Chapter ten: The Box, The Bear, and The Burden of Promise
Time passed quickly for (Suzuki) as he waited for the acceptance letter—or the rejection letter.
In either case, he had a big problem brewing in his mind, a persistent, nagging thought that liked to whisper to him during the quiet hours of tinkering.
The idea of being rejected, of not entering the academy, seemed absurd on the surface, but the whisper had a point.
Why did he choose to become a hero? For money.
So, why not join the Support Department and sell his inventions? Wouldn't that be safer?
Furthermore, he would get money.
Why don't I just go to the Support Department and get money easily while sitting in a room working on machines?
The answer (Suzuki) arrived at whenever he pondered this matter was something simple, yet immovable.
He couldn't do that.
First, the idea of being useless in such a world—a world brimming with superpowers, monsters, and villains—and being just a person working behind the scenes to help the heroes... how could anyone tolerate that?
Especially since he still remembered, or at least felt, the emotions of the original (Saito Suzuki).
These emotions pushed him towards becoming a hero.
He hadn't stopped them or tried to suppress them.
They were, in a way, helpful to him.
They increased his ambition.
The will of the little boy who lost his parents and wanted to become a hero was something that contributed to building his own willpower.
In the end, how could a person who was 28 years old in his previous life start studying with such seriousness?
Not just that, but train his body with maximum focus, plus avoid being immersed in any kind of distraction?
The answer was simple, and (Suzuki) understood it.
His body worked autonomously on training. It wanted to become a hero.
And after realizing that, he didn't mind either.
He also wanted to become a hero.
He wanted that fame, those admiring looks.
And he wouldn't be able to get those looks unless he became a real hero.
It was true he was still no saint like (Izuku Midoriya), who would sacrifice himself for anyone.
But he would pretend that he would.
---
In (Suzuki)'s room, the air was thick with the smell of soldering iron, ozone, and mild desperation.
Tsssss-tink. Click-whirr.
He was repairing his reinforced gauntlets and the retractable grapple lines connected to his acceleration boots.
He looked at those parts, which were slightly broken from overuse during the exam.
He couldn't help but frown, and at the same time, he muttered under his breath, almost maniacally, about how to fix these things.
He didn't have enough money to buy many new parts.
He had literally used parts from junkyards, plus a lot of dealings and selling while fixing some things for neighbors to secure enough money to build this gear.
And it was just a modest set of tools.
The device that allowed him to skate at high speed and increase his velocity.
The gauntlets that allowed a slight amplification of his muscular strength.
This equipment, plus some explosive, electromagnetic, and smoke grenades, and tear gas pellets... this was literally his arsenal.
And it was very simple.
But it was effective if used well.
Even the weakest blow can shatter a rock if it hits the right spot, and he used this concept to make these tools effective.
The problem was, "the right spot" was often occupied by several tons of hostile metal or muscle, and his tools bore the brunt of finding it.
A small spring from a grapple mechanism sproinged out of its housing and rolled across his workbench with a pathetic pitter-patter... plink before falling to the floor.
He sighed, a long, weary exhalation that fogged the lens of the protective goggles perched on his forehead.
---
Downstairs, in the modest, sunlit living room of the (Suzuki) home, the doorbell rang.
Ding-dong.
The sound was cheerful, innocuous, and utterly terrifying to the one person who heard it.
(Hana Suzuki), the 60-year-old grandmother, moved from the kitchen, wiping her hands on a floral-print apron.
The shuffle-shuffle of her house slippers on the wooden floor was a slow, anxious rhythm.
She reached the door, peered through the peephole, and her heart, already a fragile thing where her grandson was concerned, gave a painful little thump.
She opened the door.
There was a courier with a tablet for a signature—a scratch-scratch of stylus on screen—and then he handed her a package.
A very specific, thick, official-looking envelope nestled inside a sturdy cardboard box.
The UA seal was emblazoned on the side.
It felt heavy in her hands. Not physically, but existentially.
