Chapter 8: The Melody Between Two Heartbeats
He woke up to the sound of machinery. One of them hissed softly to the rhythm of his breathing, the other whirred to the beating of his heart. He didn't have to remember the fight, it had been beaten into him.
Trying to lift his hand failed. He wasn't tied to the bed, but his body refused to move in spite of his insistence that it should. He closed his eyes again, listening as he breathed. There was no tube in his throat, which was its own blessing. The antiseptic smell of a genuine hospital let him relax slightly. His lung seemed… fine.
The pain in his chest was still there. Of course it was. It would remain his reminder of his own weakness.
Once again, he tried to move his hand. His finger twitched. The feeling in his limbs returned, revealing that a small device hung off his index finger. He slowly maneuvered his middle finger and thumb to push it off. One of the devices to his left made a warning sound, loud enough for him to wince. It was enough to get the attention of the nurse that was likely just outside the door, causing her to come in and check the disturbance.
She walked up to him, hitting a button next to his bed and then checking his eyes with a small flashlight. He swallowed, opening his mouth slowly. The fluids they were pumping into him stopped his throat from being bone dry, but it was still uncomfortably sore.
"How long?" he asked. The nurse blinked.
"You arrived yesterday morning," she said. Izuku frowned, slowly turning his head. A clock was visible on one of the screens, displaying 15:18. He had missed school. "Just relax, the doctor will be here shortly. You're a very fortunate young man."
Izuku nodded, both to the mention of the doctor and the mention of his life.
One did not simply recover from an injury like that, of course. Unless, as it stood, you had a world full of amazing abilities. It was rare nowadays not to find someone with a medical quirk who wasn't fast-tracked into university to become a doctor. The government offered stipends for those fortunate few, and in their few moments of wisdom, they were sent around the country so that every hospital would have someone who could deal with what would usually be a dead patient.
He couldn't rationalize that the man didn't intend to hurt him. In the end, your intentions didn't matter when your actions say otherwise. It just happened that he was hit in the exact moment that his breathing stopped, but his lungs were still filled with air. If anything, it was fortunate that only one of them collapsed.
Or tore. He could have sworn he heard the sound of flesh and muscle being ripped apart.
He closed his eyes and focused on the sound of his breathing. When the doctor came, half the devices on him were removed. Izuku was exhausted, but other than that, the grogginess of being asleep for over twenty-four hours slowly washed away.
"My mom," came Izuku's hoarse whisper. Was she safe? The yakuza man clearly wasn't working alone, they might go after her-
"She's right outside the room," the doctor said. She wrote something down on his chart before nodding, walking towards the door. Izuku heard the hushed voices. He couldn't turn his head to look at her as she walked in. Inko Midoriya was not someone who held a presence in the same way that Nezuko-sensei did, she walked as he did quite often. Slow, mostly short steps, as if the world would crumble under her feet.
She came up to him, her face pale and her hands shaking as she reached out. She pulled back, quickly giving a glance to the doctor who gave her a nod before continuing. Izuku could feel the warmth as she took his hand.
"Izu-kun," his mother whispered. He could see it in her eyes, the various questions that went through her mind she wanted to ask. He breathed in softly, turning his body and putting his free hand onto hers.
"Hey mom," Izuku said. It became easier to speak. When he reached for a cup of water on the bedside table, his mother took it and helped him drink. The cool liquid was a relief that couldn't be described as anything but heavenly. "Did the villain get away?"
She opened her mouth, hesitating for a moment before nodding. "I heard he ran. I… I slept through it all, I didn't wake up until Umeno-san came over. I'm so sorry."
"It's not your fault," Izuku said, pursing his lips. "He thought I knew where to find someone and wouldn't take no for an answer. It's just bad luck."
"You could have died, and I was asleep," she said, as if repeating it would make the gravitas of the situation hit home more. Izuku remained steadfast.
"I'm fine," he said. "And you're tired, you've been on your feet for too long."
They were bold words from a boy who managed to get hospitalized by a villain, but he could see that his mother found a certain sense of comfort in them.
"You have to take care of yourself, Izu-kun." Inko's words cut deep. "You should have run away and gotten help."
"He was threatening the neighbors," he murmured. She nodded, obviously aware that a villain would do such a thing. "I couldn't just let him do something to them because of me."
"You're a child. You shouldn't have to fight these battles."
"I want to be a hero," he insisted. "I will have to fight them eventually."
"You're just like," she began before cutting herself off, her face turning from tired sadness to righteous frustration. "Promise me, if something like this ever happens again, you'll run."
"Mom-"
"Promise me," she said. She wouldn't make threats about pulling him out of U.A. or not allowing him to train with Nezuko-sensei anymore, because that wasn't her, and she knew that it would cause nothing but resentment between them.
"I promise," he said, to grant her some peace of mind. He knew that if push came to shove, he wouldn't be able to keep this promise, that was as certain as the amen in a church.
She stared for a moment, as if trying to measure the genuinity of his words by his haggard appearance and tired murmurs.
"I have to go on another trip," she eventually said. He had not once complained after the first time she left him with Nezuko, but the way she said it made him wonder if she expected him to do so now. "It won't be long, I promise."
"It's fine," Izuku said, ignoring the pang of guilt. So much for their dinner together, he thought. So much for the mature son who would not hold his mother back from doing what she needed to do. If he asked her now, would she answer?
"I've met your girlfriend," his mom said suddenly. Izuku coughed, looking away.
"Momo's not my girlfriend," he insisted, but the fact that he knew who she was talking about just caused her to grin. "Is… she alright?"
"You're probably the only person who would ask that while lying in a hospital, Izu-kun," his mom said, exasperated. "I remembered her, I used to go to the same university as her mother, we both stopped around the same time when we got pregnant."
"Todai," Izuku said, pursing his lips. She nodded.
"You know, then," she said, smiling slightly. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. I'm quite a smart cookie, aren't I?"
She tried to make a joke, but Izuku didn't find it in ihim to laugh. "Is that where your job is?"
"It's in Tokyo, yes," she said. Tokyo, but not in that university. "I work as a research assistant in a private company. I suppose you could call me a scientist."
He could hear the lie.
But he said nothing.
Because she would not lie without reason.
And because, for the first time in his life, she had lied to him when he asked. This answered the question that was on the back of his mind for so long.
"Why are you crying?" he asked. Tears were flowing down her face, and she blinked, as if she hadn't realized it before.
"Because I'm an awful mother," she said. Izuku frowned. "My son almost died and is lying in the hospital, and I'm with one foot on the train to Tokyo."
"I think you're great, mom," Izuku said, squeezing her hand. She lied, but did that matter? Every parent has their white lies, every person had their right to privacy. "I'm grateful for all you've done."
She didn't say much after that. She sat with him in silence for a few minutes, taking comfort from his hand, before she had to go. Izuku couldn't rest afterwards.
Momo was crying. Izuku didn't like that sight. She came in not unlike his mother did, with her hands reaching out and hesitating from grabbing onto him in fear that she could hurt him more than he had already been. He reached out in return, and she put her hand on his arm, slowly checking with her eyes and hands if he was truly intact.
She had come over once school was done, he realized. The hospital was not too far from his neighborhood, so with the time on the digital clock on the vital screen she must have not had any time to return home first, causing her to stand next to him in the classic U.A. uniform.
"You're alive," she said, like a prayer rather than a statement. Her legs gave out and she fell onto the chair next to his bed with more force than was necessary. "You're alive."
The second time she said it, it came with a sigh of relief.
"It's all good, the doctor even told me I can go home tomorrow," Izuku said. He made an exaggerated motion of rolling his shoulder, smiling at her. "You should've seen the other guy."
"That isn't funny at all." Her voice left no room for interpretation, she was genuinely angry at him. "You need to stop treating this like a joke, Izuku Midoriya."
"I'm sorry," he mumbled. Momo sniffled, wiping at her eyes. "I'm… sorry?"
"You almost died," she said. Izuku's words died in his throat. "Your mother said you were somehow still forcing yourself to breathe through your functional lung, it's a miracle that you were still breathing when they brought you here!"
