Chapter 6: A day of (Pure Chaos)(Rest)
Welcome back! Time for a bit of a breather after that big punch up last chapter! But I mean, when does Chaldea ever actually get a break? Thank you all so much for the reviews! Glad to see you all enjoyed getting a look at what the Singularities and Lostbelts can turn a person into!
When Sherlock returned to Chaldea he informed Nathan that UA would be canceling classes the next day.
It was an attempt to give the students time to decompress and come to terms with what had happened the day before.
And so he was allowed to sleep in.
"Master. Master. Master get up. Master. Maaaaaster!"
Nathan opened his eye and leveled a glare at Oda Nobunaga.
"What?"
Nobunaga pointed a nerf gun at his head.
"I accidentally started another nerf war and I'm taking you hostage for leverage."
Allowed was a strong word.
"Can I get dressed first?"
"No, the Shisengumi are already on the way according to Chacha."
"Is it just you and the Shisengumi?"
"Um. Yes."
Nathan looked at the tiny black haired Archer class Servant.
"Technically." Nobunaga added.
"How many members do you have?"
"You'll have to consult Nobukatsu for that! But my personal squadron is ten strong!"
"I'm getting dressed anyway, if only to have some mystic codes available to heal myself." He said flinging his comforter over her head.
He did not sleep in immodest attire. That was a habit that had to be broken as soon as the trio famed for breaking into his room every night arrived. He wore Chaldea themed pajama pants and a white tshirt with the word EXTRA printed on it.
A soft thump from behind him indicated that Nobunaga was in fact losing her battle against his comforter.
Quickly changing into the mystic code he'd needed to wear during his trip to Uruk he prepared for the worst as Nobunaga finally freed herself from her blanket prison.
She leveled her nerf gun at him once again.
"So Master. You'll have to pick a side today! Is it with me or the Shisengumi?"
"I think this time I'm playing wild card."
"Wh-"
Before she could respond he kicked over the table in his room and ducked behind it. He pulled the nerf pistol he'd taped to the underside of it off and held it out to see just how trigger happy Nobunaga was.
A dart zoomed past him, probably aiming for where his head would have been if he'd charged out.
"Count I need covering fire."
Nathan's shadow extended out and from within a figure clad in the flames of vengeance emerged. The Count of Monte Cristo was one of his most stalwart allies, Nathan could always rely on him to be nearby and ready to answer at the slightest call.
"At your command Master."
From his cloak Edmond Dantes pulled out a large custom nerf rifle.
Nathan briefly wondered if he'd let this whole nerf war thing happen a few too many times.
Either way Edmond darted out from behind the table and opened fire, striking Nobunaga square in the chest.
Nathan followed his lead, jumping out and taking aim. A holographic blue ring shone out from his nerf pistol, displaying enough information on how it was pointed to compensate for his lack of depth perception. With that type of advantage his shot struck Nobunaga's head ensuring that she was out of the game.
"Guh. Tell my brother… I loved him…" Nobunaga fell over letting out many exaggerated groans as she 'died.'
"Well that's one Nobunaga down," Nathan said, taking her nerf rifle away from her just in case she decided to pretend she wasn't dead.
"Yes. Moreover I believe your room is surrounded. I suggest a tactical retreat to the cafeteria so that we may recruit some allies to our cause."
"Sounds good, let's go."
Edmond picked up his wayward Master and used his abilities to "Escape" space and time. They emerged from the darkness between the folds of reality into the cafeteria with a dull thud.
"Oh good you lived." EMIYA said with a smile, "Breakfast?"
"Dear god yes."
Midoriya watched as his phone rang. Usually Nathan texted him something in the morning but today he'd been quiet. And so he decided to call his friend to make sure he was ok.
It had nothing to do with the fact that he now knew Nathan lived in Chaldea and wanted to see what he could overhear.
"Hey, sorry I'm kind of busy today," Nathan said in a hushed tone.
He was breathing heavily and Midoriya could faintly register yelling in the background.
"Oh! I'm sorry! Is something wrong-"
"No. No more than usual for around here. Nobunaga started a nerf war and apparently Most of Chaldea has formed an intricate faction system and I'm just trying to live my life Midoriya."
He sounded more stressed than he'd been after going toe to toe with that massive villain yesterday.
"A nerf war?"
"It happens every now and then."
"I hear yelling, are you sure everything is ok?"
"They're being dramatic," Nathan said dryly, "Um…"
"Hm?"
"Your arms are healed up right?"
"Yeah! Good as new!"
"You… You were interested in Chaldea right?"
"Absolutely! I mean I like all hero organizations but Chaldea is just so mysterious that any scrap I can find about it is-"
"Do you wanna come over and help me out? Apparently there's a prize worth fighting for in this Nerf War so I haven't been able to get many heroes to back me up."