She thanked the courier with a voice that sounded tinny to her own ears and closed the door with a soft but final click.
She stood in the entryway for a long moment, just holding the box, staring at it as if it were a sleeping viper.
(Suzuki), upstairs, engrossed in coaxing life back into a stubborn actuator with a series of tap-tap-taps from a micro-hammer, couldn't hear the door.
If he had, he would have descended at a speed that would have warranted use of his half-repaired boots.
(Hana) walked to the dining table, her steps slow, and placed the box on the polished wood with a soft thud.
She looked at it for a full minute without speaking.
Her gaze, behind her practical glasses, was unreadable.
Then she looked toward the ceiling, towards the room of her grandson.
A room that constantly hummed, whirred, and occasionally emitted a small pop or a curse in a teenage monotone.
She thought one thing, a thought worn smooth from six years of repetition:
"I just hope he doesn't succeed in becoming a hero."
She said it as if wishing upon a star in a world that had long stopped granting such benign wishes.
Her grandson had changed since his family died.
He focused only on one thing: becoming a hero.
He had put in the effort.
He had always gotten good grades in school—that, to (Hana), was a good thing.
But to her, her grandson had also found no friends.
He had no friends. Literally none.
He would return from school and immediately start making those sounds, as if he were building something.
He would always go out and come back with loads of old gadgets and do things in his room.
She had gone once to check and saw him building some things.
When she asked him what he was doing, he answered and said he was building things to allow himself to become a hero.
Those words from the small boy had made (Hana)'s heart ache terribly.
She didn't want her grandson to lose his life for something as silly as being a hero.
What had the heroes done?
They had allowed a villain to kill her son and his wife, making her grandchild an orphan.
Was this her grandson's future? To become that kind of hero?
---
After this, she thought of one thing.
What if I hide this letter and pretend it never came?
The thought was a dark, tempting little cloud.
But what if he wasn't accepted in the first place?
Could her grandson even become a hero without a Quirk?
She herself was Quirkless.
It was something hereditary.
Her husband had possessed a Quirk, but it was very weak.
Her son had one, and even her daughter-in-law.
But when (Saito) was born and had no Quirk, she had felt a kind of relief.
Especially since her grandson, like her, didn't possess a special or dangerous Quirk.
But his desire to become a hero was immense.
"I'll deal with it now. All I have to do is lose this letter. Then I'll see that my grandson won't become a hero. It's impossible for someone to enter that academy without a Quirk."
Convincing herself was very easy for her, especially since she had seen many people who wanted to become heroes but didn't succeed, even with distinguished Quirks.
How would her grandson succeed using only tools scavenged from junk piles?
---
Creak.
The door to the second floor opened abruptly.
(Saito) came out, frowning.
His face was slightly blackened with smoke from adjusting the reinforcement mechanisms in his glove.
A faint smell of burnt wiring and stubborn hope followed him.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
He descended the stairs, his mind still running calculations on tensile strength.
When he reached the downstairs area, however, he froze.
He recognized that box on the table immediately.
It sat there, pristine and accusatory.
His grandmother was staring at it, and then she sighed, a sound like rustling leaves.
"The academy's letter has arrived, (Saito). You can look at it, dear."
She said it with affection, a forced warmth that didn't quite reach her eyes.
But (Suzuki) was able to see that she wished for him to fail.
That didn't upset him.
In the end, he understood his grandmother after six years of living with her in the same place.
He knew she was a very kind woman.
She just didn't want her grandson to lose his life.
But at the same time, he couldn't fulfill what she wanted.
He wanted to become a hero and get the fame, the money, and the opportunities he couldn't obtain in his previous life.
All these things… he couldn't lose them.
He couldn't let himself be filled with regret like he was in his past life.
This was just a new chance at a life that could be filled with things he could never have dreamed of in his past life.
So, (Saito) walked over, the floorboards letting out a soft groan under his weight.
He sat on the wooden chair, the old wood creaking in familiar protest.
He looked at the box.