Momo, Izuku realized, did not cry the way he saw in comics and shows. She didn't wail and push her head into his chest to be comforted, or scream at him in concern. It was a much more quiet reaction, frustrated tears that flowed without heaving sobs, his hand clenched in between hers.
They haven't known each other for that long. It has not even been a month since the school year started and they had begun training together. And yet, he could not help but feel bad about reducing his best friend, by a mostly simplistic definition of the word, to tears.
So he did the only thing he knew wouldn't make the situation worse. He said nothing.
His last visitor for the day was Nezuko. She sat in the chair next to him, dressed in her usual kimono, a knife in hand. She had arrived with a basket full of fruit, mostly apples and oranges, though Izuku could also see a few grapes and strawberries at the bottom.
"Are you angry with me?" Izuku asked. Nezuko shook her head without hesitation. "My mom was, she said I should have run away."
"You should have," Nezuko said, nodding. "But I have long since learned that dwelling on the mistakes in our past will make it harder for us to move on. All you can do is take that experience and not do it again."
"I'll still do it," Izuku said. Nezuko nodded once more.
"I know you will. I have already told you, I can't teach you kindness. In the same vein, I cannot force you to let it go."
Izuku let her statement sink in for a moment more. He looked away, out of the window. Somehow this conversation was both easier and harder than the ones with his mother and Momo.
"I lost," Izuku said, the frustration at the final result seeping into his voice. "Even though I've been training for so long, even though I went as far as I could without killing him, I lost."
"You say that like a loss is something to be ashamed of," Nezuko said, grabbing an apple from the basket.
"Because I'm ashamed that I lost," Izuku said, frowning. "I know I can't win every fight, but the man wasn't that skilled. His quirk was pretty strong, but-"
"Every battle is a learning experience," Nezuko cut him off. "Whether you're a demon slayer or a neophyte."
"I learned that I have a lot to learn, even if I can use all the forms you've taught me," Izuku said. She smiled, nodding. "I… wanted to talk to you about something."
"Oh?"
"I saw a man," Izuku said, staring at the ceiling. Nezuko was meticulous as she skinned an apple, slowly unwrapping it like a candy, keeping the entire skin intact. "He smiled at me as I blacked out. He wore those earrings."
He looked to the left where the earrings sat on the bedside table. Nezuko's hand stilled. Her eyes didn't widen, she didn't ask anything in surprise, and just as usual, her breathing was slow and methodical as she emulated something she no longer needed to do.
"My brother once said something similar to me," Nezuko said calmly, cutting the apple into pieces. Izuku nodded, remembering the story she had told him once upon a time. "That the spirits of our ancestors would come to him in moments of need."
"But I'm not related to you," Izuku said.
"Indeed, you are not."
Izuku frowned, his body feeling heavier in the bed. His frown deepened as he remembered something important.
"Did the police call you?" Izuku asked. Nezuko nodded, putting the pieces of the apple onto a plate and onto the table. "They asked, about Stain, he… he used a Breath."
"I know," Nezuko said. "They asked the same questions you are thinking of right now, and I gave them the answers that they found sufficient. I have not taught Stain the Breath of Water."
"But you know who did."
Izuku didn't mean to sound so accusatory. It was a harsh statement, made with the best of intentions.
And no intention mattered when her eyes clouded over, giving an even stronger reaction than the mention of the ghost of an era long past. Izuku winced, cursing himself for it.
"I'm sorry," Izuku said, trying to sit up. Nezuko shook her head, putting a hand on his shoulder.
"There's nothing to be sorry about," Nezuko said. "You're right, at least in part. While I don't know who taught him exactly, I have my suspicions. It's hard to reconcile the people who were and the people who are."
"Those they left behind," Izuku assumed. She nodded. "Their descendants, you think he learned it from…"
Izuku thought. He went through the names in his head. If her brother had any remaining relatives left, she would have certainly stated it, or perhaps stayed with them rather than move to Musutafu all by her lonesome. The Breath of Water was, as she had mentioned, the most represented Breath in the Demon Slayer Corps, but few would ever reach the level to teach it.
"Tomioka," Izuku concluded. "Giyu Tomioka."
"This being about three hundred years, there are many people who could claim to be his descendants," Nezuko said. A soft smile was on her lips. "He was quite busy once the war was over, you see. Shinobu-san worked him ragged."
Izuku coughed, trying to ignore the crude reference to one of her friend's sex lives to preserve the image of his mentor in his mind.
"What are we going to do?" Izuku asked. Nezuko blinked, tilting her head slowly, her hair falling over her shoulder.
"What do you mean?" she asked. Izuku pursed his lips.
"About Stain, I mean." He felt the frustration of the past few days. The idea of someone forging the dance into a murder weapon. "He's still out there, isn't he?"
"We're going to do nothing," Nezuko said. Izuku opened his mouth. Her finger was on his lips before he could speak, a motion she had long since perfected to establish with as much certainty as she could that he should let her speak. "Stain is a villain at large. The police, and the heroes that aid their investigation task force, will take care of him."
"I… don't know," Izuku said when she pulled her hand back. "It feels wrong, letting someone use the Breath of Water to kill people."
"You can't feel responsible for what people do with a sword, Izuku-kun," Nezuko said, shaking her head. "What would be different about how you treat him if he didn't use a Breath? You have barely started school, even a provisional license is at least a year away."
"But-"
"Focus on studying," Nezuko said, raising a finger. "Learn to enjoy your youth while you still can, get good grades, go on a date or two. You can't let everything gnaw on you and fester."
But-
"You have to learn to let go, Izuku-kun," Nezuko said. Izuku sighed, his breath hitching for a moment. "Slow down, just this once."
"The yakuza know where I live."
"Let those be my worry. The police will likely come to ask you about the incident, don't say a word unless your teacher is with you, alright?"
Izuku wasn't sure he wanted to say any word considering his loose involvement with the case caused this entire mess in the first place. He nodded. When he opened his mouth to speak again, Nezuko had already shoved a piece of apple into his mouth.
Izuku's doctor had told him that as long as he avoided any strenuous activities for a week, he should be fine. He was thankful, of course, both in there not being any permanent damage and that the temporary damage was something the excellent staff at the hospital could fix with their expertise and liberal use of licensed medical quirks.
Fortunately, after insisting on it, the doctor said that simply going to school wasn't a strenuous activity, as long as he stayed away from PE, or in his case, heroics. Izuku could concede that, of course, a week wouldn't kill him.
Izuku didn't have any trouble breathing, but there was a small limp he noticed in his stride as he tried to avoid straining the still tender skin on his chest. The surgical incision was, of course, healed, but all quirks came with a drawback.
The drawback here was that it felt like a rather miserable sunburn whenever his shirt rubbed over the skin.
So he had his bag over his right shoulder instead of his left like usual, the bundled up sword left at Nezuko-sensei's place to keep him honest about not exercising until a doctor, in this case the resident school nurse, gave her approval.
He opened the door to the classroom, finding that most people were already there, with the exception of Momo and Uraraka. All eyes found his, causing him to hesitate for a moment before raising his hand in greeting. "Yo."
The class crowded around him. Even the people hadn't had much contact with ganged up on him. Kirishima stood at the front, his hand coming down on Izuku's shoulder. Izuku held back a wince, smiling at the gathered class.
"Are you sure you should be back already?" Kirishima asked. Iida, who stood behind him, nodded.
"Indeed, it's no shame to take a few days off to rest, Midoriya-san. Yaoyorozu-san mentioned that your injuries were quite severe."
"It's fine," Izuku said. "I'm just not allowed to do any heroics classes until Recovery Girl allows it, but I can come to school."
"If you say so," Kirishima said diplomatically. "You, err, you need something from me, just give me a call, alright? I can carry your bag for you."
"It's fine," Izuku said. It felt nice being worried about by his classmates, but it still felt weird considering how little time they've actually spent. Outside of Momo, Uraraka, Iida and Kirishima, he wasn't sure he would call any of them his friends, but-
Iida had taken the bag from his shoulder and put it on his table. It was still a few minutes before class would start. As the rest of the class slowly dispersed around him, Kirishima was the only one left, dragging Izuku out of the classroom.
