know what i've made by the marks on my hands is a My Hero Academia fanfiction, started on Tumblr by Simkjrs and also posted to Archive of Our Own here
. It's sometimes referred to as My Spirit Academia, or MSA.
Quirks are granted by spirits everyone has, though Izuku is just weird enough that he both does not have one and also can see and interact with other people's spirits. They drag him into shenanigans and generally keep him from the anonymous life he desires.
Has not been updated in a while, but is definitely still in progress, according to Simkjrs' Tumblr.
Official Summary:
Midoriya Izuku just wants to lead a quiet, peaceful life. This is foiled by the fact that a) he can see spirits, b) his good nature demands that he help anyone he sees in trouble, and c) he, by all rights, should not exist.
Helping the heroes who have fallen victim to the new quirk-breaking drug is a terrible idea for many reasons, the first and most important being that he hates attention and avoids it like the plague. But he's the only one who can help, so he does.
This is, Izuku decides as he breaks in, more trouble than it's worth.
This fanfic provides examples of:
- Acceptable Breaks from Canon: Zigzagged. MSA was written before the full details of quirk-erasing drugs was revealed, and was working under the assumption that they would be permanent without interference. This was later validated by canon, when it is revealed that permanent ones do exist, they simply took longer in development. Now, MSA canon has it that the permanent ones were developed earlier, are available on the market if expensive, and can be undone with a purchased antidote, and that the temporary ones also exist.
- Adaptational Angst Upgrade:
- Instead of only having to deal with being Quirkless, Izuku also has to deal with spirits who see him as a means to an end, constantly dragging him into danger to do favors for them.
- The Kamino Ward incident is a huge source of trauma for Izuku as he remembers destroying All for One's spirit after fusing with One for All.
- Adaptational Personality Change: Izuku in this fic is exhausted, done with life, and shies away from attention like the plague. He has also given up on the heroes being able to help him, though he still does admire them to some extent.
- Adaptation Relationship Overhaul:
- Rather than the mentor/student relationship between All Might and Izuku, in here, they are strangers on opposite sides of the law, although Izuku did save All Might from All for One in Kamino Ward.
- Where Kirishima and Izuku were classmates who were not particularly close in canon, MSA has them set up for a much closer friendship.
- Adaptational Species Change: Izuku is not entirely human, and he has been suggested to have fused with his spirit at a young age.
- Adaptational Superpower Change: Izuku has spirit magic instead of a quirk, which allows him to, among other things, modify people's quirks to an extent, cancel the effect of a quirk, use glyphs to achieve different effects and the like. On top of that, being the Name Eater, he effectively has the abilities of All for One.
- Appropriated Appellation: Instead of it becoming his hero name, Izuku uses "Deku" as his identifier. This is because he subverts the compulsion to tell Red Riot his name by claiming that he doesn't have one (implied to be his true name).
- Armor-Piercing Question: Aizawa asks Izuku several of these during his interrogation.
- Ascended Extra: Kirishima Eijirou, a side character in canon, has been featured prominently in MSA. There is even a chapter in his perspective.
- Bad Powers, Good People: Izuku is able to replicate the effects of All for One, even though he really wishes he could not.
- Badass in Distress: Izuku, when arrested, still manages to sass everyone out to the point he impresses the heroes and makes some of them laugh.
- Body Horror: What Overhaul does to Izuku, figuring out how much blood he has, grafting his arm onto separate objects and seeing if he can still control it, and testing how much foreign energy he could take.
- Born Unlucky: Izuku's theory is that the Universe thinks he just should not exist, and does everything it could to make his life miserable.
- Broken Pedestal: Izuku used to look up to heroes. However, after learning that they can't help him with his spirit problems, he becomes disillusioned, though some part of him still wants to look up to them.
- By the Power of Grayskull!!: Izuku's, "Release," from when he was caught in Uraraka's Zero Gravity field causes it to disperse. However, it seems to take a toll on his throat.
- Cannot Tell a Lie: In the Second Intonation, it is impossible to lie. This also means that switching back to the First Intonation might as well be revealing a lie.
- Chronic Hero Syndrome: Izuku, whose conscience eventually drags him into helping everyone restore their Quirks, at the cost of his recluse, sleep, and patience. It's also what compelled him to interfere during the Kamino Ward incident, going as far as letting One For All possess him, something he hates allowing any spirit to do, so he could save All Might and Bakugo.
- Comes Great Responsibility: Izuku wishes he were not the wielder of his power, as it makes him the one all the spirits come to when they want something only he could do.
