Aizawa looked at the tiny kid who had managed to track him down. Izuku Midoriya might be quirkless, but he was already a better hero than his most recent class. He had the right mindset and could care less about fame, glory or the cash that came with being a pro hero.

Sure the martial artist mindset was a tad weird, but every hero had their own personality quirks and his was well within the range of acceptable.

Even if he found the fact that every therapist in the prefecture apparently knew the boy by sight, if not name and refused to have anything to do with him. He didn't know how the kid managed to make so many trained professionals snap, and he wasn't sure he wanted to know.

He had the terrifying feeling that the kid and Nezu would get along entirely too well, especially when it came to tormenting others for their own amusement.

Still, the kid genuinely wanted to train and was willing to put in the work without any complaint at all. He even had a proper appreciation for Eraserhead's capture weapon, rather than dismiss it like many had in the past.

In fact, Izuku's growth was downright frightening in a way once they hit their stride. He seemed to soak in things like a sponge and his ability to analyze and break down quirks was scary as hell. If he didn't know for a fact the boy only had a latent quirk that still needed some form of external stimulus to awaken, he'd swear the kid had special eyes like he did.

He was still going to chew out All Might for directing the kid his way.

He should have expected this, but honestly he was just happy to see that pig-bastard.

Ryoga looked hopelessly at his phone, and was a bit older than Izuku remembered. But he knew that chi-signature anywhere.

Izuku debated on how to handle this. Then he spotted a water bottle and a wicked grin filled his face.

Five seconds later, there was a very pissed off piglet squealing with absolute rage. Izuku easily pocketed Ryoga's things and picked the piglet up who was making his anger known in spades.

"Long time no see, Pig-boy," said Izuku easily.

Ryoga oinked in confusion.

"You followed me to Jusenkyo because my old man dragged me off from our fight, despite the fact I waited almost four days for you to show up," said Izuku.

If a piglet could have yelped the name "Ranma?!", Ryoga would have managed it. He came rather close with that oink of his.

Izuku grinned.

His ma wasn't in, as she was with her friends for a few hours. Izuku dumped some hot water on his friend and gave him back his clothes.

"Ranma, is that you?" said Ryoga with no little amount of hope.

"Better believe it, pig boy," said Izuku with the same cocky ease as before. He dodged the punch Ryoga threw without a second thought. "Easy piggy! This body ain't up to my old standards just yet!"

"You bastard! Do you have any idea how much the others have been after my ass to find you?!" snarled Ryoga irate.

Izuku winced. He should have guessed they'd ask Ryoga to track him down with his random sense of direction.

"How badly did they take it?"

Ryoga calmed down slightly, but not by much.

"Akane's married," he said simply.

Izuku might have felt a sting of unhappiness at one time, but he only felt relief she had moved on.

"Your mother was beyond upset, and the panda keeps trying to trash your honor claiming you failed as a martial artist. The Amazons are using your disappearance as an excuse to introduce their younger members to a less secluded group of martial artists under the assumption you'd return at some point."

Izuku nodded.

"I might have returned, if I hadn't realized that sticking around Nerima was pretty pointless. If it wasn't the crappy rivals, it was the endless fighting over who would have me as a husband or lover," said Izuku tiredly. "I came to the realization that I was stuck in a rut that everyone was determined to keep me in and damn what I had to say about it. Any love I had for Akane was mired in misunderstandings and a fake sense of duty that we had to marry."

Ryoga could admit, things had gotten pretty out of hand back home. Everyone was unhappy, but several had finally moved on past Ranma when it became clear he wasn't going to suddenly show up and might actually be gone for good.

Which was why Ryoga changed the subject.

"What's this place like?"

"Ryoga, apparently your shitty sense of direction doesn't just apply to home. It applies to other worlds as well," said Izuku dryly.

"...That would explain far too much," said Ryoga. Like the giant robots, and the literal cat girls among other things. "Why do you look twelve though?"

"Reincarnated. Not complaining though. Even though I can't go on the same sort of training trip like last time, my new Ma is really supportive and kind. She's rather down to earth and has been encouraging my goals, though she has put her foot down on schoolwork," said Izuku. You'd like her."

"What about Nodoka?"

Izuku winced.

"She married Genma and thought nothing of the fact I was on an extended training trip with zero contact with her. I thought she was dead for years until she showed up," said Izuku.

Ryoga winced as well. He could hardly blame Ranma for wanting an actual childhood this time around, considering what a bastard Genma was.

"So what's this place like?" asked Ryoga, genuinely interested.

Izuku grinned.

"Wait till you hear about this place. They actually have a job that's called 'Pro Hero'," said Izuku enthusiastically.

Ryoga listened intently and could see why Ranma didn't want to come back. Not only did he get an actual childhood this time around, but it seemed this 'pro hero' work was right up his alley. Sure he didn't have any fancy ability, but with someone as skilled as the pigtailed bastard it wasn't going to slow him down that much.

Ryoga almost felt sorry for the poor villains. Almost.

Eventually Ryoga left, but he memorized Izuku's chi signature...he'd track down his old friend again, now that he knew the man was alive.

Ranma was definitely much happier here, at least.

The news of his survival had been meet with some fanfare...right up until they found out Ranma had reincarnated and had only just hit puberty. Which meant any attempts to force him into the varied agreements he was under was now null and void.

Cologne wisely did not inform the Amazon tribe of this, as they were finally getting some fresh blood in their tribe after far too long. Young men were all too happy to sleep with young, pretty girls who had a shared interest...and if they were disinclined to continue the relationship, well they were often fine with visiting the girl children. Males were highly prized outside the Amazon village and quite a few martial artist families wanted male heirs. It was a win for everyone.

