What if deku was the reincarnation of popeye the sailor man. When he eats spinach he gets stronger than all might for 3 hours

The sea was a violent tempest of navy blue and frothing white, churning with an ancient, restless fury.

 

Izuku Midoriya stood at the helm of a massive wooden galleon, the deck slick with brine and rain. The sky above was a bruised purple, split open by jagged forks of yellow lightning. The wind howled a terrifying symphony, tearing at the sails, yet Izuku felt no fear. He felt an inexplicable, overwhelming sense of belonging.

 

His hands gripped the heavy wooden spokes of the ship’s wheel. They were not his hands. They were massive, calloused, and ruggedly tanned, with forearms so disproportionately thick they looked like bowling pins sculpted from solid granite. Branded into the flesh of each bulging forearm was a dark blue anchor, glowing faintly in the storm.

 

A colossal wave, easily the size of a skyscraper, loomed over the bow of the ship. Within the watery monolith, a monstrous face formed—a bearded brute with eyes like black coals and a laugh that shook the heavens.

 

“Argh-har-har! Ye’re finished this time, runt!” the ocean-brute roared, a voice that sounded like grinding tectonic plates.

 

Izuku didn’t scream. Instead, he felt his face contort. His right eye squinted completely shut in a permanent wink. His jaw jutted out defiantly. A small, wooden corncob pipe inexplicably rested between his teeth. He bit down on it, and from the bowl of the pipe, a high-pitched, almost mechanical sound erupted over the thunder.

 

TOOT-TOOT!

 

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, green cylindrical tin. With a single, fluid motion of his thumb and forefinger, he squeezed the tin. The top popped off like a champagne cork. A wad of dark green, leafy mush vaulted through the torrential rain, perfectly arcing through the air and landing squarely in his mouth. He swallowed it in a single gulp.

 

Immediately, a sensation of absolute, unadulterated power surged through his veins. It was a power that defied logic, a strength that didn't just bend the rules of the universe, but snapped them over its knee and laughed. His muscles vibrated like struck tuning forks.

 

Izuku wound up his right arm. It spun in a perfect, blurring circle, faster and faster, sounding like the propeller of an airplane taking flight.

 

“I’ve had all I can stands, and I can’t stands no more!” Izuku heard himself yell, though the voice was gruff, raspy, and carried an accent he couldn't place.

 

He threw the punch. His fist collided with the skyscraper-sized wave.

 

There was no splash. There was no explosion of water. Instead, with a sound like a giant cymbal crash, the entire ocean shattered like glass. The monstrous water-brute froze, his eyes popping out of his head with a comical boing, before the wave literally fragmented into millions of tiny, neatly-tied blue ribbons that rained down upon the deck.

 

Izuku chuckled—a strange, rhythmic, guttural sound. “Ug-gug-gug-gug-gug…”

 

Then, the alarm clock rang.

 

 

 

Izuku gasped, jolting upright in his bed. He clutched his chest, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He was gasping for air, the phantom taste of sea salt and iron-rich leafy greens clinging to the roof of his mouth.

 

He blinked rapidly, the morning sun filtering through the All Might curtains of his bedroom, casting a warm, heroic glow over the countless posters and action figures that adorned his walls.

 

He looked down at his arms. They were pale, scrawny, and completely devoid of any anchor tattoos. He rubbed his right eye, which felt perfectly normal, and ran a hand over his mouth. No pipe. No unyielding jaw.

 

"Just… just another dream," Izuku whispered, his voice trembling slightly.

 

He had been having these dreams for as long as he could remember. Ever since he was four years old—the year he was officially diagnosed as Quirkless. While other children were breathing fire, floating objects, or stretching their limbs, Izuku remained painfully, remarkably ordinary. The doctor’s cold, clinical words, “You should probably give it up,” had been the defining tragedy of his young life.

 

Yet, the dreams never stopped. They were always the same motif: the ocean, the absurdly large forearms, the spinach, and the absolute, unquestionable strength. For a brief period in his childhood, Izuku had hoped these dreams were a manifestation of a late-blooming Quirk. He had begged his mother to buy canned spinach, forcing himself to eat the mushy greens by the spoonful, waiting for his muscles to bulge and the power to awaken.

 

Nothing ever happened. He just got a stomachache. The kids at school had laughed at him when he tried to explain it, and the bullying, spearheaded by his childhood friend Katsuki Bakugo, had only intensified. Deku, Bakugo had dubbed him. The one who can't do anything.

 

Izuku sighed, dragging himself out of bed. He went through his morning routine with practiced, melancholic efficiency. He washed his face, put on his black gakuran uniform, and meticulously packed his yellow backpack. He placed his current pride and joy, Hero Analysis for the Future, Vol. 13, safely inside.

 

Despite his lack of a Quirk, Izuku refused to let go of his dream. He was going to apply to U.A. High School, the most prestigious hero academy in the nation. It was a fool's errand, statistically impossible, but the heroic spirit of All Might burned too brightly in his chest to simply extinguish.

 

"I'm heading out, Mom!" Izuku called out as he slipped on his iconic red shoes.

 

Inko Midoriya poked her head out from the kitchen, her eyes crinkling with a mixture of love and perpetual worry. "Have a good day, Izuku! Oh, wait! I packed your lunch. I made that boiled spinach you used to like so much as a kid. I know it's a bit strange, but you looked a little pale yesterday, and it’s good for your iron!"

 

Izuku offered a gentle, somewhat strained smile, taking the green cloth-wrapped bento box. "Thanks, Mom. See you later."

 

 

 

The air in the classroom of Aldera Junior High was stifling, thick with the scent of chalk dust, adolescent sweat, and the distinct, acrid smell of burnt sugar—the chemical byproduct of Katsuki Bakugo’s nitroglycerin sweat.

 

Izuku kept his head down, his pencil flying across the pages of his notebook. He was currently muttering under his breath, analyzing the debut of a new pro-hero, Mt. Lady, whom he had seen on his commute.

 

"...her gigantification Quirk is incredible for widespread area control, but the collateral damage to infrastructure is a significant drawback. Furthermore, her lack of mobility in tight, urban corridors makes her highly susceptible to..."

 

"Midoriya."

 

Izuku snapped out of his trance, realizing the entire class was staring at him. The teacher stood at the podium, holding a stack of career aptitude papers.

 

"You're also applying to U.A. High, aren't you?" the teacher asked, his tone laced with a mixture of disbelief and pity.

 

The classroom descended into a stunned silence for a fraction of a second before erupting into uproarious laughter. Desks rattled as students howled, pointing at Izuku, who shrank into his seat, wishing he could evaporate.

 

"Midoriya? No way!"

"You can't get into the hero course just by studying!"

"He's completely Quirkless!"

 

BAM!

 

An explosion rocked the room. Izuku’s desk was suddenly engulfed in a burst of searing heat and concussive force, sending him tumbling backward out of his chair. He hit the floor hard, groaning as the smoke cleared to reveal Katsuki Bakugo standing over him, his palms smoking and a feral grin stretching across his face.

 

"Listen up, Deku," Bakugo snarled, his voice a dangerous, gravelly growl. "You're even worse than the rest of these rejects. You're completely Quirkless. Do you really think you can stand in the same ring as me?"

 

"N-no, wait, Kacchan!" Izuku stammered, scrambling backward like a cornered crab. "It's not like I'm trying to compete with you! I swear! It's just... it's been my dream since I was little. And there's no harm in trying..."

 

"Try?! What can you do?" Bakugo spat, his crimson eyes burning with unadulterated contempt.

 

Class eventually ended, but the torment did not. As Izuku was packing up his bag, Bakugo snatched his notebook off the desk.

 

"Hero Analysis for the Future?" Bakugo read, waving it mockingly. "Are you kidding me?"

 

Before Izuku could protest, Bakugo clapped his hands together, sandwiching the notebook. A sharp CRACK echoed through the room, and flames licked the edges of the book. The cover charred and blackened, the pages curling inward from the intense heat.

 

"Ah!" Izuku cried out, reaching for his ruined treasure.

 

Bakugo nonchalantly tossed the smoldering book out the open third-story window. It fluttered down like a dying bird, landing squarely in the school's koi pond below.

 

"Most top-tier heroes have stories about their school days," Bakugo lectured, stuffing his hands into his pockets. "I want my story to be that I was the only student from this crappy public middle school to make it into U.A. I'm a perfectionist, you see. So do me a favor, Deku. Don't apply to U.A."

 

Bakugo turned to leave with his lackeys, pausing at the door. He glanced over his shoulder, his eyes cold and devoid of empathy.

 

"If you want a Quirk so badly, there's a quick way to do it. Take a swan dive off the roof and pray you'll be born with a Quirk in your next life."

 

The words struck Izuku like a physical blow. The sheer cruelty of it paralyzed him. He stood alone in the empty classroom, his fists clenched tightly at his sides. For a fleeting, bizarre second, the smell of the ocean hit his nostrils. He felt the phantom pressure of a wooden pipe between his teeth. His jaw muscles tightened, and a deep, ancestral anger bubbled in his chest. I’ve had all I can stands...

 

He shook his head violently, dispelling the feeling. No. He was just Izuku. Powerless, weak, useless Deku.

 

He trudged downstairs, retrieving his soggy, fish-nibbled notebook from the pond. The ink was running, the pages ruined. He held it to his chest, the weight of his reality pressing down on him harder than ever before.

 

 

 

The walk home was a blur of gray concrete and hollow thoughts. Izuku decided to take a shortcut under a large overpass. The shadows were deep here, the air damp and smelling faintly of sewage.

 

Take a swan dive... Bakugo’s words echoed in his skull.

 

"Idiot," Izuku muttered to himself, his voice wavering. "If I really jumped, he'd be instigated for suicide. Think before you speak..."

 

He forced a weak smile, attempting to mimic All Might's signature laugh to cheer himself up. "Ha... ha... ha..."

 

A metallic clanking sound echoed through the tunnel. Izuku froze. He turned around slowly.

 

Behind him, a manhole cover rattled violently before being blown off entirely. From the dark depths of the sewer, a horrific mass of dark green, viscous sludge erupted. It smelled of rotting garbage and stagnant water. Within the shifting, gelatinous mass, two bulbous, manic eyes and a jagged mouth full of jagged teeth formed.

 

"A medium-sized invisibility cloak," the Sludge Villain hissed, his voice wet and gurgling. "Perfect."

 

Izuku’s blood ran cold. He tried to run, to scream, but his legs were lead.

 

Before he could take a single step, the villain lunged. A tidal wave of putrid sludge crashed over Izuku, knocking him to the pavement. The impact knocked the wind out of him, and instantly, the villain was upon him, forcing thick, suffocating tendrils of slime down his throat and into his nostrils.

 

"Don't worry," the villain purred, the sludge tightening around Izuku's limbs like an anaconda. "I'm just taking over your body. It'll only hurt for about forty-five seconds. Then, it'll all be over."

 

Izuku thrashed violently. His hands clawed at the sludge covering his face, but there was nothing solid to grip. His fingernails tore through the liquid, finding no purchase. He couldn't breathe. His lungs burned with agonizing intensity, screaming for oxygen. Tears streamed down his face, mixing with the foul slime.

 

His vision began to darken at the edges. Black spots danced across his eyes. The strength in his arms faded. He was going to die here. In a dark tunnel. Nameless. Quirkless.

 

As the darkness threatened to consume him completely, a voice echoed in the deepest recesses of his mind. It wasn't his voice. It was the gruff, booming voice from his dreams.

 

“Come on, lad! Don't let this bilge-rat sink your ship! Where's yer spinach?!”

 

Izuku's eyes rolled back in his head.

 

Suddenly, a loud, metallic clatter echoed from the tunnel entrance. A colossal figure stood silhouetted against the afternoon sun.

 

"FEAR NOT, YOUNG MAN." The voice boomed, vibrating with absolute, unshakeable authority. "I AM HERE!"

 

The Sludge Villain panicked, whipping a tendril of slime toward the figure. But the man was faster than the eye could track. In a fraction of a second, the towering blond hero was directly in front of them. He pulled back a massive fist, the air pressure around it visibly distorting.

