HINT #10- The time Class 1-A had to learn about Golden

School curriculum was weird.

Of course, Kaminari couldn't really be the judge of whether the schedules and classes at UA were weird or not, mostly because he'd never even been to a school before this one, but he was fairly certain that normal highschool didn't jump around from topic to topic each week and switch subjects every three to four days. Aizawa was unpredictable like that. He could be teaching a lesson about the importance of keeping an untarnished record one day and then go on a two-hour lecture about how to defuse a bomb efficiently and quietly the next. He jumped around a lot and gave his students almost no stability with their studies or their notes.

Was that one of the reasons Kaminari struggled with his studies so much? Probably. Was it helping them become quick thinkers and teaching them to store away important information for later like they would have to do on potential future missions? Yeah, but it was confusing as hell, and Kaminari just wanted to pass his classes, thank you very much.

Kaminari never knew what to expect when it came to Aizawa's class. He was their homeroom teacher, which meant he had virtually free reign over whatever lesson plan he wanted to present as long as it didn't clash with any of the other subjects the other teachers were teaching. That was good, because as fluent as Kamianri was in English, he didn't think he'd be able to handle two hours of staring at books with weird letters printed on them that kept mixing themselves up and running all over the page.

Despite that, it didn't stop Aizawa from assigning them extra projects and homework for whatever subject he chose to talk about that day. His impromptu lessons ranged from presentations about the world's greatest supervillains to how the first quirk was developed. Walking into his class was arguably the most stressful part of Kaminari's day because Aizawa never gave them any warning about what they'd be learning about or receiving a lecture on. He always sprung it on them when they least expected it, which more often than not, always happened to be the moment they were swamped in homework from other classes and courses.

The thing was, Kaminari had a lot of inside history about the workings of the villain's underground network that even a veteran like Aizawa didn't know about. That made these surprise lessons all the more nerve-wracking, because even though he'd covered his tracks and kept his identity a secret from anyone and everyone he'd ever interacted with, he could never shake the paranoia that someone was going to pick up on something in one of Aizawa's presentations that somehow linked him back to the world of cruelty, abuse, and murder he'd tried so hard to escape from all those years ago.

It was irrational, of course. Kaminari hadn't been an amateur, even back then. He'd covered his tracks perfectly, leaving only the name 'Golden' and his horrifically high body count behind as his legacy.

Despite that, when he walked into class and saw a presentation keyed up on Aizawa's computer, his stomach dropped.

Well. Fuck.

He was not in the right mindset for another one of Aizawa's 'surprise' lessons today, and by that, he meant he hadn't gotten more than thirty minutes of sleep in the last six days.

He wouldn't usually go so long without sleeping on a school week, but ever since his little...cutting incident, his classmates had been watching him like a hawk for the past month or so. The fact that they were worried about him made Kaminari's insides gooey, he'd admit that, but it was also annoying. He understood why none of them had believed his claims that he wasn't suicidal (they'd caught him cutting himself for fucks sake), but he wasn't suicidal.

It wasn't like his classmates had been walking on eggshells around him or anything. They still joked and played around with him just like before, but they hadn't let him out of their sight. More often than not, Kaminari fell asleep next to a warm body or two who insisted on staying the night in his dorm room. No alone time meant his classmates were continually monitoring his moves, eating habits, and self-destructive tendencies, even if they weren't for the purposes they thought they were for. All of that added together equaled one thing: no assassin training for the past month and a half.

While that had been a nice break from the rigorous workouts and torturous endurance training he put himself through, he couldn't afford it. He needed to be at the top of his game, and he couldn't do that when he wasn't even able to be ten feet away from his classmates at any given time. Their concern was flattering, and Kaminari's love for them grew every day, but he needed to keep them safe, dammit, and he couldn't do that with their constant coddling.

