Author's Note: I'm thinking that the size of my backlog on these chapters will allow me to basically post one every few days in order to catch up to what I've already got out there on AO3, because I've already been posting this story to AO3 since September of last year. I've been writing this since March of last year. This is a big project. The thing stopping me from making this a one-a-day thing, even temporarily, is basically feeling like that makes it a bit spam-ish and like I'm looking for attention, which is not what I really want. I just want to share something I put a lot of time and effort into. I'd appreciate some advice on that if you can spare a moment. No need to review or anything to boost my stats or something, just PM me and I'll answer it 99% of the time. I'm putting this author's note here to kind of prompt that, and I'll wait for maybe a week or so and then go from there.

With that out of the way, enjoy the chapter today!

A week after the entrance exam, Izuku sat in his living room with his mother, Inko, and All Might in his skeletal form. He was extremely nervous, only because Inko didn't know who she was really talking to, thinking All Might to be a consultant from UA and not the top ranked hero in Japan. They had been talking for an hour or so, about how Izuku had passed the exam, how his studies would work and how UA's education plan was kind of erratic, to say the least. All Might had also told Izuku that he was going to talk about the boy's new Quirk, which worried him. Inko didn't know about his Quirk, mainly because the two hadn't figured out what they were going to tell her in regards to how his Quirk worked, and Blackwhip was a new factor that they hadn't really talked about at all.

"What's this about my son's Quirk?" Inko asked, a conflicted expression on her face.

"That's the thing, Mrs. Midoriya. We don't … know what exactly it is. It's an Emitter Type, we know that. I think Izuku might be better equipped to explain his powers," All Might said.

"Oh, um, okay. Well, it's like there's this massive … I don't know … pool of energy inside of me, and I can use that energy to manifest different effects. I can enhance my strength, speed, durability and all of my physical abilities, as well as some … other stuff," Izuku explained as best he could.

"What does 'other stuff' mean, Izuku?" Inko asked, scared of what the answer may be.

"Nothing bad, I promise! There's this thing, I call it …" Izuku paused to look at All Might, who nodded to him slightly. They had talked about telling Inko about One for All, and had agreed that they should, now that the Quirk has the potential to be so much more important, as well as destructive, now that the previous users' Quirks were manifesting. "... Blackwhip. I can manifest energy tendrils from my hand to pull things closer to me or to swing things around. It's great, but it almost ripped my arm apart the first time I used it," Izuku said.

"Anything else?" Inko asked, barely holding in her tears at the mention of her baby being hurt.

"Nothing yet, but we expect more in the future," All Might said.

"And … what does All Might have to do with this?" Inko asked, looking the man himself in the eyes.

Izuku felt his heart skip a beat, and All Might almost coughed up some blood at the mention of his alter ego. The obvious reactions from the two told Inko everything she needed to know, and she chuckled at herself, not wanting to actually frighten the two.

"I don't understand what you mean, Mrs. Midoriya. Why would All Might be involved in this?" the older man asked.

"Please, I'm not stupid, Mr. Yagi. I can spot those eyes anywhere. With Izuku always running off to take notes on heroes' Quirks and villain fights, I look at your face on those posters more than he does," Inko said, smiling brightly.

"Wow," Izuku said, marveling at the intelligence displayed. He had never seen that side of his mother, but he reasoned that because of her job, she needed to be intelligent at the very least. Inko worked as a nurse, and had put herself through medical school while Izuku was growing up. He was so proud of her, that when she had completed it, Izuku had gone around at school telling people that his mother was like a hero, and that she saved people. Nobody cared, but it made him feel special.

"Well, I guess there's no reason to hide it now," All Might said, nodding to Izuku gravely.

"Alright. Mom, there's something we need to tell you about my Quirk that's … pretty important to understand why it hurt me so much, and why there's so many facets to it," Izuku said, looking to All Might to continue.

"There is a reason I have never publicly disclosed my Quirk's name and it's details. It's because it has been an extremely well kept secret for about a hundred and fifty years," All Might said.

"What? That's not possible. You haven't been alive for that long," Izuku said, not having heard this story either.

"That's right. I'm sorry for not telling you this story earlier, Young Midoriya, but I hoped I would never have to. Now, though, we all need to understand how my Quirk came about in order to proceed," All Might explained.