Midoriya's mind went blank.
He was being invited into Chaldea?
Was that really what was happening right now?
"I also feel bad that we haven't been able to hang out much since school started. I keep getting distracted by wanting to talk with everyone."
"Y-You can make other friends Nathan it's ok!" He said.
"So you don't want to come over?"
"No I absolutely do, one hundred percent."
"Ok I'll send the Count over to pick you up. Make sure you tell your mom."
With that Nathan hung up.
Midoriya bolted into the living area where his mom sat quietly watching TV.
"MOM I'M GOING OVER TO A FRIENDS HOUSE!" He shouted perhaps louder than he'd intended.
"Oh! How wonderful! Do you need me to pack you anything?"
"Um? I don't think so. I just wanted to let you know where I was going and ask if it was ok!"
"Absolutely Izuku! I'm so glad you've already made such good friends at UA!"
She absolutely beamed at the thought of her quiet son having another friend he could spend his off days with.
Midoriya returned to his room in order to make sure his things were in order before leaving.
He let out a muffled yelp when he noticed there was someone else already there.
"Midoriya Izuku I take it?" The man in a dark green cloak asked.
Everything about the man seemed to scream villain but before Midoriya could fully process this he spoke again.
"Nathan has instructed me to take you to Chaldea. Do you have a nerf gun by chance?"
"No?"
"A pity. One will be supplied to you then. Come along." He extended his hand to the boy. There was a sense of reluctance about him but Midoriya simply nodded.
"Can we do this out front so my mom sees me leaving and doesn't think I crawled out my window."
"Fine."
Midoriya blinked and the man was gone.
He must have some kind of warping quirk. An extremely powerful one at that if he was able to disappear so quickly.
Wait.
That had to have been a Chaldean pro hero! He had just talked to one of them! One of them had been in his room!
He had to suppress his urge to scream and write about it in his journal. He had an actual Chaldea to explore. Writing could be done later.
He gave his mom a quick wave and exited his house.
Someone grabbed his shoulders the moment the door closed and everything went dark.
He couldn't even begin to describe what he was feeling. Beyond the cloaked man holding onto his shoulders behind him he couldn't tell where anything was. With no reference point even his sense of time failed him. The endless darkness of the void stretched out before him and threatened to take him should he lose focus on his sense of self for even a moment.
He blinked and he was in a room with Nathan and two others.
"What just-"
"Thanks Count. Here take this," Nathan immediately offered him a nerf pistol as if he hadn't just experienced an endless eternity beyond time and space.
"Um. Hi?" He said to the two adults lingering behind Nathan after accepting the pistol.
One of them was a beautiful woman with blond hair. She wore a black dress the likes of which he'd never seen and wielded a nerf rifle that seemed to be brimming with an unnatural power.
The other was a lanky white haired man clad in a black skin tight suit. He had a large red feather cape hanging behind him from two golden shoulder pads that didn't seem to be attached to anything.
"This is Ereshkigal, Karna, you've met the Count, and Gramps is watching the door."
It was only when Nathan pointed him out that Midoriya noticed him.
Death itself stood facing the door. That man was well over 200cm and held a nerf gun that was probably quite large but was dwarfed by his imposing skull themed armor.
"Everyone, this is Midoriya Izuku. He's a good friend so please be nice to him," Nathan said calmly.
This was it. This was Chaldea. These were Chaldeans. He was actually here inside their facility.
It looked like a relatively normal room. Nathan himself stood next to a table with a large map spread across it. He'd fashioned some custom pieces and had them laid across the map to mark key locations.
"So here's the situation. We've got something like seven or eight factions. Apparently the last one standing gets some kind of prize so they're being a little more competitive than normal."
"D-Does this happen often?" Midoriya asked, walking over to the table to get a better look at the map. Chaldea was a truly sprawling facility. It had several rooms marked as out of play but was still easily as big as a large apartment complex. Unmarked was how many floors this structure was.
"Mh. Every month or so. It's a good stress reliever. Sometimes."
"It is an enjoyable break," Karna said, shifting his stance slightly, "There are simply too many of us to fill the requests we receive for aid, so certain members of our organization can grow quite bored."
"Oh. I understand," Midoriya nodded.
An avalanche of questions begging to be asked waited, but he didn't want to come off as some sort of spy. He would just go along with whatever they were doing and see what he could find out from there.
"The rules of engagement are simple. Three shots and you're out unless you get shot in the head or directly in the heart." Ereshkigal explained. "Quirks are fair game as long as they're not too destructive."
That meant Midoriya's quirk was off the table.
"Has our intel unit gotten back yet Gramps?"
"Aye, he approaches."
That hulking monstrosity stepped to the side as the door opened.
A familiar tattooed man entered.
"Oh. Hey Mido, what are you doing here?"
