Fanfic / Type-2 Hero

Izuku goes to UA with a disability and a shattered dream, but soon learns shattered things can still be fixed.

Type-2 Hero is a My Hero Academia fanfic written by Mad_Nimrod over at Archive of Our Own.

Type-2 Side Stories deals with certain important events from different points of view.

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This fanfic provides examples of:

• Absurdly Sharp Blade: Izuku's Blade Below the Shoulder is sharp enough to cut through steel and slice off both of Overhaul's arms in one swing.
• Achievements in Ignorance: Izuku manages to lie to All for One by claiming the red matter powering his arm will explode if he uses an emitter Quirk to attempt to destroy it, not knowing that All for One has a Living Lie Detector Quirk that is unable to work on Izuku due to his stutter.
• Actually Pretty Funny:
  • Several villains crack up laughing after Izuku makes a witty remark at Shigaraki.
  • Even though it's blocking his way to his target, All for One admits that some of the things Izuku is using as mental defenses are hilarious.
  • Izuku roars out laughing when All for One declares that Shigaraki is (or rather was) Nana Shimura's grandson, because he knows his mother Inko is Nana's only child, which makes him Nana's grandson.
• Adaptation Name Change:
  • The percentage-based version of One for All that Midoriya develops is called Full Cowling in canon. Since Uraraka has it in this story instead of Midoriya, it instead gets called "Nebula Shroud".
  • Izuku picks the name "Scouter" as his hero name instead of "Deku".
• Adaptation Origin Connection: Ujiko (the doctor behind the project that created the Nomu) turns out to be the one who experimented on Nezu.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul:
  • Kamui Woods has been in a relationship with Pixie-Bob from the Wild, Wild Pussycats for some time before the explosion that crippled Izuku. This causes them to learn about Izuku well before they meet him at summer camp.
  • Ochako decides to go forward with her attraction to Izuku sometime after the Sports Festival.
• Adaptation Species Change: Slenderman is an actual person, a Pro Hero no less, instead of either a meme or some kind of (potentially) Eldritch entity.
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade: Like in a myriad of other stories, Midoriya gets quite the hefty upgrade in angst. Not only does he avert the School Bullying Is Harmless trope but he even lost an arm thanks to Bakugo.
• Adaptational Badass:
  • Uraraka has One for All, which comes with all the ridiculous perks that Midoriya had in canon.
  • Retroactively, even though he got dealt quite the Adaptational Angst Upgrade, Midoriya also becomes a bigger badass by the fact that he takes out Stain and Overhaul alone, Quirkless and all within the same week.
  • In the Kamino Arc, The U.A. students' rescue squad not only becomes bigger thanks to the addition of several 1-B and 1-C students, they also make a direct intervention into the fighting with Nezu's approval. Mei and Melissa are also able to intervene as well, the former as a Friendly Sniper with a railgun and the latter controlling combat robots.
  • During the Kamino Arc, All Might manages to fight All for One at his best level for longer - until Ochako and Izuku take over and pummel the villain.
• Adaptational Early Appearance:
  • Eri, Overhaul, and the Meta Liberation Army appear before the Summer Camp even happens.
  • Yoarashi Inasa, who first appeared during the Provisional Hero License Arc, shows up as a 1-B student.
• Adaptational Nice Guy:
  • Mei is a lot more considerate than her canon self, being more careful with her inventing when Izuku's around (as she knows he has explosion-related PTSD), gets behind the projects to help him with his life (such as the portable desk and the artificial arm), and is ready to hunt down All Might with an anti-tank cannon when she learns how he told Izuku that his Quirklessness would prevent him from being a Pro Hero.
  • Dabi as well. In this story, Endeavor is arrested for his crimes and Stain doesn't get linked to the League of Villains, which gives him fewer reasons to be a Jerkass or be loyal to the League, which leads to him ratting out the League to the heroes to save Izuku.
• Adaptational Sexuality: Uraraka is straight in canon and only has a crush on Midoriya. Here, she's bisexual and crushing on him and Melissa.
• An Arm and a Leg:
  • The second divergence that leads to the story is Izuku losing an arm after Bakugo blows it off with his Quirk.
  • Shigaraki loses one arm when he tries to reach out to Moroboshi through one of Kurogiri's portals, only for Uraraka to break Kurogiri's concentration with a rock, causing a Portal Cut. He gets grafted another arm, but it turns out to be an actual Nomu that tears itself off from Shigaraki when Dabi, Izuku, Mustard and Toga overwhelm it, causing Shigaraki to bleed to death.
  • Izuku ends up having to do this to Overhaul when it becomes obvious the villain won't quit trying to kill him.
  • During the Kamino Raid, Mei's railgun is capable of vaporizing Nomu's arms and legs.
