A/N: there will probably be a decent amount of power scale shifting from canon; non-werewolf characters will (mostly) have the same quirks, but may be weakened (or in rare cases strengthened) as I see fit.
--
After some thought on the matter, Izuku settled on registering his quirk as rapid healing. A wolf-transformation might have seemed like the most useful for combat on a surface level, and being able to sense lies certainly had value, but he knew that one of the biggest problems with letting the quirkless going in with the Heroes had always been getting hurt, and this way would shut down any awkward questions the unknowing Herd might have about his connection to Mighty Wolf.
Once he started seriously getting into fighting, he learned that it was a bigger advantage than one might think; a lot of the restrictions people placed on themselves in the middle of combat, especially the ones most people didn't realize they were placing, happened because of fear of injury, but thanks to his apparent heritage that was far less of a concern. It wasn't that he was invincible, as Mighty Wolf was certain to remind him at every opportunity, but it meant that torn muscles and broken bones were more of an inconvenience than a debilitation, which meant that he could go farther, hit harder without worrying about blowback, strike outward with less concern for keeping his guard up, and just do more by learning to suppress his pain and survival instincts.
He spent just as much time in the weeks before UA's entrance exam learning to ignore his body's natural recoil to the actions he was taking as he did learning martial arts, much to his mentor's terror.
"Kid, I know what you're doing, and I've done it myself when in a sticky situation, but going this route has consequences, even for us."
"I can't use my full power, and I'm fighting people who've gotten used to using their quirks, eh, Ridden Gifts, over the whole course of their lives. I've got to use what I can to its fullest potential," he argued back.
"All good and true, but don't come whining to me when someone comes at you with a silver sword and you've taught yourself to overcommit and not dodge."
Izuku sighed in frustration. "Is there anything else that can help? I mean, I noticed that my sense of smell is stronger even in Hishu, so maybe I can call on some of my strength without transforming?"
"That…requires a Gift, and those aren't something you can just learn, not after what your Auspice already taught you. A Gift of Strength would be invaluable, I use them after all, but finding a Spirit that knows it and is willing to teach you…"
"Wait, you know how to use it? Then why don't you teach me?"
Mighty Wolf scratched the back of his head. "It's not that simple. Kid, do you remember learning that Half-Moon Gift you know? Why don't you try and explain how it was taught to me, right now, just from memory."
Izuku opened his mouth to do just that…only to realize that he couldn't. He remembered the ordeal just as easily as if it had happened a minute ago, and he doubted that he would ever forget it, but translating the experience outside of thought and into comprehensible words….
"I just saw the world as the Half-Moon sees it, and I….understood, somehow."
Mighty Wolf nodded. "Exactly. Spirits know how to make sense of it and share it, but our human halves mean that we tend to get a bit stuck. I could teach you a Rite, if I knew any, but Gifts are beyond me to share."
Mighty Wolf suddenly snapped his fingers, as if he had just thought of something. "Actually, I do know a Rite, or of one, even if I can't use it myself. But with Half-Moon Gifts, you could…" without informing his protege of anything, he suddenly ran off, prompting Izuku to sigh and follow his scent.
They eventually came upon an old shack filled with bizarre knicknacks, most of which looked like some Hollywood bastardization of Native American culture but which Mighty Wolf assured him were actually artifacts that, in the hands of those who knew how to use them (which unfortunately didn't exist in the immediate vicinity) could hold great power over the spirits.
Rummaging through them all, he eventually pulled a bar of black chalk and then drew a circle around Izuku, chanted something in the First Tongue, and then sprayed some chalk dust into the boy's eyes.
"What the hell!" The boy in question shouted as he vainly tried to wash the substance out, but his mentor simply stated, "come with me," and led him out into the streets until they ran into other people.
"Use the Gift of the Half-Moon to see those people," Mighty Wolf requested, and Izuku, still blurry-eyed and irritated, reluctantly complied.
