Izuku stretched his arms as much as the cramped bus allowed him to. The exercise was supposed to be just search and rescue, but it was their first trip away from the classroom, and he wanted to be ready for anything.

"Looks like someone's ready to go!" Kirishima clapped him on the back and asked, "Got any more good pirate stories to tell us?"

Izuku rolled his eyes. Half the class thought he was making things up for fun, and the other half thought him crazy. In no rush to correct their delusions, Izuku donned his best Usopp grin and said, "Did I ever tell you guys about the time I sailed on a ship up a massive geyser and landed in a sea made of clouds?"

"But how would that even work?" Tsuyu asked. "Clouds are just water vapor."

"There was something in them that made them solid. But anyways, the people up there had white wings, and when the sun hit the clouds right, you could see their giant shadows dancing on the waves. Very friendly, and they know how to throw one heck of a party."

"Everybody throws parties in your stories!"

"Yeah, because they're fun. So, the first time we were up there, Roger went off to find a Devil Fruit, leaving me with Luffy and Shanks at their village. Not long after they left, the village came under attack by a band of pirates on flying ships, and-"

"Alright, everyone off." Aizawa's voice cut cleanly through the story. The students listening closely all groaned and said it was just getting good. Izuku grinned at them, shot them a wink, and hopped straight out a window.

The moment he entered the spacious building, he felt something off. A charge hung in the air, warning against an imminent bolt of lightning, and Izuku had a hunch that lightning wasn't him.

With a shrug, Izuku reasoned that it couldn't be that bad with All Might there with them. The moment Thirteen approached them, they whispered to Aizawa that All Might had something come up.

Well. It couldn't be that bad with two other pro heroes there with them.

Once Thirteen got through their explanation about rescue work, Izuku felt the electrifying sensation increase. It emanated from a swirling black void that appeared above the central fountain. Izuku gathered lightning in his hand and asked Aizawa, "Should I attack that ominous shadow over there?"

Aizawa's eyes snapped towards the anomaly. "Stand down. You're only students, save the fighting for the pros." His scarf unfurled around him, hovering in the air. "Everyone, make for the doors and stay together. Call for help, and don't engage unless you have no other option."

"I'm afraid I can't allow you to do that." A deep, courteous voice echoed from everywhere in the building. The shadow widened, and from its depths emerged a horde of villains. Another dark cloud emerged above the students and sprouted yellow eyes. "My name is Kurogiri, and today, it is my job to show you all despair."

"I think not." Aizawa's scarf snapped out and grabbed them. A cloud formed around him, but Aizawa's eyes glowed, stopping the warp. "You're under arrest for trespassing. If you don't resist, that's all you'll be charged with."

"I'll show you despair you cloudy freak!" Bakugo leapt into the air, propelling himself with explosions and blocking Aizawa's sight. The explosion passed harmlessly through Kurogiri, and the warper took advantage of the smoke to spirit Bakugo away.

"Children these days are so terrifying. It makes me feel less guilty for what I'm about to do."

Izuku stalked forward, ready to impale Kurogiri with lightning, but Aizawa shot him a glare. Taking a deep breath, Izuku let the lightning fade away and waited for the teacher's next move.

"Thirteen, get the students out. I'll keep the crowd busy."

Izuku glanced over the cannon fodder. He'd seen better out of Shiki and the Marines, but numbers and direct combat were hardly Aizawa's specialties.

"I don't think that's a good idea, sir," Izuku told him. "I could take them easily-"

"It's my job as a hero and a teacher. Besides, I wouldn't be here at U.A. if I was a one-trick pony."

Thirteen put herself between the warper and the students while Aizawa charged at the villains. True to his words, Aizawa darted through them like a fish in a river, tripping villains with his scarf, making them attack each other, and disabling Quirks when people least expected it.

Meanwhile, Thirteen opened a black hole and drew the warper inside. Izuku caught the shimmer of darkness behind the teacher and hastily drew her back before they could be eviscerated by their own Quirk.

