Dragon Arts

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

Kanako had had more than her fair share of headaches in her life. Sure, she'd inflicted them on herself and used them as weapons more often than not. Sure, she could take more mental pain then the average person. But this headache was like hell itself had climbed out of the ground and clasped her head in a smothering grip. She was barely standing, and any movement caused the pain to flare wildly.

She was out of the Nomu's mind, thanks to Matsuru. Aware of what was happening around her once more. Aware of the bloodshed and the aftermath of the battle she'd missed. If she'd been fighting alongside the other Heroes instead of fishing for information would this many people have died? Maybe... but maybe not.

It was enough to make her question whether the information she'd gained was enough to justify the damage obtaining it had caused. In the end she decided that no, it hadn't been worth it, but the damage was done and nothing could be changed now besides moving on. Although that wouldn't stop her from fully believing these deaths were her fault.

The pain in her head was ebbing slightly, like a wave being drawn out to sea, when the Villains began appearing. The redheaded flirt had singled out Haru, ignoring the others. Kanako just wanted this stupid fight to be over. She memorized the voice of the redhead and linked their minds just as Haru's attack landed. The effort of establishing the link was much harder than maintaining it. Once the link was established it'd be simple to keep it active. With all the willpower she had left she took hold of every bit of power over the redhead that she could. Rigth then the wave of the headache came crashing back with more power than before.

Freeze. And shut the hell up. She commanded firmly, forcing the Villain's muscles to lock in place and clamping her jaw shut. The headache Kanako felt was shared by the redhead. Her eyes were glowing a bright gold, almost white, instead of the usual orange gold. The mental effort it took to maintain full control over someone was lessened slightly by the shock caused by the first use of her quirk on a person. The redhead was unprepared and dazed. An advantage that Kanako wouldn't pass up. Once Kanako had control she would make it an uphill battle of will for her opponent to gain back anything.

She utilized the control factor of her quirk combined with the telepathy aspect to nearly double her own control over the redhead. The headache she felt being shared also helped her now, although she still felt it's pain, so did the redhead. Her hindrance had become her weapon. The use of her quirk on another person and not a Nomu was the difference that let Kanako still be aware of everything around her, as well as staying in control of herself.

If she was being entirely honest Kanako wanted to shatter the mind of this Villain, she wanted to make someone suffer, wanted to take out her anger at herself for not helping enough in the fight on someone, it almost didn't matter who. But she held back from breaking the mind of the redhead entirely, or, well, more than it was already broken. She could find another way to take out her anger later, after this Villain was safely in custody.

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

_{Location: Le'Nombril Restau,}

---

How many hidden weapons Kanako had on her at any given moment would never be figured out apparently. She pulled out two daggers from the sleeves of her jacket then jumped down through the hole Yusuke's burning snakes had made without pausing or hesitating for a second. She was already regretting trying to explain why she couldn't talk. She'd heard a few of Yusuke's subconscious thoughts without him realizing it, wondering what the best way to communicate with someone who couldn't talk was, those thoughts were followed by wondering why she couldn't talk in the first place, hence her response. So the next subconscious thoughts she heard, him confessing to her, she deliberately ignored. She made a mental note that Yusuke could hardly hide any of his thoughts. To prevent any more awkward situations in the future she might try to teach him a few tricks to hide his thoughts later. But dealing with the Nomu was priority #1 right now.

She hit the ground on the lower level and looked around, her earlier assessment of who were Pro Heroes held true. Now this, pure chaos, immense danger, and no time to plan ahead. This was when Kanako was in her element. First step: Figure out what the hell's going on. Ice, Rin's doing, an attempt to slow the Nomu. Hawks Heroes evacuating people already. She made her way calmly through the panicked patrons and past the other Hawks Heroes outside and towards the Nomu, she could hear it speak above the sounds of screams. It's got a voice... that's a first. Next question is whether it has thoughts, or if it's like a parrot, voice, but no exploitable mind. It's contrived from a person, so the possibility that it has a mind is still viable, although if it does I'm guessing it'll be like the mind of someone who's high, nearly completely useless to me. If that's the case I'll have to rely on combat for the first time in a while. Look for weak points: Wrists, crack the bones and sever the ligaments, that'll render them useless. If they grow back I'll be able to tell exactly how much of a regeneration factor it has, depending on time it takes to regrow and how well it can regrow. Possibly the fire on it's back, a weak point between the muscle and spinal vertebrae where the fire emits from. The eyes, always a starting point. It'd still be able to function without sight most likely, but there's a lot of nerves around the eyes, distract it with the pain, get it to scream, or roar or whatever, then memorize it's vocal patterns and try using my quirk on it. If I link my mind to it will it's goal seep through to my mind, or mine to it's. I've got to consider the possibility that this could go either way. This will either be a really good idea, or a really, really bad one. Just wait, figure out more, then act.

