Better late than never, yeah?

Izuku stood in the bathroom in just a towel. He was about to take a shower and was about to get dressed for school. Before doing that, though, he was examining the wounds from his fight with Eraserhead.

The bruises were slowly beginning to fade, but unfortunately, it seemed like he still had to wear his mother's makeup to hide it. It was a good thing he was an outcast or else people might actually realise that he looked different.

He had already made peace with having to wear makeup. It was the lesser of two evils.

What was actually harder to explain was the state of his right hand. He had used wind chakra to escape from Eraserhead's battle scarf. It had worked, but perhaps it had worked too well.

He had a myriad of cuts crisscrossing his entire hand. They weren't terribly deep so he was able to clean them and bandage them himself, but it was a reminder that he had quite a ways to go when it came to elemental manipulation.

He'd gotten past the so-called first stage of elemental manipulation for all five elements, but it really did not feel like much of an achievement when he had discovered the second stage for all elements.

Redirecting a lightning bolt, disintegrating followed by reforming a boulder and splitting a waterfall were three of five of the next steps. Those were the three steps for lightning, earth and wind chakra respectively.

Izuku did not even know where to find a boulder let alone a waterfall.

The fire and water exercises were equally ridiculous but ultimately irrelevant. There was a massive leap between step one and step two. It was a leap so big that he wouldn't be able to bridge it for a while yet.

It would be smarter if he focused on gradual improvement. He had mastered leaf exercises so the next step up would have to be harder than the leaf exercises, but not as ridiculous as the final stages.

So, for instance, instead of cutting leaves with wind chakra, he could try cutting rocks and metal items.

That seemed a lot more doable than a waterfall.

Izuku took off his towel and he jumped into the shower. The water was still pretty cold, but if he was late to class then there was a chance someone would point out his makeup.

That would be awkward.

About ten minutes later, Izuku dried himself in the bathroom before rewrapping his hands with bandages. He had bought some more after finishing the supply his house had yesterday.

His mom hadn't yet seen what was under the bandages and Izuku intended to keep it that way until the exams.

It was easy for him to forget that his mother didn't know that he could use chakra. From her perspective, he was just putting his life on the line for a pipe dream. It explained her hesitance to really discuss anything UA related.

Izuku did want to tell his mother everything. He wanted it more than anything, but he was still dragging his feet on that front. A part of it was him just wanting to blow her expectations away, but he had another more pragmatic reason.

If he told her, word for word, what had happened in Konoha, she would drag him to the nearest hospital and spill the beans. From there, he'd probably get an in-depth examination instead of the simple toe joint check.

Who knew what that scan could and would reveal?

Izuku already knew he had an entirely new system integrated into his body. Mutation Quirks were like this except that without fail this always occurred well before birth.

A Quirkless boy gaining powers after eating a fruit in an ancient city? The same ancient city with evidence of Quirk usage well before the Luminescent Baby?

The attention he'd get would be downright awful. If Izuku's couple of months of fame were any indication, he would never be left alone. Ever.

That was just the 'positive' reactions. Who knew what more insidious people would do to him if they caught wind of all of this? What would they do to his mother?

It was why he could only tell his mother when he felt safe.

Izuku got dressed in his uniform and as he packed his bag, his eyes settled on the Kage mask. It brought up a ton of mixed feelings within him.

Izuku loved being able to help out as Kage. Despite his goals for the future, he'd never quite fully believed he could make an actual difference in people's lives.

Discovering his chakra had relit a flame within him he'd thought was long dead. However, rescuing Sumire had turned that flame into a raging bonfire. No, he wasn't saving a hundred people in five minutes like All Might's debut or anything absurd like that, but he was doing something.

He didn't even go out looking for trouble or at least he didn't at first. A knock-on of training so late was that he'd be going back home when a lot of criminals liked to do their business.

After the first few successes, he'd begun to take roads that were rather high-risk areas. Even then, he'd been very lucky. The truth was that truly powerful criminals weren't going around stealing cars or robbing university students.

He'd been lucky that he had not yet faced an actually dangerous villain. He'd also been lucky that there was zero footage of him outside of Sumire and Kendou's videos. He'd been lucky that there were many clashing theories on what his abilities were.

Finally, he'd been lucky that higher level heroes were unconcerned with him and left his capture to the lesser heroes. Eraserhead and Midnight were some of the best and he had gotten away solely because Eraserhead's Quirk did not work on him.

Again, lucky.

In another timeline, Izuku would have been caught, his abilities exposed and any pathway to the top, let alone UA, would have been shut down.

The more he did as Kage, the more trouble he would be in once he got caught. Quirk usage laws were not an easy thing to bypass even for well-liked heroes let alone a vigilante like him.

The news stations seemed favourable to him, but that seemed more of a way to criticise heroes more than anything. At the very least, online hero forums seemed to have a mostly positive view of him.

Still, though, the positives were vastly outweighed by the negatives especially if he were to be caught. Izuku had known this before helping Sumire, he'd known this when helping Kendou and he'd known this when facing Eraserhead down.

So, why couldn't he quit?

