Chapter 38: Pre-Adolescence - 13
"So we can match, huh?" Isshun hummed.
"Yeah! Aren’t we going to be a two‑person team?" Nejire nodded excitedly. "You promised!"
"...I guess we can come up with some ideas then," Isshun relented. "But only after we finish your costume first."
Nejire nodded quickly, smiling the whole time.
"Okay!"
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"Hey... Shunkan‑kun." Toru asked during lunch, peering at Isshun’s notebook. "Who’s this girl?" She pointed at one of his drafts of Nejire in costume.
Isshun already had the boring T‑pose version fully mapped out in his head.
Since Nejire probably wouldn’t want to see herself standing stiffly like a mannequin, he’d drawn her in a dynamic pose instead, mid‑flight, hair trailing behind her.
"It’s the friend I was telling you about," Isshun replied, taking a bite of his lunch.
"Is she trying to be a Hero?" Toru asked.
"Yeah. She’s already in middle school," Isshun said.
"Then... are you going to try to be a hero too?" Toru asked offhandedly, her eyes drifting to the notes about Nejire’s support gear.
Isshun had written everything down in simple terms so Nejire could understand it. As a result, even Toru could easily follow how each piece of equipment worked.
Toru was good at reading the room and picking up on social cues, so it was no surprise that despite being a transfer student, she became friends with the girls in her class almost immediately.
She also wanted to enroll in U.A. and become a hero, but compared to some of the other girls, whose Quirks were more obviously combat‑oriented and were more flashy, Toru found it awkward to openly say so.
That awareness was what separated Toru from Nejire.
Toru naturally considered how others might see her and adjusted herself accordingly.
Nejire, on the other hand, didn’t have much awareness of that sort of thing, at least not until Isshun pointed it out. Even then, she mostly acted on her own feelings and Isshun’s advice.
Still, Toru felt like Isshun simply didn’t care whether she had dreams of her own.
That intuition wasn’t wrong.
Isshun disliked gossip and rarely talked enough with anyone to even start it.
He barely ever pried and didn’t feel the need to comment on things that weren’t directly put in front of him.
"Well... I guess so?" Isshun shrugged, taking a sip of his miso soup.
"Then..." Toru hesitated again. "Would it be weird to want to be a hero?"
Toru wasn’t sure why, but looking at Isshun’s plain expression, like nothing she said would change how he saw her, made her want to say what she honestly felt.
It was the same feeling she’d had when she asked him what she looked like.
"No." Isshun shook his head immediately. "Heroes are undeniably popular in children’s entertainment. It’s only natural for kids to want to become one."
’Aren’t you also a kid?’ Toru thought, but she continued.
"But isn’t it weird to only have invisibility and still want to be a hero?"
Instead of reassurance, Isshun’s blunt, matter‑of‑fact answer only made Toru feel more confused, like she’d been overthinking the problem from the start.
He did it often, making her doubt the worries she’d built up in her head with a common-sense bomb.
"Then let me ask you this," Isshun said. "Why do you want to become a hero?"
It was a question that could be hard or easy, depending on the person.
Regardless of whether it was reasonable or not, it was still a question with an answer.
Toru hesitated before answering. "Because it’s cool...?"
"Is that really the reason?"
"...I don’t know," Toru admitted, fidgeting with her sleeves. "I guess it’s weird that I want to be a hero without having a real reason."
Isshun shook his head.
"It’s not weird. People do things without a reason all the time."
’Though I don’t know why I’m giving such a philosophical lesson to a kid when I don’t even have much of a reason to be a Hero either.’
"You might not get this yet, Hagakure," Isshun continued, "but sometimes the choices you make without a reason end up being the most meaningful ones."
Maybe he was talking about himself, too.
He raised an apple and took a bite before finishing his thought.
"If you want to be a hero, then be one," Isshun shrugged. "Who cares if people think it’s weird?"
"Just don’t give up halfway."
Toru paused, letting his words sink in.
"I... guess you’re right?"
"I know I’m right."
A tick mark practically appeared on Toru’s face. What a mood killer.
She went back to eating, lost in thought.
--<>--
"Hmm..."
Nezu studied the screen thoughtfully.
"I seem to have overlooked a crucial issue due to my enthusiasm."
He had been sidetracked by the existence of such a powerful Spatial-Type Quirk user, subconsciously linking the Musutafu vigilante activities and the Sky Egg Stasis Incident to the same individual.
Statistically, it was extremely unlikely for two Spatial-Type Quirk users with such exaggerated capabilities to appear so close together in time. His instincts had made the connection automatically.
That didn’t mean it was impossible.
Still, if the method by narrowing down suspects by comparing the people within each area didn’t come out to anything, it wasn’t too bad.
While the existence of two overpowered Spatial-Type Quirks would be troublesome, Nezu believed that even if it was possible it was unlikely.
However, the most important thing Nezu hadn’t considered was how to convince this student to do anything at all.
Blink’s Quirk registration obviously would contain no mention of teleportation; otherwise, this investigation would have ended in a single day.
Which meant either teleportation was only a sub-aspect of his Quirk, or he could use it well enough to mimic other abilities and had deliberately registered false information.
Identifying the culprit behind the Sky Egg Stasis Incident and the Musutafu vigilante was only a matter of time.
But there was a different issue entirely.
How were they supposed to catch him doing anything?
The culprit could simply deny involvement, and without concrete evidence beyond vague circumstantial details like location overlap and Quirk similarity, it wouldn’t be enough to justify an arrest.
That meant that Nezu couldn’t just kindly ’convince’ them to go to U.A. and be a Hero.
Catching them on camera was just as unlikely.
"...Might as well identify them first and decide what to do after!"
If the student was engaging in vigilantism, then deep down...
They probably wanted to be a hero, didn’t they?
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A/N: I feel like MHA is a good world to go in-depth about the belief of Heroism and why some people become a Hero. Or rather, why anyone would go out of their way to save and protect people at the expense of their own safety in a suitable environment.
While in modern society this theme and reasoning can be seen in some jobs like firefighting, police, etc, in a fictional world like MHA where all of these jobs are combined into one, where Heroism can be a theme behind joining, it’s a good area to explore personal motives in my opinion.
Tho idk why im hyperanalyzing MHA. It’s just an interesting universe when it comes to the theme of Heroism in a Human Society.
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5 advance chaps on Patreon, at Cypresss!
If you want to talk to me, then the discord link is in the description of the fanfic!
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Also, just a disclaimer, and i’m pretty sure i explained this in the author’s notes in an older chap, but the powerstone goals for this week effect the next week’s extra chaps. So this weekend will only have 2 since it’s from last week. And for next weekend we’ll have 3 extra chaps because you guys smashed the ps goals.
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3500PS - Not Complete
7000PS - Not Complete