"It's no good, his Quirk counters yours," Izuku pointed out. "If you'll just let me-"

"You heard Aizawa, run back to the school and get help!"

With Thirteen distracted, they reacted too late to the dark gas billowing around them. They only had time to stretch out a hand, trying in vain to engulf the villain, before they disappeared. "Not a part of the plan, but I'm sure those villains I sent her to can improvise. Now, where was I?"

Finally alone, Izuku itched to chase after the villain. Yet, he saw how that worked out with Bakugo, and two teachers expressly forbid him to get involved. Racked by indecision, Izuku noticed too late the void engulfing him and spitting him out underwater.

Izuku held his breath as his body lost its strength. The water was clear, and the bottom shallow compared to the other world's oceans, but with his feeble limbs, the surface may as well be a mile away. As he sank, a villain lurking in the water noticed him, grinned wickedly, and darted towards him like a shark.

Izuku tried to use Tekkai, but his muscles lacked the strength to even twitch. Bracing himself, Izuku watched rows of sharp teeth approach at an alarming speed.

A flash of green sped out from behind him. Tsuyu's kick caught the villain on top of their head and drove them into the concrete bottom. Shark teeth and blood floated in the water. Tsuyu wrapped her arms around him, kicked off the bottom, and carried them both to the surface.

As Izuku caught his breath, Tsuyu asked, "Can you swim?"

Izuku mouthed the word 'no', still too exhausted to speak. Tsuyu caught the sentiment and angled her kicks towards a boat. Once they made it, she hauled him up the ladder and shouted, "Help me with him."

"Seriously? He can't swim?" Mineta asked.

Once Izuku was back out of water, he said, "My Quirk's weakness. I lose all my strength in standing water."

"So, what, you can't take a bath either?"

"I'd drown if I did."

"Please focus," Tsuyu said. "There are more of them in the water. They have us surrounded."

Mineta shrieked and hid behind her. Izuku cracked his knuckles. "How many? I'll let you guys each take a third of them."

"Midoriya, no." Tsuyu put a hand on Izuku's arm. "You heard what the teachers said."

"And because of it, I nearly died." Izuku's flat tone made her flinch. "Thirteen almost died, Aizawa's hopelessly outnumbered, and everyone else is scattered through the facility and fighting villains of their own. I'm going to kick their asses."

Tsuyu faltered, trying to come up with a response. Mineta, however, said, "Perfect! You can take my share."

Izuku gave him a calculating look, and Mineta shriveled under his gaze. Shrugging, Izuku said, "More for me then."

An icicle launched out of the water. Izuku caught the sharpened tip an inch from his face and shattered the ice in his grip. The villain yelped and ducked back underwater an instant before lightning crashed against the surface.

"That's a problem. I can't hit them if they keep hiding down there."

Tsuyu shook her head. "There's way too many of them for me."

When they both looked at Mineta, he hastily said, "My Quirk's no good either! They just float on the surface. See?"

Mineta threw a sphere. It plopped on the water's surface. The villains warily backed away from the bobbing sphere.

"Hey, let me try." Izuku plucked a sphere, only for it to instantly stick to his hand. Trying to grab it only resulted in getting his second hand stuck. Grunting angrily, Izuku tried wrenching his arms apart.

"Hold on, let me. The spheres only get unstuck when I touch them."

Before Mineta could grab his sphere, Izuku's arms crackled with electricity. The adhesive instantly came undone.

Izuku hefted a sphere in his crackling hand and said, "I think I can work with this." He eyed the villains, who instantly dove under. Tracking one, Izuku wound back his arm and threw. The sphere impacted the water with a deafening crack, and an enormous splash shot high into the air. Once the water fell, an unconscious villain floated to the surface, tagged by Mineta's sphere.

"Tsuyu, look underwater and sight for me. Mineta?" Izuku held out his hand. "Another, please."

Izuku hopped over the water's surface and waited for Tsuyu's signal. When he felt he had the right aim, Izuku fired, and another limp villain floated up. Blood trickled down Mineta's head, and twenty villains bobbed alongside the boat when Tsuyu signaled the villains were taken down. Izuku hopped back, grabbed them both, and cleared the indoor lake with a few Geppo hops.

