- – —[#]— – -
"...Dreams can become reality." the young man smiled. "I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss it all, but as long as I can still inspire and encourage others, then I'd say this is still the tale of how we became great heroes."
"Just put my fries in the bag, man." Gintoki Sakata wasn't impressed.
"Oh! R-right..." Midoriya flushed red as he filled the striped paper bag with warm chips. "Here's your order!"
The air in Family Burger smelt of hot grease and cool sauces, mostly ketchup and relish. Izuku Midoriya was working his second job at the chain's local joint, to substantiate his income. Teachers didn't get paid very much after all, and he wanted to move out from his mom's apartment some day.
"There better be the right amount, you know." Gintoki narrowed his dead, scarlet eyes. "I'll be counting them."
"B-but what's the right number even supposed to be?" Midoriya squealed.
"That's for me to judge. The customer is always right, don't forget it!" Gintoki pointed a finger across the counter assertively. "I tuned out right from the start. Boku no Hero Academia... What kinda grown-ass man uses 'Boku' instead of 'Ore' anyway? What is this, Blue's Clues? Hell, why not 'Watashi' if you were feeling fancy enough? Like Aizen; 'Yosoko, Watashi no Hero Academia...' That'd be so much cooler-sounding..."
"Hey, that's such a nitpick! Nobody cares about weeb stuff like that!" Midoriya coped and seethed.
"—Also, what the hell was with that ending? You started off by saying—" he put on a high squeaky voice, "—By the way, I forgot to mention this is the story of how I became the greatest hero!" His voice lowered again. "–But you just ended it with 'we became great heroes'. What a let-down. Like some Assassination Classroom rip-off. You can't just backpedal the entire point of your story like that. Sure it was pretty generic all of the way through, but honestly I would've preferred a usual Hokage Pirate-King shounen ending to... "
Gintoki vaguely waved in his general direction. Fry-cook cap, apron and all.
"...Whatever the fuck this is. Are you sure it's not the story of how you became Employee of the Month?"
"T-this is just my side hustle! I'm a teacher too! And that's a great ending message!" the shorter man protested.
Gintoki put on the high-pitched voice again.
"'A-All Might-Sama? Whaaat? I'm going to lose my quirk, the only thing that made me RELEVANT and feel any level of HAPPINESS? I lost the rivalry to my lifelong bully, proving him right all along? And it's going to be all because of Shiggy-kun, who I have to save even though he tried to KILL ME, and he is going to DIE anyway, rendering the sacrifice of my quirk MEANINGLESS? Huh? Aaaand I will be forced to take up a dead-end job that will disconnect me from my ENTIRE circle of friends and I won't see them for a DECADE? And Ochako will drop me like a sack of potatoes to be RUN THROUGH by BAKUGO while I am grading papers and eating my convenience store meals alone every night? And she didn't even kiss me, before she killed the only other girl to ever love me? SUGOIIII! What can I say except YABBA DABBA DOO NTR PLUS ULTRAAAAAAA!'"
Ginoki coughed awkwardly. "Ah-hem. This is how you sound."
Midoriya's eyes were left clouded over, and it took him a little while to reset his fried brain. When he finally did, he didn't want to even process any of that, so he just continued like nothing had been said at all.
"...All-Might-Sama was a great man, but all of society shouldn't be built around just one guy!"
Gintoki shrugged, "Eras are shaped by a few great men," the Shoka Sonjuku came to mind, "You, as a Jump MC should know that. You know who shaped your era? Demon Slayer. That was rushed, sure, but Tanjiro didn't take up a dead-end job and get ghosted by all his friends he knew at least. Peaking in highschool... what a bitter blackpill..."
"Ah–um," his green eyes darted left and right, "Well, this is a mature and realistic ending to the story!" he threw his hands in the air.
"And 'mature and realistic' is good because...?"
"Uh..." Midoriya froze, then reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone hurriedly. "–Just watch this YouTube video essay! It explains why!"
"Sorry kid, not interested in groomers." Gintoki took his to-go order and turned away. He waved over his shoulder as he stepped out the automatic doors. "Try growing a spine, and maybe you'll get somewhere, someday. At least you're not Eren."
"...No tip?" Midoriya sighed and slumped, "Hah..."
Somebody tapped him on the shoulder.
"Huh?"
