Izuku had only delivered this kind of punch a single time before. When he'd fought The Rhino, and that had ended with his own hand breaking.
Izuku's hand didn't break this time.
His enemy, however, did.
...
In the brief moment Izuku's closed hand connected with the monster, he FELT it as the titanic force of the blow liquidated and broke it's insides into itty bitty tiny pieces.
Then, it was sent flying, smashing straight through the same building it had sent Izuku through.
-That's not gonna kill it you know.-
"Yeah, I do remember the first one."
-Judging by how quickly it healed a broken head, We'd say this one will heal even faster. We got to kill this one. Quickly.-
As Izuku jumped after it, soaring over the punched through building, Venom continued.
-So this is probably a bit awkward point to cram in how it works, but one thing you should know about our poisonous bite is that it's a one-load kind of deal. Whether we succeed or not in injecting the Venom fully, once we begin pumping it through our teeth, it's gonna keep flowing until we're out of it.-
The implication of Venom's words hit him harder than the undead monster's blow had.
He would have to kill this thing.
That was not a question.
Whether it was him or Mina, or even one of the other heroes, running out the clock until this thing stopped healing was not a realistic option.
He had never killed anyone in his life. He'd never honestly considered killing anyone in his life.
He knew, logically speaking, that this thing was not alive. He knew that it could not be called murder, either morally, or legally(Not with that kind of indiscriminate destruction behind it) speaking. He knew all of that but...
The street where he and Mina had just battled a short, short while ago came back into view beneath him.
4 people were dead on the street.
The world seemed to freeze for a moment, as his eyes went wide taking it all in. 4 people. All wearing a costume of some kind, all with some injury, be it the mundane, or the grotesque.
One was lying under their own cape, whatever injury they had suffered covered by the blue cloth, the bloody stains seeping through being the only thing visible of what lay beneath.
He'd only been gone for 2 minutes. 4 people had died, in 2 minutes.
Mina, where was Mina?!
Reality asserted itself, and his eyes went sideways to those players still active.
Of the people around, the only one still left was the lion guy and Mina.
The lion guy was currently in the air, wrestling with the flier, while Mina was dancing a particularly speedy dance through a rain of razor-sharp metal spikes flung at her by the red one, while the black one was taking swings at her, completely unheeding of the fact that he was subject to the same barrage of spikes as the young catgirl.
If the fact both of them were completely naked, alongside a whole host of dismembered body parts being strewn about were any indication, she'd ripped each of them to pieces about a dozen times already.
Off to the side, standing about where she'd been when this whole thing started was the one with the glowing rings on her arms, who seemingly hadn't moved at all. In fact, the only change was that her arms had begun glowing much brighter.
A bit farther away, his hooded foe was currently rising up after putting himself together again.
He did not think, just act.
Two tentacles shot down in arcs, their ends lining up to smash straight towards the heads of the two undead monstrosities, only for two teeth to form on them, turning into what was effectively a reverse Kusarigama.
Izuku did not stop to see the aftermath of the Klyntar scythes, instead dropping the lines as they and the teeth disintegrated into nothingness, and instead lined himself into one of the nearby buildings.
With a strong, powerful pull, he went in that direction, just barely in time to avoid another expanding arm from Hoodie that just graced him, ripping off a bit of his black skin.
The moment he hit the ground, he immediately jumped downwards, down to ground level as Hoodie followed up his dodge by slamming his arm sideways.
"CRRRRAAAASSSHHHHH!"
The upper part of the building crumbled into pieces as the massive arm went straight through it like some sort of grotesque tree falling on a house.
Please don't let there be people in there, please don't let there be people in there, please don't let there be people in there.
Izuku landed right unto the ground where his two enemies were currently regenerating, right by where Mina- No, she was gone.
She was over there, attacking Hoodie.
His enemies both finished regenerating their own heads and turned on him.
The black one tried to tackle Izuku again, but this time, he saw it coming and acted accordingly.
Before the black monstrosity could get his hands around him, Izuku weaved his way around him and dug his hands into the black skin, his fingers digging deep, deep into the muscle, as he tightened it in a grip.
Then, he threw his enemy. Straight up towards the sky as hard as he possibly could.
Maybe it could regenerate from anything Izuku threw at it, but from what he'd seen of it, it would have no way of affecting its momentum while it was airborne. It would be a minute or two before it landed, giving him that so, so precious commodity time.
He was about to do the same to the red one, only to be forced to dodge a rain of deadly metal spikes.
As he danced through the air, one almost took him straight in to head, and though he dodged sideways, the spike cut a deep, gash in his side, punching through the suit
Pain flared up, but Izuku, still high on adrenaline, bit his teeth and powered through it easily.
What he could not shake off near as easily was the sight of corpses around him.
Nausea struck him as he danced and dodged the deadly rain, ending up landing on one of the still-standing pillars that still held up the train tracks.
He then did a backflip up the pillar as another rain of spikes was launched right at where he had been.
Then, he went on the counteroffensive.
Getting into the stance Black Cat had drilled into him over the course of days, Izuku's wrist began moving, as another form of rain began to fall.
Cannonballs, each stronger, and with more power behind them than an actual Cannonball began to rain down on the red undead.
The muscular, undead body disintegrated into bloody chunks under that rain of black spheres, and the ground behind her broke as a barrage from beyond the stars destroyed everything it touched.
Izuku kept going, long, long after there was nothing more than bloody chunks left.
-JUMP!-
Izuku more going on adrenaline than conscious thought at this point obeyed immediately, not questioning why.
The why, was that Hoodie had somehow gotten behind him without him noticing, and had planned on launching another push of that damn arm of his. It was a good plan, one that only was foiled because Izuku had a partner who could sense souls.
Izuku though did not dwell on the implications of his enemy being able to form plans, instead focusing on a panicked thought.
If Hoodie was there then where was Mina?
Had she… A pang of relief surged through him when he landed right by her, safe and sound.
"Sorry." She muttered, in a voice that was as obviously forced to be calm as could be imagined.
"I was holding him off just fine but... but then he just turned and ran away."
Somewhere further down the street, a sickening crashing sound announced that the one Izuku had sent skywards was finally back down on the ground again.
It would take a bit for him to regenerate. Izuku focused on their enemies in front. Hoodie and the red lady.
Hoodie was saying something more about strength, and asking them about it, but Izuku ignored it. And the red one… Well, she was putting herself together again, but judging by the speed… She was nearing her limit.
"Seems he realized I was about to… To kill the red one… So he bounded around to stop me."
Izuku winced as he said it. It was probably stupid. No scratch that, it WAS stupid… But as he said it, he felt a strong, strong pang of fear that Mina would say something to condemn him as he mentioned killing the red one.
As she spoke though, there was not a hint of condemnation in it, instead just more of someone who was desperately forcing themselves to be calm.
"The black ones heals faster. Seems their limit is way worse too. The red one won't last much longer."
Right. Tactics. He could do tactics. He was damn good at tactics.
...
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