So, this week was catchup week. It was a way for him to make up all of the lost hours he couldn't spend honing and sharpening his skills, which meant eating practically nothing, making a few small cuts on his ankles, and getting zero sleep these past few days in favor of practicing his stealth, combat, and reflexes.

They were all perfect, of course, because fifteen years of rigorous training wasn't just going to disappear overnight, but he couldn't take any chances. He had to be perfect. If perfect was what it took to keep his classmates safe, then perfect he would be.

Unfortunately, that meant pretty much completely neglecting his school studies and making him horribly mentally unprepared for whatever lesson or impromptu unit Aizawa thew at them today. He could always tell his teacher that he was sick or something if he really wanted to, but there was no way in hell he was going to admit to how shitty he was feeling due to the lack of rest (it was six days with no sleep and no food. If it were anyone else, they'd be passed out on the floor and quite possibly in the hospital) when he was just starting to get his classmates off his back.

He groaned and scrubbed his face with his hands. Fuck everything.

Kaminari set his books down and slumped into his seat in front of Kirishima. He took a swig of his water bottle, scowling at nothing. If this was a full-on lesson, Kaminari was pretty sure his head might explode. A lecture would be even worse, but if they had to write a report-

"Problem children. Today, we'll be learning about Golden."

Kaminari choked, nearly spitting the water out of his mouth and devolving into a coughing fit. He pounded on his chest a few times, desperately trying to get his breathing under control and hyper-aware of all the concerned eyes on him, before putting his hand up in apology and smiling sheepishly.

"Sorry."

If he could manage to crack a joke to two to lighten the situation he would, but one simple word was all he could muster right now because what. The actual. Fuck.

"If I may continue," Aizawa said flatly as if it was his fault he'd decided to choke and die on his water (it was, because, once again, what the actual fuck, but he didn't know that). "Today's presentation will be on Golden." He paused for a few moments, seemingly gaging the reactions of the students around the room. Kaminari slipped a passive mask on with practiced ease, matching the rest of his classmates' neutral expressions to a tee. "Can anyone tell me who that is?"

"I thought it was a type of metal."

"Don't be funny with me, Kirishima."

"But-"

"He's an assassin." Yaoyorozu interrupted, saving Kirishima from any further embarrassment. Her notebook was already out and her pen in her hand, ready to go. A spark of terror lit inside Kaminari at the thought of someone as smart as Yaoyorozu having inside and personal information about him and his past deeds, but he brushed it off. He'd long since been afraid of anyone realizing his true identity. "He's one of the greatest of all time, I believe."

"Very close, Yaoyorozu," Aizawa said, tugging on his scarf loosely. "Yes, Golden is one of the greatest assassins of all time, but from what I've gathered, they were actually a female."

Wait. What.

"Oh. I'm sorry." Kaminari could hear the scratch of eraser marks from behind him. "I just assumed that since the assassination business is a predominantly male career, Golden would be a male. Forgive me for my shortsightedness."

Kaminari froze, barely able to keep a slow smile from budding on his face. A female?

"Don't apologize. It was an honest mistake." Aizawa's gave her a slight nod. "I, at first, assumed Golden was a male as well, but I've been in this business for many years, and it's highly unlikely a male would be so slender and toned with such graceful agility."

Kaminari bit his lip to keep from laughing out loud. This was...holy shit, this lesson that could've so easily been a disaster was turning into a fucking comedy show. Female? Slender and graceful? Was Aizawa...he had to be kidding. There was no way...how the fuck...even the most basic information such as his gender, which was literally a fifty-fifty guess, was wrong.

Before Kaminari could spontaneously combust and double over with laughter, Aizawa clicked to the next slide. Ah. His statistics. Kaminari hadn't seen those in a while.

Unfortunately, neither had his classmates.

Several gasps were heard around the room, and more than a few people covered their mouths at the sheer size of the numbers. Kaminari followed along, always one to blend in with the crowd, but those numbers weren't even all that impressive in all honesty. They...oh wow, Aizawa's data was so off.

