Age 9
Gray and Natsu continued to get stronger.
Gray quickly realized that training at home was a bad idea. They had gotten too powerful; too many scorched walls, frozen doorways, and shattered windows. Their mother warned them that any more damage, and she would start grounding them and taking away their allowance. That was simply unacceptable to Gray and Natsu, who were finally allowed to go out to the park on their own. So instead, they went out to train in the woods, abandoned lots, and empty fields, anywhere far from property damage and civilian panic. Thankfully, there were some areas close to their home that fit. Endeavor was too busy with Shoto and his hero work to really pay attention to them.
They still went to school, passed their classes (barely, in Natsu's case), and tried their best to not get into trouble. (Barely, in Natsu's case). But they also trained regularly, pushed each other hard, and steadily improved.
—
One evening
The sun filtered through the trees in the clearing as the three brothers stood in a wide circle. Natsu was sitting on a boulder nearby, chewing on a twig and looking way too smug.
"Alright, let's go, Shoto!!!," he called. "Show that pervert what's what!"
Gray just rolled his eyes.
Shoto stood a few feet away, arms crossed, expression unreadable. He nodded once. "Ready when you are."
Gray took a breath, then launched forward.
Just as his feet skidded against the dirt as he swept a sharp line of ice across the ground. Shoto countered instantly, firing a low burst of flame to melt the attack.
Gray swung his hand upward. A ramp formed just in front of Gray launching him above the flames.
Shoto raised his left arm up to prepare for a counter. Flames ignited between his fingers but Gray flipped over him, grabbing his wrist and freezing his entire arm. Just as Gray landed on the ground, he kicked Shoto in the back, sending him flying.
Shoto rolled across the dirt. Gray blinked.
"Come on man. Use your ice to catch yourself. You can adjust the angle that you're falling at so that you'd be standing up again instead of skidding across the floor." Gray commented.
The ice around Shoto's left arm began to melt and he got up on one knee, staring at Gray between his fallen bangs.
"Noted…"
"Blast his dumb head off!" Natsu shouted.
"Shut up, I'll deal with you next!" Gray turned his head to focus on Natsu. Shoto's eyes widened. A chance.
He froze the ground immediately. Gray's feet and knees became engulfed in a thick layer of ice. Gray turned his attention back to Shoto and a giant ball of fire was hurled straight at him. Gray smirked.
"That's the spirit."
Gray bent down, slamming his palm directly onto the iced over floor in front of him.
"Ice make: Geyser!"
The fireball collided into a newly formed pillar of ice. Gray appeared from within the steam cloud holding a spear made of ice. He hurled the spear at the unprepared Shoto.
Shoto's eyes widened as the spear just grazed his cheek, causing a small amount of blood to drip down from his cheek.
"You already escaped and had another attack ready while I was still recovering from my own…" Shoto sighed.
"Not bad bro. You took advantage of an opening. You're just lacking a bit of finesse with your attacks. You focused too much on speed so the ice holding me down was sloppy."
"Also you don't move around enough!" Natsu interjected. "You keep standing still!"
"Yeah…I haven't figured out how to use my quirk and move around like you guys yet…it's especially hard if I'm using both sides at the same time."
They exchanged a few more moves but it wasn't the battle Gray expected. Shoto was good. For his age at least. But it wasn't enough. Not compared to him or Natsu.
Shoto hadn't trained like they had. Endeavor's training methods were effective but still flawed. He didn't seem to teach Shoto anything about how to use his ice abilities. Or maybe Shoto had too much on his mind. He was trying to prove something.
Gray and Natsu training was for their own self improvement. They loved the feeling of getting stronger everyday and trying to best each other. It made sense, he thought. Natsu and he were from another world. They remembered what it meant to train and surpass their limits. They clearly remember their peaks and try to reach that state of strength again.
Gray pulled his next strike. His ice stopped an inch short of hitting Shoto. Shoto blinked.
"That's it for today," Gray said, giving a small smile.
Shoto looked at him, a mix of confusion and quiet frustration in his eyes. "You held back."
Gray shrugged."
