The Cannibalistic Chimera

Hello everyone and welcome to the latest chapter of Hailstorm Vol. 2! First off, for those of you who were waiting I apologize that it's taken this long to get a new chapter out but the holidays and other projects demanded my attention. Also a quick announcement, once the next chapter or the one after that is completed this story shall be going on hiatus for a little bit, mostly just until the next season of My Hero Academia comes out. More than likely it won't be too long of a wait. And last thing, fellow reader redfang19 is seeking a writer interested in doing One Piece stories. He's got more than a couple of ideas so if you feel like writing One Piece but don't have a clear story idea, do look him up. Now then, with no review questions this week, let's dive on in!

Daytime: Deika City

"They seriously have a hundred and ten thousand fighters!" Exclaimed Compress as a mass of Liberation Army 'Soldiers' all dressed in civilian clothing came charging, running and leaping out of the many buildings surrounding the League of Villains, all with their quirks active.

"Not quite that many," commented Chimera as he went down on all fours and launched four, pointed bone tendrils from his back which impaled a small group heading for him, "but it'll still be enough to be a problem!" He jumped and spun then with the bodies still on his tendrils, slamming them into even more Liberation members until the corpses were torn off from either the force of his attack or by blocking the quirks of other attacking enemies. But the Flesh Beast wielder smiled in spite of this as he retracted the tendrils and leapt at the next attacker, sinking his actual teeth into the man's throat before violently tearing out quite a bit of it.

The man howled in agony before Chimera tossed him aside, savoring the taste of blood in his mouth as he produced a large, worm-like protrusion from his back which sported numerous sharp teeth in a mouth the size of a great white sharks. He used it to chomp down on one of the soldiers trying to attack him from behind before coiling the appendage around his body to block several projectile quirks that included stones, bullets, scales and even feathers. "Well this is interesting," he noted as he whipped the monster protrusion around to swat several more close range fighters away before charging forward with two flesh lion heads forming around his hands. "You're not freaking out about your comrade's deaths or the sight of blood. You've all had training, haven't you?"

"Very perceptive, Chimera was it," said Hanabata as he watched the villain dodge and flip over several more attacks, "indeed, our dormant Liberation warriors have been training every day to strengthen their minds and bodies. It is all for the sake of living more human lives."

"Heh, 'human'," scoffed Chimera as he grabbed an enemy with a sprayer nozzle for a head who was targeting Dabi and threw him into the front windshield of a car, "what does that even mean in a day and age like this?" He leapt behind the car and slammed his monster head tail into it, sending the vehicle barreling into a couple of 'chefs' who'd been attacking Compress before narrowly dodging out of the way of a man with a giant fish head for a hand.

"Why that should be obvious," said Hanabata as a white news van pulled up which he started climbing aboard, "people should be allowed to use their quirks, their innate gifts freely. That is why it's such an issue to have an organization like yours around with no clear goal who's become such a hot topic recently."

"That's what this is," said Chimera as he leapt up and bit off the head of a woman using a broom as a weapon before taking a hit to his side from a guy shooting high speed spitwads with extra force, "you hate that we're more popular than you right now?" He swiftly impaled the spitwad user with two scorpion tails before ripping him in half to throw at his comrades, taking a quick taste of the entrails that were hanging off of his newly grown weapons before diving and spinning under another set of attacks. He turned this dodge into an attack of his own as he whipped his current scorpion tail appendages around, slicing the legs off of several of the Liberation warriors surrounding him.

"Don't misunderstand," said Hanabata from his place atop his propaganda van, "we don't hate you, you're something of liberated individuals yourselves. But by sacrificing you, we'll pave the way for the Superhuman Liberation Front to rise again!"

"Heh, how arrogant," said Chimera with a smirk as his scorpion tail appendages quickly retracted before his large, bat-like wings quickly shot out of his body, slicing the faces of two more Liberation soldiers as he leapt out of the crowd of surrounding enemies. "Seems you don't quite understand why the League is the talk of the town!" Several soldiers with quirks that helped them leap high attempted to come after him, only to have their heads violently taken off by a long dinosaur tail sporting an armored club end similar to an anchilosaur. "Your soldiers might be well trained," he said while using his wings to slice through a pair of enemies with insect wings, "but they still largely lack in experience."

He charged towards Hanabata then, "they don't know how to think without a commander!"

