Viridian: The Green Guide

Chapter 81: Seek

Alright, so maybe the heroes hadn't gone over all the details of what being involved meant, but they also hadn't told him what he couldn't do, with the exception of go vigilante before making it into the hero course, so now that that was off the table, Katsuki figured he could just plead ignorance if anyone said anything. He shoved his hands deeper in his pockets as he headed to Dabi's bar. The doctors said that Ogawa's prognosis was good. They expected him to wake up within the next few weeks, probably, but that wasn't a lot of time for Katsuki to keep his promise and take down the villain factory, which meant that he wasn't going to be able to do this alone.

The biggest problem he was running into so far was that there was still so much about the case he didn't know. Obviously, the heroes didn't want him involved in the first place so even though Amplifier had promised to give him an overview, he didn't trust her not to hold anything back, which meant that he needed information from other sources too if he wanted to make sure Ogawa was safe when he woke up.

From what Katsuki had heard, a lot of the information that the heroes had on the case was stuff they'd gotten from Viridian, which was a big part of why they were so hesitant to let Katsuki participate as well. Why would anyone want two snot-nosed brats going up against a major shadow organization that was arguably better trained and better funded than either of them? But the fact remained that Viridian was apparently pretty deeply involved in the case and was better at sniffing out leads about it than almost anyone else, so if Katsuki wanted to better his understanding of the case, he may as well go to the source.

Dabi only glanced up briefly when he came in, then went back to buffing glasses, "Hey Kacchan, you back?"

Katsuki huffed and sat down at the bar, "I never left, asshole. But yeah, I just had my first day of UA this morning, so technically I've got more or less full permission to go poking around again. I'm gonna find these bastards even if I have to explode their asses myself."

"Not if I burn them to the ground first." Dabi muttered. "So? Got any leads you care to share?"

"Not yet, but I think I know who does." Katsuki answered. "Do you know where I can find Viridian?"

Denki looked again through all the papers All Might had given him and tried not to feel overwhelmed, "This power comes with a legit nemesis. I mean, it's kinda cool, but also kinda scary."

"Definitely." Izuku nodded and picked up one of the brain scans All Might had provided. "All for One did come up in my research about quirk transfer, which was part of why I was so worried when you said that you'd been offered a quirk. I'm glad All Might warned you that you might be targeted."

"Technically, I didn't say that I'd been offered a quirk." Denki pointed out. "You asked and I didn't think of a convincing enough lie in time."

Izuku smiled, "Would you have been able to convince me though? Really?"

Denki shook his head, "With how much you know about quirk theory, probably not. What do you think? I'm having a little trouble making heads and tails of this."

Izuku sighed and rubbed his nose, "The risks are still there, obviously, but it looks like there is a layer of protection between the quirk and the user that mostly prevents your body from rejecting it. There's still the risk of it being too much power for your body, but oddly enough, with your electricity quirk, your body might be more suited for that than All Might's was. Also, All Might's brain scan did show some minor decay, so that is still a risk, but your quirk makes your brain a lot more plastic and allows you to recover from brain damage when you overuse your quirk, which would be a useful addition for future users, if it ends up getting wrapped up into the quirk. There's always the possibility that it won't actually work that way, so you have to decide if you're going to be active for long enough for that to matter and if it's a risk you're willing to accept. From what I can see, if your quirk doesn't counteract that minor brain decay, it would basically act more like early onset dementia than anything else and wouldn't actually meaningfully impact your life until your sixties or seventies at the earliest."

"So, One for All isn't going to kill me, but it might make me an interesting old person." Denki summarized. "Alright. I mean, that doesn't sound too bad, and you said that with the way my quirk affects my body, it might not even happen."

Izuku gave him an exasperated look, "You can't count on that Denks!"

Denki laughed, "But really! It seems like it's a lot less dangerous than you thought it was! I mean, with how often I fry my brain, I'm probably gonna get dementia whether or not I accept One for All."

Izuku shrugged, "I guess...I'm just glad All Might actually researched it and told you. With the whole absolute secrecy thing, I was scared he wouldn't."

"Meh, it's not like any of this is too dangerous if you don't know what you're looking at." Denki pointed out. "The documents never identify All Might by name and even the history about All for One could easily be passed off as an urban legend."

"I guess." Izuku was silent for a long moment as he looked at the papers again before hesitantly speaking up. "So, do you know what you're going to do?"

Denki sighed and flopped back onto the floor, "I don't suppose you have any recommendations one way or the other?"

"That'd make it too easy." Izuku chuckled. "I don't know what you should decide. I will say, though, that I think you'd make excellent use of the quirk, but at the same time, you don't need it to be an amazing hero. At the end of the day, it's all up to you and the kind of hero you want to be."

Denki thought about it for a minute. On the one hand, One for All was dangerous, even if that danger just came from an overpowered nemesis, but on the other, while they were sparring, Izuku had said over and over again and he should use whatever resources it took to win. If he had to fight dirty to stay alive, he should. If he had to throw sand in a villain's eyes to get an opening, he shouldn't hesitate to do so. All Might was offering him a tool, a resource, that would allow him to be a better hero and protect people even more than he could do on his own. Could he really just say no to that? Did he even want to?

"I.." Denki looked to Izuku, who nodded in encouragement and made Denki's shoulders slump with relief. His friend wasn't going to judge him either way. He could make whatever decision he wanted to and Izuku would be there to support him, even if he made the wrong one. It was just enough of a security blanket for his decision to solidify in his mind. "I think I'm gonna accept. I wanna be the next holder of One for All."

Katsuki shoved his hands in his pockets and glared at anyone who looked like they were about to talk to him as he made his way through the bar district. According to Dabi, Viridian usually hung out between here and Rock Lock's territory, only wandering farther when it was necessary for a case or something. If Katsuki didn't manage to run into him tonight, he could always come back tomorrow, or the next day, or the next day, however long it took for him to get the information he needed to take down the villain factory. He wasn't the kind of hero who was gonna give up just because the going got hard.

He'd been out for about an hour when he finally caught sight of the vigilante. He didn't look like anything special, just a kid in a hoodie who had his back turned to Katsuki as he dumped a zip tied criminal at the mouth of an alleyway. Katsuki ran after him as the kid disappeared back into the alley and Katsuki was just fast enough to see him scamper up a fire escape before he was on the rooftops. The kid was fast, but Katsuki grinned and used his explosions to help launch him up, keeping them as quiet as possible, not that anyone would care too much about casual quirk use in this part of town.

He got to the roof just as Viridian was about to jump onto the next one and yelled, "Oi! Viridian! Slow down for one damn minute, I wanna ask you a question!"

Viridian slid to a stop and turned around, eyes blown wide with panic, an expression that Katsuki mirrored as he froze, realizing just who was decked out in full vigilante gear in front of him.

"Kacchan?!" Izuku squeaked. "What are you doing here?!"