Bab 35: Chapter 34: You can't see me!
~Kotaro Hakari~
Well, the sports festival didn't seem to be changed from canon, in a few days the UA Sports Festival would start and everyone was hyped in the class. Especially Ochako for some reason I didn't remember. She even had a murderous look in her eyes. Honestly, her quirk was a bit scary if applied properly. Even if it was completely useless against me with Gravity Jail.
Regardless, Aizawa, being the lack of a teacher he was decided to give us the words of wisdom "The sports festival is coming up so go train." and decided to cancel classes so we could go train and more so that he could sleep in peace.
It didn't really matter to me though, I was still trying to regain my full strength by slowly warming my body up. My recovery was going well thanks to Regeneration finally reaching Uncommon in rank getting a noticeable boost in how fast and thorough it was. So I could finally spend my gene refinement uses on other things. Of course, I already used it on regeneration for it to start working slowly toward Uncommon+. So what ability would I put to refinement other than Gene Refinement and Regeneration?
Nothing particularly interested me in my ability page. I had a lot of abilities but I made a personal choice of focusing on a few. I did not have the time, patience or resources to build up all of my abilities. Better a master of few than a novice of many.
As I was thinking about how to use my abilities while gravitating toward a vending machine to grab a quick snack or 30. Due to regeneration my calorie intake needed to be immensely increased. Toga and Ochako weren't with me since they decided to train together after Ochako showed interest in CqC.
I could have taught her myself but Toga was a better pick for Ochako. My fighting style was centred around heavy strikes and grapples to cripple the enemy which definitely didn't suit Ochako. It was difficult for me to fight without aiming to cripple.
But before I was able to punch some numbers in and get my desired snacks out I heard a patter of footsteps approach me, by the weight distribution of them probably a girl my age.
Giving up on my beverage I turned to see a disembodied uniform walking at a brisk pace and waving its arm at me before speaking in a cute and pleasant voice. Toru if I remember correctly.
"Hey! Hakari-kun! I am so~ glad I finally found you. You are like a ghost these days, even harder to find than me." I gave her a short smile at her joke before punching in some numbers to grab a black coffee.
"Yo, Hagakure-san, how'r you? What did you need?" Hagakure walked over to me before standing awfully close, it felt really weird to be able to see the straps of her bra from the inside of her uniform from the headhole.
"Yeah, I'm good. Say, Hakari-kun, I heard you offer to train anyone who asks, Mina-chan told me how g-good you were." Why the stutter? "And since you have so many quirks I thought why not ask you? Maybe you had a quirk that worked like mine and I could get some... advice you know?"
Hmm, her worries sound a lot more than that. I made a noise of affirmation and motioned for her to follow me.
" 'ya sound worried. What's wrong? I'm all ears. Don' worry about me judging you or anythin'." That made her flinch a little before she took a less confident posture that showed more vulnerability.
"Was I that obvious? Oof, I really am a mess aren't I?" I shook my head.
"Not really, I'm more a monster than human at this point, I can just tell these things better due to my enhanced senses." And prior experience.
"Yeah, I won't hide since you already found me out instantly. I am just... worried. My quirk just isn't suited for these kinds of things, I barely passed the exam because the robots couldn't see me. I am afraid I just won't stand out at the sports festival or, well, ever." I just stood silent and let her vent to me without interruption.
"It's a bit... well, embarrassing to admit, but I joined the hero course because I wanted to be recognized and be known. I often felt ignored and in the background, because I am invisible and all. I just wanted to stand out at first, it may sound selfish but I wanted to be seen by others. I don't want to just fade into the background. So I thought, why not ask you for help? I am really sorry if that sounds like too much. I may have spoken a bit too much ehe." Toga looked embarrassed as I finally gave my answer-
"Well, nothing wrong with wanting to stand out, I can't say I relate to ya but I can understand." Living with invisibility you can't turn off would of course give you a bunch of grief growing up, especially if you are a girl instead of a boy.
"And, while I might not have an invisibility ability like you Hagakure-san, I can train you. Though, I wanted to know about your quirk a bit first. How's it even work? Can you turn it off?" Toru crossed her arms.
"Yay! thank you so much Hakari-kun! I won't disappoint. As for your question, unfortunately not, my quirk works like a film over my body, apparently less than a millimetre above my skin that bends light around it according to the specialists. I can't ever turn it off, ever since I was born I was like this." I grimaced. Holy shit that must have been awful, unless she was doing hero work it would be almost exclusively be a demerit.
"Yeesh, that sounds fuckin' awful, my condolences." We had reached outside and were walking to my usual training ground Toru groaned.
"Yeah, it makes things so hard, I had to learn how to cut my own hair since the hairdressers couldn't see my hair. I like being a hero but being invisible just really gets to you sometimes." I nodded in sympathy.
Hmm, I probably could fix her quirk right? What am I talking about, of course it can, Gene Refinement is an epic ranked ability, it can fix basically any genetics-related problem.
"I see, want me to fix your quirk?" Toru stopped dead in place and looked at me as if I had grown another head.
"...What?"
"As I said, I have a quirk, 's called Gene Refinement, it allows me to upgrade quirks and choose which way I can upgrade them, I am pretty sure I can add an on & off switch to your quirk if you wa-"
Toru moved so fast I barely saw her before she grabbed my collar and leaned in, taking me by surprise.
"Really!? You aren't joking right Hakari-kun? If you are joking I am going to hit you really hard you know?" I couldn't see her eyes but her voice conveyed her desperation enough. She was like a man in the desert who found an oasis in the distance.
"Is that a yes?"