"DOWN WITH THIS ONE!" Yelled Hanabata. Several more Liberation members moved and intercepted Chimera with a volley of multi-type projectiles, melee weapons and even their own bodies. The Flesh Beast user was able to deflect the first bit of the attacks but was quickly overwhelmed as a quirk user with a bullet body slammed into him and sent him flying into the second floor of a large two-story building. He winced in pain as his body flew through the outside wall before impacting with a couch that managed to soften the remainder of his landing. 'Ouch,' thought Chimera groggily, holding his head as he slowly sat up.

"Never been hit by something like that before," he thought aloud as he peered out the hole in the building to take stock of what was going on. Spinner and Compress were just barely holding their own, spending as much time running as they were fighting. Twice had been fighting but something had distracted him and now he was heading away from the other two. 'Must be going after Toga,' he realized upon noting that he couldn't locate the bloodthirsty blond anywhere among the crowd.

The cannibal then turned his attention towards Dabi who was now fighting an ice user who must've been among the strongest of the Liberation Members given that he was holding his own against the blue flame user without any other assistance. At last there was Tomura, and Chimera smiled upon what he saw next. The tired leader of the League of Villains used his decay quirk on the first of a large group of enemies. But instead of just that one person decaying, his power actually spread to the other individuals, decaying them all into dust within seconds of each other.

'Right again, Boss, he just might be a good successor after all,' he thought as an image of All for One passed through his mind before he noticed the quickly approaching group of Liberation Warriors entering, landing on and climbing into the building he was in. "I guess that means the break's over," he thought aloud while standing up and crossing his arms in front of his face, "now let's cut loose a little more, Thorns of the Shrike!" Every window in the second floor was shattered then as what appeared to be sharpend bone tree branches burst forth, impaling several of the Liberation members who'd been climbing the building before pulling them in. Blood and limbs were sent flying everywhere then as the floor Chimera was on collapsed down into the first floor.

As other Liberation soldiers approached, a large, slender shape burst out of the dust and debris which resembled a horrid red dragon head. It struck at the nearest batch of unfortunate victims who'd been gathering on the building next to the one Chimera had been in, biting down on both them and the roof of the building itself. Even more dust and debris were kicked up as the dragon head seemed to disappear into it. 'Now let's see how well you trained your soldiers for this,' thought Chimera with a smirk as he quickly leapt around through the shrouded area, having grown what appeared to be coyote and hyena heads on stalks from his back and arms that he used to bite off heads, rip out throats and even tear apart guts.

While it was a messy way of doing things it was also brutally efficient as Chimera felt the adrenaline pumping through his veins. 'Yes, this is more like it,' he thought, 'the smell of blood, the tinge of fear in the air, the taste of flesh as I devour it!' The Chimera quirk user couldn't help the feeling of nostalgia which came over him as flashes of his previous life went through his mind. His first kill, his escape, the many days and nights he spent learning how to hunt and fight, and his first time meeting All for One.

Before he knew it, the dust had settled, revealing a mass of carnage as the blood-soaked cannibal looked around for any movement. 'Guess I got a little carried away,' he thought before walking out of the remains of the building and onto the street. It was there he was met with several more Liberation warriors approaching his position. "Damn," said Chimera with a bloody grin, "so much to eat and so little time. I'm not even sure I 'can' eat all of you."

His performance had definitely had an effect on a couple of their enemies, but the majority of them were still clearly ready for a fight as they closed in. But in the next instant, he wasn't one of the bigger problems they had to worry about. "It's time for a massacre!" Shouted Twice, or rather what sounded like a multitude of Twice's. "SAD MAN'S PARADE!"

Everyone including Chimera looked in the direction of the voices, but only one of them smiled as a literal army of Twice clones were charging down the street. "Look at that," said Chimera as he sprouted his signature wings, "it seems he overcame his trauma. Saves me having to break one of his bones later down the line." He flapped his wings and took off then, "enjoy the procession dickheads!"

Naturally some of the Liberation warriors wanted to go after him but they quickly found that impossible with the mass of Twice's overflowing the streets, growing larger and larger by the minute. 'Guess I'd better work on taking out the tower or taking down another one of their commanders,' mused Chimera after seeing that Curious was nowhere to be found. Instead he focused his attention back on his original target, the most loudmouthed of the leaders, Hanabata. The man had retreated some distance while still shouting propaganda and other words meant to pump up his followers.

Funnily enough, every one of the followers in his vicinity seemed to be fighting more fiercely and ferociously than those stationed in the rest of the city. Chimera surmised that his quirk must be a support type aimed at powering up others. Though another problem occurred when the ice quirk user Dabi was fighting suddenly assaulted an entire section of street with a mass of ice spikes growing out of the ground. It skewered a large number of the Twice clones while sending several others flying.

