(Note from MNL: So I noticed a couple of people thought that the AN at the end of the last chapter was from me. No, it's bunnyscribe's AN that I copied from AO3. Me posting up this story affects none of the releases for my own projects as it's just me reposting it to FFN. So please don't leave reviews regarding my other works, because this isn't one of them. Thank you.)

Disclaimer: Neither bunnyscribe or I own Mob Psycho 100 or My Hero Academia

Train Your Body, Train Your Mind, but Above All Train Your Heart

By bunnyscribe (AO3)

"Where were you last night brother?" is how Ritsu greets Mob in the morning.

"Studying," Mob answers, not looking up from where he's attempting to tie his shoes. "You don't need to worry, Ritsu, but thank you."

Ritsu is silent, unmoving from his spot in front of Mob's bedroom door. Mob doesn't look up, not wanting to look Ritsu directly in the eye after such a blatant lie.

His brother already has so much to worry about, between school council and the stresses his quirk puts on him. Mob can't bring himself to burden him any more than he has too. He's done enough of that already.

"What happened to your cheek?" Ritsu asks next.

Mob says nothing, bringing up a hand to thumb against the shallow mark.

The question lingers, unanswered. Ritsu shuffles his feet and the air conditioner hums in the background.

"If you don't want to talk to me, it's fine," Ritsu says. "But you know where I am, if you need to."

Mob looks up at him and is met with a tiny little smile that doesn't quite match his tone.

"I'll let you finish getting ready." Ritsu turns around, starting down the hallway.

"Ritsu," Mob says, and his brother stops short.

"Yeah?"

"...I confessed to Tsubomi-chan last night," Mob says.

"You did?" Ritsu asks, and Mob can hear the confusion in his tone. "Like romantically?"

It's then that Mob realizes he had never told Ritsu about his endeavors. Sure, his brother knew about the small things, like how he had joined the Body Improvement Club and had been studying with friends in order to his grades up. But somehow the overarching reason behind these attempts to better himself had slipped underneath the radar.

Mob starts to feel a little sick at the thought.

"Yeah," Mob says. He swallows his nausea and it cuts down his throat the way a knife wielded by a cult leader might. "She rejected me though."

Ritsu's eyes narrow in the way they always do when Mob asks him for help with a complicated question on his homework. It's a bit frightening to have the intensity of that look pointed directly at him and not at a piece of paper.

"Did she do that to your cheek?" Ritsu asks, crossing his arms and jerks his head in Mob's direction.

"What?" Mob asks. "Oh. Oh, no, that was something else."

"Something else," Ritsu repeats, an edge in his voice.

Mob nods, pauses, nods again. "It's fine."

Ritsu studies him, looking for something that Mob cannot guess at. The stern look on his face drops off after a moment, replaced with something far more pensive. "Right," he says. Then, "I'm sorry about Tsubomi."

"It's ok," Mob says, and is surprised to find that he means it for the most part. The wound is still fresh, but it doesn't sting as much as much as Mob thought it would.

Ritsu opens his mouth to say something but seems to think better of it as it snaps shut a moment later. His lips curls up into a familiar smile that Mob's only ever seen directed at himself. "Thank you for confiding in me brother, you should hurry though or else you'll be late for school."

"Oh, Ritsu," Mob says. "You don't have student council this morning do you?"

"No, why do you ask?"

"Do you want to walk together?"

Ritsu's face lights up. "I'd like that," he tells Mob earnestly.

Mob smiles back. Overall, it's a good morning.

.-.-.

The fact that Takenaka can partially read Mob's mind makes him an extremely valuable study partner.

They sit across from each other at the table in the Body Improvement club room, surrounded by a flurry of notes and exercise equipment. Takenaka points at one of the numbers on the page, circling it with his finger.

"Alright, so to solve the equation we have to move this over. No, it's not positive, it would be negative seven. We're subtracting. Got it? Nice. Now, the x is isolated except for the four, so we-Yeah, right. You're getting it, good job."

"These study sessions are the most I ever hear Takenaka speak," Inukawa says casually. He presses the buttons of his game console in a flurry of motion, only perfected by countless hours of practice. "It's kind of surreal."

"Shouldn't you be studying too Inukawa?" Takenaka asks pointedly, not looking up from their math homework. "The entrance exams for engineering schools are supposed to be really difficult."

Inukawa's face flushes. "I haven't told anyone about that yet! That's an invasion of privacy you know!"

Saruta glances up from his manga. "Eh, you want to be an engineer?"