"We could have run the whole time?" Mineta screeched. Tsuyu also gave Izuku an unapproving stare.

"And what would happen if another of our classmates fell in once we left?" Izuku retorted. Knowing fully well that no one else could fight underwater like her, Tsuyu silently conceded.

Over in the central plaza, Aizawa continued his one man stand against the villains' cannon fodder. Izuku stopped to silently admire his handiwork.

"Don't tell me you're thinking about jumping in there," Tsuyu said blandly.

"I would if he needed it," Izuku answered, "But he's got them handled. They're pretty weak."

"Pretty weak!" Mineta shouted. "They could've killed us!"

"So can a flight of stairs. Doesn't make them scary."

Izuku felt the battle shift in an instant. One second, Aizawa had four villains tangled and knocked the lights out of a fifth. The next, bones crunched as Aizawa writhed in the monstrous grip of the Nomu. Dead silence fell across the USJ as the villains stopped to stare in awe at the monster in their midst. The crowd parted, and Shigaraki strode forth to inspect the teacher at his mercy.

"You know, you're one of the coolest heroes. You don't beg for attention, you do your job and do it well. I almost don't want to kill you." His grin stretched wide, and he leaned close to say tauntingly, "Almost. Nomu, kill him."

Izuku saw it happen. Saw the Nomu's fist squeeze tight. Saw his teacher pop like a balloon. His vision went red. The air shuddered as Izuku's single-minded will made itself manifest in a soul-shaking command.

You will not harm him.

Every person in the USJ felt it. Fights stopped cold as villain and hero student alike turned towards the plaza. At the epicenter, villains dropped senseless, crushed by the weight of Izuku's will. Kurogiri's eyes flickered, and Shigaraki buckled but stayed on his feet. The remaining villains collapsed like dominos, in a wave of raw fury that rippled out from Izuku. Only the Nomu remained unmoved, dead to all wills except its master.

Izuku cleared the distance between him and the Nomu in a green flash. His fist, coated in Haki, slammed like a sledgehammer into the monster's forearm, shattering the bone buried beneath armored skin and hulking muscle into a thousand pieces. The Nomu's grip went slack. Izuku whisked Aizawa away from the villains' clutches and laid him down at the base of the stairs.

"Midoriya," Aizawa rasped. "I told you to-"

"I'd have listened if you could handle it."

Aizawa grimaced. Weighing his options, he said, "Don't kill anyone."

"I'll try not to."

Izuku turned back to his opponent. The mangled arm knit itself back together, and the creature showed no discomfort on its distorted face. Shigaraki scratched at his neck in annoyance. "You're the special side-quest Sensei gave me. He really wants you dead."

Izuku cracked his knuckles. "Then he can get in line. I've dealt with far scarier than you lot."

"Big words from a wannabe hero. Nomu, crush him."

The Nomu rushed over and slammed its arms onto Izuku's head. Izuku let the hands pass through him, blurring his body in an electric haze before it seamlessly reassembled itself.

With the Nomu crouched, Izuku punched its head into the ground. He punched over and over, again and again, chipping away at the stone beneath them and driving its skull deeper into the ground.

The Nomu's arms crashed in a clapping motion around Izuku's chest. Izuku slipped backwards and crouched into a fighting stance while the Nomu pried itself out of the ground. Stone shards plopped from its face as its flesh mended itself.

"What kind of hacking bullshit is this?" Shigaraki roared. "Just die already!"

"I could say the same for this thing." Izuku pointed at the Nomu. "How many Quirks does it have?"

"Enough to kill All Might, and more than enough to deal with a pest like you." Shigaraki's eyes scoured the area. When his gaze fell upon Eraserhead, he said, "Ignore the brat. Kill Eraserhead instead."

Izuku felt a flash of panic as the Nomu bolted towards the fallen hero. The Nomu's fist crashed down, threatening to pulp him in one hit. Izuku threw himself in the punch's path and braced. The ground beneath his feet buckled, but Izuku himself stood firm.