'Strange,' thought Chimera, 'Dabi was holding him back until this point, what's going on?' Chimera got his answer when he glanced down and noticed part of the ground which had split open had a pipe underneath the asphalt, with ice in it. 'A water pipe, he's freezing all of the water in it to create more ice. Crap, that means his next move will probably be-.' Several of the streets exploded with ice then, turning an entire section of Deika city into what looked like a scene from the Artic with a lot of buildings randomly placed in it.

"Well that'll be annoying," said Chimera as he continued to circle around in the air, "but at least it means we can still stick with the original plan." He put his finger to the communicator in his ear then. "Yo Doc, I know you're probably seeing all of this. We've been holding them off up to this point but that's not gonna last if they've got more bozos like this ice dude running around. So you might as well go ahead and wake up Machia."

"One step ahead of you, Chimera," replied the Doctor, "he's already on his way. He should be arriving in just a few minutes, less than ten I'd say."

"Good enough," replied the Cannibal with a grin as he noted one of the now probably hundreds of Twice's yelling at him, "in the meantime, I think we're going to try out another idea." Chimera flew down towards the copies of his teammate then as a group of them all started saying and finishing each other's sentences.

"Hey Chimera! We got an idea! Why don't we make more of you?! It'll be great! It'll be scary!" Said the group of Twice's he landed in front of.

"Just try not to make too many," said Chimera, "We don't need this battle turning into a total slaughter with Machia being on his way. So why don't we make this…" A half dozen other Chimeras were formed and added their voices to his next declaration, "A FEAST!" The multiple Flesh Beast Wielders leapt back into the fray then, slashing, clawing and devouring the many Liberation members in their way. Even if they weren't as strong as him, his copies were still fairly lethal and made some good headway as they approached the tower.

Unsurprisingly, though, the closer they got the more enemies there were. And Hanabata was there too, pumping up their foes with his speech quirk. 'Gonna have to shift this a little more in our favor,' mused Chimera as he bit through the midsection of a fish quirk user with one of his giant mouths, 'hmm, I wonder.' Currently the biggest mass of Twice's had formed around where Shigaraki and Spinner had wound up, attempting to clear a path to the tower. But the numerous Liberation members were making that a problem, especially a group of them who'd wound up on top of a larger building and were using their various projectile quirks to rain down pain on the Twice clones.

"My fellow cannibals," said Chimera as he spotted a nearby manhole which he proceeded to widen with a powerful blow, "I believe I've spotted our next meal." The Chimera clones all grinned wickedly, knowing exactly what he had in mind as they all dove under the ground. Not long after that, several places around and underneath the taller building started to collapse as glimpses of what looked like large worm monsters tore into the foundation. In seemingly no time at all the building began to list to the side as the Liberation warriors screamed in realization of what was happening. The end result was the building crashing into the street with a thunderous impact that crushed several of the League's enemies, injured more and sowed confusion thanks to the large dust cloud that had been kicked up.

"Shigaraki," said Chimera over his comm, "now's as good a time as any to make for the tower. Leave this guy and his cronies to me and the Twice army."

"Just be careful where you drop the next building," replied Shigaraki lazily over his comm before it shut off.

"No promises," said Chimera as he and his clones went to work. It was chaotic for more than a couple minutes as the Liberation members fired their quirks blindly into the dust and debris, hitting both Twice clones and some of their own. The Chimera clones moved through the mess of bodies and debris, taking out anyone still capable of putting up a fight. Turned out there were still a good number of them and as soon as the noise from the fallen building cleared, Hanabata was back at it again with his voice quirk.

One of his clones fell to the horde of Liberation members, then another and another. 'Seems its true what Twice said,' thought Chimera as he entered the side of another building, 'each proceeding clone is a little weaker than the last. But I can still make that work.' With that thought in mind, he produced a massive, clawed limb out of his back which he used to punch his way through the building, scattering several more Liberation members who'd tried entering the building.

He smiled at the feeling of flesh and bone collapsing under the limb as he stepped through the hole in the wall and back outside. He couldn't help the smile on his face as he licked the blood from his arm. "Whoops, looks like I missed my mark by a little," he observed as he saw the propaganda truck had pulled further away. But it was fine, he'd already done his part after all.

