Determination was a strange feeling. Yu had felt it before, of course. She felt it during the grueling U.A. entrance exams, during the sports festival, and she had certainly felt it on the morning of her debut. But this was different. This wasn't the bright, optimistic determination of someone chasing a dream; it was a cold, sharp determination born from the deepest humiliation. It was the kind of resolve that made you want to hit something. Hard.
Standing in the middle of her living room, already clad in the purple and ivory spandex of her Mt. Lady suit, she felt the power buzzing under her skin. The ridiculous magazine article, the smug faces of the "experts" on TV, the searing shame… it was all becoming her fuel. She looked at Izuku, who stood before her with an expression of solemn seriousness, and for the first time since meeting him, she felt a surge of genuine confidence in him. He had seen through her panic and offered her a plan, a way out. A path of training and sweat to escape the pit of public misery.
She was ready. She was focused. She expected him to pull out a whiteboard, maybe a stopwatch, or to start barking orders like a drill sergeant.
Instead, Izuku took out his laptop.
He placed it on the coffee table with an almost reverent delicacy, opened it, and the screen illuminated his concentrated face. His fingers hovered over the keyboard for a moment before he began to type. Yu raised an eyebrow, intrigued. Maybe he was going to show her a video analysis of her debut, or perhaps a combat simulation he had programmed. Yes, that made sense. He was a nerd, after all. His genius had to manifest in technological ways.
She leaned slightly over his shoulder, her curiosity piqued, to see what brilliant strategy he was about to unveil.
And then she read the words he had just typed into the Google search bar.
How… to train… a… twenty meter… giant… girl… for combat.
The silence in the room suddenly became dense, heavy, and absolute. The distant hum of Musutafu's traffic seemed to fade away. The only sound was that of Yu Takeyama's hope dying with a quiet, pathetic whimper.
Her brain tried to process the sentence. It bounced off the walls of her skull, each word a hammer blow against her newly forged determination. How to train a giant girl? It wasn't a technical query. It wasn't a data search. It sounded like the title of a perverted fantasy light novel.
All the inspiration, all the confidence, all that rage turned into fuel evaporated, leaving an icy void in her stomach. The image of her career rising from the ashes was replaced by a much clearer vision: her, in a courtroom, trying to explain to the Hero Public Safety Commission that her "personal trainer" based his methods on the first three results of an internet search.
Her mouth went dry. "I've put my career, my life, and my dignity," she thought, with a terrifying calm that bordered on hysteria, "in the hands of a kid who uses Google for this. I'm going to end up as a cautionary tale in the academy textbooks. 'The Mt. Lady Incident: Why You Don't Hire Your Fan Club as Staff.'"
"Are you… kidding me?" she managed to say, her voice a choked croak.
Izuku didn't even seem to notice her existential crisis. His eyes scanned the screen with a frown, clearly disappointed with the results.
"Of course not," he replied, his tone completely serious. "Data acquisition is the foundation of any successful strategy. My experience is limited to canine training and theoretical hero analysis. I have no practical experience in developing training regimens for individuals with large scale gigantification Quirks. It would be irresponsible to proceed without consulting the existing literature."
"There is no 'existing literature'!" Yu hissed, her voice rising an octave. "Because nobody is stupid enough to look that up! This isn't a plumbing problem, it's a hero's life!"
"Exactly," Izuku said, nodding as if she had just grasped a crucial point. "Which demonstrates an alarming gap in the publicly available knowledge. The results are disappointing. A couple of niche forums with speculative theories, a Reddit thread that devolved into a debate about whether King Kong could defeat All Might, and several works of questionable quality fanfiction. Nothing useful."
With a sigh of academic frustration, he erased his initial search. Yu watched, about to suggest that maybe they should just call the whole thing off and go get more ice cream, when Izuku's fingers flew across the keyboard again.
New searches appeared, this time far more coherent.
"Endurance training routines for high impact heroes: A comparative analysis." "Reaction time and agility exercises for body mass alteration Quirks." "Combat analysis: Ryukyu vs. Class A Villain 'Juggernaut' – Destabilization tactics." "Oxygen consumption and muscle fatigue in gigantification Quirk users: a case study."
He began to scribble furiously in his notebook, muttering to himself.
"...fascinating correlation between atmospheric pressure and Quirk energy expenditure at altitude… center of gravity stability decreases exponentially, not linearly… the key isn't brute force, it's inertia management…"
A tiny spark of hope rekindled within her. Okay. The kid was a complete weirdo with zero common sense, but at least there was a method to his madness. A strange, internet self-taught method, but a method nonetheless.
To calm her nerves, she began to stretch, moving her arms and twisting her torso. The spandex of her suit clung to her muscles, a familiar reminder of her purpose. She needed to move, to do something, before the anxiety consumed her again.