Inukawa shuffles around in his seat, lowering his game console. "Yeah. It was a recommendation from one of my teachers because my math and science scores were pretty high. I like the idea of it though and it's pretty high paying too,so," he shrugs, "you know."

Mob looks up from the paper for the first time in a while, the colors of the world slightly distorted due to the bright white of it. "That's neat," he tells Inukawa. "What would you like to invent?"

Inukawa hums, rubbing the back of his neck. "I don't...I don't actually know yet? Probably something to help with quirk control since that's a pretty big business."

"Like hero gear?" Saruta asks.

Inukawa snorts, "Oh no, no, definitely not hero gear. The only school that certifies for that that's anywhere close to here is UA, and I'm definitely not getting in there no matter what I do. Nah, I'll probably just invent casual gear, like for the kids who can't control their quirks well or people who have chronic pain because of them."

Something about Inukawa's words strikes Mob oddly. He wonders if he can even get into UA if Inukawa, one of the smartest people he knows, doesn't believe he himself can. The realization of who he's sitting across from strikes him a split second too late. Takenaka's head pops up from the paper, eyes going wide.

"Mob?" he asks. "What was that about UA?"

Twenty-six.

All eyes in the room focus on Mob. He goes flush, sweat starting to bead down his face at the unwanted attention. "I-I...I…"

He must think something else incriminating in his panic without realizing it because Takenaka's eyes narrow. "Mob," he says slowly. "What schools did you put down on your academic aspirations sheet?"

Mob's stomach churns, his subconscious desperately trying to smother an embarrassment he can't even explain why he has. "I...I wrote down-"

The door slams open before Mob can finish his answer.

"Mob-kun, I'd like to speak with you."

Mezato stands tall at the door, hands on her hips and camera swaying back and forth on her neck like a pendulum. She's holding a newspaper in her hand, the local paper from Musutafu, the city over. The sight of her rigid determination sends whatever relief Mob felt at the interruption immediately down the drain.

"Ah...newspaper girl…Mochi?" asks Inukawa.

Mezato's eyes narrow at him, she puffs out her chest. "My name is Mezato Ichi! Current lead reporter for the Salt Middle Newspaper, future investigative reporter for the biggest newspapers in Japan! I have an eye for big news and I am here-" She crosses over to them in two strides and slams down the newspaper down on the table. "-about this!"

VILLAIN ATTACK STOPPED BY ALL MIGHT; MIDDLE SCHOOLERS SAVED, reads the title in all capital letters. Below it is a picture of All Might, smiling towards the camera. Underneath that are two frontal shots of boys who look about the same age as Mob.

"You want to talk about All Might?" Mob asks her.

"Yes, exactl-Wait, what?" Mezato starts and then stops, looking at Mob her jaw going slack. "No! No, no, no! I'm talking about this!" She points at the portraits of the middle schoolers, her finger practically shaking with the effort she puts into the gesture. "These kids! They were involved in a villian attack, almost died, I think."

"Oh," Mob says. "Well I'm glad All Might made it in time."

"Yeah. Yeah, me too," Mezato says, brushing the statement aside with the swoop of her hand. "But, that's not important right now! What is important, Mob, is the page."

"The page?" Mob asks.

"She's trying to get across that it's a front page piece," Takenaka tells him. "Though," he gives Mezato a hard stare, "I don't understand how this pertains to you."

Mezato grins, like a predator that has it's eye on its next meal. "Mob-kun," she says, voice breathy with excitement. "I want to report on the incident from yesterday."

"No," Mob says immediately.

"...No?" Mezato asks. "Mob-kun...this could be a front page piece! This could...this could be your ticket into UA! Just think, you'd be unveiling yourself as a hero, unveiling your charismatic, selfless nature! They might let you in on recommendation if the piece gets big enough!"

"No," Mob says again. "Doing heroic acts for personal gain isn't right. If I get into UA, it'll be because of my own ability, not because I helped people that one time."

"Mob-kun, you saved a crowd of people from a villain!" Mezato continues, ignoring the confused protests of Inukawa and Saruta in the background. "That's not something small, that's a one time kind of event! And I could get you recognition for that. Don't you want that?"

"He said no," Takenaka says. "Stop trying to convince him otherwise for the sake of your dying newspaper."

Mezato glares at him, her expression strong enough to make Mob squirm in his seat. Takenaka holds steady though, meeting her gaze with zero apprehension.

Finally Mezato sighs, crossing her arms across her chest. "Alright, fine, I'll go." She doesn't move. "Mob-kun," she says.

Mob jolts to attention. "A-Ah...yes?"

