Two weeks went by in a flash.

By then I’d mastered the way of looking as if I were listening but internally dozing off eyes wide open.

We kept going to trials, I kept training my ass off, and I gradually started going to Leo’s more and more often.

Katsuki still hadn’t responded, and Keigo still wasn’t awake.

I did great progress on my fuinjutsu.

My goal was an easy one : if I couldn’t store chakra the way Tsunade did, then I’d have to store full clones inside seals that would pop up fully refreshed when I needed them.

It seemed harder than Tsunade’s way but it was technically easier : clones, though not me, had a certain degree of awareness and cognizance.

Once inside a seal, they should be able to hold tight onto the chakra they had and avoid its dispersion, whereas I still had no idea how to store unused chakra without, a), making my head explode, b), avoid its dispersion.

Dad looked rather down nowadays.

I believed it was because of Touya.

He still visited him every day.

I had no idea what to do to make him feel better.

Anyway, rather than try and store clones inside seals, I decided to try a new approach : sealed kunais, for example, needed a very low amount of chakra coating to be recognized by a seal and stored inside.

Putting more chakra on it would result in nothing except losing my energy quicker and without storing anything.

I believed if I worked gradually on the amount of coating, I would figure a way to store clones in seals.

I had a hunch the way I chakra-coated stuff was the problem ; rather than cover it thickly, I had to change the way I layered my chakra.

My goal was to make a spider thin web on objects that would criss cross so much that, through a normal eye-sight, it would seem like normal coating but it would not be. By superposing coatings in such an intricate pattern I’d be able to put more chakra in a smaller space and avoid seals going off.

I still was stuck on how to make the spider web.

I was good with chakra strings but nowhere near good enough to make something so complicated without the strings losing their shape and melting into each other.

I worked hard on physical conditionning, too.

Evacuating that many civilians in such a short amount of time made me realize I had unexplored limits.

Adrenaline and stress made me go faster than I ever thought was possible.

I used to believe that even chakra augmented individuals had limits : Tsunade’s strength was, in my opinion, the peak one could hope to achieve.

Yet it wasn’t : Tsunade’s strength was insane, but it was merely a beginning.

It had came easily to me, a bit like breathing did to any individual.

I remembered the day I’d broken a sink by merely holding it between my hands.

I worked on it for years before I managed to control it.

I thought it was nice, but now I realized it was nowhere near enough.

I had fucking chakra between my hands. This shit was pure gold.

People had managed to bring back the dead to life with it and, for someone who died once, I knew this was an absolutely insane feat.

If I managed to work on my speed the way I did my strength over the years, nothing could stop me from becoming the next Minato Namikaze.

Hell, what wouldn’t I be able to do if I improved my strength ?

Shattering boulders was nice ; shattering continents was my new goal.

And everything started with good old fashioned training.

Over the last few months I’d neglected completely the physical aspect of my training : chakra enhanced individuals, once they reached a certain threshold, would not lose completely their built once they stopped working out the way normal people would.

Chakra would passively strenghten your muscles and avoid them thinning and getting back to what they used to be.

Yet chakra wouldn’t make your body better if you put no work on the physical aspect of stuff.

Thus, I started waking up very early in the morning and sneak out of the city and to Mount Nokogiri.

It was close enough I could go to easily and thankfully not as popular as Mount Fuji, thus I was mostly left alone, especially because with the recent events Japan was not at the top list of places to visit for international tourists.

My training was rather common yet original in its own way : I did push-ups on one hand, did handstands at the peak of the mountain on the verge of a three hundred meters fall, I fought my clone – one on one and then plenty of them against me – and all of this with gravity seals.

Using gravity seals was like moving through a mix of oil and mud : you felt your chest was compressed, you had a hard time breathing and feeling the world around you, yet it was the fastest way for me to improve.

Another thing I realized was that my skin was too soft : going as fast as I did at Atago-Jinja I had half expected my flesh to start peeling layer after layer.