 

"TEXAS... SMASH!"

 

The shockwave was cataclysmic. A literal tornado generated from the sheer force of the punch tore through the confined tunnel. The air pressure was so immense that it ripped the sludge villain apart at the molecular level, scattering the slime across the tunnel walls in a violent splatter.

 

Izuku felt the sludge leave his throat, replaced by a massive rush of sweet, life-giving air. But the concussive force of the punch was too much for his oxygen-deprived brain. As he saw the smiling face of the Number One Hero, the Symbol of Peace, standing victorious before him, the world faded to black.

 

 

 

"Hey! Hey! Wake up!"

 

Izuku's eyes fluttered open. He was greeted by a series of gentle, yet heavy slaps against his cheek. Standing over him, in all his muscular, towering glory, was All Might.

 

"Oh! Good! You're awake!" All Might boomed, his trademark smile blindingly bright. "Sorry about that! I didn't mean to get you caught up in my villain hunt. I usually don't make mistakes like this, but I was excited in a new city!"

 

Izuku scrambled backward, his heart leaping into his throat. He couldn't believe it. The man, the myth, the legend was standing right in front of him.

 

"A-All Might! The real thing! Oh my god, I need an autograph!" Izuku frantically searched for his notebook, finding it lying on the ground. He flipped it open, only to find that All Might had already signed a massive, sprawling signature across a two-page spread.

 

Izuku bowed so fast his head almost hit the pavement. "Thank you! Thank you! It'll be an heirloom! A family treasure!"

 

"Well, I must be off!" All Might announced, patting his pockets. He held up two large plastic soda bottles, completely filled with the subdued, swirling mass of the Sludge Villain. "I've got to get this guy to the police."

 

"Wait! Already?" Izuku panicked. He hadn't asked his question. The question that had haunted him his entire life. "I have... I have something I need to ask you!"

 

"Pros are constantly battling time and enemies!" All Might declared, bending his knees. The concrete beneath him cracked under the pressure of his impending leap.

 

In a moment of pure, unadulterated desperation, as All Might launched himself into the sky with explosive force, Izuku lunged forward and grabbed onto the hero's massive leg.

 

The wind tore at Izuku’s face, whipping his hair violently as the ground fell away with terrifying speed. The city transformed into a miniature diorama far below.

 

"Hey! Let go!" All Might yelled over the roaring wind, looking down in shock. "Your fanaticism is too much! If you let go now, you'll die!"

 

"If I let go now, I'll die!" Izuku screamed back, tears streaming from his eyes from the wind pressure. "I have to ask you something!"

 

"Alright, alright! Just close your eyes and mouth!"

 

All Might adjusted his trajectory, scanning the cityscape before plummeting toward the flat roof of a nearby commercial building. They landed with a heavy thud, the impact rattling Izuku to his bones.

 

"Good grief," All Might sighed, stepping away from the trembling teenager. "If you knock on the door down there, someone will let you in. Now, I really must go."

 

"Wait!" Izuku pleaded, stepping forward. "Please! I need to know!"

 

He closed his eyes tightly, his fists clenched, his heart bearing its deepest vulnerability.

 

"Even if I don't have a Quirk... Can I still become a hero? Can someone without a Quirk be like you?!"

 

The wind seemed to stop. The silence on the rooftop was deafening. Izuku kept his eyes closed, terrified of the answer, but needing to hear it.

 

"Without a Quirk...?" All Might’s voice sounded strange. Strained.

 

Suddenly, a cloud of thick, white steam erupted from where All Might stood. Izuku opened his eyes, coughing as the smoke cleared.

 

The towering, muscular symbol of peace was gone. In his place stood a skeletal, emaciated man with sunken, shadowed eyes, baggy clothes, and sharp, angular features. He looked like a stiff breeze would snap him in half.

 

Izuku screamed. "You're deflating! You're an imposter!"

 

"I am All Might," the skeletal man said, a stream of blood suddenly leaking from his mouth. He wiped it away casually. "You know how guys at the pool suck in their gut to look good? It's like that."

 

Izuku’s brain short-circuited. His idol. The invincible god among men.

 

All Might sighed, sitting down heavily against the railing. He lifted his baggy t-shirt, revealing a horrific, jagged scar that covered the entire left side of his chest. The flesh was sunken, twisted, and purple.

 

"An injury I got from an enemy attack five years ago," All Might explained, his voice low and tired. "My respiratory system was nearly destroyed. My stomach was removed. I've gone through repeated surgeries. Now, I can only do hero work for about three hours a day."

 

"Five years ago?" Izuku murmured, his encyclopedic knowledge of heroes racing. "Was it the fight with Toxic Chainsaw?"

 

"You know your stuff," All Might chuckled dryly. "But no. That punk couldn't do this to me. I asked that this fight be kept under wraps. A Symbol of Peace who saves people with a smile must never be daunted by the forces of evil. I smile to hide the fear inside. I smile to trick the fear."

 

All Might stood up, walking toward the rooftop access door. He didn't look back at Izuku. His next words were spoken with a somber, crushing finality.

 

"Pros are always risking their lives. Some villains just can't be beaten without power. So, no. I honestly don't think you can become a hero without a Quirk."

 

The words struck Izuku with the force of a physical execution. The final nail in the coffin of his lifelong dream, hammered in by the very man who inspired it.

 

"If you want to help people, become a police officer," All Might said gently, opening the door. "They get crap for just receiving villains, but it's a fine profession. It's not bad to dream, young man. But you have to be realistic."

 

The door clicked shut.

 

Izuku was left alone on the roof. The afternoon sun beat down on him, but he felt freezing cold. The world seemed completely devoid of color. The dream was dead. The doctor had said it. His mother had apologized for it. Bakugo had mocked it. And now, All Might had confirmed it.

 

He didn't cry. He was too numb. He slowly walked down the stairwell, his feet dragging as if chained to iron weights.

 

 

 

Izuku didn't know how long he walked aimlessly through the streets. He was operating on autopilot, his mind a vast, empty void.

 

BOOM!

 

A massive explosion rattled the windows of the street he was on. A plume of black smoke billowed into the sky a few blocks away. The sounds of sirens and screaming civilians pierced the air.

 

Out of sheer, ingrained habit, Izuku's feet began to move toward the commotion. A villain attack. I should go take notes... He stopped himself. No. What's the point? I'm not going to be a hero.

 

Still, the crowd was moving, and he found himself carried along with the tide until he stood at the perimeter of a chaotic scene in a shopping district.

 

Fires raged through the alleyway. Pro-heroes were scattered around, looking helpless. Death Arms was holding back the crowd. Kamui Woods was attempting to put out the fires, but his wood quirk was highly flammable. Mt. Lady couldn't fit into the narrow two-lane street.

 

Izuku pushed through the crowd, looking to see what the monster was.

 

His heart stopped.

 

It was the Sludge Villain. The very same one.

 

Wait, Izuku thought, his breath hitching. If he's here... that means...

 

He remembered grabbing All Might's leg. He remembered the fierce wind. The bottles. The bottles must have fallen out of All Might's pockets when Izuku clung to him.

 

This is my fault, Izuku realized, a wave of nauseating guilt washing over him. Because I was selfish. Because I couldn't accept reality. This is my fault.

 

He looked closer at the monster. The sludge was thrashing wildly, fueled by explosive bursts of fire that erupted from within its mass. The villain had taken a hostage. A middle school student with ash-blond hair.

 

The sludge shifted, and for a split second, Izuku saw the hostage's face.

 

It was Katsuki Bakugo.

 

Bakugo’s eyes were wide. For the first time in his life, the arrogant, explosive prodigy looked completely, utterly terrified. He was suffocating, just as Izuku had been. He was looking at the crowd, at the heroes, begging silently for someone to save him.

 

The pro-heroes were shouting.

 

"We can't do anything!"

"None of us have the right Quirks for this!"

"We have to wait for someone with a suitable Quirk!"

 

They were just standing there. Waiting. While Bakugo was dying.

 

Izuku's mind went blank. The fear, the logic, the crushing rejection from All Might—everything vanished.

 

Before he could process what he was doing, his legs moved.

 

He burst past the police tape, ignoring the shouts of Death Arms and the gasps of the crowd. He sprinted directly toward the towering inferno and the horrific slime monster.

 

"Idiot! Stop! You'll get yourself killed!" Kamui Woods yelled.

 

Izuku didn't listen. His mind was racing, trying to find a tactical solution. What do I do? What do I do? Page 25! A swift strike to a sensitive area!

 

He ripped off his yellow backpack, holding it by the straps, and hurled it with all his might directly at the villain's monstrous eye.

 

It was a desperate, foolish throw.

 

The backpack flew through the air, but the Sludge Villain merely shifted its form. The bag passed harmlessly through a liquid portion of its body, clattering uselessly to the burning pavement.

 

"You again?!" the Sludge Villain roared, recognizing the scrawny green-haired kid. "You've got some nerve, brat!"

 

With blinding speed, a massive arm of solidifying sludge whipped out, striking Izuku squarely in the chest.

 

The force of the blow was akin to being hit by a speeding truck. Izuku was launched backward, flying through the air, completely out of control. He crashed through the shattered glass window of a heavily damaged, evacuated convenience store on the corner of the street.

 

He rolled violently across the linoleum floor, knocking over shelves and displays. Dust, debris, and crushed merchandise rained down upon him.

 

Izuku groaned, his vision swimming. Blood trickled down his forehead, stinging his eyes. His ribs ached with a fiery intensity, and his left arm felt dislocated. He was buried under a pile of collapsed shelving, unable to move.

 

Through the broken window, he could hear the villain laughing, the heroes shouting, and the sickening sound of Bakugo's muffled explosions growing weaker and weaker.

 

I'm sorry, Izuku thought, tears mingling with the blood on his face. I'm so sorry, Kacchan. I couldn't do anything. I'm just Deku.

 

He closed his eyes, preparing for the villain's final strike.

 

Clink. Clatter. Roll.

 

Something bumped gently against his hand.

 

Izuku weakly opened one eye. Lying in the dust, amidst the crushed cereal boxes and shattered soda bottles, was a small, cylindrical tin can. It was heavily dented, the paper label torn and scorched from the surrounding fires.

 

But Izuku could still read it. The label featured a drawing of vibrant, dark green leaves.

 

Spinach.

 

Izuku stared at the can.

 

Suddenly, the world around him seemed to slow down to a crawl. The roaring fires, the screaming crowd, the villain's laughter—it all faded into a muffled hum.

 

A heavy, phantom smell of sea salt and pipe tobacco flooded the ruined grocery store. The sound of a distant, melancholic foghorn echoed in his ears.

 

His stomach, despite the pain, let out a thunderous, demanding growl. It wasn't hunger. It was an ancient, cellular craving. An instinct buried so deep within his DNA, it predated his very existence.

 

“I yam what I yam,” the gruff voice whispered in his mind, louder and clearer than ever before. “And I yam a hero. Eat yer greens, boy.”

 

Izuku's trembling, bloodied fingers reached out. He grasped the cold, dented metal of the can.

 

He didn't know how he did it. He had never opened a can without a pull-tab or a can opener in his life. But his thumb and index finger clamped down on the top rim of the tin with inhuman precision.

 

He squeezed.

 

POP!

 

The lid of the can shot straight up into the air like a bullet, embedding itself into the ceiling.

 

From the open tin, a massive clump of dark, boiled spinach was ejected. It defied gravity, performing a perfect, mathematically impossible arc through the dusty air.

 

Izuku didn't think. He didn't question it. He opened his mouth wide.

 

The spinach landed squarely on his tongue. He swallowed it whole.

 

For exactly one second, there was absolute silence.

 

Then, the universe broke.

 

TOOT-TOOT!

 

The sound wasn't a hallucination this time. It was a deafening, physical sound wave that blasted out from Izuku's position, shattering the remaining glass in the convenience store. It sounded exactly like the whistle of a steamship, but higher pitched, frantic, and triumphant.