What kind of people is it targeting? Is there a consistent theme? Keep that thought, that'll be useful to figure out, All these thoughts passed through her mind in the span of only a second. Her mind was working at twice the pace of a normal person's mind now, three times, she steadied into that pace of thought and allowed herself a moment to send a few surface thoughts to Hebi and Yusuke. In a minute I'm going to disconnect myself from this telepathic link. I'm going to try linking my mind to the Nomu, I'm going to deacteviate my quirk and leave the telepathic link from the hawkpads so that if it breaks my mind I wont drag you two down too. Partly a joke, mostly genuine. The idea of using her quirk on the Nomu was a risk, a risk she was willing to take.

Second step: Act based on the information available. Kanako slipped one dagger back into the sheath on the inside of her sleeve and threw the other one with deadly accuracy towards the Nomu. The blade lodged itself firmly in the Nomu's left eye. It didn't exactly have the effect Kanako had been hoping for. The Nomu didn't even flinch, it turned to Kanako and rushed towards her. Kanako narrowed her eyes but didn't move until it was just about to crash into her. She stepped to the side quickly, pulled out her other dagger from her sleeve, and stabbed it firmly into the Nomu's back, right underneath it's shoulder blade. The Nomu whipped around and slammed it's arm into Kanako's chest, sending her flying backwards.

Kanako heard her ribs crack at the impact. She skidded but didn't lose her balance somehow. She took out a throwing knife from the pocket on the side of her pant leg and threw it towards the Nomu, hitting it right in the center of it's face. Never could it be said that Kanako didn't know how to throw a knife. Unfortunately the Nomu didn't seem too bothered by any of the blades. High pain tolerance, very advanced regenerative abilities. Physical attacks wont do much against it, unless they're ending it, Kanako noted, seeing that the dagger in it's shoulder didn't hamper it at all from moving. Honestly fighting with this many knives was fun, even if it was ineffective at the moment.

The Nomu started rambling again. Kanako memorized it's voice patterns quickly, ignoring the other sounds around. She severed the link between her and Yusuke's minds then cut herself out of the telepathic link made by the hawkpads. If this ended badly she wasn't going to drag Yusuke and Hebi down with her. Then she linked her mind to the Nomu's.

Inside the Nomu's mind was horrible. Chaotic and indiscernible. A searing headache bloomed in the back of Kanako's head. She felt her sense of reality slip as she searched through the Nomu's mind for something, anything she could use. A single coherent thought would do. Something to latch onto, anything that could giver her the slightest bit of leverage. Instead there was just an immense dark void filled with an instinct to kill. It was eerily similar to how Kanako had felt after the class earlier today. A fog, all consuming, and impenetrable, it drifted from the Nomu's mind to Kanako's. She found herself lost in the fog, completely unaware of what was happening around her. Completely unaware of what she was doing.

From the perspective of anyone watching on it would look like Kanako had gone completely insane, attacking anyone around her, whether they be a Hero, civilian, or the Nomu. Her eyes were glowing a bright gold orange, as were the Nomu's.

Needless to be said, it'd been a really, really bad idea.

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

_{Location: Le'Nombril Restau,}

---

The first thing Kanako had done when they'd arrived at LeNombril Restau was to find who, out of all the patrons, was most likely to be there on a mission for someone, whether that be a Hero agency or the League of Villains. Her list was surprisingly long, and surprisingly accurate.

Once they were at their table she looked over the menu briefly. She looked over at Yusuke when he spoke. No way in hell was she going to tell anyone what was on her mind tonight. For one, she wasn't really sure what was on her mind herself, for two, if she tried to explain it people would think she was insane. Besides, she didn't really want to use her quirk to talk to anyone right now. She'd been actively avoiding using her quirk on Yusuke specifically, because she knew he'd use the opportunity to figure out how her quirk worked and copy it. Which she was trying to avoid because her quirk could be just as harmful to the user as to the target if the person controlling it didn't know how to use it. She'd figured that out when she'd gotten the mind link stuck being active on fifteen people at once and had woken up from the coma the mental strain had caused a week later.

