So looking at the weather weve had like 5 springs and winters now, but the days are getting longer so I think the actual spring is approaching. New chapter release days always seem to come around so quickly. Next three are going to be a hefty package of friends, tears, slight nightly accident while sleeping and smiles bright enough to wake you up in the morning.

Before that. Enjoy this chapter about our favorite or most hated Trashfire Mc Kaboom and one other character who is making his/her first appearance in the fic now.

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Comments:

Dregus: Yep. It was really a perfect platform for Izuku to throw any dirt he had on anyone and Endeavour made the mistake of pissing him off right at that time.

AnimeFan13579: Never even thought about the confession quirk. I could see a conflict being born with Izuku trying to expose all the dirt of current system to make it tear itself apart and reform while Tomura wants to tear down and destroy everything.

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Proofread by 3DPhantom

Chapter 49: V For Vigilante

A purse fell out of a robber's grasp as Bakugo's fist sunk into her cheek with the momentum of explosion-boosted flight. There was a crack and the wannabe robber slammed against the wall, instantly knocked out.

"Tsk," Bakugo scowled at the middle-aged woman. He breathed a little faster than usually, but from brief excitement, not effort. She had run fast for her age, but that wasn't much to Bakugo, and she hadn't used any quirks trying to get away even when chased. At her age group it was totally possible the woman might have been quirkless, not that it would have made any difference.

"Weak."

He thought about picking up the purse the woman had stolen, but there was already an audible ruckus approaching from behind the corner. The owner would get her purse back. He quickly went through her pockets, finding a wallet with some cash, then held out the unconscious thief's arm and brought his shoe down on it hard enough to break the elbow with a satisfying crunch. He repeated the same with her other arm then looked up. With a few explosions getting to the roof of the building next to him was no different to him than walking up a handful of stairs. Looking down some of the more heroic but unfit and slow bystanders reached where Bakugo had taken out the robber, followed soon by the victim and the ever-useless police. The victim thanked them profusely as they handed her back her purse as if they had anything to do with getting it back. Bakugo spat on the roof and walked away.

Let them crawl on the ground. He was fine walking above them. He didn't even need his quirk to leap from one roof to the other, and that was more thanks to his own strength than the distance between the roofs. Looking down at the people crawling on the ground below was just a bonus from liberating himself of that existence, and if any of them took issue with him, well he'd like to see them try and stop him. The criminals he encountered weren't giving him enough of a challenge.

Of course, there was a dark side to everything as Bakugo soon arrived at the crappy motel he was staying at. The owner didn't even bother sticking around at the reception. From the sound of things, he was watching some adult movie in the backroom again. Bakugo rung the bell on the reception desk and waited for a few seconds. When nothing happened, he bit his teeth together, scowling, and detonated a loud explosion on his palm.

"HEY SHITTY HOST! YOU WANT MY MONEY OR NOT?!"

"WHAT THE HELL YOU WANT?!"

"I SAID I WANT TO PAY FOR MY ROOM, YOU DEAF OR SOMETHING?!"

"IF YOU KEEP MAKING NOISE LIKE THAT I WILL BE!"

The owner of the motel finally stepped out of the backroom, scowling at Bakugo. As if the fatso could have hoped to intimidate Bakugo. All he did was make his face more punchable. A series of small explosions sparked on Bakugo's palm.

"I should just kick you out."

"Then who would pay you to stay in this dump. It's not exactly the trendiest place in the city. You need every yen you can get. Here. I'm going to stay another week."

Bakugo handed him a bunch of cash from robbers that he had taken down. The man moved faster than he looked capable of to take it before Bakugo could change his mind. After counting them he looked back up at Bakugo.

"What are you still doing here?"

Bakugo huffed and left to go to his room. That was another issue solved for at least one more week. As he walked he counted what was left, not enough to eat for the week. He'd have to find more criminals, even if it was more small-time thugs, mutants, and purse snatchers. He wished there had been even one that could have at least given him a warm-up. Beating them up was turning into a chore more than a fight. How could pro heroes be worshipped for catching such nobodies?

Bakugo slammed the door to his room shut behind him, not caring about the shouts from the motel owner. Bakugo already hoped the man would try something criminal so he would get to crush the man. He might end up doing that anyway, but he didn't feel like finding a new place right now.

As soon as Bakugo was in the room he ripped off and tossed away the shirt he was wearing. He hated the thing, but it was a great robber bait. The oversized shirt would have fit the fat motel owner better, but with Bakugo the long sleeves completely hid any muscles that would have made random scum think twice about messing with him, at least for now. The picture on the shirt was of some nobody hero making him look like some fanboy nerd Deku whenever he wore the thing. In the right parts of town he just needed to pass through a few alleys, glancing around like he was worried for his safety and eventually some nobody would make the biggest mistake of their life. In a few cases they made the smart choice to go after someone else, but did so too close to Bakugo, like today.

