Neither a Bird nor a Plane, it's Deku!

by FoxOnPie

A young boy learns to fly with the world beneath his wings. *Now with a TV Tropes Page!*

30. The Heroes' Journey (2)

Kayama could practically see the frustration oozing out of Aizawa, and she couldn't blame him for any of it. To the unfamiliar, watching Watahashi work looked like you were subjecting yourself to a bunch of nonsense, but that was only true some of the time. At a time like this, her doing things like shattering glowing rocks into dust over the ofuda and lighting flames that didn't even singe it were obviously actions undertaken for the sake of completing the task presented to her, because that was the only thing she needed to be doing at the moment.

That being said, Kayama still had no idea why she kept sucking on it as much as she did. She used to rattle off something nonsensical, but after the first few times, she started to ignore the question whenever it was asked. It was probably better left ignored, she reasoned.

"Well, this certainly is interesting," Watahashi said after some time.

"Were you able to figure something out?" Kayama asked.

"Indeed I was." Kayama could see All Might's face lighting up like a child on Christmas morning. "I can't trace back anything." Kayama could see All Might nearly fall over like a child who just found a calendar as one of his presents.

"What do you mean you can't trace it back? I thought you said Shigaraki was an amateur?" Aizawa asked.

"Oh, he most certainly is, and if that were all that there was to this, I could have had this done before any of you had the chance to get comfortable," Watahashi said. "The problem here is that even though this ofuda was crafted by a third-rate onmyoji, his master was clearly anything but, and he decided to be just enough of a helicopter parent to force some of his own warding charms into it."

Kayama rolled her eyes; not simply at what Watahashi had said, but at the fact that she was smiling the entire time she said it.

"So we did all of this for nothing, then? Great. Just great," Aizawa said. Watahashi chuckled at that.

"If that were the case, do you sincerely think I would have said this was interesting? Kayama-chan, tell Aizawa-chan why he's wrong, please."

"Huh? O-Oh, right!" Kayama would do that the second she figured out why he would be wrong. Aizawa wasn't wrong to feel like their time had been wasted. After all, they came all the way out to Isamu to see if the ofuda could be used to track down Shigaraki, but it was apparently worthless because of the protection imbued into it by whoever his teacher was.

The answer hit her like a ton of bricks.

"We might not be able to use this to track down Shigaraki, but it can be used to narrow down the list of his potential teachers!" Kayama said.

"Ding dong Bing bong! That's my Kayama-chan!" Watahashi said, clapping her hands for further emphasis. "Yes, even if this can't help us find the student, it can still help us find the master, for there are only a few people in the world who would be skilled enough to make an ofuda that could get the best of me."

All Might started to tense up a little.

"The first person on that list is me, naturally, but I can be crossed off of that last for obvious reasons. Unless, of course, you think I'm playing the long con here."

"Sensei, please don't joke around about something like this," Kayama said.

"Fine, fine. The second person on that list would be the Dragon King, one of the oldest Villains of all time. He was the world's premier expert in onmyodo during the Golden Age, but he hasn't shown himself since he was defeated by Batman, Wonder Woman, and Mordred the Shining Knight at the tail end of World War Two. It's not impossible for him to still be alive, but considering that the Fat Man was dropped on him not long after his defeat—or at least what they say was the Fat Man—" Yamashiro rolled her eyes, "it seems highly unlikely he'll come back any time soon. The third person on that list…" Watahashi trailed off at that point.

"Who is the third person?" Yamashiro asked. Once again, All Might started to tense up.

"The third person, Yamashiro-chan, is a bit of a wild card. He's someone with talent in the spiritual arts the likes of which this country hasn't seen since the days of Abe no Seimei, but with notably more self-interest." Watahashi laughed a bit for punctuation. "Yes, this third person is one who ruled over the metaphorical underground and only thinks about conquest and destruction, much like the Dragon King, so on that level, he'd come across as the kind of madman this Shigaraki person would seek guidance from. The reason he's a wild card, however, is that as far as I know, he was caught up in a storm of fists five—no, six—years ago and hasn't shown himself, since. For this man to be the one teaching Shigaraki would be quite the dark twist of fate. Don't you agree, All Might?"

For a brief moment, All Might went into his muscular form, despite still being under the effect of Kayama's glamour charm, and fell off of his floating pillow and onto his feet, the floorboards cracking in the process.

"Sorry, Ms. Watahashi. I didn't mean to hurt the mahogany," All Might said.

"There are always more trees to be torn down. Still, that's quite the reaction. Struck a nerve, did I? Open old wounds, perhaps?" She knew things. The sultry sort of drawl she spoke with made it clear to Kayama that she knew things she didn't need to know. It wasn't as if everything about that man was a highly guarded secret; tidbits of information about him had made their way to the internet over the years, and Kayama even remembered looking things up about him for an essay she had to write back when she was a student. But after All Might joined the U.A. staff and told them as much about his past that he could, she learned just how much of that was fact and how much was fiction. As such, if she was right about Watahashi, then it begged the question of how she became privy to such intimate details.

Before it could be thought about further, a few of her shikigami flew together and folded into an origami telegraph that began relaying a message.

"Oh, my," Watahashi said. "I think we need to cut things a little short so you all can go check on the children."

"Is something wrong?" Yamashiro asked.

"No, they're perfectly fine." Kayama let out a breath. "They might die, though."

Way to bury the lede! Kayama thought.

"What's the danger? Why are they in trouble?" Yamashiro asked, her katanas almost completely unsheathed.

"You'll have to go to Chaim-chan for the details. Not that I don't know them, but because I wish to be alone now," Watahashi said.

"If you don't tell us—"

"Yamashiro, I speak from experience when I say it'll be faster for us to just leave!" Kayama said. Yamashiro sheathed her katanas and the four of them ran out of the room.

"Wait, the ofuda!" Aizawa said.

"Hold on, I'll get it!" Kayama turned back around and ran back into Watahashi's office. Upon entering the room, she was treated to the sight of her teacher once again sucking on the ofuda like a popsicle with an expression of pure bliss.

"Oh my, I didn't take you as one who enjoyed voyeurism," Watahashi said.

"That's not—Why are you even doing that?!" Kayama asked as she ripped the ofuda out of her mouth.

"You wouldn't get it. You really wouldn't get it." Watahashi's laughter was the last thing Kayama heard as she left the room. She wanted an answer for all of that, but for now, the students' safety took priority.

---

Darkness. Chaos. Unbridled insanity. Ever since he became bound to Dark Shadow, Tokoyami had been a witness to those sorts of unholy elements and more. Many of them he still saw every day thanks to his Genie, but there were rare occasions when he saw it in his fellow man.

Midoriya's zombified state was one such occasion. The pale skin and purple aura of Fujimi's zombies could make anyone come across as frightening, and it did more than that for Midoriya. There was something ghastly to the sight of him, something inhuman, beyond the zombification, and it frightened him down to his very core.

"Midoriya's a zombie?! How?!" Ashido asked.

"The how's kind of obvious, isn't it?" Mongoose asked.

"The hell it is! If one of my explosions can't hurt Deku, then some lamebrain's teeth sure as hell shouldn't be able to!" Bakugou said.

"Really? He's got that kind of powerset?"

"He's supposed to. Midoriya looked as surprised as the rest of us that he got bit," Kendou said.

"Midoriya-chan's Quirk isn't the kind of power that stops working if you let your guard down, so how did—" Tsuyu stopped talking the second Midoriya appeared in front of her. Tokoyami felt a cold sweat forming, one that seemed to be shared by the others. He knew Midoriya was fast, but he didn't know he could move so fast that he was impossible to track.

"Me finish with you, croak-croak her," Midoriya said. A split second later, he slapped Tsuyu through the air, her body not stopping until it ran through seven trees in total.

"Tsuyu-chan!" Mongoose cried out. Midoriya let out an animalistic roar as he twisted his body around and jumped at Mongoose, though Shiozaki was able to pull her out of harm's way just in time.

"Don't you dare put frog girl over me!" Bakugou shouted as he threw a Die Die Discus at Midoriya. Before contact could be made, however, Midoriya's jaw seemed to unhinge to a cartoonish degree to allow him to swallow the weapon whole. A few seconds later, Midoriya burped and smoke came out of his nose.

"Yum! Not gross! Super tasty!" Midoriya said as he spat out onto the ground.

"You're not supposed to eat it, dumbass!" It was astounding that Bakugou found the time to voice that sort of complaint.

"Me not sorry!" Midoriya dug into the ground and pulled up a massive chunk of dirt that was quickly thrown in their direction. Ashido was able to do a fine job of kicking it away, and even finer job with the second chunk of dirt thrown at them.

"Hey, this is fun and all, but your friend over there looks like what happens when the pallbearers drop the coffin on the way to the grave," Dark Shadow said.

"Then do what you can to remedy that!" Tokoyami said.

"You forgot to make a wish, Fumi."

"I wish for you to do what I just told you to do!" Dark Shadow gave a mocking salute before flying off towards Tsuyu while imitating an ambulance's siren. Once it reached her, it spat out a large mass of gauze that wrapped around her like she was being mummified. From there, it tied a heart-shaped balloon to her midsection and made her float up into the air.