She didn't eat much at all. Her appetite had been dashed by what had happened with Rin, and the paranoia spike. But she could tell that Yusuke was going out of his way to make this a nice evening, and she was grateful for that, she was, but she was so distracted by other things that it was hard to show. Just forget about all that right now. This is going to be a nice night with absolutely nothing to worry about, she thought. She tried to put on a smile and be happy, she mostly succeeded, but there was still a nagging feeling of doubt that she couldn't get rid of.

She didn't want to just ignore Yusuke completely. So she took out a small notepad. Thinking about my sisters, she wrote, it wasn't untrue, she'd been thinking about them a lot more than usual, she just neglected to mention how much she knew about their more recent legally dubious actions. She tapped the eraser of the pencil against the notepad for a second then also wrote: By the way, do you know sign language? I realize that I've never asked you. She always found it better to write things out on paper rather than texting because paper couldn't be hacked, besides, it was funny in restaurants because sometimes people mistook her for a critic of some kind. She tore out the note and handed it to Yusuke.

@Urizen @rexgn

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

_{Location: 1B Dorms,}

---

Kanako jumped slightly as she realized she was still using her quirk. Most of her thoughts had been thankfully hidden subconsciously during the paranoia spikes, an old habit that helped her appear sane in stressful situations when she was using her quirk. She'd nearly forgotten about the mind link until she heard snippets of Hebi's thoughts and saw a flash of something that she thought said 'Mute chick,' honestly not the worst name she'd been called, not even close. She didn't really care what people called her. She severed the link a second later and wondered how much of her paranoia spike Hebi had actually heard. Hebi was surprisingly good at hiding her own thoughts, much in the same way Kanako hid her's, hence why she hadn't noticed her presence in her mind. Kanako's eyes faded back to their normal lime green when she severed the link.

I'll come, but I'm not paying for shit. Kanako read the text from Hebi and bit her lip, wondering whether sass would be a good idea right now. She thought of something almost immediately. No, you'll be paying for fancy French cuisine, she thought, really glad that she'd noticed and severed the mind link before thinking that. But as funny as it would be it probably wasn't a great idea. She sighed and texted back, Fine, I'll pay. She didn't feel like stirring up conflict. Well, she felt like it, and it'd certainly be fun, but she could tell that it wasn't the time. Besides, she didn't mind paying for Hebi's meal.

She tipped her head to the side for a minute and closed her eyes. No conversations to listen in to, not in earshot anyways, no new texts to read, no thoughts to listen to, just silence. Just as soon as she had nothing to focus on the thoughts of paranoia began to seep back into her mind. She furrowed her brow as her hand balled into a tight fist subconsciously. She felt like she was slipping again, every muscle in her body tensed. Okay then, relaxing before we sneak out is out of the window, she thought, getting up from the couch and starting to pace around the room again. Her hand tensed and relaxed repeatedly and her eyes darted around as though she expected something or someone to jump out of the shadows at any second.

Her mind was going in circles again, warping and doubling back on itself, and this time just pacing wasn't enough to dampen the paranoia. She knew fresh air would help, so she walked quickly out of the hawks common room, passing by a few of the other students in the hallway. Her eyes had a wild, distant look to them, like she was ready to snap and attack at any moment, or ready to bolt on a dime. Every time she thought she got rid of the paranoia it returned tenfold, if it happened a few times quickly you get a paranoia spike, a panic attack, or a fight.

She quietly made her way to the rooftop. A cool wind blew past her. She took a breath of the brisk air and calmed herself down, quieting down the paranoid voice in the back of her mind by listening to the ambient sounds around her. It was a nice moment, she didn't do this nearly as much as she probably should. She pulled out her hawkpad and texted Yusuke, You ready to go? She needed something to be focused on.

Keep busy, stay sane. Her unofficial motto.

@rexgn @Urizen

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

_{Location: 1B Living room,}

---

Long time no talk. We haven't talked since the Joint Training, although we lost, I do find you useful and not just your Quirk. I was the leader yet I got blindsided by my rivalry with Jun. It should be nice if I get to fight her again. Kanako read while she paced around the common room.