The sound of cracking stone and shattering glass filled the air then as he looked over towards the tower, or rather, the now collapsing structure that used to be a tower. "Everyone," said Hanabata as he donned a special full-face helmet that had several speakers on it, "go to the grand commander! They are committing an assault on the soul of the army!" He was interrupted then as Spinner dropped to the ground right in front of him, clearly in pain as he reached for his sword on the ground.

"Oh it's you," said Hanabata, "Shuichi Iguchi, the one who possesses the quirk 'Gecko'. It seems you can't do much more than stick to walls and leap around. I'm assuming you were one of those shut-ins who retreated from society after being bullied. Not that I blame you, but at the same time, I honestly don't see you as a person who can accomplish anything."

"I know that…better than anyone," grunted Spinner as he shakily got to his feet, "I don't have anything I like, like Toga does, or anything I necessarily want to do. But at that time when Stain was on the news, my heart burned. And then when I heard Shigaraki's dream, I definitely thought 'I want to see the future this guy set his eyes on.' That's what I thought, and if I hadn't jumped in with other people I'd just be an ordinary nobody."

"And that's who I am! You got a problem with that?! Of course you don't, because you're all the same aren't you?! And that includes you too, right, Mr. Politician?" This statement seemed to give pause to a couple of the members of the Liberation Army as Hanabata stopped speaking for a moment to ponder his words.

"Are you putting us on the same level," he asked, his face inscrutable behind his voice amplifying helmet.

"Of course he is," came the voice of Chimera from seemingly nowhere, "you're not as special as you think." The ground beneath the propaganda truck exploded then as another large dragon head burst forth, clamping the bottom of the truck in its maw as it lifted into the air. 'What,' thought Hanabata as he quickly fond himself high above the others, 'there was another one?' He looked over then, noting the one who'd recently emerged from the other building was being overwhelmed before dissolving into a mud-like substance.

'No,' Hanabata realized as the dragon head quickly receded and changed shape into wings, 'this is the real one!' Gravity quickly overtook the truck as it began to fall back towards the ground, but not before a hand seized his throat and pulled him through the air. For a few seconds all he saw was the ground below or the pair of batlike wings belonging to his captor before the sound of planting feet suddenly halted their movement. "Finally got you," said Chimera as he formed a monstrous clawed hand which enclosed around the Politician's head, "you won't need this any more."

Hanabata winced in pain as his support item was ripped off of his head and tossed down in pieces to the streets below. "Now let's see how well your quirk functions at a distance when speaking is a little more difficult."

"You…won't win," said Hanabata, or at least the best he could while having an enlarged hand clamped around his throat.

"You sure about that," said Chimera, angling him so that he could see the area where the tower had been just a little better. A battle was taking place, between Shigaraki and Re-Destro who'd increased the size of his body somehow. "Because we've clearly gotten farther than you anticipated. Even better, we've got more reinforcements on the way. Okay just one reinforcement, but he's more than strong enough to deal with your forces in their current state."

"You might've surprised us a couple times," coughed Hanabata, "you were an unknown variable and the sudden increase in some of the League member's quirks was unexpected. But…..none of you…..can stand against our leader."

"Wanna make that a bet," said Chimera as he threw the Politician onto the roof of the building. He coughed several times as he gulped down much needed air while the Flesh Beast user continued to speak, his attention still firmly on the battle below. "How about this then: if Re-Destro wins then we'll surrender and join your cause, or die if that doesn't work. But, if Shigaraki wins, then you all bow down and serve us."

"And why would I, or any member of the Liberation Army agree to such a thing?" Questioned Hanabata.

"Isn't that your philosophy," questioned Chimera with a glance back, "you've been yammering about it the whole time, how one's place in society should be determined by their meta ability. But how do you even determine that? Are you basing it off of basic utility, specific application, versatility, contribution to society, or combat application? Based on what I've seen up to this point you guys are fans of combat application, which makes it even odder that a guy like you has a high position at all."

Chimera turned toward him then, "I mean look at you. You don't even appear to possess the same level of physical combat training as your followers. All your quirk is good for is pumping people up and now that you got no one around to help you," a scorpion tail shot out from his back and impaled a winged quirk user, throwing them down to the street below without Chimera even glancing back, "you're basically quirkless. Do you really think you're gonna keep a high position if you get the world you want?"

"The world will need leadership," said Hanabata, "good leadership. I will be one of Re-Destro's confidants, one of the people who will shape our new society."

"Typical polititian," said Chimera, "thinking you can have it both ways without realizing the contradiction. Now you say you should be in a good position because of your leadership abilities while everyone else's place should be determined by their Meta ability. 'Rules for thee but not for me' comes to mind right about now."

