Quick apologizes for not updating last month, I was excited to update the new costumes I made for our six third-years on the two year anniversary of this fic :(
But problems at work that had me covering a lot of shifts stuck me in square in the writer's block corner.
I got it back for now and fingers crossed it won't leave again.
Thank you all for waiting so patiently.
Tamaki had expected the last of their quirks, Youchi's quirk, to be accessible tonight.
Which he and Nejire had been confused by at first since didn't them having Blackwhip and the others show that they had Youchi's quirk?
Apparently, according to Deku-Sensei, not quite.
They were able to access most of the hoard yes, but that did not mean Youchi's quirk was fully settled inside them, and that the quirk fully settling would mean that they would be able to pass on Inheritance.
So, Tamaki was expecting the glowing on his and Nejire's person.
Being able to enter the main space and meeting the rest of the past holders was not what he planned or prepared himself for, but he had Nejire with him and knew Nana-San, Yagi-San, and En-San fairly well so he had been willing to try going to the main space.
And he'd been hit by the very disordering wave of emotions and memories that were not his own.
Then been dragged to his and Nejire's throne to meet the other holders properly.
Something that was already making his skin crawl somewhat as he looked around at the many human faces looking back at him, he'd been very glad that Nejire was with him and was more than willing to hold his hand to calm his nerves.
That all being said, Tamaki was not expecting for Nana-San to declare himself and Nejire as her grandchildren.
Though he wasn't able to fully process the sudden 'adoption' via Inheritance as Nejire had immediately jumped onto the train of thought and was hugging him tightly and calling him her baby brother.
He was very flustered by the whole thing, and he struggled to arrange his thoughts about it.
Because he already had a dad, Tamaki hadn't met his papa before he passed but his mama had told him plenty of stories about him so that he'd know his papa.
He didn't need another dad.
Not that there was anything wrong with Yagi-San, Tamaki was sure that Yagi-San would probably be a nice dad for someone, but he didn't want Yagi-San to try and be his dad.
His papa's urn and his spot in the shrine his mama had set up immediately came to mind.
The pale blue urn decorated with hand painted lily pads and koi fish, his small purple handprint clumsily added after his mama gave him permission to add some paint to it too.
The memory coming to him much like the random ones that forced themselves in his head when they left his and Nejire's ocean.
(He sat with his mama, letting her clean the hand he dipped in the paint his mama gave him, beaming as he looked at the purple glossy paint drying on his papa's home, his mama taking his head in both of her hands and kissed his head looking at him so proudly.)
(Feeling confused why she looked sad too.)
(Hadn't he made papa's home prettier?)
Nejire's arms loosened, clearly taken aback but then she hugged him even tighter.
"Oh Jiki... " Nejire said her voice sounding conflicted, Tamaki looked at her confused for the sudden change in her demeanor.
"Amajiki, as Deku-Sensei mentioned memory is more fluid here, and that means we can see your memories with you when you think of them." En-San informed him.
Tamaki's ears folded back and he buried his face in Nejire's offered shoulder, his face burning with shame.
Nejire's hand coming up to rub his back in firm circles.
Tamaki jumped when he felt someone placed a hand on his other shoulder and whipped his head around to see Nana-San.
"I'm sorry Jiki-Kun," Nana-San told him as she crouched down and wrapped him and Nejire into a hug.
"I would never force you to replace your dad with Toshi," Nana swore "If you don't want him to be your dad then he can just be your uncle instead." Nana promised pulling back slightly.
Tamaki, still feeling his skin crawling with unease merely looked away from her and pressed the side of his face against Nejire's shoulder.
Not feeling confident to answer her like this, especially not since she had a human appearance right now.
The massive sea horse with eldritch elements wasn't un-alarming, especially with her large seven black eyes staring back at them.
But that was somehow still less threatening in his mind somehow when compared to speaking with her as a human.
He also did not miss the wince that crossed Nana's face before she moved away to give him more space.
"You don't need to answer now Jiki-Kun, we can talk about this more another time back in your and Nejire-Chan's space, okay?" Nana-San told him.
Tamaki meekly nodded, resisting the urge to bury his head again as he realized his thoughts most have spilled over, much like the memory.
Nejire's arm was quick to wrap around his shoulders and stay there protectively, her concern tinged the air but was smothered by protectiveness, the smell of the exact emotions coming to him after a little recall from when he used animals to transform.
