only had their first names revealed do have surnames, but they just go unrevealed.
- Though it's hinted that the names most Sigil Holders have are aliases, like how Murdoch Mandelson goes by Aldrich.
- Random Events Plot: The first ten chapters are a rather generic story about a Kid Hero defending his city from the machinations of a Nebulous Evil Organization. But once said hero loses his powers to said organization's leader, the story devolves into a Gorn-infested romp involving dozens of characters wreaking havoc for the sheer sake of it. And this goes on for fifty chapters straight until Andromeda is finally namedropped and the race to vanquish her begins.
- Skilled, but Naive: The Sigil Holders who're kids and the child protégés of adult Sigil Holders. The sigils, of course, make them forces to be reckoned with, but their lack of life experience (coupled with Power Incontinence) also make them dangers to society and tools to those who wish to exploit them. The only ones who manage to avert this are Oliver, who's a Child Prodigy and a Manipulative Bastard in his own right, and V, who's been around long enough to know when she's being used and when she isn't.
- Superhero: Deconstructed. Sigil Holders are superheroes in all but name, being people in colorful outfits with supernatural powers. However, most Sigil Holders in the story proper are bloodthirsty and very irresponsible with their powers, and often cause more harm for regular civilians than good.