"You should be thanking us," exclaimed Hanabata, "I'm one of the people leading the world towards a better future, a freer future! If not for the oppressive rules and regulations keeping others from being their true selves, people like you and the League of Villains wouldn't be doing what you're doing, right?! Don't you all blame society for your lot in life?!"

"The others might," said Chimera with a shrug, "but in case you haven't noticed, I'm a cannibal. I doubt my habits would be tolerated even in your so-called 'liberated' world. And besides, what exactly are you even going to do with your quirks once you're liberated? There are already licenses you can get in order to use your quirk more freely, so what you really want to do with them probably isn't the most honest thing."

"What exactly are you trying to say?" Questioned Hanabata with narrowed eyes. He'd lost his sunglasses along with his helmet.

"Exactly what Spinner was saying earlier," replied Chimera, "you're on the same level. You think you should be allowed to do what you want, when you want and with no consequences whatsoever. In other words, you're all thinking like villains."

"No, the government said Destro was a villain," seethed Hanabata, "but he wasn't, they just didn't want to acknowledge that he was right! Quirks are a part of who we are! We shouldn't be forced to deny that!"

"And now we're arguing in circles," Chimera pointed out as he noted a mass of destruction suddenly sprouting up at the edge of the city and quickly approaching them, "you still haven't told me what you'd do with a basic support ability like yours, how it would really affect your life all that much if you were allowed to use it openly? The answer is, not much would change for you. But for guys like him, you'd basically be turning the world into their giant playground." Hanabata's eyes widened as he beheld the lumbering, rocky hillside that was Gigantomachia tearing a straight line through both buildings and Liberation warriors alike.

"You were hiding something like that," he said as the color drained from his face.

"'Hiding' is a bit of a strong word," said Chimera, "he hid himself on the orders of All for One and emerged when he felt it was time to find his successor. Dude's been tearing up the mountain range with us for a solid month. Surprised you didn't see that with your satellite surveillance."

"If that monster reaches the Grand Commander," Hanabata thought aloud in horror.

"Hard as it is for me to believe I'm saying this," commented Chimera, "I don't think you'll have to worry about Machia interfering. I think the battle between our leaders is about over." He'd noted the fact that Re-Destro had donned some kind of mechanized armor in order to assist with his quirk, whatever it was. And yet, he still seemed to be on the defensive as Shigaraki's decay quirk was growing stronger and stronger.

And then it happened. Shigaraki put his hand to the ground, and the largest wave of destruction yet was unleashed. A mass of dust and debris possibly half a mile wide or more spread out in all directions as buildings crumbled and Liberation fighters were torn asunder. Re-Destro himself was on the run, using his suit to jet away as whole sections of it were falling apart before he was engulfed in the dust that was part of the destruction. "I think that's our cue," said Chimera as he leapt over and grabbed ahold of Hanabata before flapping his wings, taking flight from the building and heading towards the center of the destruction.

He dropped the struggling politician off right at the edge where the remaining members of the Liberation Army had gathered before soaring over to the highest spot he could currently find, Gigantomachia's shoulder. As soon as the mass of destruction had started, the mountain of muscle had actually halted his advance, likely waiting to see the outcome. "So," said Chimera as he landed on the beast's left shoulder, "what do you think of your master's chosen successor now?" Machia didn't say anything at first as he looked upon the scene.

Nothing was left in the center of the crater save for two figures, Shigaraki and Re-Destro. Now that Chimera saw him, he wondered how so many people had taken the man seriously with his pointed nose and orange hair that ended in points on either side of his head. He was shirtless like Shigaraki was at the moment, though he was also missing his legs likely due to the mass use of the decay quirk from earlier. But the most noticeable thing about the Leader of the Liberation Army right now, was the fact that he was bowing to Shigaraki.

"He is," said Machia as actual tears welled up in his eyes, "the successor." And Chimera found himself agreeing with the beast of a man. Though the Leader of the League of villains was bruised and bloody, he seemed to stand taller and prouder than ever. His strength was undeniable now and Chimera for one could almost feel himself shaking at the prospects to come. The New Year would bring many interesting things, including a feast which would put even this one to shame.

And so ends the Villain Academia arc, or at least most of it. There's still a bit more for them to do before we switch back over to U.A., but that's for next time. So for now, feel free to leave a comment or review about what you liked/disliked or if you've got any neat ideas for future chapters. Be sure to stop in next time as the League solidifies its new position and our heroes return to U.A. from their internships! 'Til then.