Chapter Text
Born into this world of amazing powers called ‘Quirks’ Midoriya Izuku is overwhelmed with great interest in how these powers work and what you can do with them. At the age of 3 Izuku starts keeping a journal of all the quirks he sees and finds interesting. He does this when he is not playing with his friends and Kacchan, he does because he has nothing else that interests him aside from learning more about the world. And for a child of three years old Izuku loves reading and finding information, he was inherently very smart for a child.
When Izuku turned four years old, just a few weeks after Kacchan, he developed his quirk. At first, he thought he was dehydrated and that his mind was playing tricks on him because his shadow was moving while he was not. When he asked Kacchan if he was seeing the same thing, his friend became excited because Izuku’s quirk finally appeared. They were both so excited until something happened. His shadow went out of control and attacked Kacchan. His shadow had latched onto his friend and made him unable to move.
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On the inside, Katsuki was having a panic attack. He could not move his body; it was as if something took control of him and could bend him to their will, and Katsuki was scared of that. On the outside, Katsuki was still as unmoving as a rock but still breathing. Eyes roaming trying to find what was the cause of this. All he could see was the worried face of his friend, who was also panicking. And then Katsuki connected the dots, his friend was doing this to him. The person he trusted the most, the person he considered a brother was attacking him and looking down on him. And Katsuki became angry that his closest friend was looking down on him.
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When Izuku finally got control of his quirk he was surprised to see his friend become angry at him. Yelling at him for looking down on him and calling him a Monster. And then his friend ran away. Izuku tried to run after him and tell him he was sorry and did not mean to do that, but suddenly he was out of breath and panting like a dog. He could not muster enough strength to move, and by the time he could gather enough energy to move his friend was long gone. And so Izuku just went home to his mom.
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The following week Izuku had an appointment at the doctor’s office to see about his quirk. When they got there the doctor ran a bunch of tests on him. Asking him to use his quirk as much as possible, gathering all the data they could. And when they were done they were asked to come back the following day to get the results. When they come back the next day they are informed of the results. His quirk is called Shadow Control. He has the ability to control his and other shadows, forcing them to bend to his will. The overuse of his quirk results in physical exhaustion. The limits can be extended by normal stamina training. At the end of the appointment, Izuku gains the courage to ask a question.
“Um… doctor c-can I be a hero with m-my quirk?” his voice is shaky with nervousness.
“Though you will face adversity with the nature of your quirk, you will have to train hard but there is no guarantee. If that is what you wish, I bid you good luck.” the doctor says with an encouraging tone.
“T-thank you, Doctor.” is Izuku’s meek reply.
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After that doctor visit, Izuku noticed his mom had changed. She doesn’t talk quite as much as she used to, but he thinks that’s fine, she just wants to give him more time to think about his quirk. But the change in his mother is not the only one; his friends start to turn on him calling him names like Villain or Monster and he becomes ostracised from his friend group. And as he goes through the years of school the name-calling becomes worse and worse. Then it turns into bullying until one day in his last year of primary school when he has had enough of people calling him names and pushing him around. One of his regular bullies comes up to shove him into a locker, what he does not know is that Izuku started training with his quirk, when the bully gets close enough Izuku wraps the bully in his own shadow, immobilizing him. After that incident people leave him alone, no longer willing to interact with him for fear of having a similar experience. And for Izuku after that, he becomes colder and colder, no longer smiling and happy. He starts wearing a neutral face and starts to focus on his studies, learning more and more every day.
When he starts middle school the following year he starts keeping a journal about his quirk. Writing down ideas that pop into his head about ways he can use his quirk. Now after school he spends time testing his ideas and studying. When he enters his second year he starts to train his body more and more, no longer focusing on his quirk but his stamina and strength. As he is looking for a place to train he stumbles upon a beach filled with trash. He looks over the beach, over mountain after mountain of trash, he now knows what he is going to do. Every day after school he goes to Degohba Municipal Beach and starts cleaning the trash, moving it from the beach up the stairs and to the curb for it to be picked up.