"I recruited him for extra manpower."
"Aaaaah I see I see. Well lets go over enemy positions real quick," Yan Qing said, approaching the map.
The level of tactical thinking that followed left Midoriya reeling. It was as if they were conducting an actual war, discussing potential strategies, potential casualties that may result from them, how such losses might impact their overall prospects of victory.
Midoriya was skilled when it came to individual one on one fights that relied on applying quirks in the correct way.
But listening to Nathan essentially wage war on Chaldea was something else.
It was a completely different skill set from Midoriya's.
"The knights are going to be a problem," Karna muttered, "We don't have the manpower to match them at all and picking them off is going to be tricky."
"What if we don't fight them directly? We could just get them and the Romans to clash. That might be enough," Nathan suggested.
"It would thin the herd at least."
"Um. What's our most pressing threat?" Midoriya asked.
"Immediately? The Shisengumi. If Okita and Nobunaga meet up and their factions merge it'll be a big problem mainly because we'll just be surrounded."
Karna pointed to a point on the map for Midoriya just so it'd be easier for him to follow along. "There aren't that many of them so we should be able to fight them man to man except for Hijikata."
Midoriya found it a little strange that all the heroes in Chaldea seemed to use their hero names even in Chaldea but he supposed that it was good practice for hiding their true identities. Not to mention that all of their hero names had some sort of historical or mythological meaning behind them.
"We should try to take back the cafeteria so we can have lunch," Nathan said simply.
"Which means we'll have to deal with the artists and the french," Yan Qing said simply, "If we give them time Salieri will probably lose it and start a civil war for us."
"Or we could throw fuel on the fire." Nathan added. "We'll get to it when we get to it, for now we need to clear our surroundings and move on. Yan Qing, what about Okita Alter?"
"Willing to join us at the drop of a hat."
"Cool, I'll appeal to her myself then. Midoriya you're with me, the rest of you. Survive."
"Yes Sir!" they called as the relatively small group filed out of the room.
"You guys take this so seriously," Midoriya said with a nervous chuckle.
"It is like that sometimes. It's good practice for tactical thinking at least."
"I'll say."
"Alright Midoriya, let's get moving. Don't forget to watch our flanks."
"Yes sir!" Midoriya said on reflex before realizing Nathan was the same age as him.
It was simply his presence. Nathan already had the air of someone who had commanded many battles.
Ten minutes later they'd found their Target. She stood with her frankly ridiculous shoes which added about 18 cm to her height. She seemed to be asleep on her feet despite this.
Another woman who looked almost exactly like her but with less of a tan and shorter more colorful hair stood with her nerf rifle at her side.
They were both around the corner and weren't paying attention so Nathan and Midoriya had the element of surprise on their side.
Nathan motioned to his eye and pointed to their surroundings before nodding and stepping out.
His movements were absolutely silent. Midoriya had no idea how he was doing it beyond that it must have taken a ton of practice.
Leveling his pistol, Nathan fired once, striking the shorter woman in the back of the head.
"BWAH!" She coughed up blood before falling over, waking the long haired version of herself.
"Oh. Hi Nathan," The long haired one said with a yawn, "I wasn't sleeping."
"I believe you. Wanna join our side?"
"Absolutely. I'm only here because Okita asked me first. And she's dead now so…"
"We've got company!" Midoriya called out.
Nathan and Okita Alter turned to look where Midoriya was pointing.
"Oh fuck." Was the only thing that escaped Nathan's lips.
Dozens of golden portals bathed the hallway in an ethereal light.
"Well well well. You've gone and recruited a couple of mongrels I see."
He was shirtless with red lines tattooed on his torso. His lower half was clad in golden armor. He had his blonde hair slicked back.
Midoriya had never seen this man before but he could tell he was some kind of royalty just by looking at him.
Most importantly. Each of those golden portals had produced a gold plated nerf gun.
All of them were trained on Midoriya.
"Gilgamesh…"
"I'm ashamed mongrel. Truly. You've been waging this war for nearly three hours and you haven't come to request aid from your king!"
"Uh… You wanna help us out?"
With a snap of his fingers the golden portals snapped shut.
"Fuahahahaha! Of course, I only play for the winning team!"
"We're dealing with the Shisengumi right now. The others should be herding Hijikata this way. I want to seal off his escape routes."
"Consider this hallway covered!" Gilgamesh shouted proudly.
"I can stay here and man this one," Okita alter said, "I promise I won't fall asleep."
Midoriya finally recovered from having his life flash before his eyes at the sight of so many gun barrels pointed at him, "I'll take this side."
"Good." Nathan said, approaching Midoriya. "Hijikata is extremely wild so be ready for anything."
Just as he finished speaking.
Almost as if called.
A shout so loud Midoriya swore their opponent was already right in front of them rang through the hallway.