Shoto just huffed. Unconvinced. He felt it, he knew Gray was still holding back. He saw him get distracted during the fight and still have the upper hand. He looked at Natsu who he knew was probably just as strong as Gray. He would work harder to catch up.
Natsu let out a loud groan from the rock. "Ugh, boring! I was hoping for a KO!"
"You want a KO, come fight me yourself," Gray snapped.
"You're on!"
"Wait…I want to fight Yakuto next." Shoto declared. Natsu and Gray both turned to Shoto and Natsu's face lit up.
"Okay! But you gotta get fired up." Natsu said with a grin.
"Fired up?" Shoto asked.
Natsu cracked his knuckles and fire began to leak out from between his hands. He suddenly raised his left arm out with flames coming off the top of his finger tips, spelling the words "Come on."
"Woah that's cool…let me try that…" Shoto raised his left hand up, expelling a small amount of flames out from between his fingers. He concentrated hard trying to form their shape.
"Fire doesn't have a concrete form…this is harder than trying to make a sword like Haise…" Shoto grabbed his wrist, really trying to make the letter "C" out of fire.
"Almost. Now let's fight." Natsu jumped back, creating some space between them.
Shoto took a deep breath in and exhaled a cold frost. His entire left side was engulfed in fire.
"Yeah…I'm fired up now!"
Natsu grinned. "That's the spirit!"
Natsu crouched down and fire erupted from his heels. The ground caught on fire as he burst forward with great speed.
Shoto watched in awe. 'He's fast! Like how dad propels himself!'
Ice erupted from Shoto's feet, forming a wall in front of him. Natsu clad his arms in fire and swung them out.
"Fire Dragon Wing Attack!"
Natsu broke through the ice wall with two bursts of flames coming from his arms. Shoto grit his teeth.
'I have to be fast…slide like Haise…and propel myself like Natsu!' The ground beneath Shoto froze, forming a path to one side. He raised his left arm, creating a burst of flame that pushed him to the right.
Gray smiled as he watched from the sides. "He learned."
Shoto slid across the floor, propelling himself with his left side. 'I have to change my angle…and get behind him!'
Shoto formed the ice directly in front of him, still blasting behind him with flames. He circled around Natsu. Natsu turned his head, tracking him the whole time with a grin.
"Pretty good!"
Shoto raised his right hand. 'Fire doesn't work on Natsu…I'll have to rely on my right side!'
A crude club made of ice formed in Shoto's hand. Still propelling himself, he swung the club at Natsu. Natsu immediately ducked the attack, but to his surprise, Shoto was still spinning like crazy as he had never turned off his flames. 'Why can't I stop?!'
Shoto suddenly veered away from Natsu, still spinning as he started heading towards the nearby trees.
"Hey hold on, turn off your left side!" Natsu shouted.
Shoto realized he was still propelling himself. He turned off the flames but the momentum still flung him into the tree. Natsu and Gray ran over to him. He sat on the floor holding his forehead with a bruise on it.
"Ow…it's a lot harder to move fast like you than I thought."
Natsu helped him up and he and Gray suddenly locked eyes. Shoto could feel the tension in the air. It wasn't malicious, but there was a certain pressure. The pressure of those who are about to get into a fight.
"Had your warm up?" Gray smirked.
"Yeah, I'm ready to go." Natsu responded, cracking his knuckles.
"Let's go to the usual place." Gray said.
Shoto looked at them, puzzled. "Usual place?"
"We found an abandoned factory not to far from here. Whatever they were making in there is pretty sturdy and fire resistant so we were training there." Natsu said.
"It's that time now to settle which of us is the strongest." Gray added.
Shoto just watched them with that same quiet stare, and after a moment, let out a small laugh.
—
There was an empty clearing in the center of the factory. Surrounding the edges near the walls were multiple broken conveyer belts. Shoto sat atop one of the machines. Natsu and Gray stood facing each other with a ten meter gap between them.
Natsu cracked his knuckles and widened his stance. Gray got into his signature Ice Make stance.
Fire suddenly burst out of Natsu's feet. He launched towards Gray at blinding speed. Gray immediately started forming ice in his hands.
"Ice Make: Cold Excalibur!"