- Cryptically Unhelpful Answer: Izuku gives many of these to the heroes. His answers are about spirits that they are not even aware exist, making all of his answers seem crazy.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Izuku's trauma stems from a combination of a "Temple Incident," Kamino Ward, and having to deal with ungrateful spirits on a daily basis.
- Dark Secret: Izuku destroyed All for One's spirit, and is eventually forced to confess to Overhaul while under the influence of Shin Nemoto's, or Dark Scale's Quirk.
- Deal with the Devil: Izuku makes a deal with Red Riot's spirit, the Temple-Dog, who would help him escape in exchange for Izuku providing Red Riot with information later. He realizes too late that the spirit intends to help him escape by possessing him, something he does not deal with well. At all.
- Death Wish: Izuku thinks that if he cannot find a way to escape, he would rather remove his protective medallion and have the Skinbeast eat him than spend the rest of his life as Overhaul's experimental subject.
- Defector from Decadence: Izuku could have taken credit for defeating All for One, but sees it as too stressful as well as traumatic to want to remember it ever happening.
- Didn't Think This Through: Following the Kirin was an impulsive decision as Izuku did not know if he would be able to spot it again. He did not count on being caught in Eight Precepts territory.
- Dude, Where's My Respect??: Izuku, despite restoring Eraserhead's Quirk, gets arrested and interrogated for his efforts.
- Experienced Protagonist: Because of an incident when he was young, Izuku was exposed to Spirits and was able to learn how they work. This also means that others are incapable of understanding his totally true explanations of what he is doing.
- Heroic Self-Deprecation: Aizawa calls this out, accusing Izuku of being taught to do this by his "anonymous benefactors." He's not exactly wrong.Aizawa: You displayed reckless behavior and disregard for your own health and well-being. They have taught you to devalue yourself.
- Hitchhiker Heroes: Senshajou, Eri, and Rappa.
- I Know Your True Name: Names have power for spirits, and knowing their true name would give the wielder power over them. Izuku possessing the Temple-Dog's name would allow him to break the deal they made. It's also strongly implied that Izuku doesn't have a true name, such as when the Kirin refers to him as 'the nameless boy' in their shared headspace after they fuse together.
- Innocently Insensitive: Red Riot and how he keeps telling Izuku that it really was Izuku who interfered at Kamino Ward, even though this is his Trauma Button.
- It's All My Fault: Izuku blames himself for destroying All for One's spirit, even thought that was probably the best anyone could have done. The narration implies that he used All for One's spirit's true name to destroy it, for which he is nicknamed the Name Eater.
- Metaphorically True: Even prior to Detective Tsukauchi showing up, Izuku answers with truths that are too absurd to be believed.
- The Oath-Breaker: Averted with Red Riot, although he had to be convinced to keep his word. Even though he would not have suffered Supernatural Consequences, he kept his word to let Izuku go because he's an honest man.
- Oh, Crap!: Izuku when called out on being the guy who called Eijirou about the Kamino Ward incident.
- Punch a Wall: Izuku is so affected by Overhaul experimenting on him that he does this in his cell's bathroom.
- Saying Too Much: Izuku, under Shin Nemoto's truth-forcing quirk, reveals that he was the one who stopped All for One by fusing with All Might's spirit, and that he gained similar abilities to All For One in the aftermath.
- Secret Identity: Izuku is terrified of gaining any sort of attention, so he uses a blood protection to cause static in recording software, invalidate his fingerprint scans, and preventing artists from being able to draw his face.
- Spirit Advisor: Izuku temporarily gains many of these when he's in police custody, and later after he's been kidnapped by the Eight Precepts.
- Tears of Fear: Izuku releases these in the bathroom of his cell in the Eight Precepts of Death's headquarters after enduring experimentation by Overhaul.
- These Hands Have Killed: See It's All My Fault.
- They Would Cut You Up: This is the very reason Izuku tries so hard to prevent Overhaul from finding out his deepest secrets. Then, he gets cut up anyways.
- Trauma Button: Izuku has multiple.
- Mentioning Kamino Ward to him. At all.
- The idea of being possessed by another spirit, though for Eri's sake he would have agreed to a full possession by her spirit to rescue her from the Eight Precepts.
- We Do the Impossible: Izuku, having gained a reputation from interfering at Kamino Ward, is now the go-to person for spirits whenever someone loses their quirk.
- Wrong Context Magic: Izuku's "Quirk" is not a quirk so much as manipulating spiritual energy. That being said, what everyone thinks is scientific evolution quirks are actually granted by said spirits.