"Is Tsuyu-chan going to be all right?" Mongoose asked.

"She'll be fine. Well, fine enough, I guess," Dark Shadow said. It truly did feel like it was too much to ask for something good to come out of its mouth.

"Okay, that's enough out of you!" Meanwhile, Ashido had grown frustrated with Midoriya's tactics. "Zombie or not, you're going down!"

"Mina, wait!" Kendou's cry went unanswered as Ashido flew at Midoriya, her legs wrapped in a blue aura.

"Let's see how you like my X7 Ashi-Drop Kick!" Ashido's kick hit Midoriya square in the face, the resulting impact releasing a gust of wind and a loud burst of sound.

Despite that, the attack couldn't even move him from his spot.

"Me hate pink her's attack. Me think it stinks!" Midoriya said. He grabbed her leg with enough strength to break her boot apart before tossing her into the air as he did to Tsuyu, but this time, Kirishima was able to catch her and Shiozaki was ready to catch the both of them with her hair.

"Why you all so exciting? Be less boring. Make me have less fun!"

"Go back to grammar school!" Bakugou shouted. Midoriya roared before charging at him. Shiozaki transformed her hair into a wall of vines that blocked his path, and while he was surprisingly slow at tearing through it, it was still happening, nonetheless.

"This is why we said there was a problem!" Lori said.

"My fist breaking his teeth, that's the problem!" Dark Shadow said. "Come on, let me at 'im. I got this, you know I do!"

"I refuse," Tokoyami said.

"Good, 'cause if anyone's going after him, it's me!" Bakugou said.

"You can't do that, either! We need to fall back and hide so we can come up with a plan."

"Huh?! We win if we beat his zombie ass, but we can't do that with our tails between our legs!"

"He's right! We gotta stand our ground!" Kirishima said.

"After what he did to Tsuyu-chan? No way!" Mongoose said.

"Don't be stupid!" Ashido said. "He's not the only zombie, remember? We need to regroup now, while we're only dealing with one of them."

At that exact moment, a zombified Jirou fell from out of nowhere in front of them. While several people screamed, Lori, who was among the screamers, quickly decapitated her with a kick. The zombified Jirou left them alone to fetch her head, but it was at that moment when Midoriya succeeded in completely tearing through Shiozaki's vines. Tokoyami commanded Dark Shadow to carry them all away, but before they could get anywhere, a blast of light struck them all and knocked them back to the ground.

"Not cool, man," Dark Shadow said, its body slightly deflated, like a balloon.

"What the hell? Fatty?!" Tokoyami used context clues to surmise that Bakugou was talking about Dadan Tadan, and sure enough, a zombified Tadan was approaching them with a zombified Sero, Uraraka, Aoyama, and Mineta in tow. Those were the people approaching them from their front, and from their back, Jirou—her head now sloppily reattached to her body—was approaching them alongside a zombified Kaminari and Shouji.

"Everyone different from me. That's great!" Midoriya said.

"It's a complete gathering of devilry," Shiozaki said.

"Yeah, sure. Why aren't they attacking, though?" Kendou asked.

"The bastards are circling us like a pack of wild animals," Bakugou said. He wasn't chomping at the bit to fight anyone, so it was good that he was acknowledging the severity of the situation, but Tokoyami wished that the situation didn't need to have escalated to make that happen.

"Yeah, and they're ready to pounce the picosecond I tell them to, just the way I like it!" Though he had only heard his voice a few times, Tokoyami still recognized it with ease. Maybe him being the instigator of the current situation had something to do with it; he didn't know, and he didn't care.

He just wanted to know how to make Fujimi put an end to it all.

"Egads! Even Midoriya-kun has been turned into a zombie!" Iida said as his team approached them while being carried by a troupe of skeletons.

"I know, right? What a shocking plot twist," Dark Shadow said, its body back to its normal shape and inflation.

"Would have preferred seeing it happen in person, but beggars can't be choosers. After all, at least I get to watch this white-haired asshole kick the bucket!" Fujimi said.

"You pasty-faced bastard. This is your fault!" Bakugou said. Fujimi just laughed at that, for some reason.

"Fujimi-kun, stop this right now!" came the voice of Kashiko Sekigai—Tokoyami hoped he was remembering her name correctly—as she, Yaoyorozu, and Todoroki arrived on the scene in a Range Rover, for some reason.

"Now that's what I call a finisher car," Dark Shadow said.

"Nice of you to save me the trouble of rounding your team up, Sekigai. Now I can win this thing in one go!" Fujimi said.

"No, you can't! We both know you don't have enough control over this spell yet," Sekigai said as she and her team exited the Range Rover.

"That's what I told him, but Iida's the only one who wants to listen to little old me," Komori said with a pout.

"I don't really have a right to say much about anything involving magic, but he's doing fine, isn't he?" Ojiro asked.

"He's not! It's all going to—" Before Sekigai could finish, the zombified Sero sealed her mouth shut with a shot of tape. The other zombies yelled out in response to that, for some reason.

"I willed him to do that," Fujimi said. "I can make my zombies do whatever I want with just a thought, so stop saying I can't control shit. Just sit back and watch me waste these stuck up U.A. punks for good!" Ojiro rolled his eyes in a way that made it seem like he knew something, but given the circumstances, he couldn't find it in himself to bother thinking about it. "Midoriya, take the lead and bring them all down, starting with Mister Loudmouth over here!"

"Yes," Midoriya said. Sekigai's eyes widened as she struggled with the tape, and even Fujimi appeared taken back by the statement.

"Why the hell is he talking? They're not supposed to do that. Whatever. Who cares?" Komori mumbled something about him being an idiot. "Stop standing around and get him!"

"Yes." He said that, but he still didn't move.

"Do it, already!"

"Yes!" Midoriya screamed so loud that Fujimi and the rest of his team fell off of the skeletons that were carrying them. Tokoyami didn't understand what was going on, but it only took a few seconds for him to figure it out, and judging by the looks on everyone's faces, he wasn't alone in that.

"Wow. It took you all way too long to realize everything he's been saying is backward. Bet you all feel pretty stupid right now," Dark Shadow said.

"You am boss of me now, and you am so big!" Midoriya said.

"What the shit is—obey me, dammit!" Fujimi said.

"Me want to obey you!" Midoriya started stomping over to him. Fujimi looked like he was ready to wet his pants.

"Now's as good a time as any!" Bakugou said as he threw another Die Die Discus at Midoriya. Tokoyami knew that would fail, and it did, but rather than fail because it was too weak to affect him, it failed because the zombified Mineta jumped in the way at the cost of his own body.

"I-I didn't tell him to do that. They're not supposed to do stuff like that unless I tell them to!" Fujimi said. Midoriya roared as he jumped at Fujimi. Ojiro wrapped his tail around Fujimi's waist and pulled him out of the way just in time to avoid an earth-shattering stomp, Iida doing the same by picking up Komori and running away from the scene.

"Stay away from them! Especially Kacchan!" Midoriya said.

"The fuck!" Bakugou asked. All at once, the once unmoving zombies—in addition to the skeletons Fujimi brought with him—charged ahead with primal roars. Tokoyami had Dark Shadow bring everyone behind the Range Rover and out of harm's way, and while Tadan attacked them a second time, Shiozaki and Todoroki were able to block his magic missiles with vines and ice.

However, no one was able to stop Aoyama from biting Ojiro's tail. Fujimi was thrown against the Range Rover before Aoyama could grab him, but it was only a matter of seconds before Ojiro joined the horde.

"Fujimi-kun, you colossal moron!" Sekigai said as she materialized a pixelated grenade that, after being thrown at the horde, exploded in a cascade of blue light that knocked them back—even Midoriya, surprisingly.

"I told him this would happen. And what did I say would happen when this happened? Exactly what just happened," Komori said.

"If only he had listened to you, Komori-kun!" Iida said.

"Fine! You all fucking win, okay?!" Fujimi said as he climbed atop the Range Rover. He moved his hands around in a rhythmic pattern as he chanted an old, mythical language, clearly the tongue one needed to speak in to activate his necromancy. After a few seconds, Fujimi slammed his hands together, shouted another word in his mystic tongue, and looked dumbfounded as nothing happened.

"Let me guess, you can't stop it, right?" Sekigai asked. Fujimi mumbled a curse as Sekigai threw another grenade at the zombies. "Why can't you stop it, Fujimi-kun? What happened to your full control, Fujimi-kun? Huh? What's wrong, Fujimi-kun?"

"Maybe a good blow to the back of the skull will fix this," Dark Shadow said, a baseball bat suddenly in its hands.

"It doesn't work like that, and even if it did, like hell I'm gonna—" Before Fujimi could finish, Bakugou walked over to him and blasted him in the face with an explosion. His body was propelled hard enough into the Range Rover to leave a trace of impact, and anyone with eyes could tell that he had lost consciousness.

"Why on Earth did you do that? He said that wouldn't stop the spell!" Yaoyorozu said.

"Like he didn't have it coming, either way," Bakugou said. Tokoyami found it hard to argue with that. "Snake Girl, Computer Girl, Fish Legs, one of you tell us how we stop this, now!"

