My Hero Academia: Son of Justice

by Jayme F. Midorikawa

The son of the disgraced former greatest Hero of The Soviet Union is extended a chance at a new life by the Symbol of Peace, All Might. After having lived so long resenting Heroes and Villains, and being scared to death of his own Quirk, will he be able to step forward and become the Hero he once dreamed of, and will he be able to find new purpose through friendship, or even love?

140. Otheon Arc Part 5 - Global Declaration

Hello everyone. I'm sorry once again for just how embarrassingly long it has taken to even get this far in writing out the rest of the third MHA movie for this story. I won't bore you all with repeating myself from my recent author's announcement, but just know that I'm hoping to make the wait all worth it from this point on.

Unfortunately, I underestimated the sheer workload of my last week of this college semester, hence why I'm unable to own up to my promise of delivering three chapters to finish up the movie today, but I can at least provide you all this one, and hopefully I can use my new amount of free time to finish up the last two so I can upload them together next Saturday. Hope, being the operative word. I can only hope this chapter even partially makes up for how long you've all had to wait while I had to struggle with balancing my responsibilities, burnout and all my personal hobbies at once.

Of course, the inescapable fact that the manga is nearing its end has also played a big part in that sensation of burnout as well. That being said, as longtime MHA fans, I want you all to be honest with me, as my readers, seeing the way the manga is now going: do you all think I've just been wasting my time writing this story and building this specific ship between Kolya and Mina that I've put so much of my passion and energy into along the way?

Anyway, I hope you all still enjoy this chapter all the same.

My Hero Academia is the property of Kouhei Horikoshi and Shonen Jump. I only own my original characters, and the original events surrounding them.

A/N: [[]] indicates that characters are contextually speaking Russian.

Chapter 141

Global Declaration

(Глобальная Декларация)

Monday, January 19th

At the heart of the maze of echoing brass-lined tunnels within the ornately carved mouth of the cave stood the heart of the Humarise cathedral, practically vibrating and humming with the hundreds of heartbeats, footsteps and breaths of the unanimously masked and hooded devout followers, soldiers and defenders of the faith, having finally come to gather here at their leader's command; Flect Turn himself still glowing as brilliantly upon his balcony before their masses.

But even with this much of his army amassed before him, his attention was elsewhere, as was theirs, as upon their arrival, a multitude of holographic screens lit up in projection behind him, lining the wall of the chamber bearing their crest. Upon all of these screens were the various faces of Humarise's regional lieutenants, and those picked to personally lead each of those regions' teams for what was finally about to unfold; among them, the young bearded Romanian, Marius Lazarescu, bearing a razor sharp coldness in his brown eyes that could have cut through diamonds, like the face of a heartless and hardened warrior.

"We are all in position, sir, and our soldiers are armed and ready to act upon your command. The Heroes have no idea of our present positions, so there is no worry they will be able to stop us."

One after another, Marius and his fellow lieutenants echoed this very same affirmation of their advantage and preparation. However, one among them, on the screen labeled for Otheon, looked less than confident, even though he still tried to hide it in his way of speaking: "Forgive me for speaking out like this, sir, but there have been some developments you must know. It has come to our attention from our allies in the police, that not only has the operation to eliminate the traitor failed, costing us a fair number of our initiates and the chief of police, but brothers Sidero, Terrioros and Sister Beros, have likewise failed to retrieve the stolen case and have been neutralized. The interlopers have escaped into the neighboring country of Klayd, and our advantage through the police has been lost."

There was only the beginnings of an uneasy stirring amid the throngs of soldiers all around him, but Flect Turn reflected no such emotion, as his voice boomed with the authoritative confidence that could level mountains and move nations with his faith: "It no longer matters. The hour of the great work is finally at hand. Our brothers and sisters know this, and will give up nothing to the Heroes. Even if they did, it would make no difference. You all have the tools with which to deliver God's final judgment where you are, while I have the master key with which to deliver the final stroke, should any Heroes even try. No matter what, they could not be able to stop us now."

With that, all of the holographic screens turned off, and Flect Turn looked to his loyal congregation, reaching into his robes before pulling out the familiar sight of his intricately designed dagger, holding it high overhead, as though he were about to plunge it into his own chest.

"The time has come to do God's will, to address the masses, and purge this world of abomination and sin…for the salvation of humanity!"

At his proclamation, the entire cathedral shook with the repeated chanting of Humarise's creed from the hundreds gathered around; each repetition booming with more and more zealous fanaticism and certainty…the very same certainty in their cause and the good it would do, that finally drove Flect Turn to push his thumb against the button on the handle of his dagger, sending a simultaneous activation signal that would officially arm their secret weapons placed all across the globe in unison, and thus finally begin the countdown that would change everything for the entire world over.

…

All across the world, internet connections, television and radio signals of all kinds were suddenly being intercepted, leaving telecommunications agencies in every nation scrambling for some kind of explanation as to how such a thing was possible, while the civilians in their countless billions, could only watch and listen, as the grim portent that empowered Flect Turn's soul-shaking voice against the foreboding image of Humarise's crest onscreen, broadcasted to all corners of the world, like a decree from God on high:

"We, Humarise, will rise to action to protect the pure humans this sinful society deems 'Quirkless', like some kind of stigma. We will deliver God's righteous punishment upon those afflicted with the disease of Quirks. The tools we have developed with which to deliver humanity's salvation have been set in twenty-four cities across the world, and have already begun their final countdown. The purification of our world will commence two hours from now. However, know that we are not without mercy. To the Heroes out there listening to my words, I will provide you the locations in the countries these devices have been set up within. Even if our ideals may differ, you should still be given an equal chance."

All across the globe, major cities and small townships alike erupted into the kind of mass blind panic that seldom came once in a lifetime. Of course, threats on this kind of scale were even rarer, and that fact hit hard for a great many of the local Heroes in these cities and towns, as the communities they had sworn themselves to protect all went off like a powder keg, and the emergencies and injuries mounted up in numbers faster than those Heroes could properly attend to them.

However, this threat and this widespread panic would not win out today, for with Humarise's declaration, and the revealed locations of their Ideo Trigger bombs having finally hit the airwaves and online, it had given the all-Star World Heroes Association the information they had so long been waiting for, to finally give the green light to their waiting Hero teams in all those same countries.

Finally, once given the word, all the teams that had waited so patiently were officially in action; local and foreign, Pro and student Hero alike, were all officially on the move to give their all to assist the citizens in their evacuations, and to try and find the bombs in the cities their placements had been identified in. For many, they proved fortunate enough to already be in the major cities they had been working in to begin with, thus it came down to dividing their ranks evenly in half in order to perform both duties.

But for the Australian Team, they had a far heavier workload on their hands to deal with, as upon seeing the live feed switch over to a global map dotted with red symbols marking the locations of every bomb, the one on the Australian content was set right on the western coast, as opposed to the southeastern coast of Sydney.

"Bloody hell, they tossed us for a loop!" Tas-Maniac exclaimed in disbelief, mirroring the looks on her fellow Heroes' faces. "That bomb's all the way in Perth!"

"Couldn't we get in touch with the local Heroes there and tell them where to look?" Mirko immediately asked, only for Mantypus to grimly shake his head as he held out his phone, showing live footage from one of the Australian news networks, wherein they could see the streets of Perth writhing with panicked civilians trying to flee the city. "There's no way. We all know they don't have as large a Hero population as Sydney and Melbourne do. It'll take all of them just to keep the civvies from getting themselves killed alone."

As if on cue, the sound of breaking glass suddenly sounded from outside the Heroes' office, prompting Mina and Mirko to hurry to one of the windows, where they could see similar panic having already consumed the streets of Sydney as well.

"What are these people doing? They should know the bomb isn't even close to here." Mina voiced her frightened confusion, before Mirko growled in frustration. "Doesn't matter, Pinky. Between here and Perth is a whole lot of expansive flatland; The Outback, you might've heard of it. I remember this time of year, a lot of heavy winds carry all across the continent from end to end. If that bomb goes off in Perth, there's more than a good chance those winds will carry that Ideo Trigger crap all the way here, then we've got an even bigger body count just waiting to happen."

"These sick bastards, it's almost as if they knew that little factoid ahead of time." Tas-Maniac similarly growled in growing aggression, while Mina was visibly shaking from head to toe, looking between all the Pro Heroes around her for some kind of answer…until Stampede slammed his hands upon his desk, snapping everyone at attention, as the Kangaroo Hero looked them all in the eye; a fire burning in his gaze.

"There's no point rending our garments over a little run-around, folks. The Association put Mirko and Pinky-chan with us because they felt we'd work together the most effectively. Let's show 'em they were right to do so and get out there."

Ignoring the still-confused looks on Mirko and Mina's faces, Stampede Hopper suddenly grabbed a tiny remote from out one of his desk shelves and pushed the one button on it, causing a hidden door in one of the walls to open up, revealing an industrial elevator. Upon seeing this, Tas-Maniac and Mantypus both dawned a look of unspoken knowing; the diminutive Hero grinning in anticipation. "Well, it's about damn time we finally got to hit the blacktop with this baby."

"Thinking too pedestrian, Tas. C'mon, folks, we haven't got a moment to lose!" At Stampede's insistence, they all hurriedly filed into the elevator, before it quickly started descending further and further down.

But while the Australian Heroes all looked as prepared as could be, Mina didn't look nearly so confident, her fists still clenched tight and visibly trembling. "What are you all talking about? There's no way we can cross the whole country in time before that bomb goes off! And what about all the people panicking out here?"

"We aren't the only Agency settled here, Pinky-chan. If we didn't trust the Heroes working out there to keep everything here in Sydney nice and civil, we wouldn't be nearly so sure, so take that to heart and breathe easy." Mantypus explained, before Stampede further answered with a confident smirk directed at her and Mirko both. "Besides, with what's waiting for us downstairs, you're about to have everything you know about speed redefined."

Not even ten seconds after, the elevator finally hit its destination, the doors opening to reveal what could only be described as a Pro Hero's perfect muscle car: a sleek black body mounted on what almost looked like unbreakable tires that elevated it well above the ground, and a large hole cut out of the hood, from which protruded an intense looking engine block with a gleaming belt turbine, and multiple metal pipes running from it all the way down the sides of the chassis before running the rest of the way across the undercarriage, ending in multiple powerful exhaust ports.

This thing looked like it was made to devour roads without mercy, and while the rest of the Australian Pros were hurriedly making their way to hop in, Mina simply looked like she couldn't begin to fathom what difference this would make. Miro, on the other hand, now had a knowing grin all her own. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me, Jack. You went and got your dream Mad Max car put together after all, huh? I thought you'd outgrown something this bulky and ugly years ago."

Stampede, having already hopped into the driver's seat and turning on the engine, resulting in an absolutely deafening roar of incomprehensible horsepower, simply gave the Rabbit Hero and her intern another cocky smirk. "Aw, c'mon, Rumi; you really think any Aussie worth his salt's gonna turn his nose at making a suped up V8 Interceptor with all the fixings of his own? Let alone the Number One Hero? Not on your life. Now both of you hop in; this baby may make super speed look geriatric by comparison, but that doesn't mean we've got all the minutes to spare."

His confidence in his custom ride's capabilities was enough to get Mirko to shrug her shoulders and usher Mina along; practically diving inside through the rear passenger window, with her intern hurriedly climbing in right on her tail.

As Stampede flipped several switches on the dashboard; each one producing yet more and more noise from the engine and the rest of the machinery that had the whole car rumbling beneath them, he called back to his two Japanese tag-alongs: "I suggest you both get yourselves buckled up and get your game faces on! If we're gonna make it all the way to Perth in time, we're gonna have to forego roads and cut right across the Outback, so brace yourselves for a real bumpy ride!"

Mina barely had her own seatbelt on in time before Stampede finally flipped the last switch. In an instant, the poor young Hero had herself nearly flattened against the seat at her back, as the car took off like an actually bullet, the roar of the engine alone making her dizzy, as the whole crew found themselves all but literally flying down the road leading from the Agency and across Sydney. Stampede's skills behind the wheel almost immediately proved to be superhuman, as even at the speed with which they were going, he was able to expertly swerve this way and that through the bustling throngs of civilians trying to get to shelter upon receiving word of the danger liable to come from Perth.

Within minutes, they had already managed to reach the furthest outskirts of Sydney as the cityscape was giving away to rolling hills, and soon the expansive grassy desert plains beyond that. Mina was clutching onto her seat for dear life, while Mirko, Tas-Maniac and Mantypus all were simply watching the horizon ahead as Stampede continued to drive like a manic through the terrain; all of them simply bracing themselves for the fight that was soon to come.

Unable to hear herself even speak over the roar of the engine, Mina could only mentally try to psyche herself up just the same. But even for as much as she knew she needed to get ready for their own fight; knowing that the penultimate battle of this whole mission had come, once again had her mind going back to everyone else out there, all her friends, her teachers, and her boyfriend most of all.

'Kolya-kun, Midori-kun, Urara-chan, Maja-chan, Kiri, Tunguska-sensei, everyone…please be careful!'

…

Klayd, several minutes earlier…

To call the neighboring country of Klayd a micro-nation would have been generous when compared to the vast portion of this manmade isle that Otheon occupied. But the size of the land didn't matter. What mattered was that Shoto and Bakugo's decision to explore the land ahead of time had quickly proven to pay off. Not only was their being outside of Otheon police's jurisdiction able to help Nikolay, Izuku and Rody breathe much easier, but the short distance they ultimately had to travel to get to the city Shoto had mentioned was mercifully short, as escape and fighting together was really starting to make the three boys really feel the building pain in their feet.

Upon spotting their first hotel, they all knew it was far too soon to start lowering their guard; thus Shoto and Bakugo took it upon themselves to maintain their cover story of being travelling backpackers on summer break, and thus secure a room for themselves, while Shoto left his phone with the three so that Bakugo could text them which room they were in, so they could sneak in from the outside. Naturally, Izuku protested the idea of doing something illegal, but some very choice words of "Suck it up, ya damn boy scout" were enough to make him swallow his Hero's pride for their own sake.

What really would make things much easier now was that this hotel had the benefit of having a computer provided for guests in every room. So, once the five boys all reunited, Nikolay wasted no time inserting the small SD card he had taken from the briefcase's mysterious puzzle box, into the computer's chip slot. In the few minutes that they waited for the computer to finish installing and opening the contents of the chip, the young Russian was still pondering over the nonsensical mishmash of numbers and letters haphazardly strewn across the folded paper that had come from the same puzzle box. "I just can't make any sense of it. You think it could be some kind of chemistry equation or formula, just with all the calculation signs removed?"

"What, you mean like the make-up of those screwed up Humarise Trigger bombs? What would we be able to do with that? It's not like you can just reverse-engineer an opposite compound by writing out the formula in reverse, chemistry doesn't work like that." Bakugo immediately assumed and just as quickly debunked, while Nikolay kept scratching his chin as a sign of his intense thinking; the beginnings of itchy fuzz starting to form across his cheeks after the last couple of days spent without getting to shave.

"Maybe it's like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Like, maybe the guy who originally had this briefcase wrote out the rest in invisible ink or whatever that stuff is they use to make watermarks. Just hold it up to a light and it should appear." Rody suggested, to which Nikolay immediately proceeded to do so, holding up the paper before the balcony sliding glass door they had originally come in through, where the afternoon sun was still shining bright.

Alas, no matter what angle he held it at; he saw nothing pop up that hadn't already been there in plain old black ink. Thus, he let out a defeated sigh, with Rody and Izuku bowing their heads in similar sentiment.

Suddenly, an electronic *ping* sounded from the computer, as a window quickly opened upon the monitor's screen, prompting all five boys to hurriedly crowd around it, and see the sheer multitude of audio files displayed before them. Thankfully, they all looked to be chronologically dated, thus Bakugo quickly clicked the most recently dated one.

Within seconds, the first of the files began to play, and an unknown adult man's voice spoke out through the built-in speakers: "My name is Alan Kay."

Thankfully, by this time, Shoto had taken care to inform Nikolay and Izuku of what Clair Voyant had informed him of, regarding the man recovered from the car accident, and his apparent affiliation with Humarise.

The recording continued: "I am a biologist who, several months ago, was kidnapped and forced to work for a worldwide organization of religious zealots and terrorists known as Humarise, to help improve upon a…a nightmarish biological chemical agent that was provided to them by that Romanian boy, who has so quickly worked his way so far into their ranks and good graces. This compound he gave them was able to forcefully activate the dormant Quirk Factor in people deemed to be Quirkless, but with the disastrous side effect of powering said Quirk to a state where the subject's body could not physically handle it and would be overwhelmed and destroyed.

"Humarise and their leader, a man known only as 'Flect Turn', wanted me to expand its genetic properties so that it could not only be converted from a liquid into a gaseous state, but to have the same Quirk overpowering effects on people with Quirks as it did on those without. For my family's own safety, I was left with no choice but to do as they demanded…and it's because of me and the many other scientists whose families they have taken hostage for years, that they now have the means to pursue their ultimate goal of global Quirk genocide through these devices they call Ideo Trigger bombs, through which they plan to end the world as we've all come to know it.

"This horrific plan of theirs will begin with the detonation of one of these Ideo Trigger bombs beneath the heart of Berlin, Germany. With the already catastrophic death toll and scale of destruction that will result from that one event, Humarise aims to set the wheels in motion, of dispersing many of the world's top Heroes to all of the cities within which he has set up the rest of these bombs as a response; none of those Heroes realizing the trap they're unknowingly walking into.

"Humarise's penultimate plan is to announce the countdown to the detonation of the rest of those bombs, knowing the Heroes will flock to those locations to stop it. Then, Flect Turn will either give the command to his lieutenants in those regions to set the bombs off as an act of martyrdom to the cause… or if they somehow fail, he will set them off himself with the master control he has in their headquarters. This simultaneous detonation will result in countless Heroes and civilians alike dying…and when so many Heroes meant to maintain peace, law and order are gone, Humarise plans to use the resulting collapse of society to recruit the terrified and blindly infuriated Quirkless masses that remain to their ranks, to commit to manually erasing the rest of the Quirked population across the globe, in an act Flect Turn is delusional enough to call a clean slate from which humanity can start over. That is his ultimate goal."

All at once, the four young heroes could feel their blood turn to ice and their stomachs clench. What they had initially been informed was already a global disaster on the horizon now had become a monumentally more horrifying scenario that had been placed in theirs and their peers' hands to try and stop. The very idea of just what Humarise was really aiming to do now made it impossible for them not to imagine the worst possible case scenario: the idea of Flect Turn standing victorious like a god atop a veritable mountain of Hero corpses, with those of all their friends and teachers stamped beneath his merciless feet at the very top. Such a nightmarish image left them all visibly shaking from head to toe.

"I have had to bow my head in fear and submit to Humarise's demands, but I can no longer stand by and do nothing, knowing what they plan to do. I must do something to make my warning heard by the Heroes before it's too late. One of my fellow prisoners, an engineer named Eddie Soul, who was likewise kidnapped and forced to work under their threats to go after his family, gave me a device he created that will contain the chip carrying this message, as well as a crucial document I've put together in regards to their plan, and finally, a special key designed to remotely deactivate all of the Ideo Trigger bombs across the world from Humarise headquarters. He gave me this and asked me to get it out to the Heroes at the cost of his own life."

As the desperate sincerity of Alan Kay's message rang clear in all their heads; Nikolay, Shoto and Bakugo all instinctively looked at the small flat key still resting in Izuku's hand. The curly-haired boy looked at it as though he were literally holding the entire world within his palms; his spirit completely and utterly shaken with the weight of this responsibility. Not even All Might had faced a threat of this scale before, and yet here Izuku now was with his friends, with no example to look back on to try and truly prepare himself with. It was both incredibly intimidating…yet also just as affirming. In order to become the Hero he always wanted to be, it was only inevitable that he would need to take on a whole new challenge like this himself.