He is so caught up in the cleaning process that he does not notice that his mom becomes more and more distant, she starts taking more and more shifts at work. She only starts leaving notes apologizing for not cooking for him and leaving only money to buy his three meals every day. When he finds the first note he is sad sure he loves his mom’s cooking but realizes he is a growing boy so she might not always have enough to cook for him. So he just pushes it aside and continues training. By the end of his second year only ten months later the beach is cleaned and his strength and stamina had increased greatly. Even after the beach is cleaned, he still trains to keep his body in shape but not as much as before. Now he starts focusing on his mind, he sets his goal to be at least a year ahead of his peers. But he is already like that in regards to some subjects. He is already fluent in English because how else would he be able to watch All Might’s interviews and other media interactions from his time in America. (A/N: In this au Izuku is still an All Might fan but not as much as canon. He still has All Might posters and stuff but not nearly as much.)
By the time he starts his third year he is farther ahead in his class than most, he has the top spot in all subjects including sports and the like. He is the fastest runner, has the farthest softball throw at 80 meters, but he is also the most feared person in his school. The only person who stands against him it's his ex-childhood friend Bakugou. And they regularly get into verbal arguments about who is better or who will be the best. Izuku always wins because he uses words better than Bakugou, always making him fumble his words and falter in his come-backs. One day after school his homeroom teacher calls for him to stay after school. That day after school the teacher confronts him about his mental prowess.
“Midoriya-kun, what do you think of the classes this year?” Izuku falters at the words of his teacher. The words were not expected, he was thinking he would get scolded for getting into an argument with Bakugou.
“Uh… they are pretty easy this year, to be honest.” is the monotone reply he gives his teacher.
“Because Takeda-sensei has noticed you have been sleeping in his English class yet you still hold the top rank in the class.”
“Oh, I'm already fluent in English,” Izuku said flatly.
“Midoriya-kun, what high school are you trying to attend?”
“ I am aiming for the U.A. Hero course,” Izuku says it so casually that his teacher does a double-take
“Oh, okay well with your grades you should do fine on the written tests, and you have a great physical prowess, but how do you think you will do in the practical exam?”
“I have been training for it since the start of the second year, but I still think I need more quirk training. I have yet to master everything I believe is needed for the practical.” Izuku’s answer surprises the teacher. He had no idea that Midoriya had been training for that long. And he still thinks he needs more training.
“Well then, We have nothing left to discuss and I will see you tomorrow then.” With that, Midoriya leaves the classroom and his teacher thinking about what he should do with him.
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On his way home Izuku thinks about starting up his quirk training again. To give himself more time to consider what he wants to do, Izuku takes the long way home. He walks under a bridge on his path and startles slightly when the manhole cover starts to rumble and shake. Suddenly he is covered in a sludge that is talking to him.
“ Oh you have a nice body I think I will be making you into a nice meat suit.” comes a garbled voice.
While he is being suffocated by the villain trying to take his body, Izuku thinks he needs a plan. After a few seconds of thinking, he decides the first step is he needs air. With all his might he uses the shadow the bridge casts to create a cylinder. He covers his head in it like a helmet that reaches out of the sludge. He morphs the cylinder to create a breathing hole as he finishes his lungs are immediately filled with the precious oxygen he was craving. His next step is to capture the Sludge villain but suddenly the manhole cover rattles again revealing the form of All Might with his signature smile on his face.
“Have No Fear, Citizen, Why, Because I AM HERE” Comes the signature line from the No. 1 Hero.
“No!, curses it’s All MIght” Comes the garbled voice of the villain.
In a flash of wind, the villain is blown away and knocked unconscious. At the same time, Izuku also faints. When he awakens again the number one hero has the villain contained in two large two-liter bottles. When he sits up the hero is signing his notebook with the villain loosely secured in his pockets.
“Shouldn’t you secure the villain better than that All Might?” His question startles the Number 1 hero
“Ah, you are correct young man. Thank you for pointing that out, that could have been bad.” is all All Might can say. And he quickly does a better job of securing the villain.
“By the way, Young man are you injured?” All Might questions
“No, I am okay, a little excited to meet the No.1 Hero but otherwise fine.”
“Glad to hear it young man now before I go I must ask your name and address so a police officer can later collect your statement after you have had time to calm down.”
“ Oh sure, My name is Midoriya Izuku and I live in apartment 35B in the Takeshi Apartment Complex a few blocks away.”
