A student died. Ordinary people only see that.
No matter how recklessly that student acted, no matter how blinded by revenge they were, no matter how brutally their hero family member had been treated by Stain, people focused on the result. U.A.'s prestige decreased and only criticism poured out.
The principal bowed his head, and the homeroom teacher, someone named Aizawa Shota, also bowed his head. He looked angry. Midoriya Izuku couldn't tell if that anger was directed at the reckless student or at Stain.
Heroes began receiving looks from the ordinary people who make up society. Not good looks. Looks judging when they could bite.
With Iida Tenya's death by murder, applications to U.A. and other hero schools decreased. Students withdrawing appeared. Reality finally hit. This is what it is. In the Hero Course, there was no change except that a student named Mineta was the only one who quit. It was disappointing about Mineta, but the other students, all of Class A and Class B, remained. That was enough to move Midoriya Izuku.
As expected of hero hopefuls, hero candidates chosen by heroes. They all had reasons not to quit and continued growing toward becoming heroes.
Not everything was bad. Seeing Shinso Hitoshi from the same General Studies... no, now a different class, having entered the Hero Course, Midoriya Izuku expressed joy he couldn't contain with a bizarre face. He was so happy that Shinso Hitoshi asked if he was an alien. He gave a thumbs up and nodded, saying "you're the best." Shinso Hitoshi had transferred to the Hero Course.
Quirkless Midoriya Izuku from General Studies became a second-year like that.
It was the appearance of the League of Villains.
"Recently with the Stain thing too, as soon as the credibility of schools that train heroes dropped, even people who weren't villains rose up for reasons like 'why should Quirks be controlled by society' and 'why should we live oppressed.' An excuse was created, you know. Rather than getting worked to death trying to serve with their Quirks at schools like that, they'd use their Quirks for themselves. Something like that... Among them, the real deals, not just any riffraff, started moving when society became unstable, and that's the League of Villains, I think."
"Whoa, the League of Villains... scary..."
The number of second-year General Studies students dropped drastically. Many students withdrew because their parents worried they'd be negatively affected by being "U.A. graduates." At a classmate's words, someone with thin eyes instead of eyebrows, Midoriya Izuku laughed lowly. "Hahaha."
"But for heroes to exist, villains are absolutely necessary."
"That sounds kinda weird, Midoriya. Villains appear, so heroes appear to stop villains, right?"
"Quirkless Midoriya Izuku better hope the heroes defeat the League of Villains before you graduate and leave the dorms."
His classmate said. Midoriya Izuku understood the other meaning in those words. Ordinary people, not the Quirkless. Before harm comes to ordinary people, heroes should clean up the League of Villains. That image of distrusting heroes while leaning on them could be seen everywhere.
Midoriya Izuku bit and ate the snack his classmate offered. "Pfft, you look like a duck, Midoriya." With two potato chips in his mouth, he did look like a duck. The voice full of joy clashed awkwardly with current society's anxiety. It felt unreal.
Recently, Midoriya Izuku thought it was natural yet unfair. If only they were indifferent. They criticize, oppress, tear down, and jeer, but when they're in danger they scream to be saved. They threw out a scapegoat and rolled them endlessly.
If you compare people who use Quirks to snacks, when people eat one bag of those snacks, they eat the easy-to-eat villains. Easy and bad, so good to pick on. Fine to use as an emotional trash can. But when they finish eating the easy-to-eat villain snacks in one bag, what's left? Hard-to-eat heroes.
Corrupt heroes. More precisely, those who don't deserve the title of hero hide well, but heroes who can emit the light of good will at any time get eaten. Midoriya Izuku began judging usefulness, reasons, justification.
Midoriya Izuku loved heroes. He admired them and wanted to become a hero, and received the verdict that he couldn't because he's Quirkless. What could Midoriya Izuku do that's related to heroes?
"It's true that as villains increase, heroes have more work. Heroes who've become more visible recently too..."
"Right. Makes you wonder why we're only seeing them now. Heroes who work super hard and are seen often versus heroes who half-ass it. Thanks to that Stain guy, I guess."
"Even villains have their uses then."
"...Dude, that's kind of a dangerous thing to say."
Crunch. The snack in his mouth broke.
Even villains have their uses. At those words, Midoriya Izuku felt like his head suddenly cleared. Not that Stain did well. Not that villains are good. Heroes' enemies: villains. Midoriya Izuku couldn't become a hero, but he could become something else. That being a villain.
The criteria for villains was ambiguous. A dangerous person with a Quirk takes over a building. Steals money and runs. Uses their Quirk to commit violence. A villain.
What about Quirkless people? A dangerous Quirkless person takes over a building. Steals money and runs. Commits violence without a Quirk. For people with Quirks, unless they're heroes, harming others outside of daily life is illegal. Therefore, if a Quirkless person commits the same acts as a villain, the same things without a Quirk, they're equally a villain.
At Midoriya Izuku's reaction of widening his eyes and shaking pupils, his General Studies friends patted his shoulder, saying the kid was scared. Telling him to relax. There were still many heroes, and All Might was here too. As long as the Symbol of Peace All Might was here, bigger crimes wouldn't occur. Crimes...
They believed that. But the problem was elsewhere.
"I heard Bakugo Katsuki killed someone?"
That even if heroes worked hard, society, ordinary people, evaluated by their own standards and pushed with the weight of countless numbers.
"They say a kid aspiring to be a hero killed someone."
People who already viewed heroes unfavorably due to the Stain incident had increased, and when the League of Villains' birth became known, people trembling with anxiety only spewed criticism.
"If a kid like that becomes a hero... what's the difference between villains and heroes?"