She didn't really talk to any of the other students, talking to people was too stressful most of the time. On the one hand, most people freaked out when they realized she could hear all their thoughts when she used her quirk, on the other hand, writing or texting to communicate was a bit of a pain, and it wasn't like she could talk normally. But texting was still better than listening to her own thoughts during a paranoia spike. She texted him back, Useful because of my unmatched wit, impeccable logic and quick thinking? She sat down on a couch in the common room and rested her head on her hand. Jeez, sarcasm is hard to convey in texts, she thought. Her eyes had a far off look to them, like she was stuck in an old memory.

Suspicion crept into her mind and she couldn't shake the paranoia this time. This was usually the kind of language people used when they wanted something from someone. Saying that he thought she was useful then pointing out his own shortcoming. The first point serving as a compliment of sorts, especially since Kanako valued being useful so much. The second point to get her to drop her guard by stating how he'd messed up. Kanako was nothing if not paranoid. The distant look in her eyes flicked away and she focused again on the conversation. Spill it, what do you want? she texted. Her tone came across as passive aggressive, accidental or not. She definitely wasn't the most trusting person, she just normally wasn't this upfront about it.

She was hoping that the suspicion was unwarranted and there was nothing to worry about, but at the same time she could come up with a hundred reasons to justify her suspicion. The paranoia never really left, it was always there in the back of her mind, a steady hum of possible lies, trickery, deceit, and betrayal. This was normal, it shouldn't be, but it was.

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

_{Location: 1B dorms,}

---

Drifting... she was drifting. Her thoughts intertwined and tangled, repeating over and over in her mind. A tick closer to insanity, another psychopathic train of thought in the back of her mind. An echo of a distant memory. Was it a memory? Or just a nightmare? Or a memory of a nightmare of a memory she'd pushed out of her mind long ago. Whatever it was it was resurfacing, and bringing threads of insanity with it.

She was running, running from something, people were with her, people she cared about, running from the same something. Who? Blurry faces and mingled thoughts, nothing was right, nothing was anchored, nothing was safe, not anymore. The bang of a gunshot... then fear, panic, grief, and sharp pain on her neck. Light fading, dark dissipating, nothing. This memory, or nightmare, or memory of a nightmare, had played in her head before, last night, and now tonight, she knew why. No, no, I don't remember this, I'm not going to remember this, she thought, trying to force the thoughts down.

Her hand moved instinctively to the right side of her neck, over the scar she hardly realized was there in the moment. She felt herself slipping closer to insanity, trapped in her own denial. Whether it would be temporary or not she didn't know. Maybe this time she'd drift too far, to the point of no return, that thought terrified her, but she couldn't shake it from her mind. It nagged away at her relentlessly until Kanako realized that for a moment she didn't know where she was, she didn't know what time it was, she hardly knew who she was...

The sound of a notification on her hawkpad brought Kanako back from her thoughts. She jumped, startled back from the edge, then blinked a few times. Looking around her dorm, she tried to center herself in reality again. The minute she was grounded once more in reality, the memory vanished from her mind and she found herself unable to recall it again. She reached over to the bedside table without bothering to sit up. Then turned her head to the side and read the texts from Yusuke. Her first instinct was to read between the lines and see all the ways this could be a murder plot. The lingering paranoia brought bought by the memory was still forefront in her mind. She shook her head and sat up on the bed, rereading the texts again and debunking every paranoid thought with simple logic.

After she'd beaten down the paranoia as much as possible she texted back, Okay, then closed her hawkpad and slipped out of her uniform and put on her street clothes. She was slipping her green hoodie over her head when she was interrupted by her hawkpad's notification sound again. She fixed her hoodie then looked over at the screen and saw the notification about voting for class representatives. Voting was simple enough, she'd already decided earlier who she'd vote for anyways. Mia for female Rep, and Akira for male Rep.

She sent in her votes and after voting she picked up her bag and walked out of the dorms through the halls without any particular destination. Walking gave her something to do, something to focus on besides... whatever that had been. This didn't happen often, but when it did she found that moving from one place to another helped, even if she didn't have any particular reason to walk or any particular place she was walking to.

Her plan for the night had been to flop on her bed and sleep, but sneaking off to a French restaurant sounded much more fun, and she wasn't sure sleep would be possible tonight anyways. So she had to find something to keep her busy, keep her mind off of things. Picking who to bring to sneak out was probably a good idea.