 

An explosive surge of energy, completely foreign to the biological laws of the human body, detonated within Izuku. His heart pumped at a thousand beats a minute, not with blood, but with pure, unadulterated toon-force.

 

The black gakuran uniform jacket ripped at the seams. First, the shoulders tore open. Then, the sleeves exploded outward as Izuku's forearms rapidly, terrifyingly expanded. They ballooned in size, muscle fibers weaving together into dense, hardened mounds of flesh that looked like ham hocks. The skin tanned instantly, and on the crest of each colossal forearm, a glowing, neon-blue anchor tattoo materialized, radiating a faint, humming light.

 

Izuku stood up. The collapsed shelving that had pinned him was casually thrown off, the metal twisting and disintegrating as if made of wet tissue paper.

 

He stepped out of the ruined store, back into the burning street.

 

The pro-heroes stopped shouting. The crowd fell dead silent. Even the Sludge Villain paused, its bulbous eyes widening in confusion.

 

The boy who had just been swatted away like a fly was walking toward them. But he looked... wrong.

 

Izuku’s posture was slouched, yet aggressively confident. He bounced slightly with every step, his massive forearms swinging heavily at his sides. His face was contorted in a bizarre expression. His right eye was squinted completely shut in a permanent wink. His left eye was wide, focused, and burning with an intensity that made the surrounding fires look cold. His jaw jutted forward prominently.

 

Most absurd of all, clutched tightly between his teeth, was a wooden corncob pipe. Where it came from, no one knew. From the bowl of the pipe, small puffs of smoke shaped like anchors floated into the sky.

 

In the crowd, a skeletal, blond-haired man dropped the plastic grocery bags he was holding. The oranges rolled into the gutter. Toshinori Yagi—All Might—stared in absolute, mind-shattering disbelief.

 

"What... what is that?" Death Arms muttered, stepping back instinctively.

 

"Hey! Kid! Get out of there!" Kamui Woods yelled, though his voice lacked its usual authority.

 

Izuku ignored them. He stopped ten paces from the Sludge Villain. He removed the pipe from his mouth with one massive, calloused hand.

 

When he spoke, the voice was Izuku’s, but heavily layered with the gruff, raspy, sailor’s drawl from his dreams.

 

"Now listen here, ya overgrown puddle of bilge water," Izuku declared, pointing the stem of his pipe at the monster. "I'm a polite boy, usually. But you're messin' with my friend, and I've had all I can stands, and I can't stands no more!"

 

He popped the pipe back into his mouth. TOOT-TOOT!

 

The Sludge Villain sneered, recovering from its initial shock. "I don't know what kind of Quirk you just pulled out of your ass, brat, but physical attacks don't work on me! I'm liquid! I'll drown you where you stand!"

 

The villain unleashed a massive barrage of sludge, forming a half-dozen spiked tentacles that lashed out at Izuku with the speed of a striking cobra.

 

Death Arms screamed a warning.

 

Izuku didn't dodge. He simply stood there, his jaw jutted out.

 

The spiked sludge tentacles struck him. But instead of piercing his flesh or knocking him back, an impossible, cartoonish physics took over. When a spike hit his chest, his torso simply stretched backward like a rubber band, completely absorbing the impact, before snapping back into place with a loud BOING sound.

 

The sludge spikes literally bounced off him, vibrating harmlessly.

 

The villain gasped. "What the hell?!"

 

Izuku chuckled. It was the laugh. “Ug-gug-gug-gug-gug!”

 

He planted his feet firmly on the asphalt. He pulled his right arm back.

 

He began to wind it up.

 

His massive forearm began to spin in a circular motion. Slow at first, then faster. And faster. And faster. The air around his fist began to distort. A high-pitched whistling noise, like a falling bomb, began to emanate from the sheer velocity of the rotation. His arm was a complete blur, a propeller of pure, unadulterated kinetic energy.

 

"Shiver me timbers, ya big slimeball!" Izuku yelled, pulling his left arm back like a bowstring. "Have a taste of a genuine Midoriya-spinach-smash!"

 

He threw the punch.

 

He didn't hit the villain’s physical mass. He punched the very air in front of the villain.

 

The resulting shockwave was unlike anything the city had ever seen. It didn't just generate wind pressure; it generated a localized, reality-warping hurricane.

 

But it wasn't destructive. It was... cartoonish.

 

The shockwave hit the Sludge Villain. The villain didn't explode. It didn't scatter. Instead, a series of bizarre, rapid-fire sound effects echoed through the street.

 

WHAM! CRASH! BING! BONK! WHIZZ!

 

The sheer force of the punch completely negated the villain's liquid properties. The massive wave of sludge was instantly compacted, forced by impossible physics into a tight, solid space.

 

In the blink of an eye, the towering monster was gone.

 

In its place, resting neatly on the asphalt, was a silver platter. And on that silver platter were exactly twelve, perfectly shaped, symmetrically aligned mud-pies. They even had little decorative crests of sludge on top.

 

Sitting next to the platter, completely unharmed and covered only in a light dusting of dirt, was Katsuki Bakugo. He was gasping for air, his crimson eyes wide and staring blankly at the mud-pies.

 

The fires in the alleyway had been entirely snuffed out by the residual wind pressure, leaving only a gentle, cool breeze carrying the faint smell of spinach.

 

The silence that followed was absolute. It was a silence born of thousands of human brains simultaneously failing to comprehend what their eyes had just witnessed.

 

Kamui Woods slowly lowered his arms. Mt. Lady’s jaw was unhinged.

 

Katsuki Bakugo looked up from the mud-pies. He stared at Izuku. He looked at the massive, pulsating forearms. He looked at the glowing anchor tattoos. He looked at the corncob pipe.

 

"Deku...?" Bakugo whispered, his voice cracking. "What the... what the actual f—"

 

Before Bakugo could finish his sentence, the reality-warping energy within Izuku suddenly flatlined.

 

PFFFFFFFT.

 

A sound identical to a balloon rapidly losing air echoed from Izuku. His massive forearms instantly deflated, shrinking back to their scrawny, pale, Quirkless proportions. The glowing anchor tattoos vanished. The corncob pipe popped out of existence like a soap bubble. His right eye unsquinted.

 

Izuku blinked, the adrenaline and toon-force abruptly leaving his system, replaced by an overwhelming wave of exhaustion and the blinding pain of his previous injuries.

 

He looked down at his normal, shaking hands. He looked at the mud-pies. He looked at the stunned crowd, and finally, he met the utterly flabbergasted gaze of All Might, who was standing at the edge of the police tape.

 

"I... I think..." Izuku stammered, his normal voice returning, weak and trembling. "I think I'm gonna..."

 

Above Izuku's head, entirely visible to everyone in the crowd, a glowing, holographic digital clock popped into existence with a cheerful ding! sound.

 

The numbers read: 2:59:59.

 

Then, they ticked down. 2:59:58.

 

Izuku’s eyes rolled to the back of his head, and he collapsed onto the pavement, completely unconscious.

 

The clock continued to tick.

 

The scent of sterile alcohol and the rhythmic, steady beep-beep-beep of a heart monitor were the first things to register in Izuku Midoriya’s mind.

 

He opened his eyes slowly. The fluorescent lights of the hospital ceiling were blindingly bright, forcing him to squint. His body felt heavy, incredibly sore, and yet, strangely hollow, as if a great, expansive pressure had suddenly been evacuated from his very cells.

 

He turned his head. Sitting in a plastic chair next to his bed was a skeletal, hollow-cheeked man in an oversized, yellow pinstripe suit. Toshinori Yagi—the true form of All Might—was leaning forward, his hands clasped together, watching Izuku with an expression that was equal parts awe, confusion, and deep concern.

 

"Ah. You're awake, young Midoriya," Toshinori said, his voice quiet in the pristine hospital room.

 

Izuku blinked, his memories rushing back in a fragmented, chaotic flood. The Sludge Villain. Bakugo suffocating. The desperate throw of his backpack. The brutal impact that sent him flying into the convenience store. And then…

 

The can. The leafy greens. The pipe. The… mud-pies?

 

"All Might…?" Izuku croaked, his throat feeling dry and scratchy. "What… what happened? I remember running in, and then… everything went crazy. I felt like… like someone else."

 

Toshinori didn't answer immediately. Instead, he pointed a long, bony finger at the space directly above Izuku's head.

 

"Look up, my boy."

 

Izuku furrowed his brow and tilted his chin up. Floating about a foot above his messy green hair was a glowing, holographic digital clock. It was completely translucent, emitting a soft green light, and it was ticking down.

 

0:00:15... 0:00:14... 0:00:13...

 

"What is that?!" Izuku yelped, trying to swat at it. His hand passed right through the numbers, disturbing nothing but the air.

 

"The doctors have been running tests on you for the past two hours and fifty-nine minutes," Toshinori explained, his blue eyes unblinking. "X-rays, blood tests, quirk registries. They can't figure out what it is. It's not a hologram projected by any known technology. It's tethered to your biological signature. And, according to my observations, it started exactly at three hours the moment you… transformed."

 

"Transformed?" Izuku’s heart began to race. 0:00:08... 0:00:07... "You mean I really did that? The mud-pies? The giant arms?"

 

"You bent the laws of physics, young man," Toshinori said, a hint of genuine reverence in his raspy voice. "You saved your friend. You saved the city block. And you did it with a power that I, in my forty years of heroism, have never even conceptually witnessed."

 

0:00:03... 0:00:02... 0:00:01...

 

0:00:00.

 

A loud, comical PFFFFFFFFT! echoed through the sterile room. It was the distinct, undeniable sound of a cheap party balloon rapidly losing its air.

 

The glowing holographic clock shattered into a burst of harmless, sparkling green confetti that vanished before it even hit the hospital bedsheets. A sudden wave of intense lethargy washed over Izuku. The strange, lingering phantom sensation of sea salt in his nose completely dissipated.

 

He was just Izuku again.

 

The door to the hospital room swung open, and a doctor holding a clipboard rushed in, looking frantic. "Midoriya! The anomaly! It's gone from the monitors! What happened?"

 

Toshinori stood up quickly, flashing a reassuring, albeit skeletal, smile. "Ah, nothing to worry about, Doctor! The boy's Quirk simply has a visual timer that ran its course! We'll be taking our leave now, if he's medically cleared!"

 

The doctor looked bewildered. "Medically cleared? Sir, he was thrown through a plate-glass window by a villain with the force of a moving truck. He should have broken ribs, a ruptured spleen, and severe lacerations. But… his x-rays are perfect. He doesn't even have a bruise. It’s as if his body is made of… of rubber."

 

Izuku stared at his own hands. A Quirk? Do I… do I finally have a Quirk?

 

"We'll follow up with our own Quirk specialist," Toshinori lied smoothly, placing a hand on Izuku's shoulder. "Come, young Midoriya. We have much to discuss."

 

 

 

Thirty minutes later, Izuku found himself standing on the sand of Dagobah Municipal Beach Park.

 

To call it a beach was a gross misnomer. It was an illegal dumping ground. Mountains of rusted refrigerators, crushed cars, broken washing machines, and general societal refuse choked the coastline, completely obscuring the ocean view. The smell of rust and rotting kelp was pungent.

 

The sun was beginning to set, casting long, melancholic shadows across the mountains of garbage.

 

Toshinori stood beside him, holding several plastic grocery bags. The skeletal man looked out at the trash-filled horizon and sighed. "Heroes these days… they only care about the flashy stuff. The villains, the media, the fame. They forget that true heroism is found in the dirt. In the community."

 

Toshinori turned to Izuku, his expression turning deeply serious.

 

"Young Midoriya. When you ran out into that street today, to save a boy who had tormented you… you acted before you had a chance to think. You moved because your body commanded you to save a life. That is the essence of a true hero."

 

Izuku felt tears prick the corners of his eyes. The words he had waited his entire life to hear were finally being spoken to him.

 

"I originally sought you out today because I believed you were worthy of inheriting my power. One For All," Toshinori confessed, causing Izuku to gasp. "But… after what I saw in that alleyway… I realize you don't need my power. You have something… else."

