VROOM! VROOM

Devil Hunters. Founded in the year {REDACTED} by {REDACTED} in {REDACTED}.

Officially, they were the collection of greedy, violent, incompetent and psychotic failures and freaks. Which, to be fair, they very much were. Unofficially, they were also the secret organization tasked with protecting the world from the horrors beyond a mortal man's imagination.

Which is why their main appeal to the governments was how expendable they were. They even had that on their office mugs!

Not that Kobeni got one - an error in inventory saw to that.

But losing out on a cheap mug with a grim motto on it was not the worst experience in the young woman's life. It didn't crack even the top fifty of the terrible things that happened to her this month. Or even a week!

Her neighbours from the floor above her continued to leave their trash next to her door and she got scolded for not throwing it away. Mom also called her and said that Junichiro needed the latest reference books on top the increased tuition fees. The landlord was upping the rent starting from next week. She got swallowed and almost digested by Frog Devil before it threw her up.

And that was just Monday!

But none of that mattered anymore.

Why?

Because she was going to die.

"We are going to die," she whispered, curled on the floor. She didn't even know why they brought her here - right as the lunch break started, too! "Any second now, we are going to be dead."

Any second now, the boy in the room would go berserk and kill them all. She was sure she would die last - that way the universe would get the last few kicks in as she helplessly watched the monster tear his way through her colleagues.

And then it would kill her.

I suppose this is it, she swallowed pitifully. I lived a good life.

... Did she, though?

She was twenty but she had no friends, no real hobbies or interests outside making money. Which she earned by risking her life and limb (life, most of the days) because mom and dad decided that her brother deserved to go to college and she didn't. And not just any college but the best one in all of the country, too.

Her Quirk, which should have made her life easy, only added to her regular humiliation. Her Contract was more trouble than it was worth, too. She was pretty sure that someone has already eaten the lunch she brought. Because, of course, it would happen on the day that she decided to splurge a little and buy herself something delicious.

Yeah, I didn't live a good life. It sucked.

But it would all be over soon, she thought as she watched the teen fidget in his seat. No doubt he was already planning how to kill them all.

"Are you seriously afraid of a kid, Higashiyama?"

"Yes, very much so," she said, not even looking up at her peer's expression. "You saw him on that bridge! He is a Devil!"

"And we are Devil Hunters," Arai scoffed confidently. "We have nothing to fear from them."

"We have been here for only a year and a half..."

"That's twice as much as most people make it!"

Oh thanks, that makes me feel better!

If life taught Kobeni anything, it was that she was not lucky or exceptional. Her whole existence centered around being the punching bag of the universe. And whenever she wasn't being used as one, it was not because the universe wanted to cut her a break.

It just needed to wind up for the especially powerful punch in the throat.

"Shouldn't Tsutsumi-san be here with us?" Madoka adjusted his glasses, watching as Himeno took a seat opposite the Devil. "She is the one who brought him in, after all."

"You know her. She doesn't do administration. She hunts Devils and brings them, dead or alive," Arai said, more than a little excited. It was no secret that the man admired the fallen heroine. "So? Anything we should know about this kid?"

Madoka handed them the files on the boy. Fifteen years old. Attending Aldera Junior High. Good grades. Quirkless. Mother works at a small company. Father died three years ago in a car crash. No criminal record. No reports of delinquency. Nothing that would indicate that this kid knew about Devils until today.

Doesn't make him any less dangerous.

In her short time here, Kobeni learned a lot of things. She learned about the existence of Devils. She learned how much damage they can cause. She learned that she will still fight them against all reason as long as she gets the agreed salary.

But most of all, she learned that there were no good Devils.

W

Himeno sat down and sized the kid up. He was pale, shaking and agitated. However, the look in his eyes was not that of an innocent and frightened kid. No. No, instead, she was looking at the cornered animal. The most dangerous kind of all.

And it seems that he was not alone in his own head.

There was nobody here besides the two of them. Nobody that she could see, that is.

