Moriyama had a quiet funeral, attended by almost everyone in the village.
With the average age of the villagers being in their fifties and above, his passing—while mourned—felt more like an extension of an inevitability they had all learned to accept.
Explaining Moriyama's death to Nejire had been… uncomfortable.
Trying to phrase it as him having gone to a faraway place he wouldn't be returning from only went so far, but thankfully her parents had already sat her down and talked to her about separation in their own way.
While Nejire seemed to understand(or at least looked like she did), being so young, the meaning of an indefinite parting wasn't fully registered in her head.
Not long after the funeral, she returned to her usual self.
Loss was painful, but time really was the best healer.
After all, summer vacation had only just begun.
Nejire had followed through with her inner promise, not giving Isshun a single chance to rest.
Every morning, before Isshun could even properly register that it was daytime, Nejire—who seemed to have an internal clock far more reliable than any average college student's—would shake him awake with limitless energy.
Unfortunately, Isshun could almost never get a good night's sleep.
With the unexpected guests staying over at the Hado household, there simply weren't enough rooms. The house only had three bedrooms and a single guest room.
While the Shunkan family had been perfectly fine with all three of them sharing one room, Nejire had firmly—and loudly—disagreed.
In the end, entirely due to Nejire's insistence, she and Isshun ended up sleeping in the same guest room.
Which meant Isshun had to endure her rather… unfortunate sleeping habits.
Waking up in the middle of the night without a single blanket—despite them sleeping on completely separate futons—was only the beginning.
On another night, he found himself actively suffocating, Nejire having somehow twisted herself into a loose chokehold in her sleep.
That had been his final straw.
"I refuse to sleep with that woman any longer."
Isshun complained to Kako while she and Genzai helped Shiori prepare breakfast.
Kako merely looked at him with amusement, casually handing a washed bell pepper to Genzai to cut.
"Why not?" she asked, smiling.
Isshun raised an eyebrow, utterly incredulous.
"Why not? Just look at the past few days!" he protested. "I wake up with no blankets, and this morning I almost died from being strangled in my sleep!"
Kako and Genzai both chuckled, and Genzai shrugged. "Shun-kun, can't you be the bigger person?"
"Bigger person?" Isshun echoed flatly. "No. Nejire is obviously the bigger person. Maybe a little too big."
He gestured with his eyes toward the living room.
Nejire was sitting in front of the TV, completely engrossed in a local hero-versus-villain battle taking place in Akita City. She was happily munching on the strawberries Shiori had set out, her cheeks puffed out as she ate.
As if she could feel Isshun looking at her, Nejire turned and met his gaze, immediately lighting up. She waved enthusiastically and patted the spot beside her.
Isshun expression settled into a grimace.
He'd only managed to escape earlier by claiming he needed to use the restroom, using the opportunity to complain to Kako instead.
"See?" he said.
That earned him nothing but fond smiles from the adults in the kitchen.
Why is it that every time I try to complain, I get that look? Isshun thought irritably.
"Well, don't worry too much, Shun-kun," Shiori chuckled, placing another bowl of strawberries into his hands. "Maybe Nejire-chan's just excited that she gets to play with you all day. She'll probably calm down soon."
"...Is that so?"
Isshun didn't get the chance to say anything else before Nejire grabbed his wrist and dragged him back to the TV.
He gave up almost immediately.
Thankfully, Shiori turned out to be right. Even a hyperactive child like Nejire couldn't go Plus Ultra for weeks on end.
So instead of constantly running around the village, Isshun and Nejire spent the rest of their days helping the Hado family with their strawberry fields and other farms in the village.
With his teleportation Quirk, Isshun was greatly appreciated throughout the village, a fact that didn't surprise him in the slightest.
By the time summer break ended, the Shunkan family returned home with enough strawberries and vegetables to last them quite a while.
--<>--
After that summer break, nothing particularly important happened.
Elementary school was as boring as ever.
If anything had changed, it was Isshun himself.
He began experimenting with different ways to increase his computational abilities—pushing his mind the same way others trained their Quirks.
Instead of letting his computational ability passively grow, maybe actively utilizing his computational abilities would help in increasing his computational abilities.
He studied new languages while solving advanced math problems, all while memorizing human anatomy, forcing his brain to multitask under constant strain.
Still, for a long time, life remained uneventful.
If there was one notable discovery, it was that Isshun could "artificially" increase the effective distance of both his Teleportation and Omniscient Domain.
For context, both Isshun's and Genzai's bodies were built differently from most people's.
Enhanced senses meant denser, more numerous nerves throughout their bodies.
One side effect of this was slow hair growth.
Extremely slow.
His hair never shed either.
Isshun hadn't actually noticed this until Genzai pointed it out.
Lacking confidence in choosing a hairstyle, Isshun hadn't cut a single strand of hair since he was born—and even then, it only reached his armpits.
He had already decided that he wouldn't touch it unless he was one hundred percent sure he wouldn't regret it.
Unfortunately, Isshun had a devil's advocate for a friend.
After hearing him complain several times about his bangs blocking his vision, Nejire enthusiastically volunteered to cut them for him.
Well… the rest was history.
Surprisingly, it didn't look half bad.
Unfortunately, both of them were scolded by both sets of parents that day.
Isshun, thinking it would be a waste to throw away hair that took forever to grow, stuffed it into a plastic bag.
Imagine his surprise when he went to school the next day and instinctively knew where that bag was and the area around that bag.
After some experimentation, Isshun realized that if enough of his DNA was concentrated in one location, it acted like a marker, kind of like a small Omniscient Domain separate from the one centered on himself.
That discovery surprised him, but it was a pleasant one.
The radius of the smaller Domain was only about two meters, but it was enough to bypass the distance limit of his Teleportation.
Still, as interesting as it was, Isshun couldn't be bothered to investigate further if it meant cutting more of his hair.
Lying down on his bed after deciding to revisit the issue only once he settled on a proper hairstyle, he sighed—then immediately sat back up.
When he opened the curtains, instead of the usual bright, energetic face of Nejire, he was met with something different.
She looked… sad.
Nejire accurately tossed the Blueberry Vanilla Phone Mk.109 into Isshun's hands—three years of experience showing in the throw.
When Isshun raised the cup to his ear, an uncharacteristically quiet voice came through.
"Shun-chan…" Nejire said softly. "I think… I might be moving away when I graduate."
--<>--
A/N: Just in case ages are a bit confusing. Isshun is now in 4th grade and Nejire is in 6th, so she's going to graduate elementary school soon.
Also, i saw some comments about the leap in logic. Idk why but when i was writing i thought it made sense, but looking at the comments i lowkey saw how shortsighted i was.
I said ua would start by chap 30, but my chapters are shorter than i thought. There's two mini arcs im planning before ua, so maybe chap 30 is a little too soon. sry about that.
More characters will be introduced though so it'll not be boring(i hope). But for now, the Childhood arc is done! there'll be an interlude chap from Nejire's POV and then Pre-Adolescence will start!
Thanks for reading!
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A/N: Also im really happy that there's an influx of new original mha fanfics recently, i havent read much, but it's filling up my library!
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2200PS - Complete
4500PS - Complete