"What's the matter?" Izuku muttered. Kirishima led him down the hallway, near the stairs and away from the classrooms. "Is everything alright?"
"Y-yeah," Kirishima said. "I… just wanted to ask, I know you're a good guy and you'd say anything so people wouldn't worry, but… are you alright?"
"Yes," Izuku said, blinking. "Why shouldn't I be?"
"After the video, people are kinda, y'know-"
"Video?" Izuku asked, frowning. His voice took on a dangerous edge. "What video?"
Kirishima hesitated. "Fuck me, you didn't know."
"Kirishima," Izuku said. His name was enough to make Kirishima pull out his phone. He opened the streaming site app, not having to type in anything. It was the last watched video. 'Samurai vs Yakuza showdown'. The title would have made him snort if it wasn't for the timestamped point in the video where Izuku was sent flying through the air. From the angle, someone from the second floor of the house across Umeno-san's must have taken it.
Rather than let Kirishima hesitate, Izuku tapped the play button and watched his crash onto the ground. There was no sound, but Izuku didn't need it to hear the things that were happening. He was on the ground, thrashing, bleeding, dying.
"Ah," Izuku said. That… explained a few things. Why his classmates were treading softly around him, the image of him almost dying. He hadn't even noticed just how much blood he was forcing out of his body as he kept breathing until he managed to be treated. It looked genuinely grotesque from the outside.
He couldn't say the feeling of choking on his own blood was very nice either, but looking at it like this it certainly didn't feel that bad.
It certainly explained why Momo was so upset. If she had seen this, and he had no doubt that she would have simply by her unbound curiosity and the class being incapable of keeping a secret for longer than two minutes at a time-
"Ah."
It was all he could say really. Kirishima looked guilty, as if the recording was somehow his fault, or as if he could have prevented what happened to him. He heard a door open. Momo stepped out of the girl's bathroom with Uraraka, her eyes slightly red as if she had been crying. When she caught sight of him, she all but rushed towards them. Kirishima was smart enough to put his phone away quickly.
Once more, Izuku had to hold back the wince when Momo's arms wrapped around him. Uraraka had walked up behind her, giving him a soft smile that did nothing to hide her own insecurity about his health.
"I'm back," Izuku said. Momo nodded, her stature making her chin rub over his hair instead. He wondered if he'd ever be taller than her. Patting her back, he looked towards Kirishima for help, who just returned a sheepish look and slowly walked towards the classroom to not bother them.
"You're an idiot," Momo said. Izuku nodded. He could accept that. "A big, big idiot."
He had to do something to assure her he was fine.
"Do you want to get something to eat after school? Just the two of us," Izuku asked. He wasn't sure why he added that, and the short glint of something akin to annoyance in Uraraka's eyes made him feel a pang of guilt. He shouldn't excuse his other friends, of course, but… "I can't exercise, and Nezuko-sensei ordered me to take it slow for a bit."
Momo blinked the tears out of her eyes.
"Yes," Momo said, stretching the word out just a tad bit longer than necessary. The tip of her ears were turning slightly red. "Yes, of course."
Izuku smiled at her, ignoring his own blush.
Chapter 9: Soft Winds
Izuku would not under any circumstances call the trip to a small Italian restaurant in the rather sizable shopping mall on the way home a 'date'. Really, the only reason the word was even in his mind was because he suddenly remembered Nezuko's words to take it slow.
Of course, they were still dressed in their uniforms as they arrived there, and the pain in Izuku's chest subsided as they walked towards their table. They ordered, and sat in silence for a moment. Izuku's thoughts kept running rampant. He didn't want her to remember the video, so this left him with fewer topics.
"I asked my mom," Izuku said suddenly. The lead-in to that was so bad that he hesitated, scratching his cheek. "A-about the research at Todai, I mean. She didn't really go into detail but she mentioned remembering your mother."
"Yes, I asked as well," Momo said, nodding. "After no results online it was… weird. She said she should still have some old photographs if you want to look at those. I can bring them with me, or you can just come to my place."
"I, yeah," Izuku said, biting his lower lip and looking away. The mystery of his mother's research kept a hold on his heart. He wondered idly if Nezuko knew. They were friends, he was certain, or Nezuko-sensei wouldn't be allowed to keep an eye on him. Inko Midoriya was a mother hen, after all, and after what happened with Bakugou's mom, she was even more worried about who he hung out with. "I'd like that."
Someone behind him made him turn around, their slow steps approaching him with a gait that was not the one of the waiters. A young woman stood there, a high school girl or perhaps a young college student, a phone in hand.
"Excuse me," she said, turning the phone screen so he could look at it. It took all the self-control he had not to slap it out of her hand when he saw the video app. Instead, he turned his head slightly, trying to hide the screen from Momo. "That's you, isn't it? The little town samurai?"
Izuku opened his mouth and closed it again. He turned back to Momo, who looked absolutely livid rather than sad.
"Err, you must be confusing me for someone else," he said, raising his hands. "I'm not-"
The video played, what kind of camera recorded this? His face, though twisted in exhaustion and with beads of sweat running down his face, was unmistakable. The young woman's smile widened.
"I'm a huge fan," she said, putting emphasis on the word in a way that made Izuku cower. "Can I have your autograph?"
"Sorry," Izuku said. "I'm kind of busy right now."
"Causing a commotion in a restaurant," Momo said, her voice tense. Izuku didn't need to turn around to imagine her impression. "How indecent."
"Ah," the young woman said, blinking. She actually looked kind of embarrassed. "I'm sorry for interrupting your date."
Rather than give him the pen to write something down, she wrote something onto one of the napkins that was on their table. Izuku barely recognized the scrawl as a phone number before he found himself grow red in the face. The woman waved him off with a wink and walked away.
Momo reached out, grabbed the napkin and crushed it in one hand when the young woman's back was turned. Izuku didn't comment on it. The food wasn't there yet, but a waiter came by with their drinks and a few breadsticks.
"I continued training when you were in the hospital," Momo said, moving on as if nothing had happened. He nodded, of course she would. "Kirishima was there to cheer me on. I'm almost there."
One hundred consecutive swings was not an easy feat, but he knew she would improve rapidly. It was in her nature, something that he could say was quite similar between them. A single minded dedication to a singular task that they would do anything to achieve.
"Good job." Izuku's smile was bright and vibrant. The genuine praise made her lower her head slightly, as if trying to hide her face. "I knew you could do it."
"I wouldn't have been able to without your help," she said. "I've always had a habit of picking things up and putting them down when they didn't work out well, the only thing I've only ever managed to dedicate myself to were my quirk and my goal of being a hero."
"That doesn't make you lazy," Izuku said, shrugging. "It just means that you need the right motivation, if I can be that motivation for you, I'll be all the more glad to help you. In return, I'm learning as well, aren't I?"
Teaching was the gateway to one's understanding of a topic from a perspective that wasn't possible as the singular student. He hoped he would one day achieve the level that could carry on the legacy that Nezuko-sensei wished to pass on.
"Thank you," she said. Izuku frowned, causing her to hurry her words. "For your help, and believing in me."
Izuku shook his head, simply smiling. Passing on the thanks could go forever, and there was a point where they had to stop.
"You once said something about your master's dances," Momo spoke up again. He nodded in response. "She knows multiple styles, but she mastered two you had said. What's the other one?"
"It's, err," Izuku began, unsure how to describe it. It was an awkward topic, in a way. "She… calls it the Dance of the Fire God, she doesn't really do it with a normal sword."
"A… Kagura?" she asked. The ancient Japanese form of entertaining gods through dance. "What does she use, then?"
"A seven branched sword, or at least a replica of it," he explained. She nodded, knowing its shape from the description alone. "She dances it once every year, from the time the sun goes down until it goes up."
"So it's not a Breath?" she asked. Izuku wasn't sure, it certainly had the rhythm of one, but the way it was danced reminded him less of a technique to slay and more of a prayer. "What day does she do it on?"
"Nezuko-sensei's late brother," Izuku said. Things were hard to explain without going into detail about Nezuko's age. "His birthday was a day before mine. Every year, she takes me to his grave. I stayed with her and watched her dance through the night. She said it's something to ward off disease and bad omens."