"Here." A business card is shoved into his hands, depicting a smiling Mezato. Call me with your news! is writing in a goofy font on the back, attached to what appears to be a hotline number. "Call me if you ever change your mind."

Mezato leaves, but the tension in the room doesn't. Mob can feel everyone's eyes turn to him, their stares accusing. He fidgets in his seat, not looking up from his lap. A droplet of sweat drips into his eye, he doesn't move to swipe it away.

"What," Takenaka says, finally breaking the silence, "was that?"

"Did you actually save people from a villian Mob?" Inukawa asks. "Like, from a real life actual villain?"

"That can't be true, can it?" Saruta says.

Mob glances up, looks at them individually, and then immediately back down at his hands. They tremble slightly. "I...I...I…"

Fifty one.

"Hey, Mob, look at me," Takenaka says, tone soft but commanding. It reminds Mob of Reigen in his more serious moments, and this correlation is probably the only thing that gets him to glance up.

"You're panicking," Takenaka says bluntly. "You need to calm down. Plus-" Here, he grimaces, a hand coming up to brush against his temple. "You're thinking so erratically that it's giving me a headache."

The pressure inside Mob spikes, but the realizations that he's hurting Takenaka, even indirectly, forces his subconscious to quickly attempt to smother it. His mind runs blank, like a film reel that reached the end of a movie.

"Is that better?" Mob asks.

Takenaka's frown deepens. "Yeah I guess." He glances back at Inukawa and Saruta, who are both just silently watching them. Inukawa's game console is slack in his hands. Takenaka rolls his eyes and looks back at Mob. "Look, it's alright. You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to, we're just concerned, that's all."

"Sorry," Mob says.

"No, I mean, ugh, you don't need to apologize." Takenaka rubs his temples, looking so stressed that Mob can't help but feel bad. "We're your friends, we want to know what's going on with you. Especially, if you're fighting villains in your spare time." He pauses. "Or going to UA."

"Ah, sorry," Mob says again. "I just didn't think it was important."

Inukawa sputters. "No-Not important!? Not important?! You're applying for the top school in the country and you think that's not important?"

"It's not that big a deal," Mob says.

"Uh, yeah it kinda is," Saruta says. "But, more importantly, did you actually take down a villian? Why would you do that? We're not even legally allowed to use our quirks."

"I didn't want to," Mob says. "He wouldn't let me call the police."

Takenaka stares at him, trying to work something out. "...Why wouldn't you tell us about it?"

"I didn't want to bore you."

Apparently, this was the wrong thing for Mob to say, as the others groan. Inukawa buries his face in his hands, and Takenaka gives him the same look Ritsu does when Mob does something especially oblivious.

"Mob, heroes train for years to be able to take down villains effectively," Takenaka says. "Some pros still have to hone their abilities because even they can't fight well. And you're saying that you, a middle schooler with zero official training, taking down a villian makes for a boring story?"

"But I do have training," Mob says, a bit confused. "I work out with the Body Improvement Club almost everyday. Plus, my master teaches me a lot about hero work."

"Yeah, yeah, your hero master, you've told us," Inukawa says. "But that still doesn't change that you took a villian down by yourself. Your master wasn't there with you, was he?"

"And even if he was, he probably couldn't do anything," Saurta mutters.

"That's not true. Master is really good at self defense," Mob says, immediately jumping to Reigen's defense. "He could've handled it."

Takenaka waves his hand, cutting off the conversation. "Alright, forget your master for a second," he says. "Do you think you can handle going into UA?"

Mob feels his chest tighten, his doubts about his ability creeping back up at the question. "I don't…" he says, "I don't know?"

Takenaka's frown deepens. "Don't take it that way," he says, mostly likely picking up on what Mob was thinking. "I didn't mean it like that. You wouldn't fail, you'd definitely get in, it's just…" He pauses here, squinting at Mob. "The other people going into UA, they're going to be…competitive. And you're just…"

"Kind of a pushover," Inukawa says.

"Not cutthroat in the slightest," chimes in Saurta.

Takenaka spins around to glare at them, and slowly turns back to Mob, his expression going soft. "I was gonna say too nice," he says.

Mob glances at each of them. "I don't understand."

"All those kids are going to be aiming for the top," Takenaka says. "UA's a hard school to get in for a reason, and the people in there are probably going to be really ambitious."

"Some of them will probably be even aiming to surpass All Might someday," Inukawa says.

"But no one can surpass All Might," Mob says.

"Yeah, but they'll probably be aiming to."

"That's besides the point," Takenaka says, his voice distracted. He's eyeing Mob, face pinched up in concern. "Haven't you watched the sports festivals? Those in the hero course always wind up beating the shit out of each other at the end. Could you really do that? Could you hurt someone for some else's entertainment?"