"I know." The man said after a moment, once again soaking in everyone's horrified reactions. "Yaoyorozu wasn't kidding around when she said that Golden's one of the greatest assassins of all time. In the nearly eight years since she's appeared on the scene, she has already racked up over eight hundred murders and assassinations."

Kaminari frowned, though not enough to be noticeable unless someone was watching closely. He...he didn't like the way that was worded. Those kills weren't...they weren't murders. A large portion of those numbers actually included felons or criminals that had stolen from his parents, as well as other people. Hell, he'd killed other murderers more times than he could count, as in people killing for fun and not because they were forced to like he was.

The worst part was that if Aizawa and his classmates thought this was bad, Kaminari didn't even want to know how they would react to his real statistics.

Eight hundred? Eight hundred was nothing. He'd killed thousands of people back in his heyday. He'd been responsible for the deaths of some of the world's greatest supervillains all because said supervillains had wronged his parents. He had killed and assassinated and murdered nearly every drug lord in the depths of the black market, and every person who had dared to so much as look at his parents the wrong way.

Was he a terrible person? Kaminari didn't think so. He was a bruised, beaten, and abused child forced to assassinate for his parents in hopes of being spared a torture session or two. He never was, would always come home to knives and whips and blood, but he had just kept hoping. He had been a kid, a goddamn kid trying to survive in his sick world of murder where death was constantly knocking at his front door.

"Sir?" Midoriya interrupted Kaminari's thoughts before he could spiral any further. "I don't understand. She has a higher kill count than most major villains. Why didn't we know about her?"

Kaminari knew Midoriya well enough to know that what the greenette meant was 'why didn't I know about her,' but he didn't say anything. Midoriya basically prided himself on knowing everything about every mainstream villain and hero there was in Japan. If he hadn't even heard the name 'Golden' uttered before in his life...well, then Kaminari had done a pretty damn good job at hiding his tracks.

A morbid sense of satisfaction welled up inside of him before he quickly pushed it down.

"I agree, Sir," Iida added. "This assassin seems to be a rather formidable opponent. Why are we just hearing about her now, especially with how unlucky our class has been so far with villain attacks? She could potentially do us serious harm."

Kaminari's exterior was passive and unbothered, but on the inside, he was soaring. If only you knew.

"That's exactly why I'm informing you of her," Aizawa responded, voice monotone and stare as dead as ever. "I originally wanted to give you all this lesson much much sooner, but Principal Nezu assured me that it was unnecessary."

"He thought it was unnecessary to teach us about an assassin with a ridiculously freakin' high kill count?" That was Mina. Kaminari didn't even have to turn his head to identify her voice. "Really?"

"Yes." Aizawa nodded. "I pushed for it, but he assured me that Golden wasn't a threat to this class or this school."

Principal Nezu. Interesting development.

"So does he not know you're doing this presentation?" Mina crossed her legs and set her chin on her palms. "Like, you're going against his orders?"

"I wouldn't call them orders, but yes." He responded. Nothing about his face had changed even the slightest apart from a subtle eyebrow twitch. "The principal told me not to tell any of you any information about this particular assassin. His reasoning was that he didn't want to cause any of you irrational panic, but he didn't say anything beyond that. In the light of recent villain attacks, however, and certain students being targeted, I've decided to take action and educate you all so you can be better prepared."

No one said anything. Aizawa crossed his arms and began speaking.

"Now, not much is known about Golden other than her kill count, her basic figure, and the fact that she is one of the most skilled assassins ever to walk the streets of Japan."

Okay, first of all, Kaminari's may have a slim waist, but he did not have a girlish figure, thank you very much, and second, his kill count was so off it was almost laughable. So no, basically the only correct piece of information Aizawa had on him was the fact that he was one of the most skilled assassins in the history of the black market.

"Whoever Golden is, they're a professional." Aizawa continued. "It is not known how she got to be so skilled in the art of deception and assassination, but it is widely assumed that she taught herself all of her basic skills in order to survive in the real world."