 

Toshinori reached into one of the plastic grocery bags. He pulled out three items and placed them on the hood of a rusted, half-buried sedan.

 

A can of spinach.

A bag of fresh spinach leaves.

A Tupperware container filled with boiled spinach.

 

"I bought these at the hospital cafeteria and the local grocer," Toshinori said. "When I asked you what happened right before you transformed, you mentioned eating from a dented can of spinach. I need to know if it was a fluke, a trigger condition for a dormant Quirk, or something else entirely."

 

Izuku looked at the greens. He remembered the phantom voice in his head. I yam what I yam.

 

"Alright," Izuku said, his voice trembling slightly. He picked up the bag of fresh spinach leaves. He opened it, grabbed a handful, and shoved it into his mouth. He chewed the bitter, earthy leaves and swallowed.

 

They waited. The seagulls cried in the distance.

 

Nothing happened.

 

"Hmm," Toshinori muttered. "Perhaps it must be processed?"

 

Izuku picked up the Tupperware of boiled spinach. He took a large bite, swallowing it down.

 

Again, nothing. Izuku's shoulders slumped. "Maybe... maybe it was just a one-time thing. A miracle."

 

"Try the can," Toshinori urged, pointing a bony finger at the tin.

 

Izuku picked up the can. It was a standard, aluminum tin. He looked for a pull-tab, but there wasn't one.

 

Just squeeze it, a gruff, phantom voice echoed in the back of his mind.

 

Izuku frowned, but applied pressure with his thumb and forefinger to the top of the can. Instantly, an impossible, hydraulic pressure built up within the tin.

 

POP!

 

The lid shot off into the stratosphere, disappearing from sight. A perfectly cylindrical mass of dark green mush vaulted out of the tin, arcing gracefully through the air. Izuku instinctively opened his mouth, and the spinach landed perfectly on his tongue. He swallowed it in one gulp.

 

For a single heartbeat, the world went completely silent.

 

Then, the symphony of absurdity began.

 

TOOT-TOOT!

 

The deafening sound of a steamboat whistle blasted from Izuku’s mouth. Toshinori stumbled backward, his jaw dropping as he watched the laws of biology and physics disintegrate before his very eyes.

 

Izuku’s school uniform ripped as his forearms exploded outward, swelling into the size of large tree trunks. The glowing, neon-blue anchor tattoos flared to life on his skin. His neck thickened, his jaw jutted forward like the prow of a battleship, and his right eye snapped shut in an immovable, permanent wink.

 

From thin air, accompanied by a soft pop sound, a wooden corncob pipe materialized between his teeth. He took a puff, and a smoke ring in the exact shape of an anchor floated up toward the sunset.

 

Above his head, with a cheerful ding!, the glowing green digital clock reappeared.

 

2:59:59... 2:59:58...

 

"By the gods..." Toshinori breathed, stepping closer, his eyes wide with absolute disbelief. "It's back. The presence... the sheer, unbridled aura of power. It surpasses anything I have ever felt. Even in my prime."

 

Izuku looked down at his massive, meaty hands. He flexed his fingers. He felt no fear. He felt no anxiety. The timid, stuttering Izuku Midoriya was currently riding shotgun in a vessel piloted by the ancient, unbreakable spirit of the Sailor.

 

"Well blow me down," Izuku said around the pipe, his voice a gravelly, rhythmic drawl. "I feels like a million bucks! Ug-gug-gug-gug!"

 

"Midoriya!" Toshinori called out. "Can you hear me? Are you in control?"

 

"I yam what I yam, Mr. All Might, sir!" Izuku saluted crisply, his massive forearm moving in a blur. "And I'm ready for duty! Just point me at the bilge rats!"

 

"Okay... let's test this," Toshinori pointed to a massive pile of trash down the beach—a colossal mound of rusted cars, broken appliances, and industrial tires that must have weighed upwards of fifty tons. "Try to move that pile. See how much you can lift."

 

Izuku squinted his good eye at the mountain of garbage. He didn't walk over to it to lift it piece by piece.

 

Instead, he walked to the very edge of the sandy beach, where the garbage met the shoreline. He reached down and grabbed the actual, physical surface of the beach itself. He gripped the sand as if it were a solid carpet.

 

Toshinori watched in horror and awe as Izuku yanked his arms upward.

 

With a sound like tearing fabric, the entire geographic plane of the beach rippled. A literal wave of solid earth rolled forward, traveling under the trash pile. The fifty tons of garbage were launched high into the air.

 

While the trash was suspended in mid-air, Izuku became a blur of motion. Whizz! Bang! Clang! Smash!

 

He flew into the falling debris, his massive fists striking metal and rubber with the speed of a machine gun. He wasn't just hitting them; he was forging them.

 

Within five seconds, Izuku landed back on the sand, wiping his brow. Behind him, the trash fell to the earth with a heavy, localized THUD.

 

Toshinori's jaw practically unhinged.

 

The fifty tons of garbage had not been scattered. It had been punched, twisted, and compacted into a perfect, 1/100th scale replica of the Eiffel Tower, made entirely of crushed sedans and bent refrigerator doors. It was a structural masterpiece.

 

"Well, that was a nice warm-up," Izuku chuckled around his pipe. Toot-toot! "What's next, skipper?"

 

Toshinori fell to his knees in the sand. He clutched his head. He was the Number One Hero in the world. He possessed a Quirk cultivated over generations, designed to combat the ultimate evil.

 

And this green-haired teenager had just rearranged the geography of a beach and sculpted a monument out of trash in five seconds because he ate a can of processed vegetables.

 

"It's... it's not a Quirk," Toshinori muttered, his mind racing. "Quirks have biological limits. They adhere to the basic laws of thermodynamics. This... this is Toon-Force. This is reality manipulation constrained entirely by comedic timing and a three-hour limit."

 

Toshinori stood up, a new fire burning in his sunken eyes.

 

"Midoriya," Toshinori said, his voice deadly serious. "You have exactly ten months until the U.A. Entrance Exam."

 

"Aye aye!" Izuku stood at attention.

 

"Your power is absolute. While that clock is ticking, you are effectively invincible. But," Toshinori pointed a finger at the hovering timer. "When that clock hits zero, you are completely defenseless. And you cannot rely on having canned spinach perfectly accessible at every waking moment of your life."

 

Izuku’s pipe drooped slightly. The Sailor's bravado faded just a fraction, the analytical mind of Izuku bleeding through. "You're right... if a villain catches me without a can... or if I'm fighting for more than three hours..."

 

"Exactly," Toshinori nodded. "Therefore, I am not going to teach you how to use this power. The power already knows how to use itself. For the next ten months, I am going to teach you how to survive when the clock is at zero. I will teach you hand-to-hand combat, situational awareness, and evasion. We will build your base physical body so you aren't completely helpless without your greens."

 

Izuku grinned, his massive jaw jutting out proudly. He raised his enormous forearm.

 

"I'm ready, skipper! Strong to the finich!"

 

 

 

The next ten months were a grueling, bizarre crucible.

 

True to his word, Toshinori Yagi became Izuku’s master. But the training was completely different from anything a normal hero candidate would experience.

 

They didn't train Izuku's Quirk. They trained his humanity.

 

Every morning before school, and every evening after, Izuku would meet Toshinori at Dagobah Beach. Without consuming spinach, Izuku was subjected to intense martial arts training, stamina building, and parkour. Toshinori, even in his weakened, skeletal state, was a master of combat. He taught Izuku how to dodge, how to read an opponent's center of gravity, and most importantly, how to stall for time.

 

"A true hero must protect the innocent, even when powerless!" Toshinori would yell as Izuku scrambled over mounds of trash, narrowly avoiding the rubber tires Toshinori hurled at him. "If you are caught without your spinach, you must be able to survive long enough to retrieve it!"

 

Izuku's base physique improved. He didn't become a bodybuilder, but he developed lean, highly functional muscle. He grew faster, more agile, and deeply observant.

 

Parallel to his physical training, Izuku became obsessed with logistics.

 

He realized that his "Quirk" (as they officially registered it, naming it 'Leafy Augmentation' to avoid suspicion) had extremely rigid rules.

 

1. The Catalyst: It only activated from eating canned spinach. Fresh or boiled did nothing. However, the spinach didn't have to be from a commercial tin. Through experimentation, Izuku discovered he could boil fresh spinach, pack it into small, custom-made aluminum capsules, and upon consuming the contents, the power would still activate. It was the process of canning and preserving the green mush that somehow triggered the spirit of the Sailor.

2. The Timer: The power lasted exactly 3 hours, down to the nanosecond. Once activated, it could not be turned off early. He had to ride out the full 180 minutes.

3. The Cooldown: There was none. If he ate another can of spinach at 2 hours and 59 minutes, the timer would simply reset back to 3:00:00. However, eating multiple cans at once did not stack the time or the power. It was a flat, binary state of existence.

4. The Toon-Force: While transformed, Izuku's durability and strength were entirely dependent on his emotional state and the comedic or heroic necessity of the moment. He could be hit by a train and simply flatten into a disc, popping back to normal with a boing, completely unharmed.

 

With these rules in mind, Izuku set to work on his hero costume.

 

He sat in his bedroom, his new, un-burned notebook open. He sketched frantically. He needed something practical, iconic, and deeply tied to the source of his power.

 

"Mom!" Izuku called out one evening, jogging into the living room.

 

Inko Midoriya looked up from her sewing machine. Over the past ten months, Inko had gone through an emotional rollercoaster. When Izuku finally manifested a "Quirk," she had cried for three days straight out of sheer joy and relief. Then, when she saw what the Quirk actually was, she had simply fainted. Now, she was her son's biggest supporter, having purchased wholesale stock in canned spinach from a local distributor.

 

"Yes, Izuku? Do you need more of the green canvas?" she asked, holding up a large swath of durable, forest-green fabric.

 

"Yes, but I need a specific modification to the belt," Izuku said, showing her his notebook.

 

He had designed a striking outfit. A dark green jumpsuit with reinforced stitching. Around the neck was a classic, wide sailor’s collar, colored deep navy blue with two white stripes. On his chest, a bright yellow emblem of a ship's anchor. He wore thick, brown leather combat boots and white gloves with padded knuckles.

 

But the most important piece was the belt.

 

"I need the utility belt to have custom holsters," Izuku explained, pointing at the schematics. "I've manufactured these small, aluminum pop-top cans. They're about the size of a hockey puck. I can fit exactly one serving of compressed, boiled spinach inside. I need the belt holsters to have a quick-release mechanism so I can pop a can into my hand instantly."

 

Inko smiled, her eyes watering slightly as she looked at her determined son. "It looks wonderful, Izuku. Very heroic. And... very nautical. I'll have it ready for you."

 

 

 

The morning of the U.A. High School Entrance Exam arrived with a crisp, cool breeze.

 

Izuku stood before the massive, towering gates of U.A., a sprawling, futuristic campus that looked like a small city. His heart hammered in his chest. He was wearing his middle school gakuran uniform, but beneath it, carefully folded in his backpack, was the costume his mother had made him, complete with his fully loaded utility belt.

 

"Outta my way, Deku."

 

Izuku stiffened. He turned to see Katsuki Bakugo walking toward him. Bakugo’s face was a mask of simmering, complicated rage.

 

Ever since the Sludge Villain incident, Bakugo had been different. He hadn't bullied Izuku. In fact, he had largely ignored him. But the looks Bakugo gave him were filled with a frantic, bewildered anger. Bakugo couldn't comprehend how the Quirkless weakling had suddenly turned into a cartoonish titan that bent reality. It shattered his entire worldview.

 

"G-good morning, Kacchan," Izuku stammered, stepping aside. Even with the power of the Sailor dormant inside his utility belt, old habits died hard.

 

"I don't know what kind of freakish, late-blooming, cartoon-ass Quirk you hid from me all these years," Bakugo growled, stopping inches from Izuku's face. "But don't think you're better than me. You're still a nerd. And I'm going to crush this exam."