But while the four boys all had this similar epiphany of themselves and what needed to be done; Rody was experiencing a world-shaking surge of emotion within himself as well, thinking solely back on just what Alan Kay had said of the man that had given him the chance to get this information out to them…and the price that this Eddie Soul had paid for it.

With his hands clenched into trembling fists at his sides, Rody's face was taut with an unspoken and strongly hidden tension, like he was actively trying to physically force his emotions down for none to see. But, perched atop his ponytail, Pino made no such effort, as the tiny pink bird let out a single tear from her eyes, letting out a faint but deeply heartbroken chirp in response.

"EEEEEEEK! AAAAAAAAAH!"

Suddenly, a cacophony of panicked screams could be heard echoing from a couple floors down below, and soon in even greater numbers from outside their window. The boys were all immediately rushing out to the balcony to see for themselves what was going on, only to find a huge mob of civilians running across the roads towards the outskirts of the city as quickly as their feet could carry them.

Seeing so many people in a state of pure fear had all the young Heroes' senses of preparing to act rising in record time, not even wasting a moment to wonder just what had happened to make so many people react like this…all until they heard the barely muffled sound of a few people's voices outside their door: "RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! DIDN'T YOU HEAR THE NEWS?! THERE'S GONNA BE SOME HUGE TERRORIST ATTACK!"

This immediately had the boys all do a double take in surprise, as Shoto hurriedly pulled out his phone and presented the very first headline he could pull up, displaying a British news program; the middle-aged anchorman speaking as calmly as he could force himself to: "For those of you only just now joining us, the fundamentalist terrorist organization calling itself Humarise, who previously had claimed responsibility for the tragic chemical attack in Berlin just barely a week ago, have recently proclaimed their intention to detonate twenty-four more of the same bombs as that incident, in major cities all across the globe in approximately an hour and fifty-eight minutes. Despite the efforts of Pro Heroes everywhere, news of such potential devastation and mortality have sent civilian populations in the targeted areas, as well as in cities and towns outside of said areas, into a mass hysterical panic the likes of which we've never seen before. Displayed on this map here, is all of the identified locations Humarise claims their bombs to have been placed."

Immediately, they all looked at the foreboding red target spots dotting the global map. With each one they could see that matched up with the locations their friends had been sent to, they could feel their apprehension and worry only spike within themselves more and more.

However, there was one detail that Izuku was quick to point out: "Wait…we were told with all certainty that Humarise was targeting as well as working out of Otheon, our pursuers earlier prove it…but how come there's no signal there like all the others? You don't think we've all been tricked into setting up out there, so we would be too far to assist any other nearby targets in time, do you?"

But Nikolay's own frantic mind was on something else, as he urged Shoto to lend him his phone for a second, hurriedly typing in the Otheon news. "If this news is hitting all of the air waves, then Otheon shouldn't be an exception. After a declaration like that, whether Otheon is a target or not, there's no way any of Khodamchuk's people would let him stick around for his speech. There's got to be a cancellation announcement for sure."

However, no matter where Nikolay looked through all the web pages he could find, there was no such announcement whatsoever…in fact, there wasn't even any news from any of the Otheon news networks about Humarise's announcement to begin with. Upon revealing this to his fellows, they were just as surprised and subsequently confused.

From there, Nikolay proceeded to switch over to checking the Russian news networks for any similar news, and yet he was once again met with not a single mention of either the president's amnesty speech being cancelled and his subsequent return to the country, or of Humarise's impending countdown.

In fact, what he was seeing on his Motherland's news feeds was the exact opposite: countless self-made videos from Russian citizens expressing either excitement or trepidation for the upcoming speech and what was likely to come from it, and official news stories out of Russia and all its next door neighboring countries, describing how large populations of Quirked Russian expatriates were flocking en masse to the borders in a waiting exodus to return to the home that was now actually speaking of welcoming them back, instead of baying for their blood. It was all just a matter of seeing how their Quirkless countrymen would react once Konstantin Khodamchuk's speech was finally given. And from the local stories describing and showing how multitudes of Russian citizens were gathering in front of the Winter Palace in the old capital of St. Petersburg for the primary televised airing of the president's speech, it was otherwise a very promising sign.

All he could bring himself to say upon seeing three massive gaps in logical behavior like this was: "What the hell is going on?"

However, seeing this for himself, Shoto began thinking out loud, whilst still answering Nikolay's question: "If Humarise has enough presence in the media to frame you and Midoriya for a crime, then the idea of them having sympathizers or agents in the news networks that would strategically keep certain stories out only seems obvious. The only thing I don't understand is why they would want this declaration of theirs kept from certain ears as opposed to others."

"Dammit, we got distracted, the video's still playing!" Bakugo suddenly exclaimed upon looking back to the computer. Everyone quickly gathered back around it while he rewound it the last minute they had missed.

Thus, Alan Kay's message continued: "You now know what Humarise is planning, and you now have the one thing that can end that plan for good, but now I need to tell you about the paper you have, as I'm sure you've tried to figure it out by now to no avail. I didn't want to take any chances in case I were caught before I could get the message out, so I had to disguise the majority of what I wrote out on that paper with a very special invisible ink that can only be revealed when exposed to just the right degree of warmth."

"Todoroki-san!" Nikolay immediately exclaimed, to which Shoto was already thinking the same thing, as he quickly produced the smallest flame from out his left hand, while Nikolay held the nonsensical paper just near enough to it that it wouldn't risk bursting into flames as well.

Before all their eyes, more and more writing suddenly began to form across the page, soon forming up an entire list of twenty-six number and letter combinations.

"What's actually on there is a complete listing of coordinates for all the cities they have placed their full supply of Ideo Trigger bombs in, down to the specific locations they're hidden in. This is of the utmost importance, as I was fortunate enough to overhear the finer details of their final plan in time.

"Flect Turn will declare that he has twenty-four bombs set up for the Heroes to try and stop, but this isn't the case. Humarise is actually in possession of twenty-six, and I know where the two hidden bombs are being sent: one is to be covertly transported to the Otheon capital city, to the parliament tower where the prime minister and all of Otheon's government officials will be hosting the upcoming Quirk amnesty speech from the Russian president in but a few days. And the second is to be taken by the Romanian and his team to Russia itself.

"Now you have all the information I could possibly gather for you. To whichever Heroes out there manage to get this, please use what I have given you…and use it to save the world."

Nikolay felt his heart instantly plummet into his stomach while his throat went bone dry; the whole hotel room turning frigid cold as he struggled to stay standing. In the meantime, Shoto and Bakugo were both already fast at working typing in the respective coordinates on the paper; with one after the other proving to indeed match up to the cities on the map they had seen on the news.

Rody, upon seeing the exact spot in the Otheon capital city the twenty-fifth coordinates pointed to, nearly felt like he was going to heave from anxiety and horror, as he exclaimed in realization: "Oh no! My siblings, they're going to get caught right in the blast radius of that bomb! And without the news even telling anyone about it, they don't even know the danger they're in!"

Finally, as Shoto typed in the twenty-sixth coordinates, his normally stoic eyes slightly widened as his hands clenched in apprehension. "Bezpalov…look."

Nikolay's head felt like it was swimming, so it was honestly a wonder he could hear Shoto talking to him. However, when he saw the map on his friend's phone, and saw where exactly the last bomb was to be set up, he finally collapsed to his knees, beaded in frigid sweat and hyperventilating with a crushing weight upon his shoulders, as he saw that the last Humarise bomb was to be within the Winter Palace, with that very same massive crowd of expectant civilians looking for peace, standing just a stone's throw away from it.

All at once, Nikolay felt like his head was going to split open as his thoughts and fears just came pouring out his mouth; not an ounce of room for doubt in his tone: "Oh my God… of course! With all the repairs for Moscow finally being done, all those Heroes that came over to help will have long since left for their countries by now. All those people will be completely defenseless. That man said Humarise will want to recruit the survivors when this is all over…and no matter which of the last two bombs goes off, Russia's recent hatred and fear of Quirks from before being ignited that much more would make the whole country a ripe harvesting ground for new recruits to the cause!"

It was all Nikolay could think of. It had seemed impossible for the longest time, even after Gagaringrad, to think that the Russian people would actually accept the idea of moving on from the pain of the Siberian Flash and forgiving and welcoming back their Quirked countrymen before. Yet, his worries then had been proven wrong.

But if a mass murderous disaster like Moscow or Berlin were to happen now of all times, when the idea of peace and unity between Quirked and Quirkless Russians was well and truly visible on the horizon, then that already murderous rage that had consumed the whole Motherland before would truly be impossible to turn back around. In fact, it would undoubtedly be countless times worse, with all the survivors practically rabid for Quirked bloodshed on a global scale.

Just like that, Nikolay was now not only looking at his father, Mina and all of his friends being placed in the single worst danger they'd faced yet, but now he was looking with his own eyes at the one way to completely destroy the dream he'd had for his national kinsmen, when the idea of what he wanted to represent for them as a Hero had only recently made itself clear to him. And it genuinely felt like there was nothing any of them could do about it.

With all of the information in the chip having finally been learned by the young Heroes, Shoto immediately proceeded to start typing out a text message to his father's number. "We need to get word of this out to the others as quickly as possible, and Endeavor can more easily reach the Association than us. They can get word to all the other teams from there."

Suddenly, Izuku stepped forward: "But it's not just that, we all heard the message, Todoroki-kun. If they can take down the Humarise lieutenants to keep them from activating their respective bombs manually, that still won't be enough, because Flect Turn has access to the master controls for those bombs regardless, so he can activate them when he sees things aren't going his way. Everyone out there, they all know it's bound to be a trap, but they're still choosing to go out there to try and save all those people and stop the bombs, anyway, and that's going to include Endeavor-sensei and the others once we tell them."

A tense silence hung between all the boys, as Bakugo finally summarized: "So that means it's up to the four of us to stop that Flect Turn asshole personally. All we have to do is go to their headquarters, kick his teeth in and use that master key to disarm all of those bombs to make sure."

As Bakugo explained this, Izuku noted: "But we still don't have an exact location of their headquarters, even with all of this—hey, Kolya-san, there's something on the other side of that paper."

As soon as Izuku pointed this out, Nikolay quickly flipped the paper, to find one final set of coordinates written on it, clearly having been written in the same heat-reacting ink. Seeing this, Bakugo quickly began typing out those coordinates on the map system on his phone's map system. It quickly zoomed in to a completely nondescript section of mountain on a microscopic island a small ways off the Klayd coast.

Seeing it alongside his partners, Nikolay noted: "So, that's where they're really working out of. They must've set up that original broadcast from the decoy base in Otheon so we'd hear that bell Clair Voyant-sensei pointed out, so we'd end up there, and they'd have more Heroes to take out with the bomb in that city."

Izuku, Bakugo and Shoto were clearly on the same train of thought as Nikolay; as Bakugo answered: "Obviously. That scientist wouldn't go to the trouble of writing up another coordinate for no reason, and these psychos wouldn't put up a big screw-off-looking fortress in the middle of nowhere if they wanted any chance of getting anything done under everyone's noses. So, that's where we gotta go; then we can leave 'em all reeling!"

BZZZ!

However, another notification sound came from Shoto's phone, leaving him visibly confused. "Strange, the signal here is strong, and I know my father would keep his phone on at all times, but it's saying my message can't get through."

With that, he proceeded to instead speed dial his father's number, but after only a few seconds of holding the phone to his ear, he lowered it, his brow furrowed. "It's not even getting me through to a ring tone; it just cuts me off automatically."

Overhearing this, Bakugo had decided to likewise try the same thing through his phone; gritting his teeth in building frustration after several seconds of waiting. "What the hell gives, it's doing the same thing with mine, too!"

With both their available phones proving unable to get through to the Otheon team, Izuku bowed his head in thought: "Humarise has already proved they have presence in the police and the media. If they somehow found out that we managed to get across the border with this case, then perhaps it's possible they also have agents or sympathizers working in the telecommunications offices to keep us from sharing what we know with the Pro Heroes."

"Then we need to find some way we can get the message out from outside the cell towers' blocking range, which means from an extensive height, right?" Nikolay asked; to which Rody visibly stiffened, a look of realization all over his face.

"That's right…and I know just how to do it. I spied the local airport on the outskirts of town on our way in. There's bound to be a small plane somewhere in there…something I can fly us in. I wasn't just blowing hot air when I said my dream was to be a pilot, I've memorized the controls for a single-engine plane like the back of my hand! I can do this for you guys!"

The four Heroes looked at him with apprehension and uncertainty across the board; Izuku asking: "Rody-san…you know it's going to be incredibly dangerous. We can't ask you to put yourself at that kind of risk."

But Rody was unflinching: "Those terrorists are threatening my siblings, so don't talk to me about putting myself at unnecessary risk. If there's any chance I can help you get to Humarise's headquarters so you can stomp them down, then that's what I'm gonna do, end of story. Besides, if I can fly you all high up enough, you can get word out to all your other Heroes wherever, then they can get the rest of the job done in the meantime. You all know I'm right, and it's not like you've got any better ideas, do you?"

Nikolay looked to his three partners, as if silently asking them the same question. From the intense gaze of thought in Izuku and Shoto's eyes, and the bristling aggravation on Bakugo's face, it pretty much gave the answer Rody already had. This really was their best option, and with their window of time being as small as it was, they knew there was no time to argue.

…

With this city in Klayd being so much smaller, the airport was comparatively smaller to the national airport in Otheon. Henceforth, it made it much easier for the five boys to sneak in through the fences and snatch up a lucky unguarded single-engine plane from one of the hangars. During the whole process of takeoff, Pino was continuous chirping with panicked terror, but Rody was as stoic and stiff as a rock the entire way through, manning the controls like a man possessed, until they were finally airborne without a hint of trouble, soon taking off over the deep blue of the sea, heading west to the island housing Humarise's true headquarters.

As soon as they knew they were finally on the final stretch, Nikolay and his friends proceeded to finally get suited up into their original Hero costumes; the young Russian looking even more intense, stiff and scared in the face than he had been before. He thought he was managing to hide it, but anyone could see that his brain was still running a million miles a minute, between thinking about the battle that was to come, all their friends operating in what were basically a series of city-wide death traps, and absolutely everything that was at stake if they were to fail. This was all he could think to himself, over and over, as he looked pensively out one of the windows to the blue horizon and the sun.

As soon as they'd finished getting suited up, Rody took that chance to call out: "Alright, you guys, we should be at the perfect altitude for any cell phone calls to get past any tower blockages, so if you want to get the word out to your Hero pals, now's the time!"

"We should just call the Association directly, that way they can get word out to Endeavor-sensei; maybe even call any Heroes from the countries neighboring Russia to intercept the bomb there at once. Every second we can save is crucial." Izuku suggested, spurring Bakugo into dialing All Might's number on his phone.

"But what if the Heroes they can reach aren't able to make it in time?" Nikolay suddenly spoke up, catching his three friends by surprise, as they looked to see him still staring out the window of the door at the horizon. Feeling their eyes on him, he looked, and they could all see the distinct anxiety in his own gaze as he continued: "We don't even have two hours left, and there's no telling the kind of chaos the Heroes are dealing with in their own countries, while all those people in St. Petersburg don't even know. Even if the Association was somehow able to get in touch with the media in Russia to tell them what we know, Midoriya-san's theory is looking more and more valid by the second. There's no justifiable reason why they wouldn't have been told about this otherwise. If the Association can't get word in, and any nearby Heroes they contact aren't able to get to the city in time, then those people are just sitting on the chopping block with nobody who can do anything about it…at least…almost nobody."

"Bezpalov, what exactly are you getting at?" "Yeah, now's not the time for beating around the damn bush!" Shoto and Bakugo responded, none of the three other Hero students liking where this seemed to be going, just by observing Nikolay's restless body language and shaky voice.

Clenching his fists in an attempt to psyche himself up, Nikolay forced the words out: "I'm saying that we got pulled into this whole mission in order to help the Pro Heroes take Humarise down…and now that includes stopping Flect Turn and his lieutenants both from setting off those bombs. Even if the four of us all together took the fight to their headquarters and beat him, there's still that small, small chance of just one of his people deciding to hit the detonator within just a few seconds of us deactivating all of them…and that's too much of a risk to leave to chance."

"Kolya-san…you can't seriously be thinking…" Izuku began to comment, as Nikolay took the slightest step back towards the door.

"If anything I can do can help all those Heroes in their share of this fight, and help you guys to stop Flect Turn in time…then you know I have to take that chance."

"Are you out of your damn mind, you friggin' idiot?!" Bakugo immediately snapped at Nikolay's confirmation. "Do you even have any clue just how many of those crazy bastards you could be going up against, let alone what kind of Quirks any one of them could have? How do you expect to stand a chance against all of that by yourself?! That guy on the message even said that Romanian you and the Wax Ex-Con keep blabbering about is there, and his Quirk is meant to keep people from even laying a finger on him!"

Shoto took a step forward, his hand raised in a show of pacification. "Take a moment to think about this, Bezpalov. From all the way down here at the Mediterranean to St. Petersburg, it's nigh impossible to make it there in the time limit we have, even if we had a faster aircraft than this."

Even Izuku noted: "That's right, even with the speed of my Full Cowling, I don't think even I could make that distance in that little time. Besides, with how much you pushed your Quirk back at the border crossing, you're still bound to be in at least a little leftover pain. You just aren't in the right kind of condition to take on a fight like that."

Suddenly, Bakugo shoulder-checked his way past Izuku and Shoto; his eyes burning with determination. "You're not about to go out there half-cocked and hogging all the glory on the astronomical chance you even could make it. You and I are the only ones that can consistently stay airborne here, so if you're going anywhere but the headquarters, then I'm going, too, and you don't get to say shit about it! If the Association can get word to other Heroes about it, then at least the two of us can keep those Humarise bastards busy until they get there!"

Nikolay had to suck in a deep, shaky and visibly frightened breath through his clenched teeth as he answered the three of them: "Look, all of you are right! It's an insane, stupid idea, I'm not denying that! Dammit, I'd be happy for even one of you to come with me, no matter the distance we'd have to travel just to even make it…but no matter how I try to look at it or think of another way, nothing else sounds like it's even remotely feasible.

"This is Humarise's home base we're heading to, that of course means the security is going to be like nothing any of us faced back when this started. The three of you are clearly the most powerful in our whole class together, so you'd all have the best chance of getting in there all the way to where you need to put that disarming key, and I know, I know our odds would be even better if I was there with you all too…but again, the chances of Marius or any one of the people he's with up there having the chance to activate their bomb before you could beat Flect Turn and put in the key is just too much to risk. Somebody has to do something to try and stop that, and if the Association can't reach any Heroes who can get there in time…then that only leaves one option. I have to at least try, no matter the odds against me. That's what Heroes are supposed to do, isn't it?"

This took the three boys aback, before Izuku answered imploringly: "Don't think we don't understand where you're coming from, Kolya-san, but Kacchan and Todoroki-kun are right: it's way too dangerous for you to go out there by yourself, and the distance is just too much. You know we would have to tell the Association about you going off on your own if we let you, then they would of course have to tell everyone else, and of course everyone would be worried sick about you fighting all alone, when they have their own battles to fight."

But this actually seemed to fill Nikolay with greater vigor, as he immediately answered: "That's exactly the point though! This is the most dangerous mission any of us has faced; you even said so yourself back at the hotel: everyone knows they're essentially working within a trap made for them, and they're just as worried about us as I know we are about all of them, but they're doing their jobs anyway, just like we're doing ours right now, because that's what Heroes do, because running away and allowing people to get killed is absolutely out of the question! When you get down to it, my decision here is no different than theirs, or yours. Peoples' lives are at stake, with even more on the line if those bombs go off and even after the dust settles, and if we want to become real Heroes, then if there's even the slightest chance, we have to do everything possible to save them, including this."