Bakugo sat on the single creaky chair in his room by the equally old table and pulled out the purse-snatcher's wallet. He'd already pulled out the cash, but had taken up a habit to check on people whose ability to eat solid food he had removed. Like lots of people the wallet had some pictures of kids, one of them with an ugly mutation that made his face at least grow fur like some animal. Bakugo tossed the picture aside and pulled out the woman's id-card. He opened his laptop and a search with her name brought up quick results, from sites cataloguing the work of pro heroes of course. No one would care about her specifically. She had been caught before by the hero Rock Lock after failing at pickpocketing and then they had apparently let her go to steal again from other people. She would find it much harder now that Bakugo was done with her. The article of the incident on the other hand praised the so-called pro-hero for catching the criminal.

Bakugo scowled. What could that hero even do? Make something he had touched stay still and… what, that was it? Yet still he was praised as a hero while Bakugo was staying in practically an actual dump, pretending to be some Deku to lure out small-time criminals. He could have easily blown up that so-called pro-hero even without going through hero school. He trained better on his own, not wasting time on any useless things involved in going to high school. Bakugo closed the site before exploding the id card into burnt plastic and paper, tossing the melted ashes in a plastic bag. He took a moment longer to scroll through news. Discussion of the USJ attack was still present and there were some articles questioning the idea of having a quirk stealer at UA. There was even an image of Deku being surrounded by press outside the school. Bakugo smirked. At least he had made life a little harder for that Quirk Stealer.

Unfortunately, the school seemed to stand on that albino hair's side. Probably they were just afraid of his lawyers. Then there was a picture of him with those two nobodies he dragged around since showing up at UA. They were sticking to him like glue, holding back the reporters. A video clip had that stupid Shitty Hair who had been in class, Kiri-something, asking why they were "so mean" to Deku. Was no one at UA really able to show that Deku his place?

He started sweating again while reading the article and had to hold his hands up, releasing small explosions to burn up the sweat after closing the article. The next one was about the hero killer that had been making headlines recently. Now there was someone that would have been worth Bakugo's time. If he took down the hero killer even UA would have to admit they were wrong to kick him out.

Though, as he read the posts about the hero killer and his supposed reasons for doing what he did, Bakugo couldn't help but feel there was something there. Tons of heroes were certainly fakes, or at least nowhere as strong as they thought they were, but they still got all the worship and money that should have gone to a real hero, someone like Bakugo. There was certainly space to weed out the weaklings.

Bakugo closed the laptop and laid on the bed. It was still early but he'd need to get sleep before the night. That was when he'd really go out to hunt. He slept easy, dreaming about fights and putting weaklings in their place, several of which had white hair, and maybe someone that could make him work for it. That one had shitty red hair. Something about that guy's face had managed to annoy Bakugo despite only knowing him for two days, but even in his dreams he couldn't hit the rock-faced guy hard enough to wipe the grin off his face. He woke up scowling and eager to hit something softer. Thankfully the sun had already gone down and outside was only darkness. Bakugo got his shitty shirt and headed back out.

As much as he hated it, he had to admit his disguise worked wonders. As the first glimpse of sun reached over the horizon, he walked down into a cheap basement gym and headed straight to the bathroom to wash the blood off his hands. A couple of the early morning regulars might have noticed before he did, but they knew better than to get involved. One of them had just gotten up from the bench press to get a drink so Bakugo started adding weights. The other guy never tried to contest his claim to the bench.

Bakugo had developed a daily gym routine in the weeks since being driven out of UA, spending at least 4 hours a day at the gym training in lieu of formal hero training. He had always been fit, the strongest in any class he had been to since elementary school, but he had to push past any limits to be the absolute strongest. As he went through his routine, he had time to soak in those thoughts, at least until someone changed the channel on the old tv hanging from the opposite wall. The broadcast began showing a large stadium.

"Welcome to the UA sports festival first year tournament!" A female hero, Midnight if he remembered correctly, declared. "Here are the students, I mean, contestants!"

Bakugo squeezed his weight bar harder. If he hadn't been focused in the middle of a squat he might have told the extra with the remote to change the channel back. Instead the bastard increased the volume as the busty heroine kept blabbering the standard formalities for such an event. Bakugo should have been there. He wouldn't have just won, but crushed everyone, especially after the past weeks of constant training and busting faces on real streets.