Abandoned Mall Rooftop ~ After School

Izuku ignored the soft sounds of fabric tearing as he lugged his loaded bag up the wall. He had needed to make a pitstop of sorts and this was his seventh such trip today. His hands and feet were stuck to the wall with chakra, but Izuku was still able to push through and climb onto the roof.

The abandoned rooftop was the scene of a lot of Izuku's recent successes and practically all failures and despite that, it was a sight for sore eyes as he finished his last supply run for the next few weeks. Or so he hoped.

The garden was still in a rather good condition all things considered. The evergreen tree and plants hadn't once wilted despite the change in seasons. If anything, Izuku himself had done more damage to the surroundings than the weather had.

Countless leaves had been destroyed in the name of him mastering the first stage of elemental control.

The trees had regrown the leaves quicker than he could use them, thankfully. It was a large garden, after all. It would take multiple copies of him working on the elements together to actually make a dent in the ecosystem of the rooftop garden.

That being said, Izuku wasn't there to focus on the leaves anymore. He had to figure out additional exercises to build up his proficiency. He had already devised two such exercises for wind and earth.

Speaking of which...

"Ugh," Izuku groaned as he shrugged his bag off and left it near a rather large number of rocks, "That should count as my physical conditioning for the day. That was heavy."

Izuku had loaded his bag up to the brim with as many rocks, pebbles and bricks as he could find. As it turned out, that was a lot. He was sure his bag was in pretty bad shape, but it was all done now.

Izuku picked up a rock as he decided to test his theory. He settled on using earth chakra and he tried to disintegrate the rock. The rock he'd picked was a bit bigger than his fist so he couldn't envelop it entirely with one hand.

He held it in his right hand as he channelled earth chakra into the rock. The rock accepted the earth chakra more easily than the leaf had which was obvious. However, he still needed to channel about triple the amount of chakra before a few grains began to flake off the rock.

After three minutes, the rock had been worn down to half its original size. Izuku scooped the fallen grains up as he tried to put the rock back together His control over the tiny grains was not perfect and after fifteen minutes the rock was halfway to its original size when it imploded from the amount of chakra in it.

He would have mastered earth chakra if he could disintegrate and reform a boulder under thirty seconds. Mastery wasn't quite required to learn jutsu, but Izuku wanted as much control as possible before he began making earth dragons and earth walls.

The people at UA would be blown away.

Well, actually, that probably wouldn't be the case.

Izuku couldn't very well reveal his powers to the UA staff. Or at least not yet. He didn't know any of the staff personally and they might be able to put two and two together when it came to his moonlighting as Kage.

In all honesty, Eraserhead was the one Izuku was most worried about. Eraserhead knew that Kage was very, very fast and could emit some energy that could cut his battle scarf. That was it and yet that was a large chunk of what Izuku's style relied upon.

Despite what the man had said, the rumours on the internet were all over the place so it was likely that those would not be taken as seriously. So, stuff like the Substitution and Surface Sticking could probably be explained away.

However, the biggest concern Izuku had was that he would somehow incriminate himself. Izuku had a good handle on his powers, but surely it was inevitable that he would slip up somehow.

Especially with him moving into the dorms, he would have to be careful of where and what he trained. All it would take is one slip-up and the beans would be spilled.

So, Izuku had to either come entirely clean about his powers, which wasn't ideal or he could make his Quirk to be something else entirely. If he framed certain jutsu as being a cohesive Quirk then he would be fine.

"Which ones could I get away with though?"

The Body Flicker was doable. Being fast wasn't unique in the world after all even if the Body Flicker was extremely fast on its own. Izuku knew he could slow it down and it would probably make him puke a lot less.

The Substitution, Clone and Transformation definitely had to be shelved, though. The last two were obvious and the Substitution was good enough to be a Quirk on its own.

As much as Izuku liked it, he couldn't very well pass it off as him running extremely quickly and then putting something in his place before once again moving away.

Who in the world would believe something like that?

So, the Academy jutsu were nixed off the list. Furthermore, he couldn't really use elemental chakra, could he? Besides the fact that he was likely to hurt himself, there was also the headaches it would arouse.

"Wow, Izuku. You can run super fast and use five elements? That is not weird at all."

All in all, he had to rule out everything he could currently do except the Body Flicker.

Ironically, it was thanks to the Body Flicker that he would be able to add something new in his arsenal.

The Body Flicker used chakra to vitalise his muscles and give them more explosive strength. They exerted enough force to make him sprint at amazing speeds.

From his research into training, Izuku knew that this would really help him with boosting his striking strength. The Body Flicker simply maximised how fast he could run.

The Enhancement Technique would do the same, but for other explosive movements such as punching, kicking, jumping and pretty much anything that needs quick and fast movements.

He had four weeks to get it down. Izuku knew he wouldn't be able to carry a car down the street or anything since that was a different type of strength.

However, should things go the way he expected them to then he had the makings of a speed and strength boosting Quirk. He'd have to change some of the details on his application, but other than that it should be fine.