• Ascended Extra: Class 1-C from the Department of General Education Students are given little to no time in canon, the only ones with any presence being Shinso (who in the fanfic is a 1-A student from the get-go), Agoyamato and Togeike fighting for a spot in the hero course during the Sports Festival. With the protagonist of the story starting out as a member of the Gen-Ed course, the story itself focuses more on 1-C, portraying them as a Ragtag Bunch of Misfits with quirks that seem useless or ridiculous but can be a force to be reckoned with when the moment presents itself.
• The Atoner: Kamui Woods does his best to atone for how he berated Izuku after the Slime Villain attack as well as not acting soon enough to prevent his crippling.
• Back-to-Back Badasses: Momo and Shoto pull this off during the Battle of Kamino Ward, unloading everything on the Nomu attacking them.
• Badass Bystander: The punk Saxophone playing hermit Sasquatch in the woods next to the Wild Wild Pussycats base. They leave him alone as he just hangs out and plays the saxophone. Then during the attack by the League of Villains, he completely destroys Moonfish.
• Bait-and-Switch: At first it seems like Sir Nighteye is going to chew out Izuku for fighting Overhaul. Nighteye was really upset that Izuku had managed to do in two days that his agency hadn't managed in two years. After getting it out of his system, he tells Izuku how proud he is.
• Bare-Handed Blade Block: Izuku uses his artificial arm to do this to Stain...and punch the daylights out of the Hero Killer.
• Batter Up!: To get rid of the Nomu, Ochako uses Zero Gravity on it while Asano uses a hammer made by Moroboshi to hit it into the sky.
• Battle Couple: Ochako and Izuku best seen when the two manage to defeat All for One.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Nezu is funny, genteel, a great teacher, and a full demonstration of Putting the "Pal" in Principal. He's also The Dreaded among his fellow Pro Heroes, acts as a Papa Wolf when it comes down to protecting his students, and if angered, his twisted mind and high intelligence will come up with convoluted plans to ruin whoever gave him cause to do so.
  • Finding Doctor Ujiko (who was the one that experimented on him years before) in Kamino Ward leads to him brutally eviscerating the doctor after an Ironic Echo Pre-Mortem One-Liner.
  • When, in the aftermath of the Kamino Raid, the Hero Public Safety Commission leadership threatens to arrest all the U.A. students that fought in the battle on charges of vigilantism (which do not exist since Nezu explicitly gave permission for them to fight and use their Quirks) and one of them implies forcing Moroboshi to become a Heroics student against her will, Nezu fires back by not only threatening to reveal all of their dirty laundry (which goes from having affairs to actual embezzlement of HPSC funds) but also stating he will hire an assassin to kill them all if any of his students suffers physical harm because of their actions.
• Big Damn Heroes: Class 1-C when they arrive to the USJ after realizing Izuku's in danger.
• Big Sister Instinct: Mei "adopts" Izuku as a brother-like figure shortly after meeting him, and soon begins to develop protective instincts towards him (such as planning to emasculate Bakugo if she ever finds him or trying to hunt down All Might with an anti-tank cannon after learning about their first meeting).
• Blaming the Victim: Both Katsuki and his mother attempt to blame Izuku for the incident that cost him his arm, with Mitsuki claiming it was "just an accident" and that her son shouldn't be punished for it.
• Brick Joke:
  • One of 1-C's students' Quirk is imitating the head and voice of any person, real or fictional, and she proves it by imitating All Might. Said student does the All Might imitation again to trick Monoma into confessing to Nezu about his continued harassing of 1-A, which gets him bumped down to General Education.
  • After the fight against Wolfram's gang, Choji (who normally looks like a Wookie) has to shave all of his hair, showing that he is quite handsome under it, and he mentions that soon his hair will return to normal. Gorogoro takes a photo of him for some reason that is revealed when they return to U.A.: he puts up posters with the photo and a challenge to find the person in the photo with the prize of a date for whoever does it first. Uraraka literally laughs out loud when she sees them.
  • During Nezu's meeting with Taahkin, the latter mentions rumors about the former being part koala (another Brick Joke by itself) which might explain why Nezu has multiple thumbs in each hand. Several chapters later, Nezu gets a call from Recovery Girl, who has made an X-ray of his hand and claims not to know how many thumbs he actually has.
  • When Mei meets All Might in his emaciated form, she angrily reminds him how he misdirected her (considering how she was hunting him with an anti-tank cannon, he had good reason).
• Bully Hunter: The more and more people hear about the bullying Midoriya suffered, the more and more hunters are made. It makes sense considering the zero tolerance for bullying policy in U.A., but the number rises rather rapidly regardless.
• The Bus Came Back: Bakugo shows up as a Ketsubutsu student during the Provisional Hero License Exam.
• Casanova Wannabe: Tabata, from Class 1-C. He ends up hooking up with Amano during the I-Island arc.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • The Red Matter cells come back several times during the story.
    • Their causing extreme electric shocks when wet allows Izuku to electrocute the villains in the USJ's Shipwreck Area.