My bones had nearly gave out, too.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

I had to find a way to strengthen my muscles and joints enough for I did not want to snap like a twig next time I tried to go as fast.

I used to like hunting food, and I started too once again.

It had been years since I’d felt as blissfully peaceful.

I had goals, and I had means to achieve them.

Dabi was dead.

I could change the world if I worked hard enough.

Everything would work itself out.

I started munching on a grilled piece of fish on a kunai.

I was a Hero, I’d saved Tokyo, One for All was on the run, people liked better Dad.

For once, I did well.

Hope and happiness crept up my heart, warming my chest nicely.

I really can change.

I would be enough as long as I did my best.

*

Of course Chisaki would become a liability.

As soon as he’d heard he’d been spotted by the Commission, Nezu knew he was in trouble.

If he had managed to get his hand on him before them, he would’ve find a way for him to flee from the country and never come back : with a Quirk like his, the Commission would never leave him alone.

And now that martial law had been declared, Nezu’s leverage was limited.

The army was not as kind nor compassionate as the Commission, and the Commission had never been known for either of these attributes.

The reach and power of the military was one of the many reasons Nezu tried to get his hand on it years ago.

“Thank you for honoring us with your presence”

It was sarcastic.

She was a soldier, a woman with a low bun and a hard face. Stress lines run under her eyes and her skin was tanned, as if she’d spent hours sweating under the sunshine.

Nezu did not play the cute mouse act : everyone in the room was far above falling for his cheap tricks.

They looked at him warily, their gazes a mixture of repugnance and scorn, as they would an animal experiment that could talk.

Nezu hated humans, and his hatred had ground by leaps since Aizawa’s eyes had been gouged out.

They’d said his power was of national importance and once he’d lost it, had one of them come to see him ?

By the sixth day, he’d stopped eating.

Nezu knew him well : he was too proud to kill himself, yet too weak to bear the weight of being the shadow of the man he’d once been.

Nezu wondered, while looking in the soldier’s black eyes, if she knew that the only thing that kept him from putting all of them – weak, puny, self-important creatures – against each other was his love for this country.

Japan had welcomed him with open arms and enabled to live a respectful life, a live worthy of living for any sentient creature.

He knew it was mainly because he was useful to them, of course, but many other countries saw him as too much of a threat for the pros to outweigh the cons.

If they had given him control of the army, he would’ve gotten rid of All for One years ago.

If he’d had control of the country as he wished so much, Aizawa would still have had his eyes today.

He was greedy, and humans were greedy too, yet he was so much better than these inferior creatures.

“I had parents to soothe after the tragic events that happened. I hope you better than anyone can understand why I couldn’t come sooner”

They saw him as an aberration, an abnormality of nature.

Nezu wondered how humans would react if animals suddenly started developing sentience thanks to Quirks.

“Of course”

She slid a picture towards Nezu.

“Do you know this man ?”

Kai Chisaki.

“I do, yes. He is one of my first year’s parents”

“Are you personally acquainted with him ?”

They merely had a mutually beneficial partnership.

“No”

She hummed.

Nezu would’ve been more than surprised if they found anything about his and Chisaki’s little affairs : Nezu had carefully covered all of their tracks.

“We suspect Monoma to be a traitor affiliated to All for One. We think his uncle helped kill the Uraraka girl in order to make us think she left and to put our focus on her”

As Nezu expected.

“I assure you, young Neito is no traitor. Rather he is the one who told me about his suspicions concerning Ochaco”

“Did he ?”

She tried to act surprised ; Nezu was no fool.

Chisaki may not have batted an eye, but Neito was only a fifteen years old kid.

He wouldn’t whitstand pressure, especially after how physically damaged he’d been.

Of course he’d told them.

“It was after the Summer Camp. I decided not to act on it until we had enough proof”

“You did not think it was relevant information for the Commission ?”