He had a general sense of their emotions (a man was afraid that his wife would find out about his affair with the secretary, while the wife was grateful for her husband's sudden attentiveness and renewed vigor following hiring his new secretary) as expected, but also felt something new, seeing something that he somehow translated as "Adhesion Gaffling, Influence: Adhesion, Ban: May not touch glass" and "Lamppost Gaffling, Influence: Light, Technology, Revelation, Ban: May not peacefully spend three hours without being able to see."
As the couple walked and talked, the wife asked the husband if he could carry more things by using his quirk to stick them to his arms, pointing out that she made sure nothing was glass this time. He made some cheesy line about only doing it if she would use her quirk to light up their bags like she 'lighted up his world,' which got them both laughing.
"I can see their quirks?" Izuku questioned.
"If it worked properly, you can see the Spirits that power their quirks. It will take a while before you can garner any useful information from it, but with your analytical mind I bet you'll soon know most of your peers' quirks better than they know their own."
The effect only lasted a few hours, drained some of his Essence, and required Izuku to smear more of that black chalk stuff (which was not apparently not easy to make in the first place) over his eyes, but Mighty Wolf was right about its potential usefulness, and besides he really wanted to learn more about this world he had become part of, and what better way to do that then to see what the Spirits that gave people their quirks were really like?
Unfortunately, he had little time to ponder this development, as UA's entrance exams were coming up, and he needed to get ready to fight if he was going to pass it.
--
For all of his hyper-focusing on combat skills over the last few days, he was excited to look past the slight blur in his vision and examine what spirits were inhabiting his potential future classmates. With this chalk smeared into his eyes, he could see Concept, Rank, Influences, Bans, and sometimes Numina and Vassalage, provided the spirit was unable to resist. A few did.
Much to his chagrin, one of the first fellow potential classmates he saw was Bakugo, who looked a little shaken but determined.
"Flare Jaggling, Influence: Explosives, Fire, Rage, Ban: may not touch dry skin, Numina: Blast, Emotional Resonance."
Hmmm. Bakugo had always thought that his sweat was explosive, but actually the spirit Riding him simply couldn't use its powers if he wasn't covered in sweat. He could apparently subtly affect people's emotions, probably without even realizing it. That could include his own, Izuku noted. Was this why everyone was always so amazed, or terrified? Was it just them reacting his spirit, and not realizing that they were being affected because it had nothing to do with his quirk?
A part of him didn't want to excuse anyone's actions that way, even if he had already kind of forgiven a lot of people when Mighty Wolf explained that they would be inclined to dislike him because the spirits within sense that he was Forsaken (it was apparently one of the reasons why most of the Forsaken had withdrawn from humanity at large, though Mighty Wolf was always vague on that topic).
A different part of him was curious about the potential, and if that really did explain why everyone, including him, just couldn't help but feel what Kacchan seemed to want them to feel…dismissing the thought for now, he tried to figure out what other spirits were around.
"Stealth Gaffling, Influence: Stealth, Sight, Ban: may not cease working."
That one confused him for a bit, as he wasn't looking at anyone, until he saw the boots walking of their own accord and understood that he was looking at some sort of invisible girl.
"Tyranny Incarnae, Influence: Dominance, Willpower Ban: cannot see those who have not conversed with it, Numina: Gifts of Dominance."
That one stopped Izuku cold for two reasons. He had expected to see a lot of jagglings among his classmates, as they were more powerful than the average person by definition, but an Incarnae, the ones who Mighty Wolf once claimed were worshipped as gods by primitive man? And one associated with 'tyranny,' did that make him a maeljin? How would others react? Would their spirits have found him unnaturally frightening? Would he have attracted negative energy in the Spirit World and impacted the physical world accordingly? Izuku was desperate to satisfy his curiosity by asking the boy, but it was probably rude and confusing for his target to do so.
--
Regardless, he was stuck going through the motions if he wanted to get into UA, and that meant taking the entrance exams. The written portion was simple enough; he had always been an above-average student. It was the combat section he was most worried about.
