Viridian: The Green Guide

Chapter 74: Confrontation

The cashier had looked at him weirdly when he'd bought two ice cream cones for himself, but he'd just glared at her and paid without any explanation. He wasn't sure there was an explanation, honestly. How was he supposed to say out loud that he'd seen in some stupid scene in a movie where the characters were celebrating some stupid event that only made sense as part of the plot and poured a beer on the ground for their freind who'd died. Ogawa wasn't dead, hopefully, but he wasn't there either, and Katsuki couldn't drink, so he figured ice cream would have to do.

The sun was already starting to set by the time he reached the beach. It was still as full of trash as ever, but considering it was the last place they hung out, Katsuki thought it was as good a place as any to do his stupid little fake celebration. It was messy and imperfect and would need a lot of work to make it anywhere near decent, but that described Katsuki too, so he thought it was ironically fitting or some shit.

"I got in." Katsuki muttered, there was no point in raising his voice when he was talking to someone who wasn't even there. He felt a little ridiculous leaning over the railing with an ice cream cone dripping in each hand, but he shook his head and forced himself to push through it. "I'm gonna be a great fucking hero, even with all the mistakes I've made, and you'd better be proud of me, got it? Now that I'm a hero in training, I'm gonna find the bastards that took you and make them pay so that no one else gets hurt. I'm gonna get you back, I promise."

Izuku tried to calm his breathing and keep himself from having a panic attack as he ran home across the rooftops. He had just basically threatened the number one hero! That was so stupid! If All Might had had any more strength or any real connection to All for One, Izuku could have died! Why had he done that? A quieter part of himself, however, was almost proud. He'd done what it took to keep his friend safe and that was what was important, no matter who he had to fight to make it happen. Yeah, it might not have been the smartest thing to do, but deep down, Izuku knew it was the right one.

He wasn't planning on doing any more vigilante work tonight, but once the screams started, Izuku knew he really didn't have a choice. After what had happened with Endeavor, he knew it was too much to hope for just a purse snatcher, and his heart still sunk when he caught sight of the monster that was currently tearing its way down the street. The monster's main body wasn't that large, but the tentacles sprouting from its head spread all the way across the street. Dozens of tendrils reached out and wrapped around cars, walls, and mailboxes. Anything that was in the monster's path was tossed them aside almost like it was nothing, leaving panicked civilians to crawl out of their ruined cars and run in every direction. Some of the cars had lines of a smoking black goop smeared across them where the tentacles had been and Izuku made a note to avoid the substance as it slowly ate through the metal. Overall, the street was in absolute chaos and from his place on the roof, Izuku could almost imagine the crazed look in the berserker's eyes as he raged below.

But somehow, he couldn't there were some things about this monster that didn't really match up with the other berserkers that Izuku had fought in the past. For one, while it was definitely destroying everything in it's path, it wasn't going after people, just the buildings and cars that were in his way and it seemed like he had a destination in mind. It wasn't unheard of for berserkers to have a goal that they obsessed over, Endeavor had been a prime example of that, but this one didn't actually seem obsessed or angry, just determined and almost desperate. If it wasn't for the fact that the quirk was far too powerful to have not undergone any modification, Izuku would have thought the villain factory was taking a step backward and going back to making instant villains.

Izuku was about to jump down and attack when he hesitated. He had promises that he needed to keep, and he couldn't do that if he made himself a target and got himself killed. He'd made a big exception to fight Endeavor, but it had been just that: an exception. Even then, he wouldn't have stood a chance against the former number two hero if he hadn't had an entire team of heroes backing him up. Izuku was used to fighting at a disadvantage, it was how he walked into every single fight, but Berserkers were more powerful than standard villains and he didn't even have a quirk to fight back with. If he went down there with zero backup and tried to fight a villain this powerful, he might not be lucky enough to make it out.