Disclaimer: I do not own Log Horizon or My Hero Academia. I do not earn anything by posting this, and I recommend watching the original content from the creators. Do not repost this story.
Chapter 3
Silvertongue and Pointed Ears
"You are just like all of your false heroes, only out for the glory, the fame . . . and revenge."
Even if he had come out of the situation alive and mostly unharmed, there were some scars that reached beyond the physical flesh and bone. Stain's words were one of those scars, haunting his nightmares and waking dreams. Every time he had to make a decision, every time he had to choose, those words came back, reminding him of his own weaknesses.
Iida always knew that he would become a hero. It had been guaranteed since the emergence of his quirk as a child. A hero legacy stood at his back, and a bright future stretched ahead of him. And then his brother had fallen, and Iida had set out to avenge the brother who would never be able to walk again.
At the time, he had called himself a hero. A hero who was exercising his righteous obligation of defeating the Hero Killer, and purging the world of a stain on their society . . .
His near death and the interference of his friends changed everything.
Suddenly, his world view had been shattered. He wasn't a hero yet, he was just a teenager throwing himself to his death because he wouldn't follow the rules.
It was just like Stain had said. He wasn't a hero, not a real one, not yet.
But . . . he could become one. Now that he knew his own flaws, his weakness, he knew what he needed to do in order to leave that mentality behind. He wasn't a false hero, and the day he crossed that line is the day he would invite Stain over for tea.
Even so, it had been months since Stain was arrested. Months of careful training and nightmares, but he had been getting better. Slowly, yes, but everyone around him could see it.
The scars on his arm served as a reminder that he would never forget.
And then . . .
"In another life, in another world . . ."
Iida stared down at his folded hands. His knuckles were white with tension as he sat next to a few other officers and Eraserhead. A white bandage was wrapped tightly around his head to seal the head wound he'd received. The emergency doctors at the scene had wanted to ship him to the hospital to get his concussion looked at, but he had waved them off and said that he would come in later.
Because when he'd looked up and met identical, cold eyes staring at him over the shoulder of one of the detectives . . .
"What if you were The Villain?"
He couldn't leave. He couldn't.
That can't be me. It can't.
He'd ended up riding back to the station with a few other officers. Eraserhead was shuffled into a car with Iida's duplicate and the detective he'd been talking to, although he had looked very irritated about it. Iida could understand. He didn't know what it was about the identical version of himself, but every time he met the others eyes it was like looking down into a viper pit.
I have seen things that you can never imagine, those eyes seemed to say, and Iida believed it.
Even so, it still felt surreal to sit outside of the interrogation room as the man who had kidnapped him slowly stirred inside. Detective Naomasa was inside at the moment, and Iida knew that he and the others wouldn't be seen through the one way glass. Nevertheless, he still felt shivers run through him as he saw the villain blink and slowly realize where he had woken up.
Iida's doppelganger had been directed to a separate room and told to wait. Iida didn't know what was creepier, the fact that the other hadn't even reacted to being yanked into another world, or the amused half smile that he threw the detective as the lock clicked behind him, as if he knew that the police were stalling.
That, and they didn't really want the villain and the man he'd summoned together. Not just so that they couldn't talk and get a story together, but also because the police honestly weren't sure if the dark haired summon would attack his summoner again.
Best not to take chances.
Regardless of the circumstances, they needed answers, and this was the best way to get them. Sucking in a deep, rattling breath, Iida steeled himself and sat up straight, staring through the one way glass and at the villain who'd kidnapped him with determination.
They would get their answers, one way or another.
0~o~0
When Itsu Yamagami was four, his parents took him to see a quirk specialist. He'd been young, and enamored with heros and powerful quirks, just like every other child his age . . .
But unlike any child his age, he had yet to show signs of any quirk.
It had been slow, at first. The taunting, the whispers. Quirkless, they all said, useless.
