Chapter 29: The Wager
"Uraraka, don't worry about him," Midoriya said, his mind made up. "You all go on ahead. I'll catch up with you later."
Izuku Midoriya glanced at the time. There were only two minutes left before the ten-minute limit was up. He had already made his choice: his friends would leave, and he would stay behind.
According to the masked man, the ship would explode in ten minutes. Whatever happened to him, Uraraka and the others had to be safe.
Midoriya continued, "Also, the 'enemy' is All Might. This is just a test."
"All Might!?" Mineta cried out in shock. "Midoriya, are you delirious? How could the enemy be All Might? He captured Shoto Todoroki!"
"I think Todoroki-kun was probably asked by All Might to play along. In any case, this person isn't a villain." Midoriya stared at the man opposite him. Although his gut told him this wasn't an enemy, his actions had left Midoriya completely bewildered. For now, he could only use this excuse to comfort his friends and get them to leave.
"Is that so...? Then we should tell Iida-kun right away." Iida ran off to alert the school. It would be bad if this turned into a big misunderstanding...
Tsuyu and Jiro, sensing nothing amiss, left the room. Minoru Mineta pushed Denki Kaminari's butt, shuffling him out the door as well.
"Midoriya, we'll wait for you on the shore," Uraraka said, giving the masked man one last wary glance before she left.
As each of them left the room, the man made no move to stop them, even gallantly stepping aside to clear a path.
"So, what is it that you want with me?" After everyone was gone, the man closed the door and smiled at Midoriya. "Let me hear your final words."
Midoriya held up the remote in his hand and slowly looked up. "Actually," he said, "you never planted any bombs at all, did you?"
The smile on the man's face slowly vanished. He saw that Midoriya, at some point, had already released the button.
"Did you think I would be so worried about my friends that I would forget how to think? Yes, I cherish my friends, and at first, I was terrified. I believed you had really planted bombs throughout the entire earthquake zone. But if you just stop and think about it for a moment, you can see that you were lying.
"That collapsed building fell from the middle, crushing the smaller buildings around it. You planted a delayed-detonation bomb near the central support column, which is why it toppled in one direction."
Midoriya's body trembled as he continued, "And so, I made a wager. I bet that you never planted bombs across the entire area. I bet that even the bombs on this ship were a lie!"
Tears streamed down Midoriya's face, but a smile of immense relief spread across it. "Luckily... I won the bet."
No one could know the intense mental struggle Izuku Midoriya had gone through in those few short minutes, the countless choices he had weighed. In the end, he had gambled with everyone's safety to earn a chance to speak with Amadeus Mask on equal terms.
"Who are you, really? Are you someone I know?" Midoriya asked. There was no reason for a complete stranger to go to such lengths to deceive someone they didn't know.
"Emmm..." The man scratched his head, looking troubled. "Just as you didn't say his name directly just now, if I were to say it, I would be breaking a promise..."
"Was it All Might who sent you!?"
"To be honest, this was my own idea," the man said, turning and dashing out the door. "Since you've seen through my ruse, there's no value in me staying here. I imagine things over there have already wrapped up as well."
"Don't go!" Midoriya instinctively gave chase. "You haven't told me why you tricked me! Why you tortured Kaminari!"
The masked man ran onto the deck, leaning against the ship's railing to face the pursuing Midoriya with a calm smile. "Well, well. It seems there's no escape now."
Uraraka and the others were on the shore. Tsuyu was waiting below the ship, ready to help Midoriya. Here, on this isolated ship, it seemed the masked man was trapped.
Midoriya panted, "Most importantly... why did you say those things to me?" About being a future hero, about sticking to my principles...
"I won't let you leave until you give me an answer!" A network of crimson veins appeared on Midoriya's right arm. He charged, swinging a punch at the masked man. "Let me show you my anger! SMASH!"
Watching the fist grow closer, the man, with his back against the railing, flipped backward and dove into the water. The gale-force wind from Midoriya's Quirk-powered punch arrived a split second later, blasting past his face and whipping the sea into a several-meter-high wave.
The masked man fell into the barrier created by the wall of water. Midoriya could only watch as he hit the water with a splash and then vanished...
Midoriya rushed to the edge of the deck and looked down, his face ashen. He slammed his already-bruised arm against the railing in frustration. "He still got away!"
Midoriya had a feeling that he wouldn't have been able to hurt him, but he had still hesitated for a second or two before attacking. It was that brief hesitation that had allowed the man to escape, blocking Tsuyu's line of sight.
Ten minutes passed. There was no explosion. The ship remained perfectly intact.
Tsuyu used her tongue to rescue Midoriya from the ship, and the two of them swam back to shore together.
"Midoriya-kun, you're badly hurt!" Uraraka rushed over, her heart aching at the sight of his bruised arm. "Why did you use your Quirk!? Didn't you say he was someone invited by All Might-sensei? Why would you attack him!?"
Tsuyu said, "Midoriya-chan, if it's about what happened to Kaminari, don't worry. He's completely fine."
Jiro added, "It seems because he can absorb electricity, the shock he received just ended up recharging him. If that person wasn't an enemy, he probably anticipated that. As for the ball gag... I think that was just his twisted sense of humor. But... well done."
On the shore, Kaminari had found a sharp piece of debris and cut the strap of the gag. With his hair still spiked up, he was now dry-heaving at the water's edge. He turned, gave Midoriya a thumbs-up, and said with a grin, "It's all okay now! Why, you ask? Because I... am here!"
Hearing Denki Kaminari recite All Might's classic catchphrase, Midoriya snapped back to reality and turned to look out at the lake.
The wall of water disappeared as quickly as it had appeared, the lake once again becoming a gentle surface. The sunlight streaming through the large hole in the USJ ceiling made the water glitter and sparkle. In the midst of that golden light, Midoriya thought he could see a pale gold mask floating on the water's surface.
Midoriya suddenly asked, "Tsuyu-chan, when he jumped from the ship, did you get a look at his face?"
Tsuyu thought for a moment. "Hmm... The water curtain was in the way. I saw his mask fall off, but I couldn't see his face."
"But, if I had to say one thing... his fingernails were very long."
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