His hands, calloused and stained with grease, were steady.
He pressed a latch and opened the box with a definitive snick.
At that moment, a holographic projection appeared directly in front of them.
(Hana), who had been hovering nearby, also looked at the shape that appeared, which resembled a small white bear or a large mouse.
(Suzuki) recognized this shape.
After all, he was very famous as the principal of the hero academy, (Nezu).
---
After the hologram appeared, the message activated.
(Nezu) spoke, his voice calm, measured, and carrying an odd, knowing warmth.
"It is truly an honor to meet you, (Saito Suzuki). You were magnificent."
(Saito)'s eyes were fixed on that mouse-bear-canine shape with an intensity that bordered on madness.
On the other hand, his grandmother was also looking at the shape on the hologram with a great, desperate hope, as if she were saying, "Tell him he won't become a hero."
This hope in her mind made her eyes, behind her glasses, seem to dim.
But it seemed the eyes of (Nezu)—or rather, the pre-recorded hologram programmed with unsettling perceptiveness—lit up with a different inflection.
"You don't possess a Quirk. And yet, you proved you are better than anyone else in your intelligence, in your sheer desire to become a hero, and in your ability to do what no one else does: to sacrifice for others and help those in need."
Several clips appeared in front of them.
(Hana)'s eyes widened.
She saw her grandson saving many other youths at the exam site.
She saw him grabbing a girl and leaping away just as a giant robot's fist nearly crushed them.
Her heart almost stopped when she saw him on the video doing something insane, like walking into the sky while running on the robot's body in a way that seemed to defy basic physics.
But that didn't mean (Nezu) had stopped.
After pausing the display of these scenes, the hologram looked toward (Suzuki).
This pre-recorded message possessed a special kind of intelligence, a perfect simulation of attention.
"It is my honor to invite you to UA Academy as one of the finest students I could hope to acquire, (Saito Suzuki). Welcome to the Hero Course."
---
When the hologram disappeared, dissolving into motes of light with a soft fizz-pop, the silence it left behind was absolute.
(Hana) was sitting, tears streaming from her eyes, looking at her grandson with disbelief.
How had her grandson managed to do all that? Without a Quirk? Without a power?
Had he managed to enter the UA Hero Academy, the best academy in Japan?
(Suzuki), who had also finished watching the message, felt his mind flood with relief, with satisfaction.
At the same time, he couldn't help but feel a strange emotion as he looked at his grandmother's eyes, which were crying without stopping.
He stood up, the chair scraping back with a screech.
He walked around the table, his steps slow and deliberate on the creaky floor.
He reached her.
Then, with a slow but gentle motion, he hugged her while she cried.
Her shoulders shook with silent, decades-old grief and fresh, shocking pride.
He said, his voice softer than she'd heard it in years, muffled slightly by her apron:
"Grandma, I promise you that nothing will happen to me. I want to become a hero. I want to change the outcomes that could make other people end up like me."
And in his heart, he was saying: Grandma, this was my dream. I admit I'm selfish for wanting to do this and not telling you the whole truth. But I want to be famous. There's something telling me I'm better off becoming a hero, or else I'll just always be in the background.
"But you could die," she whispered into his shoulder, her voice cracking.
She hugged (Suzuki)'s body while she cried, little by little, still not believing her grandson had succeeded.
And at the same time, she could no longer object.
Her grandson had done it.
He had joined the best academy in Japan.
She no longer had any chance to protest.
She had never tried to help him in his dream.
But she wouldn't stand in the way of the dream he had worked so hard to achieve.
The box sat empty on the table.
The hologram was gone.
But the promise, heavy and fragile as the old house around them, now hung in the air between them, as tangible as the smell of smoke on his clothes and the salt of her tears.
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End of Chapter.
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📝 To the Valiant Readers,
I wanted this chapter to be nice and also to justify some things, guys, especially Saito's desire to become a hero rather than an assistant
In addition to some family atmosphere, if you find a problem in this class or in my language, I hope you will tell me