"Alright, go on," Inko said, glancing at her son suspiciously.

"Well, at the dawn of Quirks, there was a man. His name has been lost to history, because he went by the name of his Quirk, All for One. He had the ability to take Quirks from people and give them to other people, or keep them for himself. He amassed an army this way, giving power to the powerless and letting people with Mutant Type Quirks look like what was the majority of humanity at the time," All Might said, staring daggers at the floor.

"I've heard of this. It isn't in history books, but there's been a myth circulating for a few decades about a man who could steal powers," Inko said, covering her mouth in surprise.

"That's right. It's true. He did this for a few years, but eventually was confronted. Y'see, the man had a brother. He was sickly, and frail, and supposedly Quirkless, but had a strong sense of morality and justice. One day, he saw what his brother was doing and had to intervene. The brother clashed in a verbal battle for the ages. But, the brother was still weak. Whether it was out of brotherly love or whether it was a malicious attempt to get him to submit, nobody knows, but All for One gave his brother a Quirk that could stockpile strength to be used later," All Might said, still not lifting his gaze from the floor.

"Don't tell me that -!" Izuku tried, already knowing where this was going.

"That's right. The brother already had a Quirk. It was a useless Quirk, invisible. The younger brother had the power to pass on his own Quirk. So, the stockpiling Quirk and his given power merged into one Quirk, the ability to stockpile power, then pass it onto somebody to use. The brother passed on his Quirk to a trusted confidant, and named it One for All, a power that could help everyone, as opposed to his brother's power, which only helped him. One for All became the antithesis to All for One, and the two were locked in a battle through the ages," All Might concluded.

"How … many people have held your power?" Inko asked.

"I am the eighth," All Might said, glancing nervously at Izuku.

Inko followed his gaze to her son, who looked about ready to explode. He was purposefully not making eye contact with her.

"Izuku. Izuku. Izuku!" Inko tried to get his attention, and the last call did it.

"Mom … I'm the ninth," Izuku said, looking at her with primal fear in his eyes.

Inko passed out. Buffed up into his heroic form and caught her body before it fell to the ground, instead directing it back onto the couch. He quickly had to deflate, though, as he couldn't use his power too much outside of heroics, lest he deplete his strength faster than was projected.

"So, that's the origin of One for All. I never knew there was such a time in Japan's history," Iuzku said, awed by the story.

"That's by design. It was a dark time before there was somebody strong enough to become a pillar. I only regret not convincing my master to do it before I did to get the people on board with the idea of a Symbol. She never wanted to crack the top hundred heroes, let alone become the one true hope, as she put it," All Might with a soft smile.

"What was she like?" Izuku asked.

All Might laughed heartily, and sat back down on the chair across from his protege. He thought for a moment, before grinning widely and meeting his successor's eyes.

"Her name was Nana Shimura. She was the greatest hero I've ever met, purely because of her philosophy of 'the ones who are always smiling in this world are the strongest'. I looked up to her so much, even before she had chosen me as her successor. She's kind of the reason that I chose you to be my successor. That day on the roof when you spilled your life story to me, you said something. 'Even though you were bullied, or maybe even because you were bullied, you thought that saving somebody was just about the coolest thing somebody could do. You wanted to be the kind of hero who, once people saw your fearless smile, they knew they were safe'. That's exactly the type of thing Nana would say, so when I saw you run into danger to save your friend, I knew that, with your philosophy and your willingness to try, you were the perfect person to be the next holder of One for All," All Might explained.

Izuku was on the verge of tears. He had never had anything quite that touching aid to him before, except for that he could be a hero. Izuku looked back over his training, with All Might encouraging him to lift more, to run faster and to push beyond what he thought his limits were, Plus Ultra style. It had been the best time of his life so far, and he doubted that he could keep himself contained for much longer without hearing about why All Might had chosen him the way that he had. With this revelation, however, the dam was breaking, and Izuku was tempted to let it.

"All Might," Izuku said, a few tears falling.

"Izuku," All Might said, putting a hand on the boy's shoulder.