But he knew that he had a quirk, even if he didn't know what it was yet. And the quirk specialist confirmed it. No extra bone in the toe joint meant that he had a quirk. The one problem was figuring out what that quirk was.
Some quirks, the doctors said, take more time to reveal themselves, or are too small to be noticeable.
It didn't matter what it was, though, because Itsu had a quirk, that that was all that mattered.
He still wanted to figure out what his quirk was, of course, but at least he could confidently say that he wasn't quirkless. He tried everything from jumping off of the top of the playground to almost drowning himself in hopes of activating his quirk, but nothing seemed to work.
Years passed. As time went on, his attempts became more thought out, but happened less often. He retreated into himself, and when people asked him what his quirk was, he would just smile thinly and tell them that it was all a secret.
A secret. Right.
It wasn't until he was in highschool - well past the age in which he could enroll for a hero school - that he got the first hint of his quirk. He'd been sorting the books in his school library when he'd found an old book that looked similar to a comic book but must have been a few decades old. The cover was worn and faded, and some of the characters were unreadable, but he'd picked it up out of curiosity. Usually, a book like this would have been in the special archives, well out of reach of someone like him, but this one must have been looked over.
He took the book home.
It was a story about someone who summoned warriors from the past to fight for them using a special summoning circle. Itsu had found in amusing. There were quirks that worked similarly, but with different requirements. Regardless, he'd been curious enough to try.
He'd drawn the circle and laid out the candles before standing to the side and letting a single drop of his own blood drop into the circle. Honestly, he didn't expect it to work. It shouldn't have worked.
And, well, it didn't. Not the way that he'd expected, at least.
A swirling vortex of white, like a portal, swirled into existence. And when he looked through it he saw . . . himself.
And not just himself, but many, many versions of himself. In one he was a hero, in another he was working at a factory, a chemist, a secretary, a street boss-
There was a multitude of worlds, and many, many possibilities. In many of them, he was a hero.
He thought, maybe it was a sign. Maybe that was who he was meant to be, but somewhere along the path had failed.
It took him years to work out the particulars of his particular quirk, but he managed to do it. He trained, and worked hard, and got himself an apprenticeship at one of the local hero offices. He was only an errand runner, of course, but he hoped to one day be able to work his way up from grunt work to possibly taking the hero exam.
There was just one problem -
(Fire whirled around them, consuming the air and burning his lungs as he stared out at the destruction. Parents screamed and children sobbed as they pulled each other from the wreckage of the surrounding buildings. In the distance, a hero stood victorious, proudly standing over the broken body of a purse snatcher-)
- The heros cared only for their fame and the amount of so-called 'villains' they managed to beat down and capture. He'd never realized it on TV, of course, but he could see it now. Heroes walking past crimes because they weren't 'flashy' enough, or in a public area. Heroes turning away begging parents, grandparents, and teachers as they tried to save wayward students and children from a fate worse than death when they got caught toeing the line.
It wasn't just one hero, either. It was almost all of them.
And once you see something, you can't unsee it.
Is . . . is that what I am going to become? Is that what I want to become? Some fancy face on a billboard?
And so he'd turned back to his mirror and searched. He searched for a world where he wasn't a hero, wasn't a civilian, wasn't dead . . .
And he found one.
He found a villain, among the ashes and the flames of a burning city, standing besides other twisted, shadowy figures.
"This world is rotten," his other self grinned, "And the false heroes must be purged before it can begin anew."
In every person, in every life, everyone has the potential to become a villain.
And then Stain had showed up.
"False heroes-"
Just like his alternate self.
"They are not worthy of the title."
And he realized.
These heroes were wearing a false skin, they were unworthy of their position. And Itsu had the power to do it, he just had to step up.
And the first step . . . the first step was the boy.
Stains last victim, who escaped due to chance. His work would be finished, even if Itsu had to do it himself.
Because every hero harbors darkness in their hearts. And he knew just how to find it.