"THIS! IS! THE! SHISENGUMI!"
It was an explosion of a man.
How he managed to turn the corner going that fast was beyond Midoriya.
He was charging straight at Gilgamesh, who obliged, opening up the Gate of Babylon and firing on the approaching man.
He drew a sword and began deflecting nerf darts as he charged ahead.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" He roared, eyes blazing.
"Are swords even allowed!?" Midoriya screamed as Nathan aimed his pistol, a strange blue ring of light emerging from the gun as he did so.
"Get ready to fire!" Nathan shouted.
The moment Hijikata arrived at that intersection Nathan, Midoriya, and Okita Alter pulled their triggers.
Three darts struck Hijikata just as he pressed his own nerf gun against Gilgamesh's temple.
"So… This is how it ends… Nathan. Please. Carry the Shisengumi with you."
His nerf gun dropped from his hand as he staggered backwards before falling himself.
Midoriya couldn't help but admire him. He had faced that golden barrage head on where he'd only managed to quake in fear. Truly he had a long way to go before he reached the level of a pro hero.
A soft plink sounded.
A nerf dart hit the ground.
"You… You dare… You mongrel!" Gilgamesh got out before he fell to the ground.
Behind him stood a woman with long white hair wearing a red dress.
Midoriya recognized her as the woman that had driven Nathan to UA on the day of the entrance exam.
"Revenge for my fallen comrade. I won't let your sacrifice be in vain my dear…" She said as both Nathan and Okita Alter's darts struck her in the head and side respectively.
She fell to her knees, looking up to the sky as if accepting an invitation from the gates of heaven.
"Well. That could have gone… Worse." Nathan said simply. "I was kind of hoping to keep Gilgamesh since that would have made cleaning up the round table easier, but taking out Hijikata is good enough."
"I am sorry for betraying your trust sir," Okita Alter said, kneeling respectfully at the man's side.
Midoriya could feel tears welling up in his eyes. How could Nathan witness so much death so casually. He was only focused on how each unit could help in his next conflict rather than the fact that people were dying right in front of him.
Hijikata pushed himself up off the ground.
"Ok well, I'll head to one of the out of play areas then. I appreciate the opportunity to cut loose so thank you for allowing us our silliness."
"Fufufu yes it is quite enjoyable," Carmilla added.
"I will make you pay for your transgressions on this day, mongrel." Gilgamesh said bitterly as he stood.
"Sure you will goldy."
Oh right they were fighting a nerf war.
Midoriya shook his head in an attempt to return to some kind of reality.
"Okita are you alive still?" Hijikata asked, approaching the downed saber.
She gave him a thumbs up but otherwise did not move.
"Alright up you go." He said hoisting her over his shoulder before walking away with the other two noncombatants.
Midoriya wanted to stop them just to talk about their quirks and pro hero life but Nathan was already moving.
"Gramps. What's the status of the rest of our group?"
Somehow.
Despite wearing full plate armor
And being somewhere around 220 cm tall.
That man clad in blue fire and skulls completely snuck up on him.
Midoriya screamed as he jumped behind Nathan.
"Y-You ok Midoriya?"
"Y-y-y-yes! I'm fine!" He nodded rapidly, perhaps in an attempt to shake the fear out of his head.
"We hath suffered no casualties. Dost thou remember the rendezvous point, my contractor?"
"Yeah, rec room, let's start heading that way then. With any luck we'll be able to recruit a couple of extras on the way."
"Aye."
Midoriya blinked and that behemoth was gone.
A lot of Chaldeans had teleporting quirks apparently. Maybe that's how they responded so quickly to emergency calls.
"Ah, there you are Nathan."
Midoriya's eyes fell on a heavily dressed woman with long white hair. She looked like some kind of princess.
"Hi Anastasia," Nathan said as he leveled his nerf gun at her, "Friend or foe?"
"Friend, friend. Viy tells me your numbers are quite small so it would be cruel to play tricks on you. It looks like you've even called for outside help fufufu."
Midoriya blushed as her attention fell on him.
"Happy to have you aboard. Shall we?" He said as he lowered his gun.
"Do I not get a proper royal escort?"
Nathan rolled his eye as he hooked his right arm with her left. She made it a point to look back at Midoriya and Okita Alter with a devilish grin on her face.
Despite Anastasia's best efforts, they arrived at the rec room without incident. It was a much larger room than Midoriya had been expecting, filled with pool tables, arcade cabinets, and many other carnival games.
He'd seen the map but it did a poor job of showing how massive this facility truly was. How had it been established in such a short amount of time?
"Status report," Nathan said pulling out the large map scroll from somewhere and spreading it over one of the pool tables.
