Izuku stared up at the middle school, dread working around in the pit of his stomach. He barely registered it as their assistant manager for the mission intoned the incantation for the curtain. The curtain was a magical barrier that protected the normal world from seeing the curses, and additionally it trapped the curses inside the barrier.

"All right," said the assistant manager, a young woman with dark blue hair and matching eyes, and dressed in a well tailored and form-fitting suit. "The curtain is set. Most of the students and faculty were evacuated, but we know that there are at least five students still inside." She checked the tablet she was carrying.

"The reports we've gotten are there are likely a high grade two, and a low grade one." She looked up at them, a worried frown on her lips. "I know you two are strong, and I know that you're considered a grade-one already Midoriya, but if you get in over your head, you leave. You're no good to anyone dead."

"Thanks for the concern, Izumi," said Kataomoi, adjusting her cloak. "But we'll be fine."

Izuku didn't trust his voice at the moment, so he simply nodded. His mouth was oddly dry, and his stomach kept swirling. Five students. Five hostages. That was his job here today. Find the five students, and get them out no matter what.

Without another word, he and Kataomoi walked into the building. The moment his feet passed the threshold into the school, a wave of dread washed over him. He shivered, pulling his cloak a little tighter around him.

She didn't look like she was phased in the least by the situation. Izuku couldn't help but feel a little jealous of her cool resolve.

The silence between them felt wildly uncomfortable. Tense. A stiffness that had nothing to do with the situation. He'd been content before to simply bide his time in the hopes Kataomoi would get over whatever issues she'd had with him, but it had become apparent that time wasn't going to heal whatever wound Izuku had created. It troubled him. He got along so well with Shuji, but every time the three of them got together she just ignored him. He'd be lying if he said he didn't want to try and at least get on decent terms with the woman.

"You don't like me very much, do you?" Asked Izuku.

She didn't respond as she just kept walking forward.

"Look, I'm sorry if I offended you or something, or said something wrong, but we're going to be working together so we should at least try and get along."

Still no response.

"At least tell me what I did?"

She stopped abruptly, spinning on her heel and closing the distance between her and Izuku in a heartbeat. She leaned in close, glaring up at him.

"You're playing a game. For the rest of us, we understand exactly what this life is like. What it's going to cost us. But you? You're here to play pretend. You're not a sorcerer, you're a wannabe hero playing a game you don't understand and that makes you dangerous."

"I-I…" stammered Izuku, "I'm not p-playing at anything! I-I'm serious about this!"

"No you're not!" Snapped Kataomoi. "I know you're not, and deep down you know you're not. You said so yourself. This is just your way of being a hero, of being your own version of All Might. You claim to being doing this for altruistic reasons. To save people, to help humanity but really? All you care about is playing pretend."

"This isn't a game for me!" Snapped Izuku, his hold over his emotions snapping as his anger began to rise.

"Maybe not a game, but you're still playing pretend." Said Kataomoi, taking a step back, making to start back down the hallway. "And that makes you dangerous and unstable."

"That doesn't make any sense!"

"Doesn't it?!" Kataomoi whirled back around to face him. "You think you're the first to try and play at being the hero? Do you think you're the first sorcerer to think he could save everyone? News flash Midoriya, you aren't the first and you won't be the last. There's been dozens, and you want to know what happened to them?"

It was a rhetorical question.

"They thought they were the hero they claimed to be, and dragged people into a mess they didn't need to be in. They tried to do too much and got themselves, and others killed. They tried to tackle things beyond their capabilities. Beyond what they could manage, and they died! How many people are going to die because you think you're a hero? How much blood is going to be on your hands because you rushed off to play at being something you're not!"

Izuku didn't know how to respond to that, and Kataomoi wasn't expecting an answer.

"You're not a pro hero, Midoriya. You're a jujutsu sorcerer. The sooner you understand that, the better off you, and everyone else, will be." She turned and they continued their trek in silence. Izuku's head racing with what she had said to him.

He didn't know what bothered him more, what she said, or that what she'd said made sense. Too much sense. He tried to shake off the thoughts. He couldn't be bothered to think too much about it, not at the moment at any rate. He needed to concentrate on the task at hand. There would be time for introspection later.

Kataomoi stopped abruptly at the foot of one of the staircases.

"We need to split up,"

Izuku's eyes narrowed. "That…seems like a terrible idea. It doesn't matter how strong we are individually, splitting up is splitting our strength in half."

