Chapter 1: Enter the Gate, Soldiers
If anyone ever saw Momo Yaoyorozu walking down the street, they would assume that she was just like them: An ordinary, twenty-six-year-old woman.
However, that's just what she wanted everyone to think. She never wanted to be known by everyone as the heiress of the Yaoyorozu conglomerate, and a modern-day zaibatsu. She made sure that she would make a mark during her adult life, and not simply get by on her parent's name. And she would say that, so far, she has done pretty well.
It was an ordinary Saturday morning within the Musutafu city of Shizuoka prefecture, in Japan. Thirty minutes 'till noon, but since it was early summer, the sun wasn't killing everyone just yet. Plus, with the clouds in the sky, most would consider this the perfect day.
Everyone was shopping within Tatooin Station, with small children hugging their happy parents, and the occasional news network interviewing people on the streets. All in all, a perfectly average day in the 21st century.
Momo herself was smiling at the nice day, too. She was wearing civilian clothes on this fine morning, and was currently waiting for the train to drop her off at Tatooin Station, where she would be shopping the rest of her free Saturday.
Closing her mind, she sighed in bliss, happy that her life was going just as planned. Her parents had prepared her for everything that could possibly happen in life. Languages, economics, mathematics, the sciences, even athletics, all of this had been done to ready her, and in her line of work, it was an excellent advantage. She had climbed the ranks ever since she was eighteen, and while many would consider her a workaholic, she was looking forward to relaxing.
"Now arriving at Musutafu."
A small smile reached her lips. "Perfect," she said to herself, as she walked out of the open doors of the train, and out of the station. "First stop, the boutiques."
"Kota, wait up!" his father yelled. "Your mom said not to wander off too far!"
Kota wasn't listening to his old man. He was too busy staring to the far end of the street, his eyes wondering if they were playing tricks on him, or if the heat was getting to him.
The light in front of him began to take shape, and slowly, but surely, something was appearing right in front of the teenager. Something big.
Within the inner workings of Momo's mind, she was going a hundred miles an hour. First, I think I'll get something with a frilly top. Then, I'll get a leather skirt with a built-in belt. And then, some knee-high boots, and a white dress shirt, and a dress that goes all the way to my knees, and –
WHAM!
"Ow!" she yelped, as she tumbled down, and fell on her back. As she groaned in pain, her vision blurred as she saw that she had accidentally ran into a stop sign.
"Are you okay?"
Looking towards the sound of the voice, Momo saw… a man about her age, with sharp, and obviously dyed, red hair, a small scar over his right eye. Not only that, but he was wearing the all-green outfit of the JSDF, which would explain why he also had a sidearm.
Standing up, she smiled. "Yes, thank you… Kirishima?"
"Hm?" the redhead hummed, before remembering, "Oh, yeah, the name tag, right. Sorry, I kinda forget that we have 'em right over our hearts. But yeah, Corporal Kirishima, reporting for duty! Me and a couple of other guys are just patrolling the town today for an exercise."
"Well, that would explain the uniform," Momo said, as she gave the officer a salute before walking off. "Make us proud, soldier!"
"Will do!"
"Whoa…"
"What is that?"
"A movie prop?"
Civilians everywhere looked at the large building that seemingly appeared out of thin air in the span of minutes. It was a few stories tall, made of white marble, and it was in the shape of the Parthenon in Greece. A large blue crystal at the top of it, with three others on each side, holding the columns in place. Its entrance was dark, no one could see what was inside.
"Whoa…" Kota uttered, as he was amazed by what he saw, just like everyone else.
"Kota!" his mother yelled out, as she finally found him and his father in the crowd. "Don't run off like that again, you two! What are you even… looking… at…?"
Even his mother was entranced by what she was looking at.
Then, something flew out.
"I wonder if I can get myself a kimono…" Momo wondered to herself, as she kept walking down the shopping district of the little town, focusing on her own little world.
Well, that was until she noticed a shadow dash over her.
"Huh?" She looked up. "Did something just…?"
The locals of Musutafu still looked in awe and wonder as they saw more figures exit the gate. Some of them looked human, albeit riding unrecognizable mounts and dressed in armor, but some others stood ten feet tall, had horns, and didn't look remotely human.
One of the armored men blew into a horn, and then all went to hell.
"BWAAAA!"
The armored humans pulled out spears and began to charge, while those on top of reptiles took to the skies and dive-bombed back into the crowds of people. The inhuman creatures screamed, and pulled out their swords and clubs, and advanced.