0~o~0
Naomasa sighed as he sat down in the chair across from their waking villain, shuffling the papers in front of him as he did so. The younger man slowly blinked awake, his head rolling upward and eyes slightly glazed. Naomasa winced slightly as he saw the purpling bruise on the side of the others face. Sure, he'd seen villains come in with worse (which is why they had a fully trained medical staff stationed in the building at all times), but the fact that it came from the man who he had summoned threw a wrench into things.
How do you charge someone with excessive use of force when they don't even really exist?
He was not looking forward to the paperwork.
It also highlighted the fact that the summoned man's staff was most definitely a weapon, but they hadn't been able to get their guest to let it go or put it down, and they couldn't exactly take it without proof.
With one last shuffle, Naomasa sighed again and locked his gaze on the still slightly unfocused villain's.
"Hello, Itsu," Naomasa began, "I would like to ask you some questions about the man that you summoned," he said as he leaned forward and rested his chin on laced fingers, "First, tell me how your quirk works."
The villain blinked a few times before he grinned, eyes sparkling, "Oh, but you already have my file, Detective!" his eyes flickered down to the paperwork, "Shouldn't you be a little more specific?"
Detective Naomasa frowned, "Very well. I know that you can . . . summon someone from another world that is an alternate of someone from our world, but do you know how to send them back?"
"Hmm," the villain frowned slightly and tipped his head, there was a spark of mischievousness in his eyes though, "Nope."
The detective tightened his fingers, "'No' you don't know, or 'no' you won't tell me?"
A grin spread across the villains face, "You are talking about my summon, aren't you?" His eyes were glimmering in glee, "Oh, I can't wait to hear what he's done to this pathetic society. Truly, it was a surprise to find such a perfect specimen from that boy. The power, the rank, the title-"
Naomasa gritted his teeth. "Just answer the question. Is there a way to send him back?"
He had a truth detecting quirk, but it only worked on truths and lies. Misleading information didn't trigger it. Troublesome.
"Ah, but detective," the villain paused and looked Naomasa dead in the eyes, the color of the iris darkening solemnly, "are you sure you want that answer?"
0~o~0
Eraserhead knew that Detective Naomasa was good at what he did, but it was still a sight to see him at work. The interrogation started out rough as the detective tested the boundaries of the villain. Poking and certain topics and retreating. Even so, something must have rattled him in the first few minutes, because it dragged on longer than Aizawa was expecting. Regardless, he eventually circled around to the real reason they were talking to him separately from their other . . . guest.
"You called the man you summoned the 'Villain in Glasses'. Why?" Naomasa asked, and Aizawa saw Iida lean forward as his doppleganger was brought up.
Thankfully, this topic seemed to be one that the villain was all to willing to talk about.
"Oh, you poor, unenlightened soul. You can't understand the pure genius that man contains," the villain sighed, "Most villains today name themselves with ridiculous titles and over the top exaggerations. They call for attention, they rarely think about what happens after their next big heist, all they care about is the fame," he spat, "Just as bad as the false heroes, they are. But that man? Well," the villain grinned, "He is a true villain."
"You've said that before," Naomasa frowned, "but you still haven't explained why."
The villain sighed, "You really don't get it, do you? You don't see it?"
"Enlighten me."
Leaning back, the villain examined the detective before he shrugged slightly, "He has ruled his world from the shadows for six years. Those who know him call him 'Lord', and the people fear the villain in glasses.
"Honestly, I almost passed over his world when I was searching. It had seemed so normal, no heroes, no villains, just the people living in their crumbling cities and their odd appearances. If I hadn't seen it for myself, well, I would never have believed it."
The villain grinned, "When his name is mentioned, what do you think that they do?"
Naomasa paused, waiting.
Dark eyes sparkled, "They run."
Eraserhead closed his eyes and sighed, before glancing over at Iida, who was fixed on the glass with a single minded focus. They couldn't take the words of the villain too seriously. At the moment, their guest had done nothing to harm anyone except the villain, which could be argued as self defense.