Kataomoi glared at him. "And the longer we take the more likely it becomes that the kids die. We don't know where they are, and we stand a better chance of finding them if we're looking separately."

Izuku knew she was right, but it still felt like she was trying to make an excuse to get rid of him. But he didn't want a fight at the moment, not when there were lives on the line.

"All right," nodded Izuku, "You have a radio…or something? Or do you have some way for us to communicate if we run into trouble?"

Kataomoi ignored him, "I'll take the first and second floor, you take the upper floors. Try not to die." She didn't say anything more as she took off at a run down the corridor, disappearing without giving Izuku a chance to say anything.

Sighing, Izuku channeled his cursed energy into his shoes, and took off at a run. Blasting up the stairs and tearing along the corridors. He knew he was making a racket, but that was intentional on his part. If the curses were closing in on the kids, then Izuku wanted to give them a juicer target to go after.

Vaulting up the wall, he cleared the railing marking the third floor and took off at a sprint down the hallway. The ground cracked under foot as he darted from room to room, before pausing. He was wasting his time and energy looking room by room. He needed to think about this more logically, if he were a kid, and there were monsters inside the school, where would he hide?

Turning back down the hallway, Izuku's eyes narrowed as his gaze landed on the bathroom.

"Bingo."

In a blur of speed and the blink of an eye, he was in the boys restroom.

"Hello! Is there anyone in here? My name is Izuku, and I'm here to help!"

The door to the last stall banged open and a pair of young boys, maybe only twelve years old, scrambled out.

"Help us, please!"

Izuku scanned them quickly, but apart from looking terrified they were otherwise unharmed.

"Hang on," said Izuku kneeling down and reaching out a hand to the students, "I'm a friend, okay, I'm going to get you out of here."

His hand reached out to grab onto one of the boys, when the hair on the back of his neck stood on end. Whirling around, he channelled his cursed energy into his arms and legs and brought his arms up just in time. A massive, whiteish-grey arm slammed into his arms. He grunted, the tile under his feet cracking under the force of the blow.

Grunting, Izuku looked down at the curse, and blinked in surprise. Instead of a grotesque monster or nightmarish creature, he was staring at a young girl. She appeared to be clad in a school uniform. A dirtied and parched looking white dress shirt under a blood red pinafore. But it was her face that was truly haunting. Her eyes were pupil-less black voids, and strange black veins crisscrossed across her face like distorted wrinkles.

"Hide…seek…"

Her voice was course, and distant. As though she were speaking from some time and place not of the earth. For the briefest of moments, Izuku was so thrown off by her strangely normal appearance, that his guard dropped. That was all the girl needed however, as her other arm streaked out clocked Izuku in the cheek. He somehow avoided the boys behind him as he was thrown to the back wall of the bathroom.

"It's Hanako-San! Run!" Cried one of the boys, and they tried to run past the girl.

"Not…your….turn…" Hissed the girl, and reached out to one of the boys, snagging his arm in her own. Her long, razor-sharp nails digging into his flesh. The boy cried out in fear and pain. Blood dripping from his arm and staining his shoes.

Growling, Izuku blurred into motion, the heel of his foot slamming into the girls midsection. She shrieked, as it became her turn to fly across the room and slam into the opposite wall. In a smooth motion, Izuku grabbed the boy and tucked him under one arm. He caught up to the other boy not a moment later and tucked him under Izuku's other arm and darted from the bathroom as quickly as his legs could carry him.

The girl screeched in fury, and chased after them. The boys screamed in terror, and Izuku did his best to tune out all of the noise and focus solely on the threat in front of him. It suddenly made sense, in hindsight why he'd been forced to endure weeks of training before he was let loose back into the world. The fear and rage that had always been present. That had festered beneath the surface at all times. It felt controlled. Tempered. Those emotions did not control him, he controlled them, and it allowed him to think and react without hesitation.

Darting down the hall, Izuku suddenly turned, and threw himself at the nearest window. He kicked out behind him as he jumped, shattering the window as he and the boys flew backwards and out of the building. He channelled his energy into his legs, landing with a skid on the ground outside the school. He dropped the boys to the ground.