"Am I Fish Legs?" Lori asked.

"Normally, it would be easy for the caster to just stop the spell, but that's only the case for someone with a modicum of competence!" Sekigai said as she threw more grenades.

"Fortunately, there's a failsafe built into the spell for stupid times like this," Mongoose said. "It leaves us with two options: we can either wait an hour for it to wear off, or we can deal enough damage to a zombified person to cause the spell to wear off."

"So we just gotta kill them until they stop dying? That's great!" Bakugou, smiling like a mad man, threw out a barrage of Die Die Discuses at the horde and wasted no time in igniting them. Kaminari, Sero, Tadan, Jirou, and Aoyama were caught in the ensuing blast, but the rest of the zombies managed to avoid taking a hit thanks to Midoriya knocking some of them away with a thunderous clap. Yaoyorozu fired a couple of rounds from cannons of her own design while Todoroki let loose a massive wave of ice, but both attacks failed when Midoriya used his body to intercept them and barely moved as a result.

"He's even more annoying now," Todoroki said.

"We won't be able to get out of this with Midoriya-san as an opponent," Yaoyorozu said.

"Easier said than done!" Ashido said as she used her acid to melt a skeleton away and blind Kaminari as he tried to electrocute her.

"If we can't defeat Midoriya-kun, then at the very least, we need to free our classmates from Fujimi-kun's spell to bolster our forces and make it easier to last until time is up!" Iida said. At the same time, Shiozaki had ensnared Uraraka in her vines and tossed her aside into Iida's path. Iida apologized profusely as he ran up to her and prepared to deliver a kick to her head. Instead of that, however, it was Iida's head that was hit with an attack.

The attack being dealt by an incredibly muscular arm from Uraraka.

"What the hell?!" Bakugou said. An appropriate reaction, considering that Uraraka's arm—and now the rest of her body—had nearly doubled in size and muscle mass as she became covered in a brown aura; if it weren't for the Feminum, Tokoyami was certain that her costume would have been ripped to shreds. "Hey Karate Kid, isn't her only power making shit float?"

"I don't know what I'm looking at, either!" Kendou said as she used her enlarged fists to hit Ojiro with an upward strike, most likely a technique of her Super Bajiquan.

"All I'm looking at is a pile of limbs!" Bakugou said as he blasted Uraraka with an explosion. A blast like that normally would have knocked her off her feet at least, but Uraraka stood her ground and her pale flesh was barely scorched. Uraraka yelled at Bakugou like a wild beast, and the second he put up a fighting stance, she turned around, ran over to a dazed Iida, ripped off his chest plate, and bit him on the stomach.

"Iida, no!" Komori said as a dozen of her Shroom Buddies joined together to pull Uraraka off of him, though his skin rapidly becoming more and more pale made it clear that it was a wasted effort.

"He really made them ignore me? Even in unlife, you're pissing me off, Deku!" Bakugou shouted. Uraraka, meanwhile, used a single punch to shatter a wave of ice made by Todoroki, and he then summoned a smaller amount to block a tackle from a now zombified Iida, one of his legs flying off as a result of the impact.

"When exactly are we supposed to hit the threshold?!" Yaoyorozu asked as she hit a skeleton with a staff.

"I don't know, if I'm being perfectly honest!" Lori said as she cut Mineta's body in half with a kick.

"This is exhausting. We can only keep this up for so long," Tokoyami said as Dark Shadow punched a zombified Shouji. As he flew back, Midoriya flew in on his left with a punch that was barely avoided thanks to Dark Shadow lifting him in the air. "Dark Shadow, I wish for you to tear his flesh asunder with the almighty power of Ig-Alima!" Dark Shadow acknowledged the wish and dropped Tokoyami in order to transform into the shape of a massive blade that swung down on Midoriya, but Midoriya bent backward in time to avoid getting anything worse than a small cut on his arm.

"That counts as asunder, you know," Dark Shadow said as it went back into its normal form.

"That hurt, but me not mad, anyway, bird him!" Midoriya said. He flew back down to the ground, picked up two trees, and threw them at Tokoyami with speed comparable to a missile. Shiozaki formed two giant hands made of vines to intercept the blow, but she was still pushed back into Tokoyami and the trees still managed to pierce through her hair a bit.

"No, you can't do that!" Shiozaki said as she crushed the trees into splinters. "As dire as things might be, a crusade is not the answer. Do not act like He would allow it!" Tokoyami had no idea what Shiozaki was talking about for the most part, but he perfectly understood her cries of the situation being dire. Between Midoriya's strength and the strange new power Uraraka was exhibiting, ending things in their victory was seeming less and less likely by the second.

There was one thing he could do, though. It would be easy enough to make happen, but then there was the aftermath to consider. Using that much power would undoubtedly have a negative effect on him, and he had enough negative effects to deal with. But if he didn't do it, then there was no telling how hurt everyone would get, especially since it didn't seem like Seraph was going to help them, any time soon.

"Dark Shadow, I wish for you to reverse Midoriya and everyone else's zombification at once!" It wasn't an easy one to make, but his decision was obvious.

"Yeah, that's not happening," Dark Shadow said.

"What?" Tokoyami knew that the area was polluted with the sounds of carnage, but it still felt as if the world abruptly went silent.

"I said it's not happening."

"What?!"

"I said I said it's not—"

"I heard you, you buffoon! I want an answer, obviously!"

"I don't do zombies. Beating them up is fine, but I'm not gonna mess around with their insides. Those guys give me the willies, you know?"

"The one time I'm willing to use you to your full potential, and you refuse?!"

"Yeah, how's that for irony? Wait, is that ironic? I never know if I'm using irony right. Wait, is that ironic?" Tokoyami wanted to strangle Dark Shadow. He wanted to grab him by his abyssal neck and wring the life out of him for this and every other insane thing he had done to him.

But before that could happen, Shouji snuck up behind him and bit down on his neck with a mouth sprouted from one of his tentacles.

And then Tokoyami was a zombie.

---

Lori Lemaris was having a rollercoaster of an emotional day. It started off wonderfully with her checking off one of the boxes of surface world goals by meeting Izuku, the absolute boy of her dreams, then it got disappointing when he said that he wanted to just be friends, then it became enjoyable when she realized that temporary friendship had its own set of benefits, then it got confusing when Itsuka, her other new friend, kept getting mad at her for reasons she just didn't understand, and then it hit a definite low point when Izuku became a zombie who then went on to become king of the zombie horde. It was all hard to process, and not just because she might die.

That was a thought running through her head as a zombified Fumikage tried to peck at her.

"Seven Seas Strike!" Lori said, breaking his body apart with a watery explosion. His head and limbs went flying in different directions while his torso just fell to the ground.

"Hey, be a little more careful, would ya?!" And Dark Shadow—Lori was pretty sure that's what he called the Quisp-like Genie he was bonded with—was still sticking out of his body.

"Sorry, sorry!" Lori said.

"Man, this sucks! Fumi can't talk while his brain's a pile of mush, so he can't give me any commands, and he can't even send me back home! I'm so uncomfortable!" Dark Shadow said as it fell back in a recliner and started eating a hamburger, both of which appeared out of nowhere.

"It's not like you were helping that much before!" Itsuka said as she struck Kyoka in the face with her elbow.

"Hey, I tore Midoriya asunder by a very technical definition of asunder, so that was something. Besides, it's not like it'd be hard to beat him if you just took advantage of his weakness."

"What weakness?!" Dark Shadow stared at Itsuka for a few seconds before laughing and spewing hamburger chunks everywhere. It kept laughing as Fumikage's severed body parts crawled back to the torso and came back together, the walking corpse then moving away to try and attack Todoroki with minimal success.

"So Izuku had a weakness?" Lori asked as she kicked off a skeleton's head.

"Not that I'm aware of, and that's why this whole thing doesn't make sense!"

"But something about the zombies allowed them to make him join them. What do zombies have in common with the other stuff that's been working?"

"I don't know! The only stuff that's even pushed him back a little is Shiozaki's vines, Sekigai's bombs, and that stupid Genie. That's all random stuff!"

"Yeah, I guess none of that magical stuff has anything in common." Itsuka suddenly dropped what she was doing—which meant that she dropped half of Kyoka's body to the ground—and looked at her like she was someone watching in disbelief as she ate a fish taco. "What?"

"His weakness is magic," Itsuka said. "His weakness is magic. That's why Sekigai's bombs could push him back, why Shiozaki's vines could hold him off, and why Mineta was able to bite him in the first place! His weakness is magic!"

Thinking about it for a second, that made a great deal of sense. Lori couldn't decide if they were smart for figuring it out or dumb for taking so long to put it all together.

"Everyone, listen up! Midoriya's weak to magic attacks!" Itsuka shouted. "That's the only way we're going to do any kind of damage to him, so the magic users need to focus on him while the rest of us work on the others!"