"Fascinating," Momo said, somewhat breathless at the idea.
"When is your birthday?" Momo asked, tilting her head slightly. "Mine is in September, the twenty-third."
"Fifteenth of July," Izuku said, blinking. "I'm older?"
"By two months, apparently," Momo said, crossing her arms. Izuku sighed. Two months older and still she towered over him. "You'll have your growth spurt soon enough."
He flushed, cursing himself for leaving his thoughts so easy to read. Looking away, he noticed the waiter approach with a plate of their food. Happy for the distraction, he thanked the waiter with a smile and turned to the food.
They ate in silence for a moment. It was not bad, but compared to his mother's and Nezuko-sensei's cooking, it fell short. What made it good was the company. Momo seemed to enjoy it, smiling with every bite into the pasta.
It was halfway through that Momo spoke up again.
"How long did it take you to learn what you know now?"
"From the day I started until now, I don't think I haven't had a day which I wouldn't describe as a learning experience."
"You know what I-" Momo began, exasperated. Catching herself, she crossed her arms, giving him a look. "Until you managed to use your first Form."
"If I'm being honest, it was my first try," Izuku said, trying to avoid sounding too proud of himself. She blinked. Scratching the back of his neck, he laughed softly.
"Didn't you say she called you unsuited for Water?"
"Nezuko-sensei once said that I had above average hearing," Izuku said. It wasn't always a positive, of course, sometimes you heard things you really wish you hadn't. "Not the same way as Jirou-san, of course. So I can hear the rhythm of a Breath and that helped a lot with learning."
"Is that why you call it dancing?" Momo asked. Izuku opened his mouth to answer, hesitating for a moment before nodding.
"I've never really paid attention to that, but yes," Izuku said, scraping what was left on his plate onto a fork and eating it. "For me, the words are interchangeable. Nezuko-sensei had started out telling me that she wasn't a swordswoman, and I kind of never felt like one either?"
"What is she then?"
"An artist," Izuku said decisively. She blinked once more, waiting for him to elaborate. "She immortalizes her late brother by painting with the sword, or rather, she said that she would do it by teaching me, and in return I would teach others one day."
"Are you one as well, then?" Momo asked. Her plate was already empty as well, and Izuku could see that half the breadsticks had already disappeared. "An artist, I mean."
"I want to be a hero," Izuku said. Momo nodded, understanding dawning on her face. "If I had to describe myself as anything, it would be that. I use the Breath of Water to express myself. It's something that I've learned to love just doing on its own."
He wasn't sure if he could describe himself as anything else. He wasn't a master or a swordsoman, he certainly wasn't an artist, and he couldn't describe his clumsy steps and angry swings as dancing, so he could not be a dancer either.
When the plates were gone, and the waiter came with the bill, Izuku reached over the table and stopped Momo from taking out her wallet.
"I invited you," Izuku said, his voice almost stern. Momo coughed slightly, looking away. "So I'll pay."
He knew that Momo was, without any exaggeration, rich. That didn't mean that he was poor by any sort of sensible measurement. He had never been wanting, and his allowance was so large that he ended up saving more money every month for years.
"Okay," she said, her voice small. "But next time I'm paying."
"Next time," Izuku said, nodding with a smile.
It wasn't a date, after all. It was just two friends going to eat together.
He arrived at his stop, stepping out of the train with the bag on his back and his head held high.
"Little town samurai, quite a mouthful, isn't it?"
Izuku sighed, stopping in his stride on the way home to find himself face to face with a hooded teen. Izuku could see too dry lips and old scars on his neck that had almost faded into nothing, wondering for a moment if this was another kidnapper. He certainly had the appearance of someone up to no good, but his heart was… soft.
It did not beat with the drums of hostile intent. Too happy about the day to become upset, Izuku just shrugged at him.
"I didn't pick it," he said, smiling at the young man. "Can I do something for you?"
Despite the haggard appearance under the hood, the young man's clothes were quite clean, from one of the more popular brands at the moment.
"I've had something of a rough day, nothing to be concerned about," he said. After a moment, he bowed in greeting. "I apologize, where are my manners. I am Tenko Shimura."
"Izuku Midoriya," Izuku introduced himself as well. He thought about turning around and leaving, but somehow, something about Tenko made him hesitate. He didn't have his sword with him, but nothing about the young man in front of him registered as dangerous.
The way he took care not to touch himself with all five fingers, instead deliberately keeping the pinkie away from his clothes, almost reminded him of Uraraka.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Izuku said before thinking. His mother wasn't home, so he had no need to hurry, and Nezuko-sensei would not train with him. Izuku could see a moment's hesitation. "If you're not waiting for the train, we can walk together, you're not stopping me or anything."
Tenko nodded, falling into step with Izuku as they walked towards his neighborhood. It would be a long walk at their pace, and if he bid goodbye to him before his house, he wouldn't need to worry about anyone knowing his address-
Not that it mattered considering the yakuza had it.
Izuku shook his head, letting the thoughts disperse.
"I imagine you had your own troubles, didn't you?" Tenko asked. Izuku shrugged. "Still, really kicked some ass out there."
"I almost died," Izuku said, sighing. "And people keep either treating me like I'm made out of glass or coming up to me as if I'm some new and upcoming pro hero."
"Well, with that U.A: uniform, I wanna say that the latter people are right," Tenko said. Izuku shrugged again. "Still, I can't imagine it's fun being reminded of something like that every day. Sorry about that."
"It's not that, really," Izuku said. He got hurt, sure, but it wasn't like he lived in fear of being hurt again. He knew that some people suffered from PTSD after injuries such as that, the brush with death taking more from them than they had thought at first. "I lost the fight and people in the train recognized me and wanted a picture with me?"
"Feels kind of fake, doesn't it?" Tenko said. Izuku stopped in his step, blinking at the words before nodding. "I feel that. You know the pro hero charts number three?"
"Hawks," Izuku said easily. The aesthetic of the winged hero was as memorable as his simple name.
"Stuff like that happens, he saves a bunch of people, suddenly he's on the fast lane to becoming a hero," Tenko said as if simply summarizing the contents of a documentary.
Or an online encyclopedia article. Izuku was certain he read the same page before.
"But they didn't really want him to be a hero, they just liked the idea of him as a hero," Tenko said, emphasizing the word with a small tilt of his head. "People want to look up to others, and they feel entitled to those people giving them attention for looking up to them. It's fanboy-ism at its finest."
Izuku pursed his lips. He couldn't disagree. In a way, he wanted to be acknowledged by his pro hero teachers as well. All Might had kept a professional distance to his students so far, as if evaluating them rather than being there for them as a hero. He was, after all, their teacher as well.
"Well," Izuku found himself saying. "If someone wants to give me a hero license for that video, I wouldn't complain."
He wasn't entirely joking, but he still laughed along when Tenko snorted at the words.
"Say you got a bad fucking hand dealt to you," Tenko said. His voice was calm, which made the crude language hit even harder. "Your entire life just falling apart while you're too young to really grasp what's happening, you don't know where to go."
Izuku couldn't quite relate that much. He always had his mother, and when he didn't, it was Nezuko who gave him a shoulder to cry on when he felt miserable.
"You ever wondered how villains are made?" Tenko asked suddenly. Izuku opened his mouth ready to answer, but the way the question was worded and intoned made him hesitate. "I'm not stupid enough to say they're all victims of circumstance, there's the arrogant and the greedy, the stupid and the murderous. But I think the worst villains are the disillusioned ones."
"Disillusioned?" Izuku asked, tasting the words on the tip of his tongue. Tenko nodded.
"So you got a bad fucking hand dealt to you," Tenko repeated. "You need a hero, but there's no one to hear you. No matter how much you beg and cry, there's no salvation. Somehow, you survive."
"And you become a villain?" Izuku asked, frowning. "I guess I can see that. I don't really agree, but…"
"See, that's the thing with people," Tenko said suddenly, spreading his arms out wide. "You can't guess how someone will react to something like that, right? You get someone like you, who when push comes to shove becomes his own hero, sword swinging and all. You got someone like the average Taro, who moves on with his life in drudgery and contention that nothing will ever change, and then you got people like Stain."