"Ha!" Shigaraki crowed. "Not everyone has the same hitbox-erasing bullshit as you do. Let's see how long it takes to crush you!"

The Nomu punched down again, and again, and again. Each impact rattled Izuku's bones, and bruises quickly welled up all along his forearms. The blows drove his feet deeper and deeper into the concrete like a nail.

Abandoning defense, Izuku took a hit on his jaw and threw a roundhouse punch. Izuku staggered back, nursing a swollen cheek, and the Nomu forcefully realigned its own jaw. With a mindless roar, the Nomu charged again, and again, Izuku met it blow for blow.

Over time, Izuku's injuries mounted up, but the Nomu's wounds seamlessly vanished. Izuku huffed and wheezed as all the exertion sapped his strength.

"Looks like the wannabe hero's getting tired." Shigaraki watched with rapt attention as his monster fought on. "You're a DPS cosplaying as a tank, while my Nomu is the whole package. You talked such a big game earlier. I thought you could do more than be my Nomu's punching bag."

Izuku realized that just punching the Nomu would do nothing, but he also noticed that the wounds took time to heal. The healing hadn't slowed down, which meant the only way to deal with it was to attack it faster than it can heal.

Izuku grabbed both its arms and kicked both feet into its chest. The Nomu barely staggered back, but it gave Izuku time and room to prepare his attack.

"Oh, I can," Izuku told Shigaraki. "Watch me." He raised both arms and filled them with as much electrical energy as he could manage. His fists glowed with Haki, and wisps of static drifted from them. "Rumble… Gatling!"

Izuku's fists flashed forward, one after the other, too fast for the eye to track. The impacts left fist-shaped indents across the Nomu's chest. The monster held its ground, planting its feet and weathering the assault head-on. With a furious roar, Izuku sped up. Distinct punches overlapped into an electrical arc, striking continuously and filling the air with the smell of ozone. The Nomu took one step back, than another. Its skin peeled away, and bits of its flesh vaporized under each charged blow. Its ribs shattered, its organs turned to pulp, and still, it stood, staring down Izuku with its lifeless gaze. Izuku smashed in its beak, crushed its eyes, spattered its brain across the shattered ground. And still, the Nomu stood.

Izuku shouted with all his might. His fists sounded like the blurred retorts of a gatling gun and fell with the same frequency. Even as the Nomu's body frantically drew itself back together, Izuku's fist dashed it apart. Punch after punch, Izuku carved his way through the Nomu until his fists broke out the other side.

When he no longer felt resistance, Izuku slowed his punches. Mist and glowing plasma obscured the battleground, but when it faded away, it revealed the Nomu's legs, still standing, ending in a bloodied stump where its torso once rested. Bits of burnt flesh lay scattered across the ground, pulped and charred into unrecognizable masses.

An eternity passed in a single second as every villain and student watched the Nomu for any signs of life. The legs twitched. The mangled flesh at the stump bubbled outward, rapidly regrowing its torso. Shigaraki let out a shaky laugh and said, "That's right, Nomu, you're indestructible! Sensei said so! Now, Nomu, kill the heroes!"

Izuku braced himself, but the monster didn't move. Confused, Shigaraki shouted, "Nomu! Kill them now!"

The Nomu had no ears to hear with. Realizing this, Izuku knew he had seconds until it attacked again. He could attack Shigaraki, but he couldn't risk the Nomu following its previous orders while he was distracted. He had to finish the Nomu. If a million punches couldn't get the job done, then he'd have to do it with one.

Izuku's legs and left arm shrunk as he funneled the electrons away from those areas, leaving them little spindles of lightning. His right arm billowed out, growing to a giant's proportions. It wobbled, struggling to maintain its size, but Izuku held it through sheer force of will.

The Nomu had regained its arms, and the writhing flesh creeped up its regrowing neck. "Nomu!" Shigaraki shrieked. "Move! Dodge! Do something!"