Second year of high school, summer vacation. Weather with scorching sunlight so harsh you could barely open your eyes. The dumbbell in his hand moved up and down. The exercise he'd started with Shinso Hitoshi continued to this day. Though second-years in high school, the Hero Course participated in suppressing rampaging villains through something called hero internships due to personnel shortages. Of course, this was done after receiving waivers from parents. Students who didn't get waivers were immediately excluded from hero internships if dangerous situations occurred.
Midoriya Izuku watched the news with shocked eyes. Bakugo Katsuki had received a waiver, and the scene shown on the news was of Bakugo Katsuki stopping a villain with a tree Quirk after neutralizing him in various ways: the best matchup.
[With the villain's death, several of the hostages suffered major injuries...]
Bakugo Katsuki didn't actually kill the opponent. It was almost desperate. Even rough, sharp-edged, twisted Bakugo Katsuki had a dream of always winning, of becoming a hero like All Might. What that required was citizens' safety and self-sacrifice to protect. The only problem was that luck didn't know when it would grab someone's hand.
He was unlucky. The hostage rescue succeeded, but in the process of suppressing the villain trying to rampage, one hostage used their Quirk out of fear. The Quirk the hostage had wasn't much. Just scattering dust-like stuff that blocked vision. In the hotel room where the hostages were trapped, hazy powder like smoke scattered. Could that powder be a problem? The exact problem was that Bakugo Katsuki's Quirk and that situation really didn't match.
The cause of the villain's death and the hostages' injuries: a dust explosion.
There seemed to be no interest in Bakugo Katsuki's injuries from working as a hero intern. Everyone blamed the heroes who couldn't save the hostages and the heroes who left the work to a kid who wasn't a hero yet. They should have known not to use their Quirk in that situation. Rather than words about the hostage's sudden action, only Bakugo Katsuki got cursed at for using such a Quirk recklessly.
Midoriya Izuku hurriedly packed his bag and was finally able to hear about Bakugo Katsuki's situation from his mom on her way out. He was hospitalized with burns and numerous injuries, and the heroes were struggling to block reporters from swarming in.
With this, reporters latched onto two things: the dust explosion that erupted from a chain reaction with Bakugo Katsuki's explosion Quirk, and the complacency of the heroes who left the suppression to young Bakugo Katsuki.
It was absurd. No matter how he thought about it, Midoriya Izuku found the hostage who had used their Quirk recklessly in that situation absurd, and the heroes and Bakugo Katsuki who had created a situation where all hostages could be rescued through proper judgment were amazing.
The citizens, people, because they weren't heroes themselves, opened their mouths and spoke in unison.
It was shocking. Midoriya Izuku found the people talking about heroes that way absurd. He even got a headache. Why did they use their Quirk just because they were scared, making a fuss? It would be scary, but why the Quirk? He even had the extreme thought that being Quirkless like himself would have been better. He couldn't empathize with the hostage's thinking. Because he was Quirkless, and Midoriya Izuku wasn't a hostage in that situation like those citizens criticizing them.
Like that, several heroes had to remove the name of hero. Bakugo Katsuki didn't give up, but if he came outside as a hero, stones ready to be thrown piled up.
He was so angry. Midoriya Izuku wanted to appeal. The heroes just did what they had to do, yet everything done recklessly became the heroes' fault. He dropped the dumbbell in his hand to the floor. Midoriya Izuku held his head and swallowed his anger.
He was so angry he just cried. It was unfair. Even though he wasn't someone who experienced that situation, his admiration, what he couldn't become: Bakugo Katsuki, who had always been more amazing than him, was condemned because of just one hostage's mistake.
It had been a long time since he could have a conversation with Bakugo Katsuki, but to Midoriya Izuku, Bakugo Katsuki's words about heroes and his Quirk were always a back he wanted to follow. Now that he had given up, setting his character aside, Bakugo Katsuki was also Midoriya Izuku's idol.
U.A. sank once again. Returning to the dorms after being home during vacation, Midoriya Izuku fell silent seeing General Studies even more empty. Cricket sounds rang out, and he stood alone in the dorm's dark living room with no lights on, quietly looking around.
It really was the worst.
At that time, the League of Villains' hideout happened to be discovered. At the end of second year of high school, Shinso Hitoshi rubbed his dark circles with his hand and told Midoriya Izuku. Because Midoriya Izuku was the only General Studies student left talking with Shinso Hitoshi.
"It's far from your house, but... tell your parents not to go anywhere near there if possible."
"...Yeah. Be careful, Shinso."
"You too."
It would be big. It was something involving various pro heroes centered on All Might. Even graduated students were participating, and All Might said that judging by danger level alone, they'd have to risk their lives. Shinso Hitoshi couldn't participate. After all, they were villains "who couldn't be reasoned with."
They didn't tell the citizens. Of course not. If they did, they'd obviously scream "save us, heroes" and make a fuss, potentially making things worse. Midoriya Izuku thought that and drew an awkward smile on his face. Since when did he start thinking this way?
Covertly and precisely. They started the operation while asking for evacuation of the surrounding shopping district under the pretext that bombs were discovered.
The result?
"Who knew Endeavor and his son's relationship was that bad..."
"I heard somewhere... about that hero intern. They say he was born from a Quirk marriage."
"What? A hero committed such an unethical act?"
The boss of the League of Villains, a villain who showed overwhelming power, was suppressed by All Might. More precisely, they knocked each other out and it ended. The surroundings were devastated. It wasn't without the kind of emotion you'd see in dramas or movies. However, the problem was seeds of discord that gradually showed in that situation. One of those seeds of discord was because of Todoroki Shoto.