Thorny Path of a Pro-Hero

Having agreed to hear Setsuna Tokage's explanation for her stalker-like behavior after classes—I'm sure, after these spy games, finding me won't be hard for her—and pushing the unruly girl out of the third-floor window (Kami-sama, am I really a hero?), I dashed off to class.

The remaining classes went by as usual. Well, except for the awkward moment with Yui, who sniffed around and softly announced that I smelled like women's perfume (I almost disrupted the class with my laughter).

And so, I had time to think.

After all, I had taken a pause in communication partly for this reason.

And skipping classes... well, who would care? Me, who only needs perfect grades out of sheer competitive interest? My parents, who know perfectly well that I could almost teach the school curriculum myself?

Or the U.A. Academy, where the practical exam involving beating up metal villain faces is more important than academic knowledge? Which, logically, makes sense, since the vast majority of heroes work with their hands. Except for pure strategists like Nighteye and the like.

In short, no, I needed to think about Setsuna.

There were no reasons to consider this world any different from the one I knew from the anime.

Therefore, I should focus on the story I already know.

I vaguely remember Setsuna's character. I only know that, firstly, she had an amazing multifunctional quirk. Secondly, despite this quirk, she didn't make any impact at the sports festival, during the villains' attack on that mountain, or even during the joint training. And thirdly, she wasn't a particularly bright personality.

And she was also a brunette, yes.

Well... if something has a quirk like Setsuna's, shares general traits like age and appearance with Setsuna, and calls itself "Setsuna," then it's highly likely to actually be Setsuna. Of course, I'll need to observe her just in case, but... the question is settled; let's close this topic. Otherwise, I might end up "Setsuna'd" myself.

In that case, there must be objective reasons why she didn't achieve anything at the same festival and why she looks and behaves differently from the anime... I don't like calling that version of events just "anime." It doesn't capture the scale. Let's call it... "World A"?

And my original world will be "World B."

Oh well, whatever, let it be.

So, why is she a blonde—I already figured that out.

She's dyed.

And why does she dye her hair?

Because she belongs to one of the popular Japanese youth subcultures called "gyaru."

One of the very old subcultures, by the way, because this movement started several hundred years ago and already existed in my... um, in World B.

This subculture emerged as a natural reaction of the youth to Japan's post-war political and cultural orientation toward the West. Concepts of beauty were changing along with them, albeit not universally. Partly this was reflected in fashion, partly in the appearance of anime characters, and partly in such subcultural movements.

What exactly is "gyaru"? Girls, and it is indeed a female movement (there are also guys, gyaru-o, but they are few) imitate Western fashion, or rather, how they perceive it. They massively dye their hair blonde, highlight it, or wear wigs (it's unlikely to be Setsuna's option considering her quirk), wear loose blouses and plaid skirts like in those American college comedies (or Brazzers videos, but let's not talk about that).

It's hard not to know about gyaru if you live in a big city in Japan. Paradoxically, given the general tolerance of contemporary society and acceptance of quirks, the attitude towards them among people... isn't that great.

It's not hard to explain: gyaru girls look like, um, people with somewhat lowered social responsibility. They look accessible, that's it.

Sometimes, to be honest, some girls actually look quite good in such an image... especially if they don't overdo it, and if the girl herself is naturally pretty. However, in most cases, they turn out to be, well... rather unappealing. Or provocative.

For Setsuna, it suited her, but I think this was more due to her natural appearance.

But, besides all that, dyed blonde hair among Japanese people is traditionally associated with hooligan, rude, and tsundere behavior.

Based on all this, one might assume that Setsuna Tokage is, to some extent, an outcast. Maybe she only socializes with a limited group of people, or maybe she's a complete loner.

And also—a fifteen-year-old teenager who, being in a transitional period, is prone to going against social norms and simply shocking people.

To some extent, this explains why she burst into the men's restroom with a friendship proposal.

To some extent.

Hmm...

... and, if we get into it, even anime itself emerged as an attempt to adapt the principles by which a certain well-known Disney started making its cartoons, like Bambi or Snow White, back in the day.

A more than successful attempt, I must say.

And if we think further, even the anime world of "My Hero Academia"... I mean, the reality of World A is, to a large extent, the same projection of all sorts of American superhero comics onto Japanese culture and anime tropes as such... wait, stop, stop!

I shouldn't think about this! I shouldn't think about the fact that I'm living in a sort of cultural phenomenon cubed... stop, that's enough!

Stop, don't think about the white elephant.

Or else I'll end up giving myself an existential crisis right here.

In short, the reason she's a blonde instead of a brunette is clear. I probably didn't need to spend so much time discussing this with myself, but hey, the time lost in lessons won't waste itself!

The second, and far more important point, is why she didn't show herself in World A at all?