"Dekuck, I need you to work the drive-thru." Kobeni Higashiyama asked quietly. His ever-wary, nervous and sweaty co-worker. "My shift's ending, so..."
"My name isn't– nevermind..."
- – —[#]— – -
The first car that pulled up a long, black five-seater saloon. It looked expensive, and German.
The tinted windows rolled down, to see a face he really didn't want to see right now.
"—T-Tanjiro Kamado?"
"Huh?" the other man pointed at himself surprisedly. "You know who I am?"
"–Who is this guy?" the rear windows rolled down, revealing Edward Elric.
"You know him?" Allen Walker asked from the other back seat.
"Nope, not in the slightest." Tanjiro smiled, and a bead of sweat rolled down the side of Midoirya's face. "But I'm happy to meet you! What's your name?"
"Deku–" he answered on autopilot, "–no, wait–"
"Deku huh? Doesn't that mean useless?" Edward translated.
"Ah, that's just a nickname!"
"Nicknames? We just met, I don't think we're at that point, buddy..." the bald man, the driver he hadn't paid much attention to up until now faced him curiously. "I hope you're not the weird clingy gay stalker type..."
"Saitama!" Mumen Rider cried from the back-middle seat. "You can't just say that to someone's face! Even if he does have those creepy Spongebob-looking eyes!"
"Hm..." Allen assessed, "He does look slightly gay though..."
"Uh..." Deku— no, Izuku— was losing his thin composure, "what's the order?"
"I'll have two number 9s, a number 9 large, a number 6 with extra dip, a number 7, two number 45s, one with cheese, and a large soda."
"Alright Sir, will that be card or cash?" Midoriya noted.
"I'll pay, it's the least I could do since you're carrying my bicycle in the boot." Mumen Rider offered.
"Oh, it's no problem, I've got a lot of savings." Allen refused.
"I'll pay my own part too." Edward declined.
Wow... these people were all so kind and generous... wait, he thought that was supposed to be his defining character trait...?
"Gah, now I'll look greedy if I don't go along..." Saitama cursed. "Hero work pays enough, at least..."
"I love getting paid to save and rescue people!" Allen Walker agreed. "It's the best!"
"I couldn't imagine doing anything else, like being a public school teacher... ew." Mumen Rider nodded.
Tanjiro nodded. "Demon Slaying was a solid career, until I had to retire. I'm just a family man now."
"Eh, same thing happened to me. I lost my powers, but I ended up trading it for a sweet big house in the countryside, and a wife and kids. Worth it, in the end." Edward Elric reminisced.
"You had powers?" Mumen Rider cocked his head. "I never needed any. I can't imagine letting something as minor as not having superpowers stop me from being a hero!"
"Yeah," Saitama approved, "That'd be pathetic, haha."
"Y-yep..." Midoriya grimaced.
"So we'll just split the bill, please?" Tanjiro requested.
"O-of course sir... have a Plus Ultra day! Come again..." he watched numbly as they drove off.
It wasn't lost on Midoriya that everyone in that car was like him... or was who he wanted to be... but better...
- – —[#]— – -
His last shift was waiting tables. The absolute worst one of all. Because that meant...
"Order up! Family Burger tastes best with family!" he struck a pose. "Tomato!" he made a fist. "Lettuce!" he waved his hands over his head. "Cheese!" he made a peace sign with his fingers. "Buns!" he clapped his hands. "And the star of the show, a kickin' beef..." he punched the air, "–patty!"
He pulled the giant squishy burger-mascot mask-helmet thing from his head, and fell into one last pose with a strained smile towards the full booth-seat. "I Am Here, to take your order sir!"
"Bwahahahahahaha!" Joseph Joestar laughed and pointed loudly. "I can't believe it! He seriously did it! Good thing I lied it was my birthday!"
"Y-you lied!?" Midoriya's eyes watered. Joseph's eyes were wet too, but for the opposite reason.
"I think I've lost my appetite..." Ichigo Kurosaki winced with second-hand embarassment.
"Speak for yourself. Hey pal, I'm sure you practiced that real hard, but can we just get our food already?" Son Goku frowned.
"If he had to practice that, then he needs to use his time better." Kenshiro advised. "I hope not all of the new generation are like this..."
"Hmph, well I like Denji at least." Yami Yugi weighed in. "Besides, it's not as if we didn't have Shinji Ikari back in the day."