"Run!" He barked, as an unearthly wail pierced the air around them. At the same time, there was an enormous eruption of flames from deep within the bowels of the school. Windows on the west side of the building exploded, a raging inferno escaping from inside and scorching the earth outside. Kataomoi must have found the other curse. But he didn't have time to worry about her for the moment. Izuku needed to deal with the little girl, or else he wouldn't be of help to anyone.

"Run to the black curtain behind you!" Izuku barked again, "Don't stop, just keep running! There are people outside who will help you!"

The boys hesitated, eyes glued to Izuku and wide in fear and apprehension.

"Go!" He roared, and the boys scrambled into movement. Disappearing into the black curtain and into safety.

Not a moment later, the girl had appeared in the window. Her face contorted in fury.

"You….ruin….game!" She seethed, but she didn't pursue him. She simply stood there, raging in the shattered remains of the window. As a curse, she was bound to the location where she was cursed. Some curses were able to leave their hallowed grounds, but most were tethered to the building, place, or thing they were cursed to. She wouldn't be able to pursue him out here, but that also meant she was free to continue hunting the remaining children in the building. Growling to himself, Izuku launched himself through the air at the building.

He flew through the air, and at the last moment he changed his direction and blasted through the brick of the building beside the window. His arm shot out, and he tried to grab her, but she danced out of his grasp. She darted backwards. She raised her hands out in front of her, and the building began to shake.

Not liking whatever was happening, Izuku tried to rush the girl but she was too fast. Water exploded out from in front of her, slamming into Izuku with the force of a car, and cascading him down the hall. Quickly, the entire hall was submerged under water, and Izuku was thrown back. He tumbled end over end, trapped in a rapidly moving current of sewer water. His lungs burned and his eyes stung as he flailed desperately in an attempt to fight his way to the surface. He flailed about for a moment, his knuckles briefly touching the wall of the building. In a desperate move, he shot his hand out and punched at the wall. Even under water, the blow had enough force to it that part of the wall shattered, creating a small hole. The water flowed from the hall, draining out of the school and into the courtyard below.

He swam up, his head breaching the surface as he managed to find his footing. He choked, throwing up a lungful of water as he tried to fill his burning lungs. But he was so preoccupied and distracted, that he never noticed the girl bearing down on him until her claws were wrapped around his head. He screamed in pain, and his scream quickly turned into a choking gurgle as the girl forced his head back under the water.

The girl's nails dug into his skin, and it felt like she was trying to pry his head clean from his shoulders. His vision going dark, and his lungs filling with water, Izuku flailed. In his desperation, he managed to wrap his fingers in the girls hair. In one last burst of power, he ripped the girl from his face, just as the water level dropped enough for his head to breach the surface again.

Tangling his fingers more tightly into the girl's knotted curls, he swung her like a bag. She screeched in fury, her claws ripping free from his face and pulling chunks of flesh free. Izuku ignored the pain, ignored the blood, and focused solely on exorcizing the girl. Her body crunched as she impacted the wall. She howled in fury, but Izuku wasn't going to allow her to summon any more water or ever catch the upper hand. Izuku planted his feet, and reversed his grip as he slammed her into the opposite wall.

With a furious roar, he cocked his arm back. Channelling his cursed energy into his fist, he drove it into where the girl's heart should have been. She screamed in pain and terror as Izuku tore through bone and muscle, her body erupting into blue and purple flames. Izuku pulled back, his arm dripping in purple blood, as her flaming body fell into the water. Not even the several inches of water still in the hallway were enough to douse the flames, and in a matter of moments the curse was little more than ashes and a very sour memory.

He fell to a knee. Water and blood dripping from his temples. His face was throbbing, and he wanted nothing more than to curl up and go to sleep. But there were still three kids missing, and whatever Kataomoi had been fighting. As if on cue, the temperature in the building rose violently. A torrent of fire raged up the nearby staircase. Breathing heavily, Izuku hauled himself to his feet. He could trust Kataomoi to handle her business, the priority as far as he was concerned was getting the kids out the building.

Wiping the blood from his eyes, he began his search.

BREAK

Kataomoi idly played with the case of her lighter. Flipping the lid up and down as she strolled through the hallways. She was idly expanding her senses, reaching out with her cursed energy she scanned for any other people in the building. She could feel the negative energy from two souls on the third floor, but Midoriya was heading in their direction. There was one more in the bathroom down the hallway, and two more back down on the first floor.