"There's been some unrest in the cafeteria. The saints arrived and made a big ol mess of things. The writers are all down thankfully, but the actual numbers in the cafeteria are larger now." Yan Qing said, laying out the miniatures, "But since it is almost lunch we could just run in, take as many of them out as we can, and call for time out before they can retaliate."
"Underhanded but I suppose against these odds it is the best we can hope for," Karna said quietly.
"And the Nobu squad?"
"Destroyed itself, the only one still around is Kagetora and Avenger Nobunaga."
"Mh. Problematic but we can probably grab Kagetora. How're the deities doing Ereshkigal?"
"Almost completely wiped themselves out. I impersonated Ishtar and said a few colorful remarks," She said with a proud smile.
Midoriya just watched in amazement as they continued on, updating their map as they spoke of the intel they'd received.
It was too much for him to keep up with.
"Art thou feeling under the weather young one?"
Once again this so called Gramps startled the everloving hell out of him, but Midoriya was starting to get used to him suddenly popping up.
"Y-Yeah! It's just a lot to take in at once you know!"
The man nodded. "The hour approaches, shall we ring the evening bell?"
"Right. Let's get this battle started! Then we can call for lunch!"
Midoriya stood alongside Ereshkigal and The Count.
He wasn't sure why he'd chosen to separate from Nathan considering he now had two extremely difficult options for conversation partners.
One of them seemed to have a barely repressed disdain for his existence. His hatred seeped from him almost visually as if he was physically made from that emotion.
The other one was a cute girl.
"Just remember not to go too wild Count."
"Oh I won't…" he said in a tone of voice that indicated he very much did not mean what he was saying. "I'll just take out those damn rulers. They can take their salvation and go back home!"
A dart whizzed through the air and struck a white haired man with a large sword in the back of the head.
"Sanson no!" A woman with a large pumpkin hat shouted as the group began to mobilize.
Ice flowered out across the floor, freezing a few of the heroes in place before they could react in time.
Edmond was out in a flash firing his rifle and striking a tanned man with white hair in the head before fading into the darkness of his own shadow.
"That was Edmond wasn't it!? Nathan is here!" An androginous person wearing a purple hat shouted before that purple hat was shot off their head.
"Hooooooh! Motzart!" A man clad in a striped black suit turned and fired on one of his own, taking him out as the kitchen erupted into chaos.
"Give me thine head."
Gramps appeared directly behind a purple haired woman and shot her straight in the head.
Another dart flew out from the doorway and struck a man with bronze armor straight in the head.
"Alright. It's our turn human!" Ereshkigal darted out, firing and missing her target, "W-w-w-w-wait! Let me!"
The blond woman she'd fired on didn't even let her finish her sentence before shooting her in the head.
This proved to be the perfect distraction for Midoriya to hop out, taking out the woman who had defeated Ereshkigal.
The sound of electricity crackling reached Midoriya's ears as Nathan dropped from the ceiling, firing his pistol at the woman with the pumpkin hat.
His aim was impeccable despite his lack of depth perception. Did that gun have some kind of aim assist? Was that what that glowing blue ring was?
"Alright Salieri. You with us? Truly?"
"Ooooh! Salieri!? That's… That's not my-"
"Yan Qing!"
"Nothin personal buddy." Yan Qing appeared from the shadows behind that raving man and shot him in the back of the head at point blank range.
Okita Alter and Anastasia emerged from the main doors to the cafeteria each carrying large nerf rifles.
"Is that all of them?"
"Looks like. The cafeteria is ours!" Nathan called out, "Time for lunch."
The cafeteria filled with heroes as word of the ceasefire spread.
Midoriya's mental notes had overflowed from the sheer number of them present. There were easily a couple of hundred people milling about in groups just casually chatting with each other.
To think Chaldea had this many heroes at its disposal.
Granted they protected the entire country but still…
There was a difference between theorizing about them and actually seeing their scale for himself.
"So what do you think?" Nathan asked casually from his place across from Midoriya.
"It's so much. I want to interview everyone here and find out about their quirks and… Just everything about them!" He said excitedly.
The Count raised an eyebrow before giving a hearty laugh, "My my. It would seem you two are compatible in a fair number of ways."
Midoriya looked at him, expression shrouded in confusion.
He was the second Chaldean that had compared him to Nathan favorably.
What were they seeing that he wasn't?
"I'm sure they would enjoy someone new to talk to but it will take a while. There are a lot of them…" A nervous chuckle followed those words.
"D-Do any of you mind if I ask about your quirks?" Midoriya muttered. It was the one surefire way he knew he could keep a conversation going with strangers he barely knew.
"I don't see why not. Why don't you get started Count?"
"Hm?"
"You did use it on him before. And you'll have to use it on him again to take him home."
