There's some important information in this chapter's author's notes concerning things that will be changing about this story in the future, so be sure to read it, even if you usually don't.

Chapter 11: Rock-Bottom (Ascent)

What the hell had she missed yesterday?

Passing through the school gates the morning after she'd found out Izuku had been in a fight, Yakkai could hear some people already talking about it, which was normal; obviously something like a fight would gather some attention, teenagers will stick to anything concerning school-drama like leeches, it's not something worth her attention.

After she entered the main building however, and the chatter concerning the fight increased, Yakkai started to feel that something was up. No one but the idiot and her friend should have actually been present to witness the aftermath of the fight, there's no way this many people should know about it already, it was unnatural.

Upon entering her classroom, everyone was talking about the fight. And what was worse was that they somehow knew that Izuku had been involved, even though that should have been impossible; no one but the people who witnessed the brawl or had taken part in it should be aware of the details.

Those two at the vending machine wouldn't remember that Izuku was mentioned thanks to the side effects of her quirk. This meant that only the idiot, her friend, Izuku and the two third years should have known, yet the information somehow managed to spread at an unnaturally fast rate.

Yakkai quickly looked for Izuku at his desk in order to see how he was taking all this gossip about him, and to maybe ask him what had happened, if she felt confident enough.

What she saw instead, made her blood absolutely boil.

The teen's usual spot next to the window was empty, his desk was absolutely covered with black marker. Countless horrible words crudely scribbled onto the wood calling him all types of insults, ranging from monster, to freak, villain, and even abomination.

But the thing that absolutely infuriated her, were the wilting black roses sticking out of a vase sitting on the wood, and the incense sticks placed right in the center of his ruined desk.

In and of itself, placing flowers and incense on someone's desk is seen as a harmless practice, it's a sign of respect towards the person who owns the desk, and is something done in good faith.

A key detail however, is that it's a tradition meant for people who have died, and is supposed to be performed on the grave of a deceased loved one.

Placing flowers and incense sticks on a living person's desk is an incredibly backhanded and cruel way of saying that the person is better off dead, or that the people who were responsible for the mock-funeral want them dead.

Yakkai also knew a fair bit about flower language, and was aware that flowers have different meanings: daisies for example symbolize innocence, sunflowers symbolize adoration and red roses are commonly seen as the flowers of love.

Black roses however, symbolize death, hatred and misfortune. She figured that whoever did this was either a girl—she could name three girls that worked part-time in flower shops off the top of her head—or a gigantic smart-ass.

Her nails dug into her palms, the pain serving as a deterrent preventing her from exploding on the spot. She moved away from the doorway to look around the class, subtly analyzing the face of every student present, to glean their reaction to this blatant act of bullying.

And she saw nothing. They acted as if absolutely nothing was wrong.

Every student had seen the atrocity that had been committed, yet not a single one did anything to get rid of the absolutely abhorrent display of harassment. They either thought Izuku somehow deserved the bullying, or they were just spineless sheep—too afraid of going against the flow by saying something about it, and potentially angering other students from the class.

Yakkai on the other hand, had no such reservations.

Without a sliver of hesitation, she strode towards the ruined desk and knocked the glass vase clean on the ground. Brushing the remaining petals off the desk, she watched apathetically as they fluttered onto the small puddle of water that had originally been in the vase, but was now pooling around the broken glass and dry flower stems.

Unbothered by all the shocked and disbelieving looks her classmates sent her as the noise of the shattering glass sounded throughout the classroom, she only bothered to send the guy that was seated next to Izuku a scathing glare when he had the audacity to curse at her for dropping it at his feet.

Yakkai had seen and heard him and Izuku have a lot of friendly conversations about heroes, and had assumed that they were at least friends. Yet the coward didn't even have it in him to do something about the extreme bullying of someone he was at least acquainted with, when he was seated right next to them.

You fucking wimp. She insulted internally, praying to god that the glass and the water got all over his indoor shoes—maybe when his school issued uwabaki got ruined and he'd be forced to buy new ones, he'd learn to grow some balls.

Ignoring the rest of the wimp's complaining, she opened the window next to the desk and snatched the cheap incense sticks off the table. Cocking back her dominant left arm, she chucked them as hard as she could. Making sure to aim for the really loud third years seated on one of the benches outside, before exerting the last of her frustration by slamming the windows shut, inadvertently causing the frame to rattle in place.

