The remnants of Hero's Eve were now a warzone of shattered stalls and smoldering wreckage. Above it all, Hawks hovered, his crimson wings twitching with restless energy as he scanned the chaos below. Mirko crouched beside him on a half-collapsed lamppost, her ears flat against her skull, muscles coiled like springs.
"There." Hawks murmured, golden eyes locking onto a flicker of movement, a flash of white fabric between two crumbling buildings.
Miyu Ogawa stepped into the open, her kimono pristine despite the carnage, her fingers curled like a conductor's before a symphony. Behind her, two figures lurched forward, Rikiya Katsukame, his massive frame swollen further by what both heroes assumed was Trigger, his veins were bulging like worms beneath his grayish skin, and Mimic, his form flickering between solid and liquid as he oozed across the pavement.
"Ah, The winged hero and the rabbit hero," Miyu mused, her voice honey-smooth. "I was hoping for Endeavour but it seems he's on his way to Tokyo. You'll just have to do."
Mirko's lip curled. "Cute. You brought friends."
"Not friends." Miyu corrected, tapping a lacquered nail against her chin. "Puppets."
Then... she snapped her fingers.
Rikiya moved first. No... blurred was more accurate.
Hawks barely had time to blink before the brute was there, fist already mid-swing, the air itself was screaming as it split around his knuckles. Hawks twisted, feathers instinctively forming a shield.
CRACK.
The force sent him spiralling backward, his wings barely compensating before he slammed into a storefront. Plaster rained down as he shook off the impact, grimacing. "Okay. That's new."
Mirko didn't wait. She launched, her leg a piston aimed straight for Miyu's throat...
A wall of flesh intercepted.
Rikiya took the kick head on, his chest denting inward with a sickening crunch, but he didn't stagger. Didn't even grunt. His bloodshot eyes, glazed under Miyu's control, locked onto Mirko with an eerie calm.
"Oh, you've got to be kidding me." Mirko spat.
Miyu's laugh was a silver bell in the dark. "Trigger's a wonderful thing, rare as it is these days. No pain. No fear. Just aids in his obedience to me!"
Then, Mimic struck.
The pavement rippled beneath Mirko's feet, liquefying as Mimic's form surged upward, his amorphous body solidifying into a spiked tendril aimed at her spine. She backflipped, but not fast enough, the spike grazed her thigh, drawing a thin line of crimson.
Hawks' feathers shot forward, a storm of scarlet blades aiming to pin Miyu down...
Rikiya inhaled.
A vacuum formed, yanking Hawks' feathers off-course, their edges scraping uselessly against Rikiya's reinforced skin.
"Damn it," Hawks muttered. "She's using him like a meat shield."
Miyu smirked. "And you're just figuring that out?"
Mirko wasn't one for strategy, she didn't even like the facts that Hawks was here with her, 'helping her'. Mirko could do it all on her own. She was momentum. She was force.
So when she lunged again, it wasn't at Miyu.
It was at Rikiya's knees.
Her heel connected with a snap, the joint bending sideways, but still, the giant didn't fall. His leg twitched, muscles knotting unnaturally as Miyu's quirk overrode biology. Or maybe it was something else, 'self healing?'
He swung downward, a hammer-fist aimed to pulp her into the pavement.
Mirko ducked, rolled, and sprung upward, her other leg whipping around in a devastating arc.
CRUNCH.
Rikiya's jaw dislocated, his head snapping sideways with enough force to send spittle flying.
"Heal that, Prick!" Mirko growled.
Hawks didn't waste the opening.
His feathers converged, not on Miyu, but on Mimic, forming a razor-wire cage around the oozing villain, forcing him to solidify or be shredded.
Miyu's smirk faltered.
"That was cool..." Miyu admitted. "But not cool enough."
She touched the ground.
The streets shuddered, cracks spiderwebbing outward as Mimic merged with the earth, his form dissolving into the rubble. The cage collapsed, empty.
Hawks' feathers barely yanked him aside as a lamppost erupted from below, Mimic's grinning face forming in the metal before he lunged.
"ENOUGH!"
Hawks wings flared, a hurricane of scarlet blades forcing Mimic back, but Miyu was already moving.
She dashed forward, fingers outstretched.
Mirko intercepted, her fist meeting Miyu's palm.
"Oh, rabbit," Miyu purred. "You shouldn't have done that."
Mirko's muscles locked.
Her arm twitched, fingers spasming as something foreign slithered up her nerves.
"What the...?"
"Marionette," Miyu whispered. "Three touches is all it takes. But I can settle for less."
Mirko's own fist swung, a single action, toward her face.
Hawks moved faster than thought.
A feather sliced between them, forcing Miyu to leap back, her control snapping like a severed string. Mirko gasped, stumbling as her body became her own again.
"Bitch," she snarled, shaking out her hand.
Miyu sighed. "And here I thought we were bonding."