Maybe Hebi, either her or Jun, Kanako thought. She settled on asking Hebi first and focused on what Hebi's voice sounded like, down to the smallest details, pitch, tone, the subconscious and conscious ways her voice fluctuated, then used the passive form of her quirk to try and link their minds for communication. (if Hebi is within 10 meters of Kanako in any direction it succeeds) Hey, want to sneak out with me and Yusuke later tonight? We're going to a French restaurant, she thought. Her eyes shifted from their normal yellow-green to a gold-orange that had a dim glow to them like candlelight.

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

_{Location: 1B dorms,}

---

Kanako grabbed her Hawkpad and got up. She walked out of the 1B classroom confused. She couldn't figure out what exactly had just happened in class. Normally she relied on her quirk to figure out what people were thinking, and what they meant, and their motivations for things. So when she didn't have the mental energy to use her quirk, like say, when it was the day after using it to the point where it could be considered psychological torture, she was effectively socially blind to tone or social cues. Being able to read minds came with it's advantages, yes, but had it's downsides too.

She barely batted an eye as Katsuo make a show of jumping from the balcony. Meanwhile she took the sane way down and used the stairs then walked off towards the dorms. Her mind was reeling from the events in the classroom. Danzo was actually Ravens, and all the threats had been a bluff... except for the ones made by Rin, who was now under house arrest and wasn't a problem anymore, so none of her threats would come to fruition. But at the same time, she was pretty sure that Rin was on the verge of snapping, being under house arrest might not do that much to stop her if she really went rouge.

Rin... she felt off, too power hungry, too eager to escalate conflict, too much like Tama... Don't think about Tama. She pushed the thought down and kept walking. Rin was confusing, Kanako didn't know how to read her, because half the time she was bordering on psychopathic murderous insanity. If it were anyone else she would have just used her quirk and found out what she wanted to know about a person that way, but every time she'd tried to link her mind to Rin's while she was working with her in the Blackhawks, she'd gotten such an intense headache that she had to sever the link. And even if she had been able to link her mind to Rin's for more than a few seconds before the headache set in, she would've been too scared of hearing something she shouldn't have and putting herself in danger to try using her quirk on Rin. Rin seemed like the kind of person who had secrets, closely guarded, possibly dangerous, secrets.

Kanako sighed silently, the whole situation was fucking confusing. She came up on the dorms and headed to her's, trying to find something else to think about. How about the League? Try to find out what they're up to now, consider rejoining them for a bit, then hate yourself for the next few days for even having those thoughts in the first place, she thought sarcastically. This wasn't something that was too uncommon her her to do. Old habits were hard to break.

She eventually settled on thinking about the election for the class representative instead. Jun seemed like the logical choice, of course. But she and Mia were going to be roommates, and Kanako didn't want to give Mia any reason to hate her. So maybe voting for Mia was the best choice. But then again Jun was the better choice for the job. Mia seemed too rash and headstrong, compared to Jun's calm collected attitude, but if Kanako was going to be living in the same dorm as Mia she wanted to be on Mia's side as much as possible, right? That was what people here did to avoid conflict, right? Who are you to be avoiding conflict? A hypocrite with the way you were in class, and a paranoid wimp, that's who. Stop guilt tripping yourself into putting yourself in the line of fire. Just keep your head down, don't be noticeable, she thought. And with that she decided to vote for Mia.

Confused, paranoid, and with nearly everything she was thinking contradicting herself further, Kanako pushed open the door of her dorm. Her eyes darted around the room for a second to make sure everything was in order, to make sure that there wasn't someone hiding in the shadows, waiting to strike. Then when she decided everything was fine she walked over to her bed and flopped down face down in her pillow with her arms sprawled out on either side of her.

@Lewascan2

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

Kanako glanced around at the other students, most of whom were practically fuming with frustration and anger. Her posture shifted, shoulders hunching slightly and her head tipping down to make her look smaller. To her nothing could possibly be worse than being stuck in a room with a bunch of really really pissed off students.

She hadn't been paying enough attention at the start of the conflict to really know what the hell was going on. Well, she'd been listening, but just listening and actually paying attention were very different. She'd really only started paying attention after the gunshot. She had pretty much nothing to go off of from before that point, except something about Yusuke insulting the class and everything spiraling from there. Literally nothing had gone right today.