    • They can store a lot of energy, which Izuku exploits by making All for One think they explode if exposed to certain Quirks, preventing the villain from taking Ragdoll's Quirk or his arm.
    • This then leads All For One to try and detonate Izuku's arm on purpose, only for Izuku to reveal his lie and electrocute him with his now supercharged taser arm.
  • The knife Sir Nighteye gifts Izuku ends up being fundamental during the fight against Overhaul when Eri stabs him with it, distracting Overhaul and setting him up for his defeat.
  • Sometime after the I-Island arc, Mei gets several materials for a project she's working on with Melissa, but won't tell Ochako about it. After Izuku is kidnapped, the project is revealed to be robots that Melissa can control from a distance to aid in the field.
  • At the night of the Kamino raid, Bakugou Mitsuki makes a call to Inko to make amends and mentions that Bakugou has been brought to a juvenile detention center after he failed his UA entrance exam in her talk with Inko. It's later revealed that Ketsubutsu has a Villain rehabilitation facility that doubles as a juvenile detention center, and it's where Bakugou was brought and enrolled after failing his entrance exam to UA, and where Toga, Mustard, and Dabi were sent to after the Kamino raid.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Red, the vigilante that became a thorn in All for One's side fifty years before the story, turns out to be Gakushuu's grandfather - and Gakushuu remembers Red's particular insult for the villain.
• Chekhov's Skill:
  • The student with the head imitation Quirk uses it during the Kamino Raid to make the villains think Endeavor is waiting at the bar's back door, preventing them from trying to escape that way while letting Mustard and Toga try to sneak Izuku and Ragdoll that way.
  • During Summer Camp, Ochako learns how to invert her Quirk to increase the strength of gravity in a person while fighting Tiger. She uses it again on All for One to paralyze him and let her use her Finishing Move.
• Combat Pragmatist: Izuku, due to his loss of an arm and lack of training, learns how to be this. For example, decking Overhaul when he tries to monologue.
• Combination Attack: Izuku and Ochako during the fight against All for One.
• Contrived Coincidence: Eri crashes into Izuku when he's walking between agencies in Hosu.
• Covert Pervert: In spite of everything he's suffered, Izuku's still a teenager who is in a polyamorous relationship with two very beautiful teenage girls, and it shows particularly with what All for One finds behind Door 69 in his attempt to read Izuku's mind.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Izuku vs Muscular. Muscular pushes him aside, but Izuku cuts into him and tases him, causing him to lose the muscle he creates. Seconds later, the killer is knocked out.
• Dawn of an Era/End of an Era: Chapter 53 opening describes how All-Might’s retirement has lead to an increase of crime like in canon. But also watching so many Heroes work together to defeat All For One has resulted in Heroes, Vigilantes, and even random citizens picking up the slack with All-Might's retirement.
• Death by Adaptation:
  • Overhaul bites it when the Eight Bullets attempt to get him out of police custody.
  • Re-Destro is killed by Thrawn's men after he tries to kill Thrawn in the aftermath of the attack on the Meta Liberation Army's last compound.
  • Shigaraki dies when the arm that had been grafted on him turns out to be an actual Nomu that rips itself off him, causing him to bleed out.
• Demoted to Extra:
  • In-canon, Bakugo is a constant presence in the story since he is Midoriya's Foil and rival. While his presence in Izuku's life is still very relevant to the story (considering he was the one who turned him into a stuttering, one-armed bag of anxiety), Bakugo was barred from enlisting into UA and is thus entirely absent in the story proper. He eventually returns as a Ketsubutsu student after having been placed in juvenile villain rehabilitation.
  • Because Midoriya's not part of Class 1-A, and in fact, not part of the hero course at all, most students from there, besides Uraraka, don't get any major roles. Same for Class 1-B, but that's nothing new.
• Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?/Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?:
  • Gakushuu gives All for One the double bird before catapulting him into a warehouse. He's the vigilante Red's grandson, so it's In the Blood.
  • Melissa does the same through one of the robots she controls, grabbing All for One and flipping him off before self-destructing.
• Disability Immunity: Izuku's stutter makes him immune to All for One's Living Lie Detector Quirk - which lets him lie to the villain about the Red Matter powering his arm and its properties.
• Disappointed in You: Melissa calls All Might by his hero name, no longer calling him her uncle after she finds out what he did to Izuku. While All Might was already in the middle of a months-long Heel Realization, that one hurt the most.
• The Dog Bites Back: Eri stabs Overhaul with a knife during his fight against Izuku. While Overhaul can heal his injuries easily, it distracts him from trying to take her and angers him enough that he sets himself up for Izuku to slash both of his arms off.
• Dramatic Irony: In canon, Sir Nighteye was critical of the fact that All Might picked Izuku as his successor. Here, he criticizes him for not considering the possibility of picking Izuku as his successor.