Looking over the desk one more time, a wave of pity and confusion hit her. Monster is by far the most common one, why the hell would they call… wait, what's that? Her eyes were suddenly drawn towards Izuku's chair when she spotted what looked like a note stuck onto the seat.

Scooting the piece of furniture back, she peeled the note off the wood. On first glance the handwriting looked rather neat, with clear pen strokes indicative of someone older having written this. Hesitantly, the raven haired girl read the well structured note—

'Kill yourself, monsters like you don't deser-'

—only to instantly crumple it into her fist.

That was the last straw.

Yakkai turned towards her class, noting that they were all still gawking at her as if she had suddenly grown a second head. Her cold onyx eyes landed on one of the students seated at the front row.

When their eyes met, he instantly looked away.

"Kondo." She called, voice dripping with malice. "Was this stuff already here when you arrived?"

The boy looked affronted. "Wh-what do you want from me?! I did—"

"Shut your degenerate mouth and answer me."

His mouth hung open in shock, revealing the braces on his deformed teeth.

Pure, absolute contempt emanated off of Yakkai, and the terrified look on the boy's face indicated that her scorn was more than visible for everyone to see.

As her death glare bore into him, all she saw was a filthy rat, a rat that was told to perform a trick, but was disobeying. She was well aware of the fact Kondo always gets to class early because of his club; if anyone would know it would be him.

In that single moment, the viciousness she'd been known for before her involvement with Izuku and Katsuki returned full force, her black pools daring the pitiful creature to object or lie, until his pride finally cracked.

"I… when I entered the classroom it was already like this." He ran a trembling hand through his long, greasy dreadlocks. "Why are you even surprised? Basically everyone knows what the frea-"

Her eyes narrowed dangerously.

Kondo cleared his throat awkwardly. "Ev-everyone knows what Mi-Midoriya did yesterday, it could've been a-anyone, why do you even care?!"

Hushed whispers broke across the class, as if Kondo mentioning Izuku broke a dam, and Yakkai fumed silently as she considered Kondo's words.

Despite her anger, she could still see that he had a point.

Why did she care?

Why was she even angry to begin with?

She hadn't been aware of Izuku's existence until months ago, and had actively avoided him since. They hadn't interacted whatsoever, they were practically strangers to each other.

Yet seeing these people mistreating him made her seethe as if she'd known him all her life. And when she thought about it, she realized that it was because he reminded her of someone she did know all her life.

The person she'd abandoned…

After being saved by him just because he felt it was the right thing to do, she wouldn't forgive herself if she abandoned him too, especially when she was in a position where she could at least do something.

She sat down at her own desk, shoving the crumpled note into her skirt pocket. Silently, she seethed as she went through a list of potential perpetrators, when a loud explosion suddenly interrupted her just as she got to the most likely suspect.

Looking in the direction of the noise revealed Katsuki—who had most likely entered shortly after she sat down—standing next to the now scorched remains of Izuku's desk.

The murderous expression on his face made it clear just what he thought of the people who had done this to his friend's seat. Letting off one more explosion in order to properly scorch the remains of the marked wooden furniture, he moved to his own desk in front of it, and looked around the class, usually fiery eyes now frigid in their contempt.

"I don't know who had the fucking audacity to pull this shit, but the moment I find out, you'll be wishing your old man's pull out game was stronger."

Lucky for him, Yakkai had a pretty good guess as to who was behind this, and she spent the rest of her classes mentally preparing herself—for she was about to confront her sole tormentor head on.

"What did you do."

"What are you talking about, Ya-chan?" He said in a sing-song voice, face the definition of confusion. Anyone else would've fallen for it—Yakkai knew better.

"What. Did. You. Do."

"Haha, you're being a little weird Ya-chan. Asking me 'what I did' is a bit of an odd question, isn't it?" He smiled sweetly, peering down at her from his seated position on the club-room desk. "I've done lotsa things since we last met; my homework, a biology project, even Nanase-chan~"

Shaking off the disgust she felt at his crude joke, she met his plastic smile with a scowl. "Don't act dumb; you know what I'm talking about."

"Why so angry? You're gonna hurt my feelings you know."

"Stop changing the subject!"