Izuku and Shoto both looked clearly shaken by the absolute conviction lining Nikolay's words; to see and hear just how scared he really was, and yet how he was still choosing to take his stand despite that. At the same time, Bakugo looked utterly frustrated at his classmate's insistence on going alone so their assault on the headquarters would have as much manpower as possible. The irony of his being angry at such stubbornness was completely lost on him.

"He's right." Rody suddenly commented from the cockpit, catching all four Heroes by surprise.

Having listened to them this whole time, the young pilot's grip on the wheel was white knuckled, but the light of inspiration in his eyes was piercing. "Everything you guys and your pals are doing is for the sake of saving countless families, including my own. If you know Niko as well as I'm certain you do, then you know he knows just how bad things have already gotten before for people with Quirks in his neck of the woods. But something like this could spread that and worse to every other corner of the world, and there's no telling how many innocent families would suffer then. If he thinks doing something like this has a chance of stopping that, just like how you all hitting that base could stop the whole thing…then I think you all know you need to let him take that chance, Hero to Hero."

Izuku, Shoto and Bakugo all looked deeply torn, as they continuously exchanged frustrated, pensive and worried glances with Nikolay one after the other. Of course they all understood where Nikolay was coming from; how could they not? They'd heard so many of the stories from him, Tunguska and now even Maja alike of just what life was like back in his country for people with Quirks. When he'd come back from Hokkaido with the feeling of actual hope of being able to turn that around, it was like a once impossible dream coming true for so many wayward people.

Now, with Humarise threatening to not only destroy Nikolay's hopes, but to instead make reality a million times worse for so many people who have already suffered so immensely, it was only natural that Nikolay wanted to do something to prevent it, even if he had to do so on his own, while the three of them took on the primary concentration of Humarise's forces. But no matter how one could rationalize and empathize with it, it was still no easier to accept, even with Rody throwing his hat in with letting Nikolay go through with it.

But the young Russian Hero himself had already expressed his feelings and his decision in all the words he could think of, and now all he could possibly hope to do to make them understand, was simply look them in the eye; the heartfelt desperation and intent crystal clear in his green eyes. It was a desperation similar to that which Izuku expressed every time the going got tough, and he had only his dream to pull him back up by his bootstraps; the same bullheaded determination that drove Bakugo to push himself leaps and bounds beyond his limit at everything he put himself towards; the same mindful and relatively calculated certainty that Shoto exuded naturally whenever he was faced with a problem.

They knew deep down that Nikolay's point was valid. No matter how fast the three of them together could be able to work their way into the heart of Humarise's fortress and deactivate all the bombs; leaving the bomb team in St. Petersburg unopposed for even a second was too great of a risk to far too many people, even without the looming nightmare that would unfold after it could go off.

Thinking about that once more, Izuku clenched his hands into tense fists, before he finally closed the distance between himself and Nikolay; looking his friend and companion through the last several days' tribulations in the eye…before finally holding up his closed hand in invitation for a heartfelt fist bump. "We'll tell the Association about the bomb and what you're doing, Kolya-san. If nothing else, just try to keep them distracted until any nearby Heroes can make it to help. Don't try to end the whole fight on your own if you don't think you can, alright?"

Nikolay could feel a breath of relief catch in his throat, before he formed the beginnings of a grateful smile, and met Izuku's fist with his own. "I promise."

But that wasn't enough for Bakugo, who angrily forced his way past Izuku's side; his red eyes burning into Nikolay's. "You'd better, Russkie; cause if I found out you up and got yourself killed doing this, I'll find a way to bring you back just so I can kick your ass personally!"

Nikolay couldn't even feel himself get shaken by Bakugo's thinly veiled threat; knowing this was simply the only way he knew how to show concern. As such, he nodded his head. "I understand."

Finally, Shoto likewise stepped forward, offering no hand, but instead giving Nikolay a deeply personal gaze, as he stated wholeheartedly: "We will disarm all those Ideo Trigger bombs."

Emboldened even further, Bakugo likewise stated: "We're going to flatten all those crazy assholes."

Izuku then bowed his head, keeping his hand in that same tight, driven fist. "We will protect all the Heroes, our friends…"

Feeling his chest swell, and his veins run with the adrenaline to take on any challenge, inspired by his partners' similar vows, Nikolay finally opened the door to the plane, his voice still managing to carry and pierce through to his fellow Heroes' hearts through the rushing wind and the roar of the engine as he culminated it all with: "…and we will save the world!"

And with that, and a final sincere nod of thanks to his fellows and friends for their support and understanding, Nikolay adjusted his goggles onto his eyes, situated himself in the doorway, once more looking at the location of the sun in relation to where the plane was headed and where he had seen it rise from this morning, and upon realizing which direction was north…finally proceeded to leap out of the plane, letting the insane friction of the wind blow hard against his body as gravity took him further and further down to the deep blue sea below.

BWOOOOM!

Before finally opening his eyes; his irises burning with focus, as he let all of that building and waiting Kinetic power come rushing through his muscles at maximum power, and sent it all out through his waiting hands and feet, launching him through the air at breakneck speed like an artillery shot, leaving the plane carrying his allies far behind, as they could only watch in silent concern and support alike, as the son of Tunguska sent himself soaring off into the most uncertain battle of his life…just as they themselves and all their friends were at this very moment, for the sake of each other and everyone on the planet.

…

Otheon Capital City Police Department

For the first time in several days, after continuously waiting for word from the Association and worrying about the four interns that had now taken it upon themselves to scatter to the winds without any backup, it felt like the Pro Heroes in Otheon had reached an actual opportunity, a lead that could get them results in their battle against Humarise. For that organization to have tried something so bold as to assassinate their traitorous scientist in the middle of a public hospital under Hero and police protection, seemed downright childish in its recklessness. But for the very chief of police himself to have then tried to kill Endeavor when all else was lost was downright insanity, difficult for the Flame Hero and his fellows to comprehend, despite having seen and stopped it for themselves.

But as a result, investigation of his office, computer and all his phones was able to ultimately prove his connection to Humarise, and as such, presentation of this evidence to the rest of the Otheon police was able to get the rest of the officers on the side of the Heroes, specifically in the goal of arresting the remaining officers who were fellow for any other active Humarise sympathizers.

With all of these factors in consideration, this should have felt like the Heroes had gained a real foothold against their enemy…and yet, even now it felt like anything but that, as no matter how much Endeavor, Clair Voyant or anyone else tried to appeal to the chief of police while he was in custody, he refused without one single flinch, to tell them anything of Humarise's plans.

As such, the Flame Hero by now had decided that their best course of action would be to question the Humarise initiates themselves; all of them currently being held together in individual interrogation rooms to a man, all under strict lock and key, as Endeavor and his fellow Heroes questioned them one-on-one.

And this had been the course he had stuck to working with for the last hour or so. Thus far, each of the men had refused to talk. Now, Endeavor personally found himself towering before the last man, the same haggard, graying-haired man he had previously burned a hole through the hand of, when he had tried to assassinate the comatose Alan Kay.

With his minuscule patience already at its end, Endeavor wasted no time: "We are both adults; we all know how fickle the loyalty of an organization like Humarise is, especially towards those that fail in their missions. You pledge your undying loyalty to them, and what do they give you in return? Apathy, and a merciless cruelty the moment you prove an inconvenience for them. You truly believe they would put forward any effort to preserve your life, knowing you've failed? They would happily send someone to kill you just as easily as they had sent you to kill one man. Why offer your loyalty to those the least deserving of it?"

Up until now, Endeavor had leaned on his usual repertoire of blazing fury and pure intimidation to try and get Villains to talk, and it only served to make his blood boil that much hotter to know that this was far too delicate a situation to rely on such blunt tactics. And so, he had decided to take up Clair Voyant's advice, and try a more humane, imploring approach, as unnatural as such a demeanor and way of speaking was for someone like him.

"If you have anyone that relies on you back where you come from, then surely the authorities would be willing to consider that if you were to give us something to work with towards stopping Humarise's plans. No matter what you've done, it's not too late to turn things back around to where you have something resembling a future for yourself. Tell us what your leader is planning, and I give you my word that I will tell the judges of your cooperation."

Ptoo!

Without even a visible hint, the man with graying unkempt hair mockingly spat on the Flame Hero's boot; earning his blazing rage-filled gaze in full, while the man himself just met it head-on with a near manic grin on his unshaven face.

"There are no words traded between humans and monsters. That's all you are; that's all any of you are, so don't insult my intelligence by acting like you're anything like good, Quirkless humans like us. Your word doesn't amount to shit."

The flames adorning Endeavor's body began to grow in size and heat, raising the temperature in the interrogation room exponentially, but the restrained man didn't even flinch or avert his gaze.

"You all fight to preserve a world that's completely lost its way. Quirks are nothing more than an abomination, a divergence from the path God meant for us to tread. We were all fools to ever actually look up to freaks like you. Flect Turn and our brothers and sisters in Humarise are only trying to preserve the survival and salvation of our species through the erasure of Quirk-wielding kind! If we don't, your disease will only continue to spread and mutate further, until it becomes too much, and our entire species is destroyed down to the last man, woman and child. If you Heroes actually gave half as much a shit about the lives of others as you claim you do, you would recognize the threat you pose to humanity, do us all a favor, and kill yourselves right now! That's the only way you can possibly guarantee me or anyone else that precious future you were talking about."

Seeing the furious desperation in Endeavor's blue eyes, the haggard Slavic man laughed from the pit of his gut. "Everything has already been set in motion, there's nothing any of you or your allies can do to stop it. But, if nothing else, it'll be fun to watch you all struggle fruitlessly until the very end…so do with this whatever you think you can."

Situating himself straight in his chair, the man puffed his chest out in a show of animalistic defiance to Endeavor's presence. Finally, he continued: "We've got a bomb set up somewhere in this city, set to go off in but a few hours; maybe even less than a couple by now. You'll all get to personally experience a repeat of Berlin firsthand. Soon, all the people stupid enough to embrace this society, and the traitors who suffered the same losses as the rest of us yet turned their backs on the memory of our dead and all we strove towards in order to shake hands with the very same monsters that brought us all to our knees in the first place; they will all suffer the punishment God has ordained for them to be carried out through our hands!"

Where there had once been a mockery poorly hidden in the man's tone, now there was a deeply pained emotional brutality, as if this were the man's first real chance to express the hatred and anger that had so clearly been building within him for who-knew-how long. Endeavor could see this all clearly, and as the intensity of his flames only slowly began to die down, he suddenly asked: "What is your name?"

This actually managed to catch the man by surprise, not expecting a Hero like this to even give enough of a care to ask something so personal. So great was his surprise, in fact, that he instinctively answered: "F-Fyodor…Fyodor Elimovich Idryanov…but what does that matter anymore?"

Endeavor suddenly knelt down so that he and Fyodor were on the same level. "Fyodor, if all of your hatred is as deep as this, then why would you even give me such a vague clue as just that your bomb is somewhere within this city? Why not go out, knowing you gave us nothing so that you could watch us pathetically scramble to the very end?"

Now, as Fyodor lifted his head to look Endeavor in the eye, he almost looked several decades older, as his fiery anger had now turned into bitter sadness. "You put so much effort into trying to get me and my comrades to talk, and then you ask questions when you're actually given something. You even go so far as to ask my name in an attempt to act like we're suddenly friends. Pathetic."

As he and Endeavor looked each other in the eye, the Flame Hero could see an incredible depth of indescribable pain in those of his captive. This visibly took him aback, as Fyodor continued: "We learned all there was to know about you Heroes when you came after us here. How many of you there are, and exactly who each of you are…including your students. You really want to know why I would actually give you something to work with? I'll tell you: one of them…your foreign student…more than a year ago now, he put my only son through the wall of their school bathroom…before running off like a coward into the night. My Vanya is the only thing I have left, and he's been left a goddamned vegetable ever since."

Endeavor's eyes were the only indication of how surprised he was to hear Fyodor somehow knew Nikolay on anywhere near such a level. Of course, given the similarity in accents between this man and his intern, it made a sliver of sense the more he thought about it.

"You Heroes go around saying that you're there to help people…but that's the biggest crock of horseshit there is. So many of us lost everything because of you animals…and if you're all going to keep shirking off the death and destruction you're all directly or indirectly responsible for, then I can't think of any greater justice than to watch you all struggle, chasing your fake ideal in pursuit of bettering your image and egos…until it lands you right in the mass grave you all deserve to rot in."

Fyodor let out a sigh that sounded as if he'd just released the weight of the world from his chest. Whatever Endeavor would do from here, he felt satisfied that he'd sealed all the Heroes' fate like his comrades had, and he felt filled with a sense of peace he once deemed impossible.

Half expecting Endeavor to incinerate him in frustration on the spot, Fyodor closed his eyes and sucked in a silent breath, just waiting for the moment…and waited…and waited. Yet it still didn't come.

When he opened his eyes to see if the Hero had actually decided to just up and abandon him here in his blind rush, Fyodor was instead met with Endeavor still kneeling before him, but this time, all the flames obscuring his face had vanished, leaving only the square-jawed, stubble-lined and deeply scarred face of Enji Todoroki looking him in the eye.

None of the previous aggression, intimidation or Heroic bravado or intensity was there anymore. In fact, if Fyodor had to pick a word to describe the look on the unmasked Hero's face right now, it would've had to be…not compassion, but a very stoic, yet profound sense of understanding.

As he looked through Fyodor into his very soul, Enji struggled to find the words, until eventually resigning himself to the fact there were no prepared speeches in his head he could say. He could only say the words as they came to him, and simply hope it would be enough: "I know you won't listen to anything else I could say, Fyodor…but you should at least ruminate on this: whether he's in a coma right now or not, the fact is that your son is still alive and breathing. You should consider that fact, after everything I know you and your countrymen have suffered through, and be grateful to whichever God you worship for that fact. There are…"

For a moment, Enji had to avert his gaze as his face tensed with the struggle of swallowing a great lump of emotion working its way up his throat. "…there are far too many parents in this world who genuinely can't say they're so lucky. I know. I don't know what kind of sentence ultimately awaits you and your comrades, but you should take this time to really ask yourself what kind of future you're securing for your child by falling in with a group like Humarise, whether you succeed or not. Don't forget, there are plenty of children that have been orphaned, and parents that have had to now bury their children, because of your allies."

With nothing further needing to be said, Enji punctuated this unexpectedly heavy interaction by turning his back on the silent Fyodor, never looking back to see if the man had simply chosen to ignore his words, or was actually thinking on it.

As soon as he stepped out of the interrogation room, he immediately reignited the flames upon his face, just as Clair Voyant stepped out of the next room, visibly looking frustrated. "Have you managed to uncover anything?"

She let out a deep sigh. "Nothing. Humarise clearly knows how to indoctrinate the most unflinching loyalty in its members. Maybe the Sidekickers are doing better, but every second we spend here could be the difference between countless lives."

Looking down the hall for the first sign of his sidekicks, Endeavor answered: "Well, I was able to get us something to work with. He said that they do indeed have a bomb set up somewhere in this city that they're planning to detonate in but a couple of hours. Of course, the possibility of him sending us on a wild goose chase has crossed my mind as well."

RRRING!

Suddenly, both Endeavor and Clair Voyant's phones went off with a notification signal, with soon three of the doors bursting open, as the Flaming Sidekickers came rushing out, all wielding their phones as well; Burnin' urgently exclaiming: "HEY, BOSS, IT'S THE ASSOCIATION CALLIN'! YOU THINK SOMEONE FINALLY DUG UP SOMETHING?!"

But Endeavor was not about to waste another moment through idle chatter, as he answered his phone, seeing he was personally being called by All Might's number. His fellow Heroes all quickly followed suit; all of them immediately being answered by the voice of the Association director, while Endeavor was met with Toshinori's voice:

"Endeavor, we have urgent news: we've just received a notification from Todoroki-shonen's phone in the Klayd region! He and Bakugo-shonen have not only reunited with Midoriya-shonen and Bezpalov-shonen, but they have also managed to uncover some vital secret info regarding Humarise's plans. Flect Turn has recently made a global announcement through internet, radio and television, that Humarise is planning to detonate Ideo Trigger bombs in twenty-four cities across the world in less than two hours from now; however, those boys have discovered the truth: they actually are in possession of twenty-six, and their two secret bombing locations are at the Otheon capital city parliament tower, and at the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg, Russia!"

Hearing this, Endeavor and his fellow Heroes felt their hearts jumpstart into a rush. "WHAT?! Such an announcement was made and we didn't hear a word of it from a single officer? How is that even possible?!"

Toshinori personally answered, having been the one to call him amid this rush: "Because the announcement from Flect Turn was deliberately kept off the airwaves in the Otheon and Russia areas altogether; assumedly so that the casualties from the detonations of both secret bombs will be at their maximum. Todoroki-shonen informed us of their group coming to this conclusion already. They suspect Humarise may have sympathizers or agents in the media that are controlling which information gets into the respective countries."

Having been given this same information via her own call, Clair Voyant answered: "We have the honest officers within the police on our side; surely we could be able to have them legally seize the local telecommunications departments across the city and take control of the airwaves so they can send warning out to the citizens."

Given the mortal cost if they didn't do something to get the word out, Endeavor nodded in grim agreement before returning to his call with Toshinori: "If Shoto and the others gave you all this information, then does that mean they're still in Klayd right now?"

Unfortunately, there was just enough hesitation on Toshinori's part to tell Endeavor this was not the case, before he ultimately answered: "Unfortunately…no. They were also able to pinpoint the location of Humarise's true headquarters from the same computer chip they got the news of their true plan from. It's a small island off the western coast of Klayd. Last we heard from those boys, they're on their way there now to take out Flect Turn and disarm the bombs remotely, while the rest of the Hero teams are working now to locate their own bombs and neutralize the lieutenants who would otherwise activate them on-site.

"What's more, the Association has no Heroes on-site in Russia right now; any that were in-country have already long since left for their home countries after the repairs to Moscow were done. Because of this…they said that Bezpalov-shonen has taken it upon himself to head to St. Petersburg on his own to try and stop the bomb there from going off. We're currently trying to contact whichever Heroes we can who have a chance of getting out there in time, but it's a long shot at best. Flect Turn's announcement has sparked mass panic in nearly every nation, including their own."

Naturally, the very thought that one of his interns decided to go off to face an unknown number of unknown-Quirked assailants so far away by himself, had Endeavor's flames burning even hotter with simultaneous worry and anger, before the Sidekicker Kido suddenly interjected: "Endeavor, I pulled up a map of the Klayd area. I've got the island they mentioned on sight right now. If we split up now, we could take care of the bomb situation here, and you could go to catch up with the boys before they get in way over their heads."

Clair Voyant quickly answered: "That doesn't tackle all the problems. I can call the rest of the local Heroes in the area, and we can handle the bomb situation no problem. You all should go to take care of your interns before it's too late."

Burnin' eagerly nodded in agreement. "Clair's right, you guys, they need the backup, and somebody's gotta stop Solovei-kun before he gets himself killed. Endeavor, we know how much Shoto-kun means to you, but you're way faster than any of us, so you've definitely got what it takes to stop Solovei-kun before he gets anywhere close. We can catch up with the others easy from here. If the Association is already sending word out to nearby Heroes to Russia, then they surely could be able to get there in time."

Suddenly, Endeavor's visibly shaking form went still, and his flames began to settle down, before he finally answered with a most unexpected calm: "No…those boys told the Association all they know, and in turn have told us all they know, because they realize this city needs all of us together to be able to save it. There's no telling just how heavily guarded Humarise will have its bomb, now that they're so close to their end goal, especially if they know the possibility of the details of their true plan reaching us as they have."