Okay, at least that wasn't as far off as some of Aizawa's other conclusions. No, he didn't necessarily teach himself all of the stuff he ever knew (he learned through trial and error with his parents beating him up all the time and expecting him to learn how to fight back on the fly), but he had learned them so he could survive in the real world and not get murdered and brutally tortured by his parental units, so that was something.

"In all, the Hero Commission knows virtually nothing about Golden's identity. Some think that she is an orphan, while others think she is the daughter of a prominent family gone rogue. Only a select few people very high up in the villain hierarchy know her true identity, or so we've been told. Most of the black market has never even seen her face, which they insisted was a good thing when we interrogated them. They said whoever saw her face was killed instantly."

Okay, Kaminari didn't know where the hell Aizawa had gotten that piece of information (it made him sound like a psycho serial killer, Jesus Christ), but that was not true. Plenty of people had seen his face. Hell, he was reasonably sure whatever villains the Hero Commission had interrogated had seen his face and hadn't known it. He used to walk around all the time in the underground villain circuit with Toga, Touya, and their other friend just to see what was going on with everyone. Most villains didn't even spare them a second glance, deeming them 'scrawny little kids' who they didn't have to bother with.

"Damn." Uraraka murmured. "That's brutal."

Kaminari slumped in his seat. It's not even true but go off, I guess.

"It is." Aizawa nodded grimly. "Golden is known for being ruthless. Cunning. She shows no mercy, especially to people who cross her. It is not known who she works for or if she works for anybody at all, but she has been employed by hundreds of villains over the years to execute their killings for them. Yet, she's never been caught."

"Never?" Bakugou asked roughly. His feet were propped up on the desk, his hands were shoved in his pockets, and he was glaring blankly at the wall, but Kaminari could tell the subject had him hooked. Leave it to Bakugou to be mesmerized by an assassin with more blood on his hands than most major villains who also happened to be one of his best friends. Go figure. "That many murders under her belt and no one's ever caught her?"

"Not even once." Aizawa clarified. "She's like a ghost. At first, the Hero Commission hadn't even been sure she existed. Their initial theory was that multiple people were acting under the same alias. However, a few years ago, it was confirmed that the assassin was indeed one girl and one girl only by the up and coming pro hero Hawks after he led his own private investigation."

Kaminari winced before he could stop himself. Ah. Hawks. Keigo Takami. Yet another touchy subject he had no wish to dive into.

"How old is she?" Even Sero seemed engaged, surprisingly enough.

"We don't know for sure, but we have estimated her to be somewhere in her twenties since the first known record of her was about eight years ago."

Okay, back up. Kaminari had to physically take a deep breath to calm himself. Aizawa's facts were such a strange mixture of reality and fiction that it was almost funny. Okay, yeah, they were right that he'd officially started assassinating eight years ago when he was seven years old, but in his twenties? Did they think he was ancient or something? It was good for his identity, sure, but he didn't quite know how he felt about his twelve or thirteen-year-old body (which was the only age a photographer had managed to take a very blurry and pixilated shot of his clothed back. He honestly just looked like a blob, but his parents had starved him for two weeks because of that slip up) being assumed to be one of an over twenty-year-old female.

Iida raised his hand. Aizawa nodded at him to go on. "Do we know any physical features about her? Any defining characteristics that might help reveal her identity?"

"No," Aizawa said simply, folding his hands together. "Whoever this female is, she's extremely good at her job. No known pictures of her have any identification besides human-shaped blobs, and any villains we interrogated who had a connection to her didn't even know so much as the color of her hair."

"Is she still active?" Todoroki's signature monotone voice made Kaminari straighten a bit. Todoroki never participated or talked in class more than he had to. If he was so interested in a topic that it actually prompted him to ask questions, then he had to be incredibly intrigued. Kaminari didn't really know how he felt about that. On the one hand, he was clearly getting recognized by his classmates as an extremely dangerous and efficient killer. On the other hand, what had gotten them so hooked wasn't a typical badass assassin but the subject of years of abuse and brutal torture that made him so skilled.