A massive blade of ice formed in his hands and he swung it forward. Natsu propelled himself upward, just barely dodging the slash as he started spinning downward into an axe kick.
"Fire Dragon Talon!"
Natsu kicked downward towards Gray's head, only for a pillar of ice to appear right in front of him to catch his leg. Natsu spun himself as the ice melted around his leg, kicking the pillar with his other leg. Gray had already readjusted himself behind Natsu.
"Ice Make: Hammer!"
Gray swung a massive ice hammer at Natsu. Natsu turned his body, propelling the other way with flames as he shoved his elbow into the hammer.
"Fire Dragon Elbow!"
The two collided and the hammer shattered. Natsu and Gray were blown back from the attack. Natsu adjusted himself in the air, cancelling his momentum with reverse propulsion and he landed softly on the ground. Gray formed ice across the floor behind him that eventually crawled up to his feet and froze him to the ground, stopping him from skidding.
Natsu took a deep breath in, his chest puffing out. Gray took another ice make stance. Natsu exhaled a stream of flames from his mouth.
"Fire Dragon Roar!"
A giant wall of ice formed in front of Gray from the ground.
"Ice Make: Wall!"
The wall immediately began to melt and turn into steam from the breath exhaled from Natsu. Natsu appeared from the right side of the wall, his figure bursting from the steam.
"Fire Dragon Iron Fist!"
Natsu's flaming fist collided into Gray. Or what he thought was Gray. An ice doppelganger shattered and Natsu's eyes widened.
"What?!"
Natsu felt a sharp pain in his side as Gray leapt out from the steam cloud, punching him with an intricate yet heavy spiked gauntlet made of ice.
"Ice Make: Gauntlet!"
Natsu grunted in pain as he was launched across the factory. Gray caught up to Natsu, materializing ice on the floor as he launched forward.
"Ice Make: Lance!"
Gray pierced upward with the lance. Natsu managed to grab onto the shaft, doing almost a handstand midair. His foot ignited and he slammed down with a heel drop on Gray.
"Fire Dragon Talon!"
Natsu's heel slammed into Gray's shoulder and Gray fell face first into the floor. He put both hands down, crashing hard onto his palms as his face was just barely touching the hard concrete. Ice began to form rapidly from his palms. Natsu realized what was happening and jumped back up into the air, forming flames in both hands.
"Ice Make: Geyser!"
"Fire Dragon Brilliant Flame!"
A massive fireball collided with a huge jagged pillar of ice as it was forming. The resulting explosion of steam blasted both Natsu and Gray in opposite directions, their backs slamming into the opposite walls of the factory respectively.
Shoto remained quiet but stared wide eyed at the fight. There was a long silence as the steam in the factory lingered.
Natsu got up first, emerging from the rubble covered in scratches and bruises. He wiped some blood from his lip. Gray got up right after him, some blood trickling from his forehead. Both Natsu and Gray started walking towards each other.
"That was a crazy explosion, are you guys okay?!" Shoto interjected.
"We're nowhere near done yet." Gray responded.
"The fun just started." Natsu added.
Shoto jumped down from where he was sitting. "Guys I think you should-"
It was too late. They had already started charging at each other once again.
The day ended and Natsu and Gray weren't able to decide a winner. Their quirks were so overused, the fight eventually devolved to just weak punching and flailing. Shoto quickly stopped the fight and decided they should all just head home. Rei yelled at them for coming home so late and bruised. Endeavor checked on Shoto and saw the small cut on his cheek. He reprimanded Gray and Natsu.
"Stop getting your brother into trouble. I'm letting him some free time as promised, but it doesn't mean you can just take him out all hours of the day!
Rei didn't say anything, She just applied some ice over Natsu's face.
Gray and Natsu just ignored Endeavor, they had gotten this lecture more than once. Endeavor's eye brows twitched. He held in what he was about to say and just took Shoto with him.
Things were still sometimes tense, but it was getting better.
—
The rest of the year passed. Shoto wasn't able to come out as often, as Endeavor became more focused on his training and after that last stunt, he was worried they might harm him. However, they still spent time after school with all their siblings or going on outings with Rei.