The name made Izuku start, his eyes widening.
"People who think the heroes are too soft, so he's taking justice in his own hands," Tenko continued, "you got the villains out there who feel like society failed them."
"Which category are you, then?" Izuku found himself asking. Tenko stopped, his arms coming down to his sides.
"So, you got a really fucking bad hand dealt to you," Tenko said, for the third time, and Izuku found his breathing stop for a moment. "And there's someone who finds you. They're not a hero, but they reach out to you and help you out. They teach you shit, prop you up, make you who you want to be as a person."
"Yes," Izuku said, nodding. He felt the answer was more than satisfactory. "I can relate."
"So where do you go from there?" Tenko asked. "You don't like heroes, so you don't want to be one. You're kind of too adjusted to be a villain either. And you really don't want to be Taro who just keeps on going until he dies."
"Where you want to go," Izuku said, shrugging. "Make your hobby into a job, find a passion and study it? Have you considered writing a book?"
Tenko looked at him for a moment, tilting his head. After a few seconds of staring, the young man roared with laughter, his head thrown back so fast that the hood fell, revealing long blue bordering on grey hair. Izuku found himself amused as well, smiling rather than laughing. When the laughter died down, Tenko wiped a tear from his eye.
"I was a bit too angry, so I didn't want to be angry anymore," Tenko said, his voice still slightly higher pitched than before, and his shoulders still trembling with small fits of laughter. "I was a bit too sad, so I didn't want to be sad anymore. At one point, I tried to kill myself, but I couldn't even do that right."
Izuku's smile slipped off his face, his eyes widening at the admission. He tried to school his features, but failed bringing out more than a slight smile. "I suppose it's good that you didn't, then, or we couldn't have this conversation, Shimura-san."
"I guess so!" Tenko said, smiling widely. The sound of a small vibration. Tenko pulled out his phone, the smile slipping off his face as he sighed. "Well, I guess it's time to be Average Taro for today."
"I guess so," Izuku said. Did Tenko have a job already? He supposed not everyone had to go to high school, but… "Have a nice day, Shimura-san."
Tenko nodded, turning around and walking back to the train station. "You as well, Izu-kun."
Izuku stumbled over his own feet. When he turned back, Tenko was already gone.
Chapter 10: The Other Breath
He sat in the dojo, but there was no sword in front of him. Nezuko, too, had put hers away. Today was resting, as she had insisted, until Recovery Girl told him he could go again.
"I have watched the fight." She said it with the kind of voice that Izuku knew would come with a lesson. Still, there was no judgement in it, no disappointment or anything Izuku could latch onto to feel bad. "You think that you could have won if you had committed to that last strike."
"I… thought so, yes," Izuku said. Nezuko gave a satisfied nod. Izuku had thought, and watched, and thought some more. It was hard not to look at it and judge himself for his failure, but as he watched he realized more and more that this wasn't simply that last strike which had lost him the fight.
"What changed your mind?"
"He came to kidnap me," Izuku said, pursing his lips. "So he held back, because he didn't want to kill me before interrogation."
The words sounded almost too detached. It was hard to consider what would have happened to him if Yu had succeeded in his quest. For all he knew, Yu's boss was a nice guy who really just wanted to ask him a few questions.
Probably not, but there was a slim possibility.
"If I had fought him with all I had, treating him like a demon," Izuku said, in a way to avoid using the word 'kill' or 'slay'. "If I had done it like that, he would not have held back either. I would still have lost, and I might have been unfortunate enough to die."
"Every battle is a learning experience," she said, repeating the words she had said to him at the hospital. "But to learn is the privilege of the living. Your ears could hear his intent."
Izuku nodded slowly. He knew from the very start that Yu was not going to kill him.
"In between a man who goes for the kill," Nezuko said, frowning. "And a man who does not, ending a fight in a draw, would you not say that the man who held back from killing is stronger?"
"The intention does not matter," Izuku said. "The result does, right?"
"Wrong."
Izuku flinched. The one word came down on him like a heavy blade.
"We're talking about a measure of skill here," Nezuko said. Izuku looked down onto the wooden floor, unable to meet her gaze. "You think you're weak. You're not."
"What other word would you use to describe someone who lost a fight?"
"A child," Nezuko said, her voice lowering in pitch and leaving her throat with a rumble. The temperature in the room rose violently. Izuku could have sworn he saw porcelain cracks around Nezuko's eyes for a short moment, "fighting an adult with a quirk uniquely suited to fight a sword, is not weak."
Izuku swallowed the lump in his throat. The temperature lowered, but the sudden drop caused him to break into a cold sweat.
"You wish to lose fewer battles, correct?" Nezuko asked. Izuku nodded, the unspoken inevitability of losing more weighing heavily on his mind. "Then I must remedy my failure and leniency with you."
"You've never failed me," Izuku found himself insisting, raising himself from the seiza position, one hand on his chest. "It's my own lack of skill-"
"You've learned the Breath of Water because you wanted to learn it, but as a teacher, and as the last cultivator, I should have told you no. Yet, despite my initial doubts, you've exceeded my expectations and learned it anyway."
Izuku could not feel pride at the words. "You're telling me to stop using the Breath of Water."
"No, of course not," Nezuko said. "I'm telling you that you will not just spend ten years mastering a technique your body wasn't made for."
"Just?" Izuku asked.
"I've told you before, Izuku-kun," Nezuko said. "My brother had mastered two styles and passed them on to me, while Giyu's wife Shinobu had learned the Breath of Water, mastered the Breath of Flowers, and developed her own Breath of Insects."
"But-"
"For someone who is so obsessed with the Breath of Water, you are as rigid as a rock."
Izuku coughed, the sudden joke making him forget all he wanted to say. Nezuko sighed voicelessly, her shoulders sagging slightly.
"The originator of the Breaths, a peerless swordsman, had taught six students the Breath of the Sun. Not one of them could learn more than one or two of their techniques."
"So he instead taught them to harness those techniques into their own styles, creating the six branches," Izuku said. He had heard the story before. It was also why he couldn't quite put the Dance of the Fire God in those branches. It wasn't the Breath of Flames, so perhaps it had branched out of it?
"You have to stop putting me on a pedestal and find something that suits you. You're my first student, I was overjoyed that you wished to learn the one Breath that I knew like the back of my hand."
Izuku couldn't deny the words. In the end, it would be an admittance that he could never become her peer.
More than that, it would leave the implication that she was not as good of a teacher that he thought she was.
Izuku bowed. "As you wish, Nezuko-sensei."
But in the end, she was his master, right or wrong.
A solid week had passed since the hospital stay. The new routine was to visit Recovery Girl early every morning, so that is what he did. He came to school half an hour earlier and made a beeline towards the nurse's office. Fortunately, the room itself was on the ground floor of the main building, towards the end of the hallway near the stairs so that he could walk up to his classroom without any issue afterwards.
As he passed the gates and entered the campus, greeting Ectoplasm, who had taken this morning duty to make sure the gate would be locked up once all the students were inside, someone called out to him.
"Sup, little town samurai."
Izuku did not sigh. He did not. He calmly turned around, meeting the eyes of the resident Aizawa impressionist, Hitoshi Shinso, who grinned at him.
"Don't let Momo hear you say that," Izuku warned, resigned. It wasn't like the class had any intention to hold back, after the initial period of treating him with velvet gloves had passed. "I have my checkup with Recovery Girl in a bit."
"I'll come with you," Shinso said, Izuku blinked, raising an eyebrow. Shinso shrugged, walking up to him. "Not because I'm worried you might keel over. I got insomnia and need help with that."
"Never would have guessed," Izuku found himself mumbling. Shinso's grin widened, making it clear that he heard. While Momo was at the school early as well, she had her own trip to make to the teacher's office to get the printouts for Aizawa-sensei's class. "How are you adjusting to heroics 101?"
"You ever feel like you're dreaming cuz stuff seems too good to be true?" Shinso asked. Izuku nodded. "Basically like that. Didn't think I'd have an opportunity to become a heroics student until after the Sports Festival."
"Yeah," Izuku said, remembering his own high when he became better and better at the Breath of Water, and the pinnacle of good feelings when he had passed the test. "I get that."