"You know, if you are going to talk to your Devil, you can just do it."

"How did you-"

"You should play cards with us when you are older. It will be nice to have the junior who I can actually win against," she chuckled. He didn't appreciate the joke, instead eyeing her like a lamb would a butcher. "When you first woke up here, you started screaming questions. Where are you? Who are we? What is going one?"

He blushed beet red. Cute.

"And then you suddenly stopped. As if someone told you to quiet down. After that, your eyes seem to oddly shift to the same spot on the floor as if there is someone talking to you," she smiled, each of her point making the boy uneasy. "With that out of the way, feel free to ask me any questions you have."

"I want my lawyer."

"That's not question."

"I already had enough questions for today," the boy said dryly. They both quiet for the next five minutes. Once it was clear that she was not going to call anyone, he sighed and looked at her with the eyes not quite right for the kid his age, "Why did you bring me here?"

"That would depend on who I am talking to. Are you still Midoriya Izuku?"

"Yes," he gave her one mean glare. "What kind of question is that?"

"The kind that saves us a ton of paperwork," God knows how hard it was to deal with Fiends. "For what it is worth, I am glad that you made it, kid. Not many are as lucky as you."

He scoffed, muttering something under his breath.

"... are you going to kill me?"

"Maybe."

"Seriously?"

"Yup."

Again, silence.

"I don't feel safe."

"Why? You should."

"You just told me you will kill me."

"I said we might kill you."

"Not exactly reassuring thing."

"No, it is not."

He tapped his finger against the metal wrapped around his wrist. A black bracelet with a white cross-shaped keyhole in it. Every few seconds, he would look at it with caution. Like a student glancing at the cheat sheet.

"May I ask a question?" He nodded. "What Devil are you contracted with now?"

He looked at that spot on the floor again. The boy had absolutely no control over his face. Anger. Fear. Panic. Regret. Disbelief. Frustration. Every emotion was as clear as day while he conversed with the Devil of his.

"Incarceration Devil. Or Chained Devil," he said before grunting in clear annoyance. "We can agree on your other name later!"

"Other name?" Himeno didn't hide her amusement at the ourburst.

"He - I think it is him, at least - wants a name besides the official one," Izuku groaned. "Which is not something we should be discussing right now!"

Himeno watched the boy argue with the Devil. As amusing as it was, the experience taught her to know better than lose sight of the situation however peaceful it might appear.

Incarceration Devil. How many people in the world feared prison? Was it only the fear of prisons or any form of confinement? Loss of freedom? Judgement? Abuse? None of the potential layers helped the boy. However it happened, he managed to enter the Contract with quite a powerful one.

"And what are the conditions of your Contract?"

One blink and the boy changed. His body and face remained the same. But his lips stretched wide in a smile she only saw on the people experincing the wildest of highs. Whereas his eyes were cold and dark, sucking all light and life nearby into the endless pits that were his irises.

It was... quite the contract between his features.

"We were dying. A Human and a Devil," he - they? - it? - spoke with three voices. "One wounded by Devil. One wounded by Human. We both wanted to live. And we both wanted power. Only life that we could salvage by sharing with one another. Only power one could give to the other and the other could give to one."

"That doesn't answer my question," she said, still smiling.

Contracts were unbreakable. But many Devils and humans always tried to find a loophole. And she would not put it past the Devil to trick a dying kid into an onerous agreement.

"What is the nature of your Contract?"

"We saved our life. We granted and gained power to hunt and imprison evil. In exchange for the power granted and gained, we require that we learn what we know about the world to reach our true potential as the Chained Devil."

"And you expect us to believe that you are willingly hunting your own kind? Like some Justice Devil or something?"

"No. We want justice. But we couldn't care less for it," it - they? - said with a laugh. She guesses it referred to both itself and the boy as 'we', despite the confusions it could case. "We want to fight evil because it has been our dream. While, we want to take away the freedom the others enjoy. We wish to see their spirits broken behind our bars. And no soul fears prison more than the guilty ones."