It was then she noticed that Izuku had stopped writing. The silence made her look up.
He was staring at her.
But it wasn't the adoring gaze of a fan, nor the evaluative gaze of a coach. It was something else. An almost predatory intensity that made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. And he wasn't looking at her eyes. His gaze was fixed, with the focus of a laser beam, directly on her chest.
The air caught in her lungs. She froze, one arm still above her head. Her mind, already on edge, began to panic again. What is he doing now? Is he analyzing my posture? My heart rate? Or…? Oh, no. No, please, no.
She heard a low, almost inaudible murmur from Izuku's lips. She strained to hear it, while a part of her screamed not to.
"...the hypothesis is sound…" he muttered, his eyes narrowed. "The rear proved to be an effective contact point for mass and firmness enhancement… a gluteal application… would the same principle work on other areas of large… soft tissue distribution?"
Pure, unadulterated terror seized Yu.
"...the contact surface is ample… nerve cluster density could be a factor… could an application to the breasts result in… structural reinforcement? Greater impact absorption? Experimentation… is needed…"
She crossed her arms over her chest instinctively, as if that could create a physical barrier against the incredibly strange and alarming thoughts emanating from the boy. Tactical genius or the most complex pervert in the universe? The line between the two was becoming dangerously blurry. The silence in the room grew heavy, charged with her fear and his intense, scientific concentration. She was about to scream, to run, to fire him and move to another country, when salvation arrived in the form of two sharp, shrill notes.
DING-DONG!
The doorbell echoed through the apartment, breaking the spell of awkwardness. Yu had never in her life been so happy to hear that sound. She jumped up, practically running to the door, grateful for any distraction that would get her away from Izuku's "breast hypothesis."
She yanked the door open, a relieved smile on her face, expecting to see a delivery person, a neighbor, anyone.
The smile died on her lips.
On the other side of the threshold was not a delivery person. It was Rumi Usagiyama. Mirko. In her full hero costume, her rabbit ears tense and an expression of righteous fury on her face. She had not come for tea.
Without so much as a word of greeting, Mirko burst into the apartment, forcing Yu to back away.
"Takeyama," Mirko said, her voice a low, dangerous growl. "I just saw that piece of trash magazine they call 'The Weekly Buzz.' I couldn't believe it, so I came to see it with my own eyes. What the hell are you thinking?"
She planted her hands on her hips, her posture radiating barely contained aggression.
"You've barely had your pro license for five minutes and you're already embarrassing the uniform! A date with a teenager! Do you know how hard we heroines work to be taken seriously, to not be seen as mere decorations or idols? And you go and become the walking cliché of a tabloid scandal! You make all of us look bad!"
Mirko's gaze, sharp as a knife, swept the room, and then it landed on Izuku.
And, in a twist of cosmically cruel fate, at that exact instant, Izuku's predatory gaze, which had been interrupted by the doorbell, had returned to its original point of reference. The place where it had all begun. Mt. Lady's butt. He was observing the way the suit fit her curve, probably recalculating her center of mass or some other crazy thing.
But that's not what Mirko saw.
Mirko saw a teenage boy shamelessly staring at a professional hero's butt, in her apartment, alone.
The look of anger on Mirko's face transformed into something much worse. It became an icy contempt, an absolute disgust.
"Ah," she said, her voice dripping venom. "I see. You're not even trying to hide it. This is disgusting, Takeyama."
Yu's brain went into total panic mode. The words stumbled in her mouth, forming a senseless syllable salad.
"No-no-wait-he-wasn't-looking-he's-training-me!" she stammered, waving her hands frantically. "It's-scientific-it's-not-what-you-think-we-were-going-to-train-that's-why-I'm-in-the-suit-and-he's-my-assistant!"
Every word that came out of her mouth only made her sound more guilty, more pathetic. Mirko's expression hardened even further. It was clear she didn't believe a single word.
Just as Yu was about to faint from the sheer force of mortification, a calm, composed voice cut through the tense air.
"Mirko-san. A pleasure to meet you in person."
Izuku took a step forward, placing himself between the two heroines. His demeanor had shifted again. The curious, slightly creepy analyst had vanished, replaced by a calm, collected executive. He completely ignored the floating accusation, the tension, and Yu's panic.
"Allow me to introduce myself," he said, his tone so formal it was absurd for a boy his age. "I am Izuku Midoriya."
He reached into his pants pocket. Yu watched him, confused. What was he doing? Was he going to pull out his phone to show her his ridiculous resume?
No. He didn't pull out his phone. He pulled out a small, elegant metal card case. With a clean, practiced motion, he slid the lid open, extracted a single card with his thumb, and offered it to Mirko with a slight bow of his head.
"Professional Assistant to Professional Heroes."
The world seemed to stop for the second time in ten minutes.