Though there was the occasional awkwardness that came from the families wanting to approve arranged marriages...fortunately a brief explaination of Amazon culture was usually enough to smooth that over with the agreement that there was no issue with the girl child learning their branch of martial arts before the wedding. Most Amazon women were very quick learners after all.

Izuku, age fourteen...

To say Izuku was pissed that the damn slime villain almost caught him was an understatement. He must have been slipping, to let that half-assed villain capture him.

On the plus side, he got to see All Might in person again.

However two seconds after seeing the man, Izuku's eyes went straight to the man's left side, around his abdomen.

"What happened to your stomach?" he demanded. "It feels like someone deliberately put some malevolent chi that's eating away at you."

All Might fumbled a bit.

"I don't know what you're talking about! I must go, citizen!"

Izuku wasn't having that, not a chance in hell. He respected the man too much to let something that potentially dangerous drop.

All Might panicked a bit, seeing a teenager able to follow him with ridiculous ease, before he had to drop onto a nearby roof.

"Seriously, what happened to your stomach and abdomen? I know it wasn't there before because I've met you once as a kid," said Izuku, arms folded.

If he was surprised by the sudden smoke show, he didn't show it. He also didn't bat at an eye at the emaciated figure before him.

"You've certainly let yourself go... Secretary-san," said Izuku dryly.

All Might, or rather Toshinori, blinked at him.

"How did you know I'm my own secretary?"

"Again, I've met both your forms before. You greeted us outside the room and said that All Might would be right in, and five seconds later you walked into the room in your hero form," said Izuku. "You can fool most people, but not someone who's trained to read chi. Both you and your secretary have identical signatures. I just figured that the secretary bit was because it was your civilian form or something."

"What if I had a twin brother?" asked Toshinori, fascinated. He never met someone who could read chi-signatures before.

"Even twins have slightly different signatures. No matter what they do, they still have slight variations...even if they can be difficult to spot at first glance," said Izuku. "Now what happened? That malignant signature on you can't be healthy and it's eating away at your life span."

Toshinori sagged a bit.

"About five years ago I took a hit from a villain. I asked those in the know not to publicize it, as it was a fight I'm not proud of," said Toshinori. He pulled his shirt up to reveal a nasty wound that Izuku could sense had the bad chi in it. "I didn't know about the chi thing though."

"Whoever did that really didn't want you to recover from it," said Izuku with sympathy. "I've meet creeps who like to torment their victims long after their dead, and this guy must have been a real piece of work."

Toshinori sighed. The teen was a bundle of surprises, but he was strangely easy to vent to.

"What do I do?" asked Toshinori. This wound was slowly killing him, after all.

"Removing bad energy like that isn't my specialty...but I might know someone who would have an idea of how to deal with it. The problem would be getting her here."

He wouldn't trust Happosai in a thousand years, but as manipulative as Cologne was, she at least was somewhat reliable to work with.

The problem was getting her to come here through Ryoga. The pig was sporadic at the best of times, and he wasn't due for at least a week or two.

It was rather comforting that since Ryoga managed to memorize his chi-signature, that he could roughly schedule when the Hibiki would be in the general vicinity. Bakugo found him rather fascinating and was all too happy to spar with the guy...even if he laughed his ass off whenever he turned into a pig.

One of these days Ryoga was going to hit the explosive teen with a bottle filled with the cursed spring water, and Izuku was going to laugh and laugh at whatever the explosive blond got stuck with.

Toshinori left, but realized rather quickly that in his attempt to escape Izuku he had dropped the bottle containing the villain. Smoke rose in the distance, which was a pretty good indicator of where the bottle went.

On the plus side, Midoriya was still one of the best candidates he had for a successor. The fight five years ago might have accelerated that particular problem, but from what he could tell the green-haired teen had all the right qualities he was looking for.

Best of all, his physical condition was already strong enough to handle the bare minimum of One for All.

Izuku POV

Seeing Bakugo trapped by the slime villain and the heroes doing jack squat about it, Izuku sighed. On the plus side, he got a second chance to express his irritation with that damn villain for attacking him earlier. Izuku was rather good at holding a grudge.

"Oi, Bakugo! Apologies in advance!" shouted Izuku as he dodged past the ridiculously lax security around the villain.

One could read Bakugo's "Oh shit!" expression rather clearly as he braced himself for something.

Izuku rather gleefully used the Roasting Chestnuts technique to blow away the slime, allowing the blond to get out. There was an undercurrent of blood in the water, but before Izuku could get a little payback All Might stepped in and blew the slime away...and oddly enough, changed the weather in the process.

Apparently he didn't want the teen to get a vigilantism charge on his record, since if he beat the villain he'd have to report to the police.

Was it his fault the heroes here sucked?

A short time later, once the villain was properly...collected, Izuku and Bakugo headed for home.

"Thanks...for saving my ass I mean. Those idiots were flailing their arms and running around like chickens with no head because their fucking quirks were almost useless," said Bakugo.

Izuku clasped his hands on Bakugo's shoulders and looked at him seriously.

"Dude...there is no way in hell I would EVER let you be taken out by a damn tentacle monster villain. No bro worth his salt would ever allow it."

Bakugo thought that over, before paling.

"Dammit Deku, why the fuck did you have to put that thought into my head? Now I'm going to have nightmares about that for weeks!" said Bakugo irate.

Izuku cackled.

Bakugo glared at him before heading to his house.

Izuku was about to head to his...when All Might showed up, before having to quickly switch back to his civilian form.

Izuku raised an eyebrow, but when he heard the offer being made he had only one reaction.

A wicked grin and a "Hell yeah, I'm in!"