"Don't tell me what to do!" Katsuki said as he blasted Hanta and Minoru away. Everyone followed suit in knocking the zombified students away to a specific part of the field. At one point, the oddly muscular Ochaco came at Mina with a giant fist, but Eijiro blocked it at the cost of ending up buried in the ground down to his hips, which gave Itsuka a chance to send her flying with a punch. Once all of the zombies were together in one place, Shouto summoned a giant wall of ice that wrapped around behind them, leaving only a single point of entry and exit. As Shouto fell back against Momo and Mina pulled Eijiro out of the ground, everyone headed for the half-dome of ice to keep fighting the zombies.

"Good luck," was what Itsuka said to Lori after a moment of silence.

"You too, Captain!" Lori said with a thumbs up, one Itsuka was on the verge of reciprocating before ultimately turning away from her and running off to the zombies.

"Everyone still here. Why everyone still here including you five?" Midoriya asked.

"Not gonna lie, I'm kinda getting annoyed by the backward talk," Kinoko said.

"If he's as vulnerable to magic as Kendou-san claims, then that'll be done with soon enough," Kashiko said as she summoned a pixelated shotgun into her hands.

"It is time for his sinful form to be purified," Ibara said.

"Revenge for Tsuyu-chan!" Habuko said as she spat out a ball of venom at Izuku. He tried to sway it away, but he completely failed and the attack melted away a bit of his hand.

Itsuka appeared to have been right on the money.

"That no hurt. That no hurt!" Izuku screamed and flew at them.

"Repent!" Ibara said as her hair morphed into a giant hand that slapped him down to the ground. Ibara held him there and Kashiko fired off a round of blue light from her shotgun to blow off a chunk of his head. Izuku, however, quickly worked his way out of the vines and jumped over to Kashiko to rip the shotgun out of her hands, bits of brain dripping out the entire time. Izuku hit her upside the head with it, but she quickly summoned a pair of pixelated tonfas and smacked him away.

"I'm really sorry about this, Izuku!" Lori said as she tearfully launched a bubble at Izuku, only for him to fly up into the air before it could hit him.

"Purple her bad girl. Me get why red her like purple her, but that here and now!" Izuku said as he flew at Lori like a rocket. It was a dangerous sight, but it gave her a chance to blast him with a bubble without missing, a chance she didn't hesitate to take. Izuku put up a guard that allowed him to land on his feet, but a good chunk of his arms still got blown off in the process.

"Okay gang, it's our turn to shine! Shroom Buddies, combine to form Mega Shroom Buddy!" Kinoko said. Her legion of tiny mushroom warriors jumped on top of each other to form a tower of sorts before their red glow intensified and they melted into each other. When the glowing died down, the Shroom Buddies had combined into a giant version of themselves—comparatively speaking, as the end result was only a little taller than Midoriya.

It certainly lost a lot of its cuteness, especially with its stubby arms now having throbbing biceps built into them.

"For Lady Kinoko, kino!" Mega Shroom Buddy slid over to Izuku and punched him in the face. Izuku stood his ground, however, and punched Mega Shroom Buddy right back; even with so much of his arms missing, it still looked like it hurt a lot. Mega Shroom Buddy quickly recovered and went back to punching him, and it soon became a continual trading of blows. In the midst of all of that, Ibara's vines wrapped themselves around Izuku from behind and sealed up his movements tight, allowing Mega Shroom Buddy to strike him unopposed and for everyone else to hit him with their own attacks.

"Don't stop doing that!" Izuku shouted. With a mighty flex, Izuku tore through Ibara's vines, kicked a hole through Mega Shroom Buddy, and used the broken vines to lasso Kashiko and throw her into Habuko, knocking them both to the ground.

"Mega Shroom Buddy!" Kinoko cried.

"Be... good… kino..." was all Mega Shroom Buddy said before exploding into a box of chocolate-covered almonds.

"I'm sorry about your friend?" Lori asked.

"He shall be avenged. By Mega Shroom Buddy Number Two!" A giant mushroom that looked identical to the one Izuku just destroyed appeared out of nowhere and slid over to him only quickly to suffer the same fate. "Mega Shroom Buddy Number Two!"

"New strategy, maybe!" Lori fired another bubble at Midoriya that he barely dodged, followed by Ibara attacking him with vines that he managed to completely weave around. Kashiko shot at him with a pixelated machine gun while Habuko spat more venom, but he still managed to dodge it all. His body was falling apart at the seams and only slowly fixing itself, yet it did nothing to impede his gracefulness.

"You no need to try harder than that!" Izuku said as he kept dodging attacks.

"What if I do this, then?!" Lori asked as she fired another bubble at Izuku. He dodged, but Lori then launched a second bubble at the first bubble, creating a watery explosion far bigger than normal. Izuku couldn't escape the range of the explosion in time and was knocked down to the ground, allowing Lori to stomp on his chest, Habuko to melt off his feet, and Kashiko to ensnare his arms with pixelated chains.

"We sincerely hope you will find salvation within His embrace," Ibara said as her hair morphed into the shape of a zweihander.

"You remember that none of this is actually going to kill him, right?" Kashiko asked.

"All the better, then." Ibara swung her hair down at Izuku's neck, ready to sever his head from it, but at the last second, he ripped his wrists through Kashiko's chains at the cost of his hands, allowing him enough freedom to fly out of range of Ibara's attack.

He cut off his hands? Lori thought. Why—No, how? Romero's zombies are supposed to have a sense of self-preservation that keeps them from doing stuff like that! Between that and the talking, what is going on with him?! It would have been nice to have more time to think about it, but unfortunately for Lori, Izuku wasted no time in flying down and tackling her to the ground. Rancid drool spilled out across her face as he bent down towards her and she tried and failed to break free of his grasp. If nothing happened, she would surely be the latest member of his zombie horde, probably something along the lines of queen of the undead; part of that wouldn't be so bad.

Fortunately, most likely fortunately, that never came to pass, for all of a sudden, Izuku started to choke, of all things. He scratched at his neck to the point that his fingers—which had just started growing back—would dig through his throat, but after a few seconds, his fingers started melting off and he started rolling around in the dirt while gasping for air.

"And thus, my Mega Shroom Buddies have been avenged," Kinoko said.

"Kinoko, you did this? How? Also, what?" Lori asked as she picked herself back up.

"I just hit him with a super small variant of my mystical mushrooms to take him down a peg or six."

"Where, though? I don't see anything on him," Kashiko said.

"That's because they're in his windpipe," Kinoko said with a wide-eyed smile.

"What?" was what slipped out of Lori's mouth.

"You mean there are mushrooms growing in his throat?" Habuko asked while rubbing her own neck.

"How unseemly," Ibara said, her hair shaping itself into some sort of barf bag. Highly appropriate, Lori reasoned.

"Desperate times call for gross measures," Kinoko said. "With this, though, our victory is all but assured. The ol' mushrooms in the throat trick hurts like hell for everyone, but with Midoriya super weak to magic, it'd hurt like nobody's business, and it is! Now we can either dogpile on him like there's no tomorrow or just wait for the pain to run its course and bring him back to normal. Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy!" The last four words were said in English, for some reason.

"I mean, it seems like this'll work itself out, but it's always good to double-tap, yes?" Kashiko asked.

"Dogpile it is, then," Habuko said. Just as the girls were preparing for the aforementioned dogpiling, Izuku fell on his back and screamed towards the sky. Lori didn't think much of it, just assuming that he was simply reacting to the pain Kinoko's attack was putting him through.

Then he started breathing fire.

"Wait, what?!" Kinoko asked.

"Do-Does he not normally do that?" Lori asked.

"As far as I know, Midoriya-san can only breathe ice, not fire," Ibara said.

"Forget about that, start thinking about me!" Kinoko said. "My mushrooms can handle the cold, but fire is out of my field of expertise! My master plan is literally going up in smoke!"

Before anything else could be said, Izuku jumped onto all fours—all fours long since fully regenerated—and directed his stream of fire at the girls. Naturally, everyone was blown back by the attack, but three of them took it worse than the others: Lori, whose Atlantean physiology made her far more susceptible to extreme heat than a normal person; Ibara, whose plant-like hair naturally shouldn't be anywhere near fire, resulting in a panic when the tips of her hair were briefly lit up; finally, Kinoko, who appeared relatively fine, but was throwing a fit over the dramatic turn of events.

"Shroom her make throat feel good, but me ruin that," Izuku said. "Now me leave you alone!" Like a wild boar, Izuku charged at Kinoko, the girl barely having enough time to create a giant red mushroom that she used as a springboard to launch herself into the air. "Burn!"

"Your fire can't get me from—wait, if everything you say is backward, then—" Kinoko was cut off when blue light shot out of Izuku's eyes that, upon hitting her, trapped her in a block of ice.

"Ice vision?!" Kashiko shouted as the frozen Kinoko fell to the ground.

"Is that also something he's not supposed to have?" Lori asked.

"As far as I know," Ibara said.

"Hold on Komori-chan, I'll—" Habuko looked ready to use her venom to melt the ice, but before she had the chance, Izuku froze her, as well.

"Now snake her is free, too. You all be done with, later!" Izuku flew at them, and Ibara, who was still recovering from the fire breath, wasn't able to create a barricade that could fully absorb the impact, resulting in the three of them getting blown back.

"Well, this is a nice surprise." All the way back to where the rest of the group was situated.