And yet . . .
And yet . . . something was still bothering him.
He has ruled his world from the shadows . . . for six years . . .
The man that they were dealing with wasn't just some kind of victim of a terrible crime, and even if he hadn't done anything wrong, he might still be dangerous.
He's manipulative. And smart. He knows how to play the game.
Aizawa glanced over at his pupil again and sighed.
This is going to be hard on Iida.
0~o~0
The small white room that Shiroe had been left in was . . . disappointingly normal.
Honestly, if it weren't for some of the odd things that he had seen on the way to the police station, he would have thought that he had been teleported back home by complete coincidence. Which, honestly, would have been a little irritating, because he'd been working on a solution to that problem for over six years.
If it hadn't already been painfully obvious that this wasn't home, he might have even been a little curious over the phenomenon and how they could replicate it.
As it was, though . . . Shiroe was just tired.
Eyes flickering to the small clock in the corner of his vision, Shiroe sighed and leaned back against the chair to get a more comfortable position, even if the hard plastic wasn't really designed for comfort. It had been almost thirty minutes with the lead officer had left (and locked the door behind him, but it's not like they knew that Shiroe knew that, or that he could escape at any time if he really wanted to). Honestly, Shiroe would be grateful if they would just get his side of the story and let him go find his own place to crash for a few hours. Or better yet, let them find a place for him to crash. Less work for him.
Before being . . . body snatched, Shiroe had been working on a project that included the united effort of the three largest Adventurer cities to get the teleportation portals up and working again. It was a daunting process, but he'd done enough research that it might actually be possible. It would just take work, and magic. A lot of magic.
In essence, the magic circles that protected each of the Adventurer cities were like giant lazer containers, but instead of collecting and bouncing light back and forth to magnify it to burning temperatures, it used mana. Basically, it collected the natural mana from the earth and sent it through a series of rings that would magnify it and bounce it back, over and over and over until it overwhelmed the final circle and poured out on the surface. This caused a bit of a problem, however. Without something to latch onto, the magic would basically act as a massive wave of destruction that would create a 'kill zone' that would crush anyone who came close from the pressure of the mana in the area. That's where the teleportation gates came in. The mana cost to hold even a small portal open was immense. For one as large as the city teleportation gates, it was impossible to power it with just adventurers. Whoever had built the magic circles under the cities clearly planned to link the teleportation gates with the escaping mana. In essence, it acted as a giant battery for the entire city.
There was only one problem.
In order for it to run, there needed to be mana coming into the circles. It should have been a natural process, but it needed something to kick-start it. A magic light bulb, if you were to compare it to a laser. It was like a car battery that had been completely drained. Sometimes, all you really needed was a different energy source to 'jump-start' it.
The Adventurers themselves were walking energy sources, but in order to really get things working they needed enough of them, at the right positions, directing everything they had into the circles to kick-start the process again.
Shiroe suspected that the spell that brought the Adventurers to Elder Tales was the one that drained the mana from the system in the first place. Somehow, somewhere, someone had figured out a way to tap into the giant well of magic that powered the magic circles. That could be a problem later.
But it was a problem for a later Shiroe to figure out.
Being yanked into another world kind of out a lot of things on the back-burner.
Anyway, he'd been preparing all of his notes for the past week, running on little to no sleep for over seventy-two hours, in order to get everything ready for the conference in which he was going to present his plan to the round table and their guests from the other cities. If it worked - and he was almost 90% sure it would - then it would revolutionize the way that the Adventurers had been living since the apocalypse. It might also provide a way home - for those that still wanted to go back.
But now . . . well, unless someone was able to somehow track him down and body-snatch him back - honestly he wouldn't be surprised if Akatsuki found a way - he wasn't making to the conference in time.
Which meant that he was going to have to spend months setting up another conference as soon as he got back. Which meant more sleepless nights, political sparring, and scarring little Adventurers who all wanted a piece of his work back into place . . .