Considering these two ridiculous weeks and, forgive me, Kami-sama, the "toilet scene," the colossal potential of her abilities was evident.

She can fly... and fast. She can be in different places at once. She can control her parts entirely independently. She can somehow scan the area and evaluate the position of her parts relative to each other. In World A, there was supposedly some mention of a regeneration ability, which, in my opinion, is already a bit much.

Even so, it's too overpowered.

So, how come she never showed... won't show herself in a fight? Well, alright, not in a fight, but at least in the race at the festival? With her power, she should have automatically secured first place...

But, again, I don't know her limitations. What if she can't stay in the air for long?

... but she just jumped in and out of the window like a gazelle.

So, she can probably stay up for quite a while.

Then, the problem must be something else. What?

A physical injury? I don't remember any events involving Class "B" that could have led to such an outcome. And given her abilities, it's highly unlikely that an injury to a single part of her body would hinder her much.

Psychological?

Nah, why would she...

I absentmindedly scratched my eyebrow and suddenly froze. My own eyebrow. With my own hand.

Like, does she have some kind of cognitive dissonance over which of her parts is truly her? That’s a straight road to schizophrenia, and there was another character in World A with the same problem...

I shook my head.

No, nonsense. Complete nonsense. Even if she did have some brain glitch like that, her quirk factor wouldn't let it manifest.

Although it worked for Twice...

Ah, still no. That's a complete stretch.

There's something else...

I blinked. "My own eyebrow, my own hand"—so why not recall my own life? Yeah, in World B.

And in that reality, I had repeatedly observed from the sidelines, and even partly experienced for myself, such an interesting thing as the "village straight-A student syndrome." The name is mine, I had to call it something, but I don't claim originality.

The essence of it is that kids with abilities often grow up in environments that don't match their talents at all. As a result, they get used to getting through challenging academic situations solely on their natural gifts, becoming lazy, careless, and overconfident.

They get used to everything being easy and to being, in a way, the elite.

Then, (dramatic music), such a "village straight-A student" enters, say, a metropolitan university, and life quickly humbles them: they suddenly realize that everyone here is just as capable as they are. But at the same time, many of them know how to work, and others are far more capable and talented.

And in the end... all that used to come easily turns into a trial. Into a battle. Into a rivalry.

Not to mention that the difficulty of the academic material itself often increases significantly.

Some adapt and manage to adjust, get used to it, and reclaim their positions.

And some are broken by it.

As I know from the future/past, studying at U.A. will be quite challenging, and there are tons of truly capable, strong, and smart kids there.

And Tokage, on top of that, will enter the Academy without exams, as one of the talents recommended.

So, there's a double pressure on her right from the start.

That's it.

And now, if we combine this hypothesis with Setsuna's social image...

"Niren, are you coming?" my teacher asked in Yui's voice.

Stop.

I blinked, lifted my head, and looked around the classroom with a blurry gaze, where the lesson had already ended. Ended so much that there were almost no people left in the room.

Wow, I was deep in thought. Completely lost in reality, thinking about... about whom, exactly?

About some girl I don't even know.

Yeah. This Setsuna is not a superheroine, but some kind of super heroin.

I rubbed my face with my hands, yawned, and slid off the chair, making a show of groaning and holding my back.

"Coming, coming, granddaughter. Wait for your old man..."

***

Anyway, after sorting all the information in my head, I more or less understood both the situation and the logic behind the actions of the future heroine.

The one thing I didn't get: why did she contact me specifically?

Or rather, not quite.

HOW did she figure out she could reach out to me? How did she know?

Her answer is important because there might be a leak of information somewhere that I hadn't considered, and which could be exploited by All for... or some other nasty piece of work.

...so when, ten minutes later, Yui and I ran into the aforementioned Setsuna right on the school steps, I wasn't even surprised.

Yui... well, hell if I know whether my friend, the Snow Queen, was surprised or not. Kodai is getting better at controlling her emotions, and she definitely can put two and two together.

"Oh, there you are!" exclaimed the "currently" blonde, hopping off the railing and showing no sign of surprise, annoyance, or embarrassment that I wasn't alone.

...because, obviously, she already knew that we are always together.

"Hello, Tokage-san," I nodded. And, without pausing, I bluntly asked. "Before you explain why all this happened and what logic you were following, could you answer one question: why me specifically?"

"H-How did you..."

"Why me, Tokage-san? It's really important."

She hesitated, her gaze flickering between me and Kodai.

"Um... okay, but... what about her..."

"She's a friend," I answered without so much as raising an eyebrow.

"A vassal," Yui added in her signature, calm "winter" voice.

Two "kuderes," I swear.

No, this won't do; it's time to ease the tension.

"Nothing of the sort," I retorted in a bored tone. "Someone's just read too many novels about feudal Japan."