"Representing the students is Izuku Midoriya from class 1-A!" The screen turned into an image of the students with one familiar white patch of hair in the middle.

The entire gym shook as heavy weights fell on the floor, clanging and cracking something despite the thick covers on the floor. Bakugo stared at the screen, biting his teeth together with the weights on the floor in front of him completely forgotten. What little talk there had been going on in the gym had ended like it hit a wall, so the voice from the tv was that much more audible as that quirk-stealing Deku got to talk in front of the whole country. The audience seemed to have some sense about who and what he was, but still… The stare in Deku's eyes wasn't what Bakugo knew, at least not from the time before auntie Inko died. At UA he had been… different.

"Yes," he began his speech, not even seeming to quiver in front of the audience, "I am the one who can transfer quirks between people. My name is Izuku Midoriya, not the other thing you people have kept repeating for the past three weeks. Welcome to your annual watch teenagers punch each other in the face for your entertainment day."

Bakugo wanted to blow something up, but could only listen as Deku ranted something about the school and the world in general being unfair for weaklings and him knowing things better than pro heroes.

"I am here because I got first in the entrance exam, but did you know the person who came second, the person everyone has told he would become a great hero since his quirk manifested… Well, as soon as he was told he could use his quirk at UA it took him all of two days to commit assault, threats of violence, and an attempted murder, and later to get kicked out. So much for selecting the people with most potential to be heroes."

"You think that is really true?" Someone at the gym asked.

"To UA's credit they actually took his behaviour seriously, eventually. "

"Hard to believe, but surely the school would deny it if he was lying?"

Bakugo's vague thirst to detonate something began focusing on the present company. Deku moved on to attack their previous school and talk about lawsuits again. His daddy's lawyers had to be the reason the school and the extras there seemed to side with that bastard.

"Also, if you have called me the 'quirk stealer', and this goes especially to the representatives of media, this is the person who created that name and told you about me. Great job at being critical of your sources… not."

So Deku figured out how the word of him got out. Well, Bakugo didn't care.

"Congratulations for all the reporters involved in spreading the hate and lies of a violent near murderer…"

"For sure," an extra at the gym responded. "Those are pretty serious accusations."

Sparks of little explosions went off on Bakugo's palms.

"Or maybe he is just directing people's attention away from his own quirk stealing. I wouldn't feel at ease near someone like that."

At least someone at the gym had a working brain.

"Hope it earned you enough money to hire some good lawyers," Deku was still talking, "because you are going to need them. If you are lucky, I might settle for your quirk as a settlement."

"See," the same person at the gym said. The rest seemed uncertain as Bakugo managed to tear his eyes from the screen during a pause in Deku's rant.

"Maybe," another guy said hesitantly, "he seems to be out for people's quirks."

"OF COURSE HE IS!" Bakugo roared and emphasised his words with a bang, making the people jump back.

"Speaking of which," Deku spoke again. Bakugo turned his attention back to the screen. "If you aren't using your quirk, like most aren't allowed to, don't need it anymore, find it harmful for your wellbeing or just need money, I am in the market for new quirks. There is a limit to how many I can take, but I'll pay a million yen and up to at least a hundred million yen for good quirks. If you are interested in selling yours, email me a description of your quirk at sellyourquirk ."

He seriously expected someone to give up their quirk to him just for some of his dad's money? Well, maybe some weaklings or addicts would do it, but those quirks would be worthless.

"So what do you think about that?" One of the extras at the gym asked again. "Kind of going after people's quirks, but is there anything wrong to try to buy them?"

Bakugo stepped aside from where he had been lifting and grabbed another weight right in front of one of the extras who had been reaching for it. Bakugo paid no attention to his complaints as he added more weight for himself. Let Deku complain in front of cameras and play with other students. Bakugo would still come out on top as the strongest and take Deku down to where he belonged, and those that actually called him friend would go down with him.

If there was something that could make Bakugo stronger it was anger, and he stayed at the gym training for hours past his normal schedule. Whenever his body tried to tell him to take a break he only needed to take a glance at the tv to get more energy. The standards at UA were even lower than he had thought as Deku came first in the first race and no one seemed to even take issue that he had stolen yet another quirk, some kind of flight or rocket quirk. Didn't matter, Bakugo's quirk could do that too, and more, just with the one power.

Unfortunately that wasn't the last win that Deku had, and even Bakugo couldn't increase his weights by a lot every time he did. Bakugo only stopped briefly as he witnessed Deku's first fight in the final tournament. He never expected the bastard would have it in himself to put someone in that kind of condition, let alone someone he called a friend… Bakugo shook his head. Of course Deku could do that. He was just letting the villain he tried to hide seep out. The people around him were just too naive to understand that.

