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It was half past one in the afternoon at the city center hospital.
Todoroki stood at the hospital entrance, a lunch box in his hand. Before stepping inside, he looked up at the sky.
The weather was beautiful, just like the day he first decided to visit his mother in the hospital. The sunlight was unbelievably gentle.
After the sudden end of the training camp, everything seemed to return to normal. But he knew something had changed. He had no desire to watch the explosive news or give interviews to the frantic media. He just wanted to be alone and quiet, just like countless days before.
But in the end, some things were different.
Reaching his mother's room, Todoroki paused in front of the closed door for a long time. After a prolonged silence, as if still holding onto some hope, he gently pushed the door open.
Inside, a girl with sky-blue hair and a beautiful white-haired woman sat in the sunlight, facing the door. They seemed to be having a very pleasant conversation.
Sensing his arrival, the girl gave him a look, then stood up. She smiled and waved at the woman before walking straight toward him. In the brilliant sunlight, just as she was about to reach him, her silhouette dissolved like a bubble, leaving no trace. Since their first meeting at the hospital, he had run into the girl more and more often.
She kept her promise to visit his mother whenever she had free time. They had met here so many times, but it was almost laughable that their total conversation amounted to less than ten sentences. Whenever he arrived, she would discreetly leave, giving him his privacy. She was too kind to even try to get a free meal out of him.
No one could have foreseen that the training camp would end up like this. The word "death," which had seemed so distant, suddenly appeared before all of them. From now on, Class 1-A of the U.A. High hero course would forever have only nineteen students. That person's seat was permanently empty. Sometimes they would fantasize about seeing the blue-haired girl sleeping at her desk, but a fantasy is just that—a fantasy. Time never stops for anyone; everything keeps moving forward. Letting out a soft sigh, Todoroki entered the hospital room.
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The night was lonely and deep.
To be honest, I'm still not sure if I've truly fallen for that girl.
That existence, which felt like an Illusion.
Under the warm glow of the desk lamp, the boy wrote meticulously in his notebook.
I once heard that there are billions people in the world, and the meeting of any two people represents a one-in-billion chance. I think there must be a special kind of fate between her and me. I don't know exactly when it started. Our first meeting was far from friendly, and I initially held a great deal of animosity toward her. To be honest, at the very beginning, I really wanted to beat her up. The change in my attitude probably happened back then.
I never thought I would fall for someone because it seemed so impossible. I can't quite grasp what "liking" someone feels like. My goal is to become the strongest. Was she in the way of me becoming the strongest? Maybe that's it.
She always knew how to make me angry, but I couldn't do anything about it. I couldn't out-argue her, and I couldn't beat her in a fight. She was truly annoying. She said she hated goodbyes, and so do I, but now I'm starting to regret it. Since a goodbye was inevitable, why didn't I stay a little longer? Why did I have to go sit outside the door alone? All she left me with was a small card, something everyone received. Even though the messages were different, that wasn't what I wanted. She had a special promise with that half-and-half jerk and only talked to Deku privately when she left. All I got was a card everyone else had. I'm a little envious. I've known the saying that "all good things must come to an end," but I never imagined this day would come so quickly and unexpectedly. I don't know if she'll ever come back, since she's tricked us so many times before.
But there's one thing I really want to know.
Is "you," who are named Fantasy, truly just an Fantasy? He closed his notebook and locked it in the deepest corner of his drawer.
Tomorrow, all of them would be moving into the U.A. dorms. He had already moved his luggage. But some things he would lock away in the deepest part of the drawer. They were his memories, and he hoped he would never have to find them again. Lying down in his clothes, the boy closed his eyes.
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The silent night wasn't really that silent. At the Beach Park, two figures, one large and one small, sat side-by-side, gazing at the sea.
The night was beautiful. The bright moon hung over the sea, its light reflecting on the water's surface.
"All Might, have your injuries truly healed completely?"
Clutching a small object in his hand, Izuku Midoriya turned and asked All Might.
"Ah, yes. Although the last embers of One For All are almost gone, and I've passed it on to you, my body has fully recovered. So in terms of overall strength, I'm still stronger than most heroes." As he said this, a complex look flashed in All Might's eyes.
"Young Midoriya, are you still thinking about her?"
"I can't forget about her, no matter what. But now, I think I've finally started to understand some things." Leaning back with his hands propped on the ground, Midoriya gazed at the bright moon in the sky.
"All Might, you know, just yesterday, I had a very real dream. It was so real that I almost mistook it for reality. In that dream, I saw so many things. It was the same timeline, from the moment you passed One For All to me until the end of the training camp. The same characters and events, but many of the details were different."
"In that dream..." Midoriya spoke softly.
"In the USJ incident, Eraser Head was seriously injured, with the most severe damage to his eyes. You did manage to repel the Nomu in time, but your time as a hero was drastically shortened. At the Sports Festival, I was the one who got the ten million points. Tokoyami-kun made it to the finals, taking third place, and Bakugo won the championship. In the Hosu incident, the League of Villains didn't show up. There were only three Nomu and Stain, and in the end, it was Stain who saved me after a flying Nomu grabbed me." Midoriya gently clenched his fist.
"And then there's the Kamino Ward fight. In that battle, your opponent was All For One. You defeated him, but your injured, skeletal form was exposed to the public. The last embers of your power completely burned out, and you retired from the hero stage." Midoriya's fingernails dug into his skin. "Doesn't this plot seem a little strange? In these scenes I saw, she didn't exist, not at all. The class president wasn't her; it was Iida. During the entrance exam, I saved Ochaco Uraraka, not her. She never appeared in any of those moments. It's as if she was an existence who stepped out of a fantasy from the very beginning."
"Young Midoriya, it's time for you to wake up."
All Might sighed in his heart, speaking up. He completely dismissed everything Midoriya had said, believing the dream was just a product of the boy's grief. A nonexistent girl was simply nonsense.
"All Might, I'm more awake now than I've ever been," Midoriya said, standing up and clenching his fist with unprecedented determination.
"No matter what, I will find her. I must."
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At last, Volume 1 reaches its end… exactly as I planned.
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