They had no way of knowing that, of course, but...it just didn't sit right with Kaminari that his nineteen closest friends could be so fascinated by his fucked up childhood.

"Yes," Aizawa stated flatly. "As far as we know, Golden is still the best in the assassination business today. Many experts speculate that she's gotten even better at covering her tracks, because no one has seen a trace of her in over two years."

Kaminari resisted the urge to snort, slumping down in his seat and letting the previous uneasy thoughts filter out of his head. Uh, yeah, I haven't been active for two years because I escaped, dumbass.

"Are you sure?" Aizawa turned his attention to Tsuyu. "Isn't it possible that Golden might have died in an accident we don't know about or given up her life of killing?"

Yes, yes! That's exactly right, that's exactly it-

"Impossible." Aizawa's harsh voice was like a punch to the chest. His face was hard and his eyes were cold. "Someone with that many bodies under her belt doesn't simply give up killing. Yes, we don't know the full story, but for someone to wrack up over eight hundred bodies just to give up assassinating a few years later doesn't add up at. All."

The classroom went silent. Aizawa had never had an outburst like that, especially not during one of his planned lessons.

Kaminari kept his face blank, but on the inside, his stomach was practically doing flips. It wasn't...it wasn't Aizawa's fault that he perceived Golden as a cold-blooded killer. It was more than understandable in all actuality. It was just...it was frustrating. It was frustrating that the Hero Commission didn't have an ounce of empathy. He knew it was unfair to be mad at a bunch of stuck-up rich people for not sympathizing with an assassin they knew nothing about who had killed thousands of people, but it was infuriating. He hadn't wanted to kill people. Sure, when he was hired to murder a rapist or two he'd do with a sick sense of satisfaction, but all of those innocent necks he'd sliced had been to survive.

He had been a seven-year-old forced into a world of kill or be killed, and he'd had no choice but to run with it. It wasn't fair, it was far from fair, but Aizawa clearly didn't see it that way. He perceived Golden as a full-grown adult female with years of experience killing for no other purpose than to murder and make money, not as as a small seven-year-old who always held onto the false hope that maybe someday, if he persevered through the pain, he could live to have a normal life.

Whatever. He was reading too much into this. It wasn't like any of his classmates or teachers were going to find out anyway.

"I'm sorry," Aizawa said after a moment, flat expression slipping back into place just as quickly as it had disappeared. "That was uncalled for. I just want to prepare you all for the possibility of facing her. You can't afford to let your guard down and start making useless speculations while trying to empathize."

His classmates had literally spent the last month sleeping with him in their beds, which was the most vulnerable position a hero could possibly be in at any given time, but whatever.

"No offense, Mr. Aizawa," Ojiro scratched the back of his neck sheepishly. "But wasn't this lesson kind of pointless? From what you've told us, it sounds like Golden could wipe all of us out without breaking a sweat."

Damn straight.

"It doesn't hurt to be prepared," Aizawa said simply. He clicked onto the next slide. "Which leads me to Golden's skill set."

Kaminari nearly laughed out loud. Ohmygod, all of the bullshit on the screen was so wrong. He soaked up his classmates' sharp intakes of breath with pursed lips and smiling eyes as he tried to keep himself composed. If they thought this was impressive, they would have a fit if they ever saw what he really could do.

"First off, her endurance and stamina," Aizawa observed each of his students with calculating eyes. Kaminari noticed and made his face go blank without so much as a twitch. "Now, to clarify, none of these stats have been tested or proven, especially since no one has ever come in direct contact with Golden and lived to tell the tale."

False. He literally lived with his classmates, and they were all still alive and breathing. They would stay that way too if Kaminari had anything to say about it.