As the Japanese civilians fled, the armored men pulled out their bows and drew out their arrows, pulled back, aimed up to an angle, and fired.
And Eijiro Kirishima just happened to walk into all of this chaos.
Momo Yaoyorozou could not believe what she was seeing.
Over her head, and the heads of many other people, there was now some sort of flying reptile, which could best be described as a pterodactyl with the head and neck of a cobra, the wings of a bat, and the tip end of a scorpion, diving down to grab its prey.
Its prey being the Japanese civilians she swore to protect.
As many other people ran past her, Momo broke into a sweat, trying to deny what she was seeing. "This is impossible…" she whispered to herself, but soon enough, she snapped back to reality and proceeded to run the opposite direction of everyone else.
As she watched several… monsters… destroy the shops all around her, she weaved and dodged around them, occasionally shouting, "Out of the way!"
"Damn… if this doesn't stop… people will die!"
Running, she noticed a guy cowering in terror, as she ran towards him, and yelled, "Get up! It's dangerous here! You have to run!" When he didn't respond, she shouted, "HEY!"
Looking up, the man, clearly panicking, asked, "Who are you?"
"I'm –"
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
Before she could answer, she looked towards the sound of gunfire, and saw a familiar mess of red hair firing towards the dragon-like creatures and their riders in the sky.
Kirishima!
Momo watched as the young soldier managed to ground one of the armored riders, and relax. That was a mistake, as the soldier suddenly got up, and ran towards him, pulling a dagger out from his back, and ready to stab the redhead, who was fresh out of bullets.
"AAARRRGH–"
Before the warrior could sink his blade into Kirishima, Momo had already blocked him, grabbed him by the neck, and proceeded to tackle him to the pavement, holding him down, and restraining the man with a neckhold.
The soldier struggled, trying to grab the black-haired woman's face. Momo was clearly struggling to hold him in place, when she noticed the man's dagger. Slowly grabbing it, she lifted it towards the man's neck, and plunged it into his throat, staging her dress.
SPLURT!
As the man stopped moving, Momo turned back to Kirishima, and asked, "Are you all right?"
The young man quickly snapped out of it and nodded in confirmation.
"I need you to contact your superiors and tell them what's going on! I'll focus on evacuation and trying to get the police force here! We need to stop this from becoming a bloodbath!"
"R-right!"
Elsewhere, a squadron of armored police trucks rushed down the streets, and stopped. Getting out we're officers with riot gear and helmets, each officer armed and ready.
"Tatooin Station has been largely occupied, but we'll defend this city to the death!" the leader of the Special Assault Team, Iawo Oguro, yelled to his subordinates. "Reinforcements are coming soon, so we just need to hold them off for the time being!"
"Where's the main force?" Koichi Haimawari, his second-in-command, asked.
"They're coming now."
"REEHEHE!" the horned horse neighed, as its rider, an armored man examined the structures around him. The bandage wrappings around his head made his expression hard to read.
"Structurae lateris et marmorei sunt hic," the general said.
"Domine?" one of his subordinates asked.
"Im 'solvitur videre aliquid nota," the general, Kido, responded, as he kept marveling at the buildings all around him. "Non turbat? Non miraris ubi nos ipsi invenimus?"
"HERE THEY COME!" Oguro yelled, as his men held up their shields and rifles.
"HURHHHG…" Several inhuman monsters appeared out of the smoke and fires, all of them with their weapons raised up high, as they charged towards the armored police.
BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!
For the next few minutes, the police did everything in their power to stop the opposing force from getting any closer. Bullets kept flying out, and the end didn't seem in sight.
"When are the reinforcements coming?!" Haimawari yelled, already sick of the monsters.
"THEY'RE HERE!" a new voice responded. Turning around, they saw a redhead in a familiar green uniform waving at them. "The Ground Self-Defense Force has sent choppers!"
FWOOSH!
And as he said it, above them, a familiar-looking Boeing AH-64 Apache chopper flew right over them, and made contact with one of the flying monsters.
"SKREE!"
BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!
Within seconds, the wyvern was riddled with holes, and it proceeded to crash down.
As the armored soldiers gasped in horror, several Komatsu LAVs pulled up, all of them filled with soldiers, coming pouring out, as the mounted weapons and their rifles began to fire.
BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!
Within seconds, the monsters fell, and the armored humans learned that their shields were worthless against these sorts of projectiles, as they too fell, albeit a few seconds slower.
