Hello there!
First of all a special thx to the 5 lovely people who already joined Silver tier on my P@treon.
Nick Pearson, Taz, CHEONMA, Kacey Jackson, and David M. Sep.
Thank you guys for helping me do what I love to do.
So here it is! Chapter 21. I know it took a while but it's here. Hope you like it.
Happy reading
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"HOW IS HE DOING THAT?!" Shigaraki shrieked, scratching furiously at his neck as raw panic clawed its way past his anger.
Back with the students, Akaza gently passed Aizawa's limp form to a stunned Momo. "Bandage him up. Keep pressure on the head wound."
His voice was calm, a stark contrast to the violent energy that was beginning to radiate from his body. With his teacher safe for the moment, Akaza took a deep, centering breath and began to stretch. His neck cracked, followed by his shoulders and knuckles. Each sound was sharp and deliberate in the tense silence. He was treating this like a warm-up, a simple exercise before a workout.
'Time to test the upgrades,' he thought, a feral grin spreading across his blood-smeared face.
"Shigaraki, we should back off and let the Nomu deal with him," Kurogiri suggested, his misty form wavering with urgency. He recognized a threat that went beyond simple heroics; this was something more dangerous.
"WHAT?! You want me to run away from that brat?!" Shigaraki yelled, his voice cracking. The fact that Akaza was not only alive but seemingly more powerful than before was already driving him insane.
"Think straight, Shigaraki." Kurogiri's voice was firm, cutting through the rage. "We cannot even react to his speed, let alone attack him. He can easily outmaneuver my portals, and you need to touch him to use your quirk. The Nomu is our only option. It was designed for this. Let it do its job."
The logic, as much as he hated it, was sound. It calmed Shigaraki's frantic scratching. He took a ragged breath, his red eyes fixated on Akaza.
"Fine," he hissed. "Let Nomu deal with him. We have to wrap this up quickly; this show has gone on for way too long." He then turned his gaze to the hulking, bird-brained creature beside him. "Make sure he is dead this time. No mistakes. Let's mo--"
BOOOOOOOOOOM!
The command was cut short by a deafening explosion. It didn't come from a clash, but from Akaza alone. He had smashed his foot into the plaza's stone floor, shattering it instantly. Debris flew as he settled into a low, wide combat stance, his hands held open before him. The ground beneath him spiderwebbed with deep cracks.
'It's time to use it,' he thought, the grin returning. 'Merge Style: Compass Needle X Tempest.'
The golden, wheel-like construct above his head spun lazily, but the air around Akaza began to warp and vibrate violently. A low hum filled the USJ, a tangible pressure that made the students tremble. Akaza's eyes locked onto the Nomu, ignoring Shigaraki and Kurogiri completely. To him, they were no longer part of the equation.
"Try to keep up, you freak," he said, his voice barely a whisper, yet it carried across the plaza.
He launched himself forward.
He didn't just run. He didn't just charge. He blasted off from his position, a living cannonball of flesh and fury. The Nomu, a being bio-engineered to react to All Might, met his charge head-on.
Then… they collided.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
The resulting shockwave was massive. The very air seemed to buckle and break. The students of Class 1-A were thrown back, shielded only by Thirteen's desperate use of her quirk to absorb some of the impact. The windows of the USJ, already stressed, shattered completely, raining down glass like glitter.
To the terrified onlookers, the fight became an incomprehensible storm of violence. Akaza and the Nomu vanished. They were no longer two distinct figures, but a singular, untrackable phenomenon. All the class could see, all they could hear, were the aftershocks of their battle. A deafening CRACK would split the air to their left as a crater appeared in the ground. An instant later, another sonic boom would rattle them from the right as a section of the staircase was crushed. The air itself seemed to crackle and fracture wherever they clashed.
To Akaza, however, everything was crystal clear. Too painfully clear. The fusion of Compass Needle and Tempest turned his senses into a hyper-advanced combat computer. He wasn't just seeing the Nomu; he was perceiving its every function. He could see the slight twitch of a pectoral muscle that preceded a left hook. He could feel the shift in air pressure as the Nomu prepared a downward smash. He could predict the trajectory of every attack before the creature's brain had even finished sending the signal to its limbs. The sheer volume of information was immense, a raging flood threatening to overwhelm his mind.
But every time his brain felt like it was about to short-circuit, every time the processing load reached its absolute limit…
CLICK.
The golden wheel above his head spun once, a single, sharp increment.
His body adapted.
He got stronger.
He met the Nomu's sledgehammer of a fist with his own. Akaza felt his entire arm go numb, the bones in his hand and wrist shattering into dozens of pieces. The pain was blinding, a white-hot scream that tore through his nervous system.
But before the scream could even register fully, there was that sound.
CLICK.
The wheel spun. A warm, golden energy flooded his ruined limb. He watched in fascination as the splintered bones snapped back into alignment, as torn muscle fibers re-wove themselves in an instant. His hand wasn't just healed; it was denser, stronger, and more resilient than it was a second ago.
He ducked under a wild swing that tore through the air where his head had been and drove his now-healed fist into the Nomu's torso. It was like punching a wall of solid steel. The creature didn't budge, its shock-absorbing body nullifying the kinetic force. It retaliated with a backhand that caught Akaza across the ribs. He heard and felt multiple bones snap, a grating, wet crunch that sent him tumbling through the air.
