He raised his hand. A black, oily substance began to bubble, emerging out of thin air. 'Warp.' The next moment, five warped, muscular forms stepped out of the void.
'How unfortunate Garaki isn't finished with the near High ends. These will have to suffice.'
Nomu. Each one a grotesque cathedral of stolen biology, stitched together from the raw material of human lives. All For One did not look at them, already adjusting his ruined collar, his attention fixed on the dust cloud three blocks away where Toshinori had landed. Eraserhead was somewhere in a four block radius on an elevated platform.
That was the only way to maintain line of sight. With the chance of All Might returning at any moment, having the Nomu search the area would take too long.
He had to deal with this nuisance immediately.
'In that case.' Dark red lighting streaks flashed around his arm as it ballooned in size. 'I'll just remove the high ground entirely.' Tear down every vantage point from which he could stand on.
Meanwhile. Outside, 'Where is he?' Aizawa hid behind a water tower, goggles focused on the hole in the commercial building. 'This isn't good. I can't keep this up ....' The sound of whirring blades drew his attention.
Turning his head, the sight of a news helicopter approaching the battlefield from the distance came into view.
"—coming to you live from eastern Tokyo where All Might has finally made his appearance in what has become the most catastrophic single night in the history of modern hero society."
Reporter Fujiwara Sae kept her voice level through nine years of professional discipline and the fact that her hands were shaking badly enough that she had pressed them flat against her thighs where the camera could not see them.
"We can confirm visual on the Number One Hero. We cannot confirm his current condition. The smoke and ongoing structural collapses have made a clear assessment impossible from our altitude, but our sources on the ground indicate that—"
On the rooftop, Aizawa's face darkened. 'Do these people seriously not care for their lives? Coming to a place like this where .....'
"I repeat. The Symbol of Peace has finally engaged the leader of the League. The destruction is... it's beyond words. We're seeing
... wait! Look at the rooftop!"
The cameraman moved the camera to show Aizawa on the live footage. "Is that ... Eraserhead. The underground hero?"
The video was broadcasted to the entire country, appearing on the screens of the student televisions in Heights Alliance. "It's Mr. Aizawa." Kirishima uttered as Aizawa's figure appeared on screen.
"He's at the heart of the battlefield. No way."
"Ribbit. He must have been in Tokyo when the broadcast started."
"Either that or he was with All Might. Speaking of All Might, things don't really seem to be going well here." The news crew had only seen the damage of Tokyo. Midoriya's expression was dead serious.
"This should be a good thing. With Mr. Aizawa closeby, All Might can .. huh?" Midoriya's eyes widened. ... BANG! The walls of the commercial building was incinerated to ash as a massive column of raging flames erupted from its left side.
The flames shot forward, collapsing buildings and engulfing everything in its path for blocks on end.
"Huh?" The reporter exclaimed. The flames swept across the skyline in a continuous roar that the helicopter's microphone could not fully capture.
"... This .." The camera shook violently, capturing the terrifying sight of the commercial building's entire left wing vaporizing. She could barely let out words when the massive torrent of flames moved in a horizontal 180 degree sweep. Aizawa's eyes widened at the incoming attack. Three seconds was enough to know he could not outrun it on foot. The time wasn't enough to do anything else useful. 'Dammit!'
THWIP-THWIP-THWIP. Just then, several projectiles streamed through the air, right towards the underground hero. Aizawa felt a violent tug at his capture scarf. A single, rigid feather hooked into the fabric, yanking him backward just as the rooftop he had been standing on vanished in a roar of heat and pulverized stone.
"A bit close for comfort, don't you think, Eraser?"
The voice came from above him. Aizawa looked up to see Hawks hovering above him, his face unbearably grim. His primary wings were dangerously thin, most of his feathers already scattered blocks away to guide civilians out of the crumbling subway lines. "What's his status?"
"Unknown." Aizawa replied, eyes fixed on the destroyed skyscraper. "He's hidden in the building and I can't get a visual on ... ..."
His words had barely finished when a flame cannon shot out of the skyscraper. 'Shit!' As the column of fire streaked toward them, Hawks realized they couldn't both dodge.
Hence, with a violent heave, he separated a cluster of feathers to shove Aizawa out of the way, diving in the opposite direction while hardening his remaining wings into a protective cocoon.
The result could be imagined. The explosion was a roar of pure white noise as the fire engulfed him.
The impact sent the Number Three Hero spiraling into the distance, a streak of smoke trailing behind him as he crashed into the earth in the distance.
"Hawks!" Aizawa yelled. The next moment however, he realized that the fierce wings keeping him airborne had lost their power as he began to plummet.
In the Class 1-A dorms, the students surged toward the television, a collective, horrified scream of "SENSEI!" erupting in the room.
Aizawa looked downwards, quickly discovering there was nothing his capture scarf could latch onto. The surrounding structures either too far or already burning while he was in a dead-fall, the ground rushing up at terminal velocity. A sudden boom echoed from the distance.