Eventually the tournament had to end, and Deku, of course, used power taken from others to win it.

"THAT BASTARD!" Bakugo screamed and threw his dumbbell against the wall just as the win was announced. The weight sank deep enough into the wall it hung on for several seconds before falling off.

"HEY!" The gym owner shouted. "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?!"

"NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!" Bakugo screamed back without even looking at the guy.

"THIS IS LITERALLY MY BUSINESS AND YOU AREN'T WELCOME ANYMORE!"

Bakugo finally turned to face the gym owner and gritted teeth together when he had to actually look up at the guy. To his credit, the man used his own service all day rather than sitting in a backroom or leaving the gym to its own devices. His useless quirk had something to do with his sense of smell that turned his nose into a doglike snout, but in physical terms he was certainly stronger than even Bakugo, for now, taller too.

"Are you going to leave on your own, or do I have to drag you out?"

"I'd like to see you try," Bakugo said as his hands smoked. "Can your family afford the funeral?"

"Out!"

They stared for a long moment, but eventually Bakugo tsked and turned away.

"It's a dump of a gym anyway."

Bakugo went to the dressing room to get his stuff. He shoved the thief bait shirt in his bag. With several bloodstains he'd have to wash it again, and he really wasn't in the mood to wear the stupid thing, even if pounding some extra was exactly what he needed right now.

He headed out to a neighbourhood known for how easy it was to get drugs there. Dealers tended to have more money than purse snatchers anyway. Just had to notice them before they recognized him. It wasn't Bakugo's first trip to the neighbourhood and the word was already getting around. He checked every street, yard, and alleyway as soon as he reached the corner. A couple of people took a glance at him but turned around as soon as they encountered his stare. His "kill Deku" stare hadn't gone anywhere since he left the gym.

And now he'd have to find a new place to train his body, all because of that quirk stealing bastard. If Deku had ran into Bakugo now he would not have survived. Here on the streets he would not have rules or teachers to come to his rescue. Bakugo dreamed about such an encounter as he strode through the neighbourhood, but still remembered to glance around the corner as he passed an alley. He stopped.

There was a whole group of people, half a dozen of them, though some looked withered, almost skeletal from drug use and lack of gym time. The whole group seemed to face just one guy that was obscured by the group. The nature of the meeting though was clear, especially considering the brass knuckles and knives present. It was just the exercise Bakugo needed to vent his anger. He didn't really care what the one guy had done to get the ire of these thugs.

The first time they noticed Bakugo's presence was caused by an explosion that propelled him towards them, sinking his fist in one of the withered drug addicts' already sunken cheek just as it was turning to face him. Several smaller explosions halted Bakugo's momentum and let him turn fast to bring his feet into another addict's stomach, causing him to double over and hit the wall. Both weaklings were knocked out cold right away, but their four friends were now fully aware of Bakugo's presence. Still, Bakugo could only grin in his signature deranged 'I am going to kill you' way.

Two of them wore brass knuckles and something about their arms seemed off, besides being thick that is. One had a big knife on his hand and whiskers like a cat on his face. The last one had a crooked chin with staples holding the skin on it together. He held his fingers together and his hand formed into a metallic-looking blade that he pointed at Bakugo.

"Not sure who you think you are, but you played with the wrong people. We're going to give you a quick lesson. Not that you'll be in any shape to learn from it."

The guy with whiskers grinned. "You better learn quick because this guy has to see his lawyer. Got beaten by a kid, a kid with good lawyers, so he'll enjoy taking it out on another little kid like you."

"Shut up cat!" The sword-handed guy shouted and grabbed 'Cat,' yanking him towards Bakugo. Bakugo launched forward, sinking his fist in the cat guy's gut, pushing him backwards, but the guy twisted and flexed like rubber and landed perfectly on his feet. Bakugo didn't even have time to tsk as he had to jump back. The arm of one of the other guys had launched forward, stretching at the speed of a fast punch. Bakugo dodged the first strike but as his friend joined in, another strike glanced Bakugo's side. He landed crouching a little, but didn't even have time to draw a breath before the next long distance punches.

Bakugo launched himself up into the air with explosions, easily manoeuvring to avoid hasty punches from his opponents that hadn't expected is flight. With a bang his foot was in one of their faces. He turned around to take on the other one.

His spine bent from the impact as the guy under him wasn't out yet. The brass knuckles sunk into his back as air and spit got pushed out his mouth. He grit his teeth and drew another breath. A set of explosions with more force than that came off his hands daily. This was nothing. A rapid motion entered his field of vision. He leaned back, but still a sharp pain went through his face. Blood dripped on his left eye, but he barely cared, staring wide-eyed at the sword-handed thug. The iron stench of blood snuck up his nostrils.

