Chapter One: Trash Endings, Strange Beginnings
I threw the manga into the trash bin with more force than I meant to. The damn thing made a loud thunk against the plastic, pages crumpling against empty bottles and last night's leftovers. I collapsed back into the couch, the cheap leather groaning under my weight. The stem of a wine glass was pinched between my fingers, and I swirled the dark red liquid like it was supposed to be some kind of answer.
Wine. Wine. I wasn't a wine drinker. Beer, whiskey, maybe a soda. But right now? Right now I needed something stronger, smoother. Something that could burn away the disappointment crawling around in my chest.
I took a sip, the bitter tang sliding across my tongue. My head tilted back, my eyes staring blankly at the ceiling fan above me. The blades spun slowly, too slowly, and every second felt heavy.
'God, what the hell happened to My Hero Academia?' I thought, taking another gulp. 'There was a time this thing was king—top of the anime world. Now it's… trash. Hot, steaming trash.'
I rubbed my forehead, pressing the glass against my temple as if it could cool the frustration boiling inside me. The ending was still fresh in my mind, like an insult carved onto my skull.
"Honestly… what was the moral of that story?" I muttered aloud to nobody. "That you can't be a hero without a quirk? That's it?"
Normally, I'd be roasting Deku, calling him a crybaby, and poking fun at his simping for All Might. But now? No. For once, I couldn't.
'Deku didn't deserve that,' I thought, grimacing. 'The kid saved the world. Saved it! And he gets what? A school teaching job? No marriage, no family, no legacy. Just… nothing. Empty.'
A laugh slipped out of me, but it wasn't happy. It was hollow and sharp at the edges.
"Hahaha… fucking hell. That's so sad."
I tilted the glass again, draining more than I meant to. The bitterness matched the taste in my mouth.
And All for One? Don't even get me started. What kind of final boss villain is just… evil? Just evil? No layers, no hidden pain, no tragic story to explain the madness. Just cartoonish, generic "I want power."
Trash writing.
I slammed the glass onto the table, liquid sloshing out over the rim.
"All for One had so much potential," I growled. "He wasn't completely heartless. He picked up kids from the streets and gave them shelter. Sure, he exploited them, but at least for a moment he gave them hope. Hell, he basically adopted Shigaraki in the most twisted way possible. But no, nope—he's just 'evil incarnate.' That's it. What a waste."
I leaned back, sighing through my nose. My throat ached with the weight of words unspoken, but I forced them out anyway.
"Even Stain… yeah, Stain had more depth than All for One. A single arc villain had more goddamn presence than the so-called king of villains. That's how much the author fucked up."
I chuckled, but it was bitter again. "Although… maybe the guy did it on purpose. A big ol' 'fuck you' to all the insane fans sending him death threats. He writes a trash ending just to spite them. Hah… what a badass if that's the case."
I raised the glass in a mock toast, but before I could finish it, something shifted.
The air grew heavier.
I blinked, frowning, and looked around. The room—the same old dingy apartment—suddenly felt darker. Not "sunset dark," not "lights off dark." This was heavy, suffocating. Like tar spreading across the walls, dripping into the corners of my vision.
"What the…?"
My hand trembled around the glass. I hadn't even drunk that much. A single glass of wine? That wasn't enough to send me tripping. I hadn't touched drugs in years. I'd been sober. So why did the world look like it was folding in on itself?
Was I dying? Was this what it felt like? At twenty?
"No, no, no…" I whispered. "I'm twenty years old. I'm not… I'm not done yet."
I tried to hold onto something—my name, my face, my family. Anything. But when I reached for the memories, they slipped away like water through open fingers.
Wait.
What the hell was my name?
My stomach turned cold, colder than the wine in my glass.
"I… can't… remember…"
Family? Gone. Friends? Gone. Birthdays, school, home? Nothing. My mind was blank, erased, and yet… not completely.
I could remember dumb memes. Anime quotes. Manga panels. Useless trivia. Everything except me.
"No fucking way." I staggered to my feet, the glass toppling over. My breath came quick and shallow. "I… I can't be… I can't be gone. Who the hell is—"
And then it hit me. Like a wave crashing into my skull. A memory that wasn't mine. A boy's name: Ryuga Sakamoto.
"Who the fuck is that?!" I yelled, clutching my head. But the harder I tried to deny it, the clearer it became. His life unspooled in my mind like an old film reel—his childhood, his habits, and his quirks of thought. His story.
"This isn't… me…"
Darkness spread across my vision before I could fight it. The room collapsed into nothingness, silence swallowing my screams.
When the light broke again, I wasn't the same.
I gasped, sitting up fast. My hands shot out in front of me—and froze. They were smaller. Slimmer. The skin was paler than it should have been, the texture wrong. My lips were cracked, my body frail.
I looked around, heart hammering, and it wasn't my apartment anymore. Not the couch, not the table, not the trash bin.
None of it was mine.
And somewhere deep inside, a single, horrifying truth whispered to me.
I wasn't me anymore.