"It really isn't," Itsuka told Dark Shadow.

"Hey, Captain," Lori said to Itsuka from the ground. "Turns out we don't have as much of a handle on this as we thought. How are things going over here?"

"We lost Koda, so that kinda sucks, but the skeletons are gone, at least. They're getting exhausted, but we're still nowhere near done, and if things are going like this, then we'll probably never get anywhere!" Itsuka said. Lori took stock of the situation inside the half-dome of ice; everyone who was amongst the living looked to be on their last legs, and the zombies were all broken up in various ways, regenerating rather slowly, and just not looking into it, altogether.

That all changed the second that Izuku let out a mighty roar amongst mighty roars. All the zombies suddenly regained their focus and slammed any detached limbs back into place, as if Izuku's roar had instilled within them a sudden burst of energy. Said energy was then used by the zombies to charge at the legions of the living with renewed fury, the still muscular Ochaco doing the most work as she effortlessly made her way through everyone's defenses.

"Leave them alone! Let them all go free!" Izuku said amid all the carnage.

"I won't let you—" As Kashiko was in the middle of materializing a pixelated bazooka, Izuku jumped over to her and bit down hard on her shoulder.

"Knock it off, already!" Itsuka said, hitting Izuku with a massive punch that, despite the tremendous effort put into it that Lori greatly admired, had no effect on him.

"Even red her no hit me. Red her really am happy with me." Somehow, through the zombified guttural tone of voice, Lori could hear a twinge of sadness.

"No, that's not—" Itsuka was cut off by the newly zombified Kashiko tackling her to the ground and drooling all over her chest. She bent down to bite it, but Lori was quick to decapitate her with a kick.

"By the way, I'm still super winded from when he was breathing fire, so don't expect a lot from me," Lori said.

"From when he was what?!" Itsuka asked as she threw the headless Kashiko off of her, the action happening at the same time Izuku used his fire breath to melt Shouto's ice. "Never mind, then!"

"What the hell is this shit?!" Katsuki asked, either in response to Izuku's new powers or to the fact that the zombies were still ignoring him.

"No, a crusade is still off the table, even if it's starting to seem like a good option!" Lori had no idea what Ibara was talking about, but either way, it was clear from her repeated failed attacks that she was starting to get exhausted.

"Someone should probably do something about this," Dark Shadow said, eating a large turkey leg while Momo had her bo staff snapped in two by the muscular Ochaco.

"If we could, we would," Shouto said, his body covered head to toe in ice. If Lori was a gambling fish, she'd bet that that wasn't a good thing.

"Dammit, this is all going nowhere," Itsuka said as she slapped Mashirao into a wall.

"I know, right?" Lori asked as she kicked a hole through Yuga. "Normally, Romero's zombies all lose their minds, but Izuku keeping his for some reason is making them be way too coordinated. Just how badly did he screw up the spell to—wait, that's it!"

"What? What's it?!"

This is it! Lori thought to Itsuka.

Your telepathy? Itsuka thought.

That's right. In all the madness, I forgot that I never shut off my link to Izuku! I can use that to reach into his mind and shut his brain off!

Shut his brain off?!

It's a figure of speech that doesn't translate that well from the original Atlantean. Basically, I'm just gonna mess around with his head a bunch until he loses consciousness.

And that's, you know, safe?

It should be, and there really aren't any better options in front of us. After a bit of silence, Itsuka gave her the OK; she didn't sound completely fine with it, but Lori could tell that she just hated seeing her friend as he was and just wanted it all to end. Lori understood that completely, so with no hesitation, she focused all of her telepathic powers into Izuku's mind. Just as she feared, all of his thoughts had been twisted by Romero's magic to be nothing but incoherence layered between anger and hatred. It made her want to throw up, but she couldn't give in, so she pressed on ever forward.

In a matter of seconds, Izuku screamed and fell to his knees, the rest of the horde quickly following suit.

"All right! I don't know what's going on, but let's get 'em!" Katsuki said.

"No!" Lori interjected. "Right now, I'm using my telepathic abilities to mess with Izuku's mind, but it's very fragile to the point that the slightest physical contact will disrupt the link. Everyone needs to social distance until this is completely over and done with!" Katsuki grumbled something before conceding to leave Lori alone, as he should.

"What purple her doing to me?" Izuku asked. "Me really like it. You no stop right now!" Izuku stomped on the ground with enough force to make a small crater and stepped over towards Lori.

"No!" Lori focused more of her power into Izuku and sent him back to the ground. "I'm not stopping until you stop!" Lori kept putting her all into it, but Izuku's mind was a surprisingly hard nut to crack. It was taking all she had to just walk through the doorway, and he was taking advantage of that to keep making a slow advance forward. Even the strongest human would surely have given up by now, but Izuku still resisted her. She couldn't have that. She couldn't fail when Itsuka was counting on her, so she abandoned any and all notions of holding back and pushed forward into his mind with everything she had to give. Once more, Izuku fell to the ground, and that time, Lori could tell he wouldn't be so quick to get up. Now was her chance to break through and get him for good.

"What?" It all flew at her in an instant. So fast, so strange, so unbelievable that she barely had time to process the information she had just learned. Never had she ever learned anything so impossibly impossible before, and the impossibility of it all made her lose focus for a second. It was just a second, but it was more than enough time for Izuku to regain his footing, let out a roar, and charge at Lori. He only failed to tackle her because Itsuka pulled her out of the way, but even that was enough to disrupt the telepathic link and free Izuku, thus returning freedom to the entire horde.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I just—that's a lot to take in."

"What's a lot to take in?" Itsuka asked. Lori looked at her, dumbfounded. There was nothing hidden beneath the surface of that; she didn't know anything about it. He really had it in him to keep something like that a secret. She'd like to dwell on it more, but all of the zombies were back in fighting shape, so now wasn't the time for that.

"Now you all live!" Izuku shouted above the moans of the horde. This was the end. Everyone was too exhausted and beat up to hold the line for more than a second, so it would take very little for them to be overwhelmed and forcibly turned into zombies. Even though they would die, it still technically wasn't life or death, but that didn't mean any of them should have to deal with it, either way. As the end drew ever closer, Lori did the only thing she was capable of doing: brace for the end of her life and the beginning of her unlife.

However, at about the time that she should have seen Izuku gnawing at her flesh, she instead saw him and all the other zombies stop as a fortunately familiar light appeared out of nowhere.

"Hey, everyone," Seraph said in a carefree tone as the light faded away.

"Mr. Lavon, you came!" Ibara cried out, her hair taking the shape of an exclamation mark.

"Just in the nick of time."

"A couple of minutes ago wouldn't have been so bad, either," Lori said.

"Yeah, in all seriousness, though, I'm sorry about that," Seraph said. "Even with how badly Romero screwed up, this was still a training exercise, so I thought it'd be fine to let you all handle things on your own. It clearly got out of hand, and I'm just gonna fix everything right now, okay? Okay."

The zombies resumed their charge, and at the same time, Seraph slammed his staff against the ground, releasing a surge of magical energy that turned the half-dome of ice into a giant mass of water. Instead of falling onto their heads, though, the water split into massive tendrils that wrapped around all of the zombies except Izuku and pulled them into the air before transforming into spheres of water that perfectly trapped every one of them.

"My enemies! Yes!" Izuku shouted.

"That takes care of them; just have to wait for them to drown enough times to come back to life." Up in the air, Ochaco started to tear through her sphere, but with a quick wink from Seraph, the water fixed itself and a pair of aquatic handcuffs were thrown on her. "Wait, was that one girl always so buff? Eh, it's probably not important. Now all that's left is—"

"Live!" Izuku flew at Seraph faster than a speeding bullet, but Seraph made a small wall of Earth rise up that somehow managed to completely block the attack and cause him to fall to the ground. "That no hurt!"

"Do I have to try harder, then?" Seraph shrugged his shoulders before tapping the ground with his staff once more and causing it to transform into a giant cobra. The cobra hissed at Izuku before charging ahead like an arrow and tearing a giant hole through his chest.

"Holy crap!" said Eijiro and a multitude of other students.

"Well, part of that is correct." The snake slithered back to Seraph and turned back into his staff. As bits of flesh fell about in his chest cavity, Izuku growled and spat out a stream of fire at Seraph, only for him to spin his staff around like a fan and deflect it all. Immediately after that, he fired off a blast of ice vision, but Seraph used his magic to turn it into water and redirect back at Izuku and chop off his arms. It would have been a cool sight if the situation wasn't what it was.

"Keep going… Keep going… Me like this a lot! Why you not doing this?! Me deserve this!"

"Again, I'm sorry I let it get this far," Seraph said. He pointed his staff into the air, and right above it appeared a massive ball of fire. "With this next attack, I hereby burn away all of your sins."

"Me love this! Me love hurting people, you know! Me do this all on me own, so don't leave me alone!"

Stop it! Please, just—just stop it, okay? The words were loud and clear within the telepathic link, but they weren't Lori's, they were Itsuka's. Judging by how his movements all came to a standstill, her plea had actually worked. Interesting, Lori told herself.