"As Niren Shoda-dono wishes," Kodai responded serenely, bowing with her hands folded, looking every bit like the perfect Japanese wife and all that.

If you don't know the context, it seems like a super-polite continuation of the joke.

If you do know the context, both historical and linguistic, it's obvious she used one of the oldest honorific suffixes, "-dono," written as 殿 or どの, a near-archaic term that used to be used to address wealthy, well-off, plump gentlemen.

Literally, "possessors of large buttocks."

In other words, she had just very politely and elegantly called me "an ass." Or "fat," depending on your preference.

...I love this girl.

Smiling and giving Yui a finger (and yes, I'm an intellectual too, I didn't specify which one!), I turned to Setsuna, who seemed to be holding her breath as she watched us.

Well, yeah, "celebrities" up close—they do that.

"So? Why me?"

***

And the mystery unraveled in the simplest way possible.

It turns out Setsuna’s... drumroll... mother worked in the admissions committee's secretariat at U.A. More precisely, in the very part that deals with admitting students through recommendations.

Do you see? I had imagined all sorts of things, wound myself up, but in reality, it was just that this gyaru's mom looked into the documents and saw that one of the candidates for the preliminary recommendation stage—a straight-A student with a strong quirk who was recommended to U.A. by both his parents and teachers, no less—lived and studied less than a kilometer from her school.

That's how it was.

...still, this doesn't change the fact that anyone else could have spied this information—first seen it, then leaked it to a three-hundred-year-old blind fool who's just itching to plunge the entire social structure of humanity into chaos.

Oh well, whatever, I’ve been as secretive as possible and did everything I could not to get exposed prematurely. What’s the point in worrying now—less than a year remains until the U.A. entrance exams anyway.

Alright, back to the dialogue... although it's more of a monologue.

***

"...well, and I, um, decided to find you and have a chat! After all, we'll soon be studying together, and friends, well... never hurt, right? And... I found you! Or rather, not quite, I was sitting in class, just sitting, and I got bored, so I decided to search during class, found your school's address on Google Maps, and sent part of me there..."

"Part of you?"

"...yup! And it wasn't that simple, I had to fly far, and it was hard to gather information, and I had to search a bunch of classes, I had never worked over such large areas before!" Setsuna spread her arms wide, demonstrating how large these areas were. She did this using her quirk—"Self-Amputation," as I now knew—literally splitting each arm into five or six parts that lined up in the air. The areas she searched must have been enormous. "…anyway, not as easy as I thought. But I still managed, haha! I always handle such difficulties!" At these words, Tokage reassembled herself, straightened up proudly, and flicked a strand of hair over her shoulder.

Yui and I calmly walked around her, each on our own side.

"Hey! You could at least ask how I was searching! Hey! Come on!"

We were talking, or rather, Setsuna was talking on the move—as the three of us walked towards the training hall that Yui and I used. Right now, we had a joint training session on our schedule, so we could afford to be a little late.

It’s worth noting that Yui was making rapid progress. The sensations when, right in the heat of battle, one of the tonfas becomes too big and heavy to hold and falls on your foot… can only be topped by the sensations when your pants fall down because they've become too big.

And she had finally learned to cancel her quirk without making the canceling gesture with both hands. For now, she still needed one hand, but I had no doubt she would soon get rid of this crutch too.

Yes. Oh, Setsuna unfroze.

"…fine, whatever. So, I finally found you, and... and...," at this point, the girl, who had caught up with us, blushed and froze, seemingly remembering how our communication had started, "and decided, phew, well, to observe. In case I'd be an extra in your company… although, how could a beauty like me be an extra in any company?! Silly me. Well… then in case you'd turn out to be some kind of weirdo..."

Yui Kodai, with a very serious look, nodded enthusiastically at the last phrase while maintaining a completely impassive expression. I felt a swell of pride for my corrupting influence, honestly.

Scratching my eyebrow, I replied:

"I can understand all that, and I even find it quite logical."

Setsuna perked up, flashing a wide grin and putting her hands behind her head.

"But what I can't understand is why you were observing...” - hmm, I’m not sure if anyone else noticed her. Yui, for example. And I might not have noticed her right away either.

Maybe I shouldn't embarrass her too much in front of another girl...

I vividly recalled the scene in the bathroom.

No.

Definitely should.

"...for more than two weeks?"

Setsuna let out a muffled squeak and turned beet red, finally hiding her face behind her hands.

From behind her, Yui made big, scary eyes and silently mouthed, "Two weeks?!" to which I simply shrugged in a way that conveyed confusion, like an international kaomoji.

So, while I was performing a " ¯\_(ツ)_/¯," and Setsuna looked like "(」＞＜)」," we reached our hall. Not just any hall, by the way—it was a regular gym with sports equipment that we rented for a few hours a couple of days a week.