He knew by now that Shinso's quirk wasn't very good for the practical part of the entrance exam. It was a point of contention, something U.A. had once received criticism over in the past.
When they arrived at the office, Shinso waited outside, letting Izuku go in alone. Izuku stepped into the mostly comfortable warmth of Recovery Girl's office and immediately took a seat on one of the beds next to her desk, waiting until she was done with whatever files she was sorting through. He wouldn't call it a routine, but as he took off the uniform's jacket and unbuttoned his shirt, it was something he could recognize as a practiced motion by now.
Recovery Girl turned to him after a minute. She did the usual, checking his blood pressure, checking his breathing, then finally poking him in the side to gauge how much pain he was hiding (it was a bit less every day). Today, he didn't wince whatsoever.
She nodded in approval.
"Tomorrow you can bring your sword again, you rascal," Recovery Girl said, patting his cheek. "If you walk in here after a class with your lung popped like a balloon, I'll expel you myself."
Izuku laughed softly, before realizing that she wasn't joking. He nodded, trying to laugh off the awkwardness once more and stood, buttoning up his shirt and putting on the jacket. As he walked out, he gave Shinso a thumbs up.
"I'm cleared, want me to wait for you?" Izuku asked. Shinso shook his head.
"Nah, it's fine. We'll see each other upstairs." Shinso walked in, giving him a resolute nod as he closed the door behind him. Izuku took a moment, sighing in relief and walking up the stairs towards his classroom.
When he passed the classroom for 1-B, he could hear a commotion inside. He decided not to get involved, of course, and tried to continue just a door further to class 1-A, but he was not quite that fortunate. The door opened with a loud bang, and Izuku found a blond boy with a massive hand pushing away a girl with orange hair that seemed to have the same quirk.
"You're not going over there!" the girl shouted. Unfortunately, the blond boy seemed to have the advantage, using his grasp on the door to leverage his weight and push the girl away. "Monoma!"
When he turned around, his arm shrinking, he bumped into Izuku instead, who had been watching the scene with an almost sick fascination.
Monoma, as he now knew, fell down. Izuku managed to keep upright, reaching out to help Monoma up. The boy took his hand with a smile, until he saw his face. When the boy was on his feet again, the smile slipped off after Monoma got a good look at him. "It's you."
"Me?" Izuku asked, pointing at himself. Monoma scowled. It wasn't the kind of scowl he was used to from Bakugou, it seemed more… exaggerated. Almost frustrated, rather than upset. "I'm Izuku Midoriya, from class 1-A."
The school was big, and though their classrooms were right next to each other, Izuku never had the time or reason to meet the neighboring heroics class. He knew that their homeroom teacher was Vlad King, and that two other students who had joined U.A. from recommendations were in their class.
"I know who you are," Monoma said. Izuku sighed through his nose. Of course he did. "You're that wonderboy people use to claim 1-A is better than we are, right? Not that you look like much."
The girl with the orange hair stepped up and out of the room, this time grabbing Monoma by the back of his collar to pull him back. He shrugged her off, too invested to step away.
"I don't think anyone has done that," Izuku said honestly. He's heard a few upperclassmen talk about him, but that was nothing more than the same chatter he's had to deal with when someone recognized him on the train or on the way to school. "I think it's a bit too early to say whose class stands on top, right?"
"Come on, Monoma. Kan-sensei will be here soon," the girl said. She tried to drag him into the room.
"Shut up, Kendo," Monoma almost shouted. Izuku could hear the room to his classroom open, someone peeking their head out. It was Jirou, from the way she stepped forward, trying not to be too obvious that she was listening in. Monoma turned back to Izuku. "All this glory hogging this early in the semester, everyone keeps going on about the little town samurai like he actually won a fight."
"I'm sorry that me almost dying has inconvenienced you this much, Monoma-san," Izuku said, his voice cold. He wasn't someone to get angry easily, not for himself. It simply wasn't in his nature to waste energy that could be better spent helping other people.
But Izuku would be lying if he had said that he wasn't a sore loser about that whole situation. Nezuko's assurances were helping, but that did not remove the heavy feeling in his heart.
Monoma opened his mouth, ready to retort, before catching himself.
His eyes widened, as if the gravitas of what he was accusing Izuku with was finally catching up to him. The impulsive anger that could only be found in young adults that were put into a competitive environment wasn't something that Izuku could fault him for…
But with the rest of the class behind him, listening in on their conversation, and some of their looks screaming second hand embarrassment, it was clear that he was the only one who held such beliefs. Or perhaps it wasn't even a belief like that, with the way his heart pounded and his lips mouthed unsaid apologies-
Izuku bowed with the grace of a warrior, walking away towards his classroom. Jirou was already at her seat by the time he reached it, and Izuku could hear Momo and Iida walk up the stairs while chatting. When the door class 1-B closed with a thud, Izuku tuned the heavy shouting out. Schooling his expression into a soft smile, he met Momo's eyes.
"Good morning," he said, his anger washing away. "Guess who's good to start training again? We can go to the gym together today."
"Good morning," she said in return. Iida nodded in greeting as they walked into the classroom. "I'm glad to hear that. I think Kirishima will want that spar still."
"Not today," Izuku said, shrugging. "My sword's at home, but I'll bring it again tomorrow."
The printouts were put on the desk, and she turned to him. She frowned for a moment, causing Izuku to stop.
Momo reached out. Izuku followed her fingers, which showed their mark of exercise with the sword clearly, down towards his collar. He hadn't taken care of straightening it out as he walked up the stairs, forgetting to do so as his happiness from being allowed back into training flooded his mind.
She did it for him, fast and without hesitation. That didn't stop the usual suspects, and in this case Kaminari in particular, from making a mention of it.
"Looks like that date of yours went to places, huh?" Kaminari said, wrapping an arm around Izuku's shoulders after Momo was done. She glared at him.
"It wasn't a date," Izuku and Momo said at the same time. Kaminari whistled.
"Really?" Kaminari said, pulling out his phone. Some social media app, a picture with a littletownsamurai hashtag. It was them at the restaurant, smiling at each other. "Looks like a date to me."
"One would think you'd have learned by now to leave the private lives of your classmates alone, Kaminari-san," Iida said, his voice stern. "What people do outside of the school is their business, and unless you're friendly enough with them to ask such things, you should stop."
"Are we not friends?" Kaminari asked, blinking. Izuku took a step away from him, causing the boy to let go of his shoulder.
"I'd like to think we are," Izuku said, shrugging. "We're going to be classmates for three years after all, but that doesn't mean I have to listen to rumors about me all day, right?"
He was wondering when his five seconds of fame would finally run out. He was tired of being reminded of that loss.
"Alright, sure," Kaminari said, sounding genuinely apologetic. Winking, he gave Izuku a thumbs up. "If you ever do go on a real date, you'll tell me, right?"
"They're not," Uraraka said. She sat near the window, looking out of it, but despite her soft voice and direction of her voice, people took note. Izuku heard frustration. "They already said they're not, just settle down."
"Are you jealous?" Kaminari asked. Jirou and Mina, reading the mood in the room, both grabbed Kaminari and dragged him away towards his seat when Uraraka turned around, an unreadable expression on her face. Izuku scratched his face, turning to Momo who gave him a shrug.
Izuku dreamt of battle. In the darkness of his listless sleep, he could hear an all too familiar rhythm. It was the breathing of the Water, the enhancement of heart and body to go beyond what a normal person should.
To Izuku it sounded not like a dance, but like a prayer.
"Can you hear it?" someone asked. The world shifted. He found himself at a scene of an era long past. In a building that smelled of blood and pain. Izuku could not just hear, but see it now.
A young man with bright blue eyes was cradling the body of an older woman. Her throat had been carved out with the fangs of a rabid beast. Through voiceless sobs he could hear the prayer.
A prayer to the dead, and the river gods. Izuku blinked, the scene shifting. He stood outside now, the building was burned down, the young man stood next to an older swordsman, wearing two familiar earrings.
Izuku blinked, and the scene was gone. Izuku was sitting.
In front of him, in the middle of a dark night, sat a man. His short hair was white, his blue kimono held the pattern of a cloudy sky.