"Ah yes. Very well. My quirk allows me to escape anything," Edmond Dantes said with a theatrical flare, "A bad situation, a locked room, nothing is outside of my quirk. Even, as you experienced, time and space are targets for my quirk."
What?
A quirk that allowed him to simply "escape" that could be applied to anything.
It was a truly ludicrous ability. It almost didn't even sound like a quirk it was so strong.
Midoriya's mind boggled at the possible applications.
He opened his mouth to question further before being interrupted.
"Hello everyone!" A man clad in a long white robe with long white hair approached the group.
"Hey Merlin,"
"Ah I see the prodigal child Midoriya Izuku has joined us today. How are you adjusting to the wild world of Chaldea?" That flowery man said, giving the aforementioned boy a pat on the head.
When had Midoriya's name become something everyone in Chaldea seemed to already know?
It was flattering but also worrying.
"It's really amazing! I'm glad Nathan gave me the opportunity to come here!"
"Hm hm hm! Excellent!" Merlin took the seat on Midoriya's other side. "Good good! Before you ask, my quirk is clairvoyance! The entirety of the present is an open book to me!"
Another ridiculous quirk to add to the pile. Exactly how far did the "entirety of the present" reach? Was it truly the whole world? How could one man even process that much information without going insane.
"Some would argue that he's quite insane to begin with," Ereshkigal said offhandedly.
Oh God he'd been muttering.
"I- I'm sorry!" He bowed his head.
Merlin burst out laughing, "My my quite the timid one. I distinctly remember a time where someone else at this table acted much the same way!"
Midoriya looked up.
Right at Nathan.
That overwhelming smile was on his face.
"I still have my moments I think," He said serenely.
"Grubs up!" A voice from the kitchen called out.
"Yes good," Anastasia said from her place at Nathan's side.
How that boy could handle two beautiful women sitting so close to him was beyond Midoriya.
Large plates of food, the likes of which he'd never seen slid across the table.
A muscular man wearing a sleeveless black shirt passed by as he distributed more plates of food.
No. That was armor wasn't it?
Also what was with Chaldea and white hair? It was surprisingly common as far as he'd seen.
"I hope it's to your liking. I wasn't sure what to make for you Midoriya Izuku so I just threw together a little smattering of everything."
"It's EMIYA food I'm sure he'll like it," Ereshkigal said under her breath as she began stacking her plate.
The smell was certainly divine.
Midoriya took one bite from the plate of curry he'd picked out and was completely lost.
Was that still even a food? How could it be when it was clearly constructed of pure flavors the likes of which he'd never experienced.
"Is this what you eat every day!?" Midoriya called out, snapping himself away from his thoughts.
"Boudica, Tamacat, and Beni cook too, but mostly yes."
To be able to enjoy food that transcended his normal sense of quality every day…
He wouldn't lie and say he wasn't jealous but…
Nathan had lost half of his limbs, an eye, and was covered in scars.
He had combat and strategic abilities that were far outside what he should have at their age.
Midoriya could only guess at why he'd developed the skills he had, but every guess came to something terrible happening to him. Perhaps being able to enjoy meals like this every day was a fitting reward.
And so they ate together. The massive swirl of chaldeans that filled the room seemed to all spiral inward towards Nathan at one point or another, each of them checking in on him to make sure he was doing ok after yesterday.
Midoriya had never quite seen anything like it. Over 100 pro heroes doting on one boy.
How had he reached this point?
"What was it like? Traveling with chaldea for so many years?"
"A lot." Nathan said simply, "It was a rough time that's for sure but we all made it through together. It got easier as our ranks swelled but only barely."
Midoriya struggled to imagine a threat that could make some of the pros he'd been introduced to sweat.
Karna's quirk "Aspect of the Sun" was especially egregious. He had to be at least as strong as Endeavor, if not more so. His quirk simply had none of the downsides Endeavor's did.
"It may be hard to imagine as we are now, but our foes were quite mighty. They make for excellent tales that we dare not tell," Merlin said in a sing song tone, "Not yet anyway. There will be a time and a place for us to play all of our cards."
If there was one thing Midoriya had learned from Merlin it was that seeing all of the present allowed him to make fairly accurate predictions of the future.
Also that that ability made Merlin mildly insufferable to the rest of Chaldea.
Except for Nathan who, in his experience, unconditionally accepted everyone. He'd even offered his hand to those villains yesterday.
"Well? How was it?" EMIYA asked, approaching Midoriya from behind.
"It was really really good! Thank you so much for the food sir!"
"Hah, glad you liked it. Hopefully Nathan didn't try to hog it all for himself too much."
"Midoriya's plate was too far for me to reach," Nathan said, "Otherwise it would have been mine…"
It was Midoriya's turn to laugh. Somehow despite being surrounded by dozens of pro heroes he knew nothing about he had managed to relax.
He was getting used to the strange air this facility held.