With a sigh, Fukasu Ayashi looked around, murky brown eyes darting between the empty chairs littered around the disarranged clubroom and the half-closed door before going back to Yakkai, his smile now gone. "This wasn't what I'd been expecting when you asked me to send everyone away so we could have a private conversation after classes ended. Here I thought you were finally gonna confess your undying love to me…"

While it was true that this marked the first time they'd spoken without the presence of Nanase and the rainbow haired witches or any of Ayashi's knuckle-headed lackeys, Yakkai would rather chug down hot glue than even entertain the thought of dating him.

"Keep your delusional fantasies to yourself and cut the crap already."

"Ugh, whatever." He mumbled, voice scathing as he finally dropped the act. "You're such a killjoy, this is why nobody likes you."

The change was nearly instantaneous. Ayashi's voice dropped an octave, going from cheerful to an unpleasant scratchy rasp. His brown eyes gained a darkness to them that wasn't present before, and Yakkai felt shivers travel down her spine when they bore into her through his cropped orange hair.

They were dead, not a shred of light present.

It was clear to her then, that this was what Ayashi is really like. When he dropped the act of a cheerful upperclassman who just so happened to have the 'misfortune' of being held back three times in middle school, when he showed his true colors.

Part of her was already telling her this was a bad idea, but a reminder of why she was here silenced it.

"If we're going to be talking about productive stuff, so be it." He said, his murky pools pinned on her as if she was prey. "How did yesterday go?"

Caught off-guard by his sudden curtness, her mind drew a blank. "What?"

"You. Bakugou. Progress."

By the unapologetic scorn in his voice it was clear that he was not about to be patient with her.

"You're still on about that?" She asked incredulously, baffled that he would bring that up now of all times. "This isn't what I came here to talk about."

"Tough shit, nobody cares about what you want. You came to me, so I get to decide what we're talking about."

Getting angry would do her no good, butbreaking his nose has never seemed more enticing.

"…whatever."

"Good." He said, if he noticed her rising anger, he didn't show it. Rummaging through his pockets, he pulled out a pack of cigarettes. She could see that it was nearly empty, with only one cancer stick remaining. With an annoyed 'tsk', he grabbed the last one between his fingers and threw the crumpled package behind him without a care.

Subtly looking over his shoulder, Yakkai saw that a large pile was already present on the other side of the table. When she turned her gaze back to him he was already rolling the lit cigarette over in his mouth.

She could've sworn there was an orange tint to the smoke.

"Since you're about as dumb as you look, I'll repeat myself again." He mocks, taking a puff of the cigarette and purposefully blowing it in Yakkai's face. "You were tasked with hauling Bakugou's dumbass over to our group a week ago, and have made no progress whatsoever."

Feeling her eyes water and a cough forming in her throat, Yakkai stepped back out of the smoke as she mentally counted to ten in order to prevent herself from doing something she'd regret.

"I told you I needed you to introduce him to me as quickly as possible, but that didn't seem to get through your pretty skull." He scoffed, smoke erupting from his mouth as he did. "Your performance used to be way better, did you hit your head and become fucking incompetent or something?"

Like always, Ayashi managed to push all of her buttons, except this time he was not being backhanded and coy about it; he was just telling it to her face.

She wasn't sure which was worse.

"Maybe I've made no progress because it was a dumb request to begin with!" She snapped, channeling her anger into words instead of doing anything physical. "You might not be able to piece it together because of the cancer rotting your dysfunctional brain, but he wants nothing to do with us, or any other student for that matter."

"Does it look like I care? I asked you to get him, what good are you if you can't even do something that simple."

"Why are you so fucking unreasonable? Why can't you just accept that things don't always go the way you want them to?!"

Instead of an immediate response, Ayashi jumped off the table. And as he walked over to her, she realized just how intimidating he was.

He practically towered over her with his height, reminding Yakkai of the fact she was dealing with what might as well be a high schooler masquerading as a middle schooler. He had her outmatched in every possible way, be it strength, reach, experience, or weight. She stood no real chance against him, since even her quirk would be too slow to act were things to get physical.

That realization was the least bit reassuring.

"I always get what I want." He spat coldly, hunching to glare down at her. "And we made a deal we both agreed to; you fulfill my requests until the end of the year, and I won't tell everyone about your piece of shit mother."

Liquid fury shot through her veins at the mention of the 'deal' that had been forced upon her. "It's been months! Haven't I done enough for you already? Why can't you just leave my mother out of this!"

His eyes narrowed, though an ugly grin formed on his cracked lips as he took another puff. "Because you're just tooeasy. The others I actually have to compensate somewhat, while you quake in your boots and piss your panties at just the thought of me revealing your little secret to everyone in the school."