But they could wait. She could sense the negative emotions common with a curse a couple yards away from her. She smirked. She had plenty of aggression she needed to work out, and there was nothing like venting ones frustrations on a curse.

It wasn't that she actively hated Midoriya. On the contrary, she was rather they would on rather well if she allowed. But she knew his type. Knew what he was like, what people like him were like. She'd known bleeding hearts like him before, her own brother had been just like him once upon a time.

For all the good that had done him.

She refused to watch another bleeding heart fool give his life wastefully. Shuji was bad enough, but he wasn't a fool. He might have wanted to help people, but he understood the big picture. Understood what was at stake. Knew that there was more value to his being alive, even if it came at the cost of a few lives. It was one of they many things she loved about him.

Was it a callous approach to life? Undoubtably, but it was not born out of malice or hate, but out of necessity. The cure truth was the sorcerers were the only line of defense against curses, and should their numbers continue dwindling, then soon there would be none of them left. The sorcerers couldn't afford to be bleeding heart heroes. Couldn't afford to throw away their lives easily. Shuji understood that, but Midoriya didn't.

She simply hoped he either lived long enough to figure it out for himself, or left the job before the realities of the world got to him. Someone with that kind of a heart deserved as much.

She could feel the curse in the hall just around the corner. She flicked the lid off her lighter as the building shook, and something shattered from upstairs. She glanced up at the ceiling. Well, if nothing else then it looked like Midoriya didn't waste any time. Well, far be it from her to let Midoriya have all the fun.

She stepped around the corner, channelling her cursed energy, a sinister smile on her face. She spun the spark wheel, lighting the wick on the first try.

"Hell's Angel Technique…Dante's Inferno."

Her cursed energy rush forward through the flame of the lighter. An enormous torrent of fire shot forward around the corner. The only confirmation she got that she even hit her target, was the keening screech from the curse as her flames smashed into it. She waited a few moments, before she flicked the lid of her lighter closed and the fire faded away. The alarms began to ring, as the sprinkler system turned on and began to rain down on the hallway. It didn't matter, her cursed fire was immune to normal waterways. Until her cursed energy left the fire, it would burn.

She strode forward, flicking the lid back up, scanning the area for any signs of movement. She didn't know exactly what she was dealing with, but even a high grade two wouldn't be outright killed by her attack. Curses were smarter than most were willing to give them credit for. If it was hurt, it wouldn't just stick around and wait to die.

There was a flash of movement out of the corner of her eye, and she danced out of the way as an inhumanly large, green hand darted out of the darkness of a nearby classroom. The floor where Kataomoi had been standing a moment before shattered, blowing a hole in the ground raining debris down into the classroom on the floor below.

From the darkness came a disgusting, gelatinous monstrosity. It's large, bulbous head peeking out, it's three bulbous eyes blinking impishly at her. Its once dull green hide had been scorched and singed from Kataomoi's initial attack. It roared in fury as it lunged forward, moving far too quickly for a creature its size.

Spinning the spark wheel again, Kataomoi channeled her cursed energy.

"Hells Angel Technique, Dante's Peak!" Four tendrils of flame shot forward from the lighter. The flames scorched across the floor flying underneath the underbelly of the curse. The flames converged on one another in a singular point under the curse. From that point, a single, monumental explosion of fire arced through the sky. Erupting into the sky. The curse howled in misery, as the technique tore the curse in half.

Kataomoi smirked in victory, but her smirk soon turned into an expression of horror. While the curse had been torn in half, the gelatinous creature did not die. Instead, the creatures two halves that had been destroyed restructured itself into two new, albeit smaller, curses. The roared in fury, as one of the smaller curses darted forward, smashing into Kataomoi with tremendous force. The air left her lungs in a single gasp, and she was all but certain at least a few of her ribs had been fractured from the impact.

To make matters worse, she could feel her body get sucked into the gelatinous mass of the curse. Its skin burned her, as though it were made of acid. She could feel her own skin begin to bubble and singe as she sunk deeper and deeper into the curse. She hissed in pain, fighting down the panic that threatened to take over her. Focusing her panic and fear into her cursed energy. She exhaled sharply, blowing all of the air in her lungs into the lighter, while simultaneously covering her body in a small barrier of cursed energy.

"Hells Angel Technique…Dante's Inferno!"

