Three days later, Rei did it again.
Monday night, 10:23 PM. A woman being followed by two guys with bad intentions. Rei dropped between them like a shadow, webbed them to a wall, and vanished before anyone could thank him.
Tuesday night, 11:45 PM. A convenience store robbery in progress. Three armed men, no Quirks. Rei webbed their guns to the ceiling, then webbed them to the floor. The store owner called the police. Rei was gone before they arrived.
Wednesday night, 12:17 AM. A drunk guy with a strength Quirk throwing cars around because his girlfriend dumped him. Rei webbed his arms and legs, cocoon-style, and left him hanging from a streetlight. The heroes showed up five minutes later, confused but grateful for the easy arrest.
It was becoming a routine.
School during the day, training in the evening, patrol at night.
Rei told himself he was just gathering experience. Testing his limits. Seeing what real combat felt like in this world.
But deep down, he knew the truth.
It was addicting.
Not the violence—he'd had enough of that in his previous life. It was something else. The feeling of helping people. Of using his skills for something other than killing.
Every time he stopped a crime, every time he left criminals webbed up for the police, every time someone looked at him with relief instead of fear...
It felt good.
Better than any contract completion ever had.
'This is dangerous,' Rei thought on Thursday night as he perched on a rooftop overlooking downtown. 'I'm getting comfortable. Letting my guard down.'
Because the crimes he'd stopped so far were small-time. Street thugs. Drunk idiots. Nobody with real training or powerful Quirks.
Nothing like what was coming.
'The USJ attack is still months away,' Rei reminded himself. 'But the League of Villains is already forming. All For One is already planning. Real threats exist out there.'
He needed to stay sharp. Stay paranoid. Because the moment he got cocky was the moment someone stronger would show up and put him in his place.
But tonight, the city was quiet.
Rei was about to call it and head home when his phone buzzed.
He pulled it out, expecting spam. Instead, it was a news alert.
VILLAIN ATTACK IN PROGRESS - SHOPPING DISTRICT - HEROES RESPONDING
Rei's enhanced vision zoomed in on the text. Shopping district. That was four kilometers from here.
'Too far,' he thought. 'By the time I get there, heroes will have handled it.'
He should go home. This wasn't his problem. He wasn't a licensed hero. Getting involved in a real villain attack—one that heroes were already responding to—was stupid and reckless.
But even as he thought it, his body was moving.
Web line. Swing. Release. Fire another line.
The city blurred around him as he pushed his speed, swinging faster than he ever had before. Buildings became streaks of light. The wind roared in his ears.
Four kilometers in three minutes.
Rei landed on a rooftop overlooking the shopping district and immediately assessed the situation.
The street below was chaos. Civilians running and screaming. Store windows shattered. And in the center of it all, a villain.
He was big—maybe two and a half meters tall, with gray skin that looked like stone. His Quirk was some kind of earth manipulation, because chunks of concrete were floating around him like satellites.
A hero was already engaging him—some guy in blue armor with a speed-based Quirk, dodging the concrete projectiles and trying to get close enough to land hits.
But the villain was too strong. Every punch the hero landed barely left a scratch on that stone skin.
'Power type versus speed type,' Rei analyzed. 'Bad matchup. The hero's going to lose.'
As if on cue, the villain caught the hero mid-dash, grabbing him by the arm and slamming him into the ground. The pavement cracked under the impact.
The hero didn't get back up.
'Shit.'
Civilians were still in the area, hiding in shops and behind cars. The villain was between them and escape routes.
'I should wait for backup,' Rei thought. 'More heroes will be here soon. This isn't my fight.'
The villain raised a massive chunk of concrete above his head, preparing to throw it at a group of civilians huddled behind a car.
Rei moved without thinking.
He swung down from the rooftop, building momentum, and delivered a drop kick to the villain's face.
The impact sent the stone-skinned villain stumbling backward, the concrete chunk crashing harmlessly to the ground behind him.
Rei landed in a crouch between the villain and the civilians.
'Okay,' his mind raced. 'I'm committed now. Can't back out.'