Mob frowns, his brow furrowing as he turns the statement over in his mind. "I think…" He pauses. "...I think…"

"You don't have to answer that now," Takenaka says, putting a hand on Mob's shoulder. He looks Mob dead in the eye, gaze piercing. "Just think about it."

.-.-.

On one of the free days for the Body Improvement Club, Mob runs farther than he ever has before.

Time slips away until he's running down roads that have no semblance of familiarity, buildings becoming more and more spread apart with every step he takes until finally they disappear all together. His breath is shallow and shaky, his legs burn and feel a little fuzzy, but it says something to his increased stamina that he doesn't stop or pass out.

He starts to run past a beach so covered in trash that he can't even see the ocean. The rusted metal and broken glass glitters against the sunset, so bright it almost blinds him from his peripherals. He makes a mental note to talk to his master about it later. They've cleaned up garbage together before, not quite on this scale, but Mob thinks it's a real pity no one is getting to enjoy the beach.

It's a disgruntled screech that emerges from the mounds of trash that makes Mob pause.

He waits, hears nothing else, and waits a little bit longer. The silence dregs up the worst parts of his imagination until, without thinking about it, he begins carefully picking through the piles of trash. He carefully steps around glass shards and sharp tin cans embedded in the sand, knowing he'll be no good to whoever's out there if he gets hurt as well.

"-fraid I've used up all my time for today," a voice says as Mob maneuvers around a car with no wheels that's covered in thick, brown rust. "Are you sure you can't lift it?"

A tuft of fluffy green hair pokes out from underneath a fridge, the body attached to it shaking with the effort to keep prop it up. A rope runs around the fridge, connecting it to person underneath it. The head lifts, revealing a boy's face, covered in freckles and sweat. His breath shakes out of him. "N-no...I've got it...I can-"

Three things happen almost simultaneously. The boy's muscles give out on him, there's a blur from where the other voice came from, and Mob finds himself lifting his hand up before he can think any more about it.

The boy lands on flat his stomach, his shoulders tense as he braces from an impact that never hits. He strains with the effort to pick his head back up looks back, his entire body quaking. He looks surprised at the fridge, now standing straight up a few feet away from him. "D-Did, did I do that?" he mumbles, looking towards the other voice. "Was that me?"

"You should really take a break now," Mob tells him, and the boys head swevers to face him so quickly that Mob would be surprised if he didn't hurt his neck on top of all the physical fatigue. "You look bad."

"That was you?" the boy asks, pushing himself unsteadily to his feet. He stumbles, almost going back down. Mob starts to lift his hand again, but the boy steadies himself. "Was that your quirk? I mean, thank you, if that was you, but was it?"

"Ah, um," Mob says. "Yes."

The way the boy looks at Mob immediately reminds him of Mezato, intense and driven in a way Mob can't completely wrap his head around.

"What's your quirk?" the boy says, his voice raspy from exhaustion.

"...Telekinesis," Mob says.

"So you moved the fridge with your mind then? That's amazing! I've read about telekinesis as a quirk before, but I've known anyone who had it. It's rarer, isn't it? At least classic telekinesis is. It was mostly found in the first generation of quirks, but its mutated as it's been passed down. From what I've read it usually it becomes a different quirk altogether or there's some special conditions surrounding its usage. Is your quirk like that? What's the weight limit of objects you can lift? How many objects can lift, just one? Or could you pick up a whole room if you wanted to? Wait, wait. I think I have my notebook in my bookbag, it's around here somewhere. Let me write this down…"

After that impressive and overwhelming amount of babble, only interrupted by the occasional sharp breath, the boy turns, mostly likely to try and stumble somewhere else. He starts tilting over immediately, about to hit the ground before he can take his first step.

Mob takes a break from trying to comprehend everything that's been said to him in order to shoot his arm out, grabbing the boy and steading him.

"Midoriya, my boy," the other voice, a tall, blonde man, says with a chuckle. He walks over to them both, a bit of smoke hazing around his form. He puts a hand on the boy's head and ruffling his hair. "Relax." The man turns to Mob, "Thank you for your help, young man. I'm very thankful you showed up when you did."

Mob has the very sudden thought that this man needs to eat more.

The boy immediately gets flustered, his cheeks flushing. "Ah, I'm sorry!" He bows his head towards Mob. "Thank you so much for your help!"

"It's fine," Mob says, only half paying attention.