• Dungeon Bypass: During the I-Expo arc, the students manage to get Melissa up to security room on the 200th floor of the tower in a matter of minutes by combining Urakara's gravity control and Melissa's custom pogo stick to bounce straight up to the roof.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Izuku begins the story as a broken, one-armed teenager, but by working hard, never giving up, and simply being his kind, good-natured self, he ends up gaining multiple friends, two wonderful girlfriends who love him as much as he does them, an adorable adoptive daughter and the Pro-Hero position that had been his dream since he was a small kid.
• Embarrassing Nickname: All For One, of all people, got nicknamed "Whitey McTightyface" by a vigilante called Red fifty years before the story starts. One of the side-stories shows how that happened. It involved the Symbol of Evil receiving a nuclear Wedgie.
  • Gakushuu, who is Red's grandson, tells Dabi, Mustard and Toga about it, so the four can use it to distract All for One at a critical point.
• Enemy Mine: Izuku works with Dabi, Mustard and Toga to fight Shigaraki after he finds out the latter three's betrayal.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Not even All for One can stand the Rickroll.
  • Dabi sells the League of Villains out on account of what All for One intends to do to Izuku, while Mustard and Toga give Izuku and Ragdoll food and plot to time their escape with the heroes' attack.
• Even the Girls Want Her: Mei says she's asexual, but even she'll admit that Tsuyu has a nice butt.
• Everyone's Baby Sister: Izuku to pretty much everyone. It gets to the point Dabi, Toga, and Mustard betray the League of Villains to save him.
• Explosive Overclocking: Izuku takes advantage of one of All for One's attacks to overcharge the Red Matter cells powering his artificial arm and then unleash everything through his taser, completely overwhelming all of the villain's defenses and setting him up for Ochako's Finishing Move.
• Famed In-Story: Due to his role in capturing Overhaul and Stain, Izuku becomes famous among the hero community.
• Fire-Breathing Diner: Izuku brings Moroboshi, Shoto, and Mina to a spicy food restaurant with a standing challenge where eating certain dishes (graded from 1 to 10 in spiciness) while following a set of rules can net you a discount or even getting paid. Mina ends up accidentally sweating acid while Shoto actually burps fire.
• Foreshadowing: When Midnight reflects on Izuku's mother, she silently promises "Shimu-chan" that she will protect Izuku. Turns out that Inko's family name was Shimura, as she is Nana Shimura's daughter.
• Friendly Sniper: Mei takes up this role during the Battle of Kamino Ward, shooting several Nomu with her railgun.
• Godzilla Threshold: As Nedzu tells Izuku, Heroes sometimes have to grievously injure or even kill villains because it is the only way to save innocent people. This is a flashback that is shown when Izuku is forced to cripple Overhaul before he can kill him.
• Good Prosthetic, Evil Prosthetic: After Shigaraki loses his arm in the USJ attack, he gets a false one that is clearly a graft from a Nomu. Its monstrous appearance, such as how long it is compared to him and its four fingers, is evocative of his demented nature. Midoriya, meanwhile, ends up getting a mechanical arm built for him by Melissa and Mei.
  • Shigaraki's arm is worse than that - it's an actual living Nomu!
• Groin Attack: Averted when Mei considers shooting All for One in the dick, but chooses not to because she isn't sure that he has one at all.
• Has a Type: Inverted. Turns out that Oscar is the perfect type for wealthy multi-billionaire heiresses. Both Maria Draconis and Momo latch onto him the second they meet him.
• Hate Sink: Hisashi divorced Inko and cut off child support right after Izuku lost his arm - not wanting to support a "double-cripple", forcing Inko to take up multiple jobs to support the both of them without Izuku's knowledge - only to suddenly show up out of nowhere wanting to bond with his son after Izuku becomes a celebrity. Needless to say, Inko had no problem with Midnight knocking him out and taking him out like the day's trash the moment he dared show up and promptly filed a restraining order against him.
• Heroic RRoD: Izuku gets knocked out after his finishing move on All for One, due to both getting hit by his own overpowered shocking grasp, All for One's mask exploding and getting sent flying against a wall.
• Hiding in Plain Sight: When Izuku gets caught by Pixie-Bob and Mandalay when he's spying on them as part of his training, he manages to avoid them by going into a nearby cornfield and faking being a scarecrow.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Aldera's policy of favoring pupils with strong Quirks backfires on them when Nezu realizes they have erased Bakugo's crippling of Izuku from his record, which gets most of the teachers fired and/or arrested.
• Huge Girl, Tiny Guy: Several instances of this.
  • Ochako and Melissa are hitting 1'80 m, while Izuku barely reaches their shoulders.
  • Small mouse-like Oscar ends up with Momo and Maria Draconis.
• Huge Schoolgirl/Statuesque Stunner: Melissa and Uraraka both are noted to be pretty tall. Melissa being tall is canon, but Uraraka also being tall is a little hint that she's the Ninth Bearer of One for All.