All Might always got emotional when he thought about Nana, but even more so when he had to openly talk about her. When he had attended the small funeral on what he referred to as Shimura Island, the small land mass just off the main body of Japan where Nana died, he had wept the whole time. He had never really gotten over his funk until he had come back from America, and met up with Gran Torino again. Speaking of Gran, he'd have to meet the newest wielder of One for All some day, and someday soon.

The moment ended prematurely when Inko woke up and immediately shot up from her sitting position on the couch, looking around wildly. When she locked eyes with Izuku and All Might, still sitting on their seats, she sat back down, quietly coming to grips with the fact that the stuff about One for All and Izuku having a Quirk hadn't been a dream.

"All Might, how dare you give my son a Quirk when you know that All for One could be after him?" Inko asked, standing up.

"All for One isn't a problem anymore," All Might said gravely.

All Might's tone frightened Izuku, making him think that things had happened in the past that had deeply affected him, and that was when Izuku realized that All for One must have been the one that gave him his scar, and had taken his stomach and a lung from him. Izuku felt bad for All Might, but since he was still alive, it meant that All for One had been defeated, and All Might went on to corroborate this.

"I killed him," All Might said.

"What?" Izuku choked.

"You … killed him? How?" Inko asked, aghast.

"In a fight seven years ago, we battled for the last time. I hit him so hard that his head blew apart. He gave me injuries so grievous that they had to remove my stomach and my left lung. The aftereffects from the various surgeries have left me like this, a shadow of my former self, only able to do hero work for three hours a day if I'm lucky," All Might concluded.

Izuku suddenly felt very small. He had gotten a taste of the power he wielded now, but he hadn't truly understood just how powerful One for All could be. All Might had blown apart a person from a punch. Izuku, being the ninth, would inevitably grow to be stronger than All Might, so he could do that and then some. One for All had the power to kill, quite easily. Izuku looked at his hands, which could technically be classified as deadly weapons now. His right hand suddenly ached, probably a phantom pain from remembering the feeling of Blackwhip raging from inside him.

After that, All Might left. Izuku had a sort of feeling that he had read about hurricane survivors being in the eye of the storm. Like a lot of big things were happening around him all of a sudden, but he couldn't see or hear them. He went to bed after eating a smaller dinner than normal. That night, he had another dream of One for All, but this time he had a dream of something new.

It was the same dark void that he had been in when he spoke to the wielder who had originally possessed Blackwhip. That man was there, but there were also seven more, though a lot of them were smokey. Izuku was only able to clearly see three of them, and he found that they were all lined up. Reasoning that they were lined up based on the order of succession, Izuku looked at the wispy figure to his left to see that it looked shockingly like All Might's skeletal form, though he was incomplete, maybe because he still had the power.

Izuku looked down the line and saw a complete form, a tall woman with dark hair and a warm smile. She was incredibly muscular, though was still explicitly feminine, something Izuku thought she balanced very well. She was very pretty, with a sort of spiritual aura around her, and Izuku knew she was Nana Shimura from her place in the order, the seventh. He looked even further down the line to see a man, with white hair and a jagged scar running down his face and over his eye. He was dressed in robes, and looked sad, like he was mourning something.

Looking out at the scene in front of him, Izuku saw two figures with white hair and more than a passing resemblance to each other, obviously the siblings that originated One for All and All for One. Izuku tried to get a closer look, and found that the one with dark, crackling energy around him that was All for One looked eerily familiar to Izuku, but he couldn't place where he had seen the face before. Perhaps he had seen him on the news, not knowing who exactly he was looking at at the time. All for One started to talk, and the sounds it made were not easy on Izuku's ears, likely having stolen multiple vocal Quirks in his time as a demon lord.

"Come on, little brother. Why are you so defiant of me? I'm only trying to do the best with what I was given!" All for One yelled.

"Don't try to placate me, brother. I know what you've done, how many lives you've ruined with that cursed power of yours. I'll have no part in it!" the younger brother said. Izuku felt bad not knowing his predecessor's name, so he assigned him the moniker of 'One for All'. Symmetry was a beautiful thing, Izuku thought.

"You're naive. You haven't seen the world of superpowers in full, yet, but you will. Those people are savages, brother. They'd rip each other apart for any modicum of power. When you see it, and you will, you'll finally come to terms with the fact that what I'm doing is necessary for the betterment of mankind! Without me, they'll kill each other given the chance. I'm taking away that chance. If you look at it without the bias of your righteous anger, you'll see that I'm saving lives in the long run," All for One yelled.