He was right, and she fucking hated the irony of it all. For someone who used to enjoy manipulating people so much, to become the victim of blackmail herself just had to be karmic retribution at its absolute finest.

Ayashi continued, smirking at her lack of response. "But because I'm such a good person, I eventually decided to actually take the time out of my day to help you out with your last task. And what do I get in return? Nothing, that's what."

He… had helped her out?

"Don't give me that look." He snorted, face expressing unsettling mirth as he basked in her appalled reaction. "You could at least thank me, I had to pull a lot of strings to get this shit done."

The bastard really was the one behind it all.

"You... you really were behind everything that happened yesterday, and the stuff with the desk..."

He laughed, he actually laughed.

"Oh Ya-chan, tell me…" He managed, calming his laughter as he stepped back and casually leaned on the table, tapping his cigarette on the worn wooden edges. "Who else? Who else is awesome enough, capable enough—smart enough to pull off something as amazing as what I did yesterday?"

Yakkai was at a loss for words.

She expected him to eventually confess to it after she'd pushed him enough, she even expected him to not regret with what he did. But for him to laugh and treat the atrocity he'd set in motion as some grand accomplishment that deserved praise…

Ayashi was more rotten than she thought was even possible.

"Why. Why the hell would you do any of this?"

A disgusting smile split across his face, as if he'd been waiting for her to ask. "Like I said Ya-chan, your senior wanted to help you out since you were having such a hard time~"

Something in her snapped.

"How the fuck would ruining an innocent person's reputation ever be considered helping me out!?" She shouted, for once glad the clubroom was situated in a more secluded part of the club building. "How was involving someone who has absolutely nothing to do with this mess going to help me achieve your dumbass request!?"

"How?" Ayashi repeated, unperturbed by her outcry as he chewed on his cigarette. "Well it's simple really. Bakugou Katsuki is content with only having one person to rely on, that being the Midoriya brat. By crushing his only support, he'll be left vulnerable, and that's the perfect moment for you to snatch him up!" He explained, curling his orange hair with his finger idly as if he was explaining something incredibly obvious.

"Don't you understand what you've done? How far you're going for something as worthless as increasing your own reputation?"

"Ha! Wakuna Yakkai grandstanding about morals and how pointless it is to care about what others think, isn't that just hilarious."

Her words of protest instantly died in her throat, and she simmered at the call out. Ayashi on the other hand, only grew more amused. "Besides, why are you putting the blame on me? It's only because of you that I even managed to get this plan going, you know."

"Wh-what are you talking abou…"

Realization hit her like a truck.

He just snickered in contempt, very aware of what was going through her head. "Imagine my surprise when one day, Nezumi came to me telling me all about how his brother got beat up after he was tricked by you, and about how he wanted revenge on both you and on the kid that broke his little bro's arm."

The truck was followed by what felt like a Detroit smash to the gut by All Might himself.

It was all her fault. She's the one who started this mess.

This all went down because she was jealous, jealous of someone who didn't allow their power to corrupt him, envious because she couldn't do the same.

And because of her selfish mistake, Izuku paid the price.

"You should thank me, really. I managed to convince him and his blockhead friend to not go after you, and to focus on Midoriya instead. In all honesty, the timing was perfect, he- I had my eyes on Bakugou for a while now, and with the duo's stupid desire for revenge and your incompetence, it really wasn't all that hard to orchestrate the perfect plan to crush that green haired brat."

"Y-you—"

"But I'll admit." He continued, too enraptured with his own tale to notice her anymore. "I never expected him to kick the shit out of the dumbasses like he ended up doing, and while it honestly messed up my original plan a little, I wouldn't be me if I didn't manage to take the rebound and still dunk it like a beast.

"Getting Nanase-chan and her bimbo friends to spread rumors about how he mercilessly decimated two third years and broke a first year's arm was as easy as pie, and before I knew it everyone gathered around the principal's office to see what all the fuzz is about, only for the brat to fuck up miserably and to confirm the rumors."

An unholy smirk dripping with schadenfruede crossed his face as his eyes lit up with absolute joy and he raised his arms dramatically. "You should've seen him after everyone ran away, he actually broke down bad. Talking to himself, shouting at them to not call him a monster, yelling to the world that he was trying oh so hard!"

