but you gotta get up at least once more
by Simkjrs is a My Hero Academia Fanfic.
Midoriya Izuku does not let his lack of a Quirk prevent him from being strong.
Also known as that one AU where Izuku follows the ridiculous training regimen of Saitama from One-Punch Man and becomes stronger than anyone ever imagined he could be.
This fanfic provides examples of:
- Adults Are Useless:
- After Izuku is outed as being Quirkless, he quickly learns that trying to get his parents or teachers to stop his bullies is pointless. Tamanaha-sensei is a surprise to him in that she actually helps.
- Deconstructed as Inko tries to help Izuku with the bullying, but Izuku dismisses her attempts to stop him from seeing Bakugou because he thinks that she just misunderstands how their dynamic works, despite the serious red flags.
- All Take and No Give: Izuku realizes in Chapter 6 that he has been unintentionally taking advantage of Mitoki, and their relationship consists of Izuku going to the other boy for help with his projects or whenever he's feeling down and needs cheering up, but never actually providing that same comfort for Mitoki in turn or hanging out with him just for the sake of spending time together. When Izuku realizes this, he apologizes and promises to be a better friend to Mitoki from then on.
- Armor-Piercing Response: When Izuku and Bakugou argue about the extent of his abuse, Izuku finally manages to shut him up by revealing he still has scars from several of the injuries Bakugou inflicted on him.
- Berserk Button: Ochako manages to hit this when, after forcing Izuku to reveal how he recently confronted Bakugou over being abusive, she implies that she thinks he's either exaggerating or outright lying. Izuku snaps.
- Bully Hunter: Tamanaha Chiaki, Izuku's sensei and owner of the dojo, does not tolerate abusers. She even throws out a student for bullying Izuku.
- Charles Atlas Superpower: In the vein of One-Punch Man, Izuku trained himself hard enough to gain superhuman strength.
- Celebrity Is Overrated: Izuku and the Hero Killer Stain have this opinion on superheroes, believing that heroes who are driven by fame and celebrity often get in the way of less-flashier heroes and refuse to help the less economically well-off areas that need them out of a desire to be noticed.
- Cultured Badass: Izuku is extremely well-read, often citing economic books and essays on the nature of heroism and asking heroes about their preferred literature.
- Distinction Without a Difference: It would be understandable to look at Izuku's Charles Atlas Superpower and confuse him for having an enhancement quirk like All Might. Since it can be medically proven that his strength is not derived from a quirk, he can pretty much commit acts of heroism without legal repercussions because laws against vigilantism only apply to illegal quirk usage.
- Foil: Izuku is one to Saitama.
- Where Saitama takes Hero Duties as something to be done for fun (his catchphrase, after all, is literally "I'm a hero for fun"), Izuku takes said duties far more seriously than is healthy.
- Saitama's emotions are implied to be dulled down thanks to his power-up. Izuku's are, if anything, amplified. The poor kid suffers panic attacks and breakdowns over his responsibilities.
- Saitama doesn't see much value in controlling his powers, since he can destroy pretty much anything in One Punch. With Tamanaha-Sensei's help, Izuku is learning how to control his abilities so he doesn't accidentally hurt someone.
- Saitama seeks attention, joining the Hero Association as soon as he hears of it. Izuku works hard to keep his name out of the press and freaks out when one of his friends connects him to "Deku," the mysterious hero who inhabits the area where Izuku lives.
- Heroic BSoD: Izuku all but shuts down completely after Tamanaha-sensei, in no uncertain terms, explains just how abusive his relationship with Bakugou is.
- Humble Hero: Izuku wants to be a hero out of a desire to help people, not of a desire for fame, so much that he refuses to go to Yuuei.
- Idiot Ball: The Villain's Alliance grabs this when they kidnap Izuku, thinking he's the inheritor of "One For All," from All Might. They really fall into this when they try to hold the person whose strength is best described as "Yes" with physical bonds and don't really seem to have a way to restrain someone like that.
- Internalized Categorism: Izuku is extremely hard upon himself, having real difficulty understanding how anyone could find him special or worthy of their time, especially when grappling with his depression.
- Locked Out of the Loop: As of Chapter 6, Izuku remains completely unaware of Toshinori's Secret Identity. This is despite the fact that he and his mother are now living with Toshinori.
- After being forced to confront the fact that his best friend has abused him for years, Izuku attempts to keep Bakugou's classmates from finding out. This fails miserably.
- Loophole Abuse: Izuku's interactions with the police live and breathe this trope, as he cannot be charged for illegal vigilantism as it's defined as an unsanctioned use of one's Quirk, which he doesn't have.
- Mugging the Monster: The Villain Alliance kidnaps Izuku. They do this surprisingly well, via taking him by surprise. They then run into the problem of Izuku managing to escape in under thirty seconds of him waking up, wrecking the walls of their hideout, punching their guys, and getting back to his home before an hour goes by.
- Off on a Technicality: The fact that Izuku's superhuman strength isn't actually from a quirk means he can engage in behaviors that would otherwise be illegal if he weren't quirkless.
- Protagonist-Centered Morality: Viewed from the outside throughout Chapter 6. Ochako means well, and just wants to help their friend. The problem lies in how their desire to help leads to them being incredibly pushy, rude, entitled, and thoughtless towards poor Izuku, absolutely refusing to take how he feels into account. And when he finally explains what happened, she's reluctant to accept that Bakugou bullied him, simply because Bakugou is her classmate/friend.
- There Are No Therapists: Averted; Tamanaha-sensei recommends a hero-friendly therapist to Izuku. Unfortunately, he resists the suggestion, denying that he needs help.
- There Was a Door: Izuku is captured by the Villain Alliance. He breaks free but keeps getting teleported back to where he was being held. His solution is to ignore the doors and corridors, and just smash through walls until he gets out of the base.
- They're Called "Personal Issues" for a Reason: Many of the issues in Chapter 6 stem from Ochako ignoring this, pushing and pressuring Izuku for answers about what happened between him and Bakugou until he finally snaps.
- Unreliable Narrator: Due to his incredibly low opinion of himself, Izuku's point of view is naturally skewed: he tends to assume that the sad looks others keep giving him are due to disappointment at his failures, rather than sympathy or sorrow for his sake.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: When Izuku and Bakugou become friends again due to Izuku's newfound strength, they frequently insult and fight one another. It's Deconstructed when Inko and Tamanaha-sensei force Izuku to realize that the relationship they have is extremely unhealthy, and just because Bakugou is being nice now, it doesn't erase the years of abuse he put Izuku through. Even calling Bakugou "nice" is a stretch, considering how he ignores Izuku's boundaries and tries to use violence to get his way.
- Willfully Weak: Izuku always holds back when he fights his friends because he knows he would otherwise crush them from sheer force. Given that he basically has the power of Saitama, a man whose fights usually end with the enemy having a consistency of wet ground beef, this is a good move on his part.
- With Friends Like These...: Izuku considers his closest and dearest friend to be Bakugou, who verbally and physically abuses him on a daily basis.
- Wrong Assumption: Izuku is kidnapped by the Villain Alliance due to the assumption that he is All Might's successor and has inherited 'One for All'. He's not, but the similarities between Izuku's strength and All Might's Quirk are noticed by several characters elsewhere.