And on his face sat a red tengu mask. Izuku could have sworn he had heard about him. Nezuko had told him many stories, after all, and this one was a memorable one.
"Urokodaki...sensei?" Izuku tried the word out, giving a small bow. The man who had taught Tanjiro. The man said nothing, but nodded as if answering a question. "I'm not dead, am I?"
"Can you hear it?"
The question was the same as earlier. The voice, too, though now muffled through the mask. The angry eyes of the tengu bore into him, and Izuku found himself closing his eyes to avoid the gaze, focusing instead on what he was supposed to hear.
The prayer.
He could hear it, of course. A sword swung with the flow of a river.
"You can hear it." Urokodaki said, sounding almost impressed. "Show me."
Izuku wasn't sure why he felt the need to listen. Perhaps it was that teaching voice, or the fact that the surreal dream seemed to lead him somewhere. When Izuku stood, he could feel a sword in his hands. Sharp. Dangerous.
Shining in the pale blue light of a river under the gaze of the sun god.
Urokodaki stood as well, a jet black sword in his hands. For one short moment between two breaths, he was not Izuku. His name was Shisui. And for one moment, Urokodaki was not Urokodaki, he was the sun god, Tsugikuni.
Izuku did not dance. He prayed until morning came.
Chapter 11: Dance of the Bladesmith
When consecutive swing number one hundred came, it came to the sound of cheers. Momo nearly fell over, but Izuku caught her, keeping her upright as the sword slipped from her hands.
"Yes!" Kirishima shouted, drawing the word long. It was infectious, the happy shout echoing around the gym, and the other classmates who had joined them joined in. Momo had a satisfied smile on her lips, and a bit of blood on her fingers.
"You're ready," Izuku said, low enough that perhaps only Jirou could hear. Fortunately the girl had decided to go home early today. "Nezuko-sensei wanted to meet you when you are."
Momo nodded, still breathless, still happy.
It had taken a solid hour of instructions for Momo to start breathing. There was of course a difference between doing it once after being corrected and poked in the side to look for holes in the technique and actually doing it.
Nezuko once said that it had taken her brother six months to understand, in part because his teacher intentionally avoided giving him the instruction needed, not out of malice but out of fear. Urokodaki-sensei was an old man who had seen many of his students die.
Nezuko had a different perspective on it. As someone who had to learn how to breathe like a human, the understanding of the difference between such breathing and the Breath sword styles was at a level that only researchers could hope to understand. She also had the experience of Momo being her second student.
Even more so, someone who had an explicit understanding of their body and limits due to their unique quirk physiology clearly had an easier time grasping the basics than the kid whose small lungs tried to imitate the sound of an adult demon's fake breathing.
Today, Momo ran out of breath after two minutes just holding it.
That was one minute and thirty seconds longer than Izuku could hold it when he started out.
Once Momo regained her bearings, Nezuko ordered her to keep doing it. The breath intervals became shorter and shorter.
The Breath of Water was a technique which boosted the user's body equally.
"This isn't going to work," Izuku murmured. Nezuko nodded, causing him to look at her with wide eyes. "Why are you making her do this?"
"So her body learns. It's the easiest Breath to begin with." Nezuko stood up, a sword in hand. Momo stopped, turning to her new instructor and blinked through teary eyes. Nezuko handed her the sword, smiling. "You've memorized the motion when Izuku commits to the First Form, correct?"
Momo nodded, too breathless to speak, her face slightly red from the exhaustion. He could see the sweat forming on her forehead.
"Show me," Nezuko ordered. Izuku held his tongue. But when Momo raised the sword, his heart dropped into his stomach.
She breathed.
"First Form," she intoned. Izuku could hear it, every single mistake she was about to make. He opened his mouth to speak, but was stopped by a single finger on his lips. Nezuko-sensei did not look at him, her eyes entirely focused on Momo's display. "Water Surface Slash."
Her breath was too shallow, not just due to the exhaustion but because her body could not dance to its rhythm.
The words were too forceful, and the motion too rigid. She wasn't even a quarter through the swing before it slipped from her grasp, sliding across the wooden floor, where she had joined in on knees and hands.
She threw up. Izuku winced, grabbing the towel at his side and rushing forward. When he raised the towel to help her wipe her face, she tried to turn her head, still teary eyed, embarrassed perhaps as well as exhausted.
He didn't have any of it. Holding her head still by her chin, he quickly wiped her face. Nezuko walked up to them.
"Remember this pain," Nezuko-sensei said, her voice soft and gracious, as if she had just done her a favor. "You're unsuited for this Breath."
Unlike Izuku, Momo did not complain and insist.
"What Breath then?" she asked, sweat running down her face.
"You're making the same mistake as him." Nezuko-sensei shook her head. "You think that the beauty of someone else using something means you have to mirror it. You do not."
Nezuko walked over to the wall. Something that Izuku had seen her do before, when she gave him the sword to practice for the entrance exam. She tapped it in a specific place, and it opened a small piece of the wall she could use to swing it around.
When Izuku helped Momo stand up, taking care to avoid the puddle of vomit still on the ground and brought her over to the wall, Nezuko turned around. Momo's body shivered for a moment, pushing away from Izuku to stand on her own feet.
There were various weapons displayed, in different colors. Swords, mostly, of course, but one of them looked more like a whip, two of them reminded her more of Stain's own blade, chipped and ripping-
"Let me correct myself," Nezuko said. "It is not that you are unsuited for a sword, I would argue very few people who commit to an exercise such as the hundred consecutive swings could ever be called such. But you are unsuited for these swords. Can you use your quirk?"
Momo thought for a moment and nodded. Nezuko nodded back before pointing at a combination of flail and axe, chained together.
"Copy this weapon, make it smaller, so you can hold it and swing it around."
Momo did. The axe came first, then chain link after chain link, until the flail popped onto the ground with a thud.
###
"You will show me one form of each Breath," Nezuko-sensei ordered. "I've come to a better understanding of what is to be expected from me as a master, so that I may fail my first student less. For that purpose, we will go back to the basics."
Nezuko had already said, once upon a time, that she only knew the 'basics' of each Breath. That was not to say she was bad at them, but rather that she could not consider them mastered in the same way that she did with the Breath of Water. Such was the opinion of her brother's teaching.
Momo was doing her drills on the other end of the small dojo. The spiked flail and axe combo, a bastardization of a kusarigama if one looked at it from that angle, were overall heavier than a single sword. It was through the chain and the right Breathing which made it so much easier to use.
Momo improved leaps and bounds. Every evening, the breath became a little less strained. Every morning, she was full of energy.
"What is a Breath?" Nezuko-sensei asked. Izuku closed his eyes. "Is it more mystical, a metaphor for a tool that is ready to slay demons? A dance to a melody that only you can hear? Or is it perhaps more grounded in reality? It could, after all, be simply a repetitive action through which you hyperoxygenate your body to push muscles to a superhuman limit."
Izuku thought.
He thought and he thought. His mind went through the various interpretations of Nezuko-sensei's lessons throughout the years. She had never enjoyed being straightforward, because she insisted that the only way for someone to truly learn is to make up their own mind. It was one of the few things which he did not agree with her on.
To her, Breathing was an artstyle passed down so she may remember her brother.
To him, Breathing was a dance, to be danced in response to the need of many.
To the fisherman Shisui, First of the Water Breath users, who had to bury his mother, it was a mourning prayer.
"I don't think something is less mystical just because there's a measurable component to it," Izuku said. "I had a dream again recently. I could not hear the same rhythm and melody in it. It was not swung out of art or ambition, it was swung out of… revenge."
Nezuko said nothing. Izuku stood. He already knew that the Breath of Stone was out. His attempts to commit to movements that Momo could now do with her eyes closed were met with failures.
He stood up, pulling the sword from the sheath. Nezuko did the same. And as she danced, he imitated.
Breath of Flames, First Form. Not a failure, but not good. His feet hit the ground too hard, causing him to swing too low. Nezuko did not stop. She continued, and so did he.
Breath of Wind, First Form. Kicking off the wall, Izuku spun in a circle of slashes until he stopped in front of Momo, who was watching the display with great interest. Better than Flames, but compared to Water it was still so much worse.