"The enemy's formation is broken!" one of the higher-ranking soldiers, a guy with curly brown hair shaped in an afro yelled, as he looked over to Kirishima. "It was smart of you to call us."
"Yeah, well, communications IS my specialty," he acknowledged.
"Indeed," he hummed, as he handed him a rifle. "Alright, the rest of us are going to advance and take back the area, I want you to help us find your missing teammates. Oh, and while we're at it, exterminate all of these monsters, with extreme prejudice! Let's send them back to Hell!"
"Yes, sir!"
Momo had long since left Kirishima, and as she promised, she focused on evacuation. She finally finished explaining what had happened to the local Musutafu police, and was now let go. As she looked over the sea of civilians who had fled, she saw something.
A teenage kid, by himself, on the verge of crying.
Walking towards them, she kneeled down, and gave them the friendliest smile. "What's wrong?" she asked, extending her hand. "You can't find your mom and dad?"
The young boy, she guessed fifteen, slowly nodded.
Standing up, Momo smiled, "Alright, then let's go find them. What's your name?"
"Uh…" the teen spoke up. "My name is Kota. Kota Izumi."
Holding his hand, Momo smiled. "It's nice to meet you."
I wish it was under better circumstances…
BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!
The sounds of gunfire could be heard as the Japanese Self-Defense Force mowed down hordes and hordes of creatures, both big and small, as they tried to reclaim the town.
Eijiro Kirishima was not one of them.
During a particularly nasty encounter with a big red monster wielding dual-clubs, he got separated from the rest of the group, and was now by himself in the middle of the street, with a very limited supply of ammunition.
Stupid idiot, he cursed himself. Can't even get one damn thing right –
He immediately stopped his self-deprecating thoughts, as he looked up and saw something big. Tall, made of white marble, and adjourned with blue crystals on all sides.
This must be what's causing all of these problems…
"RAWWWRR!"
"Huh –?! AHHHH! OH, MY GOD!" Turning around, Eijiro scrambled and screamed, as she saw three more of those giant monsters appear from behind them. On instinct, he immediately pulled up his borrowed weapon, and pulled the trigger.
BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!
All three of the giants fell immediately, but before Eijiro could relax, he heard a scuffle from behind him, and in a wild panic, fired without looking.
BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA–
Stopping and gathering his bearings, he saw a fourth one, which had fallen onto its back when he wildly fired bullets into the pavement in front of it. This one was smaller than the other ones, around his height, but with a tail, and it appeared to be better dressed than the other ones.
The creature quickly tried to pull back, as it clawed onto the pavement behind it to get away from the redhead, but all Eijiro saw was the red mask with horns it was adroning, and the spear it was holding in its arm. He approached it, aiming his gun, and ready to fire, when –
"Misericordia! MISERICORDIA!"
…the gun didn't go off.
Eijiro didn't shoot.
He couldn't. He knew what that word meant.
"Mercy."
Looking back down at the… girl… it had a girl's voice... Looking back down at the girl, he saw that she was breathing heavily, and behind the scary mask, he could see her eyes. Even with her black sclera wrapping around her golden eyes, he could understand her emotion.
It was fear.
She was afraid of him.
He didn't know what to do. Was he supposed to capture enemies alive? His superior told him to exterminate them, but to do that to someone who just begged for their life?
Eventually, he lowered his rifle, and pointed towards the gate. "Vade."
Slowly, the horned girl grabbed her spear, turned around, and ran. She dashed towards the gate, but before she went back in, she turned around and looked at Eijiro one last time.
And then, she was gone.
A few minutes later, the soldiers he got separated from arrived, and made a perimeter around the gate. "There you are! Thought we lost you!" the curly brown-haired officer smiled. "And I see that you racked yourself up some kills, nice! Did you get all of them?"
"Uh… yeah," Kirishima lied. "Yeah, I did."
It had now been a few hours since the initial invasion of the unknown forces, and Momo was walking through the debris, where the JSDF was now doing post-battle clean-up: Removing corpses, checking for survivors, all of the unpleasantries of war.
But Momo was focused on other things.
She walked up towards a familiar face. Despite his military status, he had long and messy black hair, which went all the way to his shoulders. His facial hair was short and stubby, and his eyes made it look like he hadn't slept in years, or that he was just entering his forties.
Saluting him, Momo said, "Lieutenant General Aizawa."