"I see," she said. "And how do you plan to do that?"

"We can find them," they boasted. "We see the chains leading to the guilty. We shall follow. We shall imprison. We shall feast."

They smiled down on her.

She smiled back.

"You will die."

Himeno chuckled, as inappropriate as it was when talking to a person possessed by a Devil. But it was so hysterical that she couldn't help it.

"You will die," she said, again barely suppressing the laugh. "Oh my God, you will probably die within a month from now."

"We will not!" it roared, pushing the human lungs to their limit. It climbed on top of the table and got in her facem teeth bared. "We shall wrap the worlds in our chains, our metal fused together with the flesh of life itself! We-"

"Oh dear, no, this is way too good," she laughed, no longer able to keep it down. Flesh of life itself! "Shit, now I wish Aki was around to hear this! You two would get alone great! I can just see it! He would love another Power!"

"You dare- We-!"

And just like that, the boy fell flat on his face. He looked around, confused and embarrassed.

"I-I... I am not even sure what happened..." Midoriya said, carefully trying to make sense of what happened. "I... I think you humiliated him into submission."

"That's what I do," she smiled. "Now then, is what you said about the Contract true? You wanted the power to fight evil? Quite noble."

"You could say that," he averted his gaze. Not a pleasant topic, it seems. "So... What now? Are you going to kill me?"

"Maybe."

"Still maybe?"

"I am not that easy to win over, kid," she smiled. "But not today."

She uncuffed him and let him take in that fact. The hand was next to his throat if he chose to attack. And it was a testament to his good judgement that he did not.

"I didn't lie when I said you would die," she sat back into the chair. If he wanted, he could run. He gave him that opportunity. "As you are right now, it is only a matter of time before you die at the hands of another Devil or Devil Hunter."

"And you are the better option?"

"No," she was honest. "The better option is to forget that Devils exist. Live a quiet life. Pretend that the world is what you thought it was yesterday. Ignorance is bliss, as they say."

"Well, they are wrong," Midoriya scowled. "How is ignorance supposed to be bliss? I almost died today because I didn't know anything about Devils! Hell, why doesn't everyone know about them?"

Devil Hunters were seen as the scum of the hero system. And yet they were fighting the monsters from humanity's fears, instead!

"Doesn't this make your job harder?" He asked. "Everyone thinks that you guys are useless and that the Devils you fight are actually villains. You are hated and distrusted by pretty much every single person who is not a violent extremist."

"We are not in this job for respect or glory," she shrugged. "Not that we are all noble souls fighting either. Many join for money. Some because they were rejected by the proper hero schools. Some are suicidal. And quite a few are just violent psychopaths looking for a legal way to kill others."

"But you wouldn't have this problem if the world knew," he argued. "If the heroes knew about Devils, then they could help you! All Might wouldn't just stand by and let the exist of Devils stand. He would rally others behind and then- Then we could make sure that the Devils are-"

"You would make sure that all the Devils in Hell get a feast, kid. I don't know if your friend told you this or not, but Devils feed on fear. And revealing the truth to the world would throw us into the kind of mess that we could not solve even with a whole country of All Might's," she lit a cigarette and enjoyed the rush of cancer-inducing vice. "You underestimate how dangerous Devils can be."

"I got killed by one," he protested. "I think I know about their danger."

"No," she shook her head. "You really don't."

She took another drag.

"Then tell me," he challenged. "Tell me why we cannot tell the world the truth."

She looked him in the eye, searching for an excuse.

She found none.

Just my luck, she thought as she put out the cigarette. You just had to be one of the crazy ones.

W

"Thank you so much!" Mom bowed her head to Arai-san. "Thank you, thank you!"

"No problem, ma'am," the man bowed in return, visibly uncomfortable with the gratitude and the amount of tears. "Just doing our job."