• Hypocrite: During his short side story, Overhaul is revealed as this, as he states he wants to rid the world of the "Quirk disease", but he would never destroy his own Quirk.
• Hypocritical Humor: Tomura freaks out when he realizes that Izuku is missing an arm. He only notices this because he had just attempted to remove Izuku's arm with his quirk.
• An Ice Person: Apart from Shoto Todoroki, there's also Ayame Moroboshi, who not only has the ice control part down pat (perhaps even better than Shoto), she's capable of unleashing the Howl of Winter, a technique that freezes everything in a cone in the direction she shouts, as well as her uncle, the pro-hero Frosty.
• I Lied: A heroic example, with Midoriya telling this to All for One regarding the properties of the Red Matter powering his arm.
• I Owe You My Life: Iida joins the Midoriya Rescue team because Izuku saved him from Stain.
• Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: All chapters are titled "X and Y", where each chapter's "X" is the previous chapter's "Y". For example, Chapter 1 is named "Quirkless and Broken", followed by Chapter 2, "Broken and Helping".
• Immoral Journalist: A newspaper's editor (whose son was one of Izuku's bullies and just got rough-handled by Ochako) writes and publishes an article revealing Izuku and Ochako's relationship, deriding her for "dating so low". She's also a member of the Meta Liberation Army.
• Incorrect Animal Noise: In-universe to boot. Red has no idea what sound a giraffe makes so he makes one up when (badly) pretending to be a talking giraffe to mess with All for One.
• Insane Troll Logic: When Shigaraki corners Izuku at the mall, he expresses his agitation at Stain stealing the spotlight in the Hosu attack. After Izuku explains how Stain has much more of a presence with his relatable ideology while the Nomu's were just mindless beasts causing senseless chaos, Shigaraki somehow discerns from this that it was because of All Might. The narration makes it explicit that this is because of his demented obsession with All Might.
  Shigaraki: ... Oh I get it. It's because of All Might!
  Izuku: H-how the heck d-did you get th-that from what I said?
  Shigaraki: This talk was quite enlightening! I just need to destroy their faith in All Might!
  Izuku: Seriously, w-what the heck?
• Journey to the Center of the Mind: All for One has a Quirk that allows him to do this. Sufficient mental strength can block him by distracting him, though.
• Lame Pun Reaction: When the study group rips off the Die Hard version with talking apes they just finished watching, one of them asks what the ape actors were paid to act in the movie, and Mina jokes that they were probably paid peanuts. Everyone else boos and pelts her with popcorn.
• The Last Straw:
  • Izuku hit his Rage Breaking Point when he saw Bakugo attacking a girl from their school just because she wanted to go to U.A., not even the Hero Course. Izuku proceeded to give Bakugo "The Reason You Suck" Speech, crowned by calling Bakugo a villain. Unfortunately, that was the incident where Bakugo exploded Izuku's arm.
  • After having put up with Aizawa's tendency to come up with "logical ruses", half-truths, and flat-out lies while expecting his students to figure everything out themselves for the entirety of her time at U.A., Uraraka snaps when he leads them into an avalanche without any warning of their being expected to reach the camp through woods full of traps. When she manages to make it to the camp, the first thing she does is punch him in the face. The other students joining her in their complaints get Aizawa in serious trouble with the Pussycats.
    Aizawa: Impressive. You made it out-
    Uraraka: [Punches Aizawa] IS IT TOO HARD FOR YOU TO BE TRUTHFUL FOR ONCE IN YOUR MISERABLE LIFE!?
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: After the Sports Festival, Izuku mentions that it felt like it lasted months.
• Legacy Character: Izuku's Hero name, "Scouter", once belonged to one of Mei's uncles, who had to retire after he was captured and tortured by villains for several weeks.
• Let Us Never Speak of This Again: Yoshio and Tabata's reaction after seeing Oscar, Maria and Momo come out of a shed, clearly disheveled and smiling.
• Logical Weakness:
  • Izuku's prosthetic arm is a hard counter for two Quirks seen so far.
    • Eri's Rewind cannot affect it since it is not organic, so he can use it to interact with her even when her Quirk is going haywire.
    • It is not affected by Stain's Bloodcurdle, so it can still move. Since it can't bleed, it also allows Izuku to block Stain's blades without getting cut.
    • It is also a temporary counter to Overhaul, which (at least in this story) requires knowledge of what is being destroyed to work - when Overhaul manages to grab Izuku's arm, he cannot destroy it, since he was expecting human flesh.
  • Muscular's Quirk allows him to grow his muscles. It increases his strength and durability, but they are still muscles - which Izuku takes advantage of by electrocuting him with his taser.