His expression turned manic as he chewed on the cigarette compulsively, not caring in the slightest as the tobacco spilled all over his mouth and uniform "It was hilarious, but it would've been so much better if he came to school today. I really hoped he'd see the surprise I'd prepared on his desk, especially the note I wrote. Maybe then he'd actually kill hims—"

SLAM

Yakkai felt pain shoot through her hand, and looked down at it, quickly noticing the red bruise on her knuckles, she stared at them in confusion, only to notice hat Ayashi had stopped talking.

Looking at him revealed he was on the ground, clutching his nose.

She looked at her bruised fist, and then back to Ayashi, before her adrenaline filled brain connected the dots for her.

She'd punched him.

Yakkai's fury had boiled over beyond what she could control and she'd punched him in a blind rage, channeling all her wrath into that single hit.

Her temper had gotten the better of her and she might've very well made the situation worse than it already was.

Yet despite knowing what she'd just done, she actually felt surprisingly calm. Any fear she'd felt when it came to opposing Ayashi had vanished, a foreign determination that she's never quite felt before took it's place.

"You of all people have no right to call others pathetic." She spat, watching with satisfaction as Ayashi clutched his bleeding nose with trembling hands. "You're a disgusting piece of trash—a sad excuse of a human being. I'm absolutely done with your shit, so you can go convince Bakugou-kun to join your decrepit drug-den yourself."

A smirk crossed her face, totally unperturbed by the death glare he was sending her as she turned around. "Though that's also gonna be difficult; he'll probably kill you after I tell him that you were behind all this."

"Y-you!" He growled, still a heap on the floor. Though malice oozed out of his every pore as he watched her move towards the door. "You b-bitch, get the fuck back here, get b-back here or els—"

"Hell no."

"Yakkai!" His wrathful voice echoed through the room. "I swear to god, if you don't get back here right fucking now, there'll be hell to pay!"

She stopped in her tracks, and he grinned sardonically. "Good, wouldn't want me to tell everyone about your villain of a mother, would ya? Now get back here, get on your knees, and—"

Instead of following his orders obediently like he'd expected her to, Yakkai simply looked at him over her shoulder, and flipped him off, the black nail polish contrasting with her pale middle finger. "Do what you want dipshit, I'm not letting you hold what my mother did over my head anymore."

At an absolute loss for words, Ayashi could only stare in shock as Yakkai then proceeded to leave the clubroom without another glance.

Walking out of the club building as fast as she could and into the cold winter air, she finally stopped, glancing at her trembling hands as the adrenaline flowed out of her system and her actions caught up to her.

Despite herself, a nervous grin formed on her lips, and a shaky chuckle slowly bubbled in her throat as she slid down the wall tiredly, dropping herself on the tiled ground next to the door with a thud.

She'd actually done it.

After months of torment and blackmail, she'd managed to stand up to him.

Her chuckles turned into full-blown laughter when the reality of the situation finally dawned on her.

Midoriya Izuku—whether he knew it or not—had inadvertently saved her once again. The injustice he'd fallen prey to had been the catalyst for her righteous anger, allowing her to see through her fear and doubt and do what's right, instead of what would save her own hide.

Sure, she'd made an enemy of one of the most fearsome students in the school, and had basically painted a target on her back by defying him directly. Ayashi would undoubtedly be spreading her biggest secret around the school just so he could get back at her, and she'd probably be ostracized for it by the people that held a grudge against her for her past actions.

But as she was now, she simply couldn't find it in herself to care about any of those things. Because for once in her life, she acted upon the will to defend another even it came at the cost of herself, and it had felt good.

Now that her anxiety induced laughter had subsided, she stood up, brushing the dirt off her skirt and stockings before her eyes rested on the bruise that was now forming on her left hand.

Clenching it into a fist tightly, she stared at it with determination and made up her mind.

From now on, she wouldn't let herself be controlled by fear or jealousy, and no longer would she let any power she might have corrupt her.

I want to do what's right for once. Even if it might already be too late for me to change, I want to at least try atoning for my mistakes. Yakkai vowed to herself, looking back the the club building behind her once more before turning away, walking towards the school gates resolutely, brewing plans on how she'd inform Katsuki of her findings.

Had she looked closer at the building however, and paid more attention to the second floor windows, she would've spotted Ayashi's furious scowl tracking her from one of the windows, his phone held to his ear while his other hand cupped his still bleeding nose.

