"What do you mean? You want to Fight?" Bakugo asked.
"Don't threaten the professional fighters!" Tenya yelled in shock.
"Oh no, we have a bit of a grimm infestation further down in the ruins, I think you could do with something other then walking." the good doctor smiled.
"Now that sounds good to me." Kiri slammed his hardened fists together.
"I'm not a fighter." Hatsume said with a squeak.
"Well if you would like to learn a thing or two about Remnantian engineering, I'd be happy to help, after all, every Hunter makes their own weapon." Port smiled at the girl.
Chapter 58: Motives among Ruins (you know what is coming)
I brought down my elbow through the mask of the Beowulf, the grimm's skull splintered under my hardened limb. "So Kirishima in a world where you don't have to fight for survival, why did you choose to be a hero?" Dr. Oobleck asked me.
"Well, to save people." I said as I turned to the green haired man.
"No, that is what you do, why do you do it?" He asked as he walked over to me.
"Well... I want to be like this old school hero. Crimson Riot." I said as I punched another Beowulf through the chest, black blood turning to mist as it dripped off of my hand. "To be a man that fight's for those who can't defend themselves."
"I see, and how do you intend to do that?" The doctor asked as he brushed some dirt off of a stone carving.
"Well, by putting myself between the innocent and the villains." I said as I listened to Bakugo's explosions further in the ruins.
"I see, you will be the wall that prevents their harm." He smiled at me.
I blasted another grimm into a dark paste on the ground, I had a big old grin as I kept on blowing them up. "Oh this is better then just walking all day!" I grabbed a Beowulf and smashed it's head into a wall. I felt bone crunch under my hand.
"You seem more then capable in your abilities Mr. Bakugo?" Dr. Oobleck said from the sidelines as he took notes.
"Well your looking at the next number 1 Hero, everyone else will be lucky to be sidekicks." I grinned at him.
"Do you really think that lowly of your peers?" He asked.
"They don't have what it takes to go pro, they all say they want to be number 1, but they don't have the raw power to do so." I dodged his question as I fired a concentrated shot through a group of grimm. "It looks like this area is clear."
"What do you want out of being a Hero?" He asked, damn this doctor was getting on my nerves.
"Simple, I want to be the number 1 Hero in the world." I turned to the skinny man, it was hard to believe he was a huntsman.
"What then? What comes after you reach the top of that mountain? Power for power's sake?" He asked.
"RECIPRO BURST!" Blue flames burned from my exhaust ports as I kicked the small Ursa into the boulder, I heard a wet crunch as a spike in it's back was forced through it's chest. It struggled to it's feet and charged me, I threw up the twin shields to block the beast and it rammed into them head first, pushing me back a few feet. The two disks of metal spun shut as I kicked the beast in the side of the head. It twitched for a few seconds then stopped.
"You certainly don't need the money, why put your life on the line?" Dr. Oobleck asked as he did a charcoal rubbing of a inscription.
"At first it was to live up to my families name, I didn't really think of how much it mattered to save people... until the Hero Killer Stain crippled my brother." I explained, "Ever since the day... I nearly got myself and my friends killed, I have mantled my brother's hero name, Inginium. I lost some feeling in my hand from that fight, and I'll only have it fixed when I truly understand what it means to be a hero."
All he did was smile at me as he patted my shoulder. "You maybe closer to that then you think young man."
"Young Monoma, why don't you go fight the grimm? Why when I was your age, I couldn't wait to get my hands on Grimm." Port said as he leaned on his weapon.
"My quirk is copy, and I there is a time limit to it, so I can't do much on my own." I admitted to the older man as I sat prodding the fire with a stick. "Class 1-A fools, born lucky with their own quirks."
"I see, you need to find your own step in the world, a way to show off your might power on your own." I looked at the older Huntsman. he mustache quivering with a smile. "Don't rely on your quirk, to copy someone's power is amazing, as most don't plan for when they find some one with the same strengths as them. Focus on your martial skills, and your physical strength. And get yourself a weapon my boy. The rest will fall in place."
"Be a better hero then them without relying on my quirk?" I asked.
"Indeed, why that reminds me of this one time in my prime..."
"Detroit SMASH!" my fist broke through the hard shell of the Deathstalker. I felt the squishy bits turning to dust around my fist.
"Your students all seem quite capable, though Bakugo could use with some guidance." Dr. Oobleck walked into the arena that I had just cleared of grimm.
I looked at the professional as I sat on the ancient seats. My body steaming as I shrunk down. "I just don't know what I'm doing when I'm teaching them, I'm following the lesson plan, but it feels like I'm missing something." I ran a hand through my hair.
"I felt the same way when I started teaching." He sat down next to me taking a swig of coffee from his thermos.
"Why did you become a Huntsman?" I asked as I looked at the smaller man.
"Look around these ruins, tell me what do you see?" He asked.
"Old roads, ruined buildings, monsters." I listed off.
"I see lives that could have been saved, and lives that will be saved, because the more we know of these ancient kingdoms, the better we can defend our own." He said as a flock of birds flew over head.
"You would have made a great hero." I said as I leaned back.
I tried to sleep through the explosions, gunshots and Kyoka's speakers. "Why did we have to stop?" I asked my self. I looked down at Zwei as he curled up into a ball on my chest. "At least one of us able to sleep."
"Miss Hatsume, what brought you along on this mission?" Port asked me as I looked over the spare weapons they had brought with them. This was fascinating, so many moving parts, yet it wasn't compromised structurally due to the metal forging process.
"Wrong place, wrong time." I said as I unscrewed the barrel segments. The rifling on the inside of the tubes appeared to be hand filed. Such attention to detail for spare weapons.
"What of your chosen career path? I doubt Support gear makers get that much thanks." Port asked as he ran a cloth over his weapons barrel.
"Like many I was inspired by heroes, but unlike them, I fell in love with their gear, I always have a new project in the works. To make the items that save lives is just as if not even more important then the heroes themselves."
I blared another group of Grimm with my sound waves, forcing them to stop and howl in pain as Ruby shot the down with her scythe. "Oh how I missed this." She grinned as the weapon compacted into a small red box.
"Your enjoying this?" I asked with a smile.
"Of course I am, I trained for this. And who knows when I'm coming back again." She smiled while we moved further down into the ruins.
"I wonder... is there any treasure left here? I mean the grimm would ward off looters." I reasoned as we checked another building.
"You want to go looking? Maybe Oobleck will let us keep a few pieces if we find enough." She smiled.
"That would be nice." I twirled my jacks in between my fingers, thinking of what sort of exotic jewelry we could find.
"Then what are we waiting for!" She grabbed my wrist and ran further into the ruins in a flash of red and black petals.
We had just made the biggest mistake of the entire mission.
And done.