Izuku picked up a rock and he tried to mimic the effect of the Body Flicker across his entire arm. There was a gentle pressure emanating from within his arm that felt just a little uncomfortable, but nothing too unbearable.

Izuku clenched his fist around the rock as he began to apply pressure. The edges of the rock dug into his palm, but the pain only helped him to focus more on the task at hand.

"Come on, you stupid rock."

Just when he was about to throw the rock away out of frustration, pieces of the rock broke off before falling to the floor. However, before the rock could be fully crushed, the chakra he had built up in his arm faded away and the sensation of pins and needles was all that remained behind.

Izuku rubbed his arm to get rid of the uncomfortable sensation as he reviewed what he had just done. It had gone a lot better than his first attempt the Body Flicker and that was great in his opinion.

Maybe he needed to up the ante.

He needed to find a dummy of sorts to practice his punches and kicks on. He obviously couldn't go to Kendou's gym to practice that so he had to find something here. Izuku scanned the rooftop before his eyes settled on a grove of large trees about thirty metres away.

He sighed.

"It's a bit primitive, but it will have to do."

Three weeks later

The weeks leading up to the exam went by quickly and school, as always, was a monotonous and grey mess Izuku had to wade through. The silver lining was this was the last day of school.

The UA Exams were now only a week away.

They had completed the vast majority of the last projects, tests and assignments on their syllabus. As it was their final year, their school would not give those going to hero academies their final exam.

The marks they got for the Entrance Exams into hero academies would be combined with their year mark from Aldera to give them a Final Mark. The Entrance Exams by every hero academies were all moderated by external sources even if their difficulty level differed so there was no underhand stuff going on.

Bribery had been a huge problem in the past.

Anyways, UA's exam was one of the hardest and strictest around and that was just the theory portion. The practical portion was said to be even worse. It was why (almost) no one at Aldera High was even going to try the UA Exams.

It was very likely that your Final Mark could get cratered by a poor performance in an Entrance Exam. So, people went the safer route of easier Entrance Exams at decent high schools. It also lowered the number of times one had to take an Entrance Exam.

You could apply to three different high schools, but a lot of the dates tended to clash particularly for elite schools like Shiketsu High and UA. So, generally, people prioritised the very best high school they felt they could get into.

The final two spots were their failsafe choices. If something were to go wrong in their primary choice, presumably they would still be able to get into a lesser, but still decent high school.

Mr Gomasuri was going through the class list and double-checking that everything was in order. Izuku tuned out most of everyone else as he waited for something he knew was coming.

"Ami Bakou. You are applying to Seiai Academy, Musutafu Western and Musakui High, correct? The dates are the 26th, 27th of February and 1st of March respectively. Good luck, Ami. I know you can do well."

"Thank you, sir."

Finally, Izuku had to know just how screwed he was. Hell, maybe he got lucky. Maybe—

"Katsuki Bakugou," Mr Gomasuri said and it was almost as if the entire classroom sat up straighter, "You've applied to UA and UA alone. I suppose that makes sense. If anyone can make it into UA from our school, it's you. Don't forget me when you become a pro!"

"Hell yeah, Bakugou!"

"Put a good word in for me when I transfer to UA, Bakugou!"

"The system's rigged. He should have gotten in on a recommendation! The upper-class Pros protect their own."

The room was filled with all sorts of praise for Bakugou. It was nothing new and in all honesty, was pretty much the norm for their class. Izuku wasn't jealous of Bakugou per se.

Izuku knew that Bakugou worked harder than anyone he'd ever met in everything he did. Despite his volatility, Bakugou was very smart which was admittedly not obvious at first glance.

Furthermore, being born with a powerful Quirk was simply a roll of the dice. Bakugou could easily have just been born with the ability to produce glycerine like his mother and no combustion from his father.

It wasn't Bakugou's fault that he was both smart and lucky. If Izuku had been in his shoes, he'd probably enjoy the attention. Hell, Izuku did quite like the praise Kage got — only when it wasn't intended as a jab at heroes, though.

That being said, it wouldn't kill Bakugou to be less arrogant. Probably. Maybe. The jury was still out on that.

"Izuku Midoriya."

Izuku was drawn from his musings as Mr Gomasuri called out his name scaring the daylights out of him. In his stupor, he banged his knee on the underside of his table causing him to let out a pitiful groan.

"Yes, sir?" Izuku wheezed out and the class took that moment to relish in his clumsiness as they erupted into laughter.

"Settle down, class," Mr Gomasuri said as he managed to regain control of the students, "I know it's the final day and you're excited to take the next step, but there's no need for you to be so disruptive. Now, let's see where Izuku has chosen to—hmm...That can't be right."

Mr Gomasuri turned away from his papers as he went to his computer— a perplexed expression painted across his face. Izuku felt a pit form in his stomach as his class began to whisper.

The all-too-familiar cruel words began to spill from poorly contained conversations.

"I bet Deku forgot to apply anywhere."

"Forgot? A Quirkless loser like him wouldn't get accepted anywhere. He probably has to go to a normal high school with other scrubs."

This was said in varying ways and loudness, but the message was still clear. Everyone thought he sucked.