"Change of fucking plans, A defected, said she'd snitch to B." He growled into the phone, uncaring if he was being loud; no one had club activities past five. "It's not my fault jackass, it was doomed to go down the shitter the moment we involved the bitch in our plan. Now we need to deal with them pronto."

"Wait, what?" His previously angry expression changed in a heartbeat when he received an answer he wasn't expecting.

"You're saying M.T. will be out in two days? Isn't he being held… yes, those are their names. Is that why… holy shit." An evil look crossed Ayashi's face as he heard the response, his voice now dripping with excitement. "So M.T. is finally coming back, I've heard a lot about him. You said in two days time right?"

He chuckled sinisterly, eyes gleaming as he checked the date on his phone, it was Tuesday. "I can arrange that, but he'll need to be out by Thursday, we can't afford giving them too much time. Yep, the abandoned one, ask K. and he'll give you a map of the place—I know how paranoid you are."

Grabbing the ruined cigarette out of his pocket, he plopped it in his mouth and casually devoured it, an unnatural amount of orange smoke flowing out of his mouth and nostrils. "No, you'll have to come pick them up yourself, but you have that guy's quirk right? Just marble 'm up and take 'm away, easy as pie. Yeah, yeah, we'll make sure not a single hero scumbag catches wind of this.

"Now if you're done with the chickenshit, I need to get my fucking nose checked out." He said, cringing as he caressed it. "It's not funny asshole, the bitch packed a left hook strong enough to knock me flat on my ass. I'm gonna beat the daylight out of her if we're going through with this, so we got a deal or not?"

After a few moments of listening, he pulled up a list on his phone. "Let's see… It'll cost you the usual for one premium and one special request, both in cash. Pickup location is the place mentioned earlier, and date will be Friday night at nine on the dot. I'll have everything prepared as long as you send M.T. in advance—kinda lacking men at the moment, so he'll be helping with the… extraction process."

He smiled eerily at the answer he got. "We've got a deal then. Notify me when he's out so we can start preparing in advance. Yeah, you too. Pleasure doing business with ya."

With that he hung up, and stared at the contact name for a moment. "Well shit, now I need to prepare that busted up place again, really should've chosen a different location, fuck."

Stuffing the phone halfway into his pocket, the number of the caller flickered for a few seconds before it showed the contact name instead.

It read 'Giran'.

The screen turned off, and Ayashi stalked out of the building grouchily.

"Get out." Katsuki ordered, knocking on the all too familiar door in front of him.

Inko looked on, worried frown marring her face as the two of them hoped for a reply from the other side, maybe they'd get through to him this time?

There was no response.

The blond growled in frustration as he banged on the door again. "Get out of the fucking room already, damnit!" Inko cringed at his unfiltered language, but understood his frustration, she shared all of it, though it was induced by worry rather than anger. "Don't make me blast this shitty door, cause god knows—I'll fucking do it!"

"Katsuki-kun." She finally said, her voice barely a whisper, but audible enough to draw the teen's attention away from glaring a hole through the wooden door—or perhaps the person behind it. "I think… I think that's enough for now, you're going to be late for school at this rate."

Katsuki looked his surrogate aunt over. Her hair was a mess, bags under her eyes indicated a lack of sleep, and he was sure she's been wearing the same sweater for three days now.

She looked terrible, and just seeing her in this miserable state made him want to beat the shit out of the dumbass that's causing her to worry to the extent that it's affecting the woman physically.

Gritting his teeth in anger, he grabbed his school bag off the ground before giving the door one last slam. "How the hell are we supposed to help, when you won't even get out to explain what the fuck's going on with you!?" He shouted, one last time, waiting for any indication of a response.

Once again nothing happened, not even the slightest movement could be heard from the room behind the door. And he could only look down in defeat, the way his shoulders slumped betraying that even despite all his anger, he was incredibly worried.

It truly hurt Inko to see the usually boisterous and prideful boy in such a somber state. The only thing that felt right at that moment was to give him a hug, even though it was something he'd probably to try to dodge, like he usually would.

To her surprise, he actually remained still when she wrapped her arms around him, even though he did not move to return the gesture, Inko was just happy he'd let her comfort him.

So she took the opportunity to hopefully lift his spirits, consoling him with her kindest voice. "I know everything seems a little hopeless right now, but he'll come out to talk to us eventually, I'm sure of it." The mother traced circles on his back soothingly. "So you just head on to school for now dear, it would be a shame to tarnish the perfect track-record you two have been working so hard to keep up, right?"