After lunch Nathan's faction tripled in size. Apparently a lot of the groups that had been mostly destroyed as well as a few outliers had used the break to get close enough to Nathan to join him.
As such Midoriya found himself with a completely new group.
Again he'd elected to separate from Nathan.
His squadron was five strong including himself. Two of them were children of around twelve if he had to guess.
Another was an extremely loud person in every sense of the word. They wore elaborate clothing and had a shawl of what looked like pure mercury hovering around them. Probably something to do with their quirk.
The last member was a green catgirl who spent most of her time doting over him and the two children.
"Umu… So we're heading off the Celt-Pirate alliance yes?" The loud moth shaped person known as Shi Huang Di asked.
"Yes. Orders are to make sure they don't meet up with the rest of the Greeks…" Midoriya said in response.
"Atalanta. Remind Us. Why are you not with the Greeks?"
The cat girl just shot Them a glare.
"Someone has to watch over the children. If Abigail, Voyager, and Midoriya wish to accompany you then someone sensible needs to supervise them."
"Hoho! The word sensible is doing a lot of work there is it not?"
They just laughed while Abigail hoisted up her oversized nerf gun.
"Lets go play mister!" she said, tugging on Midoriya's shirt.
"O-oh! Of course!"
"It is very fun to play these games. Running around all of Chaldea and meeting all of the friends I've made while here again in a new way." The small blond child, apparently Voyager, said.
As they stalked the halls a question came to Midoriya's mind.
"Why does Chaldea have children here?"
He could understand that Nathan was a statistical anomaly. But there had to have been at least a dozen kids at lunch that were younger than him, and several people that looked to be their age.
"Mh. If We had to say one way or another… They do not have anywhere else to go. We do not deploy them, naturally, but their quirks are simply too unruly to entrust them with standard orphanages." Shi Huang Di said absentmindedly as the mercury swirling around Them formed itself into a series of nerf guns. They pulled out a handful of darts and just pushed them lazily into those liquid rifles.
"We do what we can to take care of them. There are a lot of heroes on staff like me that love children and we dedicate a large amount of time to keeping them happy," Atalanta filled in, "We've tried everything we could think of but at the end of the day, keeping them here is for the best."
"Yeah! Plus we really like Chaldea! They let us play and have fun and they don't punish us if we don't keep our rooms clean all the time!" Abigail said excitedly.
Ah. To grow up in a secret organization… He supposed Nathan had done much the same thing. Hadn't he mentioned it had been five years since he'd been taken in?
Midoriya wasn't sure how he felt about that but there were several heroes around that had enough mom-like qualities that he was sure it was fine at some level.
"Hoh. It would seem that the Celts have split off. The pirates are mostly routed. Come. We shall help Ourselves to the remainder!"
Shi Huang Di advanced into the next room, opening fire and forcing the three pirates remaining inside to duck behind a table.
"Open!" Abigail called out. A tiny gate appeared before her rifle which she immediately fired a shot through.
"Ack! Really!?" The smaller of the two women came out from behind the table with their hands up, "I'm out."
"You'll pay for that!" A busty blond popped up only to immediately get shot in the head by one of Atalanta's nerf arrows.
"Guh. Wait! Wait! I surrender! I surrender!" A man with a spear and green vestments shouted as he stuck his head out, "Please have some mercy! I'm too old for this-"
"No." Voyager said, shooting him in the heart without any hesitation. "We win! Do you think Nathan will be happy with us?"
"OF COURSE! The pirates have been routed! Come! Let Us continue on Our hunt!"
As the evening went on Midoriya's group tore through another two factions, only losing Atalanta during a pitched battle against the Celts.
Shortly after they finished cleaning up the remains of the Nobunaga faction an announcement sounded through Chaldea's PA system.
"The Nerf War has concluded! The Nathan-Midoriya Faction has come out victorious! Everyone please report to the cafeteria!"
"Ah. Such a trivial matter. It's only natural We should come out on top," Shi Huang Di said with a triumphant air.
"I'm just glad I managed to stay in play all day… I thought for sure I was going to get taken out when the Celts ambushed us…" Midoriya said. He was utterly exhausted. He'd been swept up in how serious the Chaldeans took this game causing him to truly go all out in response.
"Good job Izuku!" Abigail and Voyager added with a smile.
"Thanks! You two did well too!"
Abigail's quirk, as he'd come to understand it, allowed her to open "Gates" which sounded vague and unhelpful, but she'd demonstrated that there was absolutely no limit to what those gates could contain or where they could lead. It was as if she could twist space and time itself.
There was definitely some merit in the assertion that these children would be too much for normal orphanages to handle…
"Um. Emperor- I mean… Shi Huang Di! Um- I was wondering something else."
"Ask and We shall answer to the best of Our abilities young friend of Nathan!"