Then... Rikiya roared.
The brute charged, his body a battering ram aimed at Hawks.
But Hawks was already in the air, wings beating hard as he dove at Miyu.
She dodged, but not fast enough, his feather in his hand grazed her cheek, drawing a thin line of blood.
Her eyes widened.
Then, she laughed.
"Oh you're so fun," she giggled, wiping the blood with her thumb. "But playtime's over."
A shadow fell over them.
Hawks barely turned in time to see Mimic, not in the ground, not in the rubble, but in the wreckage of a glider, its wings reforged into grasping claws.
"Catch!" Miyu sang.
Rikiya's hand closed around Hawks' ankle.
"Oh shi—"
The world spun as Hawks was hurled into the trees, branches snapping under the force of his impact.
By the time he shook off the stars, Miyu was already gone, soaring away on Mimic's stolen glider, Rikiya vanishing into the smoke.
Mirko screamed after them, her voice raw with fury. "COWARDS! COME BACK AND FINISH THIS!"
Hawks groaned, pulling himself from the wreckage. "Let them go."
"The hell I will."
"Nah, We gotta focus on the civilians."
Mirko's ears flattened, her fists trembling, but she nodded.
Hawks watched as the lady flew away with her "pawns."
There was a sickly feeling growing in him. They received so much information ever since Proxy died, from Soryu... Kobe Arakawa.
He thought that the heroes would be ready, and in certain areas they were. But if he, the number three hero wasn't even capturing a member of the League that wasn't even as reputable as Twice or potentially as powerful as Dabi, that only told him that he may be slacking.
Not only him but other heroes too.
"Lets go already, damn chicken!"
***
The cold wasn't just biting, it felt as though it were alive.
Yaoyorozu Momo's breath crystalized the moment it left her lips, her fingers trembling as she flexed them against the creeping frost. Beside her, Kendo Itsuka exhaled sharply, her enlarged hands clenched, knuckles white under the icy glaze.
Before them, the figure in the blue hood, Geten, hovered atop a jagged spire of ice, his posture relaxed, almost bored.
"You're slowing me down," he observed, voice smooth as polished steel. "Your reactions are dull. Your breaths are shallow. The cold is inside you now."
Momo's teeth ground together. He's right. The chill had seeped into her bones, numbing her thoughts, her quirk. Every creation took longer now, the lipids in her body sluggish, resisting her will.
Kendo spat to the side, a glob of saliva freezing before it hit the ground. "Yeah? Well, talkative villains piss me off."
Geten tilted his head. "Then shut me up!"
He flicked his wrist. The street erupted.
Glacial spears burst from the ground in a fractal storm, each one honed to a razor's edge, spiralling toward them like frozen lightning.
Kendo moved. Her fists ballooned, slamming together in a thunderclap that shattered the first wave, but the shards reformed midair, twisting into jagged hail.
Momo's hands flashed, a steel-plated shield materialized just in time, the impact rattling her arms as ice shrapnel screeched against the metal.
"He's not just making ice," Momo gasped. "He turns the moisture in the air into it. And uses whatever liquids there are in the area and redirecting their fragments."
Kendo's eyes narrowed. "So he's stronger than your classmate? Lets just not let him have fragments."
She lunged, her fist swelling to the size of a boulder, and slammed it into the pavement. The concrete buckled, shockwaves rippling outward, disrupting Geten's frozen lattice.
For a split second, the ice stuttered.
Momo didn't waste that second.
Flashbang grenades materialized.
The detonation was deafening, light erasing the world in a searing burst. Geten hissed, his hood jerking back...
Kendo was already airborne, her other fist cocked back...
"BIG FIST—!"
Geten's hand twitched.
A wall of ice surged between them, but Kendo adjusted, her knuckles grazing the edge as she twisted, using the momentum to kick off the frozen barrier.
"—COMBO!"
Her other fist, still enlarged, smashed downward like a meteor.
Geten barely leaned aside, the force of the blow cratering the street where he'd stood.
"Close," he mused. "But I'm really not expecting much off of you!" He pointed sharply at Kendo.
The ice beneath her feet melted, no liquified, before snapping back into solidity, trapping her boots in a frozen vise.
Momo's mind raced.
He can also phase it between different states. Like a sculptor of ice.
"Kendo. Duck!"
Momo's arm swung, a portable flamethrower already assembled in her grip.
The gout of fire roared, licking at Geten's cloak, but he danced through it, ice sublimating into mist around him as he redirected the heat into a spiralling shield of vapor.
"Predictable." he sighed.
Momo's lips curled. "I know."
The real creation wasn't the flamethrower. It was the liquid nitrogen canister she'd dropped at his feet the moment Kendo distracted him. The hiss of supercooled gas was the only warning before the ground flash-froze, the sudden temperature drop shattering Geten's control for a single, critical second.
Kendo wrenched free, her fists already swinging...