“Yuei is mine to direct and mine to protect. I saw fit to act this way thus I did”

If he showed weakness, they would eat him in one bite.

She showed no outward reaction.

“We ran analysis on the place civilians said they last saw Monoma and Uraraka. Uraraka’s blown up remains have been found among those of Nomu’s”

Luckily.

Nezu took a second to reply.

“She may have been eaten by one of them before Chisaki came to help his nephew. We can’t know for sure he killed her”

“How do you know Chisaki was there to help his nephew ?”

“I told him where to find him”

“How did you know where to find him ?”

“All of Yuei’s students have track devices on their costumes and school uniforms. It’s a nice precautionary measure, especially as – as you may remember it – it helped us find Shoto Todoroki when All for One kidnapped him a few months ago”

“And he knew your phone number ?”

“Each and every parents has it”

“How convenient you responded so late in the night”

Nezu smiled.

“Or rather so early in the morning”

She did not.

Suddenly, she leaned forward, eyes cold.

“I’ll tell you what I think : I think Kai Chisaki and you have a stronger connection that you want to admit. I think you expected Uraraka to die when you sent Chisaki after his nephew”

True.

“I think you and him are doing shady stuff together. I think if you’d told anyone about your suspicions concerning the girl, we could’ve avoided everything that happened together”

Nezu said nothing.

The soldier sighed dramatically.

“Our General is very angry. He wants results, and he wants results soon. He wouldn’t mind making you our scapegoat. We could, say, take Yuei from you”

Nezu’s eyes shone darkly.

“Careful here. I am not one you can threaten lightly”

This time, she indeed smiled.

“I do know. You are indeed a very powerful individual ; we had to work against quite a few politicians before we managed to get you to come to us.”

And even then they did not manage to get him into a proper interrogation.

He was merely here of his own accord.

“Yet martial law has been decreed and, despite everything, we do have the right to hold back your privileges if we believe you may have contributed to the events that led to the biggest terrorist attack on our country”

Nezu had come to show his good will ; yet now they tried to pin the blame on him ?

“I believe there has been a mistake : I am, as everyone, extremely shocked by what happened. I am offended you believe me even a bit responsible for what happened. You do know how close I am to Eraserhead and you can’t fathom how angry I am about this whole situation”

She raised her hand to make him shut up.

“Sure-”

“I do not take lightly those who hurt what’s mine. I am angry about what happened to young Neito, angry at how his uncle has been treated despite helping our country, angry that young Shoto Todoroki has been put in such dire situation because the Commission hasn’t been able to handle the situation. But most of all, I am angry at All for One”

She choose to let him speak as if he were merely venting his anger ; he took the opportunity.

“Yet I believe you forgot the most important : All Might was coincidentally called far away from Tokyo that night. Hawks has been taken out of commission by a man that is known as one of All for One’s closest allies. Endeavor, half of the Peace Symbol, and his son have been lured on the other side of the city, far away from where, coincidentally, Uraraka was with Eraserhead”

They had obviously realized as much.

“What are you implying ?”

“Uraraka told All for One she would be with Eraserhead that night. Earlier in the evening All Might has been sent away by the Commission to fight off a Nomu that appeared North of the country ; Hawks had sent the Commission a text before clashing with Dabi”

She jerked up.

“How do you know about Hawk’s text ?”

“Young Todoroki and Endeavor have also received a mysterious text that sent them coincidentally where they wouldn’t be able to reach Eraserhead in time. What do you think it means ?”

She mulled his words over for a few seconds.

“You think someone in the Commission is sending All for One information ?”

“I do. And I also have a way to take both him and All for One out”

She leaned forward, clearly interested.

Nezu barely contained a self satisfied smirk.

How the tables had turned.

“Have you ever heard of the One for All ?”

*

A/N : If you like the story, want to support it and read ahead of schedule, go check the story's P@treon, Nar_cisseENG

And see you in the next update everyone !