  • A creature All for One unleashes during the Hideout Raid Arc has the ability to merge with concrete in the form of graffiti, but not standing in concrete actually hurts it. When the U.A. students fighting it notice it burning from standing on a patch of grass, they attack it until it jumps into a concrete chunk and then they hurl it into a park, trapping it and essentially taking it out of the game.
• Love at First Sight: Todoroki when he first sees Ayame Moroboshi. It just takes him a bit to realize it's love.
  • Izuku, Ochako, and Melissa Shield all had this reaction to each other.
  • Both Maria Draconis and Momo fall, if not love, then in infatuation with Oscar at first sight.
• Marshmallow Hell: What Mandalay and Pixie-Bob threaten to do to Izuku when they catch him for being out of bounds. They're actually surprised when Izuku runs faster from them at the threat.
• Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: A libelous newspaper article about Izuku and Ochako going on a date leads to the discovery and arrest of the Meta Liberation Army.
• Mistaken for Badass: People think Izuku is a badass who lost his arm at the USJ, won't let it stop him and that he's more concerned about his jacket.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • All-Might has been regretting his words to Izuku for most of the story, with the regrets piling on as the plot progresses, and both he and Izuku pay for it.
  • Todoroki has a horrifying moment during the Sports Festival when it looked like he had obliterated Gakushuu's head when one of his attacks went too high. Thankfully, Gakushuu had just flattened his head to dodge the attack.
• Nice Guy: Izuku is this despite everything. He regrets having to cut off Overhaul's arms despite the man trying to kill him and cries over the fact that there is nothing he can do to save Tomura Shigaraki from bleeding out despite being held captive by him for three days.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Ochako to Bakugo after finding him in the Provisional Hero License exam.
• Odd Couple: When Toga and Mustard showed up in the Provisional License exam as observers, Toga showed off how she and Mustard are now dating, with Dabi lampshading that he has no idea how they end up becoming a thing and highlighting this trope.
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome: The heroes only see the aftermath of the sax-player sasquatch defeating Moonfish, which is said villain being thrown into the camp after getting beaten into a pulp and having all of its teeth ripped off.
• Oh, Crap!: All for One feels fear for the first time in decades moments before Ochako unleashes her finishing move on him. The villain even believes to see all the Torchbearers ready to attack him in that one instant before he gets smashed into the ground.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
  • The U.A. teachers know that Nezu has four levels of anger, and when he gets angry usually begins from the first level. When Vlad King and Eraserhead bring Bakugo to his office and see that he's already up to level two, they know Bakugo is completely screwed.
  • The only reason Inko doesn't hang up on Mitsuki after she accidentally calls her is because the latter says she's sorry - something the blonde woman has never done.
• Original Character: Class 1-C is filled with them. This case is justified by the fact that the only known Class 1-C character in canon was Shinsou, who's not even part of the class in this story.
• Plausible Deniability: Principal Nezu's only complaint about Mei openly plotting to kill Bakugou is that she needs to do it where he can't hear so he can deny everything.
• Point of Divergence:
  • Midoriya not only doesn't get One for All but the day after he started to train with All Might in canon was when Bakugo blew off his arm, leading to Bakugo being banned from U.A. property and from ever taking the exam.
  • Uraraka gains One for All instead, and has a much easier time controlling it than Izuku in canon.
  • Midoriya goes to the General Education department in Class 1-C, considering his situation.
  • The Shie Hassaikai are arrested en masse after Izuku defeats Overhaul during the Hero Killer arc.
  • The investigation into a Quirkist journalist leads to the collapse and destruction of the Meta Liberation Army.
  • Endeavor is arrested when his abuse of his children and wife, as well as bribes and the Quirk marriage he forced on Rei, become public.
  • All for One sending Gigantomachia to I-Island cause chaos during Wolfram's attack leads to the villain's capture, ridding All for One of one of his most powerful weapons.
  • Izuku's intelligence and analytic skills make him the League of Villains' main target at the summer camp.
  • Itsuka being with 1-A during the test of courage means she's not present to blow Mustard's gas away, causing more students to fall sick to it and allowing Mustard to escape with the other villains. Magne gets captured instead.
  • As Stain never gets to make his public speech deriding Pro Heroes, he doesn't get connected with the League of Villains, so Spinner becomes a vigilante while Dabi, Mustard, and Toga aren't as loyal to the League of Villains. This causes the three of them to eventually turn on All for One (Dabi, in particular, due to the parallels he saw between him and Endeavor and emboldened by Endeavor's arrest) and help Izuku and Ragdoll escape, becoming fundamental in stopping Shigaraki.
  • The U.A. students' rescue team is bigger, with several students from 1-B and 1-C joining 1-A's group, plus they get official permission from Nezu to use their Quirks, ensuring they won't get in trouble.
    • Thanks to them, not only do they almost manage to save Izuku, the heroes have an easier time fighting off the Nomu All for One sets on them, while All for One himself suffers a surprise attack that gives All Might breathing room to deal with the supervillain. Plus, as he didn't have to go all out during the USJ, he isn't running on fumes during the fight and can go full out.