"Wait, isn't he supposed to be from a superhero type series?" Ichigo reasoned, "Can't they fix him?"
"F-fix me?" Midoriya was left frazzled.
"That's a bad idea, trust me." Goku's voice turned grim. "Western comics... aren't in the best spot right now. I saw the state of their industry myself last time I fought Superman."
"Yep." Joseph crossed his arms behind his head. "Send him there, and he'll really get cucked. Or worse..."
"You mean like Spiderman?" Yugi guessed.
"Yes, like Spiderman." Joseph crinkled his nose.
"Listen, kid!" Kenshiro pointed at him.
"Kid? I'm twenty-four!"
"But have you earned the title of man yet?" Kenshiro judged. "We are only some of the 『SHOUNEN CHADS』 who are disappointed with your lacklustre spell as a lead character. Where is your machismo, your hot-blooded masculine spirit?"
"T-that sounds toxic-coded and unwholesome!" Midoriya shuddered.
"I see... so you are a lost cause then." Kenshiro shed a manly tear at the sorry sight before him.
"Hm... If you were given a chance to fight again, would you just quit your job on the spot and go back to being a hero?" Yugi asked.
"Ye–No, of course I wouldn't!" he lied, "I don't hate my job, otherwise I wouldn't have wasted– I mean spent– eight years doing it! I definitely, absolutely love teaching! I'm not lonely at all!"
"Who said anything about being lonely?" Ichigo pointed out. "And did you even want to be one? I swear you got your job through nepotism, or something. Ask Naruto about it; he knows a lot about nepotism. And weird gay obsessive stalking, for that matter."
"Ask him about what–?" he choked, "No way! –And nobody returns my calls anyway..." Midoriya admitted.
"...That's rough, buddy." Ichigo shook his head. "Isn't UA supposed to only hire experienced professional heroes? You're not really... qualified. How do your classes even work?"
"My students might not be the most well-behaved bunch, but they're good kids!"
"Of course they don't respect you. You're a nobody civilian telling them how to be heroes. I swear, this is like the bad end of the Fullbring arc, or something."
"I'm not a nobody! One kid recognised me in the street when he tripped near the massive statue of All-Might-and-a-bunch-of-random-people-who-aren't-me yesterday! He was surprised I even exist, sure, but that counts for something, doesn't it?"
"Right..." Ichigo nodded slowly.
Right about then, the automatic doors at the front slid open. The caped man approached the table with a casual wave.
"Hey guys, sorry I'm late." Kamina drifted in. He stopped, and assessed the shorter green-haired man before him, his red sunglasses masking his expression. "Is this the guy? Grit your teeth, booger-head."
"Grit my teeth? Wh— aiiieeee!"
Kamina decked Midoriya right across the face, knocking his head sideways and sending him flailing into the table.
"Owww-w!" He rubbed his cheek, tears welling up in the corners of his eyes, "Help! A nutjob psycho showed up! Someone call the police!" he cried.
"Huh?" Kamina sounded baffled, "That should've worked! It did the job for Simon..."
"Goddamn." Kenshiro shook his head at the trembling waiter. "Are you kidding me? You're supposed to be the one who arrests people."
"He's right!" Kamina declared, "Without powers, who the hell do you think you are?"
"I–I don't know..."
"Listen." Goku spoke up. "Power comes in response to a need, not a desire. You have to create that need."
"S-so what should that need be?" Midoriya asked, lost.
"Why don't you tell us, why did you want to be a superhero, eh?" Joseph leaned an elbow on the table.
"I thought All-Might was really cool and wanted to be just like him!" Midoriya proclaimed.
"So it was celebrity-worship? That is one lame-ass origin." Ichigo jabbed.
"Okay... and when did you decide that?" Yugi asked him.
"I saw one YouTube video when I was four!" he said proudly.
They all stared at him blankly.
"Your next line will be 'Y.O.D.A.' " Joseph pointed right at him.
"Yoda?" Midoriya repeated hesitantly. Wow, he'd walked right into it.
"You are One Dumb-Ass niggarundayo." he pointed at him. "And a terrible waiter too. We still haven't gotten our order."
- – —[#]— – -
"You're late, kid!" the elderly All-Might declared. "I've got a surprise gift for you!"
Midoriya quit his job of eight years on the spot.