"Payback, Icicle."
Geten blocked, crossing his arms as ice cocooned them into a makeshift shield—
But Momo was already moving.
"Kendo, NOW!"
Kendo's fist shifted mid-swing, not to strike but to grab.
Her fingers closed around Geten's frozen arm, and she yanked him forward, right into Momo's waiting taser baton.
The crackle of electricity split the air, Geten's body locking as volts surged through him.
But he smiled.
"Clever," he rasped, frost already creeping up the baton, toward Momo's wrist. "But the cold is my domain."
The taser froze solid, shattering in Momo's grip.
Kendo growled, her other fist already coming around.
Geten spun, ice erupting from his heel, in a sweeping arc, forcing her back.
Momo's mind raced again, this time more jolted and panicked.
He adapts. He controls. He's always one step ahead.
Unless they changed the game.
"Kendo!" Momo barked. "The buildings!"
Kendo's eyes widened, then grinned.
She leaped, her fist swelling to monstrous proportions as she slammed it into the nearest structure's support beam.
The building groaned, then collapsed, tons of debris raining down. Geten's ice surged, forming a protective dome.
But Momo was already moving.
"Thermite."
The hiss of ignited metal was her only warning before the molten cascade seared through Geten's shield, the heat overloading his cryokinetic precision.
For the first time, he staggered.
Kendo didn't let up.
Her fist crashed through the weakened ice, grazing Geten's ribs. He skidded back, his hood falling, revealing sharp features and blue eyes that looked like frozen steel.
Geten wiped a trickle of blood from his lip, staring at the crimson smear on his glove with something almost like amusement.
"Thermite," he mused. "And nitrogen. You're more creative than most heroes."
Momo's chest heaved, her breath ragged. The cold still gnawed at her, slowing her thoughts, but she forced herself to focus. One more move. We need one more move.
Kendo cracked her knuckles, her fists still enlarged. "Yeah, well, we're just getting started."
Geten's smile didn't reach his eyes. "No. You're not."
He slammed his palms together.
The world exploded in frost. A tidal wave of ice surged from the ground, jagged spires erupting like the maw of some frozen leviathan. The air itself crystalized again.
"Kendo—!"
"On it!"
Kendo's fists ballooned to their absolute limit, slamming into the ground with enough force to shatter the advancing ice. But Geten wasn't aiming for them.
He was aiming at the sky.
The hail redirected, not downward, but sideways, forming a whirling maelstrom of frozen shrapnel that encircled them, cutting off escape.
He's herding us. He's controlling the battlefield.
Geten stepped forward, his breath misting in the artificial storm. "You fought well. But this is where it ends."
Kendo stomped her foot on the ground. "Like hell it is."
Momo's fingers twitched.
Then something in her mind clicked.
"Kendo." she whispered. "On my signal. Jump!"
Kendo didn't question it. She nodded.
Momo's hands flashed, not toward Geten, but toward the ground.
A high-frequency sonic emitter materialized in her grip, its surface already humming pent-up energy.
Geten's eyes narrowed. "What—?"
Momo activated it.
The screech was unbearable, a pulse of sound so intense it vibrated the ice itself, fracturing its molecular structure. The frozen prison around them splintered, not just breaking, but disintegrating into harmless powder.
Geten staggered, his control ruptured by the sudden instability.
"Now!" Momo screamed.
Kendo leaped, her fist drawn back and aimed toward the street beneath Geten.
BIG FIST—!"
Her knuckles smashed into the pavement, the force rippling outward in a seismic wave. The ground liquified for a split second, just long enough for Geten's footing to vanish.
He slipped, his balance lost...
And Momo was already there.
A carbon fiber net, weighted with conductive alloy, unfurled from her forearm, wrapping around Geten mid-fall. The moment it made contact, she jammed a stun rod into mesh.
Electricity coursed through the net, locking Geten's muscles in a vice of convulsions.
For the first time, the ice king screamed.
The blizzard died.
Silence settled over the ruined street, broken only by Geten's ragged breathing as he lay trapped in the crackling net.
Kendo wiped sweat from her brow, her fists shrinking back to normal. "Took you long enough to go down."
Momo exhaled, her legs trembling from exhaustion. "We need to restrain him properly."
She materialized different forms of restraint, like cuffs, rope and other bindings. They would have to quickly drag him to police, there would be some stationed within the area.
And since their fight made quite a lot of noise as well as the great drop in temperature they were sure to have attracted some attention, hopefully good.
"Wow." Kendo muttered loud enough for Momo to hear. Momo turned her head to her and raised a brow asking what was wrong...
"I just never thought I could fight against someone like that and come out the winner."
Momo understood where Kendo was coming from, and honestly, "Neither did I."
She knows that if she were on her own she would have lost, maybe even died. She was glad that she wasn't alone. And she was glad that she won, it was a big win that she didn't want to forget.