Weirdly, Izuku was both hurt and not hurt by this. It was downright awful to be disparaged by what were supposed to be his peers and people he'd known for years now.

On the other hand, Izuku knew that their vision of him was a year out of date. So, the joke was on them. Even if he was still seen as a joke.

"Ah, so it wasn't a mistake," Mr Gomasuri said his brows raised as he looked at his screen. The man walked back around his desk and sat on his desk.

Mr Gomasuri cleared his throat for silence and Izuku could see that the man seemed torn between disbelief and confusion.

In all fairness, Izuku understood the reaction. As far as everyone knew, he was still the shy, nerdy, Quirkless loser with dreams he could and would never reach.

Technically since chakra wasn't a Quirk(or was it?!), he was still most of those things. The difference was his dreams were more attainable than ever. Everyone else just didn't know it yet.

"As I was saying," Mr Gomasuri said as he looked down at his paper, "Much like Katsuki, you've only applied to UA. Is that correct?"

The chatter in the classroom dissipated as the words of their teacher sunk in.

"T-That's, uhm, c-correct, Mr Gomasuri sir," Izuku stumbled over his words as everyone stared at him like he was an alien, "I applied to UA. For the hero course."

Bakugou scoffed at his words.

Oddly, that was all it took for everyone to move on. There were murmurs and stares, but nothing too drastic. Izuku took the time to stare out the window as he mentally ran through his schedule for the week.

He'd probably hold back on the elemental training and focus a bit more on the academic side as well as the Enhancement Technique. It would be tragic if he stumbled at the theory stage before even getting to the practical.

So, he couldn't deprive himself of sleep if he wanted his mind and body to be prepared for what was coming up.

The bell rang signifying the end of the day. After a few more well-wishes from Mr Gomasuri, the students began to pack up and file out the class excited for what the days ahead held for them and their futures.

As always, Izuku took his time packing up. It was a bit surreal to realise that this was likely the last time he would set foot in Aldera. He hadn't had the best of times here by any sense of the word, but it was still a lot to take in.

As Izuku finished putting the last of his stuff away, he noticed that someone, or rather a couple of someones, had walked up to him. Izuku closed his bag and he frowned as he saw Bakugou and his cronies standing in front of his table.

"W-What do you want, Kacchan?"

"Look," Bakugou said his eyes narrowed, "I don't know why you think you of all people can pass UA's test and I don't care. All I know is you've been weird since that stupid trip."

Izuku held back a gulp as Bakugou hit the nail on the head.

"The test is a week away, but I'll figure out whatever it is you're up to," Bakugou said as he turned away, "If it affects me in any way then I'll show you why people look up to me and why they look down on you. You got that, Deku?"

"No one, not even you, can or will stop me from getting into UA, Kacchan. I'm not going to go down easy."

Filled a burst of unexpected confidence, Izuku put his bag and walked past Bakugou purposely bumping shoulders with him as he went by.

He was going to die, wasn't he?

Two of Bakugou's lackeys tried to grab him, but to Izuku's surprise Bakugou barked out at them.

"Leave him."

Izuku paused in his stride before he walked off. He could hear them begin to have a loud conversation, but Izuku didn't pay attention to that.

He'd walk to the abandoned mall. This way he'd probably be calm enough to use his chakra by the time he arrived.

Izuku was a lot calmer now that he'd gotten away from the school. He'd placed a delivery at the bakery he and Kendou had gone to a while back. Normally, he would have ordered something, but his appetite wasn't quite there.

Izuku was using his phone as a way to pass the time as he navigated the busy streets of Musutafu. He was aware enough to not bump into other people or stray into the street. Gradually, he got sucked into what was on his phone and paid less attention to what was going on around him.

First, he had refreshed Sumire's website to see what she had on Kage. The site had undergone a major redesign. She'd probably gotten quite a lot of money from the increased traffic to her site.

Her website had one of the larger forums discussing stuff that weren't the stuff news channels wanted to show. Complaints of recklessness or even corruption by heroes, videos and pictures of fights and even sightings of criminals and, of course, vigilantes.

Izuku scrolled past the pinned thread which mentioned something or someone called Gentle Criminal as he instead clicked on the thread dedicated to any and all news about Kage.

From what he could tell, the incident with the Red Jackets did mention him and what he'd done, but that was it. There was nothing about the abilities he'd used at all. That did make sense.

Eraserhead wasn't exactly the type to speak to the media unless he absolutely had to. Izuku was pretty sure he'd never even heard the man speak until that night by the mall which was crazy for a not-famous famous hero.

Izuku skimmed the rest of the thread, but it was filled with random rumours, opinions and other stuff that wasn't really essential. Izuku closed his browser before opening his messaging app.

He had just two messages. One from his mother about her going to visit Aunt Mitsuki and the other was from Kendou. It was a short video where Kendou sparred with what could only be her father.

They were both wearing protective gear around their heads as they circled one another. She evaded or blocked all his attacks before connecting with a clean strike across his face. Her father dropped like a bag of rocks and Kendou posed over his prone.