Bakugo got somewhat back on his feet and jumped to the side so as to not be hit in the back.

"How the hell is he still moving? I got him right on the spine," the stretchy arm guy on the ground gasped. That extra had to wait for a moment as Bakugo kept staring at the sword-hand.

"YOU!" Bakugo roared and pushed his open hand forward, any restraint forgotten. "DIE!"

The hasty explosion pushed even Bakugo back until he hit the wall as a result of the shockwave reinforced by the small space. For a moment he couldn't hear or see anything in the dust-filled alleyway. Slowly the dust dissipated in complete silence, revealing the sword-handed guy. His legs were exposed first, he slumped against the ground, then the lower half of his torso fell against the red wall.

Red wall? It hadn't been that before. The dust continued dissipating, but there wasn't much more of the man to expose. The middle part of his torso was a ripped and torched mess, anything above his lower chest no longer existed except across the wall. Bakugo's throat got squeezed, making it difficult to breathe as it felt like something was coming up.

Bakugo squeezed his nose and drew a deep breath through his mouth, easing the feeling. He still stared at the corpse he had made, but the wide-eyed look he started with narrowed quickly. A horrified look tried to find its way onto his face, but his lips slowly twisted into a rough approximation of a grin.

"Seems you're the one who needed to learn a lesson," he sneered. "Too bad you aren't in shape to learn from it."

He spat on the corpse and turned around to give a literal death stare to the rest of the gang. The people he had knocked out before were still out cold, one of them bleeding profusely from being unlucky enough to be close to the explosion. The rest had all been tossed to the ground by the shockwave and were now staring at Bakugo in a dazed terror. Bakugo put his hands into his pockets, once again confident in the harmlessness of these weaklings as he stepped closer.

"So," he said deceptively quietly, "who's next?"

He was interrupted by a groan and raised his gaze to the guy he had completely forgotten, the one this group of thugs had been threatening. His appearance actually gave Bakugo more pause than facing the whole armed group. Half of the man's skin, especially his arms and upper torso up to his face, was totally messed up and darkened, as if it had been burned repeatedly. The lower half of his face seemed like it was attached to the upper half with staples. He was standing almost exactly where he had been when Bakugo arrived, maybe a little further back. Despite being mobbed by a group of thugs and looking already like he should have been hospitalised, the man looked relaxed, like there was no issue with the situation as he pulled a pair of earplugs out of his ears and put down the phone he was watching. The grin on his face left Bakugo's in its shadow.

"Could you be a little more quiet? I was watching the best show of the year." He glanced at the remains of the now dead guy and started walking past the others to Bakugo. "I guess I should thank you. Most people wouldn't take on six people to help some stranger."

He glanced at the corpse.

"I would ask if you are some kind of hero, but you really don't seem like that. A vigilante perhaps."

"And what do you care if I was?"

"Hmm, nothing right now at least. Doesn't change what you did. Though I wonder…" He was now next to Bakugo and turned to face the surviving thugs. "What are you going to do about them now? You've only finished off one of them. Going to call the cops and give that guy's lawyers new clients?

"Hell no," Bakugo said and stared at the thugs that were barely daring to scramble away on their feet or inch slowly backwards. He held his hand up with small explosions sparkling on his palm. He took a step forward but hesitated. One of the stretchy arms and the cat guy finally processed the danger they were in and bolted into a sprint. At least they had finally understood Bakugo was well above them. The thought was exiting. Now if his body would just move to finish the job…

"So you are still as green as you look. Fine, I'll cover for you this time. Consider us even."

The half-burnt man raised his open hand towards the group. It glowed blue for an instant, and the next second the entire alley in front of them was turned into a literal hellfire of blue flames and screams of agony that didn't last long. Bakugo dealt with hot explosions constantly, but despite not being in the direct line of fire he jumped back as the air became intolerably hot. Once the burst of flames ended all that was left were barely recognizable still-burning masses on the ground with vague shapes of limbs coming out of them.

"You make for good fuel," the burnt psycho muttered, then spun around light on his feet like he hadn't just murdered a bunch of people. "We should leave. Considering how loud you were someone is going to come see what is going on."

"Who the hell are you to tell me what to do?" Bakugo barked.

"The name is Dabi, and you can do whatever you want, but I am not planning to stick around to explain to the police what happened here. Are you?"

He walked away without waiting for a response. Bakugo picked his bag up from around the corner at the mouth of the alley and wiped blood off his face with his gym towel as he grumpily followed Dabi.