He hit the ground hard, rolling to his feet just as the Nomu descended upon him, both fists raised for a ground-shattering pound. Akaza met the attack with both of his forearms in a cross-block. The impact drove him knee-deep into the stone floor. Both of his arms were broken, mangled, and twisted at unnatural angles.
CLICK.
The wheel spun. The bones reset. The pain vanished, replaced by a fresh surge of power. He roared, pushing the Nomu's fists off him and driving a powerful kick into its leg. This time, the creature stumbled back a step. It wasn't much, but it was something.
The brutal cycle continued. The Nomu would inflict devastating, crippling damage. Akaza's body would break. The wheel would CLICK. His body would adapt, healing stronger than before. He was using the Nomu's overwhelming power as a forge, hammering his own body into a weapon capable of matching it.
The fight raged across the central plaza. Akaza, now fully adapted to the Nomu's speed, began to take the offensive. He was no longer just reacting; he was dictating the pace. His movements were a blur of calculated strikes; each punch and kick rippled with the power of his shockwave quirk.
He landed a clean punch on the Nomu's jaw. The creature's head snapped to the side, a clear sign that its shock absorption was being tested. He followed with a series of body blows. But the Nomu was relentless. It felt no pain, only the cold programming to destroy its target. It grabbed Akaza's arm mid-punch and slammed him into the ground, then again, and again.
Akaza felt his spine protest, his vision swimming with black spots. He was taking damage faster than the wheel could adapt. The CLICKs were becoming slower, the healing no longer instantaneous. A deep gash on his arm from the Nomu's sharp fingers remained, bleeding freely. The bones in his left hand, shattered again, were slow to reset. The adaptive ability was reaching its limit.
He knew he didn't have much time left. He had to end it now, with one final blow.
Pushing off the ground with a final, desperate burst of strength, he created distance between himself and the monster. He took a single, ragged breath, channeling every last ounce of his energy, every bit of power granted by the adaptation, into his fists. The air around his hands grew thick and heavy, vibrating with an obscene amount of compressed shockwave energy.
The Nomu charged, sensing weakness.
Akaza met the charge. He didn't move to dodge. He stood his ground, both fists cocked back.
"Destructive Death…" he roared, his voice raw.
He threw both of his fists. It landed squarely on the Nomu's chest with a disappointingly dull thud. The creature's body absorbed the impact, its advance not slowing for a fraction of a second. It raised its own massive fist, ready to deliver the final, killing blow.
"TWIN IMPACT!"
Then came the impact. Akaza unleashed all the stored shockwave energy not at the Nomu, but into it. He bypassed the shock absorption entirely, projecting a focused, devastating shockwave deep inside the creature's torso.
There was a moment of absolute silence. The Nomu froze, its fist inches from Akaza's face. A look of confusion, the first real expression it had ever shown, crossed its bird-like features.
Then, a sickening, wet crunch echoed from within its body. It's back arched violently. A spray of dark purple blood erupted from between its shoulder blades as a perfectly round, gaping hole blew clean through its back. The light in its dull, already lifeless eyes flickered and died.
It stood motionless for a beat, a statue of impending death, before collapsing forward, landing face-first on the stone floor with a heavy, final thud.
Silence descended upon the USJ.
The fight was over.
For Akaza, the world dissolved into a haze of pain. The adrenaline that had fueled him vanished, and the accumulated damage hit him all at once. The golden wheel above his head flickered, became transparent, and then faded into nothing. His body screamed. His bones ached, his muscles torn, and blood dripped from a dozen different wounds that were no longer healing. He swayed on his feet, his vision blurring. He saw the shocked faces of his classmates, saw Rumi's wide and her terrified eyes. He smiled at her and said, "That was hella badazz, wasn't it?".
And then the world went black as he fell forward, unconscious before he even hit the ground.
At that exact moment, the main doors to the USJ were blown off their hinges.
"I AM HERE!" All Might's voice boomed, but his signature smile was gone, replaced by a mask of pure rage. He was followed by the rest of the U.A. staff, Present Mic, Snipe, Cementoss, and the others.
They took in the scene in an instant: the scattered, defeated villains, Aizawa bleeding out by the stairs, the dead Nomu with a hole in its chest, and Akaza lying unconscious in a pool of his own blood.
"AKI!" Rumi's scream was raw and animalistic. She broke from the group, sprinting towards him, her mind blank to everything but the sight of his broken body.
"Rumi, wait!" Snipe called out, but she didn't listen.
She fell to her knees beside him, her hands hovering over his body, afraid to touch him for fear of hurting him more. Tears streamed down her face, mixing with the dust and grime.
"No, no, no… Aki, wake up! Aki!" she pleaded, her voice breaking.
The teachers were on them in a second. Cementoss quickly subdued the remaining villains, while others rushed to Aizawa.
"We need to get him to Recovery Girl now!" one of the medics shouted, already assessing the horrific extent of his injuries.
They carefully loaded him onto a floating stretcher. Rumi grabbed onto the side of it, refusing to let go.
"I'm going with him!" she demanded, her eyes wild.
"Young lady, you need to stay here. It's not safe," a teacher said gently.
"I DON'T CARE! THAT'S MY BOYFRIEND! I'M NOT LEAVING HIM!" she screamed, her voice echoing through the massive, damaged facility.
They didn't have time to argue. With a grim nod, they began moving, Rumi still clinging to the stretcher, her knuckles white as she watched Akaza's still form being carried away from the battlefield he had just won.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++So how was it? Let me know in the comments.
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