His master's voice cut through his focus: "Again." And so he obeyed, he moved back slowly and steadily, getting his breathing back centred, reset his stance and began again.
The old dojo echoed with the rhythm of breath, of bare feet brushing smooth planks, of wooden joints creaking beneath tension. Sunlight cut through slatted windows in golden beams, casting the dust in suspended motion. In the middle of it all stood Izuku Midoriya, age fourteen, blindfolded, barefoot, and unwavering. Sweat dripped from Izuku's brow, his muscles burning. Two years ago, he'd been a broken boy. Now, he was a living storm—a flicker of lightning, a pulse of raw energy, growing brighter with every step.
Muscles coiled beneath his lean frame—wiry, deceptively strong. Not the bulk of a bodybuilder, but the carved definition of someone honed like a blade. His face was still that of a boy, but his posture spoke otherwise: calm, centred, enduring.
Opposite him stood Master Shimazu—tall, thin as bamboo, aged past ninety with a presence that silenced thought. His own eyes were covered by a pale cloth, his expression unreadable.
Izuku sensed the shift in the air flow before the cane struck. Whip—crack! He twisted, sidestepped, and swept low, the hem of his pants whispering against the floor. A flick of his wrist brought his open palm just shy of Master Shimazu's chest before stopping.
"Too slow," the old man grunted, bringing his cane down on Izuku's shoulder, deflecting Izuku's palm.
Izuku hissed through his teeth, bowed his head slightly. "Yes, Master."
"Again."
Strike. Parry. Breath. Step. Listen.
The cane blurred by its speed. The boy flowed around it.
Master Shimazu pressed the assault without mercy. It wasn't cruelty—it was refinement. Every hit was a question. Every dodge was an answer.
But behind the flawless movements, behind the acute perception of every gust of wind and shift of fabric, something flickered. Memory. Wound. Fire.
They told him at age four.
"No Quirk," the doctor had said, staring at the X-rays of his pinky joints. "You're one of the twenty per cent. I'm sorry."
At first, he didn't understand. he was meant to be a hero. Then the fantasy died.
He watched kids float, spit fire, and explode. He watched teachers smile at students who could fly, but barely noticed the small, freckled boy scribbling in notebooks about heroes. He had no power. No potential. No purpose.
And Bakugo made sure he never forgot it.
"Useless Deku," Katsuki sneered, age ten, shoving Izuku into a puddle in the schoolyard. "Maybe if you pray hard enough, you'll be born again with a Quirk. Hell, maybe you'll get wings and fly away from being such a pathetic waste."
The others laughed.
They always laughed.
Bruises became routine. Humiliation is a rhythm. His notebooks were burned, his name scrawled on the walls beside the word "cripple."
Teachers turned away. They always did.
And Izuku? He stopped raising his hand. He stopped speaking at all.
He remembered only fragments.
It was after school—empty hallways, the squeak of shoes on linoleum, the acrid sting of sweat and nitroglycerin in the air. Sneers. Laughter. Voices twisting into mockery.
The first blow came—a fist, then feet. Pain exploding in bursts, kicks, then stomps. A boot swung toward him. Not meant for his face—maybe it was. Didn't matter. The impact against his temple was a mistake. Their mistake.
When he woke, the world was gone.
No light. No shapes. No colour.
Only darkness.
Only silence.
And the icy, suffocating truth was settling in his chest like a stone.
Voices murmured around him—hushed, clinical.
"Mrs. Midoriya, the damage to his optic nerves is... irreversible."
A choked gasp. "W-what are you saying?"
"I'm so sorry. Your son... he'll never see again."
Then, her voice—soft, trembling, breaking over him like a wave. "Izuku... baby, can you hear me?"
His breath hitched. His hands twitched at his sides, grasping at nothing. "M-Mom?"
A warm touch on his cheek. "I'm here."
His throat tightened. "I can't... I can't see you."
A sob. "I know, sweetheart. I'm sorry."
Something inside him snapped. "No..." The word slipped out, quiet at first, like he couldn't believe it was real. Then, louder—"No." His hands trembled, fingers curling uselessly against the sheets. "No, no, that's—that's not right." His breath hitched, voice fraying at the edges. "It can't be. I—I have to—" He swallowed hard, as if the truth might dissolve if he refused to say it. "Mom." His voice cracked, small and pleading. "Please… there's gotta be a mistake. It can be fixed right!"
Her grip tightened around him, her own voice thick with unshed tears. "Baby, I... I wish it could." She choked on the words, her fingers brushing through his hair like she could smooth away the pain. "But it's—it's not something that can be undone."
He crumpled against her, his weight heavy with defeat. His fingers clutched at her sleeves, not in anger, but as if he were drowning.
"It's not fair," he whispered, the words raw. Tears spilt over, but they weren't the hot, furious kind—just quiet, helpless. "I was s'posed to—" His throat closed around the rest. I was supposed to be a hero.
She held him tighter, her own tears dripping into his hair. One hand cradled the back of his head, her touch feather-light, like he might shatter if she pressed too hard.
"I know," she murmured, lips brushing his temple. "Oh, baby, I know." Her voice wavered, but she didn't let it break. Not yet. "l'm sorry, l'm so sorry, honey."
Bakugo never apologised. Iuzku didn't even know if it was even him who delivered the kick. And the school claim it was "an accident."
Izuku had cried until his voice broke that night, not even able to see his own tears.
In the coming weeks, confined to bed rest in the hospital, a flicker of hope came.
