Story 1 - Chapter 1: MHA - Liberation

Izuku Midoriya couldn’t shake off the unease twisting in his stomach. It wasn’t an illness or fatigue, more like a premonition—an instinct that something was about to go wrong. That feeling made no sense. Today was supposed to be one of the best days of his life. Everything he had worked for over the past year was finally becoming real. His dream was within reach.

For as long as he could remember, Izuku had lived in a world where heroes stood at the center of society. Almost everyone was born with a special ability, a Quirk, and those powers shaped the very foundation of their culture. Heroes were more than protectors; they were symbols, role models, living proof that the impossible could be achieved.

But there was a darker side to this world. While most Children were born with Quirks, there were the unfortunate few born without one. They were called Quirkless. To most people, Quirkless individuals weren’t just unlucky—they were considered weak, useless, and destined to live on the sidelines. Izuku had been one of them.

It hadn’t been easy. The years after he was diagnosed as Quirkless were some of the hardest of his life. Classmates mocked him daily, teachers brushed him off, and even strangers looked at him with pity or contempt. The bullying never stopped, and some people had gone so far as to tell him he should just give up on living altogether. Even though twenty percent of the population was technically Quirkless, the majority of those were elderly. A Quirkless child stood out like a sore thumb, and Izuku had carried that weight alone.

Everything changed the day he met All Might. The Number One Hero, the Symbol of Peace, and Izuku’s lifelong idol had told him something he thought he would never hear: “You can be a Hero.” Not only that, All Might chose Izuku to inherit his power, the legendary Quirk known as One For All.

That single moment had turned Izuku’s life upside down. For more than a year, he trained harder than he ever thought possible, pushing his body past its limits to prove himself worthy of the power he’d been given. One For All wasn’t just strength—it was a responsibility. A Quirk meant to protect and save others, passed down through generations, waiting for someone who carried the spirit of a true hero.

His efforts had paid off. He made it into U.A. High School, the nation’s top hero academy, the school of his dreams. Every step forward brought him closer to becoming the kind of hero he had always admired. Even though he was still struggling to control One For All, just being here meant the impossible was finally possible. Izuku should have been overjoyed. He was happy. But despite all that, the gnawing dread inside him refused to go away.

It was only his first week at U.A., and today’s Heroics class was being held at a special training facility called the Unforeseen Simulation Joint—USJ for short. The massive dome-like building was designed to replicate disaster zones so students could practice rescue scenarios. On the surface, it sounded like a perfectly normal lesson, yet the closer they got, the stronger Izuku’s bad feeling grew.

As his class entered the facility, a strange image flickered in his mind. A monstrous figure, bird-like but grotesque, with its brain exposed to the air. He blinked, shaking his head, but the image lingered faintly at the edges of his thoughts.

The teachers leading the lesson, Thirteen and Eraserhead, began explaining the details of the exercise. Their voices echoed inside the dome, but Izuku struggled to focus. He kept glancing around, uneasy, and noticed one more troubling detail—All Might wasn’t here. The Symbol of Peace should have been present to supervise, but it looked like he had already reached his time limit earlier that morning.

“Are you okay, Deku?” a soft voice asked beside him.

He turned and saw Uraraka, her expression filled with concern. She was the first female friend he had ever made, someone who had accepted him without hesitation.

“I’m fine,” Izuku replied, though his voice wavered slightly. “It’s just… this bad feeling, I—”

The words caught in his throat. The sense of danger inside him spiked violently, sharper than ever before. His vision blurred for a moment, and he saw it: a black void opening in the plaza below, right in front of the central fountain.

Then the lights in the facility cut out.

Every instinct screamed at him to look, and when he did, his blood ran cold. A swirling black portal had appeared exactly where he had imagined it. Shadows rippled from its center as figures began to step out.

‘How… did I see that before it happened?’ Izuku thought in shock, frozen as dozens of menacing shapes emerged from the darkness.

Eraserhead’s voice snapped him out of his thoughts. His usually calm tone was laced with urgency.