"But what about those boys? They haven't faced something of this scale before, and that still does nothing to save Solovei-kun from the mistake he's making," the other Sidekicker, Onima, stated with growing concern, with Kido and Burnin' likewise looking very confused at their bosses' course of action.

But Endeavor refused to back down from his decision as he began to stride forward for the stairs, spurring his fellow Heroes to follow his lead. "Those four boys are more tightly bound to one another in their work than any of us have been willing to give them credit for…and they're even more handy in a crisis than they initially seem You really think they wouldn't have fought tooth and nail to keep Solovei from going off, if they had absolutely no confidence in his ability to at least stall the Humarise agents up there long enough for them to beat Flect Turn and deactivate the whole lot?

"You all heard the same things I did: even if the Association were to get in touch with any Heroes in neighboring countries, they still have a great distance to cover, and mass panic in their own turf to deal with. The chances of the civilians in St. Petersburg getting wiped out when that bomb goes off before a single Hero could get there are simply too great, and Solovei clearly realized that. That's the only way a boy like that could take such a risk…and it goes the same the other way around, as well. He knows those three together have the best chance of stopping Humarise altogether, and if his interference can help buy them even just a few more seconds, then that's what he's going to do.

"The point is that we all now have our jobs to do, and those boys trust every one of us to see it through…and as Pros, and their teachers, we can't afford to let them down. We'll dispose of the bomb in this city, neutralize Humarise in this area, and then…then we can give our all to head out and back them all up."

As was naturally befitting of a Hero of his stature, Endeavor's rock-solid voice of confidence in his interns and their decisions, and in their long-awaited objective, was enough to reinvigorate his sidekicks, with even Clair Voyant feeling an upsurge in confidence in their ability to do what needed to be done.

As such, with the information they now had, she handily chimed in: "They said that the Otheon bomb is set to go off at the parliament tower in the heart of the city…with this kind of timing; that would be right when the amnesty conference from the visiting Russian president would occur. It's been a major bit of buzz on the local airwaves for the last few months, in fact."

Her eyes lit up with realization; Burnin' suddenly added on: "Hey, yeah, that's right; I remember overhearing Solovei-kun talking all nervous about that back during the original flight over here. Something that big, there's no doubt a lot of the locals back up in Russia are gonna be gathering out in public to watch it, too. Maybe that's why Humarise is plannin' to set their bomb off in St. Petersburg. I mean, that's, like, their replacement capital city, isn't it?"

But Endeavor had no patience for any unnecessary chatter, even if he knew that the details all seemed to fit perfectly together. "Those kinds of details don't matter anymore, Burnin'! The point is that innocent lives are in danger, so now we have to move! Tell the police what's going on, Clair-san; we need to get as many of the civilians in the city to take shelter as we can as soon as possible!"

…

Three Peaks of Lavaredo, Italy

With Otheon and Klayd's island being situated snugly between the waters of Italy and Greece, Nikolay didn't really need to guess where he was by the time he'd finally reached land, refusing to waste a moment by touching down to get his bearings. It was all he could do to just keep his eyes focused on the horizon, trying to fight the numerous directions of heavy winds around him in order to keep himself going in as straight a line as possible.

But for how focused as he tried to be, counting down the seconds he was flying through the air with every blast from his hands and feet before firing all over again, it couldn't do anything to alleviate the building agony of his muscles fraying and straining from the continuous build-up, transference and firing of such intense Kinetic power over and over again without stopping; his bones feeling like they would ultimately shatter inside him by the time he'd finally flown into the terrain of the Italian Alps.

By then, his pain, adrenaline and restless anxiety together sent him into a delirious dizzy spell, finally breaking his trajectory and momentum, and ultimately sending him careening through the air, before landing hard upon the middle peak of a trio of protruding mountaintops in the middle of an expansive valley amid the mountains.

As soon as Nikolay's body stopping rolling with his crash landing, leaving him bruised all over and his costume frayed and torn, he could feel his brain pulsating painfully in his skull, his every muscle fiber screaming in agony as his heart pounded at such a strength and pace one would've thought he was going to keel over from heart failure. His stomach was clenched like a vice, and he could feel all the pain forcing the acidic burn of bile further up his throat, though he tried like hell to fight it back. Even as he opened his eyes, the clouds above him couldn't stop spinning, and the collecting of tears as he lay on his back only made the stinging pain burn that much more intensely. He couldn't even get his body to try and roll over so he could get back on his knees and try to recollect himself or regain his bearings.

Everything in his body was in pain, but that still didn't compare to the absolutely crushing anguish he was feeling in his heart, as he tried so, so hard to not start wailing in desperation and defeat.

"What the hell am I doing?! How long have I been going for already? How much ground have I even covered? How much more do I still have to go? They were all right! I don't even know what numbers I'd be going up against after all this…oh my God, everything hurts so bad! What was I thinking?! What chance did I ever have?! Without Midoriya-san, Todoroki-san or Bakugo with me, I'd just be throwing my life away! I can't possibly do this by myself! But I know what happens to everyone else if I don't do something to stop it! Now I can't even try to catch up with them, either! I've thrown every chance I had of being able to help anyone away like trash! Everybody else is risking their lives, but they're all where they're supposed to be…while I'm out in the middle of nowhere, unable to help my friends or my people! What the hell kind of Hero am I?!"

[[The kind that could only come from two tried and tested bloodlines of great Heroes coming together, my dear little Kolya.]]

Echoing from the apathetic blowing of the wind, a woman's voice of boundless warmth managed to pierce through the relentless pounding of physical and emotional pain and restless anxiety that was filling Nikolay's head amid his lamenting; a voice that only he could have recognized out here, as it finally drove him to open his stinging eyes in stunned shock.

He tried to ignore the burning pain of the sun shining directly in his eyes, as he tried so hard to get off his back, looking all around him at the vast empty expanse of the mountain ranges surrounding him, finding not a single sign of anyone else being near him, let alone the one person he knew he could never see, and yet knew he'd heard as clear as day above everything else. His hand instinctively began to reach to feel for Tunguska's ring hanging around his neck just under his costume.

[[…M…Mom?]]

[[I'm right here, Kolya, right behind you, just out of sight, but always with you, no matter what. Deep down, you know this.]]

[Thomas Newman – Sixteen-Hundred Men]

There was no denying it; it was indeed the sound of Gamayun's voice speaking to him out here, sounding as though she were literally just behind his back, sounding so at peace; so much so that it was able to still all of Nikolay's other conflicting emotions. To hear her voice sound so real, while still knowing the unforgiving reality, left his shoulders trembling as he bit his lip, bowing his head in an attempt to swallow the tears that naturally came. [[It isn't you…you aren't real. It's all become so hopeless, I'm hearing voices all over again.]]

[[We both know you don't mean any of those defeated words, Kolya. You are our son, and neither of us were the kind of Heroes to ever truly give up. Just look at where you and your father are now and you can see the proof for yourself. Our unbending spirits are just one of the things we were so lucky to have gotten to pass on to you.]]

As blissful as it felt to hear his mother's voice, Nikolay could still feel that sickening sensation of utter hopelessness overwhelming him as he answered: [[But maybe…maybe this is the end of all that. There's no way I can make it to St. Petersburg in time after only managing to get this far with this much pain. My body feels like it's on fire…and the fighting hasn't even started yet. I abandoned my friends for an idiotic shot at going solo! So many people are going to lose their lives…and I can't do anything to stop it from here!]]

As his muscles screamed when he tried to clench his shaking hands into fists to express his despair, he could suddenly feel a radiating warmth start to spread across his back, almost as though his mother were standing right up behind his back, readying to pull him into a motherly embrace; his skin tingling, it felt so real.

[[Oh, Kolya, how many times already have you felt somewhere inside that you were in over your head, that all hope was lost for you, your friends or anyone else? Yet every time, you've always managed to dig deeper and deeper into yourself, and rekindle that fire that gives you the strength to face those very same overwhelming threats, and defeat them for the sake of everyone around you. Even now, you struggle through the pain you're feeling, because you don't want to give up, because you want to save those you can, because even when it feels as hopeless as you think it does now, you know that there's still that slimmest chance that you can do it. That chance is what all Heroes fight for.]]

That matter-of-fact summation gave Nikolay pause, as he realized the truth of it, looking at what he was doing right now; gritting his teeth and fighting through some of the worst pain he'd experienced in a long time, instead of simply laying here to bake in the sun and just give up. All at once did he once more feel like kicking himself for having even considered such a thing for a moment. But that still did nothing to alleviate the crushing weight of what felt like inescapable reality, as his mother's voice continued:

[[But no man can move mountains or the heavens, not even the mightiest or most well-intentioned Hero. That's why we all have each other to lean on, even you, now, when you must feel the loneliest you've ever been. No matter how much you may try to convince yourself otherwise, the fate of the world rests on far more shoulders than just your own. Remember, even now, your father and all your friends must likewise feel like they're completely outmatched, and yet they are continuing to give their all despite that, because they believe in each other, no matter how far away they may be, to see that their jobs are done and innocent lives are saved. You even said so yourself. That faith of theirs, that inherent instinctive trust, is placed in you just as much as yours is placed in them. They all believe in you with everything they have, just as much as in everyone else, because you all know just how strong you all truly are, and if they know that about you, then you must know it about yourself too, Kolya.]]

[[Mom…I've never intentionally pushed myself to this level before. The last time I tried, my Quirk went out of control and almost literally killed me. I don't know if I can even go that much further from here, let alone as far as I know I still have to. It feels like my muscles are about to snap at all the seams, like my bones are about to shatter. I don't know what else I could possibly do different that isn't going to completely break me. I'm racking my brain, and coming up with nothing.]]

That radiating warmth suddenly felt as though it spread entirely around Nikolay's body; leaving him speechless and overcome with an ethereal calm. In the back of his mind, he could instinctively feel that, if he could see Gamayun right now, she would be smiling encouragingly, which filled his chest with a swelling sensation of raw emotion.

[[There is still so much untapped potential within your Quirk for you to explore and make into your own, Kolya; I can feel it. So much of what you've been able to turn it into is like that of your father…but perhaps there's more you could tap into that could expand your capabilities by leaps and bounds, even now. Let me help you the only way I can, Kolya. Close your eyes, steady your breathing, ease your heart, and listen only to the sound of my voice. Know and always remember that I am with you every moment…and let your power take you to the skies once more.]]

The pain that was searing through Nikolay's muscles was searing enough as it was, just the very action of trying to get back onto his feet from his knees made him want to cry out.

But the comfort that Gamayun's voice instilled him with was that much stronger, as he stubbornly wiped the pained tears of his condition and his emotions from his eyes. With his vision cleared, he turned his unmoving gaze back to the cloud-dotted blue skies above, remembering now which direction from here was just the right degree of north he needed to get to. At last, those seemingly pointless geography classes back at Yuuei were finally paying off.

With his mother's guiding words still echoing loud and clear in his head and within his stalwart beating heart, Nikolay sucked in a deep and steadying breath through his nose, pressing his hands and feet flush to the rock beneath him, feeling the minute yet still-existent vibrations of the very earth's ceaseless rotation beneath his fingertips, feeling it steadily surge up through his fingers and through every fiber of his being; his once rampant heart rate growing calmer with each passing second, no matter how much his mind wanted to drive forth the point that with each passing second, doomsday was approaching.

With the warmth of his mother's spirit still encapsulating him, and the thought of Tunguska, Mina, Izuku, Shoto, Bakugo, Eijirou, Maja and all his friends and schoolmates in their respective struggles at this very moment to help save countless lives, Nikolay formed one single command to himself within his head, thinking it as though he were screaming it from this very mountaintop for all the world to hear:

'GO!'

BWOOOM!

The pain immediately firing through his entire body had Nikolay's tears flying from his face as fast as they could come; his goggles thankfully protecting his line of sight from the wind. Despite how high and fast he was already going, and despite how much he could feel the friction against his body building up his Kinetics again, the very action of trying to will it through his muscles again was now simply too much for him to bear. The pain was just too much, like they were going to tear apart and break his bones from inside. After but a few seconds flying high, he was going to come crashing down and most likely die…with countless more too likely to follow shortly after. After all his struggling and trying to will himself out of hopelessness, he let himself be deceived by a hysterical delusion.

[[What have I done?! I can't go back, I'm gonna fall! I can't do this anymore! I can't go any faster! I'm not going to make it!]]

At least, that was what Nikolay was growing increasingly convinced of, almost screaming in fear… until he could suddenly feel that comforting maternal warmth spread from his outstretched hands and soon all the way across the back of his body, as though his mother were standing or flying right behind him, perhaps even holding him like a parent first teaching their child to swim.

Like that, the inescapable danger of gravity, even the pain that once consumed his whole body, felt like it was melting away at the sound of Gamayun's voice once more speaking into his ear:

[[Don't be afraid, Kolya. You only think this is the best you can do, but deep down, we both know that it isn't. Until now, you've harnessed flight by using your Quirk to absorb the Kinetic energy of wind friction against your body, and firing it off in timed bursts to help you regain speed, height and maneuverability; but that's only the most rudimentary way you can use it. Plane turbines suck in air and convert it into power enough to lift themselves, but they don't work this same way. Birds able to fly great distances and speeds, but do they maintain that by just flapping their wings? No, they let the wind itself help them glide with their wings, so they don't exert themselves into debilitating exhaustion. I learned that the hard way when I was your age, and you can utilize something similar, if not even more powerful than that. Your Quirk is so different from mine and your father's, but you have the ability to utilize it in such similar ways.]]

Suddenly, the rushing of the wind past Nikolay's ears was overcome by the sound of strong beating wings, just as he felt the unmistakable sensation of warm hands gently grabbing onto the back of his own, immediately stilling all his once mounting fear. With that instinctive comfort, Nikolay tried to think of the examples she had just described, running it through his own head:

'Alright, alright, think about this, think! Instead of constantly building and forcing all the power collected into my body in these intense bursts that strain my body like hell; why don't I try to focus on combining the absorption and release aspects of my Quirk, and change it from two separate and equally intense functions into one continuous powerful cycle. Surely that might be able to help alleviate the strain Come on, think of the turbines of a plane and the gliding property of a bird's wings. Even better, try to picture it related to my whole body. Picture it, and will my Quirk to absorb and release all at once at a constant rate, with energy being released just as quickly as it's absorbed. I should be able to figure that out.]]

Nikolay fought to not think about gravity or the unforgiving mountain peaks below, but instead the sound of Gamayun's guiding words, and the picture she had instilled in his head of how to go about this. He kept trying to picture how it was whenever he tried to focus on the power already collected within himself, and how he always had to mentally will even a share of that power through one specific direction in his body, to whichever limb he wanted it to come out of at any given moment.

He could feel the Kinetic power of the air friction already filling his body with its true cap of that power just waiting to be released. But true to Gamayun's advice, he tried to think of the act of releasing, not as one gigantic burst, but rather as one steady, continuous release, a jet stream of pure Kinetic power instead of a cannon's blast.

'Come on…just this one thing, try to focus! Let the Kinetics flow through me, not collect and then come shooting out all at once! Don't be an object standing against the wind, become a part of it, let it flow through me! Let it flow in and out of me all at once! Turbines and birds, just focus on that! Come on!'

However, in a moment when Nikolay was able to bring his focus back to the moment, he immediately realized how easily he'd lost his most vital concentration, as he was about to crash land face first into an incoming edge of one of the countless mountains.

With a terrified shriek that was drowned out by the wind, Nikolay immediately fired a massive burst from his left hand and foot, sending him barrel-rolling through the air to his right, just barely managing to avoid splattering into the mountain face. His heart felt like it was about to leap out his mouth at any given second, but his mind so stubbornly tried to keep up the same train of thought despite it all.

'COME ON! DON'T THINK OF THE MOUNTAINS, FOCUS ON THIS AND MY FLYING RIGHT NOW! I HAVE TO, DAMMIT! TURBINES AND BIRDS, ENERGY TRANSFERRENCE AND GLIDING!'

As Nikolay mentally screamed at himself in order to get his head back on straight, he could still feel his mother's warmth in his hands, and the heavy beating of her wings. Listening to that and nothing else, his mind thankfully began to steady.

'Don't be a backfiring plane engine or a cannon, be a human plane or a human bird, any combination of the two. Let my body be the bird, and let my Quirk be the engine…an internal motor…a perpetual motor. My Quirk, I know it can produce just as much power as it takes to actually use it, if not even more if I use it right. That has to be the key. I just need to be always thinking of firing without stopping, and let my body take care of the absorption all on its own. That must be what it is. It just has to be.'

With a series of deep breaths, Nikolay closed his eyes and tried to follow his own theory, thinking only of the act of releasing his Quirk, imagining his regular command as one continuous one, instead of thinking it in repeating succession. He could already feel his Kinetics come shooting out of his extremities, but as he continued focusing on this new potential way of controlling and using it better, instead of the usual pattern of one collected blast, moments of free flight to recharge and then another powerful shot, now it was like a continuous tunnel of Kinetic power continuously expelling from out his hands and feet.

As he could feel the wind friction sending its resulting vibrations throughout the entirety of his body, his muscles were still in pain. However, as the moments passed, he could feel it slowly but steadily start to lessen and dull as he continued to will himself to fire his Kinetics in one nonstop command. Instead of the intense shockwaves of vibration power tearing its way down his limbs from his core and putting so much strain on his muscles and bones; now it was feeling as though the vibration was completely encasing his body from end to end, inside and out, maintaining itself at a frequency that his muscles were actually adapting to, since the pain was still continuing to lessen.

With that revelation, and the realization that his Kinetic Blasts were still free-flowing out from him as quickly as the wind was providing him the power to do so, Nikolay could see that he could no longer feel the inescapable pull of gravity that his countless previous launches always came with. Now, he could actually say with confidence that he felt just like a bird. He was maintaining his current altitude and speed, flying with the use of his Quirk, turning him into what was essentially a human plane.

[[I…I-I'm doing it! I'm doing it! I'm actually doing it! It works! My Quirk working like a perpetual motor can make me actually fly! You were right, Mom! You were right!]] Nikolay exclaimed in ecstatic disbelief; the sound of Gamayun's wings reaching his ears just in time to hear her similarly overjoyed voice:

[[Don't thank me, Kolya. I had nothing to do with this. I only gave you the slightest push. You worked out how best to use your Quirk to overcome this hurdle, and you did it all on your own. I knew you would; you are so much more resilient and resourceful than you give yourself credit for. If you can just keep the same faith in yourself as I know your father and all your friends do, there will be nothing you can't accomplish, as a Hero and in the life you have ahead of you.]]

Nikolay always felt his chest swell with gratitude when Mina, Tunguska and his friends expressed their confidence and assuredness in him, but to hear it come from his mother's voice was enough to make Nikolay start crying in indescribable relief as he continued to fly, only able to stop once Gamayun spoke once more: [[I'm sorry I can't be here with you any more than I already have, Kolya, but I'll still be with you in your heart, always. You can do this, my sweet boy. You can get there, and you can help the others save the world. You know you can. I love you, my little Kolya, so, so much more than you will ever know.]]

With those last words, Nikolay caught the faintest golden glimpse of something flapping through the air right alongside him from just out the corner of his eye. Those two things together spurred him to immediately look to his right to see his mother, whether her spirit or just a figment of his imagination, right there before his eyes…but he was instead met only with the empty panoramic view of the passing Italian Alps.

Nikolay could already feel his heart starting to twist, the desire to call out for his mother to come back working its way up his throat…but he was just as quick to stubbornly shake his head and return his gaze to the horizon he was continuing to approach, once more focusing his mind on continuing this perpetual absorption/release cycle of his Quirk working its way through his whole body.

[[She's right…I can't let myself get distracted, not now. Dad, Mina, Midoriya-san, everyone else is counting on each other, counting on me, to help save all these people, to help save the whole world! I've already made it this far, and by God, I'll make it the rest of the way, no matter what!]]