"However, these are estimated guesses and thought to be pretty accurate by numerous researchers and professional heroes," Aizawa continued. "From her body shape and how many times she's evaded capture over the years, it has been estimated that she can sprint over five miles without slowing down or breaking a sweat."

False. He could run over twenty.

"These statistics were assumed by how consistently Golden kept escaping along with the fact that she's not recorded to have any form of transportation while on his assassination missions. While the mysterious case of Golden is widely debated among many people, the fact that she has superhuman stamina is the most agreed upon. It's widely speculated that this unheard-of endurance is part of Golden's quirk."

Ah. So close yet so far. A shame, really. The Hero Commission had hit the nail on the head when they'd figured out his incredible stamina and endurance capacity, but they'd missed by a mile when assuming it was his quirk.

"Of course, that's only one theory." Aizawa continued. "Golden's quirk has never actually been confirmed or figured out by anyone, including the villains who have been in direct contact with her, but from what we know, it is assumed that her quirk most likely has something to do with speed, stealth, or strength."

"Like invisibility?" Midoriya wondered out loud.

Kaminari sighed and propped his head up in his hands. I wish.

"Exactly." Aizawa nodded. "Invisibility was actually a popular theory about Golden's quirk, but it was quickly shot down since some researchers brought up the point that if her quirk really was invisibility, we would never even know she existed to begin with." He cleared his throat. "Next, we have her success rate. From what we know of, it is 100%."

Finally, a reliable piece of information. Out of the thousands of people he had been hired to kill, he had completed each mission with a 100% success rate and a rather disturbing amount of blood on his hands.

Murmurs of disbelief and sick awe rippled around the classroom. Some of the students looked slightly alarmed, while others looked at the stats on the board with begrudging admiration, which Kaminari could completely understand. Was he proud of his efficiency? It was hard to say. On the one hand, it only further solidified the fact that he was the most skilled assassin in history, but on the other hand, it also painted him as a merciless killer who had not even a shred of mercy for his victims.

"Quiet." Aizawa snapped his fingers. All noise ceased immediately. "Yes, I know it's rather impressive, but this isn't what this lesson is for. This lesson is to prepare you for the possibility of one of the deadliest murderers in history coming after you and your classmates, not to marvel at how much blood she's shed and necks she's sliced."

The room was deathly quiet as Aizawa's flat eyes carefully racked over each of his student's faces. Many hung their heads and avoided his gaze, while Kaminari just stared at his shoes with pursed lips and squinted eyes. Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence, Mr. Aizawa. Means a lot.

"That's what I thought," Aizawa said, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. "These stats aren't something you should be impressed by. They are something you should fear and something you should take into account when facing a new opponent. You should file her skills and statistics away and try to develop strategies to counter them."

Yeah, as good advice as that was, Kaminari would still be able to kick all of his classmates' asses in his sleep no matter how much training they put in. Unless they suddenly adopted thirteen years worth of rigorous training, torture, abuse, and unresolved trauma, Kaminari would always be better than them. That was the problem, and that was why he had taken it upon himself to be Class 1-A's official unofficial protector just because he knew he could handle the things his classmates couldn't.

"As impossible as that may seem, you all are a strong group of individuals. If Golden ever does decide to attack the famous Class 1-A, and if you worked hard enough, you will be able to get out alive."

Wrong.

"No matter how strong she is, when it's a fight between life and death, I have no doubt that all twenty of you could take her."

Wrong. So, so wrong.

"It's going to be a risk you'll have to take if the opportunity arises."

Stop. Stop giving them false hope. It's. All. Wrong.

"Because if you don't, then you will die by the hands of history's most powerful assassin."

True. That was so, so true, but he wasn't going to let that happen. Ever. Not while he was alive and breathing. He would never harm a hair on his friends' heads.

Aizawa cracked a small, grim smile and clicked off his computer.

"Class dismissed. Stay safe, everyone.".