"First Lieutenant Yaoyorozu. Of course it was you," he sighed. "Still, I figure it was probably best that it was you. You did well with the evacuation, we only have seventy-one casualties so far. I'm sure that the media vultures and the politicians will be singing your praises for months to come."
"Regardless of that," she said. "What exactly happened?"
"That's what everyone would like to find out. We've secured whatever the hell it is that spewed out those… things… but our current problem is that none of the captives speak Japanese."
"We have captives?"
"Almost a hundred," he said, as he pointed to one of them. "We think he's the leader."
The leader, a man with bandages covering his face, was currently struggling with the handcuffs and yelling at the soldiers who were trying to interrogate him. "Hoc mihi facere non potes! Ego sum dux in exercitu Imperatoris Todoroki! Omnia capita tua habebunt! Iuro!"
"We're trying to figure out what they're saying, but –"
Before Aizawa could finish, Momo immediately ran past him and kneeled down towards the armored soldier, and spoke. "Potestis intelligere me?"
The Lieutenant General looked at his subordinate in confusion. "Yaoyorozu, what are you –"
"Ita. Quomodo me intelligere potuisti? Nemo alius potest."
Aizawa's eyes widened as he saw Momo converse with the captured invader.
"Simplex," the black-haired woman responded. "Linguam tuam ut puer studui."
"In nostro imperio natus es? Si esses, essem –"
"Me paenitet, sed erras," Momo corrected him. "Hic natus sum, et pro patria pugnabo."
"Lieutenant Yaoyorozu," Aizawa said, in a tone the younger soldier knew meant that her commanding officer was trying to get her attention. "How did you know what he was saying?"
Getting up, Momo looked at him and said, "Sir, it's Latin. He's speaking Latin."
Within the next twenty-four hours, the entire world knew about what would later be dubbed by the media as "The Musutafu Incident."
With videos surfacing all over YouTube about Japanese civilians being attacked by monsters, along with the news media getting glimpses of the chaos of the JSDF fighting off the invaders, as well as any foreigners who immediately reported this to their country of origin, it was an inevitability. To even consider keeping this under wraps was a joke.
By the end of the next day, the current Prime Minister of Japan, Yokumiru Mera, was ready to address the situation, not just to the Japanese public, but to the entire world. Mera was a man approaching his fifties, with beige hair. And if Shouta Aizawa's eyes made it look like he hadn't slept in years, then Mera's made it look like he hadn't slept in decades.
And yesterday's incident was not helping his sleep schedule.
"...Naturally, this land does not appear on any map," Mera said, remembering the reports of the initial soldiers who went in yesterday. "We don't know what lies beyond the gate, or what it is like. Everything about it is a mystery. We apprehended many of the attackers of the previous incident. At present, they are no more than criminals, who have broken the law, or in other words, terrorists. Destroying the gate will not solve his problem. We fear that it may simply lead to the opening of another gate elsewhere in Japan."
"Thus, we have decided to consider the land beyond the gate, the Special Region, a part of Japan," he continued. "And in order to learn what is on the other side, as well as to bring any forces to the negotiation table, we have determined that it is necessary to go beyond the gate, even if it is dangerous. For the purpose of investigating the Special Region, apprehending the ringleader of this atrocity, and securing compensation by force, the government of Japan will dispatch the Self-Defense Force to the other side of the gate."
A small part of Mera knew that the thunderous applause he heard was hollow.
The following day, Momo marched into position, along with almost a hundred ground soldiers from the Japanese Self-Defense Force, as they all made their way towards Tatooin Station.
Getting into position, she saw as Aizawa stood up on the podium, and began speaking into the microphone. "My name is Aizawa, I'm your commander. Thanks to Prime Minister Yokumiru Mera's blessing, we are now ready to dispatch you to the Special Region. All of you, the mission which you have been charged with is of grave importance."
"Nobody knows what will happen to us in the Special Region," Aizawa continued. "Thus, you must be prepared for combat to begin with the moment we cross the gate."
Even though Momo was listening to the speech, her mind was elsewhere.
She was thinking back to earlier that day.
While civilians weren't allowed anywhere near Tatooin Station anymore, they still were around the barrier where the JSDF made a checkpoint to make sure no unauthorized personnel came across. And across that checkpoint, they had made a memorial.
A few hours ago, as Momo was walking down the street with the rest of the troops, she looked to her side to see the memorial. Rows and rows of flowers for the deceased, along with grieving friends and relatives, all of them crying in front of the flowers.
And that's when she saw them.