"It's All Might!" A streak of blue shot through the air towards the free falling hero from the rubble three blocks away. All Might intercepted Aizawa mid-flight at a speed that knocked the breath out of him before landing with a loud crash. "Hah ... hah ... hah ..."
The sound of heavy breathing fell into Aizawa's ears. All Might straightened beside him, his body releasing large amounts of steam. For a moment, all of Japan went silent as the sight of their invincible hero was laid bare before them. His suit was destroyed along the entire right side. His golden tufts tilted the wrong way. Blood stained his costume in visible areas, and his chest heaved with heavy pants. Worst of all. He wasn't smiling.
"Is ... Is that? .." A woman in Shinjuku dropped her phone. She wasn't the only one. In U.A, the entire class had gone silent. "This ... What's going on?"
"Well, I guess, All Might looks kind of ... beat up."
"Yeah. The only time I've seen him like this was during USJ."
"That means All Might's enemy is as strong as that thing."
Listening to the discussions of his classmates, Midoriya's hands clenched with anxiety. 'He's releasing steam ... That means ..'
In Tokyo, the silence was heavy, broken only by the crackle of distant fires and the rhythmic thump-thump of the news helicopter's blades.
Thousands of evacuees watched the footage of All Might at the scene, their hearts slowly dropping into pits.
All Might didn't look at the camera. His sunken, shadow-rimmed eyes were locked onto the jagged hole in the skyscraper where a dark silhouette was slowly emerging from the flames.
"Aizawa," All Might rasped. "Get to Hawks. If he's still breathing, get him out of the kill zone."
As much as he hated to admit it, his adversary was far too dangerous now with a fighting style completely different from six years ago.
Those blasts were damaging even for him. Having anyone else in the vicinity would be putting them in mortal danger.
"All Might, wait—" Aizawa started, reaching out, but the Symbol of Peace was already gone. Exerting force, All Might kicked off.
The pavement turned to shrapnel beneath his boots as he rocketed back into the sky. All the while, steam rolled off his skin in white plumes. 'I'm reaching my limit,' He thought grimly, tasting copper in the back of his throat. 'I can't waste time with a long-range battle. I have to end this now.' A guttural roar tore through the air. From the shadow of the building, one of the Nomu stepped into the light.
Its bones snapped and reformed with sickening wet crunches and skin hardening into dark scales as massive wings sprouted from its back.
Quite a grotesque transformation compared to the original owner of the Quirk. Ryukyu's dragon transformation 'Shit!'
The Dragon Nomu soared upward, its jaws unhinging to intercept the hero mid-flight. All Might didn't slow down. He twisted his body in mid-air, a sonic boom repositioning him as he used the air itself as a springboard to bypass the beast. 'Defeat All For One! That's all that matters!'
Inside what remained of the skyscraper, All For One stood waiting. His arms suddenly ballooned to five times their original size, a horrific amalgam of Body Bulk, Brawn Boost, Scale Mail, Rivets, Hypertrophy, and Kinetic Boosters.
Dark red lightning crackled between his fingers as he braced his feet against the floor. All Might cocked his right fist back to his shoulder.
"DETROIT—"
"Impact Recoil."
"—SMASH!"
The two titans collided in the center of the office floor.
The resulting shockwave shattered the support beams of the building, blowing out the remaining walls of the floor and sending a ring of pulverized concrete expanding into the sky.
All Might's right arm delivered its report to the rest of his body immediately and without ambiguity.
The full momentum of his punch had reversed direction and traveled back through the point of impact, through his hand, through his wrist, through his forearm to the elbow. His skin split along all four knuckles simultaneously. Blood erupted from the splits.
"Are you finished All Might?" All For One's fingers turned dark red. His arms pulsed as Springlike Limbs extended from his fingers, sharpening into jagged, black rivets that tracked the hero's heart. Behind All Might, the Dragon Nomu had already doubled back, its talons poised to rend the hero's exposed back.
'Shit!' It was the only thought Toshinori could muster as both attacks closed in. Just then however, a sudden, violent gust of wind rushed past.
The rivets and the dragon's claws slammed into each other, missing their mark by a fraction of an inch as All Might was suddenly gone. "Huh?"
Much to All For One's surprise. "Who dares interfere .."
The words had barely left his lips when in that microsecond, a high-pitched, electronic whine like the scream of a railgun—tore through the air. SQUELCH! The wing and shoulder area of the dragon Nomu was blown apart.
For the first time since this fight began, a chill colder than the ocean floor ran up his spine as his instincts flared with the warning of certain death. Without so much as a second thought, he jerked his head to the side a millisecond before a piece of debris infused with such a staggering density of Chakra that it glowed like a falling star—whistled past his face. The friction alone shattered the left side of his life-support mask, tearing a deep, jagged gash across his cheek and sending shards of black plastic flying.
The projectile didn't stop. Piercing into the body of the Nomu directly behind him, and proceeded to burst out of the other end unabated.
BANG!
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