At that instant, my world falls apart

I'm pushed into a wall, pushed by a powerful wind. I can't move.

I can't lift a finger or hand, the blood in my body is being pushed back.

I'm melting,

I won't make it.

I reach forward and my arm is crushed by the wind.

The skin is being blown off my body

My eardrums rupture

I can't hear anymore

Everything is silent,

"Not yet"

I die.

I woke up.

Concrete.

His face was on concrete. It was cold.

It was cold because it was winter but his face kept pushing against the concrete…

'Why?'

"Izuku!"

'Oh, it's Momo, she's calling me,' he thought to himself, as he opened his eyes and pushed himself up against the floor. His body was feeling strange.

"Iz— Midoriya can you hear me?" she pleaded, as she watched the body suddenly come to life.

'She's sitting really close to me,' He thought. He didn't mind, she actually smelled kind of nice.

His eyes opened to see the panicked girl sitting there finally calmed down now that he was awake. "What happened?" he murmured. If his memory served him right, he had been reinforcing some pipes. It wasn't like it was anything crazy.

"I just got here and I found you lying on the ground!" She exclaimed. "What were you doing?" He gave her a kind of half-shrug and felt a bit of pain in his arm. His other hand reached over to hold it.

"I think I might have been reinforcing my arm," he groaned, as he looked down at his hand. Momo, herself looked confused. In her mind, Izuku had gotten much better at reinforcement, but she always assumed it could only be done on things that weren't living, like her objects. Her face shifted into horror when she remembered she had seen him make several objects explode or shatter by accident. Considering how complex a human arm was, if Izuku made one mistake, his arm would have...

"Let's take a break," she said, stopping her own train of thought. "Let's just go out today."

It had been a few months since Izuku had first met Momo, but this was the first time they went or met anywhere that wasn't the shed. Well, it wasn't like practice was a regular thing, and Momo seemed to come at random. There were times where for almost a week, she wouldn't show up, and all of a sudden, she would be there. Izuku had gotten pretty used to it, but if he was being honest, he preferred it when she was there with him.

Izuku thought about how it was probably scary for her to walk in and see him just laying there on the floor, though seeing him try something stupid and collapse wouldn't be a good look either. But why would he care how she looked at him? She was just a friend.

He felt bad about making her worry, and that was part of why he agreed to come with her for a break. Although he didn't realize it until he was walking with her. This could actually be considered a date. He had been so focused on training his magecraft, that thinking of her as anything other than an ally had been rare.

He felt underprepared.

"Well, as it turns out, there's actually a limit on just how much I can buy from this place," she laughed, placing 4 cups of ice cream down as she began on them. "So how are you feeling, Midoriya?" she asked with a tilt of her head.

"I'm all right now, I think. Everything just feels a bit... dreamy, but that might be because I'm just used to seeing you in the shed," he replied, taking a small spoonful of ice cream. To be honest, it didn't taste very good. 'It actually tastes like nothing,' he thought to himself, a little puzzled. Maybe it was a side effect.

"I don't mind hanging out. It's just kind of hard to find time to meet consistently - it's not because of you, just some parental stuff." Her voice kind of dropped off around the end of her sentence. Her cheeks took on a bit of red as she stuffed her face with more ice cream. It wasn't hard to guess that she didn't want to talk about it. Izuku couldn't talk about his dad with anyone, really.

She certainly wasn't helping with making this feel less dream-like, either. Izuku took his last few spoonfuls before stretching his shoulders a little. "So what high school are you planning on going to? I'm set to head to Ranco High School. If we end up going to the same place we might be able to hang out a bit more."

Her face kept it's mild red hue as she looked down at the table. "Sorry, my dad wants me to go to a high school closer to my mom's place, He doesn't like how far I have to walk to get there," It took Izuku a second to figure out what she meant by that, and then he understood. "He's just being a little protective."

"Don't worry about it. I was just thinking out loud. We can always meet at UA, anyway." That brought a smile to her face. Izuku realized that she must have been hanging out with him while she was supposed to be at her mom's house. It explained her random schedule and why she avoided talking about her family. "I'm sure you'll pass the test easily."

"Funny thing about that, actually." She was rubbing the back of her head which meant she was either nervous or bashful. "I'm kind of already set for a recommendation exam. By senior year I'll be taking a different exam then the rest of the applicants." She avoided looking at Izuku as she talked, but his eyes were fixated on her. He knew she was smart, but recommendations didn't just go to anyone. Izuku knew this. He never thought she would be from some kind of high class or important family. She was just so… silly. The way she walked, talked, and (recently) smelled, pointed towards that but she never acted like it. It made him reconsider how he viewed people for a moment.

