Viridian: The Green Guide

Chapter 75: Reunited

It was a quiet night, almost peaceful with the way that the last rays of sunset reflected off the ocean, and Katsuki would have even called it photogenic if it weren't for the trash everywhere. It wasn't like he was here for the aesthetic though, so Katsuki didn't really care. He let himself get lost in his thoughts as the ice cream cones melted in his hands. It was kinda nice, but whatever weird semblance of peace Katsuki had found shattered when he heard a loud crash behind him. He spun around and both ice cream cones immediately fell to the concrete as he stared in shock in shock at what was happening on the street behind him.

The crash he'd heard was a bus being literally thrown across the street and into one of the adjacent buildings. People were screaming, obviously, but there weren't nearly as many civilians running around as Katsuki would have expected. What rooted him to the floor, however, was the thing that was currently tearing it's way down the street. At first glance, Katsuki swore that there was no way it could even be human. Inky black tentacles stretched out in every direction and wrapped around everything they could reach and with the way the thing was backlit from the streetlamps that had just turned on, it looked like someone had brought some eldritch horror to life.

Katsuki gulped and started backing away slowly. The last thing he wanted was to get on this monster's bad side, especially since he didn't have permission to use his quirk to fight back. He needed to get to safety and make sure the heroes knew what was going on, then he could worry about what the heck that thing was. It was a fairly decent plan, or would have been if the monster hadn't chosen that moment to stare straight at him. Katsuki froze and held his breath, hoping that maybe this was a t-rex sort of situation and the thing wouldn't be able to see him if he didn't move a muscle. For a split second, it almost seemed like his deprate strategy was going to work.

Then the monster charged.

Katsuki leapt down onto the beach as fast as he could, weaving his way into the maze of garbage and focusing on disappearing. His heartbeat echoed in his ears, but still didn't do anything to drown out the crashing sound of the garbage towers collapsing as the monster chased him. He almost stumbled as he slid around a corner, but managed to scramble to his feet and keep making his way around the maze.

"Shit, shit, shit!" Katsuki hissed. "Gotta go faster..."

Izuku turned away from the old man he was helping just in time to see the berserker disappear into the massive piles of garbage that covered the beach and he sighed in relief. No one ever went down onto that beach, so he didn't have to worry about the monster hurting anyone. Still, unless the berserker was trying to destroy pollution, it was eventually going to realize that whatever it was looking for wasn't there and Izuku needed to make sure that everyone had already evacuated by the time that happened.

He was on his way to another building when Eraserhead dropped down in front of him looking pissed, "Problem child, just what do you think you're doing?"

"Actually staying away from the main fight for one, Eraser." Izuku smiled. "You'd be proud."

Eraserhead sighed tiredly, "Situation?"

Izuku pointed to the beach, "I'm pretty sure it's a berserker. It's got some kind of octopus quirk, from what I can tell. I don't know how far the tentacles can stretch, they're pretty elastic, but I would avoid them if possible. They secrete some kind of ink, which is why I think it's an octopus quirk not just tentacles, but it's pretty corrosive and I'm not sure your quirk will cancel the effects of it, just the villain's ability to secrete it."

Eraser nodded as he took note of Izuku's analysis, "Any idea what it's after?"

Izuku shook his head, "Just that it keeps destroying everything in its path, but doesn't seem to be interested in hurting people like the other berserkers were. That might change when it gets bored of the beach though."