"Har-Har Infigar!" A beam of fire shot out of the ball right at Izuku and engulfed him in a pillar of flames; the sound of scorching embers was only barely drowned out by the sound of Izuku's screams. After a few seconds, the fire faded away, and Izuku fell to the ground a charred mess of a thing.

A second later, the signature purple aura of the zombies left him and his flesh, in addition to losing all signs of injury, regained its original coloration. Lori could finally breathe again. It was finally over.

---

"Is anything ever over, though? In my experience, death is just a beginning for something else entirely, but I might be biased in that regard. What do you think?"

"Again, where am I?" The woman Midoriya was talking to merely shrugged her shoulders. She did that every time he asked that question as if it wasn't important, even though it clearly was. The last thing he remembered was being in a state of shock as a zombified Mineta somehow managed to bite him, and then all of a sudden, he was in a realm of darkness with his only company being a pale-skinned girl with a parasol whose black clothes seemed to melt into the environment. He didn't know how she started waxing philosophies on death, but it wasn't what he wanted to be hearing right now.

"You know, if I knew I'd get so little out of talking to you, I don't know if I'd have even bothered to show up. But I finally had a good chance to talk to you, so I figured I'd just take it," said the woman in black before drinking from a cup of tea that wasn't there a moment ago.

"Wait, you've been wanting to talk to me? Am I someone special to you?" Midoriya asked.

"Yes, but also no." Midoriya didn't quite get it. "Let me explain. I think all things in the universe—human, inhuman, animal, well-hatted—are special in their own right, but no matter what kind of life you live, in the end, everyone has to see me all the same, so in that regard, no one's any more special than anyone else. Still, I've been looking for a chance to talk to you before the 'big day' for a while because I wanted to follow up on a talk I had with someone else a while back. Yeah, you've never been in this kind of situation before, but I could have gotten help from someone if I wasn't always so swamped with work, and having to work around Jimmy and the Big Five also didn't help a lot."

"Who and what?"

"Never mind. The point is that I finally got a chance to talk to you, and it's been nice, even if you haven't had much to say about anything."

"Sorry. My mind's been, you know, elsewhere." Midoriya gestured around to wherever it was that they were supposed to be.

"Well, this has been enough for me. I think it's about time for you to start coming to."

"Coming to? Wait, has this all been a dream?"

"No; like I told your friend all those years ago, dreams are more my brother's field of expertise. This isn't exactly what he went through, but either way, it's going to end right about—"

"What friend? What are you—"

"Now."

---

Midoriya awoke to a sense of confusion and weakness. The memories of his meeting with whoever that was supposed to be were still burning through his mind, almost as if it had really happened. That, of course, raised more questions than answers, so he decided to table it for the time being; that summed up the confusion. As for weakness, that came about from an incredible amount of stiffness running through his body; he could still move fine enough, but his body ached with every move he made.

"Is this what cramps feel like?" Midoriya asked.

"Probably." To his surprise, it was All Might who answered his question. "Did you have a good nap, Young Midoriya?"

"Maybe? Why was I asleep, and why am I in a nurse's office?"

"Well, that's kind of a long story." All Might then proceeded to tell Midoriya the previously alluded to long story about how he was turned into a bloodthirsty zombie who led an entire horde of undead against everyone else in the exercise. By the end of it all, Midoriya wanted to vomit.

"I wanted this to just be a normal day. After the USJ, I needed something light and manageable, but was that too much to ask? Oh God, and I even dragged everyone else into it, too! This is the worst. The absolute worst."

"Well, maybe you should hold off on that for a bit," All Might said with a nervous expression.

"Hi, Izuku! Hi, All Might!" Midoriya had no idea how things could get worse, but as if the universe took it upon itself to answer the question, Lori of all people barged into the room.

"L-Lori-san!" Midoriya said. "Um, I know that everyone's a little banged up after what happened, but All Might is only here with me, personally, because, um, because me being the one who caused the most damage left him worried about any possible psychological damage I might be suffering, that's why!"

"Wait, what? I know you're lying, but is that something you think you might have?" Lori asked.

"What do you mean? I'm not—"

"Midoriya, my boy, she knows about us." Despite all of his aching, Midoriya still shot up in his bed. All Might wasn't lying. He was being as truthful as he had always been, and that was the worst part about it.

"S-So all the stuff about One for All and your injury?"

"I know it all, yeah. Your glamour charm is really good, by the way; I get why Principal Watahashi likes Midnight so much," Lori said.

"I don't—This is just—All Might, why would you tell her?!"

"He didn't! I just, sorta, found out." Lori put on a slightly melancholic expression that, from the little Midoriya knew about her, didn't fit her personality. "When you were a zombie and kicking all of our asses, I tried to stop you by using my telepathy to shut your brain off—"

"Shut my brain off?!"

"It's a figure of speech that doesn't translate that well from the original Atlantean. Basically, I was just gonna mess around with your head a bunch until you lost consciousness. You were putting up a lot of resistance, though, so I had to go super deep inside your mind, and that led to me learning all your All Might secrets… among other things."

"Oh." Midoriya didn't need to ask her to clarify what she meant by that. There was only one thing she could possibly be talking about.

"I'm really, really, really, really, really, really, really sorry about that! I didn't go in your head to try and learn your secrets, and if I knew there was anything big like this in there, I never would have even tried it! Just when we had that whole thing about me being too forward, I go and do something like this." There was no arguing with that. "Look, um, we Atlanteans have always had people hating us for not being human. King Orin joining the Justice Society helped alleviate that a little, but it wasn't much, and when people started panicking over Quirks showing up, and then with all of the anti-alien stuff that happened after the Lantern War, we got thrown into the mix, too. Things have gotten a lot better since then, but it's not exactly perfect. Even I've gotten weird looks from people every now and then since I came to the surface world, and I bet it's been tough for you, even if you've been able to hide it."

"Y-Yeah." Midoriya agreed with her on that. Even if he had lucked himself into a situation where no one knew he was an alien, there was still the fact that he always had to watch people going on about how terrible the average alien was, about how great it was that there weren't any around, about how if there were any around, then for their sake, they'd better not show themselves. That was what he had to endure for over a decade, and it would have never gotten tolerable if it wasn't for one person.

"God, imagine if Sir finds out about this," All Might mumbled under his breath. "Naturally, I still feel weird about all of this, but I don't see why Young Lori can't be trusted. She seems like a nice girl, and her honesty speaks for itself. Neither of us needs to be concerned about the idea of having her as a confidant."

"Confidant, yeah! That's a good word for what this is, right? If one of your friends ever does something like bring an alien-shaped pinata to class, you can just call me to vent about it, okay?"

Something like would never happen; Midoriya only knew that Ashido, Tsunotori, and Kodai had definitively positive views on aliens, but that still sounded like a ridiculous thing to do, regardless of your stance on the matter. The second part of that he could agree with, though. He did have his parents and All Might and Professor Stein and K.E.L.E.X., but all of them were adults who didn't really understand what he had to live with on a personal level. He never had someone in his corner who was his age, let alone someone with even a remotely similar history to his own.

"Yeah, I-I guess that could be nice," Midoriya said.

"Yay!" Lori moved in to hug him, but fortunately for him, she stopped herself short and switched gears into a high-five. He could live with that, and if he tried hard enough, he could live with this change in the status quo.

"Okay, Midoriya, my boy, I still have some things to discuss with Young Lori, so you should go check in with your classmates. They're all in the arcade hall, and they should probably know that you're up, you know," All Might said.

"Yeah, okay," Midoriya said. Midoriya hopped out of bed and headed for the door, All Might and Lori giving him respectively awkward and overzealous smiles as he exited the room.

At the very least, two out of three people in that room didn't know what they were doing.

---

"Oh man, oh man, oh man, oh man." The second Midoriya headed for the arcade hall, the further reality of the situation hit him like a ton of bricks. "I shouldn't be going where I'm going; I'm just walking into a death trap! All Might said that I was beating everyone up and turning them into zombies, so who there even wants to see me? They're probably all angry about everything I did to them, even if it wasn't my fault, because of course, they would be! The circumstances behind why you were beaten up don't matter; all that matters is that you were beaten up, and that's something worth being mad about! How can I even show my face to them? What am I supposed to say to them that won't blow up in my face? My God, how could I let this happen? I'm doing this because I don't want to hurt people, but that's exactly what I'm doing!"

If he was being honest, he'd be more comfortable just making an Irish goodbye and withdrawing from U.A. the second he got back home. The situation seemed to warrant it, but as he approached the arcade hall, a small part of him knew that those people deserved a little better than that. He needed to at least look them all in the eye one last time before leaving them all behind in shame. He slowly opened the door, preparing himself for one last look at them all.

"Hey, it's Midoriya!" Mineta's voice stuck out like a sore thumb amidst the whirring and buzzing of the arcade machines, and it was quickly joined by a variety of other voices.

"Midoriya-kun, does this mean you have fully recovered?!" Iida asked.

"Y-Yeah, I guess so," Midoriya said.

"What a relief! Everyone who was zombified is feeling lingering aftereffects, so we were worried about how you were doing, what with how badly damaged Seraph left you," Yaoyorozu said. Midoriya nodded his head with a bit of hesitation.