 

Bakugo shoved past him, marching toward the auditorium.

 

Izuku took a deep breath. It's okay. I'm ready.

 

He took a step forward, but his foot caught on an uneven paving stone. Time seemed to slow down as gravity took over. Izuku flailed his arms, preparing for a face-plant on the concrete.

 

Suddenly, he stopped mid-air. He felt a strange, weightless sensation.

 

"Are you okay?" a bright, cheerful voice asked.

 

Izuku looked back. A girl with a brown bob and permanent blush stickers on her cheeks had touched his backpack.

 

"It's my Quirk! Sorry for using it without asking," she smiled, placing her hands together and releasing the Zero Gravity. Izuku dropped the remaining inch to the ground, landing safely on his feet. "It would be bad luck to fall before the exam, right? I'm Ochaco Uraraka! Let's do our best!"

 

She waved and jogged toward the auditorium. Izuku stood frozen, his face burning crimson. I just talked to a girl!

 

 

 

The written exam was a blur. Izuku’s analytical mind breezed through the mathematics and hero law questions. But the real challenge was the practical exam.

 

Izuku sat in the massive, darkened auditorium, listening as the Voice Hero, Present Mic, explained the rules on a giant screen.

 

"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! WELCOME TO MY LIVE SHOW!" Present Mic screamed, his voice booming through the speakers. "FOR THIS PRACTICAL EXAM, YOU'LL BE CONDUCTING A TEN-MINUTE MOCK URBAN BATTLE! YOU CAN BRING WHATEVER YOU WANT! THERE ARE THREE TYPES OF FAUX VILLAINS IN EVERY BATTLE CENTER! EARN POINTS BY INCAPACITATING THEM!"

 

The screen displayed images of massive, militaristic robots, labeled 1-Pointer, 2-Pointer, and 3-Pointer.

 

A tall, stiff-looking student with glasses and blue hair suddenly stood up, pointing rigidly at the screen. "Excuse me, sir! The printout shows four types of villains! If this is a misprint, U.A., the top hero academy, should be ashamed! Furthermore!" The student turned around and pointed directly at Izuku. "You, with the unkempt hair! You've been muttering this entire time! It's distracting! If you're here on a pleasure trip, leave immediately!"

 

Izuku slapped a hand over his mouth, shrinking into his seat.

 

"ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT, EXAMINEE 7111!" Present Mic placated. "THE FOURTH VILLAIN IS A ZERO POINTER! AN OBSTACLE! IT WILL GO CRAZY IN NARROW SPACES! MY ADVICE? RUN AWAY FROM IT!"

 

Izuku nodded to himself. Ten minutes. A massive, fake city. Robots. I need to be fast. I need to be efficient.

 

An hour later, Izuku stood before the towering metal gates of Battle Center B. He was surrounded by dozens of other applicants. He had changed into his costume. The dark green sailor suit fit perfectly. The wide collar flapped gently in the wind. Around his waist was the utility belt, gleaming with six customized aluminum pucks of compressed spinach.

 

The other applicants cast him weird glances.

 

"Is he a sailor?"

"What's with the anchor?"

"He looks like a mascot..."

 

Izuku ignored them. He closed his eyes, centering himself. He remembered Toshinori's training. Assess the situation. Use the power wisely.

 

"START!" Present Mic's voice suddenly blasted from speakers mounted on the walls. "WHAT'S WRONG? THERE ARE NO COUNTDOWNS IN REAL BATTLES! RUN, RUN, RUN!"

 

The massive gates swung open. The other applicants hesitated for a fraction of a second.

 

Izuku didn't.

 

His right hand shot down to his utility belt. He pressed the quick-release button on the first holster. A green aluminum puck shot up into the air. Izuku caught it seamlessly, popped the top with his thumb, and tossed the compressed block of boiled spinach into his mouth in one fluid, practiced motion.

 

He swallowed.

 

TOOT-TOOT!

 

The phantom steamboat whistle ripped through the air, startling the surrounding applicants so badly several of them tripped over their own feet.

 

The transformation was instantaneous. Izuku's sailor suit stretched and groaned under the immense, sudden pressure. His forearms detonated in size, transforming from lean, athletic arms into massive, pulsating clubs of pure muscle. The neon-blue anchors glowed fiercely through the fabric of his sleeves. The wooden pipe materialized between his teeth, blowing a puff of anchor-shaped smoke. His right eye squinted shut.

 

The digital clock popped into existence above his head.

 

2:59:59.

 

"I'm strong to the finich, 'cause I eats me spinach!" Izuku hollered, his raspy voice echoing through the faux city. "Ug-gug-gug-gug!"

 

He bent his knees. The concrete beneath him spider-webbed with cracks. He leaped.

 

He didn't just jump; he launched himself like a mortar shell, clearing a five-story building in a single bound and landing directly in the center of the main street, causing a miniature earthquake.

 

Three 1-Pointer robots, massive single-wheeled machines with gatling guns for arms, immediately locked onto him.

 

"TARGET ACQUIRED," their mechanical voices droned. They opened fire, unleashing a barrage of rubber bullets designed to sting and incapacitate.

 

Izuku didn't dodge. He stood his ground, jutting his chest out.

 

The rubber bullets hit him, but instead of bruising him, a rapid-fire series of cartoonish sound effects erupted. Bink! Boink! Ping! Pang! The bullets flattened against his chest like wet clay and fell uselessly to the floor.

 

"Is that all ye got, ye rusty buckets of bolts?!" Izuku laughed.

 

He grabbed his own sailor collar, pulled it back like a slingshot, and released it. The physical shockwave generated from the snap of the fabric hit the first 1-Pointer with the force of a wrecking ball.

 

The robot didn't explode. Instead, it was violently compressed into a tiny, metallic cube. With a loud DING!, two slots opened on the top of the cube, and two pieces of perfectly toasted bread popped out.

 

"One point!" Izuku chuckled, grabbing his pipe.

 

Two 2-Pointers, resembling mechanical scorpions, dropped from the roofs of the adjacent buildings, attempting to crush him with their massive pincers.

 

Izuku didn't even look up. He simply reached out his massive forearms, caught the plunging pincers in his bare hands, and squeezed. The steel crumpled like aluminum foil.

 

Izuku then spun in a circle, dragging the two massive robots with him. He tied their heavy metallic tails together in a perfect, elaborate sailor's knot. He finished the maneuver by grabbing their heads, twisting them violently, and molding the two heavily armored mechs into the exact shape of a giant, twisted pretzel.

 

"Five points!" Izuku announced, dusting off his hands.

 

He took off down the street, a blur of green and impossible physics.

 

A 3-Pointer tank rolled out from an alleyway, aiming a large missile launcher at him. It fired a dummy missile directly at Izuku's face.

 

Izuku simply took a deep breath, his chest expanding to three times its normal size, and blew. A literal hurricane-force wind erupted from his lips. The missile stopped mid-air, spun 180 degrees, and flew back into the barrel of the tank, blowing the robot into a shower of harmless confetti.

 

"Eight points! Ug-gug-gug-gug!"

 

 

 

Deep within the bowels of U.A., in a dark, monitor-filled observation room, the faculty sat in stunned, absolute silence.

 

Nezu, the principal of U.A., a small, impeccably dressed creature that resembled a cross between a mouse, a bear, and a dog, was standing on his chair, his paws pressed against the glass screen showing Camera 4.

 

"Fascinating," Nezu breathed, his beady eyes wide. "Absolutely, unequivocally fascinating. He's not just destroying them. He's altering their structural integrity into completely unrelated shapes. He turned a three-ton combat chassis into a giant pretzel."

 

Sitting in the back row, a man shrouded in yellow sleeping bags with long, messy black hair stared at the screen with bloodshot eyes. Shota Aizawa, the Erasure Hero, leaned forward.

 

"His Quirk registration says 'Leafy Augmentation'," Aizawa muttered. "It requires the consumption of canned spinach to activate, providing localized super-strength. But this... this isn't super-strength. This is molecular manipulation disguised as slapstick comedy."

 

Aizawa activated his Quirk. His eyes glowed bright red, his hair floating upward as he stared directly at Izuku on the screen, attempting to erase the boy's power.

 

On the screen, Izuku grabbed a 3-Pointer by its treads, swung it around his head like a lasso, and threw it into another robot, causing them both to explode into a pile of neatly stacked tin cans.

 

Aizawa blinked, his eyes drying out instantly. "My Quirk... it has absolutely no effect on him. It's not registering as an Emitter or Transformation type. It's as if... the power doesn't originate from his biology."

 

Standing in the corner, holding a clipboard to hide his skeletal form, Toshinori Yagi tried very, very hard not to burst into a fit of proud laughter. Show them, young Midoriya. Show them the power of the sea.

 

"He currently has sixty-five points," the R-Rated Hero, Midnight, pointed out, licking her lips. "He's completely dominating the field. But let's see how he handles the real test."

 

Nezu smiled a feral, excited smile. He reached forward and slammed his paw down on a large, red button on the console.

 

"Let's deploy the Zero Pointer."

 

 

 

Izuku was having the time of his life.

 

With his clock at 2:51:30, he had plenty of time left. He had racked up seventy-two points. The other applicants were just trailing behind him, picking off the scraps he left behind. He felt invincible. He felt heroic.

 

Suddenly, the ground beneath his feet violently trembled.

 

A shadow fell over the entire fake city, blocking out the sun. Izuku stopped, his pipe jutting upward as he looked up.

 

At the end of the main street, buildings were being crushed like sandcastles. A colossal machine, easily the size of a skyscraper, broke through the architecture. It was a terrifying behemoth of steel and treads, with glowing red eyes that pierced the dust cloud.

 

"LESS THAN TWO MINUTES REMAINING!" Present Mic's voice echoed.

 

The other applicants screamed in terror.

 

"It's the Zero Pointer!"

"Run! It's too big! It's a joke!"

"We can't fight that!"

 

The applicants turned and fled, sprinting back toward the entrance gates. Izuku stood his ground. He knew he didn't need to fight it. It was an obstacle. He had enough points to pass. He should retreat.

 

He turned to run, but his sharp ears picked up a sound over the grinding gears of the behemoth.

 

A cry of pain.

 

Izuku snapped his head back toward the destruction. Trapped beneath a massive slab of concrete rubble, caused by the Zero Pointer's destructive entrance, was the girl with the brown hair. Uraraka.

 

Her leg was pinned. She was struggling, her face pale with fear as the colossal shadow of the Zero Pointer's tread loomed over her, threatening to crush her completely.

 

"Ow... it hurts..." she whimpered.

 

Izuku didn't hesitate. The analytical mind vanished. The heroic instinct took over, fueled entirely by the boiling, righteous anger of the Sailor.

 

"Avast ye, ya mechanical monstrosity!" Izuku roared.

 

He bit down hard on his pipe. TOOT-TOOT!

 

He sprinted forward. He didn't jump over the rubble; he ran straight through it, his massive body shattering concrete walls as if they were made of sugar glass.

 

He reached Uraraka in seconds. He stood over her, casting a protective shadow.

 

The Zero Pointer looked down at the tiny green speck in its path. It raised a massive, hydraulic fist, the size of a city block, intending to smash Izuku into the pavement.

 

Izuku squinted his eye. He reached into his pocket and pulled out an imaginary can of spinach, miming the motion of eating it just for the sheer theatricality of it.

 

"You've rustled me jimmies for the last time!" Izuku yelled.

 

He planted his feet wide. He pulled his right arm back. The windup began.

 

It was faster than before. Much faster. His arm became a swirling vortex of kinetic energy. The air pressure dropped drastically as a localized tornado formed around his spinning fist. A high-pitched, screaming whistle, like a jet engine pushed past its breaking point, tore through the city.

 

The glowing anchor tattoo on his right forearm burned with blinding, blue intensity.

 

The Zero Pointer's fist plummeted downward.

 

Izuku threw the punch.

 

"MIDORIYA SMASH! UG-GUG-GUG-GUG!"

 

His fist collided perfectly with the descending, building-sized knuckle of the Zero Pointer.