"No! You're taking away peoples' bodily autonomy! It's against the most basic rights we have as people. Superpowers don't make you more than the rest of us, they just highlight the parts of you that aren't given the chance to thrive under normal circumstances. You were always controlling, brother, and your powers just highlighted that in the worst way," One for All replied.

All for One's red eyes seemed to glow in the darkness, and he held up his hand, that was sparking dark lightning, if there was such a thing. He stepped toward One for All and put his hand on his brother's face, the lightning coursing through the younger brother's body. The energy pulsed from All for One to One for All, and Izuku could almost see an aura forming around One for All with two distinct colors, white and black, mixing together and swirling around to form a grey-ish glow, and Izuku felt something in him change. Izuku knew that he was watching the creation of One for All, and couldn't help but feel like he was intruding on an intimate moment, something that even the predecessors had seen, at least while they were alive.

"Your power is wrong on a fundamental level. Superpowers aren't something to be controlled. That's like telling people how to use their arms, or their legs, and then cutting them off when they 'misuse' them. It's evil," One for All said.

The first user had a point, Izuku thought, and he wondered what he was watching. The two were strangely familiar to him, like he had seen them before, but he couldn't place where.

"Don't be a fool, Yoichi. I'm going to save the world, like in those manga we read," All for One said, with a dark mist flowing from his head and hands.

"You're the fool if that's your takeaway. You see, you only read to volume three, brother. That's the volume where the Demon King kills the hero's mentor, taking away everything he loved. The next volume, and all the volumes after that all show the hero overcoming that blow and defeating the Demon King in a final battle to save the world. The Demon King didn't win, brother, and neither will you!" Yoichi screamed, the passion in his voice almost feeling tangible.

"Oh, brother. I know just what you need to stop this pathetic quest for meaningless justice," the older brother said, approaching his younger brother with an outstretched hand.

Izuku didn't know why, but he felt that the hand that was steadily getting closer to Yoichi wasn't meant as a peace offering. It offered a dark energy, pulsing with evil intent, just like All for One had been from the start. He finally pressed his hand against the younger brother's face, and the smaller man instantly knew that it was a mistake to let it happen.

Black lightning, if there was such a thing, began to dance around the older brother's skin, illuminating him in a dark, twisted way so that the shadows that had concealed his eyes so far suddenly lifted upwards, making everything but his eyes cast in those same shadows, giving Izuku a look at the man's piercing gaze, his red eyes looking into his younger brother's green ones with nothing but contempt.

Then, the form of All for One faded away, leaving the weak and smaller Yoichi to raise his head and look right at Izuku. The two locked eyes, before Yoichi smiled slightly and stood up, walking toward Izuku with an uncertain expression on his face.

"So, you're the ninth?" Yoichi asked.

Izuku still couldn't talk in this place, so he settled for nodding.

"I'm Yoichi Shigaraki, the first. Izuku Midoriya, you've reached the point of singularity. We hope you do great things with our powers, and know you have the drive to do them," Yoichi said, reaching toward Izuku with an open palm.

Suddenly, all of the previous users, smokey or not, were behind Yoichi, reaching out in the same gesture that Izuku guessed meant the passing of the torch was being officiated by the previous wielders of One for All. Izuku, with his one hand, reached out as well, grasping onto Yoichi's hand. All of the forms in front of him glowed a different color. White, blue, red, green, orange, purple, pink and yellow, in order from Yoichi to whom Izuku was sure was an incomplete avatar of All Might.

In a flash of light, each of the colors overtaking each other and vying for dominance, Izuku was awake in his bedroom, the sun rising outside his window. He looked around, nothing seeming too out of place, but something felt wrong. Like he knew something nobody else did. That was probably the case, considering that All Might had said he knew nothing about why the other users' Quirks were bleeding through now, and not any other time.

The next day was meant for the students of Aldera Middle School, Izuku's current school, to have a final day there in case there was anything they needed to wrap up before they left for high school. Izuku rose with the sun on most days, so he had a few hours to get ready. Trying to be as quiet as possible, Izuku snuck down to the kitchen and made himself a basic breakfast out of a box of cereal that he was skeptical about and some milk with a glass of orange juice. Once it was time to leave, he wished Inko, who had since woken up and gotten ready for work, goodbye and headed to school.