"It's alright Amajiki, with time you and Nejire will be able to shield your thoughts and keep them from slipping out of your minds." the man with the green cape said.
"Yeah, if Yagi could figure it out, you brats will get your heads screwed on the right way sooner rather than later." the bald man with goggles teasingly agreed, jabbing his thumb over towards Yagi-San.
Yagi-San for his part choked on some kind of affronted noise that Tamaki wasn't even sure he'd be able to make out even if he had his head on straight and wasn't emotional right now.
He did feel bad for Yagi-San though, he had been in the same position of making incomprehensible sounds before and it was not fun on your vocal cords.
"Now, now Banjo. Toshi isn't that bad, it just took him some time to readjust to keeping his mind separate after coming to the main space, we all did." Nana told the goggled man, waving her hand dismissively.
"Yeah, don't be so mean to Chi-Chi!" Nejire said pouting and crossing her arms.
Unfortunately, Nejire calling him that made Yagi choke up blood like he usually did when he was shocked.
En-San patting him on the back to help him get it all out.
"Wow, Chi-Chi does that here too." Nejire commented.
"That's because Eighth's been doing it for so long it's muscle memory by now." the blonde man sitting on the red throne commented, his arms crossed.
"Bruce is correct, if you're used to your body doing something, or think of a scar as part of yourself then your mind will manifest them as a part of your appearance even if you didn't have it for most of your life." Youchi confirmed with a nod.
Nejire's eyes went over to Yagi "Huh? But then why doesn't Chi-Chi look more like a skeleton?" Nejire questioned confused as she pointed over to the healthier looking man.
"Because he doesn't associate it with himself in a defining way, like hair dye it washes away here for the image of himself he has in mind." En-San explained.
"Or if the scar has a negative context in your mind, it will purposely not be manifested as a way to protect your psyche." En-San added a second later.
Tamaki supposed there was some logic to that, this place was supposed to have a mental representation of themselves, and most people would subconsciously remove the parts they don't like about themselves.
"You can just tell them Eighth's being vain you, numbskulls." The angry looking man on the blood-stained throne waspishly commented.
"Now before you idiots continue to blabber on with your Adams family bull, I'm the Second holder and this fucker next to me is the third, Bruce." the angry man told them, introducing himself and the man next to him.
"Second's right," Bruce glaring at Nana when she puffed up indignantly "We don't know if we'll be able to speak with them when they're awake yet and need to introduce ourselves." Bruce scolded, causing Nana just huffed back at them before sitting down in her throne.
"Thank you for bringing us back on track Second, Bruce." Youchi told the two, dragging his hand down his face, then he motioned towards the man with the green cape.
"I'm Hikage, the fourth and the person you got Danger Sense from." Hikage said as prompted before jabbing his thumb at the large, goggled man in the throne next to him.
"This is Banjo, the fifth unfortunately, his only contribution is his quirk Blackwhip." Hikage stated.
"Yeah, yeah fuck you too you string bean." Banjo grumbled glared at his predecessor.
"I'm En, and I'm glad you both have been able to use my quirk Smokescreen so creatively in your training." En-San informed them, reintroduced himself waving his hand.
Tamaki really wished he could have En-San's coat right now so that he could bury his face in the neck like En-San could in any moment.
"And that should be it for introductions, we can talk on other matters." Youchi said, turning to them.
"Specifically, about how your training is going with the Strength part of the hoard." Youchi elaborated, making Tamaki to hunch in on himself.
Nejire and he hadn't been using that part of Inheritance much admittedly, both of them needing to get ahold of the more noticeable quirks like Smokescreen then practicing with the part when used wrong could harm them badly.
"Do not take this as criticism. We understand that you both needed to focus on the other quirks, but not using the strength part of our hoard could be very damaging to both of you if we leave it unpracticed for too long," En-San assured them.
Looking down to the hand he had broken and bit his lip, because En-San was right that they couldn't just not practice, not if they wanted to avoid breaking more bones.
Well, if he wanted to avoid breaking more bones. Nejire, however, basically had the management of the strength quirk even if she hadn't used it much with trying to get the other quirks under control.
"Unfortunately, Yagi won't be able to help you with training your bodies himself." Youchi informed them, Yagi shamefully ducking his head but nodding in agreement.