Honestly, Shiroe just wanted to sleep.
Also, this world was weird. He didn't really know what he expected when he got back to Earth . . . but still having access to his menu wasn't one of them. Not that he was complaining, but still, odd.
The handle on the door turned, and Shiroe's eyes shot open. He didn't move from where he was leaned back against the chair, arms crossed over his head and behind his neck. The detective that had led him here walked in, somehow looking even more haggard than he had when he left.
Ah, classic case of integrating both sides to see if the story matches. He's probably just come from talking to the other guy. Sadly, I am just as clueless as the next person, in this situation.
"Good afternoon, Detective," Shiroe smiled his small 'I'm innocent' smile that he always used on the guild leader before he threw his latest plan on them.
Now that he thought about it, maybe that wasn't the right approach.
The Detective paled slightly and then cleared his throat as he sat down, setting a file of papers in front of him and laying them across the table. After a few moments of shuffling, he had a series of pages laid out in order, and in such a way that Shiroe couldn't clearly read what was on them.
With one last sigh, the detective leaned forward and folded his hands under his chin. There was a pen tucked between the index and middle fingers on his right hand, and a notepad on the table, ready to take notes.
"I would say 'good afternoon' back, but honestly it's been a long day," the detective started, "You've left us in a bit of a situation Mr. . . . Shiroe."
Shiroe calmly peered back at the exhausted detective, waiting for him to continue.
After a moment, the detective sighed and leaned back, "Not much of a talker, huh?"
Sometimes, it's more important to be quiet enchanter and observe from the background, rather than be the bright tank that draws the enemies attention. Shiroe smirked slightly.
"If we are being honest with each other, Detective, I could care less about your situation, and more about how I can get back," Shiroe's eyes flashed as he tilted his head, "So, did you learn anything enlightening in your little talk with our mutual friend?"
The crazy brought me here, surely he has a way back.
The Detective grimaced. "Ah, yes. That." He sighed. "Apparently there are certain conditions that have to be met after each summon in order to send that summon back."
Shiroe waited patiently.
"None of which we actually know, at this point. So far, we have determined that the people who are summoned usually stick around for a few weeks to a few months before the conditions are met."
Shiroe frowned. "I would rather not wait that long."
The Detective winced, "Neither would we, honestly," he sighed, "So, let's get this over with."
Flipping the cover of the notebook open, the detective clicked the end of the pen. "To start off with, can you tell me your name for the record? Oh, and this is all being recorded."
Of course it is. I didn't miss the little camera pinned to your tie.
Shiroe shot him a slightly amused glance. "I already told you my name, Mr. Detective, but I never got yours."
The Detective paused for a moment and then nodded, eyes warily flickering up to Shiroe's own for a moment before glancing back down at his pad. "You can call be Detective Naomasa. And I need your full name, not just your last."
Shiroe quirked an eyebrow and leaned forward, settling his elbows loosely on the table in front of him. "Detective, my name is Shiroe," he paused, and then clicked his glasses back up on his nose. "Just Shiroe."
It's the only name that really matters. It's who I am, who I have been, for the past six years.
Kei Shiroegane is gone, and I no longer go by that name.
The Detective frowned as he stretched something down on his slightly angled pad. "Okay, Shiroe, what were you doing before arriving on the scene?"
Shiroe shrugged, letting his mask of polite indifference fall over his face, "I was going to grab lunch before heading back to the office with the circle of light appeared and snatched me right off of the street."
Nodding, Detective Naomasa continued, "And where exactly where you at the time?"
Shiroe tilted his head slightly, "In Akihabara."
The Detective paused. Shiroe quirked an eyebrow.
"Akihabara?" there was a spark of surprise in the detective's eyes, and recognition. "Old Akihabara?"
Shiroe blinked slowly, "Well, if you want to call it that, sure. Most of the buildings are crumbling and overgrown."