- – —[#]— – -
He was walking down the street, looking to meet Bakugo and the others for the first time in eight years. Sure, he hadn't been invited, but he could turn up anyway, right?
As he passed an alleyway, the super-suitcase in hand, he heard a voice call out to him.
"Psst. Hey bitch. Over here."
His head whipped round, finding three figures leaning up against the bare brick walls of the dark alley. Against his better judgement, he approached, slowly.
"W-who's there?"
The tallest one blew out a wispy puff from a cigarette, before screwing the butt into a wall to put it out. He let it fall from his fingers, and stepped out into the light.
"You're Deku, aren't you?" Spike Spiegel looked pissed off.
"He's gotta be. The freckles, the sweat all over him, the retarded way his face has a snout-thing going on from the side." Yusuke Urameshi chimed in.
"I-I don't have a snout! It's just an art style thing!" Midoriya exclaimed, "What do you even want with me!?"
The third figure emerged from the shadows. "It's simple." Gon Freecss told him happily. "You're cringe!"
"...Excuse me?" Midoriya muttered.
"No, you're not excused." Spike grit. "You've replaced us green-haired main characters in the public eye. Whenever someone thinks of or looks up anything to do with green anime characters, you're the first result, not any of us. And we aren't gonna allow that anymore."
"What the heck!? Is this a mugging?" Midoriya yelped. "No, you can't do this, I'm a heckin' wholesome chungus cinnamon roll!"
He reached down for his suitcase, undoing the clasps and opening it with panicked haste. To his dismay, he found it was something he'd have to put on, and he wasn't about to strip down to his underwear to change in a hostile alleyway.
"Hup!" Gon knocked the super suitcase from his hands with a sliding kick. It smeared along a pile of dog poop as it skidded down the alley.
Yusuke smirked as he stepped into action, "Let's school this teacher!"
"Hero to ZERO!"
Spike rocked him with a straight cross.
"ONE parent household!"
Gon kicked him in the shin.
"TWO balls that didn't drop!"
Yusuke fried him with a Spirit Gun.
"THREE years old to find out he's quirkless!"
Spike elbowed him.
"FOUR holes taken by the Sludge Villain!"
Gon uppercutted his jaw.
"FIVE seconds to loot that rare poster!"
Yusuke stomped on his foot.
"SIX girls in 1-A, ONE for ALL, but NONE for him!"
Spike slapped him.
"SEVEN quirks!"
Gon pulled his trousers down.
"EIGHT years later!"
Yusuke maced him with pepper spray.
"NINE wielders just to fall flat!"
Spike spat on his own hand then shook Izuku's firmly.
"TENko murdered, not saved!"
Gon push-kicked him into the wall.
"ELEVEN months cleaning a beach for free!"
Yusuke ran up the brick wall, then leapt off it to twist into a spinning jump-kick.
"TWELVE thousand annoying shippers, all cucked and gay!"
Spike held out his arms as Midoriya fell forwards, only to pull his arms back at the last moment and whistle innocently.
"THIRTEEN sucks everything but him!"
Gon dabbed on him whilst he was on the floor.
"FOURTEEN months of peaking in high school!"
Yusuke helped him get to his feet, brushed him off, and then stepped back and laughed as Midoriya tripped, realising his shoelaces were tied together.
"FIFTEEN broken fingers!"
Spike stepped on a whoopee cushion and blamed the sound on him.
"SIXTEEN months old when daddy left!"
Gon taped a 'kick me' sign to his back.
"SEVENTEEN stories off the school rooftop!"
Yusuke kicked him in the back.
"EIGHTTEEN years living up to your useless nickname!"
Spike ordered a dozen pizzas to his home address.
"NINETEEN classmates who never visit!"
Gon edited his power scaling article to 'sub-wall level' on the VS Battles wiki.
"TWENTY solstices with this shit series wasting pages in Jump!"
Yusuke gargled some White Monster Energy from a can and spat it all over him.
"That's a lesson he won't forget!" Spike grinned as he turned and walked away. He stopped, and peered over his shoulder one last time. "Oh, we didn't even mention your fanbase... bleh. Let's not even get started on that shitshow."
The Swordfish descended from the sky, landing in the middle of the street, and Spike climbed in before flying off.
Yusuke gave him a dirty look before stalking off, his hands in his baggy pockets as he strutted like a banchō. "Don't let me catch you again, you hear me? You'd better not get a sequel. And your fans better not infect anything else."