"Why not? He's learned to use it too, right?" Nejire asked confused.
"Not quite Ninth," Bruce said with his arms crossed "Can't be sure of the exact reason but Eighth's body instinctively knew to spread it all out even without Eighth thinking about spreading it." Bruce explained.
"Our leading theory so far is that Yagi's muscles are structured differently compared to our quirked muscles." Youchi commented though he stopped once Second gave him a look.
"Regardless, Eighth can't help you with adapting since he didn't need to. Depending on whether you both can hear us when you wake up, Fourth will either help guide you directly, or indirectly through Yagi until you both can use ten percent continuously." Bruce continued to inform them.
Tamaki stiffly nodded rubbing his arm to slightly distract himself.
He had known that there was going to be multiple people in his head, he knew that before he took Inheritance since that was one of the questions they had asked.
But he hadn't expected his quirk to cause them to be in his head so soon.
Tamaki couldn't stop himself from whimpering at the thought.
Nejire unconsciously took his hand barely acknowledging the sound in the back of her mind, Tamaki could see she was wrapped in the idea judging from her face and contemplative hum.
"Okay, but that brings to mind a new question I've got." Nejire told the others.
"Do you think that Jiki, Chi-Chi and I will be able to mentally communicate with each other no matter where we are?" Nejire inquired.
Tamaki found himself taken aback by the thought, it hadn't come to mind before, but he could easily follow Nejire's logic.
If they and Yagi both had access to the mind space while awake, then couldn't they speak to each other in the same way that the past holders could speak with Yagi?
It might not be perfect, like they couldn't share everything, or speak directly with each other mentally but couldn't one of the past users relay their conversation with the other two living holders?
"I... believe that could be possible." Youchi answered after a moment, sounding stunned by the idea himself "We would have to wait until you both can hear us while awake to test its limits, but it should be entirely doable." Youchi said leaning forward slightly as he began to mutter to himself.
"If it is we'll need to help all three of you to develop better mental barriers, I can't speak for everyone but I'm sure no one wants everyone else to see the ninths 'private' time, especially if they find someone in the future." Banjo brought up.
Tamaki's face felt like it was on fire and he threw his arms over his face to hide away from the rest of the people in the space.
"Banjo!" Nana scoldingly hissed.
"Hey someone had to say it! We got lucky with Yagi not being into that stuff but considering whatever is going on with that Taffy kid we're not going to avoid the awkward teen romance crap this time." Banjo defended and Tamaki was tempted to jump in the water to escape the rest of them.
"... I hate that you have a point." Hikage said sounding exasperated.
Could someone please wake him up now?
The last thing he wanted to think about was eight adults in his mind seeing him do...thatif he settled down with someone someday.
"It won't just be about that though, if their connection is on the stronger side Yagi would have to disconnect himself to prevent them from seeing or feeling his death, especially if he dies to Aoi like most of us did." Youchi pointed out coming back around from his muttering.
"Or block his chronic pain from their fight years ago." En-San added.
Tamaki's stomach twisted again at the idea as Bruce scoffed.
"Oh, they'd both be fucked if they did share that, god, could you imagine what would happen if we didn't force Eighth to start working part-time?" Bruce asked.
"Wait Chi-Chi's still an active hero?" Nejire questioned, surprised, as was Tamaki since he would have thought that Yagi had retired from heroics with his current state.
However, before anyone could have thought to answer Nejire gasped loudly.
"Chi-Chi are you All Might!?" Nejire shouted in disbelief.
Izuku already up for the day and sitting in the private office with Riya and Mido discussing things.
Izuku's phone ringing.
Izuku *answers: Deku-Sensei sp-
Nejire having just woken up: DID YOU KNOW CHI-CHI WAS ALL MIGHT!?
Izuku:...
Mido:...
Riya *whispers:... Does she mean Yagi?
Mido*whispers: Since when did Yagi adopt Hado?
Izuku, after bluescreening: Nejire-Chan by Chi-Chi do you mean Yagi-San?
Nejire*loud noise of frustration*
Nejire: You did know! Deku-Sensei how could you not tell your cousins about my Chi-Chi being All Might?
Nejire *hangs ups on Izuku*
Everybody:...
Riya, Mido, Izuku *collectively: The Fuck?