UA closed three days after the USJ.
It wasn't a decision announced with fanfare or the kind of official statement that tries to minimize what happened. It was a letter sent to families in the careful language of an institution managing a crisis while aware that everyone was watching.
Temporary closure for safety reasons and protocol review.
Mineta read it in the hospital, the morning before his discharge, on the phone screen his parents had brought along with clean clothes and the second volume of Yaoyorozu's book.
His parents were in the room when he read it. His mother wore the expression of someone who had been holding something in for days and kept holding it because the moment to release it hadn't arrived. His father was quieter than usual, which in him was information.
Neither said anything about withdrawing him from UA.
Mineta noticed and didn't comment. He filed it as information about his parents and moved on.
Discharge came mid-morning.
The doctor explained what he already knew: contused ribs needing three weeks without direct impact, a nervous system requiring progressive rest, and no intensive quirk use for at least ten days.
Mineta listened with the attention of someone taking mental notes on exactly what he could and could not do in the coming days.
Ten days without intensive quirk use.
"Intensive" was open to interpretation.
At home, the TV was on when they arrived.
Not unusual. What was unusual was the channel—a news program instead of the cooking show his mother usually watched at that time—and the volume, low in that specific way of someone who wants to listen but doesn't want it to be obvious how much they want to listen.
Mineta sat on the couch and looked at the screen.
The USJ attack had been on the news cycle for three days and showed no sign of leaving anytime soon. The anchors spoke with that particular mix of urgency and repetition that is the natural state of television journalism in crisis, with security experts, former professional heroes, and hero policy analysts giving slightly different versions of the same three or four points.
What Mineta caught in fragments over the next few minutes, while his mother prepared something in the kitchen and his father read the same paragraph of the newspaper repeatedly:
Class 1-A had been publicly identified. Not by name, because the students were minors and protocols existed, but with images clear enough that anyone who knew them would recognize them. Social media had done what the protocols tried to prevent.
Several UA parents had made statements. One mother, described by the anchor as representing a group of concerned families, spoke about the institution's responsibility, parents' right to know their children were safe, and the distinction between hero education and unnecessary exposure to real danger.
The UA principal had held a press conference. Nezu, with his usual calm of someone who has processed difficult situations enough times to have categorized them, spoke of protocol reviews, commitment to safety, and the strength of UA students who had demonstrated exactly the kind of character the institution sought to cultivate.
Mineta muted the sound.
Not the television. Just the sound.
He stared at the screen in silence for a moment, with looping images of the USJ.
The world knows we exist. Class 1-A is no longer anonymous.
It was a consequence he had anticipated abstractly. Seeing it on TV was different from anticipating it.
He turned off the television.
The three-day UA closure had that particular quality of downtime that isn't truly dead time, but time where things that normally happen in motion have to happen in stillness.
Mineta made use of it.
The first day, he was honest with what his body needed: real rest, without the logic that partial rest was sufficient. He stayed home, read the second volume of Yaoyorozu's book, which proved as useful as the first, though in different ways, and let his nervous system process what it needed to without rushing it.
His parents were also home. His mother cooked more than usual. His father asked about his classmates with more specificity than he normally showed.
— Everyone came back okay — said Mineta. — Some with injuries. Our teacher is in the hospital but stable.
His father nodded.
His mother put more food on his plate without saying anything.
That was all they directly said about the USJ, which was more than Mineta expected and less than they probably needed to say. In that moment, it was enough for everyone.
Mid-afternoon on the first day, a message came to his phone.
Sato Hina: Saw the news. Are you okay?
Mineta: Yes. Discharged this morning. Ribs and nervous system. Nothing permanent.
The reply came almost immediately.
Sato Hina: My cousin told me Hayashi-sensei closed the dojo these days. When they heard about the USJ, there wasn't the mood to train.
Mineta: Makes sense.
Sato Hina: Will you come back when it reopens?
Mineta: Yes. Probably the day after tomorrow.
A longer pause.
Sato Hina: Okay. My cousin says Hayashi-sensei asked about you the day they closed. Just that, no extra context. But he asked.
Mineta processed that.
Hayashi Kenji wasn't the type to ask about someone without reason. The fact he asked the same day USJ news started circulating was information about Hayashi that Mineta added to what he already knew.
Mineta: Thanks for telling me.
Sato Hina: You're welcome. Take care.
The conversation ended there, with that quality of interactions between people who don't yet have a complete vocabulary for what they mean to each other but have found a way to function within that lack of definition.
Mineta put the phone down and returned to Yaoyorozu's book.
The second day was at the dojo.
He arrived in the morning when the dojo had that pre-class stillness, with light streaming through the side windows and the smell of tatami and wood, one of the few smells in his body that felt completely familiar.
Hayashi Kenji was at the back, adjusting training equipment.
He saw Mineta enter and stopped what he was doing.
He didn't say anything immediately.
Mineta crossed the dojo and sat on the edge of the tatami. Hayashi sat across from him with the economy of movement of someone who had been doing this for many years.
— I saw the news — Hayashi finally said.
— Yes.
— How are you?
— Contused ribs. Nervous system overloaded. — Mineta paused. — The quirk evolved during the fight.
Hayashi processed that with the attention of someone who had spent three years understanding exactly what it meant when Mineta said something technical about his quirk.
— How?
Mineta explained. Not everything, but enough for Hayashi to understand the change in abilities and the new limitations that came with it: overheated nervous system, active-use time limit, caloric consumption, irregular distribution he still couldn't fully control.
Hayashi listened without interrupting.
— The doctor said ten days without intensive quirk use — said Mineta when he finished.
Hayashi looked at him for a moment.