 

The impact was cataclysmic.

 

A shockwave of pure, rippling toon-force exploded outward. The sheer force of the collision generated a blinding flash of white light. The air shattered.

 

The Zero Pointer didn't just stop. It didn't just break.

 

The colossal, multi-thousand-ton machine was literally uppercut into the stratosphere.

 

The steel groaned and warped as the robot was launched vertically into the sky, tearing through the clouds. It flew higher and higher, breaking the sound barrier with a thunderous BOOM, before disappearing into the upper atmosphere.

 

A second later, a tiny, comical twink! of a star sparkled in the daytime sky.

 

The robot was in orbit.

 

The shockwave from the punch cleared the dust from the entire city block. Izuku stood there, panting, smoke rising from his knuckles. He looked down at Uraraka, who was staring up at him, her jaw practically touching the floor, her eyes wider than dinner plates.

 

Izuku reached down with one massive finger and effortlessly flicked the ton of concrete off her leg as if brushing away a crumb.

 

"You alright there, missy?" Izuku asked, his pipe bobbing.

 

"I... you... the robot... space..." Uraraka babbled, unable to form a coherent sentence.

 

Before Izuku could help her up, a loud, piercing buzzer echoed throughout the facility.

 

"TIME'S UP!" Present Mic screamed.

 

The digital clock above Izuku's head ticked down.

 

2:49:15.

 

Izuku smiled, his massive jaw relaxing. He had done it. He had saved her. He had destroyed the obstacle. He had proven himself.

 

But suddenly, the adrenaline faded. The toon-force, sensing that the immediate heroic necessity had ended, decided it was time for a comedic exit.

 

Izuku looked at the camera mounted on a nearby intact wall. He pulled the pipe out of his mouth.

 

"That's all, folks!" Izuku said.

 

PFFFFFFFFT.

 

With the loud, embarrassing sound of a deflating balloon, Izuku's massive forearms shrank instantly back to their scrawny proportions. His jaw receded. The pipe vanished. The clock disappeared.

 

His body, suddenly lacking the supernatural durability of the Sailor, was hit with the delayed whiplash of launching a multi-thousand-ton robot into orbit.

 

Izuku’s eyes rolled back in his head, and he collapsed onto the concrete like a ragdoll, completely out cold.

 

In the observation room, Nezu, Aizawa, and the rest of the faculty sat in dead silence, staring at the screen showing the tiny, twinkling star where the Zero Pointer used to be.

 

Toshinori Yagi covered his mouth, trembling with suppressed laughter, tears of absolute pride streaming down his sunken cheeks.

 

You are magnificent, young Midoriya. Truly, strong to the finich.

 

 

The holographic projection of All Might, wearing a ridiculously undersized yellow suit, had played on a loop in Izuku’s bedroom for the better part of a week.

 

“You passed with flying colors, young Midoriya! Seventy-two villain points, and an unprecedented sixty rescue points! Welcome to your Hero Academia!”

 

Izuku stood before the mirror, adjusting the stiff, gold-buttoned collar of his U.A. High School uniform. He touched his chest, feeling the steady, rhythmic beat of his heart. It felt surreal. For fourteen years, he had been the Quirkless reject, the punchline to a cruel, cosmic joke. Now, he was enrolled in Class 1-A of the most prestigious hero course on the planet.

 

And all it cost him was a crippling addiction to canned, leafy greens and the occasional phantom urge to swab a deck.

 

“Izuku! You’re going to be late!” Inko’s voice called from the kitchen.

 

“Coming, Mom!” Izuku grabbed his yellow backpack. He paused, his hand hovering over his desk. Sitting next to a limited-edition All Might action figure was a sleek, heavy-duty utility belt, custom-tailored with six cylindrical holsters. He carefully strapped the belt around his waist, hiding it beneath the U.A. uniform blazer. The cool aluminum of the spinach pucks pressed reassuringly against his hip.

 

His lifeline. His anchor.

 

 

 

Navigating the sprawling, labyrinthine halls of U.A. High was a challenge in itself, but Izuku eventually found the massive door marked 1-A.

 

He took a deep breath, his hand resting on the oversized handle. Please don't let them be in my class, he prayed to whichever nautical deity was currently renting space in his soul. Not Kacchan, and not that scary guy with the glasses.

 

He slid the door open.

 

“Take your feet off that desk immediately! It is a profound disrespect to the upperclassmen and the craftsmen who made it!”

 

“Hah?! Which extra are you? What middle school did you go to, four-eyes?!”

 

Izuku’s shoulders slumped. Standing in the center of the room, locked in a fiery shouting match, were Tenya Iida and Katsuki Bakugo. Bakugo was leaning back in his chair, his feet resting arrogantly on the desk, a scowl etched deep into his features.

 

When Bakugo’s crimson eyes snapped to the doorway, the scowl deepened into something far more dangerous. It was a look of pure, unadulterated loathing mixed with a frantic, desperate confusion. Bakugo still hadn't processed the U.A. Entrance Exam. The memory of the Zero Pointer becoming a new constellation was a mental splinter Bakugo couldn't dislodge.

 

“Deku,” Bakugo growled, his palms sparking faintly with nitroglycerin.

 

Before Izuku could respond, a cheerful voice chimed in from behind him. “Oh! It’s the sailor guy! The one who punched the robot into space!”

 

Izuku turned to see Ochaco Uraraka, her permanent blush radiating genuine excitement. “I was hoping you’d be in my class! That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen! You were all like, ‘Avast ye!’ and then, WHOOSH! Space!”

 

Izuku’s face flushed a brilliant shade of crimson. “O-oh, um, t-thank you! I’m just glad you’re okay, Uraraka-san—”

 

“If you’re just here to make friends, you can pack up your things and leave.”

 

The voice was tired, dry, and seemed to scrape against the floorboards. Izuku and Uraraka looked down. Lying on the floor in a bright yellow, caterpillar-like sleeping bag was a man with long, unkempt black hair and eyes that looked like they hadn't seen REM sleep in a decade.

 

The man unzipped the sleeping bag, pulled out a juice pouch, and slurped it aggressively. He stood up, towering over the terrified teenagers.

 

“It took you eight seconds to quiet down. Time is limited. You kids lack rationality,” the man drawled. He reached into his sleeping bag and pulled out a stack of blue and white tracksuits. “I’m your homeroom teacher, Shota Aizawa. Nice to meet you. Now put these P.E. uniforms on and head out to the training field. We’re doing a Quirk Apprehension Test.”

 

“A test?!” the class echoed in disbelief.

 

“But what about the entrance ceremony? The orientation?” Uraraka asked, clutching her tracksuit.

 

Aizawa’s eyes narrowed, a terrifying, predatory intensity leaking through his tired facade. “If you’re going to become heroes, you don’t have time for leisurely events. U.A.’s selling point is its unrestricted traditions. That goes for how the teachers run their classes, too. Get dressed. Now.”

 

 

 

The P.E. grounds were vast, stretching out under the clear morning sky. Class 1-A stood in a cluster, nervously adjusting their uniforms. Izuku had managed to slip his utility belt underneath the stretchy fabric of his P.E. shirt. It formed a slight, unnatural bulge around his waist, but in a world of tail-wielding martial artists and invisible girls, nobody batted an eye.

 

“A Quirk Apprehension Test,” Aizawa repeated, holding a digital tablet. “You’ve all been doing these since junior high. Pitching, long jump, grip strength. But you were never allowed to use your Quirks. That’s an irrational system created by the Ministry of Education.”

 

Aizawa tossed a baseball to Bakugo. “Bakugo. You finished first in the practical exam. What was your farthest softball throw in junior high?”

 

“Sixty-seven meters,” Bakugo replied flatly.

 

“Try doing it with your Quirk,” Aizawa instructed, pointing to a white circle painted on the dirt. “Anything goes, just stay in the circle. Hurry up. Give it all you’ve got.”

 

Bakugo stepped into the circle. He stretched his arms, a feral grin stretching across his face. He wound up, his muscles tensing, and threw the ball with everything he had.

 

“DIE!” Bakugo roared.

 

A massive, concussive explosion erupted from his palm, propelling the baseball forward with the force of a cannon shot. The blast kicked up a massive cloud of dust, forcing the other students to shield their eyes.

 

Aizawa held up his digital tracker. The screen beeped loudly. 705.2 meters.

 

The class erupted into cheers.

“705 meters?! That’s insane!”

“This looks like fun!”

“We can finally use our Quirks! This is what the hero course is all about!”

 

Aizawa’s face darkened. The air around him suddenly felt heavy, suffocatingly dense.

 

“'Fun,' you say?” Aizawa’s voice dropped an octave. “You have three years to become heroes. Are you going to have an attitude like that the whole time?”

 

He smiled, but it was a cruel, challenging smile. “Alright. New rule. Whoever comes in last place in all eight tests will be judged to have no potential, and will be punished with immediate expulsion.”

 

A collective gasp swept through the students.

 

“Expulsion?! On the first day?!” Uraraka cried out. “That’s totally unfair!”

 

“Natural disasters, highway pileups, rampaging villains. Calamity is always right around the corner,” Aizawa countered, his gaze sweeping over the terrified teens. “Japan is full of unfairness. Heroes are the ones who reverse those situations. If you wanted to go talk to your friends at McDonald's after school, too bad. For the next three years, U.A. will inflict hardship after hardship upon you. Go Plus Ultra. Overcome it with all you’ve got.”

 

Izuku swallowed hard, a cold sweat breaking out on the back of his neck.

 

Expulsion.

 

He looked down at his trembling hands. Without his spinach, his physical stats were above average for a middle schooler, thanks to All Might’s beach training. But compared to super-speed, zero-gravity, and localized explosions? He would absolutely come in last place.

 

He moved his hand to the hem of his shirt, brushing against the aluminum pucks on his belt.

 

He didn't want to use it yet. The clock was a terrifying constraint. If he activated his power now, at 8:30 AM, it would run out exactly at 11:30 AM. He wouldn't have it for the rest of the day. But if he didn't use it, he would be expelled before second period even began.

 

“Test One: 50-Meter Dash,” Aizawa called out. “Line up.”

 

Izuku made his decision. Survival first.

 

He stepped to the side, slightly away from the group. He lifted his shirt, popped the release mechanism on his belt, and caught the aluminum tin. With a flick of his thumb, the top came off. He tossed the compressed block of boiled spinach into his mouth and swallowed.

 

TOOT-TOOT!

 

The sudden, deafening blast of a steamboat whistle echoed across the quiet athletic field. Every single student, and Aizawa, whipped their heads around in shock.

 

Izuku’s P.E. uniform suddenly strained to its absolute tearing point. The fabric groaned audibly as his forearms ballooned to the size of tree trunks. The bright, neon-blue anchor tattoos illuminated his skin, glowing vibrantly even in the morning sun. His neck thickened, his jaw jutted forward into an immovable underbite, and his right eye snapped shut in a permanent wink.

 

With a soft pop, the wooden corncob pipe materialized between his teeth, blowing a puff of smoke shaped like a tiny ship’s wheel.

 

Directly above his head, the glowing green holographic clock appeared with a cheerful DING!

 

2:59:59.

 

“Ah, much better,” Izuku chuckled, his voice dropping into the gruff, raspy, rhythmic cadence of the Sailor. “I was startin’ to feel a little landlocked. Ug-gug-gug-gug!”

 

The class stared in stunned silence.

 

“What the heck is that?!” yelled Denki Kaminari, pointing at the massive, muscular monstrosity that used to be a scrawny kid.

 

“A transformation type?” muttered Shoto Todoroki, his dual-colored eyes narrowing.

 

Aizawa frowned deeply, pulling his capture scarf up around his neck. Leafy Augmentation, he recalled from the registry. The U.A. staff notes said it was highly anomalous. Let’s see exactly how anomalous.

 

Aizawa’s eyes suddenly glowed a brilliant, piercing red. His messy black hair defied gravity, floating upwards as he activated his Quirk, Erasure. He stared directly at Izuku, shutting down the boy’s Quirk factor.