The villain's stone face twisted into a snarl. "Another hero? You're all the same. Weak."
"Not a hero," Rei said quietly. "Just passing through."
The villain laughed and launched three concrete projectiles at once.
Rei's enhanced reflexes kicked in. He dodged the first two, then webbed the third mid-air and slung it back at the villain. It hit the stone skin and shattered harmlessly.
'Tough.' Rei circled to the side, putting more distance between the villain and the civilians. 'Way tougher than those street thugs.'
"Interesting Quirk," the villain rumbled. "But it won't help you."
The ground beneath Rei's feet suddenly erupted, concrete tendrils shooting up to grab him.
Rei jumped, firing webbing at a streetlight to swing away. The tendrils missed by centimeters.
'He can control the ground itself,' Rei realized. 'Not just throw stuff. Shape it. Manipulate it.'
That made things harder.
Rei landed on the side of a building, sticking to the wall. From this angle, he could see the whole battlefield. The unconscious hero. The hiding civilians. The villain tracking his movement.
'I can't beat him head-on,' Rei thought. 'He's too durable. My hits aren't doing enough damage.'
But he didn't need to beat him. He just needed to hold out until reinforcements arrived.
'Distract. Evade. Buy time.'
The villain sent more concrete projectiles. Rei wall-ran to dodge them, firing webbing to swing around the building. The villain followed, frustrated, launching attack after attack.
None of them landed.
'Faster than him. More mobile. Use that.'
Rei swung back down to street level, deliberately putting himself in the open. The villain charged, fist raised.
At the last second, Rei ducked under the punch and webbed the villain's legs together.
The stone-skinned villain stumbled, off-balance for half a second.
Rei used that moment to web his arms to his torso, then fired more webbing at the ground, trying to anchor him in place.
For a moment, it looked like it might work.
Then the villain flexed.
The webbing stretched. Strained.
Snapped.
'Of course it did.'
"Nice try, kid." The villain's stone face twisted into a grin. "But you're out of your league."
He raised both fists, and the entire street started to crack and shift.
'Oh, that's bad.'
Before the villain could finish his attack, a massive gust of wind slammed into him from the side, sending him crashing through a storefront.
Rei looked up.
A new hero had arrived—a woman in green with wind-based powers, hovering above the street.
"Thanks for the assist, kid," she called down. "But we've got it from here!"
Two more heroes landed beside her. A big guy with a strength Quirk and someone who looked like they could shoot ice.
Backup had arrived.
'That's my cue to leave.'
Rei fired a web line at the nearest building and pulled himself up, disappearing onto the rooftops before anyone could stop him.
Behind him, he heard the sounds of the real fight starting. Heroes versus villain, proper matchup this time.
They'd win. They always did.
Rei didn't stop moving until he was eight blocks away, heart pounding, adrenaline coursing through his veins.
'That was close,' he thought. 'Too close. If those heroes hadn't shown up...'
He didn't want to think about it.
But he'd done it. He'd jumped into a real villain fight, held the line long enough for backup to arrive, and gotten out without anyone getting a good look at him.
'First real test,' Rei sat down on a rooftop, catching his breath. 'And I didn't die. That's something.'
But it was also a wake-up call.
He wasn't invincible. That stone villain had been way stronger than him. If it had been a one-on-one fight to the finish, Rei would've lost.
'I need to get stronger,' he thought. 'Way stronger. If I'm going to keep doing this, I need to be able to handle threats like that on my own.'
Three weeks until the UA exam. Three weeks to push his limits even further.
'No more easy nights,' Rei decided. 'Time to train harder. Fight smarter. Be better.'
Because tonight had shown him something important.
He could make a difference. He could help people. He could be something other than a weapon.
But only if he was strong enough to survive doing it.
Rei stood up and started the long swing home, his mind already planning tomorrow's training.
The night was quiet again.
But Rei Mizuki wasn't.
He was just getting started.
----------
Author's Note:-
Rei's getting real combat experience and facing his first serious villain. The training arc is ramping up, and things are about to get intense!
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Next up: More training, time skip approaching, and the UA exam is getting closer...
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