“Thank you for your cooperation young man, I’ll be on my way then.” And with that, All Might gives him his journal back and leaps away. After the fact, Izuku thinks he should have asked All Might if he could be a hero but he had not thought of it. So he continues his way home. Later that night a police officer comes and takes his statement to file an official police report.
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Izuku spends the next months training his quirk developing moves and learning more about it. One Saturday he was just standing there with his quirk activated after trying to make a dome around him when suddenly he fell into the shadow. When he opens his eyes, all he sees around him is an inverted world in only black and white. The ground is black and where shadows should be only being white. As he steps onto the white shadow he falls through it. But when he opens his eyes again there is no color to his vision. It is as if he is in an old black and white TV show. After blinking a few times to see if it was just an after effect of being in the inverted place he realizes that it will not go away with just blinking. He quickly pulls his notebook out and jots down the date and time. Then he runs to the closest hospital to get his eyes checked. When he gets up to the counter he tells the nurse stationed at the front desk of the not very busy hospital that he has somehow gone monochromatic and can only see in black and white. When he tells her this she calls for an optometrist to do eye tests. After some tests and a phone call to his mother, he is told two things.
“Hello there, I am Dr.Takawa, and I have the results of the tests for you.” The doctor is very nice and polite in his manner of speaking.
“Okay thank you, doctor.” Is Izuku’s reply
“ Well, it seems that this sudden monochrome vision is due to your quirk evolving after intense use. The only thing affected is the color receptors in your eyes. Meaning that your eyesight is fine and you should not face any future troubles. Another thing, it seems to have changed the color of your eyes from green to a vertical split in each eye between white and black.” as the doctor’s words sink in, Izuku realizes that he will never be able to see color again, making art class harder.
“Thank you, doctor, I am glad my eyesight will not be too greatly affected by this.” is all Izuku could muster the courage to say. And after Izuku leaves without another word.
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When he gets home the first thing he does is call his school and tell them the news. And after he tries to call his mom but only gets sent to voicemail. He decides to text his mom and tell her the news that way instead of disrupting her work. Then he goes to bed shortly after. On Monday he is surprised by what happens with his classmates. None of them seem to realize that he is there at all, after the brief shock he ignores it and heads to class. Later on, when the homeroom teacher has to help with an emergency and leaves the room in a rush Bakugou stands and walks towards Izuku.
“Oi, nerd what the fuck is wrong with your eyes” Bakugou demands
“ My quirk mutated and now my eyesight is monochromatic,” Izuku responds without looking up from his books.
“What the hell does that mean you, damn nerd!” Bakugou yells
“It means I no longer can see color at all. Anything else?”
“Tch, whatever nerd,” Bakugou says while walking away
Nothing else is said that day between the two. Though the teachers do give Izuku sorrowful looks when they walk in, they don’t say anything about it.
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The next day Izuku goes back to training his quirk and discovers something else. Now his quirk is sensitive to touch and can feel things even when Izuku cannot see the object. After the shock dies down because of this, Izuku goes back to creating moves, Finally getting the hang of the shadow dome and the shadow travel. Then he starts working on offensive moves like making the shadows into weapons and also a capture technique where he uses the shadow produced by the target to bind them in place. When experimenting with the weapons he can create, he discovers that he can make a surfboard-like object and ride it. Though it is not as fast as ‘shadow tunneling’ as he has dubbed it, but ‘shadow surfing' allows him to maneuver in the air.
Throughout his third year of middle school, he keeps practicing his new techniques and even develops a fighting style based on going in and out of ‘The Inverted Place’. It is like playing whack-a-mole in reverse and he thinks it is fun. He also notices throughout his time that he has adopted some shadow-like traits, for example, he can easily go unnoticed and sometimes phase through things.
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On the day of the entrance exam, Izuku is nervous, to say the least, but he is also happy because his mom had cooked breakfast for him and the omurice was very good. It was the first time he has had his mom’s cooking in a long time. After eating his breakfast he gets ready for the exam. He makes sure to bring clothes to change into after along with water and a sports drink. Once he is ready he leaves his house to start the fifteen-minute jog to U.A. Now at the front gates, the realization kicks in and he now feels the pressure of standing in front of the best hero school in Japan. With the realization settling in he takes his first steps onto the campus but as he does he trips over nothing and starts his fall to the paved ground.