“Don’t move! Those are villains!”

Izuku wasn’t as shocked as the rest of his classmates. The appearance of real villains inside their training facility left everyone frozen, but deep down, he had already braced himself for it. That unnatural feeling he’d been carrying all morning was too strong to ignore. Even though the pressure in his chest eased a little, his thoughts stayed locked on the plaza below. Among the last to step out of the swirling portal was the same bird-like creature he had seen in his strange vision. The sight sent a chill through him.

“Thirteen, evacuate the students! And try contacting the school!” Aizawa-sensei’s sharp voice broke through Izuku’s focus, pulling him back to the present. Unlike the students, their homeroom teacher showed no hesitation as he assessed the situation. His tone was calm but urgent. “These villains knew how to get around the sensors. There’s a good chance one of them has an Electrowave-type Quirk to interfere with our signals. Kaminari, you try as well—see if you can reach U.A. with your Quirk.”

The sudden burst of commands stirred the students into motion. Izuku clenched his fists. His instincts screamed at him to jump in, to fight alongside his teacher, but logic caught up immediately. If he used One For All recklessly, his body would shatter, leaving him unable to continue. He wanted to help, but like this, he would only get in the way.

“Sensei, are you going to fight them all by yourself?” Izuku blurted out, unable to stop himself. “Even if you erase their Quirks, there’s too many of them! This… this isn’t your kind of fight!”

For a brief moment, Aizawa turned to look back at his students. His expression stayed unreadable behind his goggles, yet his words carried a quiet confidence. “A Hero always has more than one trick up their sleeves.”

Without another word, he addressed their second teacher. “Thirteen, I’m counting on you.”

Then, with a powerful leap, Eraserhead launched himself down the stairs and into the fray. His capture weapon—a special scarf reinforced for combat—snapped out like a whip, binding and disarming the first villains who dared to approach. Each movement was precise, controlled, and efficient. By erasing their Quirks in an instant and combining that with his surprise attack, he took down multiple enemies before they even realized what was happening.

Izuku couldn’t tear his eyes away. His heart raced as he analyzed every movement, memorizing the timing and form. The calm, fluid way Eraserhead fought was completely different from All Might’s overwhelming power, but it was undeniably heroic. For a split second, Izuku could imagine himself leaping down there as well, fists flying, knocking villains away with explosive strength. The image felt so real he almost moved without thinking.

“This isn’t the time for analysis, Midoriya!” Iida’s firm voice snapped him back. Their class president stood tall despite the chaos around them, pointing toward the exit. “We need to evacuate immediately!”

Reality crashed down on Izuku. The powerful figure in his mind wasn’t him—it couldn’t be. His body wasn’t ready for that. With a frustrated breath, he turned on his heel and followed the others, hurrying after Thirteen as their class rushed toward the escape route.

But the dread in his chest pulsed again, stronger than before. He knew, even before he saw it, that their way out wouldn’t remain clear. Just as they neared the exit, a mass of writhing darkness swirled into existence, cutting them off completely.

“I’m afraid I can’t allow that.”

A figure materialized in front of them, his body shifting like living shadow. His voice was polite, almost casual, but the menace beneath it was unmistakable. The students froze as he spread his form across the path, blocking every chance of escape.

“Greetings,” the villain began, inclining his head as though he were welcoming them to a meeting rather than threatening their lives. “We are the League of Villains. Please forgive the intrusion, but we have taken it upon ourselves to enter U.A. High School, the heart of Heroes. Our objective is quite simple: to engage with All Might, the ‘Symbol of Peace.’”

The man’s words dripped with mock courtesy, as if this were nothing more than a polite announcement. His pitch-black body loomed over them like a wall of smoke, cold and suffocating.

“We were wondering,” he continued smoothly, “if we might be granted the opportunity to extinguish him. Was All Might not meant to be in attendance today? Perchance the schedule has changed?” His tone remained oddly refined, though the malice behind his words made the students’ skin crawl.