As it grew closer…he felt fine, actually. Something about the thought of fighting, of showing his mettle in a physical bout before an audience, got his blood flowing. He felt a growl coming on. Had he not actively suppressed the urge, Izuku suspected that he might have howled in anticipation.
When the Pro-Hero Present Mic himself showed up and asked the students if they were ready for the event, he couldn't suppress it anymore. A raucous sound bizarrely similar to that of a wolf resounded throughout the antechamber, and Izuku suddenly found himself the center of attention for the entire student body.
No one else had reacted to Present Mic's attempts to up the atmosphere at all, apparently, and they were a bit annoyed and confused. And disgusted, though he suspected that they didn't know the real reason why. It's okay, Izuku, modern Riddenaren't influenced by their spirits that much, you'll do fine.
"Well, it's nice to see someone get excited," Present Mic tried to ease the tension in the room, largely successfully.
He then continued on to list the rules for the practical exam, about how they would be facing a series of machines, made up of soft metal that a slightly-above-strength human could break apart with some effort, but enough to prove a challenge to those who hadn't been practicing their combat skills at all. You had to have some potential to get into UA after all.
When a boy got up and admonished the Hero for only telling them about three different types of robots while four were apparently displayed on the pamphlet, Izuku got over his nerves to stare at Present Mic in interest. Not because anything had changed about him physically, but because of what his Half-Moon Gifts showed him as their host informed the class that the fourth type of robot was worth zero points and was not something to be concerned about. His aura flared in a way only Izuku could see as he said it; the man was lying.
Having had surprisingly little practice with seeing such things, it was just as fascinating to watch as it was to speculate on what he might actually be lying about. It didn't seem fair if the system gave its potential students inaccurate information about gaining points, so more likely it was the 'not something to be concerned about' part that got the Elodoth Gift excited. Now that was certainly something to keep in mind for later.
--
Nedzu was already grading the written exams with one eye while glancing at the fields as the prospective students prepared to see whether they were worthy or not. Normally keeping track of both would be effortless, but he was a bit distracted at the moment.
According to their files, the school had four late-bloomers coming in. Late-bloomers were rare in general, especially in this day and age when his fellows from across the Gauntlet never failed to find a human they couldn't Ride. He had no doubt as to what really caused their odd state.
Sighing, he wondered about himself. Nedzu would have sworn that he made peace with the Forsaken a long time ago, seeing that they did have some value in spite of how rude they could be, and that little good could come from the Pure's psychotic dreams, no matter how wonderful they seemed to the average spirit. As the one Beshilu to break free of his original form's influence, he was no average spirit. With his consumption habits, he was more Knowledge-Spirit than Rat-Spirit, and his knowledge told him that if the Locus Rendering hadn't restored the Hunter's Paradise then the only things that could would be more horrifying than the worst dreams of the maeljin Incarnae, and he wanted no part of it. Not anymore.
Still, he looked upon these four prospects, one Izuku Midoriya, one Koji Koda, one Yuga Aoyama, and one Jurota Shinshida, and couldn't help but suppress a shudder of revulsion. Two feel like Mother Luna. It is curious that the Pureso rarely try to come here. Wondering why that might be distracted him for long enough to get off the mental track he was stuck and get back to mentally assessing UA's next two classes.
--
Present Mic may have been lying about whatever was going on with the zero-pointer, but he wasn't lying about the soft metal that a human of 'slightly above-average strength' could break, if only they didn't mind the bruising and bits of wiring stabbing into their hand as they did so. Of course, other students probably weren't throwing otherwise normal punches but with no prep for impact resistance, since other students didn't trust their hands to heal in seconds afterward, so they didn't get hurt nearly as much as Izuku did when he attacked, but what other students were doing didn't stop it from hurting him like a bitch.
Seething and concentrating on moving toward the next one, he found himself pausing when he sensed something familiar. It was like something was resonating with him, making him feel at home…just like the Locus that Mighty Wolf had shown him earlier. Was another one near here?