She could deal with consequences, even if she didn't know what she'd done wrong in the first place, but fine, it wasn't like the rest of the world was fair, she didn't know why she'd expected this place to be any different. What she couldn't deal with though, is being stuck in a room with the rest of the very, very, very angry class, if someone so much as said one wrong thing she knew at least two students who might just snap.

If that did happen, which wasn't likely, but still a possibility, her plan was to stay out of the way and hope she didn't get picked out as a target for whoever had snapped. Although, after her match in the sports festival she couldn't really pretend she was just some harmless mute girl anymore. Everyone knew what she was capable of, even though her quirk wasn't that flashy, it was still absolutely terrifying in every sense of the word. Staying under the radar and pretending to be a nobody might not be a viable option if push came to shove.

She decided to keep trying to keep her head down anyways. She could see so many ways this could go horribly wrong. Maybe it could be chalked up to paranoia, but knowing that a fear was irrational wouldn't stop her from being afraid anyways.

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

Kanako Seiki

---

Kanako blinked a few times as the adrenaline from after the gunshot wore off. Her demeanor shifted back to normal, or, well, normal for her, tense and jumpy. Her expression changed as well, no longer calm and collected, albeit the calm came with slight insanity. Instead she was back to being nervous, like she always was. She shook her head to clear it and her mind shifted back into sanity and reason.

She glanced at Rin and made a mental list of all the things to be careful of about her, far too eager to pull out a gun, power hungry, inconsistent with herself, probably would be swayed to the dark side if given a promise of freedom to do whatever she liked and the power to control others. She supposed she could understand the feeling of wanting power, that didn't make her any less wary of Rin though.

This whole situation had easily and undoubtedly earned Rin a place at the top of her list of people most likely to snap and become villains.

The detention was deserved, in her case at least, she hadn't even tried to help. And a month wasn't that long anyways, it was just that, a month, it'd pass quickly enough. She didn't know why she was being called to the Professor's office already though. Why? What did I do wrong? she thought. A few possibilities flashed in her mind: Not reacting to the situation with Rin right, the sports festival match, or something about her past perhaps, or maybe she was just overthinking things and it was something about dorm assignments, since Mia was also being called to the office at the same time.

She didn't know what she felt about the dorm assignments. Mia seemed... sane, at least, more so than she was for sure. But was it really a good idea to put her of all people with someone like Mia. Mia didn't really seem like the type to be that forgiving, at least not from what Kanako had seen of her. Meanwhile Kanako was messing up in literally every way possible, probably the least heroic person in the entire class, all things considered.

Either way she looked over at the professor and nodded, trying not to think that she'd already messed up somehow. She was used to people using language like Dirtblood, Nullblood, and Trueblood, it'd been common when she was growing up, so it felt normal to her. Even if she didn't use those terms herself she didn't even give it a second thought when others did, until she saw how everyone else reacted. So that isn't a normal thing to say here, good to know.

Mawatari, Mamushi, Himura, and Yuzuki, were all being exempted from the detention. Lucky, she thought. But then Jun turned down the exemption and Kanako was utterly baffled as to why she would do that.

She looked at Jun with a curious gaze, why would she want detention when she was being given a free pass? I guess that's the heroic thing to do, maybe. But still, a chance to skip detention, and she's just... throwing it away, she thought. She knew she wouldn't have done the same if she were given the chance to skip detention.

Just Another Hero [Invite-Only]

There was something almost funny about the situation at hand. The jerk on the ground, completely incapacitated, the second year being challenged by the punk, and heterochromat over there walking in on the aftermath. Kanako would have laughed, if she'd had a voice in the first place. But instead she just watched it all play out, still smiling, although for once it was a genuine smile and not just a mask. She looked a lot less like the nervous, jumpy, hero in training, and a lot more like the villain she used to be.

The reasonable side of her mind was telling her to get up, do something, help, be a Hero, or some shit. But the much louder part was saying that, hey, this could be fun to watch, and besides, it wasn't like he was dead or anything. And the rest of the class had things handled, they'd already taken Yusuke to the nurse.

The change in her mind had occurred right after the gun went off, before that point she'd been thinking clearly, now telling right from wrong was just as difficult as trying to pick up and reposition a skyscraper. Something like this had only happened once, morals being muddled by something that reminded her of her earlier years in life. It had happened during the Sports Festival VS matches. She'd almost killed her opponent, a kid from class 1A, then forfeited the match after her reason returned.