  • Thanks to Izuku's analysis skills, Kamui Woods manages to develop a way to shield the heroes attacking the Kamino warehouse from All for One's attack, saving Best Jeanist from taking the brunt of it, and becomes fundamental in holding the line while All Might comes.
  • With Tomura Shigaraki's death, All for One's plan to have him succeed him (and get a copy of All for One implemented in him), which has driven several arcs in the manga, has gone down the crapper.
  • All for One is finally defeated not by All Might, but by Ochako and Izuku fighting together.
• Polyamory:
  • Izuku, Melissa, and Ochako get together, as each of them is attracted to the others.
  • Momo and a 2-C student end up sharing Izuku's classmate Oscar, much to the poor kid's confusion.
• Poor Communication Kills: Played for Laughs. The students who come to scope out 1-A after the USJ incident come to the conclusion that Izuku is a total badass who won't let his losing an arm get in the way of being a hero. Izuku really lost the arm a long time ago and the tattered sleeve on his jacket is the worst he got from the incident.
• The Power of Love: Eri manages to heal Izuku of his coma-inducing injuries by concentrating on her love for her "papa" while activating her Quirk.
• Putting the "Pal" in Principal: Nezu makes up a good friendship with Izuku due to him being one of the smartest people he's ever met, works to help his students if there are problems affecting them, and when several 1-C students run to help Izuku at the USJ (breaking several rules in the process), he gives them an obvious Unishment because he knows they did it for a very good cause. He even has a snowball fight with his students!
• Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: Gakushuu's Quirk allows him to do this by quickly turning his arms 2-D and 3-D.
• A Rare Sentence: After Izuku thinks that Overhaul's fighting style is "like an amphetamine-soaked circus monkey", he ponders on how weird that comparison is.
• Refuge in Audacity: Red, a vigilante that faced off against All for One fifty years before the story begins, ran on this to bamboozle the villain and successfully fight him off several times.
• Related in the Adaptation: In this story, Shigaraki isn't actually Nana Shimura's grandson - Izuku is.
• Rocket-Tag Gameplay: A non-video game example. Izuku's fights against opponents like Shigaraki and Overhaul are very short and decisive due to both parties being capable of inflicting lethal injuries very quickly.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Yagi quickly leaves the area when he finds that Mei is hunting down All-Might. With an Anti-Tank weapon for what he said to Izuku
• Security Blanket: Eri uses the knife Izuku gave her during the fight against Overhaul as one.
• Shout-Out:
  • Following canon's predilection for Star Wars mentions, we have Taahkin and Thrawn as two Pro Heroes Nezu enlists to investigate Aldera and the Meta Liberation Army. When Nezu calls the latter's agency, he also presents himself as the Emperor.
  • During the Sports Festival tournament Momo and her opponent both discuss sword styles named for Warframe stances while imitating the flow of Inigo and the Dread Pirate Roberts' duel from The Princess Bride.
  • The hero that proctors Izuku's Provisional Hero License is a man with dinosaur-like features called Nihlus.
  • When Sir Nighteye details the features of Izuku's first hero uniform, he ends the list by stating it's machine washable.
  • Overhaul becoming surprised when his attempt to disintegrate Izuku fails because his arm is artificial is a reference to how Scar saw the same thing happen the first time he fought Edward Elric.
  • After their study session for the exams, the study group watches a parody of Die Hard with apes playing the characters.
  • Among the things Izuku uses in his mental defense seen when All for One tries to pry out his secrets are The Muppet Show, Mystery Science Theater 3000 and the Rickroll.
  • When Momo and Shoto are doing their Back-to-Back Badasses moment, Momo points out that the situation reminds her of the Recommendations Exam, while Shoto replies that the two of them remember that exam differently.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: When All for One tells Izuku he shouldn't fight for a society that spat at him and created the person that left him without an arm, Izuku fires back that he is fighting for all the people that love and believe in him before unleashing his Explosive Overclocking Finishing Move.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Because he doesn't get accepted into U.A., Bakugou has basically no presence in the story besides a flashback once in a while. But it's him destroying one of Midoriya's arms, and his cruel bullying of him, that drives most of Midoriya's character arc through the story.
• Snake People: Sakai, one of Izuku's 1-C classmates, is a person with a Quirk that turns him into a snake. Initially, none of his friends can tell if he is a person with a snake Quirk or a snake with an intelligence Quirk like Nedzu, but then they meet Sakai's sister, who is human-like save for a snake tail.
• Spanner in the Works: Izuku being present at the USJ even though he's not in the Hero Course fools Kurogiri into thinking he's one of them, leaving him unaware of Iida's escape before it is too late.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Ragdoll doesn't get her Quirk taken by All for One thanks to Izuku's intervention.