With that immovable declaration speaking out from his heart, Nikolay gritted his teeth as he began to focus on firing his Kinetic energy at an even greater continuous power level or vibration frequency inside; subsequently causing his flight to speed up at an exponential rate; the passing winds gliding along his body being nothing short of biting in their merciless cold against his skin.

[[No matter how much more power I exert, this cycle should still hold true, so I can still be able to go even faster without risking too much more extensive damage to my body. If it can just get me to St. Petersburg in time, then I can go all out as much as I have to, to stop them! This has to work…it just has to!]]

As Nikolay continued to progressively try and focus his Quirk into rushing through his whole body at greater and greater frequencies, making him go faster and faster in his continuous flight, he could only wonder within his heart just how everyone else was faring in their own missions at the scattered corners of the world; all the while hoping above all hopes that they were managing. [[Dad, Mina, Midoriya-san, Kirishima-san, Maja-san, Kyouka-san, everyone, I promise we'll all see each other again!]]

…

But if such wishes could serve as a portent of what the immediate future held, his friends, no matter where they were, would have greatly benefitted from hearing it right now.

From one country to the next, through their own various methods of searching their respective cities alongside their mentors and hosts, the different Hero teams were fortunately managing to spot the general locations of their own Ideo Trigger bombs, generally in the very places Flect Turn's announcement had shown they would be. Fortunately, none of them were fool enough to think that Humarise wouldn't be ready to protect these weapons of mass destruction upon first sight of the Heroes coming in; as they all came in ready for the fights that all ultimately ensued.

In Tokyo, Kyouka's superhuman hearing and Mezo's wide-reaching tentacles topped with further ears and eyeballs were able to pick up an unusual number of unmarked vehicles and shifty-looking men gathered around the base of the Tokyo Tower, with the sound of unusual muffled machinery under the streets quickly proving their suspicions of the bomb having been situated there. However, upon informing Present Mic, Cementoss and Gang Orca of this, they were quickly met with a large contingency of Humarise agents situated all around the area and across Tokyo Tower itself, which ended up turning this skirmish in a wide-scale battle in width and height, forcing them all to put their agility to the test if they were going to have any chance.

Similarly, in Kyushu; the team of Tunguska, Fatgum, Eijirou, Tetsutetsu, Tamaki and Maja were forced to go extensively on the move, upon the realization that the bomb they were to dispose of was all the way in the biggest city on Kyushu island, Fukuoka. Based on the coordinates they'd been able to calculate, they found themselves at the steps of Hakata Station, which provided an immediate range of vantage points for the Humarise agents situated throughout, who all quickly proceeded to lay down a wide-scale attack upon first sight of the Heroes. With the panic that was already engulfing the city only being made worse by this sudden battle, it fell to Fatgum to act as a shield for his partners, students and the civilians that were out in the open, while Tunguska had to resort to using his Solar Beams to whittle away at whatever cover the terrorists had, while Maja, Eijirou, Tetsutetsu and Tamaki took it upon themselves to evacuate the civilians from the battlefield until they had their opening to move in. Unfortunately, with the especially aggressive distance-based Quirks the Humarise members were hitting them with, it would be far easier said than done.

In Singapore, Setsuna was able to separate her body into as many pieces as she could to send in all different directions. Because of this, she and Momo were able to quickly spot the location of their own bomb far sooner; as it was actually being set up out in the open by a widespread contingent of undisguised Humarise members on the outskirts of one of the city's biggest ports. Upon giving word of their finding to Majestic and Big Red Dot, the Heroes quickly reconnected, and made their collective move against the terrorists, who naturally were more than ready for the intrusion, as they quickly mounted a counter-offensive, forcing the four of them to go on the evasive, needing to think fast together to try and find a way to break through their defenses and disarm the bomb in time.

In Paris; Ochako, Tsuyu and Selkie went searching for any sign of their own bomb via the Seine River; while Yuga, Tooru, Yoroi Musha and Frere Intrépide quickly worked their way through the streets while helping with the evacuations, and Nejire and Willow Light took to searching from the skies for any signs of suspicious activity amid the chaos. Naturally, they were the one to send the call out to their fellows, as they spotted a gathered cluster of matching hooded figures like the ones in their debriefing around the area of the Arc De Triomphe, with their bomb somehow having managed to get transported onto the top of the monument, undoubtedly due to their having taken advantage of all the mass confusion across the city.

Unfortunately, despite their fellow Heroes being more than quick to regroup so they could all intercept; the wide open nature of the surrounding area made it more than easy for more Humarise members lying in wait atop surrounding buildings to get the drop on them as they began to move in, and with still so many civilians hurriedly trying to drive around in their bid to escape, that only made things that much more difficult for their Heroes, now having to try and neutralize the terrorists, and keep any innocent people from getting caught in the crossfire all at once.

In Cairo, while their host Pro Hero, Salaam, was able to quickly pinpoint the location of their bomb as being on Gezira Island in the middle of the city; the whole team of Denki, Hanta, Minoru, Ibara, Mt. Lady, Kamuy Woods, Edgeshot and Deathwalker found the very journey to get there to be incredibly arduous, as the masses of panicking civilians and resulting traffic jams spread out all across the city were among the worst of the global panic. Thusly, it fell to Salaam to use his natural two-dimensional form to swiftly maneuver his way through the maze-like streets, keeping in touch with his allies as to where the bomb specifically was once he'd catch sight of it and its protectors, whilst the rest of the Heroes quickly got to work helping the civilians everywhere they possibly could along the way.

In New York City; Fumikage, Hawks, Mashirao, Rikido, Shishido, Nirengeki and Jurota found themselves facing an especially challenging battle ahead, as Star And Stripe immediately identified the coordinates of their bomb to be right in the heart of Times Square, which had quickly devolved into a massive cacophony of panic, accidents, and even a few accidental fires started by the people all trying to flee such a confined and immensely populated area. The Humarise members hiding out around the area couldn't have asked for a better condition with which to confront the Heroes, as they were able to masterfully blend in with the rest of the chaos at first. Thankfully, the observant eyes of Hawks, Shishido, Star And Stripe, alongside Jurota's inescapable sense of smell, were able to quickly help the Heroes clue in on how many assailants they had to deal with and where; thus Times Square quickly turned from a scene of desperate rescue to intense battle.

Finally, in the Otheon capital city, as Endeavor, the Flaming Sidekickers and Clair Voyant (with the assistance of another local Hero with a Flying Squirrel Quirk) made a hurried beeline to the parliament tower, having since informed the loyal police of the need to occupy the local telecommunications in order to get word of warning out to the public.

As they closed in, Clair's Quirk gave them a much needed edge, as she quickly called out to Endeavor in warning: "The information was right! I can see the bomb, deep in the sewers underneath the tower!"

"Can you see if there's anyone down there protecting it?" Endeavor asked, before Clair suddenly cast her gaze to the area immediately surrounding the tower, and felt her heart jump.

"We've got multiple teams, more than half of them armed, in vehicles and buildings all around! They've already seen us coming! Scatter!"

At her warning, the whole lot of Heroes quickly separated in mid-air, just as the Humarise members lying in wait proceeded to open fire with their guns and Quirks alike, soon engulfing the entire area around the tower in battle, sending all the civilians on the ground level scattering in panic, with several of the other local Heroes quickly swooping in to try and help hasten their evacuation, as well as that of the people still stuck in the buildings the terrorists were attacking from.

As the Sidekickers tried to get the drop on the terrorists attacking from the vehicles, and Endeavor and Clair worked together to try and pinpoint and neutralize the ones firing from the windows, the Flame Hero grit his teeth in building frustration and desperation; knowing they couldn't afford to let any one of these people give them the slip, lest they had the detonator to set the bomb off early.

And that was without even considering the possibility of any of the terrorists taking cover within the parliament tower itself, where the potential for them taking the local politicians, the Russian president and their respective retinues hostage would be far too great. With the clock already racing against them so badly, the Heroes were fighting tooth, nail and everything in between to try and resolve this situation beyond record time; the weight of consequence if they were to fail feeling absolutely crushing upon their shoulders.

…

Perth, Australia

It was only through the combination of Stampede Hopper's highly customized vehicle and his masterful navigational skills through the vast and treacherous terrain of the Outback, that the whole handful of Heroes were able to make it all the way across the majority of the Australian continent as fast as they had. Alongside that, he was fortunately able to likewise get in contact with several of the other local Heroes stationed in the city of Perth, wherein they were summarily informed of the situation there.

Alongside the same mass panic and subsequent evacuation efforts as what had unfolded back in Sydney; there had also been brief reports of all the entrances and exits of the city stadium being sealed up, trapping several thousand people inside. With the cross-reference of their given bomb coordinates, it became undeniable that Perth Stadium was exactly where their bomb was situated. With no idea of just how many Humarise members were standing guard, alongside the new detail of a mass hostage situation on top of that; the team of Stampede, Mantypus, Tas-Maniac, Mirko and Mina felt a leaden weight in their chests, just as they finally came bolting down the highway into Perth proper.

Thankfully, the stadium itself was very easy to spot, and with the local Heroes still giving their all to deal with the panic across the rest of the city, that gave the Sydney Heroes all the chance they needed to finally come speeding the rest of the way, all of them practically flying out the car as Stampede hit the brakes and sent it spinning and screeching across the asphalt; the Kangaroo Hero himself leaping out the driver's seat before it had even come to a complete stop.

As the lot of them came charging across the vast parking lot to the stadium's front doors, Mirko called out: "So, you thinking we should take this on like we always have?"

Not taking his eyes off the doors, Stampede answered: "Normally I'd say yeah. A little lightning fast shock and awe with some kicks to the face would throw them for a loop enough for the rest of you to wipe the floor with 'em! But we don't know how many of them there really are, or which one might have the detonator! Plus, with the hostages, all it takes is one screw-up, and we've got a potential bloodbath on our hands!"

Listening to this, Mina couldn't help but think back to her first day on the field with Mirko, and felt a spark of inspiration in her head. "Sensei, wouldn't it make more sense for us to come in where they don't expect us? Like, the front door is so obvious. You said before that focusing on taking your enemies out ASAP is the best way to keep civilians from getting hurt, and a surprise approach feels like the best way to do that, right?"

Glancing to her intern, Mirko gave the slightest smirk at the sound of Mina starting to think her way. "That's right. This is a big damn place, but with as many of us here as there are, we could be able to at least take down the ones keeping guard on the hostages in time. Surely these scumbags can't be so confident that they wouldn't get thrown into a confused mess by that, at least for a few seconds."

But before anyone could say anything else, Tas-Maniac caught the faintest glint of light from out the corner of her eye; drawing her attention to the edge of the stadium rooftop, where she could just catch the shape of a person, just as another glint of light from the surrounding city reflected off of them.

"SCATTER AND GET DOWN!" She immediately exclaimed as she dove aside, tackling Mina to the ground behind one of the many cars, just as a deafening crack of a high-powered rifle broke the air, with a large chunk of the ground the young Hero had been standing on, immediately exploding afterward.

Her warning set everyone on high alert, but before they could look for the shooter, the sound of multiple faint THWIPS reached their ears; Mantypus looking and soon catching the light of the street lamps reflecting off of faint strings extending across the parking lot, all latching onto several of the other surrounding cars.

In the blink of an eye, all of those cars were suddenly flipped high up into the air like they weighed nothing, all about to come slamming down onto the Heroes, before Mantypus, Mirko and Stampede quickly leapt up and slammed their feet and fists into the vehicles in mid-air, shattering them into piles of scrap before they could hurt anyone.

"Well, well, glad to see none of you lot have lost your edge these last few years." An adult woman's voice, sultry and lined with a sadistic delight, suddenly called out to the Heroes, drawing all their attention back to the roof of the stadium, just as the front doors likewise burst open, as over half a dozen people in Humarise robes came rushing out with guns and Quirks at the ready.

Standing atop the stadium, flanked on both sides by several more of the hooded terrorists, was a woman with skin as white as snow, with long flowing hair of the same frigid color. This made the rose red low-cut dress she was wearing stand out razor sharp, just as much as her eyes; that were likewise entirely blood red, with not even any irises or pupils to fill in the empty spaces.

Before Mina or Mirko could even think to ask, Stampede muttered in pained recognition: "Oh, bloody hell, of all the people to fall in with them."

Even from a distance, the mysterious woman's mocking voice echoed loud and clear as she laughed. "Oh, it's a pleasure to see you lot again, too. And you even brought a couple new faces along, too. They look like they could be lots of fun."

"Jack, who the hell is that?" Mirko asked impatiently, only for Mantypus to answer sternly:

"Scarlet Widow: a Villain with a nasty Spider Quirk to fit the namesake. We all had a couple run-ins with her over the years. She'd left a trail of bodies in her wake all across the country before we put her away…though we'd actually gotten word of her having escaped prison shortly before you and Pinky came over. I just didn't think she'd actually be involved with this."

As Mirko and Mina stood steadfast at the knowledge they were now up against a serial killer on top of this cadre of terrorists, Tas-Maniac called out: "What the hell are you doing rolling around with this lot?! I thought things like team-ups weren't your style!"

Glancing to her impatient-looking new comrades, Scarlet Widow chuckled to herself. "Hey, a girl's gotta find a way to have fun where she can get it, and what could be more fun than a gang that wants to wipe the floor with all you little goodie two shoes? What more reason could I need?"

At the mention of killing the Heroes, the Humarise members all hunched their shoulders in preparation for a battle to ensue, all ranging from various different kind of elemental and energy Quirks, to just as many animal-style Quirks, with Scarlet herself grinning from ear to ear as a complete set of large bloody red spider legs suddenly unfolded from out her back, lifting her body up off her feet as they touched down to the roof.

Seeing their odds, Stampede muttered out the corner of his mouth: "Mirko, you and Pinky work on getting into the stadium. We'll take care of Scarlet and this sorry lot to buy you time."

But while Mina was already focusing on channeling Acid from her boots to give her a sliding boost, Mirko actually argued: "Who the hell do you think you're talking to, Stampede? You know I'm at my best in the wide open like this. Without me assisting out here, you're all gonna get your asses put down!"

Before Mina could incredulously ask why her mentor was choosing now of all times to start arguing with their allies, Scarlet let out another echoing laugh; snapping all the Heroes back to attention, as she set her red eyes on Stampede specifically.

"C'mon, Jackie-Boy, why deny me the chance to play with some new toys before you all die? If nothing else, wouldn't you at least like to be reminded what fun time with a real woman is like?"

As her already seductive voice lowered that much more, the Spider-Quirked Villain actually went so far as to cross her arms under her sizeable white chest, lifting them up in an attempt at flirting with the aghast Kangaroo Hero and his allies…but even his visible distaste paled in comparison to the way Mirko's whole body froze up; her irises contracting to intense pinpricks, her hands clenching into trembling fists as veins began to pulse along her muscular arms, and her teeth clenched so tight they could break through steel.

BOOOM!

Mirko launched herself off the ground with a kick powerful enough to resemble a point blank firing of a cannon; flying in a high-speed kick aimed for Scarlet's face, before the Humarise members beside her all aimed their weapons and Quirks at her.

It was only through Stampede and Mantypus leaping up after her; the former catching her in mid-air, that Mirko managed to avoid getting blasted. While his partner managed to save the Rabbit Hero, Mantypus took over, throwing his body into a spin that ended with a number of nearly invisible barbs flying from out his tail, nailing three of the terrorists before they could properly defend themselves; the toxins inside quickly paralyzing them.

With that, the fight was officially on, as the terrorists all proceeded to unleash their gunfire and Quirks at the Heroes all at once. Mirko and Stampede both were like airborne bullets with how fast and powerful they were, ricocheting off the ground and the side of the stadium, trying to avoid getting hit, while also trying to take Scarlet Widow and her comrades out; the Villain sending high-tensile webs from out her wrists in an attempt to ensnare the two of them, while her once devilish smile was now a mouth lined with venomous needle-like fangs.

At the same time, Mina quickly took off into the fastest Acid Slid she could manage, having to use the vehicles all around as cover and throwing up an Acid Veil to protect herself when moving through the open. Whilst on the move, she tried to throw one handful of Acid after another. With the numbers she was up against, it was the best offense she could manage, having no time to be exposed long enough to properly aim an Acid Shot.

But after several seconds of trying to maneuver her way through this maze of cars towards the stadium, by now having only managed to melt a couple of their guns; it was through the assisting cover of Tas-Maniac, flying like a cyclone amid the Quirks and bullets altogether and tearing away pieces of the cars around her to fling back at their attackers, that Mina and the female Australian Hero were able to finally close the rest of the distance to the stadium entrance.

With the momentum she'd already managed to build up with her Slide, Mina was able to come flying up the stairs leading to the entrance as her Acid melted it down into a ramp; flying off the lip at the top; her whole body twisting and flipping through the air like a skateboarder without their board, before managing to expertly land both her balled up pink fists and one knee into two faces and the sternum of three of the terrorists standing at the double doors; knocking the wind right out of them, while Tas-Maniac likewise came whirling in right beside the young Hero; her clawed hands and feet leaving the remaining assailants blacked out unconscious with multiple lacerations all over their bodies, not deep enough to be fatal, but painful enough to overwhelm the senses.

With Mirko, Stampede and Mantypus managing the rest of the fight with the forces standing outside the stadium, it was up to Mina and Tas-Maniac to deal with the hostage and bomb situations inside; the pink Hero quickly coating her right hand in Acid as she slammed it against the padlock barring one of the double doors shut, instantly melting it down and giving them their way inside.

As they quickly rushed in, with Tas-Maniac instantly taking the lead to find the quickest way out onto the stands and the field within; the two of them could only keep hoping to themselves that they would be able to make it in time, that their partners would be able to take their opponents down and rejoin them, and that wherever Humarise's HQ was, that Mina's friends and boyfriend would make it to stop the primary countdown altogether for them.

…

Humarise HQ, off the coast of Klayd

The air in the atrium was as tense as it had ever been. With Flect Turn's message to the world having finally been given, it was now simply a matter of counting down the moments alongside his hundred remaining soldiers waiting below the balcony, until his lieutenants would either detonate their respective bombs as agreed, or that he would take the deciding action into his own hands, and send the remote detonation signal with but the press of a button. No matter how it would play out, the end result would be the same. The day of their great work would come, and the salvation of humanity would be theirs to deliver in the aftermath.

But that building anticipation could not last long, as an alarm suddenly began to ring, echoing throughout the vast congregational chamber, stirring all of them to attention. A screen immediately illuminated, revealing a live video feed of one single-engine plane making a direct beeline for the cave entrance to their headquarters.

Flect Turn's piercing expression refused to even flinch, as he knew this exactly for what it was: the trouble he had anticipated ever since Alan Kay had fled with that briefcase. As confident as he had been in the capabilities of his followers, he could never remove the nagging doubt that the Heroes involved would find their way here, and now it was playing out before his very eyes.

But he would not let this interference get in the way any more than it already had, as he raised a single commanding hand to his congregation. "Go forth, my brothers and sisters, and purge those gravely afflicted with this sin. Our greatest trial is upon us, and we must not allow ourselves to falter."

With a resounding chorus of their pledge in response, the hundred hooded soldiers immediately filed out of the subterranean chapel, arming themselves and readying their Quirks in preparation for when these unknown intruders would finally reveal themselves.

…

For the past hour that they had been flying, Izuku, Shoto and Bakugo had been torn between their lingering feelings of anticipation for the insane battle that was no doubt just waiting for their arrival with bated breath, and the still-growing feelings of concern for Nikolay, and the disbelief and frustration with themselves for having actually allowed him to go off on his own. No matter how much they understood his reasoning for going off like he did, that didn't make the odds he was facing any less dangerous, and it didn't make them worry any less.