When Izuku got to school, he almost immediately ran into Katsuki Bakugo. Katsuki and Izuku had been friends, once, but when Katsuki's Quirk emerged and Izuku's didn't, the two drifted apart, but their relationship eventually coming to a head when Katsuki began to torment Izuku, not letting being Quirkless go unpunished. The two bumped into each other in the hallway, but before Katsuki could vent any of his anger, a teacher pulled them up. This particular teacher, Mr. Yubi, had always been very dismissive of Izuku, but since the news of his acceptance into UA had spread, had suddenly been helping him out in every way possible, as if it made up for three years of neglect.

"Hey, Bakugo and Midoriya. Just the two people I wanted to see! Congrats on getting into UA, you two!" Mr. Yubi called out, shaking each of their hands before walking off to teach a class.

Izuku froze as soon as Mr. Yubi had mentioned him passing the entrance exam. Katsuki hadn't known, he was sure of it, so when the blond boy turned around with a look of pure rage in his eye, Izuku knew that he was in trouble. Katuski picked Izuku up by his shirt collar and pressed him against the wall, roughly slamming him into the concrete.

"Talk," Katsuki said, not trusting himself to completely flip out on the smaller boy if he continued to speak.

"I-I tried my best, Kacchan! Like everybody there did. I must have gotten lucky, because my Quirk finally manifested, and -" Izuku tried to explain.

Izuku was cut off by getting punched across the face by Katsuki, throwing him to the ground. Izuku held his jaw, feeling a small bit of blood trickle from his lips. He looked up at Katsuki, who looked just about ready to kill a man. The blond seethed, trying to stop himself from attacking Izuku further.

"What … do you mean … your Quirk?" Katuski asked between breaths.

"It was a completely unique experience. My Quirk was too much for my body at four years old, so it went into a kind of hibernation until my body was able to handle the strain," Izuku lied. He hated how easily he did it.

"THAT'S BULLSHIT! That's never happened before. You're obviously lying to me. WHY DID YOU LIE TO ME?!" Katsuki screeched.

"Boys," a voice from beside the two said.

The two turned to see their principal's assistant standing there, watching them fight. Katsuki straightened his posture and turned to the woman, glaring at her from his spot above Izuku's still downed body.

"What?" Katsuki asked.

As Izuku climbed to his feet, he heard something about the principal wanting to see them, and had to chase after Katsuki and the principal's assistant for a minute before he caught up to them. After the small scuffle and running after the two for a while, Izuku had broken a sweat, and would no doubt have to shower in the gym's changing room before he went to classes for the day.

The two walked into the principal's office, and saw him sitting behind his desk with a small smile on his face, though Izuku couldn't fathom why. He had been proven wrong by the one student he had given up on. Izuku should be the one feeling good about himself, but his aching jaw that was still filling his mouth with blood made him feel otherwise.

"Ah, boys! Sit down, sit down! Let's celebrate your graduation!" Mr. Kontorora said, gesturing for them to sit.

"Thank you, sir," Izuku politely said.

"Whatever," Katsuki said dismissively.

"I can't tell you how pleased I was to find out that not just one, but two students from my school had been accepted into UA's hero course! Bakugo, you were destined to be great with that Quirk of yours, but the real shock was you, Midoriya. A pleasant surprise to be sure, but a surprise nonetheless," Mr. Kontorora said, smiling ear to ear.

"Oh, please. We both know that the nerd cheated to get in. Why don't you cut the crap and just tell the school that he's a Quirkless brat," Katsuki chimed in.

"I didn't cheat! I'm not Quirkless, either, Kacchan. I told you!" Izuku said.

"Oh, yeah? Why don't you show me your powerful Quirk, then?" Katsuki asked, standing up to tower over Izuku.

"I can't do that," Izuku said, hanging his head down low.

"Why not?" Katsuki asked, a smug grin growing across his lips.