As the same boy who had admonished Present Mic earlier flew past, smashing three robots in less time than it had taken him to destroy one, he realized that it didn't matter unless it could help him with the Exam. Focusing on finding more to fight, it occurred to him that maybe it could.
If these robots had spirit reflections, then he could damage them in the Spirit World, and do so making use of Dalu form since no one would see him…what good would that do, then? If no one could tell that he was the one destroying the robots, then it wouldn't get him accepted, and that was assuming he even could do something to them from across the Gauntlet, but he still felt that there was a way he could use this.
As he braced himself for the pain of punching into another false metal monstrosity, he hoped his brain figured it out soon. His fingers could only take so much cutting and bruising. Well, they could take all that could be given, but his mental state in relation to them was still a different story.
--
Koda Changed under the New Moon; an overwhelming desire to hide was only to be expected. Some might say that his personality fit the Irraka perfectly.
Unfortunately, however well his fear might go with his Auspice, it didn't match up with the Tribe his family had been part of for as long as its lineage produced Uratha. A Hunter-In-Darkness shouldn't sit and cower; he should wait in the shadows until the moment was right, and then strike.
Koda was perfectly fine with the 'wait in the shadows' part, and only that part. He really didn't know why Black Wolf had accepted him. Yes, he had avoided detection in his Intiation Ceremony, but only because he was so afraid of his mother and uncle and how they looked in their wolf forms and he really didn't want to get any closer…
"Protect me!" He instinctively called out to a flock of nearby birds, relying on the Nature Gift he had received from Black Wolf's vassals for passing Initiation to make them understand him, and sure enough they surrounded him and tried their best to keep a particularly aggressive robot off of him, but were only able to make some minor dents in its metal with their beaks. Koda, struggling to suppress his anxiety over the situation, called on the Gifts of the New Moon to find the robot's weakest point, and directed his apparent friends to peck there. Once it was sparking and sputtering, clearly out of commission, he stood up tall, resisted an urge to howl in victory, and looked to these apparent companions of his.
"Kill more of these things, and I'll feed you," Koda insisted in what he hoped were understandable terms. They cawed in happiness, then swarmed the next closest robot without hesitation. Apparently UA's bird population was as tough as its students.
Koda tried to take inspiration from that, moving on until he shocked himself by catching the scent of one of his own kind.
Had…his uncle sent someone after all? He wasn't fond of Heroes, still thinking in the old ways, that the Ridden were a threat, and while obviously he couldn't hunt down the vast majority of the human population, he could see that the more powerful the Ridden, the more of a violation of the separation of the worlds it was, and that Heroes were thus typically the worst of the lot.
But then Koda had seen footage of Mighty Wolf, clearly one of their own, acting as one, and saw what good he could do…his uncle was furious, of course, that someone would come so close to violating the Oath of the Moon like that, but his mother was a lot of more understanding.
She thought that he could apply an Uratha's Gifts to protecting the world as a Hero just as well if not better than as a civilian. Things had changed since the Locus Rendering, and while the duties remained the same, they also had to adjust. Ridden were normal now, not a threat to the balance, at least unless they were truly villainous, and going about fighting the ones who were was not a betrayal of their sacred task
No, his uncle might have been angry but not ready to fight over it.
Could this be one of the Pure? He almost curled into a ball at the memory of the horrific stories he had been told as a child about those monstrosities, but then he realized that it was most likely a Forsaken from another pack. After all, the Pure he had heard about wouldn't want to be Heroes. It wasn't as if there was much contact between the packs these days, where that same uncertainty that had his mother and uncle at each other's throats plagued the entire Forsaken faction. Should he meet up with the other werewolf?
--
The captured essence of the light-spirit within his fetish destroyed several robots while Aoyama relied on Silver-Wolf's Gifts to keep him from grimacing from the pain. To any onlookers, it would seem that he could summon a laser as his quirk, and such things were necessary to dazzle the foolish herd surrounding him, making use of their poor spirits without realizing what they truly owed the other world…that was what he tried to tell himself to get the horrified and defeated faces of his parents after they were caught trying to escape the Breeding Farms out of his mind.