"… What's even the point?" He mumbled, almost petulantly. "We… we were both supposed to keep perfect track-records… "

Inko pulled away, a sad smile on her tired face, "I know…" she looked at the door wistfully. "But until he tells us what actually happened, you'll just have to focus on up-keeping yours. Maybe you could think of it as doing it in his stead?"

Katsuki remained silent, but dipped his head. Inko couldn't help but notice how vulnerable and lost he looked. She recognized the guilt on his face as he eyed the door out of the corner of his eyes, it was clear that he somehow blamed himself for whatever it was that may have happened.

Why was it, that both Katsuki and her own son had to share the detrimental trait of always pushing the blame on themselves, when oftentimes the situation was simply out of their control?

Inko considers selflessness a good trait, but too much of it is unhealthy. A person can only do so much, and blaming oneself for every bad thing that happens to the people around them takes a toll on the mind. The last thing she wants is for the two to grow unhappy because of how unnecessarily strict they are on themselves.

Unaware of Inko's thoughts, Katsuki straightened himself, schooling his features as he turned towards the stairs. "I… I should go then. Before I get caught in the rush hour." He told her listlessly, looking back at the door one last time as determination flashed in his red eyes. "I'll be back later."

Inko simply nodded, knowing full well what he was talking about. "I really appreciate it dear, please stay safe." Normally her send-offs would be accompanied with a reminder to have fun, but it was abundantly clear that something like that was the last thing on the blond's mind.

Tossing a half-hearted thumbs up behind his back, he descended the stairs, made his way to the main door, and closed it behind him with a click.

As she heard the entrance to the house close, Inko let another sigh escape her as she leaned on the door. "You have such a good friend, dear, not just anyone would sit at a door for three days in a row just to convince someone to come out." She slid down the door that was separating her from her child, seating herself on the cold wooden planks. "I beg of you, don't take his effort for granted, he's really trying, and so am I for that matter.

"S-so please, could you at least explain to your mother what's wrong?" She pleaded. "I'm so worried about you, Izuku. It's been three days, hasn't it been long enough already?"

She waited, and waited.

But like every other attempt on her part to get him to talk to her, no answer.

Inko blinked away the tears.

A total of three days have passed since Izuku locked himself inside his room. Since Monday, he hasn't come out even once, and he's essentially cut all contact with everyone, including his own mother.

The only indication that the boy was even still alive, and the only reason they hadn't broken the door down yet, was the fact that the food she left at his door would disappear overnight, indicating at the very least that the boy wasn't starving himself.

Katsuki had insisted they still break the door down, but Inko decided against it—she knew her son and he would never worry her like this unless he really felt like he needed to be left alone.

So she'd at least give him this, for now at least.

When he'd returned from school three days ago on Monday, looking like his soul had been sapped out of him, she simply brushed it off to him having a bad day. Only when dinner came around and Izuku refused to leave his room, did she realize how wrong she'd been.

To add more worry onto the mother's growing pile, Katsuki had suddenly also come knocking on the door, looking disheveled and worried out of his mind demanding whether Izuku was alright or not.

Not minutes following his arrival, she received a phone call from the headmaster's secretary, informing her of the fight that had occurred that same day, and of a prior incident where Izuku had apparently injured another first year.

Inko remembered not believing the woman for even one second; the Izuku she knew would never get into a fight, or god forbid injure another person just for the sake of it. Yet one look at the way Katsuki's face fell when she asked him about it after the call, indicated there must have been some truth to it.

She'd been relieved when Katsuki told her that Izuku hadn't hurt that first year on purpose, though even he admitted to knowing next to nothing about what happened the second time, aside from the fact that Izuku had apparently just disappeared during the lunchbreak, and that he somehow ended up in a fight.

The boy had looked so incredibly guilty when he had explained to her what he knew. Whether or not it was because he felt useless at the fact that he didn't prevent this from happening, or if it was for some other reason. Inko didn't know, but it was definitely eating away at him.

When it became clear Izuku wasn't going to leave his room the next day, she decided to call him in as sick. The counselor was skeptical, but Inko wouldn't consider herself as a good mother if she couldn't angrily make the man understand that her son was definitely sick and that it would be borderline child abuse to still send him to school in the state he'd have to be in to act like this.

Suffice to say, that shut him up.