-
Rei noticed early on that Natsu and Gray didn't like sitting still. They weren't kids who spent their free time playing games or watching TV all day. They needed movement, action, and adrenaline. So she let them go out more, as long as they came home before dark and didn't use their quirks on other people. She was careful to remind them each time just in case. She asked Endeavor to take them to the agency to show them around him.
However, Endeavor didn't want to bring them to the agency again.
"I'll take Shoto," he said. "Just him."
But Rei gave him that look. She didn't want her sons to feel left out.
So he reluctantly took all three.
Burnin, upon seeing Natsu walk in, immediately excused herself for a mission and vanished. She hadn't forgotten the fire-hair incident, and no amount of time healed that trauma.
"Hey Boss, I have to… something… I need the whole day." She puttered about before running away.
But this time, things were… calmer.
Natsu and Gray didn't cause a scene. Natsu didn't eat anything. Gray only stripped once. No one got injured. No equipment got destroyed. By the Todoroki family's new standards, that was a success.
Endeavor gave them a proper tour this time. He explained how the agency worked, what real patrols involved, and the risks of reckless quirk usage and how it could lead to prison time, he seemed to stare directly at Natsu when he said this. They even trained a little in one of the reinforced sparring rooms. They mostly did physical exercises and Endeavor was surprised at their stamina. All that running around causing trouble seemed to be good for their physical health.
At the end of the day, Endeavor admitted grudgingly that they weren't completely hopeless.
"They're loud," he muttered to Rei later, "but they're learning."
—------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Age 10:
It was a soft, breezy evening, the sky painted in warm orange hues as Natsu and Gray strolled down the neighborhood sidewalk, hands in their pockets, arguing about nothing in particular.
"I'm just saying," Gray said, gesturing with half a bag of sour gummies, "you could try doing your homework sometime."
Natsu blinked at him. "I passed all my classes last year."
"That's not the same as trying, dumbass."
"I thought the goal was to pass," Natsu said seriously, popping a gummy into his mouth.
Gray groaned and slapped his own forehead.
They reached the corner store, a squat, slightly run down convenience shop tucked between a laundromat and a pawn shop. It always smelled like old wood, plastic wrappers, and warm yakisoba. A faded sign above the door read Ogawa's Mini Mart.
Inside, the store was lit with buzzing fluorescent lights. Shelves leaned slightly sideways. Posters for long-forgotten soft drinks clung to the windows. The cash register sat behind a glass counter, manned by Mr. Ogawa, an elderly man with tired eyes and a permanent scowl that meant absolutely nothing. His grandson, Kenji, a wiry middle schooler with an undercut, sat on a stool behind him playing a handheld game.
"Back again?" Mr. Ogawa grunted as they entered.
"Hey, pops," Natsu grinned. "We're here for your free snack cakes."
Mr. Ogawa grumbled but tossed them each a chocolate stick. "On the house. You two are good kids."
They beamed. "Thanks!"
Ever since they were old enough to wander the neighborhood on their own, Natsu and Gray had made a habit of visiting the small convenience store tucked between an alley and an old laundromat. They'd been coming here for almost three years now. The old man who ran the place was famously grumpy to most customers, always muttering under his breath or yelling at broken machines, but for some reason, he had a soft spot for the two boys. Maybe it was because they always said hi and chatted with him. Maybe it was because they never tried to steal anything. Or maybe it was just because they reminded him of his own grandson. Either way, he'd often slip them some candy at the counter, muttering something about it being close to the expiration date anyway.
Just as Natsu bit into his snack, the little bell above the door jingled.
In walked a man in a black hood, his face hidden beneath shadows, hands stuffed in his pockets. The air instantly changed.He was easily over 6ft tall, with broad shoulders and a huge back.
Mr. Ogawa's face became tense.
Kenji paused his game looking up. Mr Ogawa reflexively placed his arm around Kenji, pushing him behind him.
The man walked right up to the counternand in one smooth motion, fired a jagged spike from his wrist, embedding it into the wall next to Mr. Ogawa's head.
Mr. Ogawa's face paled. He immediately understood what was happening.
"Cash," the man rasped. "Now."