— The doctor — he said, carefully choosing words — knows a lot about human bodies in normal conditions. He knows nothing about how your body specifically functions under the specific conditions of your specific quirk. — A pause. — It would be quite foolish to dispute a professional's answer on human bodies without context. But it would be equally foolish to apply that answer without adapting it to the context the doctor lacks.
Mineta looked at him.
— What does that mean in practice?
— The doctor is right in principle: the nervous system needs recovery before asking more of it. But "ten days" is a generic number that doesn't consider that your nervous system has spent three years adapting to a quirk that overloads it in ways no doctor has studied yet. — Hayashi gave that look of someone who's thought this through longer than the conversation suggests. — What you need isn't ten days of nothing. It's two weeks of correct work. No Resin Protocol. Just the body. Fundamentals. Mobility. Let the nervous system rest from the new level of demand while the body stays active.
— That's longer than ten days.
— It's the right time. Which isn't the same as more time. — Hayashi stood. — Then we start control.
Mineta processed that.
— When do we start?
— When the body is ready.
— And when is that?
Hayashi looked at him with the expression of someone who's been answering variations of the same question for three years and hasn't changed the answer because the answer hasn't changed.
— When it's ready — he said.
Mineta accepted it, as there was no useful alternative.
They stayed silent a moment longer, with the dojo light and the smell of tatami.
— Are the other students okay? — Hayashi asked finally.
— Yes. Everyone returned.
— Good — Hayashi said, in the tone of someone considering that the most important information of the conversation and needing no further elaboration.
Mineta stood to leave.
— Hayashi-sensei.
— Mmm.
— Thank you. For the three years.
Hayashi looked at him for a second with that hard-to-read expression of his.
— We're not done yet — he said.
— No. — Mineta looked at the dojo one last time. — But I wanted to say it anyway.
He left.
Sato Hina was waiting outside.
It wasn't something she had planned or announced. She was simply there, school backpack on her shoulder, with the expression of someone who had made a decision and appeared as a result, without elaborating on the intermediate steps.
— My cousin said you were coming today — she said.
— Yes.
— How's Hayashi-sensei?
— Same as always.
Sato Hina nodded. Then looked at him with that direct attention of hers, not intrusive but leaving no room for evasion.
— I saw the USJ images on the news. The hole in the dome wall.
— Yes.
— Was it the Nomu?
— How do you know what a Nomu is?
— The news explained a lot. And my cousin looks things up online. — A pause. — Did you have something to do with it?
It was a direct question in the specific way Sato Hina asked questions: no drama, no beating around the bush.
— Some — said Mineta.
Sato Hina processed the answer with the attention of someone who understands that some is all she will get for now and decides it's enough.
— Okay — she said.
They walked together to the corner where their paths would separate, with that particular quality of walks between people who don't need to fill the space with conversation to justify walking together.
At the corner, Sato Hina stopped.
— Mineta.
— Yes.
— I'm glad you came back intact.
She said it without drama, with the same directness she said everything else, and then continued on before there was time to elaborate further.
Mineta stayed at the corner a moment.
Then he kept walking.
The third day, Mineta began the work of understanding.
He sat in his room with the notebook open and worked methodically on what he knew and didn't know about the Resin Protocol.
What I know: the resin can flow through peripheral nerves to every pore with a hair follicle. The dermal layer absorbs impacts, distributing energy. Palms and soles can generate controlled adhesion, though control is still inconsistent. Elbows and knees can store pressure and release it upon impact. Resin viscosity can vary, though not yet fully intentionally.
What I don't know: how to activate it intentionally rather than waiting for conditions to trigger it. How to regulate distribution to make it uniform rather than irregular. How long I can maintain it before the nervous system begins to degrade. How to stop it in a controlled way rather than waiting for it to run out.
The list of unknowns was considerably longer than the list of knowns.
Which was honest, and the correct starting point for the work ahead.
Mineta closed that section of the notebook and opened a new page.
What he wrote on that page wasn't about the Resin Protocol.
It was about the League of Villains.
The attack on the USJ wasn't the final goal. It was a test. I know because what happened there has the structure of something designed to gather information rather than produce a definitive result. They wanted to see how UA would respond. They wanted to see how All Might would respond. They wanted to know what was on the board before moving the most important pieces.
Shigaraki looked at me before the portal closed. I've stopped being an extra for him. That could be a problem.
What I know about what's coming: the UA Sports Festival is the next major event. In the original canon, it was where several students showcased potential in ways that defined their paths. Where Todoroki began resolving something he hadn't for a long time. Where Midoriya continued building what he's building.
And where Mineta Minoru, in the original canon, was basically irrelevant.
A pause in writing.
That won't be the case this time.
The Sports Festival is in a few weeks. The Resin Protocol exists but isn't controlled. The body needs two weeks of base work before training it makes sense. This means I'll reach the Festival with an evolved quirk I don't fully master and a body in recovery.
Not ideal.
But it is what it is, and what it is is always the starting point.
What I can do between now and the Festival: base work with Hayashi so the body can handle the new level of demand. Theoretical understanding of the Resin Protocol so that when control training starts, I know exactly what I'm trying to control. Observation of classmates, because the Sports Festival is also information about who's who in this class, and that information will be useful.
What I can't control: the League of Villains having their own plans for the Festival. Shigaraki having filed my name as an unexpected variable. The world already knowing that Class 1-A exists.
What I can control: being as prepared as possible when it comes.
Mineta set down the pen.
He looked at what he had written for a moment.
Then he added a final line:
USJ was the beginning. Not the end. Hayashi is right that we're not done yet. But neither are they.
He closed the notebook.
Outside, the neighborhood was quiet, with that stillness of days where nothing visible happens, though below the surface, the things that matter keep moving.
The piano from the building across the street played that night.
Mineta listened for a while before falling asleep.
End of Episode 21.