The thump of the finishing blow was audible from his phone's speakers even through the afternoon activity. It was only after watching it that he saw the video's caption.

It made Izuku sigh.

'That will be you soon. Wanna put that fancy bottle of yours on the line next time we spar?'

By all accounts, Kendou was really nice and surprisingly enough they did actually text each other pretty frequently even though Izuku was rarely the instigator. It was nice to have someone to talk to besides his mother.

That being said, Kendou tended to be a bit...excitable when it came to training. The contrast between her normal personality and her battle personality was jarring. She went from nice and funny to boastful and cocky and then back again instantaneously.

He still wasn't used to it.

Izuku was pretty sure Kendou had sent that video right after flooring her dad. They didn't share too many details of their training mainly because Kendou probably wanted to surprise him when they got another chance to spar.

He'd never admit it, but Izuku was pretty excited to face her again too. He needed some revenge after she had convinced him to buy one of the bottles sold at her gym. The markup was ridiculous. He should have known it was a scam. She didn't even own one!

Izuku was about ten minutes away from the mall and so he stopped underneath an alcove to type out a message to his mother. He was about to reply to Kendou when loud tremors shook the ground.

A few blocks up he could see people running away and he put his phone away as he ran towards the commotion. He had to duck and weave through a swarm of people going in the opposite direction of him.

By the time he arrived, there were already a couple of heroes on the scene. There were abandoned cars, trucks and other vehicles scattered everywhere. It took him less than a second to find the source of all the trouble.

A giant of a man in shaggy and worn-down clothing stood in the centre of the street. A viscous green sludge leaked from his mouth and eyes further amplifying his intimidation factor.

The giant picked up a car and he pitched it towards an apartment building that had some faces peeking out at the fight. Before it could connect, a spray of tree branches caught it out the air before gently placing it on the floor.

Izuku already knew who was on the scene.

"Hey, it's Kamui Woods! That giant's gonna get it now!"

It was not that simple, however.

Izuku had already seen and recognised all the heroes on the scene. None were suited for direct combat and chances were even Kamui couldn't hit hard enough to take the giant down long enough.

He was more suited to capture than anything else.

"Pre-Emptive Binding: Lacquered Chain Hammer!"

That didn't mean Kamui was useless, though.

The wooden tentacles originating from his arms shot up into the air. They melded and wrapped around each other to form a giant hammer. Kamui brought it down on the giant and the impact was strong enough to send tremors through the ground.

The hammer pressed the giant down to the road and the asphalt splintered and cracked as a result. The hammer then morphed into a crisscrossing of branches that had him pinned to the road. The branches punched holes into the ground further tightening their hold on the villain.

There had been a thunderclap of noise that followed in the wake of the tremor and it felt like a bomb had gone off in-between his ears. Other people were also watching the fight unfold and quite a few people were clutching their ears in pain.

All of them had been ruffled by Kamui's attack, but even then nobody moved. The fight was over, after all. Right? The sound of a truck door sliding open drew Izuku's attention and he turned to see a field reporter practically sprint towards the scene with a cameraman following in his wake.

A very familiar field reporter.

"This is Masukomi Sousa for Starlight News," Masukomi said before turning towards the fight, "Number 37 Hero Kamui Woods is now engaged in a fight with a villain using a Gigantification Quirk. There are massive amounts of property damage, but for the time being it appears Kamui has managed to—"

Before Masukomi could finish his briefing, the giant began to scream and thrash against his bindings. The wood stretched with his movements, but Izuku could see clear as day that keeping the move up was taking a toll on Kamui.

Somehow, the giant managed to get up to his feet. A large chunk of the road was still attached to the giant due to Kamui's Lacquered Chain Hammer keeping him flush against it even as he rose to his full height.

The sludge dripping from the giant's face became thicker and thicker as the giant fought against his restraints. Kamui was using both his hands to keep the man tied up and was unable to do anything or he risked letting the man loose.

The branches began to pull tighter on the man, but all that seemed to achieve was make the sludge drip out of him at a faster rate. The green substance looked weird to Izuku's eyes as it bubbled on the ground as if it were boiling.

No, that wasn't quite right. If anything, the sludge looked as though—

"It's alive! Look at his feet!" screamed one of the people watching the standoff, "There's a face in that green stuff!"

After that proclamation, a lot of things happened almost at the exact time.

The sludge exploded out of the giant and formed a massive, breathing and living pile of sludge. The sludge villain sped across the road with surprising speed before it absorbed a car into its body.

Izuku was barely aware of the Starlight reporter screaming into his mic as the gathered crowd began to scatter. The Sludge villain seemed to convulse before his body suddenly compressed and from it came the car it had just absorbed.

The car had been fired at a nearby office building and it punched into the building with a powerful crash. Screams filled the air as a gaping hole was torn into the building.

Izuku had no idea if it was empty or not.

The Sludge villain then managed to absorb a couple of cars in one go and that sent everyone scattering. Even the heroes who had been helping with getting people out of the danger zone seemed to hesitate to help or backed off entirely.