"Man, zombie you was just insane! You were breathing fire and shooting ice out of your eyes —it was so crazy to look at!" Ashido said.

"I don't know if I really agree with that, ribbit," said a Tsuyu who was covered in colorful band-aids, the number of which Mongoose kept adding to.

"Oh, Asui-san! All Might told me that you—that when I was a zombie, I—"

"Hey, don't worry about it. It wasn't your fault, and Tskymi-chan made me all better, anyway."

"At least he was good for something," Tokoyami said, Shiozaki letting out a small laugh in response.

"Yo-You're not mad?" Midoriya asked, Tsuyu quickly shaking her head in response.

"And if Tsuyu-chan's okay with you, then I'm okay with you, too!" Mongoose said as she put a bunny rabbit band-aid on Tsuyu's cheek.

"Well, I'm not okay with any of this!" Komori said. Now appeared to be when people would start reacting the way they were supposed to react. "You made a total mockery of me and my Shroom Buddies, and I was only able to shine with seventy percent of my usual star power!"

"Sorry?" Midoriya hadn't guessed that that was something he'd be apologizing for.

"You're gonna be, come Sports Festival time. Now that we all know you're weak to magic, I know for a fact that I can style all over you, so just try and prepare for that!" Midoriya took in a gulp. In the middle of everything that was happening, it completely slipped his mind that the incident had revealed a definitive weakness of his outside of getting punched hard in the face. He didn't know how to feel about that any more than he knew what was going on at that moment.

"The hell you will, Fungal Bitch!" Bakugou said. In response to that, Komori just stuck her tongue out at him.

"Why are—"

"Hey, Midoriya!" Before Midoriya could finish speaking, Fujimi and Sekigai stepped forward through the crowd. Fujimi was wearing a dunce cap on his head and had a wooden sign reading "I'm a blithering, incompetent dunderhead too stupid to mess with the mortal plane" in blood-red ink, and Sekigai stood behind him with a pixelated taser in his back.

"Fujimi-kun?" Fujimi just mumbled something in response.

"Say it," Sekigai said. Fujimi mumbled incoherently once more before Sekigai zapped him in the back. "Say it!"

"Ah! Fuckin—" Sekigai zapped him again. "I'm sorry, ya hear me?!"

"That's a good boy." Sekigai patted him on the back; he nearly mumbled again, but the sound of the taser quickly put a stop to that.

"So did your magic make him fight without holding back, or something? Midoriya's always awesome, but he's never that much of a beast, you know," Mineta said.

"I don't know what the hell that was," Fujimi said. In response to that, Sekigai pointed to the word "incompetent" on the sign around his neck. "God, why couldn't it have worked the way it was supposed to work? What I wouldn't have given to reduce you to my mindless puppet—" In response to that, Sekigai tased him in the back again and he quickly went quiet.

"Whatever it was, it was awesome! Not just the way he was punching and kicking the crap out of everyone, but when he started breathing fire and shooting ice out of his? Talk about manly!" Kirishima said.

"Yeah! Between that and Uraraka getting super buff, all of you Monstars just have secrets out the wazoo!" Ashido said.

"Yeah—wait, I was doing what?" Uraraka asked.

"Getting super buff."

"Who was?"

"You."

"Me?"

"You."

"What?" The two of them kept going back and forth in that manner with Uraraka continually looking more and more confused. Midoriya would be lying if he said he didn't share the sentiment.

"You know, Kirishima, you keep saying how cool Midoriya was as a zombie, but try saying that when you actually have to become one," Jirou said. "God, my neck is killing me. How many times was I decapitated, anyway?" Hagakure then proceeded to give Jirou a neck rub, for some reason.

"Okay, can someone please tell me what's going on?!" Midoriya shouted through the chatter. "All Might told me that I was attacking all of you, that I was trying to kill you, and you're doing nothing to deny it! Why isn't anyone mad at me?!"

There was silence in the arcade hall, the exact silence Midoriya had expected to be there when he first walked in, only with a surprisingly stronger degree of awkwardness. It only took a moment for Kendou—who had been silent up to that point—to break it by walking over to Midoriya and flicking him in the forehead.

"How can you think anyone here would be so petty that we'd be mad at you? Just—Just how?!" Kendou asked.

"What?"

"Midoriya-san, even if your transformation was different from the others', that doesn't change the fact that you were forced into a state of being where you had no control over yourself. Nothing you did back then was your fault, and no one has the right to act like it was," Yaoyorozu said.

"Besides, it's not like you were a total monster. After all, you were somehow able to force us all to not touch Bakugou," Kaminari said with a laugh.

"Stop reminding everyone about that!" Bakugou said. "And you knock off your shit, too, Deku! What, you think you're so much better than us that you can break us with one little love tap? Fat chance! No one in this room's that fragile, and if you try to treat us like we are, I'm gonna kill you, for real!"

It almost sounded like words of encouragement; almost, if not for Bakugou's usual quirks. Even if it wasn't that, the message was still loud and clear, even though there was no reason it needed to be said, in the first place.

"I'm sorry!" That time, Midoriya actually had something to apologize for to the point of bowing and digging the top part of his head into the floor. "I was being really stupid, so—" Midoriya pulled his head out of the floor and then—in under a second—grabbed Fujimi's dunce cap and jammed it onto his head. "There."

Uraraka was the first to laugh—apparently, it was enough to break her out of her confusion—before the entire room was filled with laughter. Fujimi mumbled something about how he deserved more than that, only to be tased in the back for his trouble.

"Okay, now that all of that is settled, we have one hour left until it's time to return to U.A.," Iida said. "We could simply spend our time playing in this arcade hall, but I think it would be better for us to have our hosts give us a more extended tour of the facilities in order for us to—" Nearly everyone had long since run off to a random game, and a dejected Iida was pulled over to Super Robin Bros. by Komori.

"So, we were talking about some stuff before everything went to hell." Kendou was among the few who hadn't moved.

"Y-Yeah, that's right," Midoriya said. Somehow, the tension he felt remembering that was equal to what he felt when he thought everyone hated him.

"I've been a jerk today, you know that? Feeling annoyed that Lori kissed you is one thing, but I just kept being mad about it, even though you two had already settled it and were trying to move past it. Then again, it's not like she didn't keep doing stuff to warrant—see? There I go again!"

"No, I agree with you on that! Lori-san is nice and everything, but I don't think I like how, well, physical she likes to be. I don't have a lot of experience with girls, but I think I prefer it when they don't try to be overly affectionate like that? Not that a hug or other stuff is ever bad, but maybe just save it for the right time? Does that make sense?"

"It makes perfect sense," Kendou said rather quickly. "A-Anyway, I still don't have a clear idea of why I was so upset, but if my choices are staying mad at you and kicking your butt at Sentries of the Last Cosmos, well, I think I can make an effort to put it past me. At least for now, anyway. How's that sound?"

"That sounds—That sounds good to me." Kendou nodded her head with a smile, grabbed Midoriya by the hand, and pulled him over to Sentries of the Last Cosmos, where she did, indeed, proceed to easily beat him.

To think that he was so ready to abandon these people a few moments ago.

---

Soon enough, the day came to an end, and Midnight led everyone off of the giant turtle that housed Isamu Academy. When Yamashiro pulled the bus around, Iida immediately started trying to load everyone on in the same pattern as before, but the process was slightly stalled by everyone saying goodbye to the Isamu students and just chilling about, in general. Bakugou and Fujimi snarled at each other a bit before Sekigai silenced the latter, Tadan sweating through the whole thing, Tsuyu shared what seemed to be a heartfelt goodbye with Mongoose, and to Midoriya's own surprise, Lori only said a few words to him before pulling Kendou off to the side.

"I don't know what they're talking about, but I'm just glad this day is over," Midoriya said.

"Hey, it wasn't that bad, at least in the beginning," Kirishima said.

"Definitely not in your beginning, man," Mineta said. Midoriya knew what he was talking about, but there were other things involving Lori that he had to mull over now.

"I had lots of fun today, even if everyone didn't get to see me at my super best," Komori said.

"I think that what we got to see was plenty spectacular, but if you feel it wasn't, then I look forward to seeing you do your best at the Sports Festival," Iida said.

"Aww, thanks! Oh, by the way, take this." Komori pulled out a piece of paper covered in glitter and handed it to Iida. Midoriya could tell from a glance that a series of numbers were written on it that could only be her phone number. Mineta and Kaminari's jaws immediately hit the floor.

"Yes, it definitely would be good to exchange contact information if we ever have anything to discuss!" As Iida put Komori's number in his phone and gave his to Komori, Mineta and Kaminari collected themselves just enough to mouth words of frustration and disbelief. Midoriya had enough of that, so he turned his attention back to Kendou and Lori. They seemed to be done with whatever they were talking about, and the two were parting on a surprisingly amicable note.

"Eek! Oh my God, a big, hairy spider's in the seat next to me!" Ashido said in a monotone voice. "It's all gross and ugly and insecty! Oh, if only there was someone brave and manly enough to protect me from this foul creature!"

"Don't worry guys, I got this," Kirishima said, getting out of his seat while Midoriya was still trying to process what was even happening.