"Guys, I found it, up ahead! That has to be the way in!"

Rody's voice called out urgently to the trio, spurring them all to attention to look out the windshield. Just as their pilot and compatriot said, at the opposite end of another vast valley on this mountainous island, there was an undoubtedly man-made carved entrance at the foot of the peak ahead; the topography around them looking almost exactly like the spot on the map Bakugo had pulled up when putting in the final coordinates. This simply had to be the place.

And it was with that knowledge, and the bitter acceptance that Nikolay had gone off to do his duty just the same as they were now, that the three young Heroes stood steadfast and ready, approaching the door, while Rody was still clutching the wheel in a white-knuckled grip. "I'll touch us down in those woods down there so you guys can get off."

"Rody-san, we can't have you risk being around here any longer than you have to…so we'll just get off right now, and you head back to safety." Izuku suddenly announced, catching Rody completely by surprise. "What?!"

"You heard him, this isn't a place for commoners!" Bakugo snapped impatiently as Izuku finally opened the door to the roaring winds.

"From this point forward…is a place for Heroes." Shoto concluded resolutely, just as Izuku, Bakugo and finally himself proceeded to leap out of the flying plane, gliding and freefalling through the biting chill towards the looming cave entrance below, leaving Rody to look on in disbelief at such a straightforward entrance, knowing what they were going up against.

But no sooner than the three of them had taken off through the air, then they saw just how well-prepared Humarise themselves were, as several dozen of the terrorists came filing from out the cave, setting themselves up along the perimeter with guns at the ready, all of them opening fire on sight of the airborne trio.

As bullets whizzed past them by the thousands; Izuku and Shoto quickly used Blackwhip and Fire respectively to quickly duck, swing and weave through the barrage, while Bakugo propelled himself down that much faster before aiming his right hand at the biggest cluster of attackers. "ALL YOU SMALL FRIES SHOULD JUST PISS OFF!"

Before the terrorists could react, they were rained down upon with a salvo of powerful Explosions, blinding and stunning many of them, while knocking out several others in the crux of the attack.

But amid the remaining gunmen, several other members suddenly began to unleashed large beams of concentrated energy and electrical whips, forcing Izuku and Shoto to quickly part from each other in order to avoid getting hit.

The moment Shoto touched down on the ground, he immediately threw his left arm in an arc, unleashing a large plume of his Fire at the nearest bunch of terrorists, catching them off guard and forcing them to scatter, right into the range of another of Bakugo's airborne explosive strikes.

But the hotheaded young Hero had likewise not gone unnoticed, as another one of the terrorists quickly rushed forward and opened his mouth wide upon taking a deep exhale, unleashing a deafening concentrated beam of pure sound power, overwhelming Bakugo's ears.

Thankfully, Izuku had caught sight of this just before he'd come landing into the foliage of the trees lining the cave entrance; using his Full Cowling to ricochet himself from branch to branch, before grabbing onto a thick enough one to send himself looping over, before finally letting go, launching himself further through the air, borne kicking his leg out, sending a chopping blast of Air Force power across the ground into the Sound Wave-user, knocking him flat out cold before he even realized what had happened.

With his aerial assault having now been given a chance to continue, Bakugo once more proceeded to lay down yet more suppressing Explosive power on the majority of gunmen, while others had finally turned their attention back to Shoto and Izuku; the former having since sent himself gliding through the ground on another instantaneous ramp of Ice, launching himself off the lip of it before throwing his right arm out in a mid-air spin, sending a high-speed barrage of ice crystals flying through the air, slamming into many of the terrorists in front of him like fastballs, slamming them into the side of the mountain and knocking them out cold, while Izuku came flying in and grabbed him by the arm; Shoto laying down another ramp of Ice to help propel the two of them the rest of the way into the cave mouth.

Bakugo's Explosions continued to hammer down around them, taking out any terrorists that had the chance to blindside the two of them, while Izuku quickly aimed his clenched hands forward, the cuffs around his gauntlets opening up on command as he began to flick his fingers one after another, launching a multitude of Air Force strikes into the finaly doorway leading into the base proper, throwing several of the terrorists standing guard at it high through the air in the confusion.

"KACCHAN, WE'LL HEAD INSIDE! KEEP US COVERED!" Izuku called out to Bakugo while there was still a chance to relay their plan; his hotheaded partner still launching himself like a maelstrom through the air, ducking, bobbing and weaving through the remaining bullets while still laying down Explosive covering fire of his own. "I GOT THAT ALREADY, DAMMIT! DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!"

Knowing that Bakugo would give his all to keep them from being pursued, Izuku and Shoto proceeded to propel themselves that much faster upon the latter's Ice, bypassing the other terrorists rushing out to try and stop them as they flew through the doorway. From here, the stone of the mountain gave way to winding halls of brass and wires.

"Based on the layout of the headquarters blueprints we got off that chip, we need to take a right at the end of this hall!" Izuku quickly reminded Shoto, who immediately proceeded to accelerate the Ice forming before his feet, while likewise sending another handful of Ice crystals at the terrorists up ahead who were starting to draw weapons on them.

…

But what the trio of young Heroes didn't know, was that almost as soon as they had taken off to deal with their attackers, Rody had been left with no choice but to try and brute force a landing of the plane, which had left him now standing outside the wreckage of the aircraft, at the end of a half-kilometer long divot he had just forcefully carved through the forest in the process.

Paying no mind to the multiple bruises and scrapes he had sustained in the process of such a reckless landing, he could only look on in the direction of the cave entrance; his heart racing and his blood pumping with anxiety. "Those guys…all of them are unbelievable! Just go and do whatever they want!"

SNAP!

But before he could even take one step to try and rejoin them, the sound of a twig snapping nearby caused Rody to freeze, just in time to see that the rim of the ridge he had just left was now filled with multiple people in the same matching hooded robes of Humarise; all of them staring down upon him like a pack of wolves to a lone and defenseless lamb.

…

With Izuku and Shoto having gone charging into the cave, Bakugo was now running on even greater adrenaline, knowing he had the entire battlefield of the outside to work with. What had already been a vicious blitzkrieg of an assault on his part was now nothing short of Armageddon, as he laid down a relentless barrage of Explosions upon the Humarise protectors unlucky enough to still be standing, and insane enough to try and maintain a fight.

In a matter of seconds, he had the rest of them laid out amid the smoking wreckage he'd left of their front door, all of them motionless, singed and unconscious from such an attack. As soon as he touched back down on the ground, he was already gearing himself up to go racing right on inside after his two partners, more than ready to further put them in their rightful place as to who the real powerhouse was among them.

"A bunch of small-fries, are we?"

An unfamiliar man's voice suddenly hissed from outside Bakugo's field of view, but before he could begin to turn his head to see who else was possibly still standing out here, his ears caught the unmistakable sound of something whipping through the air at the speed of light…and heading right for where he stood.

BKOOM!

Throwing a clenched fist down to his feet, Bakugo launched himself straight up into the air in the flames of an Explosion, just as an extensive whip lined with gleaming blades chopped into the ground like an opposable axe, just missing him by a hairs breadth.

The deadly appendage quickly retracted, the blades locking in place into one another as they did so, and as Bakugo touched back down, his sense of alertness pounding in his chest, he saw his mysterious attacker at last: a young adult man on the other side of one of the gaps in this ledge of the cave mouth, dressed in the same robes as the rest of the Humarise members; with a head of short purple hair, a pair of large eyes with animalistic beady pupils, and a wide pointed grinning mouth like that of a snake. Upon making eye contact, the rest of this man's bladed whip had finished retracted into his right shoulder, whereupon it took on the form of a regular arm.

Seeing this, Bakugo sneered viciously. "You gotta be kidding me. Why the hell are people with Quirks falling in with these Humarise bastards, huh? What do you stand to gain from this scheme of theirs?!"

Somehow, the assailant's sadistic snake-fanged grin managed to grow that much wider, as a shadow suddenly stepped out from behind his back, revealing another man who looked identical to him, revealing Bakugo to now be standing off in a two-on-one battle. "We were chosen by Humarise! We will work with them and rule in the new world. What happens to sinners is irrelevant."

With his adrenaline already pumping with the anticipation, the flare of anger that suddenly ignited in Bakugo's chest had him virtually seeing red; his palms sparking up a storm as he grit his teeth. "So typical of Villains like you, just trying to save yourselves! THAT'S SO DAMN SELFISH! DIE!"

With that, Bakugo immediately proceeded to launch himself in an inferno of deafening proportions, sending a hail storm of further Explosions down upon the duo, only for them both to immediately zip out of the way like the wind, forcing Bakugo to try and maintain an airborne pursuit while attacking them both with one hand each, trying to take at least one down in order to halve their assault capabilities.

But they were very quickly proving to be far faster than he'd expected; managing to expertly weave their way through even the most powerful of his Explosive barrages, and at the same time keeping him on the evasive as they sent their duel bladed whips snapping through the air after him.

But even Bakugo's masterful maneuverability wasn't enough to keep him out of trouble for very long, as the moment he was forced back onto the ground, he didn't even have a chance to get back in the air before the light glinted off another incoming line of blades carving through the ground, erupting in a flurry of loose stones before Bakugo felt an ice cold yet burning pain flash across his face; a warm splash upon his skin as he was sent careening to the floor; half his eye mask now lying in a small splattering of his own blood.

But even with his right eye now having been forced shut with the flow of blood from the laceration on his forehead, Bakugo didn't let that stop him even for a second, as he once more took to the air, raining Explosive hell down on his two attackers; both of them cackling mockingly every passing second as the battlefield was blown to smithereens all around them.

"YOU BASTARDS!" Bakugo bellowed as he proceeded to focus the building power of his Quirk and throw his hands forward, sending the sweat from his palms flying towards one of them, before triggering their detonation, resulting in a wall of some of his most powerful Explosions.

But with his one good eye, Bakugo could only watch in disbelief, as with the swishing of wind and the clanking of metal, his opponent managed to actually slice the Explosions themselves apart in a lightning-fast whipping of his bladed appendages, rendering the Hero's attack useless.

"Goddamn you…DON'T ACT LIKE I'M NOTHING!"

And it was with that, that Bakugo was now forced on the evasive once more, quickly turning it around upon flinging himself around the face of one of the stone pillars, unleashing another high-speed barrage of Explosions on the tails of his two enemies, as they proceeded to embed their bladed whips into the side of the mountain, pulling themselves along and repeating this fleeing process as he chased them across the face of the cliff, hammering Explosions after them as fast as he possibly could.

"LET'S SEE YOU DODGE THIS, POINT BLANK TO YOUR FACE!"

But amid the fiery fury of his attacks, Bakugo failed to notice one of the two Villains let himself drop down, thus allowing him to get up above them, completely unawares until he proceeded to send his blades flying up from below, the razor sharp spear tips impaling Bakugo through his sides, knocking the wind right out of him as the two cackled in monstrous delight. "Too bad, brat!"

Upon pulling the blades right back out, the two Villains proceeded to fling themselves back towards the cave entrance, while Bakugo hung suspended and bleeding in the air for a second, his brain momentarily struggling to catch up with what had just happened…before that adrenaline came rushing right back, and his teeth crunched tight together in that returning rage.

"You assholes are fast…BUT THAT'S AS FAR AS YOU GET!"

With that furious declaration, Bakugo proceeded to launch himself right after them once more, unleashing another furious volley of Explosions as they proceeded to climb all the way back up out of the roof of the cave, fleeing up to the top of the mountain with the Hero in pursuit, leveling crater after crater in their wake in his murderous pursuit; the pain of his injuries only managing to make his anger and his Explosions burn that much stronger.

Explosions burst, blades flew, laughter and bellowing battle cries filled the air as Bakugo continued trying to shoot them out of the sky through all of his narrow dodges of their attacks, very much mirroring their own. It was like the three were a human representation of an aerial dogfight.

Bakugo's adrenaline was pumping so intensely through his veins, it almost felt like he was in some kind of out-of-body state, as he blindly chased them back down the face of the mountain and into the cave, pursuing them around the face of yet another of the massive pillars.

By now, the two of them were once more splitting up, while Bakugo tried to aim one hand at each of them, firing Explosion after Explosion as they continued this game of cat-and-mouse with him. His Explosions proceeded to riddle numerous holes into the pillar from top to bottom as they continued making him expend his energy.

No matter how angry and driven the young Hero was, they both knew he had to be nearing his limit; especially since in these confined settings, the versatility of their Quirks gave them that much greater of an advantage, as their blades whipped and flew from all around, managing to land numerous deep slashes across Bakugo's arms, legs and shoulders.

But none of that was as bad, as when one of the two once more managed to get into his blind spot, and proceeded to send both arms worth of blades flying from behind Bakugo's back, their merciless steel teeth raking up the height of his back before he even realized it.

With the warmth of his blood seeping down his back, Bakugo went into freefall for but a moment; the laughter of his opponents filling his ears, until his wherewithal came racing back, and he hurriedly fired himself over and back with yet more Explosions, before barely managing to land on his feet in a brutal slide back.

With his energy surely starting to fade as his injuries continued to bleed, and with his field of vision still frustratingly cut in half, Bakugo could still see his opponents grinning sadistically at the state they'd left him in, almost looking like they were expecting him to give up and beg for mercy.

But such a thought made Katsuki Bakugo sick to his stomach, as he clenched his fists once more and channeled all that he could still muster of his Quirk into his hands, aiming them not at his enemies, but at the pillar they'd just been fighting all around. "You sons of bitches, I can't stand that damn laughing!"

BKOO-BKOO-BKOO-BKOOM!

With his words echoing all across the cave, he proceeded to unleash all of his Explosive power in a whittling barrage that carved the pillar down in a matter of seconds; the building heat of those fireballs even growing hot enough…to detonate the small hand grenades that had been embedded into the numerous cracks that had previously been left all over the large stone column, propelled covertly by his Explosions while using his previous barrages as a feint.

With those added explosions cutting and shattering the core of the pillar, it finally managed to bring the entire monolith crumbling down in an avalanche of stone upon the heads of the two Villains; their grimly confident demeanor finally having been broken with the realization of the trap Bakugo had laid for them in the fury of their battle. By the time they'd realized it, it was already too late, as they were both quickly crushed under the freefalling stones.

With the echoing booms of his Explosions finally dying out, Bakugo instinctively smirked in confident victory to himself; the pain of all his collected cutting wounds momentarily numbed, either by his pride, or by the amount of blood he'd already lost. "You small fries still don't get it. That's what you get…for being cocky. You didn't even know…what I was really doing…the whole time."

RMMMBL!

Suddenly, the sound of the piles of heavy stones shifting caught Bakugo's attention, before the massive pile suddenly exploded out with a flurry of yet more bladed tendrils, forcing him to take a leap back.

As the dust settled, he looked and was stricken by the sight of his two opponents still standing, visibly roughed up by his tactics, but there was something else as well: their hair had now become spiked back, now a frosty purple; their fangs had now become that much bigger, and their once wide and beady eyes were now fully like those of a pair of serpents. What was more; their bladed whips were now rapidly extending out from all over their bodies, flying around wildly, almost as though the two didn't have full control over them.

"Dammit, so you two had some of that Trigger crap hidden on you this whole time." Bakugo surmised, before once more clenching his fists, causing his wounds to start bleeding that much more. "The hell with it; doesn't matter! I'll kick the shit out of you both, no matter what!"

…

The fight had not relented inside the winding corridors of the headquarters, either. Every step of the way, Izuku and Shoto were confronted by more and more Humarise members; but the latter's lightning-fast trail of Ice and momentary swinging hands of fire were more than enough to throw them for a loop and send them flying into unconsciousness.

After a whole minute of things going on like this, Izuku would have almost been tempted to say things were going too smoothly, that security was considerably light this deep into their base of operations. But reality made it so he didn't have to.

From out of the darkness of the corridor ahead, several panels suddenly opened up along the walls, revealing what looked like turrets, which proceeded to fire a multitude of blinding red lasers at the two incoming Heroes all at once. Before Shoto could throw up an ice wall to deflect the attack, the ice beneath his feet was quickly shattered, the break in their otherwise smooth momentum sending him and Izuku tumbling roughly down the hall.

As soon as their heads stopped spinning, Shoto could see that the laser turrets were already spinning to finish them off. But he was already on the counter-offensive, as with a swing of his left hand, a line of concentrated fire erupted from his fingertips, acting like flaming whips that he used to immediately slice the turrets apart in a flash.

But immediately after, he and Izuku could hear the sound of yet more footsteps rapidly rushing from back down the way they had come. More Humarise members had clearly just been waiting within some secret passageways along the way for the chance to get the drop on the duo's flank.

Clenching his fists, Shoto was first back on his feet. "Midoriya, you keep going and get those bombs disarmed. I'll cover you from here."

He didn't even need to look back to know Izuku was looking worried, hesitant to just leave him on his own. Hence, he immediately exclaimed: "There's no time to argue!"

That conviction was all it took to make Izuku nod in understanding, before quickly channeling his Full Cowling, spinning on his heels as he began to go into a run, before then finally bolting in a flash of green energy down the hall, leaving Shoto to stand alone against this bunch of assailants.

With his left and right hands covered in flames and ice respectively, Shoto quickly threw his right fist forward, sending a multitude of ice crystals racing down the hall, almost completely filling it, and capturing the terrorists in its wake. With them immobilized, he just as quickly sent his billowing fiery left fist forward. "FLASHFREEZE HEATWAVE!"

And with a raging column of flames, Shoto just as quickly melted away his ice; the sudden intense influx of temperatures proving more than enough to knock all of his attackers out.

However, just as Shoto was about ready to start trying to catch up with Izuku again, the faintest hint of movement from back down the hall caught his eye…before he suddenly found himself being charged at incredible speed by something unlike all the other hooded guards they had dealt with so far.

Now, he was being bull-rushed by a hulking white-skinned brute with blank yellow eyes, red flowing tendrils from atop its head, read organic swirling extensions from its fingertips that almost looked like fleshy drill bits, and a monstrously large, manically smiling mouth that let out a billowing, inhuman roar.

For such great size, its speed was even greater, as it sent its charging mass straight into Shoto before he could try to defend himself; the force knocking the wind right out of him, even before his body was sent smashing straight through the wall behind him; the young Hero rolling painfully into the middle of a vast antechamber.

With pain flaring all over his body, Shoto was steadfast in getting back to his feet, looking cautiously to the large hole in the wall he had made; knowing his opponent was just on the other side, and undoubtedly getting ready to attack him again. "That one…he's like some kind of berserk animal. He must've already taken some Trigger beforehand. I need to end this quick."

With not a moment to lose, Shoto charged up the ice in his right hand, and quickly threw it forward, sending a hurricane of ice into the hole, almost completely freezing the entire wall over, and hopefully having even managed to catch his enemy in the process.

BOOOM!

But no such luck, as the behemoth proceeded to instead just smash through the wall of ice with ease; it's insane roar almost sounding like a mocking laugh of victory once it saw the alert reaction in Shoto's eyes.

Closing the distance between them in a single leap, the beast threw one of its clutching hands for Shoto, who immediately proceeded to launch himself back with an instant expanding column of ice from his right foot. But this didn't deter his enemy, as the red drill-bit growths on its fingers suddenly began to twitch, before suddenly shooting out straight at him like a set of rapidly spinning tentacles.

Shoto found himself having to send the cold through his right side at a faster pace than he could remember ever having done before; the ice beneath his feet shooting this way and that through the air of the antechamber like a bolt of frigid lightning, just to keep these organic drill/tendrils from tearing right through him, as those that barely managed to miss him, were still spinning fast enough to send a razor-sharp cutting current of air in their wake that left several bleeding lacerations on his right cheek and both his arms.