 

“Hey, Midoriya,” Aizawa barked. “I’m erasing your Quirk. Your arms should deflate now.”

 

Izuku stopped chuckling. He looked at Aizawa. He looked down at his massive, bulging arms. He looked back at Aizawa.

 

Izuku took a long, slow drag from his pipe. He blew a smoke ring that drifted lazily over to Aizawa, settling on the teacher's nose before popping.

 

“Erasing?” Izuku asked, crossing his massive arms. “Beggin’ yer pardon, skipper, but I don’t think ye can erase what a man is. I yam what I yam.”

 

Aizawa’s eyes widened slightly. He pushed his Quirk harder, staring unblinkingly. He felt the familiar sensation of his Quirk locking onto a target, but it was like trying to grab water with a net. There was no Quirk factor. There was no genetic mutation. There was absolutely nothing biological for Erasure to latch onto.

 

After ten seconds, Aizawa’s eyes began to burn. The dry-eye syndrome flared up violently. He blinked, his hair falling back to his shoulders.

 

“My Quirk... it’s completely ineffective,” Aizawa muttered, a rare look of genuine bewilderment crossing his face. “It’s not nullifying. It’s bypassing the system entirely.”

 

Bakugo, standing nearby, ground his teeth together so hard they threatened to crack. You bastard. You’re mocking the teacher now? What the hell ARE you?

 

“Test One. Let’s go,” Aizawa grunted, rubbing his eyes with a bottle of eye drops.

 

Izuku stepped up to the starting line next to Tenya Iida. Iida dropped into an aggressive sprinter's stance, the engines in his calves roaring to life.

 

“I don’t know what kind of sailor act this is, Midoriya,” Iida said sternly, “but my Engine Quirk will not be outpaced on a track!”

 

“Whatever floats yer boat, matey,” Izuku grinned, chomping down on his pipe.

 

“Ready... Go!” the robotic voice of the starting machine chirped.

 

Iida blasted forward, a blur of speed and exhaust fumes.

 

Izuku didn't run. Instead, he stood perfectly straight. He lifted one foot slightly off the ground. Suddenly, his legs became an absolute blur, moving so fast they formed the shape of a spinning figure-eight infinity symbol. The sound of a cartoon car engine revving up—VROOOOM!—echoed from nowhere.

 

Izuku leaned forward, and he simply vanished.

 

A localized dust storm erupted at the starting line. By the time Iida crossed the finish line at a highly respectable 3.04 seconds, Izuku was already leaning against the finish line sensor, whistling a nautical tune and polishing his anchor tattoo with a rag.

 

“0.01 seconds,” the machine chirped.

 

Iida’s jaw dropped. Aizawa marked the clipboard, his eye twitching.

 

The absurdity only escalated.

 

Test 2: Grip Strength.

Mezo Shoji, a multi-armed student, crushed the digital dynamometer with an impressive 540 kilograms of force.

 

Izuku stepped up to the machine. He didn't even squeeze. He merely gave the plastic device a firm, friendly handshake. The digital screen glitched, displaying error symbols. The plastic casing shattered. The metal inner workings groaned under the immense, impossible pressure of the toon-force. The carbon components inside the machine were instantaneously pressurized beyond the limits of physics.

 

When Izuku opened his massive hand, the machine was gone. In its place, a pile of glittering, perfectly cut, flawless diamond dust blew away in the morning breeze.

 

Izuku scratched his head. “Whoops. Guess I don't know my own strength. Write me down for a 'passable', teach.”

 

Test 3: Standing Long Jump.

Izuku squatted down, muttered, “Anchors aweigh,” and leaped. He didn't come down. He literally jumped out of the atmosphere, disappearing into the clouds. The class waited for a full minute before Izuku casually walked back onto the field from behind the bleachers, whistling innocently.

 

Test 5: Ball Throw.

Uraraka threw the ball, using her Quirk to render it weightless. Aizawa held up the scanner. The infinity symbol ∞ was displayed.

 

“Infinity?!” the class cheered.

 

Izuku stepped into the circle. The clock above his head read 2:45:10. He picked up the baseball with two massive, sausage-like fingers.

 

Aizawa stared at him. He defies logic. He defies physics. He defies my Erasure. Let’s see what his maximum output is.

 

Izuku wound up his arm. Once again, the arm became a swirling vortex of kinetic energy. The wind pressure kicked up, blowing the hair of every student backward. The whistling sound of a falling bomb filled the air.

 

“I’ve had all I can stands!” Izuku roared.

 

He threw the ball.

 

There was no sound of impact. There was only a concussive shockwave that shattered the glass windows of the gym building a hundred yards away. A literal sonic boom ring expanded in the sky above them. The ball caught fire from the atmospheric friction, becoming a miniature meteor as it ripped through the sky, completely leaving the Earth’s gravitational pull in a fraction of a second.

 

Aizawa looked at his digital tracker. The screen flickered, turned blue, and then displayed a cartoonish image of a white flag waving in surrender before short-circuiting entirely.

 

“I... I don't have a measurement for that,” Aizawa muttered, dropping the broken device.

 

The class was dead silent. They were looking at Izuku not with awe, but with primal, incomprehensible terror. He wasn't a student. He was a force of nature dressed as a maritime mascot.

 

Something in Bakugo’s brain finally snapped.

 

The superiority complex, cultivated over fourteen years of absolute dominance, shattered into a million jagged pieces. The nerd. The pebble on the side of the road. The Quirkless Deku. He was standing there, a titan of cartoonish violence, laughing with a pipe in his mouth.

 

“WHAT IS THIS?!” Bakugo shrieked, his voice cracking into a feral, desperate howl.

 

He lunged forward, ignoring all rational thought. His hands ignited with massive, lethal explosions. He didn't care about the test. He didn't care about U.A. He only cared about obliterating the walking nightmare that was making a mockery of his entire existence.

 

“TELL ME HOW YOU’RE DOING THIS, DEKU, OR I’LL KILL YOU!”

 

Izuku turned around, his good eye widening slightly. He didn't raise his guard. He simply jutted his jaw forward.

 

Before Bakugo could close the distance, thick, gray cloth wrapped entirely around his torso, binding his arms to his sides. He was yanked backward, falling hard onto the dirt.

 

Aizawa stood ten feet away, holding the ends of his capture scarf, his eyes glowing furiously red.

 

“What... the... what is this cloth?!” Bakugo thrashed, the explosions dying in his palms as Aizawa erased his Quirk. “It’s stiff!”

 

“It’s a carbon fiber woven with a special metal alloy,” Aizawa growled, reeling Bakugo in slightly. “Stop using your Quirk so much. I’m getting dry eye over here.”

 

Aizawa released the scarf, letting Bakugo tumble into the dirt.

 

“We’re wasting time. Whoever’s next, get in the circle.”

 

Bakugo stayed on his hands and knees, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He stared at the dirt, his pride completely and utterly pulverized. Izuku looked at him, a flicker of genuine sympathy in his eye. But the Sailor didn't know pity.

 

Izuku simply chomped his pipe. Toot-toot.

 

At the end of the tests, the holographic scoreboard projected the rankings.

 

1. Izuku Midoriya

2. Momo Yaoyorozu

3. Shoto Todoroki

4. Katsuki Bakugo

 

“By the way, I was lying about the expulsion,” Aizawa said flatly, zipping his sleeping bag back up. “It was a rational deception to draw out the upper limits of your Quirks.”

 

The class erupted into a mixture of groans, sighs of relief, and exclamations of betrayal.

 

Izuku simply stretched his massive arms. He looked at the timer above his head.

 

2:20:00.

 

He had burned forty minutes. He felt fine. He felt invincible.

 

But as they headed back to the locker rooms to change into their regular uniforms, Izuku noticed the stares. He noticed how people gave him a wide berth. Even Uraraka looked a little intimidated. He wasn't just strong; he was alien. He operated on a completely different frequency of reality.

 

I need to be careful, Izuku thought, his analytical mind fighting through the brash confidence of the Sailor. If I rely on this too much, I won't just run out of time. I’ll run out of humanity.

 

 

 

The morning passed in a blur of mundane classes. English with Present Mic. Modern Literature with Cementoss.

 

Izuku sat at his desk, perfectly normal, pale, and scrawny. The timer had run out exactly at 11:30 AM during mathematics. The sudden deflation of his massive muscles had caused a loud, embarrassing PFFFFFT sound to echo through the quiet classroom, earning him a stern glare from Ectoplasm and a suppressed snicker from the rest of the class.

 

Now, it was 1:00 PM. Hero Basic Training.

 

“I AM...” a booming voice echoed from the hallway.

 

The door burst open, revealing the towering, muscular form of the Symbol of Peace.

 

“...COMING THROUGH THE DOOR LIKE A NORMAL PERSON!” All Might bellowed, striking a dramatic pose.

 

The class erupted in genuine hero-worship.

“It’s All Might!”

“He really is a teacher here!”

“That’s his Silver Age costume!”

 

All Might marched to the podium, his smile blinding. “Hero Basic Training! The class that will put you through the wringer to build the foundation of your heroism! And today, we’re doing... BATTLE TRAINING!”

 

Bakugo’s head snapped up, a vicious, predatory smile returning to his face. Battle.

 

“And to go with that,” All Might pressed a button on the wall. Panels slid open, revealing briefcases marked with student seat numbers. “The costumes you requested based on your Quirk registrations!”

 

Ten minutes later, Class 1-A walked out into the fake urban environment of Ground Beta. They looked magnificent. Armored suits, sleek bodysuits, utility belts, and cloaks.

 

Izuku walked out of the tunnel last.

 

He tugged nervously at the wide, navy-blue collar of his sailor suit. The yellow anchor emblem shone brightly on his chest. He felt ridiculous. Compared to Bakugo’s intimidating grenadier gauntlets, or Iida’s sleek knight armor, Izuku looked like he was about to audition for a musical on a cruise ship.

 

“Hey, Midoriya!” Uraraka jogged over. She was wearing a skin-tight pink and black astronaut-style suit. “Wow! Your costume is so literal! It perfectly matches your Quirk!”

 

Izuku rubbed the back of his neck, his face red. “T-thanks, Uraraka-san. Yours looks really cool, too.”

 

“Now that everyone’s here, it’s time for indoor combat training!” All Might announced. “Villain attacks are mostly seen outdoors, but statistically, the most heinous villains hide indoors. You’ll be split into teams of two, acting as Heroes and Villains. The Villains will guard a nuclear weapon in a building. The Heroes must either capture the Villains or touch the weapon within the time limit!”

 

All Might held up a lottery box. “Teams will be determined by drawing lots!”

 

Izuku reached into the box and pulled out a slip of paper. Team A.

He looked around. “Who else is Team A?”

 

“Oh! We’re a team, Midoriya!” Uraraka cheered, holding up her slip.

 

Izuku’s heart fluttered. A team with a girl!

 

“And the first two teams to fight will be...” All Might plunged his massive hands into two separate boxes, pulling out two balls.

 

Team A vs. Team D.

 

Izuku froze.

 

Team D was Tenya Iida... and Katsuki Bakugo.

 

Across the staging area, Bakugo slowly turned his head. His visor shadowed his eyes, but the massive, grenade-shaped gauntlets on his forearms clinked menacingly as he flexed his fingers. He looked at Izuku, and the murderous intent in the air was so thick it was almost suffocating.

 

All Might cleared his throat, sensing the tension. “Villains, you have five minutes to set up inside the building! Heroes, you will wait outside, then infiltrate! Young Bakugo, Young Iida, head inside!”

 

As Bakugo walked past Izuku, he leaned in, his voice a lethal whisper.

 

“I don't care about the test. I don't care about the weapon. I’m going to beat the absolute shit out of you, Deku. Popeye or not.”

 

Izuku stood frozen. The fear, the ingrained terror of fourteen years of bullying, flared up in his chest.

 

He reached down to his utility belt. He popped the second capsule.

 

“Midoriya? Are you okay?” Uraraka asked, noticing his trembling hand.