They were pure wolf-blooded, not a drop of Forsaken in their ancestry, it was necessary to keep them in line. That was what he was told, that was what the Ivory Claws wanted him to believe, and that was what he told himself was true as he took a dazzling pose to let the lesser creatures of the physical world take in his glory.
It didn't matter if telling himself that over and over again caused more agony than his fetish, than the pain of having molten silver spread over him for his Initiation, than the Penance that had been demanded for not stopping his parents from trying to leave by himself.
It wasn't a lie; he believed in Silver-Wolf and how he suffered for them, he believed in joining this Hero School to give the Pure a better foothold in the world of the Ridden, to better understand why so many spirits managed to get stuck in human bodies without doing what was right by spirit society, to get into a position of power so that he may help in building a new Hunter's Paradise. It was true. He may not have been Fire-Touched, but he told no lies. Just look at the smile he made as he showed off his beauty to the world around him, and not the grimace immediately following.
--
Shinshida was skilled enough in Dalu form to maintain it without inducing more lunacy than was necessary, and could use Garu without losing control far more effortlessly than many werewolves three times his age. It was enough that he could pass off his hairier, muscled form as a mutation quirk and the much larger, far more terrifying form as his actual quirk.
It was truly impressive, and the Predator Kings would have been excited to embrace such a prodigy, if only it weren't for his mannerisms. He had been brought up to be far too polite; worse, he was far too eager to wear the formal clothing of human design. The worthless kid actually seemed to like human civilization, and somehow all the time he had spent as Pack Bitch did nothing to cure him of such sentiments.
Were he even slightly less skilled for his age, he would have been cast off to the Fire-Touched a long time ago, but as it was he survived his Initiation without issue, showed both incredible strength and a tactical mind at all times when it counted, and generally proved to be just too much of the boon to the Tribe to not keep him among Dire-Wolf's own.
Of course, having a Predator King who could stomach humans (interacting with them, not eating them, the latter would have at least been mildly acceptable) did have its advantages, like getting someone into the ranks of the Pro-Heroes, getting someone where their eyes and nose could let them know who was a threat to the Confederacy and who was ready to truly embrace the rule of the spirits within.
And so Shinshida found himself, smashing through the silly machines that humans used to pretend they could be true predators, finally away from his pack and their constant disapproval over the fact that he didn't think cursing out everyone who looked at you funny and felt that torturing random people the way a cat tortured a mouse wasn't really embracing the laws of nature as much as they thought it was (they were wolves, after all, not cats).
He was glad to be away from them, to be honest, but he would never admit to such weakness. Some might think he was considering the Forsaken Tribes, and he knew very well what happened to those who were even suspected of leaving.
--
Izuku knew that he was behind. He was getting points, but not a lot. It was barely more than he might have gotten from being quirkless. Only 40 students would get into the Hero Course, and who knows how many got recommendations to skip this little ordeal, so he had to be the best of the best and he…just…wasn't doing that at the minute. There had to be something he could do, some way to do this faster.
His mind once more focused on the nearby Locus, wondering if he could reach across the Gauntlet and maybe see if the spirits could help him. But how would he explain to UA's leadership, who were surely watching, how he managed to disappear?
His thoughts were interrupted by a sudden flock of angry birds surrounding and ripping apart the nearest robot, which would have been odd enough on its own if he hadn't also caught a familiar scent. One of his own was here; maybe a fellow Uratha could help him out in some way?
Looking to see a large boy with a rather strange face, almost looking like a Mutation quirk (an inheritance from a human ancestor, perhaps?), the two stared at one another, Izuku uncertain how to proceed and the other apparently too nervous.
"Elodoth, Ghost Wolf for now," Izuku eventually broke the ice.
"Irraka Hunter-In-Darkness," the other spat out, apparently relieved. "That was really brave, if one of us were Pure you would have just signed your death warrant."