Passing them by, she saw an adult, a brown-haired woman who was crying. But the older grieving woman wasn't what caught Momo's eyes.
It was the kid.
It was Kota.
She never did find his parents a few days back, didn't she? She tried to help them for a few hours, but by the time the clean-up was ready, she handed him over to the local police, as she left to go find Lieutenant General Aizawa.
She hoped that he would find his parents, but not like this.
"We'll be entering the gate shortly."
As Aizawa finished his speech, the sour feeling returned to Momo, as she loaded her rifle.
"READY!"
She heard Kirishima's voice over one of the vehicle's speakers, as she, and several other soldiers, entered them. That's right, he said he's a communications specialist, isn't he?
"BEGIN! Stay frosty, and watch your vision clocks like your lives depend on them."
"MOVE OUT!"
With Aizawa's order, the trucks began to drive forward, as the tanks followed behind them. Inside one of the armored vehicles, Momo looked out the window, and she saw that her truck was fast approaching the gaping darkness that was the entrance to the gate.
"Aizawa," the Major General, Hizashi Yamada, said. "The advance party has entered the gate."
"Worst case, if we are engaged in combat immediately, we'll just respond with the forces that we have currently ready," Aizawa said, as his friend and subordinate nodded.
Within the gate, it was pitch black. Even with the lights of the vehicles on, the only things anyone could see were the other trucks and tanks. They couldn't even see five feet in front of the road, almost as if it was an empty void between Japan and the other side.
It certainly felt like one to Momo. The temperature immediately dropped, and she could start seeing her own breath in front of her. Looking towards the front, she could see Kirishima in the passenger seat, and he was getting a bit anxious.
Eventually they saw it.
A literal bright light at the end of the tunnel. It was shaped as a rectangle, just like the entrance to the Japanese side of the gate. And out of the darkness, they found… a hillside.
The other side of the gate landed them into the middle of a bunch of hills, surrounded by dead trees to the front, and a mountain range to the back, and fog everywhere. It was the crack of dawn, and the sun was just about getting ready to peak out.
As the first tank came out of the gate and stopped, they all saw it.
Hundreds of small lights, out in the distance.
Torches.
It was a massive army, with hundreds of soldiers, both human and not. The soldiers could even see a few dozen of the wyverns from Tatooin Station above them.
"Enemy army sighted!" Kirishima yelled through the speakers.
SLAM!
In an instant, the soldiers slammed open the backdoors of the heavy trucks, and ran to find cover. Once found, they propped up their weapons, and waited.
As Momo adjusted her helmet, the sun had fully risen.
And then, she heard Aizawa's voice on the radio ordering them to open fire.
Author's Note: And from here on out, things will start to be different.
This originally began as a prompt I toyed with back earlier this spring, or so. However, I still have to finish writing it, so my publication dates are gonna be a bit… slower than usual. Specifically, once every other week.
So, the next chapter comes out on September 21st, 2023!
In the meantime, this upcoming Friday, the 14th of September, I will be updating last week's story, Megethos, so every other week, one of the two is gonna be updated. I really wanted to do both every week, but I don't have enough of a backlog for that!
For those of you that are new here, this is the third part of a series I have been working on known as "The Other Protagonists," where in each story, the main character will be someone other than our favorite green-haired Midoriya. Sure, he could still be an antagonist, a background character, or something, but not the main hero.
The first story was "When They See, They'll Understand," starring Katsuki Bakugou in a future where AI and the dead end up mixing. If you're interested in that story, the links are s/14250531/1/When-They-See-They-ll-Understand on , and /works/48272467/chapters/121740241 on ArchiveofOurOwn, respectively.
The second story is "Megethos," starring Ochako Uraraka in a reality where she receives One For All, and sinister forces are waiting to emerge. If you're interested in that story, the links are s/14273590/1/Megethos on , and /works/49782343/chapters/125662327 on ArchiveofOurOwn.
Also, if you're interested, you can leave a comment. I respond to them in the next chapter in the Author's Note, so if you wanna, go right ahead. Just please be respectful.
If you wanna know more, visit my Discord, the link is /3PFYSt8Dqz. You can chat with others, post memes, fanfic recommendations and prompts, role play, fan art, and we even have a writer's corner now! I'll also drop by with announcements and chat with you all every now and then! Also, if you want to add me as a friend, my username is Ernalore#8663! Just please make sure to follow the rules!
Thanks for reading, and I'll see you in the other story's debut next week!
- Ernalore