Mom was fussing around him like he came back from the death. Which he did. The Bakugous came in to check on him, all three of them. Kacchan said something to him when their parents went to talk in the kitchen. Izuku was pretty sure that Kacchan thanked him somewhere in his rant. A small part of him wanted to latch onto that and repair the relationship.

But he was far too numb for it.

Excusing himself to his room, Izuku shut his door and collapsed onto the bed.

He expected a lot of excuses from Himeno-san when he demanded the truth. He never expected her to hit him with the worst kind of it.

All his drive to reveal the truth to the world was now gone. How could he when he knew the truth?

"What is Quietus?" the Devil asked him, curious. "I never heard of such a Devil."

The Symbol of Evil, Izuku thought.

Unlike comic books, heroes didn't have archenemies or large rogues galleries. The prisons worked to keep the villains contained. And while some villains managed to rise to the infamy, they all were eventually captured and tried.

There were no mad scientists playing God every few months. There were no evil organizations with infinite funding. Those were the tropes of fiction. Plot elements meant to keep the readers invested and make sure that writers didn't need to come up with new villains every couple of months. Just fiction.

Until the Arms of Armageddon appeared thirteen years ago.

The extremist group of unknown origin that took the world by the storm as they rampaged across the countries. Appearing seemingly out of nowhere, their agents claimed over a million lives across the world. All in less than five minutes.

Police were powerless. Armies were powerless. Heroes were powerless.

Even All Might himself could only react to the rampage.

He saved over three hundred people that day. But three hundred was a number too small when the death toll neared fifty thousand.

Many more lives were claimed in the following weeks. Suicide rates skyrocketed. Riots and civil unrest grew like wildfire. People were demanding that someone answered for this destruction. The world cried for someone to hate and blame for this.

And Quietus answered to those cries, Izuku recalled. By the time he was born, the memories and the terror related to the man was still fresh enough that people spoke of him in hushed whispers. Enough that parents warned their kids against anyone wearing his symbol. One night, he took over the communications across the world to spread his message. He told the world that his group's rampage was but a warning shot. A lesson. A deterrent.

Even years after, you could still find the record of the man online. He was a man in his early forties, dressed in blood red suit and black shirt. His face was hidden behind the mask of white bone with nothing but a single eye drawn in the center.

He claimed to have been blessed with the grand vision of the future. The world where no conflict or doubt existed because he would be the one and the only person to lead the humanity. He threatened the world with more attacks if the world governments didn't surrender. He mocked the heroes that gave up. He wanted the world and would get it. No matter how many lives he would have to end.

He and the other kids were too young to remember it. But some of the older kids told them the horroes stories of those days. How many people were leaving their homes. How the panicked and desperate masses rushed to get the supplies and prepare for the end of the world. The worst of humanity brought to the surface by a madman.

And just as the world was almost ready to surrender itself to the monster and his organisation, it all came to an end.

Then, in a single night, the Heroes and Hunters' combined forces changed it all.

The secret bases around the world were raided. All the agents were rounded up and captured before they could fire a single bullet. Even as small as he was, Izuku can remember mom and dad holding him close to them as they watched the news. Even the new anchors couldn't believe the reports flooding in.

Then the channels were all taken over once again. By none other than Quietus himself.

He ranted and raged at the attack. He promised all involved Hell on Earth and long and painful death. He screamed about his doomsday weapon - the giant monster covered in weapons. He laughed and mocked their hope. Long enough for the heroes to arrive.

The world watched All Might attack the weapon as the Hunters surrounded and fought Quietus.

The world cheered as All Might smashed the weapon away into the ocean.

The world fell silent as one of the Hunters executed Quietus on live broadcast.

And then... The world moved on.

"Wait," Devil interrupted. "What do you mean, moved on? They just... accepted it?"

In a way, yes.

There were debates. About due process and human rights. About being a better person and following the law. But in the end, all you had to do was bring up the number of casualties and the protestors could onlt awkwardly repeat their earlier statements. No tears were shed for the terrorists.