Detective Naomasa had stopped writing, instead just sitting there staring at Shiroe, as if he had said something unbelievable. Shiroe narrowed his eyes.
"Is there something wrong, Detective?"
Naomasa startled slightly and shook his head, "Ah, no." He cleared his throat for a moment and then moved back to the bad. "No. It's . . . it's fine. Let's move on."
Shiroe's eyes were still narrowed, but he nodded.
I just need to play along for a little bit. No need to anger anyone at the moment. No pushing buttons. No one really knows who I am, and there is no reason to make them scared.
But by the Alvs what I wouldn't give for a good night's rest right about now.
The questions continued through a few other general things, like his age, his thoughts when he was first summoned, why he sided against the man who had summoned him - "I tend to shy away from the crazies." - what was your former occupation - "I was an engineering student." - and finally -
"Why are you called the Villain in Glasses?" the Detectives voice put an odd little twist on the word villain, which left a bad taste in Shiroe's mouth.
Great, the little nickname follows me into another world, when I finally started to get people to stop calling me that. It's bad for first impressions. Even if it is true.
"Detective," Shiroe sighed, "If you had to decide between saving a small handful of people, or an entire city, what would you do?"
The Detective narrowed his eyes, "I would call in the heroes."
Shiroe winced slightly, "And if there were no heroes?"
"I guess . . . I would save the city," the Detective's face had gone sour.
Shiroe nodded and leaned forward further, his eyes boring into the detective through the upper edge on his glinting glasses, "And what if the only way to save those people . . . was to do something that made everyone hate you," his eyes saddened, "Detective, sometimes . . . "
The detective had frozen under his gaze.
"Sometimes, people don't want to be saved. Especially not from their own mistakes."
0~o~0
Detective Naomasa slumped down next to Eraserhead and a wide eyed Iida, holding the small pad in his hands. A different officer had offered to lead . . . Shiroe to a place where he could rest for the night. Naomasa was just glad to be out of the others presence. There was just something about Shiroe . . . something dangerous.
"Sometimes, people don't want to be saved."
Naomasa groaned and let his head sink onto a convenient table next to him. "I don't want to do that ever again."
Eraserhead snorted into the coffee he was drinking and nodded. Iida just blinked slowly.
The detective sighed and sat up a little bit, throwing his notes toward Eraserhead's side of the table. "Take a look at this and tell me what you think."
Aizawa glanced down and quirked one eyebrow. "Akihabara?"
Naomasa nodded.
Iida tilted his head and pulled a little closer to his teacher to catch a glimpse, not noticing the detective twitch as his own glasses caught the light slightly, "I am afraid I have never heard of this Akihabara, sensei. What is it?"
Eraserhead put down the pad slowly and glanced around the room with exhaustion. "I am honestly not surprised that you haven't heard of it before," the teacher sighed, "Akihabara was a pre-quirk city . . ."
He sighed, "It was destroyed about two hundred years ago. Everyone lost. No one really knows what happened but . . . in the end, it was just a big hole in the ground. No survivors. No witnesses. One of the many blank spots in our history."
Glancing down at the pad again, Erasurehead shook his head, "It's also a clue about when our two worlds diverged."
Iida blinked. "Why is that important?"
Erasurehead tapped that paper, "Because we don't know anything about this alternate self of yours. And the more we know . . ."
"The better prepared we will be," Detective Naomasa picked up, "when he turns on us."
Iida felt a shiver of foreboding shot down his spine.
Not if.
When.
Cold, cold, eyes. Eyes that watched him, even when Iida knew the other was nowhere near.
Eyes that whispered, "I know who you are. You can't hide it from me, false hero, because I am you, and you can't hide from yourself."
0~o~0
Okay, wrote the last part with a high fever and the sniffles, so I am not really sure how it turned out. Please let me know!
Thanks to I'll Make My Own Wings for being the Beta reader for this chapter!
(Updated: 12/10/2019)