The boy looks familiar in a way that Mob can't quite place. He zones out, trying to put a memory to the face. He thinks of Mezato, smacking down the newspaper on the table, and it hits him.

"Ahh," Mob says, smacking his palm with a fist. "You're the guy who got rescued by All Might during the slime attack."

Both the other boy and the man tense up. Mob realizes he had interrupted something the boy was saying, his mouth half opened around a syllable.

"...Y-yeah, that's me!" the boy practically squeaks.

Mob hums, pausing for a moment to remember more about the article. "You ran in to help the other kid, right?" he asks. "That was very brave of you."

The boy flushes, looking torn between beaming at the praise and embarrassment at getting recognized. "Thank you."

Mob nods.

The silence that proceeds is taught. The tall man just looks vaguely uncomfortable and tense, The boy looks off to the side, wringing his hands together. Mob has the feeling he stepped into something he wasn't supposed to.

"Sorry," Mob says finally. "I interrupted you. What were you saying?"

The boy startles. "O-Oh! Sorry!" He brings up a hand and rubs the back of his neck, fidgeting in place. Mob can still see the slight shaking in his legs with the effort it's taking to stand up. "I was just introducing myself!" The boy grins and sticks out his hand towards Mob. "My name is Midoriya Izuku! What's your name?"

Mob stares at the hand, processing for a moment. The boy's, Midoriya's, combination of enthusiasm and nerves reminds him of his master. The flourishing movements, the expressive body language. Like with his master, it makes him a bit easier to understand than other people, but also a little bit harder to keep up with.

Midoriya's smile wavers the longer he holds his hand out. It's only when he starts to retract it that Mob reaches out and takes a hold of it.

"Mob," he says.

Midoriya glance to their hands, to Mob's face. "Wh-What?" he asks. The man behind the splutters with something between a laugh and a cough.

"Mob" he says again, dropping his hand back to his side. "My name."

"Oh, is that…? Is that your actual name?" Midoriya asks, his hand stuck in the air like it's frozen there.

"No," Mob says. "It's what my master and my friends calls me."

"Oh." Midoriya's hand slowly drops to his side, his eyes sliding over to the one part of the ocean that's visible from their vantage point. Mob can almost see the gears turning in his head, rapidly spinning in a way that strikes Mob as natural. Midoriya jolts a second later, his movements turning frantic as he turns back to Mob. "Sorry, sorry! I didn't mean to offend you."

Mob tilts his head to the side, "You didn't offend me." He glances around at all the trash, tuning out whatever apologies Midoriya gives next in order to take in old cabinets with missing doors and a TV with a broken screen sitting precariously on top of a mound of trash. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, I'm just cleaning up the beach as part of my training with All M-" the tall man starts hacking loudly, "-UH, I mean! My, uh, mentor!"

Mob nods slowly, and looks over Midoriya's shoulder towards the man. "Are you alright sir?"

"Fine, fine!" the tall man says, waving it off. "A bad cold is all."

Mob nods reluctantly, not fully believing the statement. He glances at Midoriya's shaking knees to a little droplet of blood dripping down the man's chin.

"You really shouldn't push yourself," Mob says. "My master says that's the quickest way to work yourself into an early grave."

The tall man gives a wet chuckle, something glittering in the depths of his sunken in eyes as if Mob just said something extremely funny. "I'll keep that in mind."

"Ok," Mob says, "I'm glad." He glances around again. "...Do you want some help?"

"With moving the trash?" Midoriya asks, looking unsure. He glances back at the tall man, who hesitates and nods. "Are you sure?" Midoriya asks, treading lightly as he turned back to Mob. "Do you have somewhere to be?"

"No," Mob says. "I have to be home for dinner, or else my mom gets worried, but that's not until later. And I don't think I have time to make it back to club anyway."

Midoriya hesitates for a second longer, biting his lip and looking conflicted. "I don't-" His trembling knees finally give out, almost sending him to the ground once more. His shock makes way for amusement, a bright grin on his face as he steadies himself with his arms. "-ok, alright, I guess some help would be nice."

To be continued…

It's been so long!

A lot has happened in the last few months, a lot of change. I moved out, entered my sophomore year of college, even wound up in the hospital at one point. Don't worry, I'm doing a lot better now!

Despite everything though, I still really love this fic. I think about ideas for it all the time and have been wanting to work on it for so long. That being said, I do want to get updates out to you guys a bit faster, so I think I'm gonna go with slightly shorter updates, probably aim for two to three thousand words and about three "scenes" per update.

I really appreciate you guys' patience, and I hope you really enjoy my fic! Next chapter, more Mob and Midoriya friendship and the entrance exams!