Midoriya struggled to his feet, patting the dirt from his cheap suit. He looked around, but Gon was already... gone? Gah...
"One for All, All for What?" he groaned, "I wish I was a Marvel character..."
Meanwhile, in Hell...
Tomura Shigaraki was playing League of Legends on a laptop. It was quite popular down in hell, go figure. But then...
A gold-wrapped open-top Rolls-Royce limousuine pulled up next to the spiked bone-bench he was sitting on, and sprayed the puddle of blood over him as it ploughed right through it.
"Ack! Hey! I'll kill you again for this!"
"You'll do what now?" DIO Brando asked him simply.
"Uh– nothing!" he scrambled to his feet.
"Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho!" Lord Frieza laughed in a back seat. He took a sip from his glass of red wine. "What a feisty little ant!"
"Hold the brakes, DIO..." Toguro leaned over, glancing at the laptop screen through his shades.
"Oh my..." Sōsuke Aizen frowned at the putrid sight. "How unsettling."
"Playing League of Legends in public?" Vicious's eyes narrowed. The black-feathered alien bird on his shoulder squawked harshly. "Even for Hell, that's shameless. We can't allow that now, can we?"
"Well, there's a simple way to fix that..." Madara Uchiha's Rinnegan throbbed.
"Let's go boys!" Blackbeard cackled as he opened the gold-chromed car door. "Zehahahaha!"
Once Shigaraki was beaten to a bloody pulp, and the gang had climbed back into their ride and driven off, another man arrived on the scene. Takasugi Shinsuke took a seat on the bench made out of bones nearby.
"What an ending this is."
"...The hell–" Shigaraki spat out a wad of blood, "–do you want?"
"Look on the bright side. It could be worse, after all." Takasugi suggested.
"How the fuck could this be any worse?" Shigaraki snapped.
"You could be from Attack on Titan." Takasugi shrugged.
Shigaraki paused. "Shit, you're right. At least I'm not Eren '10 years at least' Yeager."
Author's notes:
Yes, the Family Burger place is from Chainsaw Man. The whole burger dance thing is straight from that PEAK chapter 85.
I'm smoking that MHA pack tonight. I've mentioned before, I really don't care for the series, but it makes for hilarious shitposting material. My friends told me it was the best thing ever back in like 2018 and even then after watching up to the Yakuza arc I was like "wtf are you on about?" Now that the final arc was apparently a shitshow I can firmly award it the title of MID Hero ACKademia, with one of the worst MCs I've ever witnessed. Only isekai slop MCs and literal cuckholds like Kazuya from Rent-A-Girlfriend surpass MIDoriya SHITzuku.
Vigilantes is genuinely a far far better manga, and actually feels like a superhero story, (and not a thinly-disguised magic battle school thing), with a wayyy better MC. The fact that Deku quit teaching as soon as he got the suit shows he didn't want to be a teacher really, he wanted to be a hero all along. But the fact that he didn't EVEN TRY to be a hero without a quirk for 8 YEARS even with all the support he could get now shows he's fundamentally the same pathetic guy he was in chapter 1, and that's not a good guy to be. Meanwhile multiple characters either have quirks that aren't physical/super situational, or in the spinoff Vigilantes you have Knuckleduster who is legit a quirkless vigilante hero, proving he could 100% have at least TRIED to become a hero without a quirk. Instead he gives up on being a hero, even in a much safer world, until a solution is literally handed to him. Plus his general wimpy attitude just puts me off. Tanjiro is how you write a kind MC, (kind=/=nice), a mature protag written by a woman to be the ideal brother/son, whilst Deku is just a pleb "omg he's so wholesome" soyboy.
And that's just me complaining about the MC, let alone anything else in the series. Mineta is the best character in Class 1-A btw, at least he has a personality, and bizarrely enough he's like some sort of twisted reflection of the fucked-up perverted Tumblr-Tiktok fanbase this thing has, that's why it's so funny to see the constant seething at him lol. I will admit that Horikoshi's art is great though. I might actually one day write a "non-shitpost" MHA story, but the comedic twist would be that he clicks on a 'quirkless blackpill' video as a child instead of the All-Might one, and everything spirals from there.
Also, if anyone is ticked off by this shitpost, then GOOD, cope & sneed *dabs*