Mirko, the hero who had faced building sized villains without flinching, was speechless. Her fury vanished, drowned by a wave of pure, absolute confusion. She looked at the card, then at Izuku, then back at the card. She took it with two fingers, as if it might be poisoned.
Yu felt her soul leave her body.
CARDS?
Her mind screamed.
HE HAS BUSINESS CARDS? PHYSICAL? PRINTED? WHERE THE HELL DID HE GET BUSINESS CARDS? I HIRED HIM YESTERDAY AFTERNOON ON MY COUCH! DOES HE CARRY A PORTABLE PRINTING PRESS IN HIS POCKET? DID HE PLACE A RUSH ORDER AT AN OVERNIGHT PRINT SHOP? DO OVERNIGHT PRINT SHOPS EVEN EXIST?
The card was of infuriatingly high quality. Thick cardstock, almost like plastic. The text was slightly raised, in a serious, professional font. His name, "Izuku Midoriya," was at the top, and below it, in slightly smaller letters, his ridiculous title. In the bottom corner, a phone number and a professional looking email address.
Mirko read the title aloud, her voice flat with shock.
"'Professional… Assistant… to Professional… Heroes.'"
She looked at Izuku, who maintained a perfectly neutral expression. The situation was so bizarre, so unexpected, that her fighter's brain didn't know how to react. She couldn't hit him. She couldn't yell at him. She could only stand there, holding the strange piece of cardboard.
Yu, meanwhile, stared at him with wide eyes, her mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. He noticed her gaze, turned to her for an instant, and with the slightest of smiles, whispered:
"Details, details. Preparation is the key to professionalism."
That was too much. Yu felt a vein in her temple begin to throb dangerously.
After what felt like an eternity, Mirko finally seemed to process the situation, or at least, accept its weirdness. The fury had been completely neutralized by bewilderment. She tucked the card into one of her belt compartments with an almost automatic motion.
"Alright," she said, shaking her head as if to clear it. "I don't know what the hell is going on here, and I'm not sure I want to. But I still think you're reckless, Takeyama."
Izuku's attention, however, had already shifted entirely to Mirko. His eyes scanned her from head to toe, and Yu recognized the look. It was the analytical gaze, but this time there was nothing creepy about it. It was pure professional appreciation.
"An impressive physique," Izuku said, his voice regaining that academic tone. "The muscle density in your legs is extraordinary. It's indicative of extreme and consistent training. You are the personification of high speed, high impact, close quarters combat."
Mirko raised an eyebrow, surprised and, reluctantly, somewhat flattered by the technical analysis.
Izuku then turned to the two of them.
"Takeyama-san's main tactical weakness is her vulnerability to rapid, coordinated, short range attacks when in her giant form. Her size makes her an easy target and her reaction speed decreases. Usagiyama-san," he said, turning back to Mirko, "is the number one specialist in that precise field. There is no better sparring partner in all of Musutafu to identify, exploit, and consequently, correct those weaknesses."
Silence fell again. Yu and even Mirko watched as the boy's brain connected the dots with a cold, terrifying logic.
He looked directly at Mirko, without a hint of intimidation.
"Mirko-san, would you be interested in participating in our training session today? It would be a unique opportunity to measure your tactics against a 'giant' class opponent in a controlled, simulated urban environment. For you, it's valuable combat data. For us, it's a crucial optimization of our training regimen."
The audacity of the proposal left Yu speechless. Did he just invite his biggest rival, who had come to yell at her, to participate in her humiliating, secret training session?
But Mirko didn't laugh. Mirko didn't scoff. Mirko, the combat junkie, the one always looking for a challenge, her eyes lit up. She loved to fight. The idea of testing her skills against Mt. Lady in a sparring match was a challenge she had never considered. And this kid… this weird kid, with his business cards and his borderline perverted analysis… fascinated her. A wild grin, the first since she'd arrived, spread across her face, baring her teeth.
"I'm in, shorty," she said, slamming a fist into her other palm with a sharp crack. "I've been wanting to see what the rookie can do up close for a while. Let's see if you're as good at training as you are at handing out cards."
She turned to Yu, who seemed to have suffered a total paralysis.
"Let's go, Takeyama. Don't just stand there. You've got a scandal to bury under a mountain of sweat."
As they headed for the door, the three of them together in an unbelievably strange alliance, Mirko leaned toward Yu and gave her a playful but painfully sharp elbow to the ribs.
"Hey, Takeyama," she whispered, her voice full of a new, mischievous amusement. "Now I get it."
"G-get what?" Yu stammered.
Mirko winked at her.
"Now I get why you fell for this weirdo. He's got guts."
A paparazzi's camera would have focused on Yu Takeyama's face at that moment. It would have captured the way the last shred of color drained from her cheeks. It would have recorded the exact moment her brain shut down, unable to process the cascade of humiliations. Her mouth opened, but no sound came out.