'With a Quirk that can cover this wide of an area and move so quick, it's going to be difficult to close the distance so I can hit him. Maybe if I can just keep him focused on me, and corral him into position with my Ice, I can hit him with Flashfreeze Heatwave point blank.'

CRASH!

But just as quickly as Shoto had managed to put a plan together, had the battle turned completely against him. Amid the frenzy of his enemy's Quirk continuously forcing him on the evasive, yet more of the same security laser turrets as before had suddenly emerged all across the antechamber, and fired in a flurry of blinding red lights, shattering the ice column from right beneath his feet, leaving him momentarily airborne and stunned.

And that was when the hulking beast came flying through the air, clutching Shoto's entire torso in the grip of one of its hands, and sent both their combined weight freefalling at high-speed into the unforgiving floor; the force behind their landing enough to shatter the solid stone beneath, and sending them plummeting even further into a vast underground cavern system below, where a single natural bridge connected the two narrow ledges on both sides, which they proceeded to completely smash through. At the very bottom, a fast-racing icy cold river waited to consume them both as they slammed into its unforgiving current.

As soon as the momentary stun of sudden water wore off, and Shoto regained his senses, he was already about to send all the fury of his cold out of his body in order to try and completely freeze the river, and buy himself a moment to regain his bearings and formulate another plan…before he suddenly found himself being set upon from all sides by his enemy's lightning-fast drill tentacles; all of them expanding and and twisting into amorphous blob-like extensions that clenched all onto Shoto with full strength, completely immobilizing him despite his struggling, and spinning with that same merciless power all the while, to the point it was producing an opposing current around their area of battle, completely stilling the flow of the river all around them, leaving Shoto in a singular vortex from which he couldn't fight his way out of.

In only a matter of seconds, he would run out of air and drown. This realization; and the stubborn, silent mental call of faith and encouragement to his friends, and even to his father; were the only things Shoto could think of as he continued to try and fight his way out.

…

Otheon Capital City Parliamentary Tower

Even before Konstantin Khodamchuk had arrived in Otheon, he'd been silently counting down the days, hours, minutes, and now even the seconds before it would finally be time to meet with his fellow heads of office for this host country, and at last give his imploring address to all of his countrymen.

In light of the recent events in Berlin, naturally his security retinue had made it no secret how bad of an idea they found this whole journey, but his experiences had made him nothing if not woefully stubborn in the eyes of his naysayers. And for as many of them as there were, he was grateful to know that neither of his two faithful comrades, Angel's Eye and Ilya Toptunov, had ever even hinted at the notion of leaving him to his devices, even if they too had their doubts in just how well this would all work.

But at last, the time was finally here. He'd been keeping tabs on all the news making the rounds back in Russia, and to hear that so many people were flocking to the Winter Palace to see his televised speech, as well as to know that so many Russian expats were actually already gathered at the border crossings to hear the same, had left him feeling both ecstatic and more anxious than he could ever remember feeling.

With a knocking at the door suddenly stirring him from his thoughts, Konstantin and his two bodyguards were greeted by one of the Otheon parliamentary security guards filling the doorway; sharply dressed and clearly possessing the mental training to draw a weapon at the very first hint of danger. "Forgive me, President Khodamchuk, but it's time to go."

Clenching his fists in preparation while taking a deep breath, Konstantin motioned for Angel's Eye and Ilya to follow him. "Thank you, young man…and thank your heads of state for accommodating us for this. I apologize for any and all inconvenience this may have caused you. I honestly wasn't sure where else to possibly do this."

However, instead of the welcoming gesture to make his way to the main conference hall that he had been expecting, Konstantin was instead met with his guide looking especially tense, as he began to suddenly approach; spurring the Russian president's two guards to quickly intercede. "That's not what I meant, sir. We have recently received word of an incident unfolding outside the parliamentary tower between several Heroes and some as-yet unidentified criminals, perhaps even terrorists. We're evacuating everyone to the underground panic room until the situation is resolved. Please come with me, all of you."

All three Russian men were caught completely by surprise, as Konstantin was hurriedly urged on by the Otheon security retinue lining the hall. As they were guided down one hallway after another, they could just barely make out the sound of intense rumbling, shaking and impacts resonating through the walls. It sounded like a warzone. It was honestly a wonder they hadn't heard this even from as deep inside the tower as their waiting room had been.

[[You see, sir? This is why everyone begged you to reconsider this.]] Ilya muttered into Konstantin's ear as they finally emerged out onto one of the many balconies that lines the main lobby of the tower, all the way to the roof far, far above.

But with his heart racing, Konstantin himself still couldn't help but look out to the glass wall looking out to the city square outside, just in time to see but a few seconds of a massive battle that had civilians outside running for the doors, trying desperately to get inside out of the line of fire, while the people inside the tower itself were all likewise running for their lives to the first signs directing them to the shelters below.

But Konstantin and his men, among many others, couldn't take their eyes off the multiple beams of energy and multi-colored plumes of fire filling the air all over outside the tower, as Heroes fought and flew like shooting stars against the elusive foes scattered amid the chaos; the reports of many different kinds of guns punctuating the blasting and the screaming.

"Sirs, please, it's not safe for anyone to stay up here, we need to evacuate now!" The guard insisted upon realizing Konstantin was staying rooted to where he stood; the orders and please of the security and his men alike falling on deaf ears as his eyes continued to follow every move the Heroes made out there.

Whether it was against adversaries with guns or Quirks of their own, not one of the Heroes was backing down, even when clearly outnumbered or outgunned in any sense. Even those with Quirks of fire were showcasing a remarkable control and care to keep the civilians still out in the open from getting caught, while those with different Quirks were either using their chances to either get civilians to safety, or immobilize their opponents in order to buy those people time to flee. In one instance, an explosion had even sent a large bus careening through the air, in danger of crushing a small bunch of civilians just several feet from the tower doors; only for one Hero wrapped in bandages to come swinging through the air on his wrappings, throwing one forward as though to try and catch the bus, only for the large vehicle to suddenly go flipping right back the way it had come the moment contact was made, thus saving the civilians the rest of the way to the doors, as the panicked crowds finally managed to break their way inside.

As Konstantin watched this all unfold in stunned silence, all the while being forcibly dragged back by Ilya and Angel's Eye; he could feel a very familiar sensation of resoluteness build within his chest as he once again clenched his hands into fists, glancing to his two bodyguards, and speaking out loud enough for them and anyone else who would listen: "We should help them."

Even with all the echoing screams, there was no denying that they had all heard Konstantin say the same thing, hence why Russian and Otheon security guards alike looked at the men like he'd lost his mind. But alas, he was not backing down, as he looked to them all, eyeing the small steel briefcases his guards were still carrying, as well as the obvious gunbelts the Otheon guards were carrying beneath their suit jackets.

"We should help them, whichever way we can. Heroes put their lives on the line every single day to save us from danger just like this, but who's there to help them when they're the ones in need of it?"

If not Konstantin's words; the sound and sights of the battle still unfolding outside had the Otheon guards looking to each other, visibly conflicted. Meanwhile, Ilya and Angel's Eye didn't need to have English as their first language to understand what their comrade and president was saying; hence why they could still argue as surely as they did: [[Kostya, think about what you're saying. If you go out there, you're liable to get yourself killed; that goes for any one of us that tries to help those Heroes in all this. This isn't like Hokkaido; this is even worse.]] [[That's right. We've made it no secret that doing this speech of yours here now of all times was a bad idea, but we followed you all the same. If you go to help those Heroes and get killed, then what's that going to do for everything you said you wanted to do for our people? What happens to them and their future if you die here like a fool?]]

Konstantin's eyes once more settled on his men's briefcases; his face tensing up as he answered solemnly: [[You're both right…by any definition, this is insanity, what I'm suggesting…but so was what those young Heroes did to save us back then, too. What I aim to do here is not just saving our Quirked comrades we chased out into the cold, it's essentially saving the very future of our Motherland as we dream it could be…and in order to save our future, we have to be willing to take even the craziest risks one day. I don't know about you two, but it seems to me like today is that day. We have an opportunity to begin repaying our debt to Heroes, and showing those that would threaten us that we won't cower…and I for one intend to prove that to everyone who still has doubts. You're free to join me, or not…but if that's the case, then you can at least give me a gun.]]

…

All around the tower, the battle was showing no signs of slowing down, no matter how many of the terrorists around were being systematically taken out by the Heroes. Riding atop the back of her fellow native flying squirrel-Quirked Hero, Clair Voyant was quickly spotting and directing her fellows to any attackers hiding out in the windows of any of the surrounding buildings or vehicles, all while simultaneously having to keep herself from getting attacked and looking back down below the tower to figure out exactly how far down below the surface the Ideo Trigger bomb actually was. After several precious minutes wasted trying to neutralize their attackers, they still hadn't even begun to descend down that way.

With Clair Voyant's confirmations that no civilians were nearby the hidden attackers, Endeavor made quick work of slicing away the cover the vehicles had provided with concentrated blades of fire erupting from his fists, while Burnin' made quick work of the snipers, grabbing handfuls of her flaming hair and throwing it in shrieking fast fireballs at the windows, taking the long-distance assailants out one by one.

Those terrorists with either super strength or projectile Quirks quickly found their attacks being turned back against them, thanks to both the masterful teamwork of many of the other local Heroes, but especially with the help of Kido, whose full-body bandages continued to completely switch the trajectory of any attacks that hit them, leaving the terrorists now having to scramble for cover from their own attacks, giving the Heroes the perfect opening to hit them on their blindsides as a result.

But for as many of their comrades on the ground as they were losing with each passing moment, the terrorists were well and truly dug in and prepared, willing to use any and all methods to force the Heroes to shirk their advantages. No other moment was this clearer, than when a pair of the Humarise members made their way to a cluster of civilians being shepherded away from the battlefield by another of the local Heroes. They all didn't realize the danger they were in until it was already too late, as the terrorists used their combined Quirks of Aerosol and Fire Breath, to send a colossal plume of fire their way.

But such dirty tactics were quickly undone, as the terrorists weren't met with screams, but instead by a single approaching furious battle cry. The truth was that Onima and another of the local Heroes had seen what was about to happen, and had swiftly moved in to intercept; the local using his Iron Wall Quirk to create a wall to protect the civilians, while Onima used his Fire Resistance Quirk to charge his way through the blaze, before ultimately leaping through it and landing a devastating punch and kick to the two terrorists' faces, knocking them both out cold, thus giving the civilians a chance to escape the rest of the way to safety.

"Endeavor, we can't afford to keep wasting time fighting these guys! It's obvious they're simply trying to stall us!" Clair Voyant eventually called out to the Flame Hero, just before a lucky shot from one of the Quirkless terrorists still standing managed to hit the Flying Squirrel Hero beneath her, sending them both plummeting to the unforgiving ground. Thankfully, she herself managed to meet the ground in an intense roll, using that time to reach into one of the pockets of her costume, before finally coming to a stop on one knee and throwing her hand forward, sending a handful of tiny smoke pellets right at the attacker. In a multitude of firecracker-like pops, he was enshrouded in an impenetrable smoke, just long enough for her to come charging in the rest of the way and meeting his masked face with a flying knee.

But that momentary respite didn't last, as at that moment, she and the rest of her fellow Heroes could feel the air around them suddenly grow shockingly frigid, despite there being not even a single cloud in the sky. Unfortunately, they couldn't ponder on why this was for long, as several of the Heroes suddenly found themselves being attacked by a high-speed splash of a glistening blue liquid that burned cold at the touch for those unfortunate enough not to get out of the way in time.

As Endeavor and the Flaming Sidekickers all looked in surprise, they were met with the sight of a single man with a luminescent blue illustrating his veins, as he approached them all with a rabid stare and murderous gait, his every step and touch with his hands spreading a freezing crystallization to everything around him, even one of the many long-abandoned trucks sitting in the middle of the road, which proceeded to shatter like glass as soon as the terrorist's deathly touch completely encased it.

"Are you serious? A Liquid Nitrogen Quirk?" Burnin' exclaimed, just before the terrorist focused his gaze on the bunch of Heroes before him, brought his hands together, and built up a large liquid bubble of his enhanced Quirk, and sent it flying their way in a near fire hose-like spray, forcing them to scatter; Burnin' and Kido both hit with a considerable graze to their sides.

Knowing Endeavor was the biggest threat here, the terrorist kept his focus on him, sending his nitrogen spray after him. Refusing to back down, Endeavor focused as much of the power of his flames into his fists, quickly launching them in a punch that sent twin drilling columns of flames across the square, meeting the deathly liquid head-on, resulting in an explosion of gas that enshrouded half the square, still carrying with it the inhuman cold that kept his sidekicks from getting inside of it to try and hit the terrorist from behind.

And he immediately capitalized, as he came charging from out the mist, his body enshrouded in a living suit of liquid nitrogen, rushing for Endeavor with unexpected speed. Seeing this, the Flame Hero once more channeled his fire into the right fist he was rearing back, and sent it slamming straight into his target's midsection. Furious fire met merciless cold, as the terrorist's suited Quirk actually somehow seemed to be withstanding Endeavor's flames, but the heat and the cold were equally staving each other off, leaving the two of them in a standoff that would be finished fatally the moment one of them gave an inch. However, even with that, the continuous extremes of heat and cold were starting to take their toll on Endeavors' fists, as he could feel his gloves tearing apart, with the skin of his hands quickly following suit.

Endeavor grimaced in realization, knowing there were still a fair number of civilians and other Heroes caught in the middle of this fight, while the clock was still ticking all the while. 'Dammit, Clair-san's right; this is all just a ploy to keep us from getting to the bomb in time. What's more, any one of these terrorists could possess the detonator to set it off prematurely…but if that hasn't already happened yet, then it must mean we were able to take that one out by sheer luck…but that still doesn't help us right now.'

Still having no clue just how far down beneath the tower the bomb was, but knowing he still couldn't leave his comrades and the civilians to the mercy of such an overwhelming force tailor-made to counteract their Quirks, Endeavor, even if just for a moment, found his mind going somewhere he'd always dreaded:

'Even if the one with the detonator may have been neutralized, it's still nothing more than an assumption…and what's to stop any of the Humarise members still standing from grabbing it amid this scuffle and setting it off instead? Between that and the time limit…I may have no other option. If I were to push my flames to…that level, I doubt any of us in this square would survive…but I know it would at least be able to burn all the way down far enough to destroy the bomb entirely, no matter how far down it is. A drop in the bucket of lives that would have to be given, so that all the people in the rest of this city could survive. Is that really what this is going to take? Is this…what he felt like when he had to make that choice all those years ago?'

A flash of Tunguska's face briefly crossed Endeavor's mind as that weight came down upon his shoulders hard. To have been brought to a point of such inescapable finality, to actually consider having to risk his life and those of his allies in order to save countless more, was something Endeavor had never expected to feel…but now that he was faced with circumstances that gave him no other choice, he could feel a deeply painful sense of relativity to the foreign Hero he once dismissed and mocked so arrogantly in the past.

With the flames in his body intensifying into a white heat, Endeavor could see that he and his opponent were getting blanketed in an increasing billow of steam, as the terrorist's liquid nitrogen armor was starting to actually evaporate in the wake of his intensifying temperature.

Gritting his teeth as he could feel his blood actually start to boil, Endeavor prepared to rear his one free fist back, ready to drive it into his enemy's face. The flames all over his body actually started to turn white, the asphalt beneath his feet actually starting to melt down below.

Realizing the danger he was in, the terrorist likewise began to rear both his free hands back, building up large liquid bubbles over them, ready to bring them together against Endeavor's head from both sides and extinguish his life in an instant, even if this would result in them killing each other.

K-KRAAK!

But amid the deafening roar of his building flames and the intensifying bubbling of liquid nitrogen and all other sounds of the battle still unfolding around them, Endeavor barely registered the sound of a high-powered rifle shot, before one of his enemy's arms suddenly exploded in a splash of the freezing liquid and the crystallizing red of blood, as a bullet blasted a role right through the terrorist's arm, sending him reeling away from Endeavor and collapsing to the ground, writhing as his liquid armor fell away from him in an instant.

Eyes wide with surprise, Endeavor looked to where he'd heard the shot come from, just in time to see a number of black-suited men come rushing out from the entrance to the parliamentary tower with militant coordination and speed; an older and far more official looking man with graying blondish-brown hair and a pistol in hand, leading the charge with what had to be his rifle-toting bodyguards covering both his flanks.

In a multitude of barking orders in what the Flame Hero could only vaguely recognize as Russian alongside English, the presidential looking man and his guards worked alongside the Otheon security and police officers on the scene to help evacuate the remaining civilians, whilst helping to tactically neutralize every blindsided terrorist they could spot across the battlefield with surgical accuracy and simple Quirkless firepower; either crippling one of their limbs, or disrupting their attacks long enough for whichever Hero they were facing against to quickly close the distance and take them out themselves.

Realizing the chance that had just been bought for them now that they had this much extra backup to help them remove the rest of the terrorists, Endeavor returned his focus to his still-downed opponent, who was already trying to rebuild his liquid armor around himself, only to instead be met with a point-blank burst of fire from out the Flame Hero's palms; a devastating FWOOSH echoing across the square as the contained vortex of flames forced the terrorist to completely burn himself out, trying to use his Quirk to protect himself from being burnt to a crisp, until the heat itself finally forced him to black out.

Even as he recalled his flames, Endeavor's white hot inferno emanating from his body refused to die down as he immediately turned to address Clair Voyant nearby: "Clair-san, this could be our only chance left! Which direction from here is the bomb hiding, and can you see if any civilians are anywhere nearby?"

Clair quickly activated her Quirk and looked back down through the street and the tunnels below the tower where she had seen the Ideo Trigger bomb before. As soon as she pointed in the direction it was and confirmed that no utility workers or any other civilians were anywhere in the way from where he stood, Endeavor's hands once more erupted into two white balls of fiery devastation just waiting to be unleashed. "EVERYONE STAND BACK!"

Civilians, officers and Heroes alike quickly backed away several meters from Endeavor, before he finally aimed his hands down and unleashed two blinding concentrated beams of fire directly into the ground, burning hot enough to not only melt the asphalt, concrete and steel several layers down, but to virtually turn it all into something resembling glass or obsidian. Gritting his teeth as he fought the overwhelming temperature within himself, Endeavor refused to withdraw his last ditch attack, as the two flaming beams continued to drill their way further and further down, before finally erupting through the roof of a final tunnel, and driving straight through the Ideo Trigger bomb in an inferno that reduced the entire foul construct to ashes in a matter of seconds.

As soon as he heard Clair Voyant call out that she could no longer see the bomb, Endeavor finally stopped focusing his Quirk's power; the white flames all over his body quickly returning back to his regular orange, as the flames from his hands likewise finally went out; revealing his hands to have sustained some especially terrible burns of their own to his fellows.

Endeavor struggled to catch his breath, having burned away any sense of hydration he'd had after having had to push his Quirk to such an extreme he rarely ever had before. But regardless, he didn't let that stop him from lifting his gaze to see the Quirkless men that had come from out of nowhere to give them a helping hand at the most crucial moment.

The political-looking figure at the forefront of all the action quickly realized the Flame Hero and his fellows were watching him, thus he quickly stepped forward, feeling no other approach worked here as well as simply giving a bow in greeting. Dismissing this, Endeavor finally said: "You and your men should not have come out here, it was far too dangerous. However, considering how many lives in this city we've managed to save because of your help, it's only right that I give you all my thanks."

Shaking a hand in denial of such needless praise, Konstantin Khodamchuk answered in pleasantly clear English: "There's really no need for any of that, Endeavor-san. Yes, I'm well aware of who you are. I can't afford not to be. In fact, we're all quite aware of just what you and many other Heroes out there are up against right now, beyond your everyday exploits, thanks to these Humarise thugs. For how much you all risk for regular people every single day, you can't really expect someone to not one day want to try and pay back the favor, even a little bit."