Izuku lay still in his hospital bed, his head throbbing with a dull, persistent ache. Bandages wrapped around his eyes, the fractures in his temple still healing. The assault at Aldera had left him blinded and bedridden, and the world plunged into darkness.
It began late in the Long, sterile nights. No screens. No books. Just the rhythmic beeping of machines and the muffled voices of nurses drifting in and out. At first, he noticed the differences in footsteps—who walked heel-first, who dragged their soles, who would hesitate before entering. Then came the heartbeats—fluttering like birds' wings, some steady as metronomes, or erratic with unspoken unease.
And that was when everything changed.
A soft touch on the door made him flinch like it was right next to his head. He shouldn't have been able to hear it so clearly—not over the hum of the air conditioning or the distant murmur of the hallway. Yet, somehow, he had. His head turned toward the sound before the door even creaked open.
"Midoriya?" A nurse's voice, gentle but laced with surprise. "You… you turned toward me before I even stepped inside."
Izuku swallowed, fingers tightening around the sheets. "I...I thought I heard something."
The nurse hesitated. "How? I didn't make it through the door before you were facing me?"
But he had.
His senses stretched like invisible threads, weaving a fragile map of the world around him. He could feel the shift of air when someone moved, the tension coiling in their muscles before they spoke, the faintest tremor of hesitation in their breath. He could taste their emotions, Fear like copper on his tongue, sharp and electric, the same metallic tang as licking a battery. Anger burned like cayenne pepper, searing the back of his throat, leaving him choking on phantom smoke. Guilt, Burnt coffee grounds, acrid and suffocating sand. Joy was like Rainwater and honey, clear and golden. Sorrow was like stagnant water left out too long. Excitement sparked like popping candy, crackling against his palate in frantic, sugar-rush bursts.
They coated his mouth, unwelcome and cloying, until he learned to not let them influence his own emotions.
The headaches came in waves, sharp and sudden, like lightning splitting his skull. But with them came something else—a flicker of awareness, a ripple in an unseen current.
One afternoon, as he lay facing what he thought was the window, he felt it again. A presence. Movement. His head jerked toward the door just as Dr. Tanaka stepped inside.
The doctor froze. "Did you sense me?"
Izuku's throat tightened. "I… I don't know."
Dr. Tanaka exchanged a glance with the Quirk specialist beside him. "Midoriya, we have some news for you. We have asked your mother for permission for us to talk and look at you. Is that ok?"
Izuku nodded.
Dr. Tanaka started, "Ok, in the last few weeks, we've noticed some unusual behaviour you have been exhibiting in regards to your reaction to the things around you. If you'll let me, I'd like to check your eyes again."
Izuku, unsure but trusting, nodded.
The doctor carefully untapped the bandages over his now unfocused, semi-vacant eyes. The light he shined into them elicited no reaction. The ophthalmoscope revealed nothing but damage. Dr. Tanaka sighed and turned to the other doctor, shaking his head before speaking in a heavy tone. The other doctor was jotting down some information.
Turning back to Iuzku, he started, "Midoriya, your scans show unusual neural activity near the injury site, specifically the occipital lobe. We believe your brain is compensating for your blindness by developing the unused part of your brain responsible for processing visual information and using it to form a type of extrasensory perception—a mental radar, of sorts. We believe that this is a quirk manifesting."
Izuku's breath hitched. "A Quirk? Now? But—I've been Quirkless my whole life. And even if I have one, it won't… it won't bring my sight back."
"No," Dr. Tanaka admitted gently. "This won't restore your vision. It won't help you read or watch screens. And right now, its range seems limited—about two meters around you in all directions. With training, that might improve, but…"
"But I'll still be blind." Izuku's voice was hollow.
"Yes, you will," the doctor confirmed, his tone heavy with sympathy, "but this will allow you to live a life better than most in similar circumstances."
Izuku's chest ached. A Quirk that couldn't undo what had been taken, only help him survive it. The words echoed in the sterile quiet of the clinic room long after Dr. Tanaka had left.
Days passed in a black haze of adjustment and frustration.
Izuku practised within his narrow sensory radius, the world beyond two meters a terrifying, silent void. He was alone in his room, trying to map the familiar furniture by the strange new pressure against his awareness, when the sound of the hospital door opening broke his concentration.
His mother is visiting.
Her footsteps were light but uneven with bodily exhaustion as she approached his doorway.
His mother visited, her footsteps light but uneven with exhaustion.
"Izuku, sweetheart," Inko murmured, voice trembling as she stepped beside his bed.
He turned to her instantly, his head tilting to her face as if seeing her. She froze.
"Izuku…?"
Before she could finish, her bag slipped from her shoulder. A thermos tumbled out, plummeting toward the floor—
And Izuku's hand shot out, catching it midair.
Silence.
Inko gasped. "You—you caught that."
Izuku's fingers trembled around the cool metal of the thermos. He hadn't heard the bag slip from her hand. He hadn't seen the thermos fall. But for a split second, he'd felt it—the sudden weightlessness, the precise trajectory, the subtle shift in the air pressure as it fell within his sphere.
"Mom," he whispered, voice raw with a mix of wonder and profound sadness. "I can sense things. But it's not… It's not enough." Not sight. Not my old life.
Tears welled in Inko's eyes as she rushed forward, cupping his face. "It's a start, Izuku," she insisted, her voice thick with emotion. "It's something."
He clenched his jaw, nodding slowly against her hands. It wasn't perfect. It wasn't sight. But holding the thermos, feeling his mother's tears on his skin, feeling the shape of her presence… for the first time in weeks since the darkness took everything, he didn't feel completely helpless.
He had a way forward.
And he would learn to live with it.