Kamui was still struggling with the giant who was apparently just another villain and not someone with an odd side effect to their Quirk. However, Kamui was forced to slam the giant into the ground before releasing him as the Sludge Villain fired more cars towards the fleeing crowds.

The cars were travelling with such speed that Kamui was only able to deflect them away from the crowd. Despite his best efforts, though, the cars ended up smashing into office buildings, apartments and shops.

"Kamui is endangering the lives of everyone with his reckless defensive manoeuvres! The ongoing situation here at —"

Izuku had slowly begun to lost his eagerness to see Kamui in action and it finally dwindled to zero as the first car Kamui had deflected—stuck between two buildings— exploded. Windows exploded all over the street and the smell of burning fuel clogged the air.

As Izuku fled, he saw the giant get back up to his feet and Kamui seemed to take a step back as he looked between his two opponents. The giant seemed to focus deeply before his body began to get even bigger. And bigger and bigger and bigger.

He grew and grew and grew until he towered well over all of the buildings. Izuku fled through the crowd as the situation became increasingly dire. Kamui, let alone any other hero, was now nowhere to be seen and as things were it was foolish to stay.

There was a rush to get away, however, as all the people from nearby buildings all chose to take a single exit point. Izuku looked up as the giant closed in on them and he had to squint through the shining sun to keep sight of the villain.

He was going to die, wasn't he?

The situation seemed dire, but then in the blink of an eye, it turned around for the better.

A large shadow swept over the crowd and Izuku caught a flash of purple and yellow before he heard a loud thump followed by the voice of someone, a woman, screaming at the top of her lungs.

"Canyon Cannon!"

The giant was sent hurtling away as another giant kicked him square in the face. He tore a trench through the road before collapsing. A titanic woman in a purple and tan bodysuit stood with her hands on her hips.

She turned back to the shellshocked crowd with a smile on her face.

"It's Mt Lady!"

"She saved us!"

Mt Lady bent over the giant in a rather provocative pose. She held him to the ground with ease before looking over her shoulder, "There's no need to worry. As you can see, this ass is well taken care of."

Izuku's face almost melted from how much it was burning up. It wasn't uncommon for both male and female heroes to use their...attractiveness to their advantage. It made them pretty memorable and it helped with the younger demographics too. A lot. Almost disturbingly so.

Judging from how a lot of the crowd seemed to switch gears from scared to cheerful, it seemed to be good for morale too.

Izuku turned back to the ass— he took a beat to refocus. He looked at the giant and he let out a breath as he saw that the villain was unconscious and now back to a normal height. The road was heavily damaged and a pretty disgusting smell emanated from the now-exposed sewers.

A few police officers got cuffs on the man as Mt Lady and some other heroes began evacuating the buildings that were still occupied. It would probably take a couple of weeks to repair everything unless someone like Cementoss was recruited to speed things up.

The only problem was that there was no sight of Kamui or the Sludge Villain. Izuku could only guess that Kamui had gone after the other villain after Mt Lady's timely save.

A few yards away, he saw news stations begin to report on what happened and as expected the most passionate of them was Masukomi. He was the closest to Izuku and he heard snippets of the given report.

"—a lot worse if Mt Lady hadn't been there to clean up their mess. She, above everyone else who was here today, should be commended for her actions. However, let us not forget that Kamui—"

"Deku! What are you doing here?!"

That could only be one person.

Izuku saw Bakugou and his goons began to weave through the crowd towards him. He had no idea what possessed him. Perhaps it was madness brought on from the fumes from the sewers or maybe it was Izuku deciding that today had had enough drama.

In the end, it didn't matter.

He began to run away from Bakugou and his friends and unfortunately just like most days, they wouldn't leave him alone.

Izuku knew that they probably weren't above beating him up. They'd come close multiple times before, but without the threat of expulsion looming over them, Izuku was sure they wouldn't be so hesitant.

"Oh, you are so getting it now, Deku! School's out, but you've still got one lesson to learn!"

He just had to make it to the abandoned mall. It was about ten minutes away if he ran. Once they got to the abandoned district then it would be even easier. He could just use the Surface Sticking to go up a wall or something or he could even Transform into like a dumpster or something.

That would work, right?

Izuku's plan did not work.

He had managed to stay well ahead of his bullies/classmates until he reached the abandoned property. From there, he was planning to use his chakra to find a way to escape.

Unfortunately, he wasn't the only one with the idea of using his powers once he got out of dodge.

Akuma was using his devil wings to fly after him and even as Izuku managed to temporarily lose some of the others, Akuma was always on his trail. He flew above the buildings and Izuku's bright bag made him an easy target to follow.

That ruled out climbing a building as well as Transforming.

He could not use the Body Flicker to get to the rooftop because it would raise far too many questions. Questions he was only prepared to answer after the UA exams and not a second before.

Besides, he was pretty certain that Akuma would still be able to find him once he was on the rooftop.

Izuku veered off the main road and instead ran down as many alleyways as he could. He was slowly getting closer to the mall and with the long shadows being cast by the buildings would help hide him.

It seemed to work as he could no longer hear the flapping of Akuma's wings. Maybe he'd gotten tired.

