Chapter 48: Yoshikage Kira
With Nomu sent flying and Kurogiri and Tomura Shigaraki escaped, all the remaining enemies chose to stand obediently under the watchful eyes of the U.A. teachers, their hands raised in surrender. Now, all that was left was to clean up the battlefield.
The injured, Shota Aizawa and Thirteen, were seriously wounded and sent to the hospital. Yoshikage Kira and Izuku Midoriya were put on stretchers and taken to the infirmary. Although All Might was also injured, he didn't go for treatment. Instead, he miraculously disappeared when the police rushed in, presumably to report the details of the incident.
When Kira woke up on the infirmary bed, it was already night. The room was dark. As he sat up and fumbled for the bedside lamp, he saw a girl sleeping by his bed and froze.
Tsuyu Asui was wearing her U.A. High school uniform. Her long, dark green hair wasn't tied back as usual, but was slightly damp and spread out, carrying the scent of shampoo. She must have showered at the school. She had pulled a chair up to the bed, her hands crossed on the edge of the bed, her head resting on them, snoring softly.
Kira didn't turn on the light. He just sat on the bed in the darkness, silently watching her folded hands, a bitter feeling in his heart.
After he had unleashed the move he had named "Tengen Toppa Overdrive," he had fallen into a strange state. He could feel everything in the outside world, but he couldn't move at all. It was as if his entire being had separated from his body, and his soul was in control.
The reason he wasn't affected by Shigaraki's Quirk was simple. Hamon was, in essence, a form of energy. When it was released outside the body, it was called an Overdrive.
Normally, when he used it, the Hamon would spread outwards, with some uncontrollable, dissipated energy scattering outside his body, creating the phenomenon of a golden glow. But in reality, this was a sign of not being able to control the Hamon well.
When Kira concentrated the energy in his head, the sun-like Hamon energy instinctively resisted Shigaraki's Quirk, preventing it from changing the shape of his brain. Then, he released all the energy at once from a single point, forming a Hamon beam, which manifested as a pillar of light. Of course, this had nothing to do with Spiral Power.
To put it simply, when Hamon covered the surface of his body instead of being released, he would be immune to negative status effects like petrification, freezing, and burning. A Quirk like Shigaraki's was also within this scope.
Of course, Shigaraki couldn't have known the reason.
After he entered this "suspended animation" state, he watched everyone's actions from an overhead perspective. Whether it was Bakugo using a series of explosions to dash through the air to Midoriya's side, or Todoroki creating a slide of ice from several meters away to instantly freeze Nomu... or Asui holding him tightly and not letting go, none of it moved him much. He remained a calm observer, analyzing the situation.
He was a little confused when he saw All Might refuse the others' help, but he was soon shaken by the violent, brutal, fist-to-flesh battle between All Might and Nomu. His heart was stirred by All Might. Close combat truly was a man's romance!
Suddenly, his whole body convulsed, and the entire scene became dull.
Kira felt that a part of him had been stripped away, that he was missing some of his emotions. When he turned around, he saw a blond, blue-eyed man in an impeccable suit floating beside him. In his hand, which had appeared out of nowhere, was a severed hand, which he was examining with great interest.
"...Yoshikage Kira, why are you here?" Kira asked, his mouth dry. In his mind, the man named "Yoshikage Kira" was just an obsession, or a side effect of his "Killer Queen" Quirk, a side effect like any other.
Midoriya's Quirk broke his bones. Iida's Quirk would suddenly stall after prolonged use. Aoyama's Quirk would give him diarrhea if used for more than a second... There was no such thing as a perfect Quirk. This was the common understanding in this hero society. Kira had naturally assumed that Yoshikage Kira was a similar side effect.
...But seeing him floating so clearly beside him, Kira knew that he had been wrong all along. Yoshikage Kira was real.
"It's rare for you to have a face so similar to mine. You shouldn't make such a shocked, stupid face," Yoshikage Kira said, as if he could see right through him. "Don't worry, I have no intention of possessing you. I'm well and truly, completely dead. Oh, right, in your words, I died under the 'JO-mbulance'."
"A fondness for women's hands, sudden urges of bloodlust, fingernails that grow at an incredible rate..." Kira saw that this person seemed to be open to conversation and took the opportunity to ask the questions that had been plaguing him. "Why do I have the same hobbies and desires as you... Are you trying to say that my body also craves these things?"
Yoshikage Kira slowly shook his head, a condescending look on his face, as if he were both mocking and pitying him. "Because we are the chosen ones."
"Are you trying to say you believe in God? That God wanted you to kill people continuously for over a decade?" Kira found this ridiculous. He knew that Yoshikage Kira was an out-and-out egoist, who would even sacrifice his own father, who had been helping him all along, as a pawn.
"It is a god, but an evil god..." Yoshikage Kira placed the grayish-white hand on his own face, a look of intoxication on his. "That man named Shigaraki has no taste. This was the hand of a strong, kind woman... to let it become so dry and shriveled..."
"I can imagine her beautiful face. Even a decayed hand can radiate light. It's just a pity that I can't truly touch it..."
Kira turned his attention to the hand and keenly noticed that it was the same one that had fallen into the water when Shigaraki failed to retrieve it during their battle. From what Yoshikage Kira was saying, it seemed he hadn't actually touched it, but had only recreated its appearance.
"An evil god? A Nyarlathotep who goes around with a crowbar, thinking about love all day?" Kira forced himself not to look at the hand and frowned. "Don't use some so-called evil god as your excuse. Or have you gone mad, Yoshikage Kira?"
"Eh, as I thought. You don't understand anything right now. You're still just a fool who worships heroes in your heart..." Yoshikage Kira said with a gentle smile, slowly lowering the hand. He took a handkerchief from his suit pocket and carefully wiped the hand.
He said softly, "Who would truly believe in the unspeakable horror without seeing it?"
"What are you trying to say?" Tortured by the oppressive atmosphere, Kira couldn't take it anymore and shouted, "Are you a person or a ghost right now? Why did you suddenly appear in front of me?!"
"I am just a pitiful ghost who was reminded of his own death by the hot-blooded manga-like scene below."
As if he were standing on solid ground, Yoshikage Kira walked over to him, one foot in front of the other, and carefully straightened the wrinkles on his tracksuit. "Don't reject these hobbies that normal people can't accept. They are your shortcut to that existence."
Kira had no thought of struggling. He watched blankly as Yoshikage Kira carefully patted away the non-existent dust on him. "Why did I come to this world?"
Like a puppeteer, Yoshikage Kira took his hand, placed the handkerchief in his palm, and folded his fingers over it, one by one.
"That is something only you can find out."
When Kira came to his senses, Yoshikage Kira was gone from the air. Time seemed to have stood still, and the scene of All Might and Nomu's clash was still ongoing. Then, All Might let out a roar and sent Nomu flying into the sky with a rising dragon punch, just grazing past Kira.
Kira felt Nomu's eyes meet his for a fleeting moment as it passed by. He didn't know if it was his imagination. He looked down and saw that he was clutching a handkerchief, which was wrapped around something.
Kira unfolded the impeccably folded handkerchief and lifted the last corner—inside was a toy car.
A small toy car, with a ferocious skull protruding from it and two bony claws extending from the sides, lay quietly on top.