Her words hung over him. To stop imitating and start doing. Suddenly, her rhythm was gone. Mist.
Izuku could not even begin to grasp it. He stumbled over his feet, stopping Momo from grabbing him as she reached out to help. Nezuko-sensei sheathed her sword, so he did the same.
It was like bowing to each other. Listening to a certain moment. A distant rumble. A thunderclap nobody else could hear.
The sword swung. By the time he regained his bearings, he had traded places with Nezuko. He could see strands of his hair dancing in the wind that had been kicked up by the Breath of Thunder.
"Good," she said, stopping. Izuku blinked. Something else in the wind, strands of long hair which did not belong to him. "The Breath of Thunder is one I am fond of as well, it belonged to a man who had once tried to make me his wife."
Izuku coughed, remembering that story as well. She rarely talked about her love life unless it was to make a joke about Zenitsu Agatsuma. For someone she described as reliable and kind and funny, she certainly made a lot of jokes on his behalf.
"We'll start training again tomorrow," Nezuko-sensei said. She frowned. "That does not mean you get to slack off with the Breath of Water. As I told you before, I expect you to use both."
###
Another Monday at U.A. and another week without Aizawa-sensei. The homeroom teacher had now officially spent less time teaching them than he had spent outside the city. Due to this, the teachers swapped each other out for the first lesson to take care of homeroom stuff and the printouts were handled by the class representatives.
Due to the lack of a teacher to schedule things for them, however, their trip to the USJ had been delayed for much longer than they were comfortable with, and with the Sports Festival coming up soon it would leave them at a solid disadvantage.
That wasn't to say they didn't get to practice their quirks, they had after all lessons with All Might that allowed them to go approach these things.
Said man stood in front of them at the moment, putting away the roster after marking everyone present.
"There's a few news to share," All Might said, nodding at them. He wasn't smiling. "Your homeroom teacher, Aizawa, is currently hospitalized after a fight with a villain. While his chance for recovery is perfectly fine, he will not be able to come back for another week. Due to this, we have rescheduled your training exercise at the USJ to happen in tandem with Class 1-B."
The class exploded into chatter, mostly about Aizawa-sensei's hospitalization. Izuku had wondered if it was Stain, considering the rather unfortunate series of events lately. Only few seemed to wonder about Class 1-B. Among them, Kyoka Jirou, who seemed to curse under her breath at the thought. He knew she had caught wind of the conversation, if it could be called such, between him and Monoma.
"Vlad King will be your supervisor during your trip, I would like to ask you to listen to him as if he were your homeroom teacher. I shall join you halfway through. Please don't make it harder on your teachers than it needs to be."
All Might sounded tired. Everyday a little bit more. Izuku found himself nodding at the request.
"Other than that, Izuku Midoriya," All Might said suddenly, causing the boy to start in his seat. "I would like to speak with you in private. I assure you it won't take long."
Izuku nodded slowly, standing up and following the man out of the door. All MIght's back was tall and reliable as always. Izuku had to hold himself back from asking for an autograph as usual, instead focusing on the sound of his breathing.
It sounded like someone who was missing half a lung. Izuku frowned. The usual thumping of energy in All Might's chest was replaced by a desperate howl. Shaking his head, he looked at the man's face, meeting his eyes as the stopped outside the hallway, far enough from the classroom that they should not be overheard. Izuku made sure anyway. Jirou was still in her seat.
"Aizawa wanted to talk to you," All MIght said. Izuku blinked, not expecting that. "He's currently hospitalized in Tokyo, which is quite a trip. We would need your guardian's permission to drive you there for a day or two, and couldn't reach anyone."
"Ah," Izuku said, nodding. "I can make them call the school when I'm home, is everything alright?"
"He wouldn't tell me, but… it seemed serious. We don't want to interrupt your schooling any more than it already has, though, so it would be good if you could get permission by Friday, is that fine with you?"
"I see no reason to say no," Izuku said, mumbling the words slightly. He was too curious to say no. "I'll get the permission. Thank you, All Might-sensei."
All Might smiled a reassuring smile, putting a hand on Izuku's head.
###
Today was the day.
Nezuko-sensei had massive expectations, and he was more than eager to meet them. She had prepared a few targets of which she had quite a few in the basement, made out of dry stalks of hay.
Izuku breathed. And he did not dance to the tune of Nezuko's technique. He tried to capture that feeling he had in his dream.
"Breath of Water," Izuku intoned. "First Form."
He stopped.
The sword at his side was not in his hand, but still in the sheath. He could hear the prayer in the sound of the sword being drawn, it was as if time had slowed to a crawl for one precious second.
"Mourning Prayer."
The sword was drawn. It was not the flow of water, and not quite the screaming thunder. Storm and Rain. By the time the sword was back in the sheath, the hay target had been cut into four pieces, two strikes diagonally in the time it took him to finish the prayer.
His vision blurred and darkened for a moment. It was Momo who helped him keep his balance, quickly stepping to his side as Nezuko walked up to the target, observing the damage.
"The cuts were shallow," she commented harshly. Izuku coughed, trying to catch his breath. He could see Momo frowning, ready to complain about the criticism for him, but his hand on her shoulder stopped her. "Again."
Izuku nodded, pushing away from Momo who didn't seem willing to let him go. A small smile was enough, however, to reassure her. She smiled back, walking away from him as Nezuko brought forth another target.
The mantra wasn't quite complete.
Izuku held the sword in the sheath, the sharp side of the blade aimed at the sky. What was it? The prayer of a fisherman to a river god? The sutra of a farmer who begs for blessed rain? The mantra of a hero?
Nezuko-sensei was right. His greatest skill was to listen to the rhythm of others and ape them, achieve a mimicry of what they can do and call the quits in satisfaction. He had to stop being content with other people's techniques, he had to use his own.
He didn't have a name for it. He wasn't sure if it was the first form or the tenth. He had nothing to compare it to, besides his own body's memory of the Breath of Water touching on rhythm of a melody akin to a thunderclap.
But he knew that it was a prayer.
"Mourning Prayer," he invoked once more. The sword swung, with a force that caused the target to not just be cut but blown away, its four pieces slamming against the wall at the back of the dojo. This time, Izuku did black out. It was for a few seconds only, and by the time he came to again it was to the smiling face of Nezuko-sensei, giving him a solid nod of approval.
Izuku sighed, rubbing his head into the pillow under him. It stirred, as if ticklish-
Izuku blinked, raising his head to find himself in the lap of Momo, who gave him a smile as well. He tried to stand, but Nezuko and her were too strong, keeping him lying down. Izuku resigned himself to this fate, trying to regain his bearings so that he may stand up again without issue.
"You have succeeded," Nezuko-sensei said. "You're wasteful, however. Too much breath for one form, while the cuts were less shallow you overextended this time. You waste movement, you will leave yourself open to counterattacks-"
"You waste," he began, coughing. "You waste breath, you invite death."
"If it's anything like the first lessons about the Breath of Water, you will improve fast, but don't crutch on this technique. Keep using Water until you are ready to move on."
Izuku sighed, smiling. He wasn't sure he ever wanted to move on from the Breath of Water.
"What do you want to call it?" Momo asked. Izuku blinked. He would have tilted his head, but tried not to be too much of a burden on Momo's lap. "It's not the Breath of Water or Thunder, right?"
"I don't know," Izuku admitted. "Rain? Storms? I don't think it deserves a name right now, it's one technique I practically stole off the Breath of Thunder."
"Don't underestimate the meaning of the forms," Nezuko chided. He could hear the frown in her voice. "The forms are what they are because they get the most out of the way you Breathe. If you had used the Thunder Breathing here, you would have likely passed out before your hand had found the sword."
Repetitive actions were important, after all. Izuku had heard this lesson before, but for someone who relied so much on the rhythms of others, it was difficult to consider himself anything but a pale imitation.
"Unnecessary thoughts," Nezuko said, flicking his forehead with her middle finger, "begone."
Izuku winced, his hand coming up to his forehead as the strength in his limbs returned. Slowly standing up, still aided by Momo who was still looking incredibly happy due to his success.