He burst from an alleyway and made it to the mall front. He managed to scale the majority of the wall before he was found out, but unfortunately, his luck seemed to run out just as he got one leg over the edge. His water bottle, loose from all the running he'd done, fell to the ground.

He watched it fall through the air before landing on a manhole cover with a loud shatter. It reverberated through the empty streets and Izuku knew that Hayamimi's Quirk would have definitely heard that.

Why did he listen to Kendou about getting a glass bottle? That thing had floored his mother from how much it had cost. It was way too expensive for just a bottle and she'd been concerned he may lose it so she had...made him put his name on the lid.

Great.

Izuku was forced to crouch down as he heard them approach. Akuma had rejoined Bakugou's group which was good for Izuku. They spilled into the mall's street and Izuku held back a breath as he saw that Hayamimi's ears were enlarged.

If Izuku so much as let out a breath, Hayamimi would probably find him with ease. Thankfully, they did not seem to notice him at first until one of them pointed out the glint of the broken glass.

"What the hell is that?"

"It's probably just from the building. These are all abandoned, right? Maybe they're just old."

"No, it can't be," Akuma said as they walked closer to the glass shards, "My dad's a real estate developer and he said this whole area had a problem with their sewage system. Especially the mall. These buildings are still new and this glass is too small to be from the windows."

"What a nerd!"

"Hey! I just know stuff! It's not my fault you couldn't pass an eye exam!"

"I wear glasses!"

"Exactly!"

"Shut up!" Bakugou screamed at the bickering duo, "Chunky, pass me that metal thing in the middle of that mess!"

Izuku felt his heart sink as Akuma handed the lid to Bakugou. He froze as Bakugou read the inscription before blowing the lid up as he clenched his hand.

"Where are you, Deku?! You dropped your bottle! Rabbit Ears, find him!"

"My name is Hayamimi..."

"I don't care."

Despite the retort from Bakugou, Hayamimi still used his Quirk to search for Izuku. He tried to be as quiet as possible, but in the end, it was pointless.

"There's a heartbeat up on the roof."

There was no point in hiding anymore. Izuku rose to his feet and he looked down at his former classmates. Bakugou's frown deepened as he caught sight of Izuku.

"You could have made this easier on yourself, but if you want to get beaten up here then be my guest. Now are you gonna come down here or are we gonna have to go up there?"

"I don't want a fight, Kacchan!" Izuku said to his former friend, "The exam's in a week. We can't afford to—"

"I don't care about that, Deku!" Bakugou screamed up at him, "If you're not gonna come down here then I guess I'm coming up there!"

Bakugou placed both his hands by his side before he fired a simultaneous blast from both hands. The explosion was strong enough to send tremors to Izuku all the way up on the top floor and it completely destroyed the manhole cover that Bakugou was standing on.

Bakugou was flung through the air at breakneck speeds, but he misjudged the angle of approach. Izuku took a few steps back as the other boy slammed into the side of the roof. His hands latched onto the edge of the roof and Izuku almost went to help him when Bakugou pulled himself up and over with ease.

"It's just you and me here now," Bakugou said as he approached Izuku, "Those scrubs down there can't interfere with this."

Izuku frowned as Bakugou's smile grew larger. He couldn't use his chakra. It would only result in a massive headache especially if he was able to match up to whatever Bakugou threw at him.

"I won't use anything too strong," Bakugou said as he walked forward and Izuku spied a chair leg on the floor, "Just enough to show you that I can stop you from taking that exam if I have to."

Hopefully, that meant he would not have to use his chakra.

Bakugou rushed him and Izuku dove for the chair leg immediately. He sprang up to his feet as Bakigou lashed out, as expected, with a right hook. Izuku used the chair leg to slap aside Bakugou's arm before he lashed out with a side kick.

His foot went flush against Bakugou's ribs and sent the other boy stumbling a few feet away. Izuku held the chair leg at the ready as an irate Bakugou looked back at him. His red eyes held fury and shock and confusion.

"How did you—screw this! I'm gonna enjoy this!"

Izuku had had plenty of practise evading strikes with Kendou and he was pushed to the limit as he strained to stay ahead of Bakugou. The other boy didn't seem to mind when he missed letting out stronger and stronger explosions as he went tearing the garden to shreds.

The main reason Izuku was able to avoid being hit was that he knew Bakugou's attack patterns like the back of his hand. He barely had any time for a counterattack as he shuffled back across the garden.

Izuku managed to slap aside another attack by Bakugou before a kick slammed into his side. Pain erupted in his ribs, but before he could readjust Bakugou connected with a low-powered blast that sent Izuku sprawling across the rooftop.

"Doesn't feel great, huh?"

He had lost his weapon and also been sent closer to the edge and once Izuku rose he could see over the edge. Without warning, the memories from the scavenger hunt came flooding back.

For just an instant, when he looked down he saw the rushing river that had almost killed him.

"You look scared, Deku."

Izuku turned to see Bakugou a few feet away from him.

"I've heard about all the training you've been doing since that trip from my mom," Bakugou said with a frown on his face, "Do you know how much stress you're putting your mom under?! She calls my mom all the time because you stay out past fucking midnight doing who knows what!"