Yui immediately, without entering, occupied the bench by the entrance and strategically armed herself with a book, this time… wow. “Kusarigama-jitsu: Myth or Reality?”

Well, well, she's up to something again.

Suppressing the urge to whistle, I leaned against the wall, watching the clouds and giving the gyaru girl time to collect herself.

However, it didn't take her long. Still blushing, almost with tears in her eyes, Tokage stood at attention in front of me and resolutely blurted out:

"Yes, maybe I'm a stalker! S-so embarrassing! I apologize! It happened accidentally! Won't happen again!"

A couple of random passersby turned around with wide eyes, Yui stifled a chuckle and dropped her book, and I nearly fell over from yet another unstoppable bout of laughter that pierced all my psychological defenses.

Damn, I really need to do something about this. What if All for makes a good joke during a fight… or worse, what if some villain makes a bad joke, or doesn't joke at all and starts spouting some stupid pompous speech in all seriousness. I'll just laugh, get hit, and that's it for me. What a bother.

I caught my breath and glanced at the girl.

Honestly, I used to be a hundred percent sure that those screams in awkward situations from anime were just a non-existent, impossible cliché in the closed and caste-based society of real Japan.

And here I am—laughing.

The quirks of national culture, I guess.

And the culprit of the "laugh," the so-called patient zero, is trembling, blushing, worried, all curled up. She says she's ashamed.

And yet—she doesn't look away.

She doesn't run off anywhere, doesn't hide.

She’s ready to take responsibility for her reckless actions.

She's scared—but she stands her ground…

And she’s not even fifteen yet.

A heroine, in one word.

Such a stance deserves respect.

"It's all right… well, almost all right, Tokage-san," I finally calmed down and addressed the girl. "You're not a stalker, come on. You didn't call me with threats, didn't send insults to my email, did you?"

The girl shook her head vigorously—as if she had some specialized quirk for it.

"Then don't worry about it," I shrugged. "It's all good, it happens."

Maybe not the most consistent and educational response on my part, but how much longer can I torment this rather nice and even cute girl? And what kind of teacher am I, for kami-sama's sake?

Oh well, whatever.

What concerns me more is… Did I guess right? It's about time to move on to more interesting things.

"Uh... okay," Setsuna replied a bit confused, freezing in the middle of the street and clearly unsure what to do with my sudden kindness. "Um..."

Deciding to test my latest hypothesis, hinting at it to the girl-builder and also giving her time to compose herself, I began to stretch demonstratively.

Kodai quietly chuckled behind her book.

Well, yeah. Funny to say, but even after fifteen years in this life, I still start my warm-up routine with a couple of typical exercises straight from my first life's school gym class.

Neck, shoulder girdle, wrist, and ankle rotation...

"Oh, right, that's it, I almost forgot!" exclaimed the blonde, slapping her forehead. Interestingly, her hand was levitating in the air. "I wasn't just looking for you for nothing!"

At these words, Setsuna Tokage, flipping a strand of hair with a characteristic gesture, struck a pose she thought was impressive, thrusting out her hip and pointing a finger at me:

"I challenge you! I challenge you to a duel! For the right to be considered the strongest and… um, the coolest recommended student of U.A.!"

I guessed. Guessed right again. I’m good!

Maybe I should go into psychology if the hero career doesn’t work out? Or maybe beat the roulette in a casino, seeing as I'm this lucky. Heeeey… I could nudge the ball with my quirk onto the right slot…

Wait, hold on, head. I've just been challenged to a duel!

The "epic" moment was slightly ruined by the muffled giggling from somewhere behind my back, but I still tried to keep a straight face and nodded sternly, cranking up the drama to turbo-action levels.

"Well, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t expecting something like this. What's at stake?"

"Uh… what do you mean? Oh, wait… oh! Alright, I’ve got it: I'll be the class president, and you’ll be my deputy! Well, I mean when I win. I mean, if… ugh, you get it. Anyway, All Might was the president of Class 'A,' and so will I!"

"And you're that sure you'll get into 'A'?" The skepticism was particularly hard to suppress, considering my knowledge of the future where she wasn't the brightest student in ‘B.’ "Besides, we might end up in different..."

"Pfft," Setsuna waved dismissively, "I’m the best! Everyone says so, and I’ve never lost! Of course, I'll get into Class 'A'; everyone knows the best students are there! And you’re not too bad either… well, from what I’ve seen… sometimes… Anyway! You won't throw me off my path with your insinu… insinua... ugh! In-si-nu-a-tions, yes. Now, where was I..."

She tilted her head and smirked:

"Anyway, enough talking, let’s have a match!"

I grinned in response.

"Why not."

Illustrations:

Gyaru-Setsuna sitting and waiting for Niren and Yui :)

I must say, I really like this look.

… Niren does not, though. Impractical!