"Absolutely no one else cares about this," Bakugou said.

"Right, right. Okay, let me at this—hey, where's the spider?"

"Must have left because he was scared of you. You should stay and make sure he can't come back," Ashido said. She pulled Kirishima down into the seat next to her—something he didn't look too upset over—at the exact second Kendou stepped onto the bus.

"Mina, why is Kirishima in my seat?" Kendou asked.

"He's protecting little ol' me from creepy crawlies. It's super necessary, so I guess you'll have to find somewhere else to sit," Ashido said with a big smile on her face. Midoriya saw Kirishima look at her with confusion, then Midoriya saw Aoyama looking at him with a look that was somehow weirder than his usual looks. Kendou shrugged as she sat down next to Midoriya, but he couldn't help but notice that she was a little slow at it. Nevertheless, he happily welcomed her as a seatmate.

Midoriya was happy that the day was over, but if he was being honest, there were worse ways it could have ended.

---

Soon enough, the day came to an end, and Kayama led everyone off of the giant turtle that housed her Alma mater; Watahashi refused to meet with them again, but Kayama would be hard-pressed to view that as a negative.

"Today was certainly one for the books, Kayama, but let's try to not do it again," Chaim said as Iida made the U.A. students step onto the bus in a specific order.

"It would have been fine if you had stepped in before the plague got out of control. Didn't they teach us about that in freshman Exorcism?" Kayama asked.

"You know I took Voodoo freshman year."

"Oh yeah. The classes earned you the same credit, but only one of them was for cool people."

"And yet they let you in Exorcism, anyway. Go figure." Kayama was a bit ashamed to admit that she didn't have a retort for that one, so instead, she opted to just laugh and hug her old friend.

"You're calling me tonight and we're picking a day to get drinks and catch up, you hear me?" Kayama asked.

"Wouldn't miss it for the world!" Chaim said. "And hey, maybe you can tell me how things ended up with you and Atsuhi—"

"Okay, you heard me, so that's enough. Goodbye, and see you soon." Chaim looked confused, but a pat on the back sent him on his way with a shrug of the shoulder. Kayama thought interrupting him earlier made it clear she didn't want to talk about him, but it seemed like she gave him too much credit. Well, it was over, so no need to dwell on it.

"Yamashiro's waiting for us, so come on," Aizawa said. Kayama nodded her head and stepped away from Isamu grounds as it folded back into the regular cityscape.

"I guess I'll meet you three back at school, then," All Might said as he climbed into what was technically his car.

"You all right?"

"If I'm not, then I'll use the drive to try and cool off. Try being the operative word here." For a split second, Kayama thought about asking him if he wanted her to use a spell to calm him down, but he probably wasn't in the mood for that. "You know the thing I killed at the USJ? The Noumu? They're still working on the autopsy, but Tsukauchi, my friend in the police force, says that they've found things to suggest the presence of multiple Quirks inside of him, and there's only one man who could do something like that."

Even in his untransformed state, All Might's steering wheel seemed to bend a bit under the pressure of his hands.

"I never confirmed it, and in the back of my mind, I knew that I failed to finish the job all those years ago, but even still, I wish that I didn't have to accept this. I wish I didn't have to accept that after all these years, that man—that monster—is still alive."

All Might said nothing else before driving off. Aizawa and Kayama headed for the bus, the two of them exchanging a look that made it clear that even if they knew what was to come, neither one of them could ever hate or understand it as much as All Might.

Kayama didn't know if she wanted to, either.

---

Without warning, he stirred himself awake. With his body still as broken as it was, he tried to spend most of each day asleep to try and recover as much as he could, yet something had managed to awaken him. Or, rather, someone.

"Oh, you're awake, sir," his doctor said. "Did you want to check on the Number Nine Project?"

"Hm? Well, I'm awake, so I might as well see how that pet project is going," he said.

"What brought you out of your slumber, then?"

"If I'm being honest, I believe I sensed something; a presence I have not felt since…" He trailed off at that. Exactly how long had it been since he felt what he felt? How many years? How many decades? How many centuries? It was hard to say, honestly.

"Anything we should be concerned about?"

With the best smile he could manage, he told his doctor, "Quite the opposite, actually." He didn't know how long it had been since he felt what he felt, but he knew what it meant for him and the wider world around himself.

And he couldn't wait for it to come out in full force.

---

They were in Roshiyua Forest, if he was remembering right. The trees there were the tallest and thickest in all of Japan, and they all came together to make one of the densest forests in the country. It was probably nice to look at when you were on vacation, but when you were at work, especially when said work involved chasing down violent criminals, then it was just an annoying obstacle for you to maneuver around.

"I see her, Ishido! Up in that tree!" Ishido looked up in the direction Donald was pointing, and sure enough, their target was sitting up in a tree, laughing at them the way she always did.

"Hey, guys. You havin' fun down there?" she asked without a care in the world.

"Yeah, a real party. You should join us before we run out of appetizers," Ishido said.

"Nah, I'm good."

"It wasn't a request," Donald said. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a gun that nearly matched his six foot five height, and fired it at the target. Naturally, she jumped down and away from it, and the tree she was sitting on was blown to smithereens.

"Well, I guess you did manage to get me down for the party. Unfortunately, I've got work in the morning, so I need to leave early." With that, she started running out of the forest, Ishido and Donald immediately giving chase. Donald kept firing his weapon at her, but all he did was make craters in spots she ended up being nowhere near. It was ridiculous for a girl so young to be so fast, yet this was their reality.

"We can't let her get out of the forest. Ishido, how we doin'?" Donald asked.

"I'm ready," Ishido said. At his word, his eyes changed from brown to black with a pattern of white dots reminiscent of stars. One look at the target allowed him to project a single command into her: fall.

"Whoops." With that, the girl tripped over her own two feet and fell to the ground. It only kept her delayed for about a second, but a second was all Ishido needed to pull out his own gun and shoot her in the knee, resulting in a much more permanent fall.

"Maximum Gravity Photon Emitters. MGPE for short, but we like to call them 'Black Hole Lasers' and 'Black Hole Bullets'," Ishido said as the target rubbed her wound.

"We only save them for the worst of the worst, so congratulations on that, Jacqueline Ripper," Donald said.

---

Donald Fite! Quirk: Hammer Space! Donald can fit anything inside of his pockets, no matter how large it might be, so long as it's only two pockets at a time, at most!

Ishido Maad! Quirk: Will Power! Once every four hours, Ishido can look at someone and instill into them a specific command that they must obey, so long as it isn't in conflict with their personality!

Together, these two form the duo Fire 'n Maad, the top agents of the All-Purpose Enforcement Squad, or "A.P.E.S." for short!

---

"Are we sold on that name? I'm not even British, and I've killed way more people than that guy ever did," Jacqueline said with a laugh.

"No one asked for your opinion," Ishido said, pointing his gun right in her face.

"Well? What are you waiting for?" It was a tempting offer, it truly was. She passed herself off as a schoolgirl with messy hair and sharp teeth, but underneath it all was a sociopathic murder with a body count modern-day Villains could only dream of. He didn't know if that said more about her or Villain society as a whole, but in the end, killing her then and there would definitely do the world a favor.

"That's not how we do things. You're going down the same way as any other criminal scumbag. What happens after that—"

"Is none of your business, right?" Jacqueline cut in. "Man, don't you just love hypocrisy? It's hands down the easiest way of figuring out who is and isn't full of shit, and guess which category you fall into?"

"You want me to do it, man? I guarantee you I'd have an easier time with it," Donald said.

"Not funny, Donald," Ishido said.

"Not as funny as your face, anyway." Ishido felt his eyes widen as Jacqueline's body melted away into a liquified mass.

"Shit!" Ishido didn't know who said it first, him or Donald, but it didn't matter, for in a matter of milliseconds, Jacqueline had knocked them both down to the ground with hits too fast to see and too strong for them to stand up as fast as they should.

"That damn illusion trick again! When did you even have time to use it?!" Donald asked.

"Like I said before, don't diminish and degrade this art by labeling as a simple illusion," Jacqueline said. "As for when I used it, well, why were you dumb enough to think I wasn't using it before you showed up?"

She was smart and cunning, at least a little more than the average Villain. That's what helped make her a threat, and that's what Ishido hated about her.

"Well, this was fun, but I gotta get going. I got big stuff going on soon, huge stuff, and because of that, I'll be a good sport and let you go. Kill ya later, though, okay? Okay. Buh-Bye!" With a mockingly innocent wave, Jacqueline skipped away from them a speed they could never hope to rival, and in a matter of seconds, she was completely gone from sight.

"Dammit. That brat just—dammit! Bones is gonna rake us over the coals for this mess," Donald said.

"It's fine. We'll get her next time," Ishido said. He wanted to believe that, or, rather, he needed to believe that.

For if she kept getting away, there was no telling what could happen.

---

With that, the field trip arc—and by extension, this story's proverbial first season—has come to a close. And now, the arc you've all been waiting over a year for will finally get started… after one more chapter that, while heavily tied to the plot and worldbuilding, is rather self-indulgent, so, yeah. Let's hope it doesn't take that long.