Then, as if dismissing his own question, he gave a small shrug. “Ah well, setting that aside…” His form shifted, growing darker and larger as his presence pressed down on the group. “This is my role.”

Before the shadowy villain could finish speaking, two voices shouted out in defiance.

“DIE!”

“KIRISHIMA RUSH!”

Kacchan and Kirishima leapt forward without hesitation, blasting through the darkness with explosions and hardened fists. The swirling black mist split apart under their combined assault, scattering for a brief moment. Their triumphant cries echoed across the chamber, drowning out the tension.

“Bet you didn’t think we’d get you before you had the chance!” Bakugo yelled, smoke curling from his palms.

For an instant, it looked like they had landed a decisive blow. But reality quickly snapped back into place. The inky darkness reformed as if nothing had happened, swirling back together around the villain’s frame. His shadowy body didn’t seem harmed at all.

‘What…? It’s like he’s untouchable…’ Izuku thought, eyes wide as he analyzed what was happening. ‘A Logia-type…? Wait… what’s a Logia?’ The term felt strange on his tongue, as if it came from somewhere else entirely.

The villain’s voice remained calm, almost polite, even after the attack. “That was rather dangerous. But understandable,” he said, his tone carrying the faintest hint of amusement. “You may be mere students, but you are still considered the Hero World’s… golden eggs.”

As he spoke, the darkness at his feet spread wider, seeping across the floor like a living tide. Within moments, it surged upward, forming a storm of shadows that wrapped around the students.

Izuku’s breath caught. In the whirling chaos, he caught a glimpse of something metallic—some kind of shape hidden inside the black mist—but before he could make sense of it, the darkness swallowed everything. One by one, his classmates disappeared into the void. Bakugo, Iida, Yaoyorozu, and others were pulled in as if the shadows themselves were devouring them.

“No—!” Izuku tried to shout, but the storm reached him before he could resist.

The world flipped. His vision went dark for a split second before he felt weightless, suspended in midair. When his sight cleared, he was no longer inside the plaza. A black hole had spat him out above water, and now he was plummeting toward the artificial sea inside the USJ.

“The Flood Zone?!” he cried out, panic rising. “No—if I hit the water…! I can’t swim… the water will drain my strength!”

The words tumbled from his mouth before he even realized what he was saying. Confusion hit him just as hard as the fear. He knew he could swim—he had learned as a child, had never once struggled with it. So why had his mind conjured up the image of himself sinking, powerless and helpless in the water? Why did it feel so real, like his body would betray him the second he touched the surface?

There was no time to figure it out.

He crashed into the water with a heavy splash, the impact knocking the air from his lungs. Luckily, the drop hadn’t been high enough to break him like concrete, but it still left his body aching. For a split second, everything went silent except for the muffled roar of water in his ears.

Kicking desperately, Izuku forced himself upward. Relief washed over him as he realized his strength was still intact. His arms and legs moved just fine. He wasn’t helpless. He could swim.

But that relief was short-lived.

As his eyes adjusted to the dim light under the water, his heart skipped a beat. Right in front of him, a villain loomed, equipped with diving gear and sharp, jagged teeth. The man’s face resembled that of a shark, his grin stretching unnaturally wide as he lunged forward.

“Oho, fresh meat dropped right into my zone!” the villain growled, bubbles escaping his mouthpiece as he spoke. “Nothing personal, kid—but sayonara!”

Izuku froze, terror locking up his body as the shark-man’s jaws opened, ready to tear him apart.

But before the bite could land, another figure shot through the water like a bullet. A powerful kick slammed into the villain’s face, sending him tumbling backward.

Izuku blinked in shock as a long tongue wrapped securely around his torso, yanking him upward.

“Got you!”

It was Tsuyu Asui. Her calm voice carried even through the chaos. With one arm, she dragged another student along as well—Mineta, clinging tightly to her back like his life depended on it.

Izuku’s chest flooded with relief. In the middle of that nightmare, his classmate had saved him.