With a firm voice, hiding his exhaustion, Izuku said, "Gear Second." Haki appeared in thin patches along the arm, until it formed an even coating. "Thor's… Hammer!"

"Move!"

The Nomu's face regrew. Its ears caught its master's orders as Izuku threw his punch. Yet, for how fast the abomination could move, it was powerless against the attack rushing towards it.

Izuku's fist rocketed forward at speeds best measured in fractions of the speed of light. The very air shattered, set alight with a thousand motes of plasma as Izuku sucked the charge out of each atom and hurled it forward. A visible shockwave rippled out from Izuku's knuckles, ripping apart the earth and hurling unconscious villains in its wake.

When Izuku's fist collided with the Nomu, no simple transfer of force sealed the monster's fate. The air in the fist's path, given insufficient time to scatter and stuck between the rock and hard place that were Izuku and the Nomu, were squeezed under temperatures and pressures one would find at the heart of a dying star.

And thus, for the briefest of moments, the USJ was illuminated with the brilliant corona of the star forged by Izuku's will. Atoms squeezed together, protons and neutrons crushed to briefly form an atom visible to the naked eye, a speck of subatomic matter nearly dense enough to collapse into a black hole.

As inertia gave way and the air pushed the Nomu back, the incredible pressure holding the star together abated. The single atom had space to expand, and as it did, it tore itself apart into millions of smaller elements. Matter turned into energy, and in that minuscule space between Izuku and the Nomu, that expanding force had two directions in which it could expand.

One of those wasn't held together with Haki.

All told, the matter compressed together and destroyed amounted to a fraction of the power wielded by the first atomic bombs. But even a fraction of the power that broke nations, coupled with the sheer force Izuku himself wielded, directed in a singular direction, was enough to turn the Nomu into a meat slurry as it shot through the roof of the USJ and scattered itself across the atmosphere, so thoroughly destroyed down to the individual cells that no Quirk could ever draw it back together.

No one beholding it understood exactly what had happened, including Izuku. Beholding it, Izuku only felt a sense of exhausted triumph. But everyone else, student, teacher, and villain alike, felt the primal fear that came of witnessing incalculable power, seeing its afterimage seared into their retinas, hearing the air shriek like a wounded animal, and feeling their feet leave the ground as the shockwave it made rattled their bones.

As the explosion echoed into silence, the only sound in the USJ was the heavy rasp of Izuku's breathing. His limbs flickered like television static, but his eyes stared resolutely forward, glowing with crazed defiance.

"Well?" Izuku asked the silence room. "Who's next?"

Shigaraki ground his teeth. For all that his arms and legs shook uncontrollably, he still took a faltering step forward. His eyes were bloodshot with madness and curses and vows of vengeance hung lightly on his tongue, but Kurogiri wrapped himself around him like a veil. Without a word, the two villains vanished, leaving the cannon fodder behind.

Izuku cast his gaze around the building, feeling each foreign presence within. The villains whimpered and threw themselves to the ground as they felt Izuku's attention linger on them. Within seconds, the remaining villains surrendered.

The USJ doors flew open. Light poured into the broken facility as All Might strode inside. "Never fear!" he shouted. "For I am-"

His voice broke off as he took in the facility's ruined state. Villains lay in tangled heaps, some bent at unnatural angles, and the ground looked as though he had thrown a few punches at it. Aizawa lay wheezing and broken at the foot of the stairs, in a slim sliver of untouched stone that lay in Izuku's shadow. Izuku himself still stood triumphant, fists clenched and eyes searching for foes, but All Might recognized the clenched smile of a hero concealing their fatigue from his televised reflection and saw the deep purple bruises spreading up his shoulder. Both his arms were mangled, and his face sported swollen lumps.

"Not needed, apparently," All Might finished meekly. With a gesture from him, the other U.A. staff poured into the building and set about administering first aid and apprehending the villains.

All Might bounded downstairs to investigate ground zero of whatever destroyed the building. He knelt beside Aizawa and gently assessed his injuries. Broken ribs, shattered arm, but no punctured lung or other immediately fatal injuries.