 

“I’m fine,” Izuku said. He popped the top of the aluminum tin. He threw the spinach into his mouth and swallowed.

 

TOOT-TOOT!

 

The transformation hit him like a tidal wave of confidence. The fear evaporated, replaced by the indomitable spirit of the Sailor. His uniform stretched, the massive forearms bulging against the green canvas, the glowing anchors flaring to life. The pipe materialized in his teeth.

 

The clock appeared. 2:59:59.

 

Izuku jutted his jaw out, looking up at the multi-story building. “Let’s go crack some walnuts, missy.”

 

 

 

2:55:00.

 

Izuku and Uraraka slipped through an open window on the first floor. The corridors were dark, illuminated only by the sunlight filtering through the cracks.

 

“We need to find the weapon,” Uraraka whispered, pressing her back against a wall. “Iida is probably guarding it. Bakugo... Bakugo seems like he’s coming for you.”

 

“Let him come,” Izuku rasped around his pipe, casually strolling down the center of the hallway. He didn't bother with stealth. Stealth was for people who could be hurt by bullets.

 

Suddenly, the hair on the back of Izuku’s neck stood up.

 

From around the corner ahead of them, a blinding flash of orange light erupted.

 

“DEKU!”

 

Bakugo launched himself out of the shadows, propelled by a massive explosion from his palms. He crossed the distance in a fraction of a second, aiming a devastating right hook, completely wreathed in fire, directly at Izuku’s face.

 

Izuku didn't flinch. He didn't raise his guard. He reached out his left arm, grabbed Uraraka by the scruff of her spacesuit, and casually tossed her backward, out of the blast radius.

 

The explosion connected.

 

The corridor was engulfed in flames. The shockwave rattled the windows and scorched the walls. In the monitoring room, the class gasped in horror.

 

“He almost killed him!” Kirishima yelled. “All Might, you have to stop this!”

 

All Might leaned closer to the monitors, his eyes narrowed. He knew the toon-force was active. He wasn't worried.

 

The smoke cleared in the corridor.

 

Bakugo hung in the air, his fist planted squarely on Izuku’s cheek.

 

Izuku hadn't moved an inch. His head was turned slightly from the impact, but there wasn't a single scratch on him. His cheek had simply flattened slightly, absorbing the explosion with the structural integrity of a titanium sponge.

 

Izuku slowly turned his head back, his good eye locking onto Bakugo’s horrified crimson irises.

 

“Beggin’ yer pardon, Kacchan,” Izuku drawled, a puff of anchor-shaped smoke escaping his pipe. “But I don't care for yer tone.”

 

Izuku flicked Bakugo in the forehead with his thumb and forefinger.

 

It wasn't a punch. It was a simple, elementary school flick.

 

But fueled by the toon-force, the flick hit Bakugo like a battering ram. Bakugo was launched backward, tumbling end-over-end down the corridor, crashing through a wooden door and into an empty office room.

 

“Gah!” Bakugo coughed, scrambling to his feet. His head spun. The sheer gap in power was mind-breaking.

 

Izuku walked through the shattered doorway, his massive forearms swinging heavily at his sides. “Uraraka. Go find the weapon. I’ll keep the powder keg busy.”

 

“Right!” Uraraka shouted, using the distraction to sprint down the hallway toward the stairs.

 

Bakugo ignored her. His eyes were locked entirely on Izuku.

 

“You tricked me,” Bakugo seethed, his voice trembling with a mixture of rage and profound betrayal. “All these years... you played the victim. You played the Quirkless loser. And all the while, you had this... this freakish, invincible power. You were laughing at me the whole time!”

 

“I wasn’t laughing, Kacchan,” Izuku said, taking the pipe out of his mouth. For a brief second, the Sailor's persona slipped, and Izuku's genuine emotion bled through. “I was telling the truth. I didn't have this power until a few months ago. And I’m not looking down on you. I’m just trying to be a hero, same as you.”

 

“SHUT UP!” Bakugo roared, holding up his right arm. He placed his left hand on the pin of his massive, grenade-shaped gauntlet.

 

In the monitoring room, All Might’s eyes widened. He recognized the design. Those gauntlets aren't just for show. They store his sweat.

 

“Young Bakugo, stop! Are you trying to kill him?!” All Might yelled into the communications mic.

 

“If he dodges, he won't die!” Bakugo screamed, his sanity snapping completely.

 

He pulled the pin.

 

The blast was biblical. A massive, concentrated beam of superheated fire and concussive force erupted from the gauntlet, completely filling the office room and tearing down the corridor. The heat melted the paint off the walls. The sheer kinetic force threatened to blow the side of the building wide open.

 

Izuku stood directly in the path of the inferno.

 

He didn't run. He didn't put up his arms to block.

 

He simply took a deep, exaggerated breath, his massive chest expanding until his sailor suit buttons popped off like bullets.

 

He pursed his lips.

 

And he blew.

 

A hurricane-force gale erupted from Izuku’s mouth. It met the massive explosion in the center of the room. The wind didn't just push the fire back; it starved it of oxygen, compressing the explosion inward.

 

With a pathetic sizzle, the lethal, room-clearing blast was snuffed out completely, exactly like a birthday candle.

 

All that remained was a tiny wisp of black smoke, floating harmlessly toward the ceiling.

 

Bakugo stood paralyzed, his right arm still extended, the gauntlet smoking. His brain simply ceased to function. The ultimate attack. His maximum firepower. Blown out by a puff of air.

 

“Well, blow me down,” Izuku chuckled. “That was a close shave!”

 

Izuku didn't give Bakugo time to recover. In a blur of motion, Izuku crossed the room. He grabbed Bakugo by the shoulders and effortlessly lifted the screaming teenager over his head.

 

“Let me go! You bastard! LET ME GO!” Bakugo thrashed wildly, trying to ignite explosions, but Izuku’s grip was like an industrial vice.

 

Izuku turned Bakugo upside down. He placed Bakugo’s spiky head onto the floor.

 

Then, using his massive hands, Izuku spun Bakugo like a dreidel.

 

Bakugo became a blur, spinning on his head at a hundred miles an hour, his arms and legs flailing outward due to centrifugal force. The spinning generated a high-pitched whistling noise.

 

Izuku reached down into the spinning blur. He grabbed the heavy, solid steel grenade gauntlets on Bakugo’s arms.

 

Ignoring the structural integrity of the metal, Izuku pulled Bakugo’s arms together. He bent the solid steel gauntlets like they were wet spaghetti, looping them over each other, pulling them tight, and tying them into a perfect, inescapable square knot.

 

Izuku tapped Bakugo on the chest, stopping the spinning instantly.

 

Bakugo fell onto his back, his eyes rolling in his head, completely dizzy and violently nauseous. His arms were securely locked together by his own mangled, knotted support gear. He was completely incapacitated.

 

“A good sailor knows his knots,” Izuku grinned, chomping his pipe. Toot-toot!

 

“Midoriya!” Uraraka’s voice crackled over the earpiece. “I found the weapon! It’s on the fifth floor! But Iida is playing the villain perfectly. He’s cleared the room of all debris, so I can't use my Quirk on anything!”

 

“Hold yer horses, Uraraka,” Izuku said, looking up at the ceiling. “I’m comin’ up.”

 

Izuku didn't take the stairs.

 

He jumped.

 

He punched a hole straight through the ceiling of the third floor. Then the fourth floor. He erupted through the floorboards of the fifth-floor weapon room in a shower of splintered wood and concrete dust, landing squarely between a monologuing Tenya Iida and a hiding Uraraka.

 

Iida recoiled in shock, adjusting his glasses. “Midoriya?! How did you bypass Bakugo?!”

 

Izuku pointed a massive thumb down at the hole in the floor. “He’s a little tied up at the moment. Now, are ye gonna surrender peacefully, or do I gotta introduce ye to my spinach-fueled fist?”

 

Iida struck a dramatic, villainous pose. “I am a villain! I will not surrender! I will defend this weapon with my—”

 

Izuku sighed. He wound up his arm. He punched the ground.

 

The shockwave didn't break the floor; it acted like a localized trampoline. The entire section of the floor beneath Iida violently bounced upward. Iida was launched into the air, his arms flailing comically.

 

While Iida was suspended in mid-air, Uraraka seized the opportunity. She sprinted forward, diving toward the papier-mâché nuclear warhead.

 

She slammed her hands against the surface.

 

“Secured!” Uraraka yelled.

 

A loud buzzer echoed through the building.

 

“HERO TEAM... WINS!” All Might’s booming voice announced over the intercom.

 

The tension left Izuku’s body. He smiled, pulling his pipe out of his mouth.

 

“Good job, missy,” Izuku praised, giving Uraraka a thumbs-up with a hand the size of a catcher's mitt.

 

He looked up at the holographic clock floating above his head.

 

2:30:15.

 

He had plenty of time left. The fight had been short. The victory was absolute.

 

But suddenly, the digital numbers began to glitch. They flickered rapidly, the green light strobing.

 

2:30:14... 1:15:00... 0:45:00...

 

Izuku’s eye widened. “Wait. What’s going on?”

 

The numbers spun wildly out of control, blurring together, before suddenly snapping to a single, terrifying reading.

 

0:00:00.

 

A loud, violent PFFFFFFFFFT! ripped through the room.

 

Izuku didn't just shrink; he collapsed. The massive forearms evaporated. The anchor tattoos vanished. The pipe disappeared. The indomitable strength, the cartoonish invulnerability, the endless stamina—all of it was instantly ripped away.

 

Izuku hit the floor hard, his scrawny knees buckling under his own normal weight. His muscles screamed in agonizing pain, the sudden absence of the toon-force leaving him to feel the physical toll of the reality-bending stunts he had just performed.

 

“Midoriya?!” Uraraka gasped, rushing to his side. “Are you okay?! You’re deflating!”

 

Iida, who had landed unceremoniously on his back, rushed over as well. “Is this the drawback of his Quirk?! He looks severely fatigued!”

 

Izuku lay on his back, staring at the ceiling, gasping for air.

 

His mind raced. Why did it stop? Why did the timer glitch?

 

He mentally retraced his steps. The tests with Aizawa. He popped a can at 8:30 AM. It ran out at 11:30 AM. He popped a second can at 1:15 PM for the battle trial. It should have lasted until 4:15 PM.

 

Then, he remembered Toshinori’s warning during training.

 

“The toon-force is a manifestation of comedic and heroic necessity. It adheres to logic, but only the logic of a cartoon.”

 

Izuku realized the terrifying truth. During Aizawa’s test, he hadn't done much. He ran fast, squeezed a machine, threw a ball. But here... here he had snuffed out a lethal explosion. He had physically broken the laws of mass and density by tying solid steel into a knot. He had altered the architectural integrity of a five-story building with a single punch.

 

He had burned the toon-force too brightly. The power didn't stack, but the exhaustion of the reality-warping physics did. By pushing the gag to its absolute limits against a lethal threat, the universe had corrected itself. The joke was over, and the curtain had dropped early.

 

Izuku looked down at his pale, shaking, normal hands.

 

A cold, heavy knot formed in his stomach.

 

If this had been a real villain attack. If Bakugo hadn't been incapacitated. If there had been another villain waiting in the wings.

 

He would be dead.

 

He was completely and utterly helpless right now.

 

“I’m... I’m okay,” Izuku whispered, using Uraraka’s arm to pull himself up into a sitting position.

 

He looked toward the hole in the floor. He could hear Bakugo groaning weakly from the third floor, still tied up in his own gauntlets.

 

Bakugo was humiliated. He was broken. But Izuku knew the truth.

 

The spinach makes me invincible, Izuku thought, his analytical mind piercing through the adrenaline. But it’s a crutch. A crutch with a limit I can't even fully predict. If a villain stalls me, or if I burn through the joke too fast... I’m just a Quirkless kid in a costume.

 

He gripped his trembling knees.

 

To be the Number One Hero... I can't just rely on the Sailor. I have to figure out how to be Izuku Midoriya. Because when the clock hits zero, I’m the only one left to save the day.