• Suckiness Is Painful: As punishment for not telling the students about their having to fight their way through the forest to reach Summer Camp, Mandalay ties Aizawa down to a chair and forces him to listen to Bustin Jieber's Bicentennial Anniversary Album.
• Superhero Packing Heat: During the Battle of Kamino Ward, Momo unleashes hell on the Nomu with a M-60, while Mei goes into the field wielding a railgun. Momo uses one again (this one with non-lethal bullets) in the Provisional Hero License Exam.
• Talk to the Fist: Monoma decides to mock 1-C for having a "pet" (Sakai) and a quirkless (Izuku) in their class. Asano grows, grabs him by the head, and hurls him out of the cafeteria.
• This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself: Deconstructed. All Might realizes as he sees Uraraka and Izuku fight All For One, and do rather well, that a major reason each One For All user before him died was because their attempts to take on All For One solo to spare others left them at a major disadvantage against the strongest villain ever. Uraraka and Izuku do exponentially better simply due to working together in their fight.
• Throwing Off the Disability: Izuku loses his stutter from the shock of seeing Shigaraki dying in front of him.
• Title Drop: Several times, as it is a hero category in the story, and the one Izuku trains to become.
• Trust Password: Dabi, Mustard and Toga were about to be taken by the police, but then the three each handed a knife to Sir Nighteye and mentioned his offer to take Izuku to Disneyland, which convinced him that the three were on the heroes' side.
• The Unapologetic: One of the sidestories shows that the final deciding factor in Nezu evicting Bakugo from the U.A. entrance exam was the discovery that Bakugo felt no remorse about crippling Izuku, and for that matter didn't even understand why beating up a Quirkless person would be considered wrong at all.
  • Similarly, Endeavor (with whom Nezu compared Bakugo with) is unrepentant about everything he did in his attempts to become Number One Hero.
• Underestimating Badassery: All for One thinks he'll have an easy time finding Izuku's secrets by a Journey to the Center of the Mind. Izuku soon proves to him that A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Read.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Overhaul has little to no training in fighting, flailing around "like an amphetamine-soaked circus monkey", but one touch of his hand can destroy pretty much anything he touches.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom/Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Izuku's former bully complaining to his mother (the editor of a newspaper with links to the Meta Liberation Army) about how Izuku is dating Ochako kickstarts a series of events that ends with the destruction of the Meta Liberation Army.
• Voodoo Shark: In-universe during a flashback. All for One and his minions are reeling back when suddenly something large and tall pops out of some bushes in front of them. And are relieved when it's just a giraffe poking it's head out of the bushes. Then they realized a Giraffe being in the middle of some bushes in the middle of Urban Japan is an even greater cause for concern.
• Villainous Breakdown: After declaring he will escape and keep trying to destroy all Quirks, beginning with that of the one who captured him, Overhaul falls completely silent when Madam Foster informs him that Scouter is Quirkless.
• Was It Really Worth It?: All Might asks this of Endeavor after he is arrested, regarding all he did just to surpass him. Endeavor fails to see the point of the answer, still thinking himself in the right.
• Weaksauce Weakness: One of All For One's many quirks makes him a Living Lie Detector, but it doesn't work on Izuku because he speaks with a stutter.
• Wham Line: From the list of enrollees for the Provisional Hero License Exam:
  Ketsubetsu, first year: Bakugou Katsuki
• What the Hell, Hero?: Melissa gives one to her Uncle Might after learning how he crushed Izuku's dreams because he was Quirkless, flat out asking him if he'd have said the same thing to her if she'd tried going for the Hero track, as she's Quirkless as well.
• What You Are in the Dark: During Izuku's week-long Provisional Hero License test, he wears a device that acts like a panic button and, without his knowledge, as a microphone, so the heroes testing him can keep an eye on what he says and does while they are away. Needless to say, Izuku passes this test with flying colors.
• Worthy Opponent: When Izuku breaks down crying as Shigaraki dies, telling him he would have saved him if he needed it, Shigaraki realizes Izuku might be the kind of hero society actually needs.
• Yin-Yang Bomb: Thematically at least. All For One is ultimately defeated by the wielder of the most powerful quirk, and the strongest Quirkless person.
• You Are Not Alone: Izuku began the story as a lonely crippled kid, but soon finds himself with many friends that are willing to help him when he has a problem.
  • This is also something All Might realizes as he watches Ochako and Izuku beat the crap out of All for One: all the Torchbearers had chosen to fight him alone to save other people from potentially dying at the villain's hands, but the two of them are capable of doing it because All for One is unable to keep up with being attacked as they do.
• You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Sir Nighteye tells Izuku that he cannot believe how Izuku, by pure accident, encountered and defeated Overhaul not even twenty-four hours into his Provisional Hero License test, while he and his agency have been trying to find him for two years. Fortunately, Sir Nighteye goes on to state he's proud of Izuku and considers him a hero already.

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