All Might cemented his status as the World's Greatest Hero. Hunters went back into the shadows, their reputation as rogue butchers cemented as well.

The world was saved.

"Uh-ha," the Devil chuckled. "Too bad that it is all bullshit."

Izuku closed his eyes in exhaustion, Himeno-san's words echoing in his head despite his wishes. Little over a million people dead and over two million injured in the direct attack. Over ninety thousand dead as a result of the social unrest and infrastructure damage. All of that was caused by a single Devil.

The Gun Devil.

"We couldn't risk the world finding out about the Devils. Not this way. If the world were to learn the truth, their fear of guns would increase tremendously, linking together with the Devil himself. It would create the monster of infinite growth and change. On nothing more than feedback and paranoia."

A single Devil.

One single Devil born of a random shooting.

"And so our best PR people came up with Quietus," Himeno chuckled. "A generic supervillain that gave the world a face and a name to blame for it all. Someone you can see in your standard Miracle Movie Universe. He is scary. He is dark. He is sophisticated. And, more importantly,..."

He was marketable. Not in the same way as your average product. But every single thing about him was designed to be burned into the minds of people.

His design, his speeches, his mannerisms and even his body language... All of it was designed with the single purpose of making him the main villain of the story. All so that the story could die with him when the Hunters executed him before live audience.

And the actual Gun Devil - the so-called doomsday weapon - was rewritten into the role of a mindless cannon fodder. The third-act weapon that All Might smashes into bits and pieces and to make people laugh at how easy it was to take down.

This was the truth. One that he still refused to believe on some level.

He watched the documentaries on the damn thing. He watched the interviews with the former agents of Arms of Armageddon. He read the reports on the dismantling and disposal of the doomsday device. They were teaching this stuff at schools! They even made four different movies about it.

One of them even won an Oscar!

And it was all a lie.

One that he could never prove.

If he went out and revealed the truth to the world, he would be mocked and dismissed as a conpiracy nut. The Devil Hunters wouldn't even need to do anything to shut him up. The simple fact that the world knew the "truth" for thirteen years would take care of whatever case he could build.

For the same reasons, he couldn't tell anyone about the Devils.

I will be called a lunatic. They will point at me being attacked by Sludge and decide that I went insane from it.

"For all you know, you have," the Devil chuckled. "Maybe you are high on pills and imagining this entire thing."

Izuku appreciated the humor.

"Wasn't joking."

But it was time to decide what he wanted to do from here on out. He couldn't just go back to normal life as if nothing happened. As if the world was normal. He simply couldn't.

"Because that would also be breaking the terms of our Contract. And I assure you, the penalties are high."

Yes. That, and because he simply didn't want to. He promised himself to not be weak now that he was alive again. He refused to hide away from the truth. Even if he could not share it with the world, he intended to face the reality. No matter how ugly and twisted it was.

Izuku looked at the card left by Arai-san. He told himself just this morning that he would never want to be a Hunter. And in a way, that still remained true. He didn't want to be just another Hunter. He would not be a butcher who cared only about killing or capturing Devils.

He was going to be a Hunter on his own terms. He would work tirelesslt to redefine the image of Hunters. The chance that the old regime wasted once by executing Quietus, he would find it again and not let go.

He would make the world see what Hunters were worth. He would make everyone see that Heroes and Hunters were allies in their fight for the future of humanity.

He was going to be a Hero Hunter!

...

The name could use a little work but the idea was there.

"Oh, I see how it is," the Devil scoffed. "Here you are, giving yourself another name! While leaving me without one. I see. I see."

How about Kei? Because every lock needs a key?

"Put a little more effort into it, please."

"Alright..." Izuku yawned as he felt the exhaustion finally spread to the rest of his body. "I promise to think on it in the morning."

He still thought that Kei was a great name.

Another chapter done! Hope you liked this one! I am going to try and get more regular with my updates. Not just for this story but others as well.

The amount of discussion I had for this story on SpaceBattles was insane! And if you are interested in joining in, make sure to look me up there!