The flames exploded around her. She could feel her own skin burn, and her hair singe. She gasped in pain, but her technique worked, as she was freed from the curses grasp. She seethed in fury and frustration. She had let her guard down, and she was now hurting for it. She shouldn't have let it get as close as it did. Even though the cursed energy she'd coated herself in had negated much of the damage, her skin was still tinged pink with the first degree burns of her own attack.

"Now you've pissed me off!" She snarled. One of the curses bounded forward, either unable or unwilling to understand her frustration. It hopped in the air, and while Kataomoi managed to leap out of the way, the fire from her attacks had weakened the structure of the floor and as the curse landed, it shattered and Kataomoi fell down onto the floor below.

She only barely managed to avoid a falling piece debris.

She snarled in fury as the second curse jumped through the hole the first had created and tried to crush her.

"Enough of this!" She snapped, she was getting sick of this fight. Getting sick of feeling like a fool. She channeled every last drop of her cursed energy, exhaling every last drop of air she had left in her.

"Hells Angel Technique…Dantes Brimstone!" The earth around them cracked as the temperature in the building exploded in heat. A wave of fire, nearly two feet tall and nearly ten feet wide cascaded around the room. The flames slammed into the curses. No ability to reproduce through mitosis would save the curses this time. The fire burned them, reduced them to ashes, as the red of Kataomoi's flames turned bright blue and purple as the curses died.

She breathed heavily, sucking in heavy gasps of air into her ragged lungs. She wiped a dollop of sweat and sprinkler water from her forehead, spitting a wad of saliva and blood onto the wet, singed ground. She looked up, and gazed around her surroundings.

"Not a fight without plenty of property damage," she grumbled to herself. Then, a horrible realization hit her. She'd gotten so caught up in the fight, had lost herself to her own rage and frustration so much that she had completely lost track of her feelings for the negative emotions of the kids still in the building. She quickly tried to gather what little cursed energy she still had left, taking advantage of the swell of fear to her advantage. She breathed a sigh of relief as she felt three sources of negative emotion scurrying towards the edge of the curtain.

"Thank you, Midoriya," she breathed in relief. She might have understood that sometimes civilian lives would be lost during a battle, but that didn't mean that she was going to needlessly kill them. That was…objectively just murder. Humans might have been weaker than sorcerer's, but that didn't mean that their lives were automatically forfeit.

She then began trying to find Midoriya. She latched onto his cursed energy just outside the building, near the edge of the curtain. He must have been waiting for her to finish. Turning on her heel, she began a quick jog out of the ruined middle school.

"Midoriya!" She called out, as she caught sight of his darkened silhouette. "Thanks for waiting, I-Oh my gods!" She darted forward, managing to catch him just in time as he collapsed onto the ground. He was bleeding from some nasty headwinds around the crown of his head, but that was far from the cause of her distress.

Midoriya's back was a mess. A mess of second or third degree burns. Burns that could only have come from one place.

Her.

Realization hit her harder than any curse. She had lost control. Had lost control of her flames and the kids had been put in danger. Midoriya would have prioritized them over helping her, because of course he would. He knew she could handle herself, and he valued innocent lives over anyone else's. Especially his own. He must have found the kids, and had been unable to get them out of the path of the fire in time.

"You fool!" She hissed, tears of frustration prickling at the corners of her eyes. Frustration at Midoriya. Frustration at herself.

Frustration.

She hefted Midoriya's arm over her shoulder and began dragging him from the schoolyard.

"Kataomoi…"

She turned her head. Midoriya's voice was weak and raspy.

"I…may be a sorcerer…" Each word broke through with difficulty, as though the very act of breathing was agony.

"But…that doesn't mean…I can't save people…"

In spite of herself, Kataomoi smiled.

"You're an idiot, Izuku." She wiped at her eyes with her free hand.

"But you're right."

AN: And this marks then end of the pre-written stuff for the story! Thanks so much for all the love ya'll have given this story, it's been a lot of fun and I have a lot of fun ideas for it. Don't know when I'll get back to it, but shouldn't be too long. Shoutout to Double0Sxvxn for being an awesome Beta and dealing with my bullshit and as always if you enjoyed this but haven't checked out my other work, give them a try you never know you might find something else you like. I'm also on discord now, where I and a bunch of other writers hang out, chat and brainstorm ideas, you just have to copy the link that's in my profile bio if you want to come and hang out with us. Stay safe, stay healthy and have an awesome week

All My Love,

LilDB