Before Endeavor could answer, Clair Voyant suddenly stepped forward, the urgency in her voice still clear as day: "Be that as it may, it was still far too reckless for you to put yourself at risk like this, even for our sakes, Mr. President. It's astounding your own guards didn't try harder to keep you from stepping into a fight like this one."

But as Ilya Toptunov nonchalantly answered: "Oh, trust us, it's pointless trying to talk the man out of something when his mind is made-up, whether when he was a soldier, or now as a politician"; Endeavor looked back to Konstantin in only the mildest confusion: "President? You sound far less like any of the other people of this country I've spoken to so far…and more like one of my interns. I see, so you must be the man Solovei had been going on about before we came to this country."

Instead of looking at all surprised, Konstantin solemnly nodded his head in confirmation. "That's right, Konstantin Alexandrovich Khodamchuk, current acting president of Russia, at your service. It's an honor to make your acquaintance, Endeavor-san. I…have likewise been hearing much of the local and international news, regarding your two missing interns, Deku and Solovei. It may or may not come as a surprise to you that I actually have come to know the latter somewhat well. If you all are out here and not looking for those boys right now, am I to understand this means there has been a breakthrough in their situation? Surely they can't truly be responsible for the crime I've been hearing about."

Clenching his fists in returning resolve, Endeavor answered immediately: "Of course they're not responsible. In fact, it's actually because of all four of those boys that we were able to get here and destroy these terrorists' bomb before it was too late for this city…but there are still many more across the world that our fellow Heroes are working even now to likewise disarm or destroy if need be. My son and interns came into possession of some precious documents belonging to Humarise that gave all the details of their ultimate plan, and have been hunted down these last several days for it. They were only able to decipher the coordinates for the locations of all their bombs this morning and send them out to all of us."

"Yeah, but now that we've gotten the situation in the capital city taken care of, what's stopping us from going out to give those boys the backup they need?" Burnin' asked, with Clair Voyant adding on: "That's right, we know we have all the honest police in town securing the airwaves again as we speak, and we know where your interns are headed."

Suddenly, Onima interjected: "But even if all of us were to head out after those boys right now, there's still no way we would be able to catch up with Solovei-kun as well; there's no telling where he could be right now compared to the others."

Kido immediately then argued: "But the distance he'd be going, it would be impossible for him to get there in so little time. Surely that'd better our chances or catching up to him at least, wouldn't it?"

"Hold on, what do you all mean? Where are all your interns going?" Konstantin suddenly stepped in; his already serious eyes now looking to have intensified that much more.

"They're heading to a small island off the west coast of the next country over, Klayd, because they found out from all those documents that this is where Humarise's headquarters really is. But they also found out that they had two extra bombs than the number they announced to the rest of the world, to detonate in a repeat of their attack on Berlin; one of them being here, and the other one in St. Petersburg. Solovei-kun decided he was going to try and head up there to try and at least stall the detonation of that one so the others could take out Humarise at home and disarm all their bombs remotely from there. The Association said they'd try to reach out to any Pro Heroes in the neighboring countries to try and help, but it sounds like they've all been having their own shares of chaos to deal with already, so he could be going in there all alone right now for all we know."

As soon as Burnin' finished hastily explaining all of this, the Heroes could all see the grim realization sink into Konstantin and his guards, to know that these terrorists had managed to sneak a weapon of such devastation into Russia's current capital without anyone having ever noticed. The president himself could even now just imagine the cruel logic behind such a deceptive tactic, to completely render his call for amnesty and peace completely worthless, if the man himself couldn't be killed in the first place.

At the same time, after seeing just how fiercely Humarise had gone here just to ensure the detonation of one bomb against a whole team of Heroes, the three Russian men couldn't help but just imagine the veritable wolves den Nikolay was throwing himself into at this very moment in order to try and save more of their countrymen.

Such a thought filled them all with an unshakable resolve in their eyes that would not have looked out of place on any Pro Hero, but looked downright miraculous upon three Quirkless souls like them.

Without a moment to lose, Konstantin stepped forward. "If you've really managed to secure everything here, and if you need any help at all to catch up with any of your interns, I would be more than happy to lend you all the use of my personal jet; it's still at the local airfield. I may not know how fast any of you may be with your Quirks, but surely this can help make your job even a little bit easier."

As the Heroes exchanged contemplative glances at this unexpected offer of support, Endeavor said: "With my aerial speed, I could get to Humarise's island in enough time if I were to go after Shoto and the boys now, but the plane could help those of us that decide to go after Solovei that much more."

"Then what are we waiting for?" Burnin' asked rhetorically, already urging Onima and Kido to rejoin her. "We can go after Solovei-kun ourselves while you, Clair Voyant-san and the others go after Shoto-kun, Deku-kun and Bakugo-kun. I think it's safe to say the rest of the local Heroes and the police can help hold down the fort here from now on; Humarise is bound to know they've lost all possible power in this city now."

As if the cosmos decided now was the time to prove Burnin's point; Clair Voyant and Endeavor's phones suddenly started to ring; both of them coming from the police that had gone out to all the local television stations, confirming that they had managed to apprehend individuals among the staff that had been purposefully blocking international airwaves, or deliberately censoring the news in regards to just what was going on everywhere else.

With that one major obstacle having now been resolved, Konstantin shared a knowing nod with his two bodyguards as he answered, before ultimately making his way back to the tower: "Then you'd all best be on your way. My men and our host retinue will double the security here while I do what I came here to do. These terrorists may have thought they'd keep peace from being attempted, but I'm not about to let anyone see me back down now."

With that, the Russian president made a beeline back inside, with Angel's Eye and Ilya hurriedly reconnoitering with the police and other tower security officers, while Endeavor, Clair Voyant and a handful of the other Otheon Heroes quickly took off into the air to rejoin Shoto and his friends at the Klayd-bordering island, and the Flaming Sidekickers and another handful of local Heroes raced for the airfield, desperate to try and somehow catch up with Nikolay somewhere between here and St. Petersburg, while there was still time; none of them knowing just how much the young Hero's airborne speed had grown in power over this little time.

…

The Winter Palace, St. Petersburg, Russia

From end to end, the vast Palace Square that stood in the heart of St. Petersburg between the wide-reaching restored splendor of the Winter Palace and the bow-shaped edifice that was the city's General Staff Building, was packed full of silently bristling, anxious and restless people alike; tens of thousands filling the vast emptiness surrounding the single protruding monument that was the Alexander Column, with countless more spilling out into the surrounding streets. The crowd was made up of Quirkless Russian citizens from all possible walks of life, friends, relatives, lovers and strangers one and all, but had all gathered here on this most auspicious of days for one unspoken but undeniable calling.

Today was to be the day that could easily change the future of their motherland forever, as evidenced by the multitude of colossal projector screens that had been mounted along the end of the square before the palace, with rows of loudspeakers mounted intermittently across the square to help the sound carry equally so that all could hear their president's upcoming call for amnesty, peace and restoration clearly and without question.

For the past nearly two days, people all across St. Petersburg and beyond had come flocking here to their nation's former capital and home of their ancient past royalty, to see the possible beginning of a new chapter for their people, a possible step back into light after what had once seemed an inescapable darkness. News crews from all over the vast sub-continent had come as well, all field anchors anxiously reporting the restless atmosphere of the sea of people, as the minutes were slowly ticking by before their president's speech would at last go live.

Even far outside the cities of Russia, there were likewise multiple reports coming from the borders of all its neighboring nations, as countless of its long-displaced Quirked citizens had come in legions, all of them carrying the unspoken yet palpable hope that from this day, they might be welcomed back to their homeland, no longer having to fear for the safety of their families.

Naturally, even amid this silent anticipation and hope that had been slowly but surely bristling and spreading among the people, there were the fair share of dissenting voices calling out from all corners of the land, deriding this moment as a naïve folly that would change nothing. With so many Russian citizens having decided to turn their backs on Konstantin Khodamchuk's dream in favor of other like-minded organizations out in the world, it was hard to blame such people for expressing such cynicism.

There was no way for anyone to know how today would turn out, how receptive the Russian people as a whole would be to their president's message, for even a massive crowd that had gathered such as this one, was but a drop in the bucket compared to Russia's entire population. But the fact that there was even but a single soul out there that had hope for a better future with the return of their Quirked countrymen; that was exactly why Konstantin had called for this momentous declaration in the first place.

Even as the overcast skies with their gentle snowfall had begun to grow as dark as dusk this early in the afternoon, due to the lingering winter season and the city's proximity to the Arctic Circle; nobody let the biting cold dissuade them from staying here. This occasion was simply too important to be ruined by such fickle things. Purpose and a desire for unity had brought all these souls together, and nothing was going to break that.

But even for as determined and hopeful as so many of these people were, that single-minded hope had sadly blinded them all to the scattered handful of souls among their numbers, who had watched and prepared for this moment just as intensely, but with far, far darker intentions.

So much work had been put into the preparations for this announcement, that it had been all too easy for these men and women agents of Humarise, in their matching red-and-white robes beneath their heavy civilian coats, to slip in deep beneath the site of the Winter Palace, and carefully construct and place their secret Ideo Trigger bomb right beneath the heart of it. With its precise location having just the right connection to so many of the underground passages beneath the city, including the metro system, and especially with the aid of the heavy breeze carried upon the Neva River for when the clouds would burst from below; they all knew that this stood to be as wide-reaching and effective a detonation as the attack in Berlin could ever have hoped to be.

With the crowds' multitudinous chatter building en masse, it was easy for the plainclothes terrorists to communicate with each other through their earpieces as they made their way through, all without ever risking being overheard, even by the police officers lining the perimeter to try and keep things calm.

[[It won't be long now. Everything is going by schedule so far. Only a few minutes after the broadcast for the speech begins, I hit the detonator, just as the Otheon team will. Make sure you have your gas masks on and you're in the agreed safe spots before that happens.]]

One after the other, the terrorists all voiced their confirmed understanding of their instructions, subtly reaching into their respective backpacks to pull out their gas masks while making way to their assigned hiding places they had confirmed beforehand would protect them well enough from the chaos that was bound to unfold in precious minutes.

One of the female agents among them took the moment to speak into her own earpiece: [[I'm still not sure about this. We should have assigned more of our brothers and sisters to accompany us up here. Law enforcement security here is tight enough as it is after Moscow.]]

But their team leader sounded just as assured as ever; his thickly accented voice dripping with confidence: [[Don't lose faith. Brother Flect Turn wouldn't have sent us up here in as little numbers as we are, if he had any doubts in our ability to succeed. With the hysteria his announcement before is causing everywhere else, we have no chance of any Heroes interfering. Even if they were to somehow figure out the plans for Otheon and St. Petersburg, what hope could they possibly have of getting all the way up here in time? Besides, even if by some insane chance they could, Brother Omniscient has the perfect position to make sure they couldn't get the drop on us.]]

Those that could, turned their attention back to the very top of the Alexander Column, where masterfully hidden from sight amid the gold-embossed sculpture upon it, a man with his hood down was carefully panning his point of view across the entire square, his head adorned with eyeballs all over it, covering every possible angle.

With another glance to their synchronized watches, keeping it in mind in relation to when the speech was scheduled to go live, the terrorists quickly began to head for the outskirts of the crowd in the square, finally pulling out their gas masks once they could see the first signs of their shelters, just as the projector screens suddenly all lit up, drawing an enormous swelling cheer from the crowd.

BKKKKKKKKKKMMMM!

A cheer so loud, that the terrorists around could just barely make out the sound of what had to be a thunderclap from above. Hardly anything out of the ordinary, had it not been for the fact that snowfall as gentle as this never came with thunder.

BKWOOOM!

Suddenly, another, much more intense resonating crack echoed through the skies in the distance, this time catching the attention of the terrorists and much of the crowd, as many concerned eyes turned to the clouds, as if expecting a large plane to come flying in low.

[[WHOA, WHAT THE-?!]]

K-KOOOM!

The terrorist known as Omniscient could barely get those words out altogether, before the air was split by a tremendous crack like lightning at point blank; his all-seeing eyes just barely making out the shape of something incoming for his position fast enough to break the sound barrier, before he found himself getting plowed into with the force of an artillery round, sending him flying helplessly through the air over the span of the Winter Palace and well out into the Neva River, all before he could even cry out.

BWOOOM!

A tremendous shockwave rippled powerfully through the entire Palace Square in that same moment, accompanied by a multitude of shocked and frightened cries from the crowd; drawing the confused eyes of the terrorists among them, as they could see the human tide backing away hurriedly from the Palace Gates below the central projector.

In front of countless confused eyes, a single young man in an olive-colored kosovorotka lined with gold silk was knelt upon one knee, his fur cap long since blown off his head after how fast he'd had to force himself to go to make it all this way in time; the intense wind pressure he'd had to fight against having his short dark brown hair completely blown back along his head, revealing the small scar carved just above his left brow in the shape of a downward shooting star and its tail; and the intense cold of flying so high, even before descending into this winter cold, leaving his once fair-colored face an intense bright red.

His wide green eyes were almost animalistic, his irises and pupils constricted, reflecting his desperation and readiness for conflict, as he finally forced himself back onto his wool-booted feet, and turned to face the crowd of his countless countrymen. His right leg was still shaking after delivering the momentum-fueled kick that had knocked away the clear lookout he had spotted atop the column upon breaking through the clouds.

The Frequency Hero Solovei stood alone, tall and as ready as could be, his heart racing and his shoulders trembling as he still fought to catch his breath; his adrenaline barely managing to dull the pain in all his muscles after having had to push his Quirk's flight capability so far for so long.

The golden wings of the eagles adorning the Palace Gate extended from behind his slender frame, giving him the illusion of an avenging angel. For just a teenage boy, he gave off an aura that no one could describe as his eyes looked as though they were piercing through the crowds, looking for something none of them even knew existed.

And with his adrenaline having boosted his already fully alert senses as much as it was, Nikolay was quick to spot one of the few people amid the throngs that was moving with intent, as a man with visible red/white robes underneath a heavy coat, was in the middle of pulling out a pistol, about to aim it at him through the crowd upon recognition that a Hero had shown up when they hadn't expected it.

Without a moment to even take another breath, Nikolay took off over the heads of everyone before him faster than their eyes could blink; the deafening sound of his Quirk forcing them all to duck down in a kneejerk response, as he all but glided over all of them, never taking his eyes off his potential attacker while at the same time pulling out one of the tuning forks from his bandolier.

As soon as the terrorist finally drew his line of sight and put his finger on the trigger, Nikolay had miraculously managed to throw the tuning fork between his fingers, accurate enough to slip the handle straight into the barrel of the gun itself. The built up Kinetic power he'd channeled into it through his throw subsequently flowed through the gun itself, shattering it into a million pieces in an explosive shockwave within its wielder's hand. Nikolay immediately followed this up with a flick of his wrist, pulling the tuning fork back into his hand, while throwing his body into a forward flip, driving a devastating heel of his right foot down across the back of the terrorist's head, sending him flipping multiple times above where he stood, before ultimately landing hard on his face against the ground.

By now, everyone's stunned silence had devolved into instinctively panicked shouts upon the realization that there was a fight between gunmen and someone with Quirks in their immediate midst. Among all that screaming and resulting running of the people around him, punctuated by the desperate whistles of the police trying to maintain order, Nikolay was desperately looking all around for the next sign of another Humarise member.

Fortunately, he didn't have to look for long, as he was barely able to make out the distant sight of a single person atop the central roof of the General Staff Building, adorned in a gas mask and watching the dismantling of his comrades' plan play out before his eyes.

With no visible large firearm on him as far as he could tell from down here, and with such a perfect vantage point, Nikolay could only naturally assume this had to be the one carrying the detonator for the Ideo Trigger bomb. [[EVERYONE GET AS FAR FROM HERE AS YOU CAN!]]

Knowing he could only hope any of the fleeing crowd had paid enough attention to hear his desperate warning, Nikolay immediately launched himself straight across the Palace Square for his next target; letting the air current flow freely through the lining of his muscles and out his hands and feet in a continuous Quirk action, helping him to cross this vast distance in more than half the time he would have before; the scattered popping of gunshots ringing out from below, as the other terrorists on the scene desperately tried to shoot him out of the air upon realizing where he was going.

Nikolay could see the masked individual ahead had realized how quickly he was approaching, and thus he could see his left arm start to lift; either an attempt at threatening the young Hero to stop his charge, or simply a dramatic show of his preparation to detonate the Ideo Trigger bomb.

Whatever it was, Nikolay didn't wait to find out, as he just as swiftly threw the same small tuning fork with a powered up flick of his wrist and resulting blast, sending the tiny projectile with a single glint in the air, before it went slamming hard into the terrorist's hand, ricocheting off of it and clattering to the roof, while the detonator itself went skidding all the way across before coming to a stop against the opposite barrier.

Nikolay and the terrorist alike had their eyes focused solely on the detonator, as the young Hero momentarily broke the flow of his flight and launched himself with a sizable boost across the roof, trying to outrace his opponent for the veritable doomsday button.

Just inches within reaching it, Nikolay's feet touched down upon the roof, and with the terrorist's pounding booted footsteps racing up at his side, he proceeded to try and buy himself another few precious seconds by springing up into a spin and launching his left foot to slam into the man's chest, hoping it would be enough to make him stumble back just a few more feet.

WRAM!

But the moment he should have felt the sole of his boot meet the terrorist's sternum, Nikolay suddenly felt a crushing impact against his chest as though he were the one that had just gotten kicked, knocking all the air out of his lungs at the same time his body was sent flying back before slamming hard into the same barrier, right beside the detonator.

Gritting his teeth as his eyes burned with pained tears at the agony in his ribs, Nikolay struggled back onto his feet, looking to his opponent, who was already striding towards him with murderous intent, his voice notably muffled within his gas mask. It all came rushing to the forefront of his mind as his grimace of pain turned into wide-eyed realization and shock, even as the approaching terrorist spoke, his voice muffled within his gas mask.

[[I don't know how the hell you managed to make it all the way here from Otheon so shortly after Flect Turn's proclamation, but it doesn't make any difference. You can't do anything to hurt me, anymore than you or your damn friends could do before.]]

Clenching his hands into trembling fists as he stared into the eye lenses of the gas mask, Nikolay answered in haggard rasping breaths: [[I don't want to hurt you. Until my friends take down Flect Turn, all I have to do is stop you pushing that button…then I'm bringing you back home, Marius Lazarescu.]]

The masked terrorist before Nikolay came to a sudden halt, before slowly reaching up and peeling off his gas mask, revealing the all-too familiar olive-skinned and dark-bearded young Romanian that Nikolay, Mina, Maja and all their friends had waited so long to find any trace of.

But there was no shock or recognition on Marius' face, only a twisting and seething rage, as his free hand reached for the sheathed combat knife strapped to his waist, doing away with all pretenses as he tore away his hoodie to reveal the same red/white Humarise robes beneath.

[[Don't try to play any of your damned mind games with me, Solovei; my home is gone, both of them! My father tried to get our motherland back from the despots and tyrants that had chased us out of it, but you damn blinded fools had to go and kill him for his dream, his dream for us all! You, of all people, should have been on his side!]]

Nikolay, despite himself and others having had reason to expect a response like this, still couldn't believe he was actually hearing this, as he watched Marius draw two combat knives out, staring the Hero down like an apex predator.

[[I don't know who the hell you think you're talking to, there is no Marius Lazarescu! My name is Marius Petrovich Granin, son of Pietro Dobrynich Granin, the man killed by those that claim to protect the innocent, just because he wanted to help his people…and now, sworn brother to Humarise, and savior of the human race. Before we finally deliver God's wrath upon all those tainted with our shared curse…I'm going to see to it you pay for what you and your friends took from me, Solovei!]]