As All Might rose, Aizawa caught his pants leg with two fingers. All Might knelt closer and bent his ear as Eraserhead whispered, "Izuku did this. Tell Nezu he needs to run damage control."

"Rest, Aizawa. We will take care of the rest."

Unsettled, All Might cautiously walked up to Izuku and gave him a gentle tap on the shoulder. Izuku flinched, but his arms stayed by his sides.

"Hey. You're late to the party." Izuku said it with an easy smile, as if his arms hadn't been smashed to hamburger.

"Got held up in traffic," All Might absently bantered back. "The fight is over. Let's get you to Recovery Girl."

"Huh? What for?"

All Might gestured at his arms. Izuku couldn't even move his right, but he brought his left in front of his eyes. "Oh. I can just sleep it off. Mind showing me to a bed? I wouldn't want to fall asleep wherever like Ace."

Izuku made it out of the building, out of sight of the detained villains and injured students, before he collapsed in a puddle of green static. All Might frantically scooped up as much as he could carry and sprinted for Recovery Girl's office.

A/N: I've been waiting for this moment ever since I started writing this story. Suffice it to say, breaking the laws of physics with your fists will have Consequences.

As for me, the next twelve days of Christmas are going to be hell. I won't have a single day off in that time, one coworker just tested positive for Covid, and the other is still in training, which means I have to take every food safety call in the plant and train the rookie AND do however many quality/safety checks I can for at least a week. Fun. Ugh.

So, yeah. I'm still planning on putting out the next chapter in two weeks. Which… will be Christmas Eve. Which is in two weeks. Huh. Where did November go?

AidenJacksonSmithDSBB: "Woo. Random Question: how much Berries with the entire LoV be?"

Bardothren: if they were calculating based off the magnitude of crimes committed regardless of their world… Shigaraki would currently be sitting at three million tops, and maybe Kurogiri would get a million. Not sure how their bounties would scale up over time. But hey, maybe they'll get bounty posters later on.

Joshua the Hand-Written: "I'm pretty sure Froppy dealt with pirates during her internship. I think pirates are canon to MHA universe."

Bardothren: were they actually called pirates? I was under the impression that they were villains operating out of a boat instead of proper pirates. And let's be real. Those 'pirates' wouldn't last a minute in the East Blue.

Pungis: "This is really fun, cause I know for a fact if I had picked this up without the context of the first story I'd have written this of as a "Fan Wank". Izuku breezing through,effortlessly cool and subject to intrigue and admiration from his peers and mentors. It's all the kind of stuff that some stories, the kind I avoid, just leap right into with little to no preamble."

Bardothren: I despise those kinds of stories with a passion and I'm happy to hear this story doesn't fit that mold. Rest assured, I have no intention of giving Izuku an easy time, even in the 'weaker' MHA universe.

Mernom: "I think you managed to bring out Aizawa's intended character out very well. He doesn't like to waste time, but he's not completely unfair either."

Bardothren: I like Aizawa's character because it's pretty flexible for whatever role you need him to play. That, and I find it fun to write a blunt and no-nonsense person.

TheGreatBubbaJ: "Wonder if he'll develop a massive form like Enel could."

Bardothren: *whistles innocently while reading up on Fourth Gear*

Caspian123: "Is Izuku gonna develop Conqueror's Haki? Would be cool to see All for One exerting his presence in front of Izuku and co. And then Izuku to just stand there while everyone is cowed, because he's felt worse and starts to pour out the real Will of a King for all to bow down."

Bardothren: You just had to say it the chapter before I was going to introduce it, didn't you? Now I look unoriginal!

Naruto30: "Did the one piece manga exist in MHA world? If it does, can AFO recognise the DF?"

Bardothren: it would be an awfully big coincidence if it did. That, or Mei did time travel shenanigans.

That's it for comments. Assuming that I don't get the rona or keel over working twelve days straight, I'll be back Christmas Eve. In the meantime, enjoy.