⚀—⚁⚂⚃—⚄—•⚅•—⚄—⚃⚂⚁—⚀
It had taken a bit for me to convince Toru that, yes, I could in fact give her an off-button and yes, I would do it for her. She was literally vibrating from excitement, I would have to be one evil motherfucker to retract my statement after seeing that.
But before I upgraded Toru I decided to be smart and called Nezu beforehand to get the okay to use Gene Refinement on Toru since I am pretty sure gene alteration on someone with a quirk without any license or qualification was highly illegal, to say the least.
Thankfully, Nezu gave me the go-ahead, he was quite influential in the government and in truth, if my quirk was discovered instead of being sent to jail I would probably be used as a government resource instead.
I mean, they could try to do what they did to Nagant to me but I could easily go full S-Class threat on their asses. You do not fuck with the guy that can turn any living thing into a dinosaur and make it spread harder than the strongest viruses.
Zombie Outbreak? Slow, clumsy, and dumb, they infect through bites but they are easy to take care of.
Dinasour Outbreak? Faster and stronger than the average person with predator and hunter instincts, can also spread through bite but... well, I could create fly-sized flying dinosaurs and flea-sized dinosaurs. Good luck defending against an infection like that.
Potentially dooming the entire humanity and turning it into my own dinosaur sovereignty aside, me and Toru were in the private room of the the training ground I frequented. She looked both nervous and at the same time excited, she practically vibrated in place in anticipation.
"So, Hakari-kun, how do we do this exactly? Do you need me to do anything? Will it hurt? Will-" I put a hand on the nervous Toru's shoulder to calm her down.
"Calm down Toru, don't worry, I'll be as gentle as I can. Just trust me ok?" I gave her a confident smile that made her jump in place, probably blushing if I could see her.
"O-okay, please do so Hakari-kun! I will trust you!"
I nodded and put my hand on Toru's soft cheeks and rubbed it gently while swapping into Gene Refinement. Toru stood stiff while I activated it.
___/Choose Refinement\___
[Muffle: The film around the skin can also absorb sound to some degree to even further hide the user]
[Toggle: The user can freely swap between between their invisible and visible state]
[Cloak: The user can extend their invisibility field to objects in close proximity]
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I won't even bother to read Toru the options available to her. I just simply picked Toggle as her genetic structure started refining using my energy, I felt my energy drain which was unpleasant considering it was still strained from trying and gradually healing myself.
"Notice a change?" I gave Toru a light smile while regulating my breathing. Toru looked at me with wonder before suddenly as if a switch was flipped her invisibility was turned off, exposing her body.
Toru looked at her hands in wonder, grabbing a flock of her hair and inspecting the colours in sheer amazement and childlike wonder. After a full few minutes, her focus went back to me as she flushed and looked at my face, before shying away and grabbing a few locks of her hair and covering her face with them.
Holy fuck she was adorable.
"Wow, this is incredible, I can't believe it. S-so, Hakari-kun? H-how do I look to you?" The normally confident Hagakure was acting shy after being seen but I just stood still and took her in.
She was one of the cutest girls I have ever seen, and that list included Toga. She had yellow-green hair that looked like a gradient with pink parts of it, it was really pretty. She had bushy eyelashes the same colour as her hair and her big eyes were almost mystical, they had a similar gradient to her hair, but more colourful, with an inner yellow layer that faded to a green outer layer.
"Hakari-kun?" Toru got closer to me as I hadn't responded in a while.
I snapped out of it and scratched the back of my head.
"Oh yeah, uh. I was kinda lost in your beauty there. I can kinda see why you had invisibility, would have been kind of unfair to the other girls with competition like this." It took Toru a second for my words to sink in before blushing up to her ears but also having a massive smile.
"W-wow, you really think I am that pretty? T-then could you lean down for a second? You have done so much for me so I wanted to r-reward you, yeah." I listened to her stuttering words and leaned down before Toru gave me a quick peck on the lips with her own soft ones. She quickly backed off while I stood a bit stunned. I didn't expect her to be so straightforward.
Toru, seeing my reaction seemingly gained her confidence back as she leaned to the side and clasped her hands behind her back then grinned at me even while blushing. Her smile was almost teasing but incredibly hopeful and happy at the same time.
"I hope you enjoyed that k-kiss, Hakari-kun. It was my first. But seeing your reaction it was totally worth it. But really, thank you so much Hakari-kun. I don't know how I can ever repay you. T-there maybe even more where that came from i-if you play your cards right y-you know?" Toru said while averting her gaze and fiddling with her fingers.
Damn.
"If you really wanna repay me could we please train with your hero costume on?" I said earnestly as Toru blushed like mad and slapped my shoulder.
"Pfft, no way!" Toru seemed to have taken my words as a joke but upon seeing my completely and utterly devasted expression as my dreams and ambitions were ruthlessly crushed and shattered by her she blushed and looked away before muttering in a barely audible voice.
"...Maybe?"
I'll take that victory.
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Feat Achieved! Fix Toru's quirk +1 Gold Random Gacha Ticket
Feat Achieved! Make Toru Hagakure have a crush on you +1 Silver Random Gacha Ticket
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A/N: Toru gets her own chapter because I am prone to getting carried away. She was basically a blank slate in the Anime/Manga so I decided to give her some extra backstory and motivation for why she decided she wanted to be a hero even with such a disadvantageous quirk. Did you guys like the little extra details I added to Toru to try and flesh her out a little?
It was obvious that Toru fell for the handsome classmate whom she already hung out with that is willing to listen to her problems and even solved her biggest problem. She won't immediately jump his bones but that doesn't mean she is unwilling to. But you can bet she will be getting much more screen time now, definitely not because I am biased and love her design.
What did you guys think about the chapter and Toru? Your comments help inspire and motivate me to write more.
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