"That's great," he said, at a bit of a loss for words.

"Yeah, I guess…actually," she began, pausing for a second as she thought about something. "What if you took a recommendation exam too? I could help you get in," she offered to the boy, who was struggling to accept any of the words she was saying. Not only was she probably rich and powerful, but she was rich and powerful enough to get him into a different exam than usual for U.A. Before he could refuse, however, she stopped him. "From what I hear, it isn't much easier compared to the regular exam, and we could study together if we both took it."

Izuku was beginning to feel weak. He didn't want to just use his friendship with her for something like this, but the way she looked hopeful at the idea? The prospect of spending time together? It made him feel weak. In almost any case, he would refuse, but it felt like she was using hypnosis magic to change his answer.

"Sounds like a good idea," he said, smiling. He watched her lips curl up into that familiar catlike grin. He felt a weird feeling in his stomach.

It was probably the ice cream.

Ice cream with Momo was great and all, but he felt a little guilty about lying to her when she told him to get some rest.

Izuku was heading back to the shed to finish his exercises for the day. He had actually made a large amount of progress over these months, and he would be damned if he wouldn't continue his work. It still hurt like hell, but he was now able to reliably strengthen most items. The feeling had changed from molten metal, into a shock, though he wasn't sure if it was much better.

The problem now was dealing with trying to advance it. With reinforcement, he could do various things like making knives sharper, optimizing his shoes to never slip during runs, or just make things generally stronger, but he was currently stuck. The problem was that mage families tended to have a special kind of magic that they developed. A kind of 'calling card' that the family would become known for. Some specialized in time manipulation, while others specialized in things like alchemy or fake bodies. But no matter where he searched, Izuku couldn't find out what the Midoriya family studied or created.

All the notes he had left behind by his father pointed towards the reinforcement of one's body, but none of it made any sense. Reinforcement was one of the most basic forms of magic out there. It was simply just elevating the existence of something (which was the entire purpose of magecraft), and besides healing magic, it couldn't really get any easier.

Izuku couldn't exactly reinforce his body yet, but it wasn't like he hadn't tried . Today was the first attempt, but he analyzed his internals several times for safety. It wouldn't take long before he got the hang of it, he was sure. Maybe he would finally figure it out today.

Arriving at the shed felt like a challenge, and he would work all night if he had to. It was time to try and push the limit on what he could do as a mage.

'Alright, so that didn't work,' Izuku thought as he lay there, having recently awakened from what he assumed was another failed attempt. The concrete felt even colder this time, if he licked it his tongue might have gotten stuck to the ground.

This time, he tried to reinforce his finger. Starting small seemed like a good idea, and it worked! The blue line across all his fingers, as he felt them increase in dexterity, hardening and being able to move faster than what was human. Maybe he could play video games like this? It had been going so well, until he extended the reinforcement to his forearm.

The next thing he saw was white, and all of a sudden, the floor was in his face and it was now dark outside.

He was going to have to take this really slow, or change something.

The walk home tonight was strange, it was as if there was a bit of an odd air to it. It wasn't like he hadn't come home late, but tonight felt...different. Did the city seem bluer? To be fair, he did hear about an uptick in residential crimes not involving quirks, so he did have a good reason to feel a bit nervous. The path home was almost entirely empty, except for a strange, small girl with white hair. Seeming more normal than the air that surrounded her, he could see that she was waiting at an intersection to cross the street.

Izuku always did wonder what it would have been like to have a little sister.

She was looking his way, as well, which was odd. Was he supposed to wave? He wasn't exactly prepared for a late-night child waiting to cross the road. The red light from the 'stop walking' sign lit her face, before turning a soft white like her hair.

But she didn't walk.

"Gandr," the voice came from behind, as Izuku felt something press against the back of his head. Spreading across his skull like a puff of smoke, it began pouring into his mind, as he lost consciousness for the third time today.

The last thing he could feel was being lifted by what he knew was magecraft, before falling into a state of oblivion.

"You were supposed to catch him, Eri! One job!"

"Sorry," The small voice giggled.

Authors Note

Hey! I hope you enjoyed the second chapter so far.

The first chapter was kind of set up for the world and story but from here on forward I hope the plot interests you guys. Reviews are appreciated.

Oh, and before I go. I'm looking for some beta readers to help out with editing the story. I'm not that great at grammar and the current method is taking a bit too long. If you might be interested feel free to add and dm me on discord. Jakey#9378