"Why… Why do you all stay at Chaldea and constantly use your Hero names? Don't you have lives outside of here?"
Not once had he seen anyone break character. This facility was certainly big enough to accommodate all of these heroes, but why were they here exactly? Did they not have families to go back to? Normal lives to live?
"Hm. Simple. We have all chosen to stay by the Master of Chaldea no matter what. As long as they live We will never abandon them. As such. Our hero identities… They are Us. We have chosen to throw everything else away in order to follow in their footsteps."
Midoriya's eyes widened.
What kind of person could command that level of loyalty?
The Master of Chaldea was spoken of in hushed tones by several of the heroes but Midoriya had never seen them, nor heard anything that could help him identify them. Even Nathan, who he'd known for a while at this point, had never mentioned them.
"What kind of person are they?"
"Master is really nice! They saved us!" Abigail said.
"They saved us too. Gave us the ability to travel with them. To experience things like we've never been able to before…" Voyager added.
"They are a scion of humanity. That much is certain. But they are a normal person. Their strength comes from their bonds with all of Us, and the ability to make those bonds with others. They called on Us for help and We gladly answered."
Midoriya wished beyond anything that he'd be allowed to meet this mysterious Master of Chaldea one day. Just to see exactly what kind of hero could draw so many to their side…
"Oh, hey Midoriya," Nathan said as their groups met back up in the cafeteria, "I guess everything went alright since we won and all. Nice work man. I knew it was a good call to bring you into this!"
"Ah. Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity Relnor-san! I had a lot of fun today!"
"You look like you're about to pass out on your feet kid. Why don't you settle in for dinner then we can send you home," Yang Qin spoke with a large grin.
Midoriya wouldn't protest his words out loud. As much as he wanted to stay and keep talking with the Chaldeans he knew he was at his limit. After yesterday this was a lot to do in a day.
He had no idea how Nathan managed to look so refreshed after all of that…
After eating Midoriya said his goodbyes to the collected pro heroes.
Another trip to the space between spaces took him back home with a bento box a small bird like girl had given him for his mother.
"Oh!" She gasped upon his return, "You made it back! I was starting to wonder if you were going to spend the night!"
"I thought about it but they insisted that I get some rest in my own home after yesterday!" Midoriya said with a smile. "Have you had dinner?"
"I was just about to start making it. Do you need anything?"
"No no, I ate while I was there. Here!" He presented the beautifully wrapped box, "They made it for you as a present for letting me come over!"
"Oh how lovely of them! You'll have to thank Relnor for me tomorrow!"
"I will!"
But for now he had enough information swirling around in his head to fill at least three notebooks that he needed to get down before the details started growing fuzzy.
Sherlock received another phonecall from UA. They were becoming quite common following USJ. He was glad they were concerned but they were starting to give him a headache.
Their subject was singular.
Nathan Relnor.
His response to that villain attack had been at the level of a high ranking pro hero.
They wanted to know how he was capable of such a feat.
But simply telling them the truth, that Nathan had overcome far far greater trials just to ensure the world could be what it is today, was out of the question.
So he would be evasive in his own way. He was sure it was irritating but he had little other recourse.
"Aizawa-kun, what is it this time?" Sherlock asked.
"I'm holding Nathan in late after school tomorrow. We have things to discuss about his behavior yesterday."
"Very well, tell him to call us when he's ready to be picked up."
Aizawa gave a noncommittal grunt before continuing.
"Listen. I just want to help him. So please. I need to know what happened to him. What gave him that kind of experience? What gave him those reflexes? What made him so unafraid?"
"I'm sure if you ask him he will tell you that he was entirely motivated by fear. The fear of others being hurt sure but regardless, we've been over this quite a few times my good sir. Nathan's experiences since he joined Chaldea are still as top secret as the last time you called me. I am sorry, I know it's frustrating, but we cannot divulge anything that would endanger the Master of Chaldea."
There was a pause at the other end.
"So you're willing to throw a child under the bus just to protect your boss?"
"If I am presented with no other options then yes. I will do whatever it takes."
"You can't operate like that. No matter how much good you do… He's still a child."
"As you've said many times before. Now, if there isn't anything else I really must be going."
Aizawa hung up without another word.
Sherlock was glad.
Nathan had all the support he could ask for and more here at Chaldea. But the unique relationship he had with all of the heroic spirits here prevented him from truly appreciating their concern for his well being.
So to have a human who did not depend on him for their continued existence express that concern?
"That will do wonders I think…" He said aloud to that empty room.
Hope you enjoyed this chapter as much as I did! I figured I should maybe throw in a more Fate focused chapter for once since I've been mostly on the MHA side of this crossover. Who knows. Maybe Midoriya will start putting two and two together at some point! For now thanks for reading! Have a good week!