"It's dangerous. I can't control it, yet, but I will. I'll make my power obey me, but until then, I can't afford to go around, using it for meaningless things like proving to you that it exists in the first place, something that I thought you'd be overjoyed at. I guess nothing will ever be enough to match the great Katsuki Bakugo, though, am I right? Nothing can ever hope to touch you, because you're so great. You're such a powerful hero candidate! Well, guess what, Kacchan? I killed the Zero Pointer. Me. Did you?" Izuku ranted, in a rare display of anger.

Izuku was standing now, and he was staring into Katsuki's eyes as he yelled at the top of his lungs, venting a decade of unfelt anger and resentment. Izuku felt heat rising in him, and knew that it was One for All, begging to be let out to play. He knew that he would have to calm down if he didn't want Blackwhip to manifest again, but he couldn't help himself. He had to get this out, and it was better that he wasn't in a public place when he did it.

"That massive robot from the exam? Fuck that, it was worth zero points, why would I kill it?" Katsuki asked, snarkily looking Izuku up and down, not believing he defeated such a huge enemy.

"I destroyed it with my Quirk because it was threatening other people. I earned seventy rescue points from that alone," Izuku explained, his anger dying down a bit.

"What are rescue points?" Katsuki genuinely asked.

Izuku's anger returned in full force. He almost let some words out that he would have regretted later, but managed to keep himself under control enough to sit down and sip the tea that Mr. Kontorora had poured while they had argued. Izuku chastised himself for letting his anger get the better of him, and pushed down Blackwhip's urge to be free.

"Now, we should talk about your transition into UA's unconventional teaching style. That school is famous for letting the teachers do whatever they like with their students, not to mention their incredible standards for their students. You two apparently meet their standards, but that may not continue to be the case for very long if you stagnate. Be careful," Mr. Kontorora said in a moment of seriousness.

"Of course, sir. Thank you for your … faith in us," Izuku said, careful not to say anything negative that could be used against him.

"You may go to your class now, both of you," Mr. Kontorora said, smiling brightly.

Izuku quickly slipped out of his seat and exited the room, Katsuki uncomfortably close behind him. He could hear the blond boy breathing deeply, muttering things like 'how dare you' and 'fucking rescue points' under his breath. Izuku is almost thrown to the ground when Katsuki blows past him, knocking Izuku to the left with his shoulder. Izuku found his footing and growled in anger. He decided that he could risk it this one time.

He threw out his hand, calling on the feeling he had felt back when Blackwhip first manifested. Izuku felt a surge of power, and a smoky black energy tendril flew out of his palm, flying toward Katsuki's hand. The whip wrapped around Katsuki's hand and solidified, letting Izuku yank the blond's hand back, letting his 'friend' see his power at last.

Katsuki stared at the whip in disbelief, not blinking for a moment while looking at the smoky tendril circling his hand. He followed the whip with his eyes as it stretched across the distance between him and Izuku, seeing as it manifested from his own right hand, and the other boy's furious expression. Katsuki would laugh in another life.

"That's it? This is your power?" Katsuki ripped his hand out of the whip, breaking Izuku's concentration and causing the entire whip to dissipate.

"I told you I can't control it well, so I could only summon that one whip," Izuku explained.

"That was pitiful, Deku. Do you really think you can be a hero with that weak power of yours?" Katsuki asked.

"I do. For the first time in my life, I've had people helping me to achieve my dream, and I'm not giving up now," Izuku declared, lowering his hand.

"Whatever. Ambitions aren't everything, Deku. If you don't have the stuff to be a hero, you don't have the stuff. I have the stuff, and you don't. You haven't, at least. I don't know what you did to get this new power, but know that it won't let you be on my level. You're just a fucking Deku," Katsuki said, before walking away to leave Izuku with his thoughts.

After that, Izuku made his way to class, carefully navigating around Katsuki for the rest of the day. It wasn't easy, as the two had shared a class for as long as they'd gone to school, which seemed improbable to Izuku, but he accepted it more as he grew older. The more Izuku knew about the world around him, the less he cared about the little stuff, such as how and why he got to be in the same class as Katsuki every single year. Even when he and Inko had to move, and had thought about changing schools due to zoning issues, Izuku had stayed for some reason. Maybe he felt that he could still get Katsuki to be his friend again, but he really couldn't say anything decisive, as he just didn't know.

At the end of the day, Izuku headed home, ready to take on his new life at UA.