"Is there anything I can do to make you come out?" Inko finally asked desperately. "I-I know there's something wrong, and I want to help you sweetie, but staying locked inside… You can't run from whatever it is that caused you to be like this forever."

She stood up, dusting off her pants. "I'll always support you dear, I want you to know that. I'm heading off to work with Mitsuki now, I'll leave your breakfast by the door. Please consider leaving your room when I get back in the evening."

When her only reply was silence, she let out the umpteenth sigh that day, and went down to the kitchen to grab the breakfast she'd been hoping to eat together with her son.

She paused when she passed by one of the family pictures hanging on the walls, her eyes lingered on the smiling face of her son, before switching to the tall man standing next to her, wearing a similarly brilliant smile.

"Oh Hisashi… what's become of our smiling boy?"

(A/N)

I advise you read the points I go over that are bold similarly to this text, since those are very important for the future of the story.

It's certainly been a while, hasn't it?

I could go into a lot of the reasons as to why this took so long to come out and apologize profusely for the long delay, but that would take too long and I honestly doubt that any of you would want to read that (to be fair, I wouldn't either) so I'll just condense it by saying that I'm really sorry this took so long and that school and corona were a gigantic pain in the ass.

Anyways, my time during the update gap was mostly spent reflecting on this story and the direction I want it to go, leading me to many discoveries and ideas that I've never considered before.

Along with these discoveries came the realization that I should re-examine some of the older chapters in order to change a few things, like for example splitting chapters that are way too long in half to improve pacing. (Chapter 4 basically)

Along with these changes, I'm also going to be changing the title and summary. Looking back on these, I came to realize that they simply do not reflect what I have in mind for the future of this story anymore. The title is honestly a bit of an unoriginal placeholder that I didn't even put all that much thought into, and the summary is also not great.

I was trying a little too hard to write a 'mysterious' summary when most people probably just like summaries that tell them enough to get a grasp on what the story will be about, so that they know if it's worth the read.

With that said, I didn't want to just change the things that basically identify my story without a warning, since a sudden change would lead to a lot confusion otherwise, so I'm gonna put the new title and summary here in advance, so you know what to look for when I change it either the next chapter or the one after that.

Ghoul's Pomegranate

Awakening a dangerous quirk thought to have been wiped out decades ago, Izuku must adapt to his primal instincts and his growing bloodlust. He's always wanted to be a hero. But when his wants clash with his needs and the line between 'good' and 'evil' starts to blur, Izuku realizes just how cruel his world is to those unfortunate enough to be born with a quirk considered evil.

The title might seem a little odd, but it fits what I have in mind—you'll see what I mean when we get further into the story. While I still feel like I suck at summaries, I hope that this one is more transparent and more fitting than the last, though I'd also like to hear your thoughts on it.

I also want to thank everyone who followed, favorited and (especially) reviewed. Getting so many good reviews on the latest chapter really boosted my motivation during a time where I was severely lacking it.

Though this might sound a little messed up, I'm really happy that last chapters final scene hit you all as hard as I hoped it would. My intention was for that scene to be heartbreaking and hard to read, and the fact it came across that way means I succeeded.

On the topic of good reviews, I want to give my utmost thanks to Yutzeka for leaving my favorite review so far!

Seriously, thank you so, so much. Your review left me feeling giddy for a month, and there's not a single word in the English vocabulary that can describe how amazing it felt to have the little things I had in mind while writing a scene or a character acknowledged by a reader—especially when it comes to my original characters.

I never knew it was possible for a single review to make me smile as much as yours did, and for that I genuinely can't thank you enough. I could honestly gush about how much I appreciate your review forever, but this A/N is already getting too long, so it might have to wait until next chapter lol.

One quick thing, my dumbass only recently figured out you can directly respond to reviews, so I might actually start using that to respond to some of last chapter's reviews to see how it works.

With all that out of the way, I just want to quickly say that this story is in the process of being crossposted to Ao3, and that you can check that out if you want. My username is the exact same as the one on Ao3, so it shouldn't be too hard to find.

Since summer break has finally begun, I should have more time to work on chapters. I have the rough draft for the next chapter finished (I've started writing drafts in order to hopefully increase productivity), this hopefully means that I'll be able to write and release the next chapter within two weeks, though by now I've learnt not to make any promises.

Don't forget to follow, favorite or share your thoughts in the reviews, and I'll see you all next time.