Izuku's face blanched as he realized that he hadn't even considered the possibility. "Sorry, I'm new to this, and I would really love to chat but I'm behind on the exam. Tell me your name, and maybe we can meet later, okay?"
The other's response was interrupted by a laser striking into another robot, itself fired from a boy showing off and demanding attention from everyone around him (not that he was getting any, considering the rest of the students were too focused on their own exam performance). This would have been a mild irritation, but it turned out that he had the scent too.
"How many werewolves try to be Pro-Heroes?" Izuku asked seriously.
"Before today, I would have said practically none. I honestly thought just me and Mighty Wolf."
--
Aoyama was distracted from his latest performance by a sudden shift in the olfactory nature of his surrounding environment. Se la vie, he had found fellow children of Father Wolf! This would distract from any, well, distractions from his quest, finding fellow victims of the Bitch-Mother…what if they were Forsaken?
He dismissed the thought. Most Forsaken hid from humanity, distancing themselves ever since humans somehow managed to capture so many spirits without even realizing it. They only came out to deal with spirits that weren't bound in human prisons or harry the Pure.
Mighty Wolf was a bizarre aberration, and the idea of two more Forsaken being in the same testing site as his excellent self was just too ridiculous to even consider.
He approached them confidently, flourishing a cape and bowing, shouting out "Bonjour, my fellows, it is nice to see some…distant relatives." Taking on a conspiratorial glance as he noticed the Locus, he whispered. "I think we have time, if you want to discuss things where none of the Herd could hear."
"Won't UA's cameras notice us?" The large, mutant-looking werewolf freaked out.
"I'm behind, I don't have time to talk," the one with green hair muttered out.
Aoyama smiled. "Well, that won't do, not at all, letting the People fail. We should look out for one another, after all. I know that I don't have a problem with my current score, so maybe I could help you out in the Spirit World and you can take credit for the examiners in the physical world, if there's something in the Reflections to help us, that is. Or don't, it's no skin off my nose, and don't worry about the staff noticing, cameras tend to get weird about stepping sideways."
Izuku considered this new Uratha's offer, uncertain but also hyper-aware of the fact that he didn't currently have a better plan.
"I'll help you out too," the Hunter-in-Darkness whose name he still hadn't caught added in. "He's right, the People should help the People, and I'm also pretty far ahead myself."
With that decided, the three focused on their spirit halves, saw the shifting font of Essence that softened the barrier between the Spirit World and their own, and stepped in that indescribable direction they forced by convention and the limits of Japanese to call sideways.
The Spirit World's Reflection of the testing center was a sight to behold. Great buildings constructed themselves only to fall apart. Competition-Spirits, resembling masses of different miniature athletes from different types of sports battering one another in a pile that barely resembled a large human, danced around where the testers found themselves in the physical world, gleefully devouring the energy that the Technology-Spirits, looking like robots with bolts of lightning for wiring, gave out as they screamed in pain from the destruction being wrought.
Izuku gave himself half a second to feel awe, and another to think about the fact that maybe utilizing these Technology-Spirits could help him destroy the robots in the physical world more easily…such thoughts ended when he looked to the two other Uratha, and the glowing brands that were now visible.
Just like his own and Mighty Wolf's the Hunter-in-Darkness's were silver, but the flamboyant boy had red markings all over him. Before Izuku could think back on his lessons about werewolf culture and what that might mean, the other two acted.
Izuku didn't even have time to blink before an enormous pitch-black wolf was doing its best to wrap its maw around a silvery-white Dalu form's throat.
--
Thank you to the one commenter. I truly appreciate practically all feedback. As to your notes about the Pure, you are partially right in that most Forsaken don't work with humanity these days, as I intend to show later. As to the Pure, well, even with everyone being Ridden, it's still human civilization and not the Hunter's Paradise or any equivalent, it just changed shockingly too little for them to change their ways. I hope my reasoning makes sense.