"You need to accept that you can never, ever be a hero, Deku!" Bakugou's words cut into Izuku like the sharpest of knives, "You are just normal. There is nothing special about you and there never has been and there never will be. Stop risking your life trying to change that! Auntie Inko deserves more than that!"

Izuku felt many emotions swirl up inside as Bakugou continued to berate him. Were his actions really having such a bad effect on his mother? Why didn't she say anything? How didn't he notice?

Had he been so wrapped up in getting into UA that he forgot to check in on his mom?

"Is that why you're so angry? I don't want to fight, Kacchan," Izuku said as he cut Bakugou off, "I know I haven't been the best son for the past year and I'll work on that, but even then I won't let anyone but me decide if I can or can't become a hero."

Izuku stared at Bakugou who for once didn't seem as hostile. Izuku walked past Bakugou as he went away from the edge as he remembered the last time they'd been in a similar position.

He could hear their classmates arguing about something, but neither of them paid it any attention. As he walked away, he could hear the flapping of Akuma's wings which meant they'd probably be joined by the others soon.

He turned back to Bakugou whose gaze was still less hostile than usual. Akuma rose behind them his wings flapping rapidly as he touched down on the ground.

Izuku was about to speak when he noticed something off.

Akuma's skin was a sickly green and a nasty sludge of the same colour dripped off his wings and from his mouth and ears. Izuku felt as though ice was forming in his veins as he recognised the villain from before.

"Which one of you caused all that noise?" A distorted and deep voice that was definitely not Akuma's said.

The villain looked between the two of them before he saw the smoke trailing off of Bakugou's palms. Bakugou didn't seem to fully understand what was going on and Izuku ran towards him, but he was too late.

As Bakugou opened his mouth to speak, a flood of green sludge flew from Akuma's mouth and into his. By the time, Izuku reached Bakugou there was green sludge dripping from his mouth.

"Let's have some fun, shall we?" Not-Bakugou said.

Okay, for real now. He was going to die, wasn't he?

Toshinori was enjoying the rest of his day off. There had been a rather major incident near the edges of town. Launched cars, damaged roads and scores of injuries.

He'd been occupied with a hostage situation on the opposite side of town and by the time he had arrived, the problem had been dealt with and the clean up was underway.

One of the villains, a sludge-like monster, had gotten away before Mt Lady could apprehend. They had assumed Kamui was in pursuit, but the man himself had said he had found no trace whatsoever.

Toshinori did feel bad for Kamui. He kept his ear to the ground and kept himself abreast of the situation of different heroes. Kamui was one such hero because of his declining popularity.

Toshinori had been certain that Kamui would be a top 10 hero soon enough, but if things continued as they were Kamui would be lucky to crack the top 200 and that was being nice about it

The hit job in the media had been that successful. Maybe if he had been there then Kamui wouldn't be having such a hard time. Someone as young as Kamui didn't deserve that. No one did.

Unfortunately, it had happened before and would happen again. Some people somehow got tired of hearing all the good and began to manufacture some controversy. It was probably all just for money and nothing made money quite like controversy.

Toshinori's crime radio crackled to life and he rose out of his seat to shut it off. He couldn't keep it on when he barely had any time left to use One for All for today. It just hurt to know that he couldn't do as much as he could before.

He needed to find someone he could trust to use it. Or he had to with a rather uncomfortable solution.

"We've got a situation at the abandoned Agatarri Mall," the responder said and despite himself, he kept the radio on, "A bunch of schoolboys said they had been attacked by some sort of sludge monster that possessed their friend. Some have fled, but there are still some children fighting. The sound of explosions was clear so the recommend rank is A if alone and B if in groups of three or more. I repeat we've got a situation at the—"

Toshinori turned off his radio as he tapped into One for All. His body grew to thrice it's size as it surged with energy. He was out the door in a second and he sped off towards the Agatarri Mall.

He had about ten minutes left. He had to make them count.

Author Notes:

Thanks for the response to the last chapter. This is probably my most popular fic which is wild. Massive thanks to everyone bookmarking, reading, following and everything in-between. You guys rule.

This chapter was supposed to come out sooner, but my brother needed my laptop for this work thing and so I didn't have this thing for 6 full days.

Here it is, though. I have some normal news and then I have some great news.

Normal news: I made a Discord server where I'll give daily updates on my progress with each chapter. You can use it to ask me questions or give suggestions on stuff like OCs, Ultimate moves, ships or just chat. I also have an OC competition channel where I'll add in your Original Content where necessary.

The first competition is officially open. What do YOU think Izuku's hero costume should be? I have one in mind, but if any of you have anything cooler you've got to shoot your shot. Full credit will always be given. Please do try to join the discord server instead of putting the OC stuff in the comment section on here or on AO3. It makes it a lot easier to respond to you guys.

Server: discord. gg/ Ty68TdCDu6 (remove spaces)

Onto the great news: I have already finished chapter 7 and it should be up a day or two after this. It just needs some final touches.

Until like tomorrow or the day after lol.