The interruption came without warning.
Every screen—public billboards, transit displays, shop monitors—cut to the same image at once. Static flared. Then color stabilized. A deep, confident voice filled the air, layered with the unmistakable weight of authority and reassurance.
"—This just in. A foreign pro hero has officially entered Japanese territory. Known internationally as—"
The image sharpened.
A towering figure stood amid wreckage, cape billowing like a banner against the smoke. Blond hair caught the light. Broad shoulders blocked the devastation behind him as if his very presence refused to let despair pass.
"ALL MIGHT."
Musutafu exhaled.
Not loudly. Not all at once.
But collectively.
Like a city that had been holding its breath for months without realizing it.
---
The news didn't stop.
It surged.
[ALL MIGHT APPREHENDS SEVEN HIGH-RISK VILLAINS IN ONE DAY]
[CORRUPT HERO TASK FORCE DISBANDED—INTERNAL ARRESTS CONFIRMED]
[HOSTAGE CRISIS RESOLVED—NO CASUALTIES]
[COASTAL FAULT DISASTER PREVENTED—ALL MIGHT INTERVENES]
Clips followed one after another. No jump cuts. No missing footage. No static.
A collapsing bridge held up by a single man's hands.
A burning high-rise evacuated in minutes.
Villains bound, unconscious, alive.
Always the same ending.
A smile.
Wide. Unbreakable. Almost absurdly bright.
Children pointed at the screens. People laughed—not nervously, not in disbelief, but with something dangerously close to relief. Strangers spoke to one another without whispering.
Fear didn't vanish.
But it loosened its grip.
---
Tensei Iida stood alone in his apartment, still in civilian clothes, helmet resting on the table like an artifact from another life.
He hadn't realized he was smiling until his jaw began to ache.
"So this is…" he murmured. "This is what it looks like."
He replayed a clip—All Might lifting a bus pinned beneath debris while trapped civilians scrambled free beneath him. No hesitation. No calculation. No judgment.
Just action.
Tensei felt something warm settle in his chest. A feeling he hadn't allowed himself since before Shinmei. Before Delta.
"This isn't fear," he thought. "This isn't silence."
The city wasn't quiet.
It was alive.
People cheered when All Might appeared. They ran toward the danger instead of away from it, trusting that someone was already there to hold the line.
Delta had brought order.
But All Might brought hope.
And hope… hope didn't leave corpses behind.
Tensei clenched his fists, then slowly relaxed them.
"I wanted to believe this was still possible," he thought. "I just didn't know if I was naïve."
For the first time in weeks, sleep came easily that night.
---
Far beneath the city, where forgotten tunnels intersected with abandoned infrastructure, Jetsling Beroba watched the same broadcast through a cracked monitor.
He said nothing.
The Delta Driver lay on the table beside him, inert. Silent. For once, it didn't feel like it was waiting.
He rewound the footage. Slowed it frame by frame.
"All Might," Jetsling murmured.
He didn't analyze the man's power first.
He analyzed the aftermath.
Crime alerts dropped across the city—not because villains had been eliminated, but because they withdrew. Syndicates went dark. Corrupt officials turned themselves in before someone else did.
Fear didn't push them.
Expectation did.
Jetsling leaned back, eyes half-lidded.
"So that's your strength," he thought. "You don't chase monsters. You make them believe there's nowhere left to hide."
He pulled up his own map.
Red markers still pulsed faintly—targets he'd marked long ago. Names tied to rot that hadn't yet surfaced. Systems that would take months, years, to dismantle quietly.
One by one, he deactivated them.
The map dimmed.
"You don't need me anymore," he admitted silently.
The realization didn't sting the way he'd expected.
It felt… correct.
Jetsling remembered the boy in the lab. The one who'd said Delta wasn't real. Just a story.
Stories were meant to end.
Or pass the torch.
"People don't need a shadow," Jetsling thought, standing slowly, "when they can finally walk in the sun."
He picked up the Delta Driver.
For a moment, his grip tightened—old instincts flaring. The war wasn't over. Corruption never truly died.
But wars weren't won by fighting forever.
He set the belt down.
Carefully.
Deliberately.
"I'll step back," he decided. "Watch. Learn. Let the world breathe."
The system window did not appear.
No level-up. No prompt.
Just silence.
And for the first time, that silence felt earned.
---
Days passed.
All Might's presence reshaped the city's rhythm. Patrols moved with confidence again. Whistleblowers came forward. Files long sealed were reopened under public scrutiny.
The Hero Commission scrambled—not to suppress, but to keep up.
And somewhere between the noise, a quiet truth emerged:
Justice didn't have to hide.
---
On a hill overlooking the city, Jetsling stood in civilian clothes, hands in his pockets, watching All Might land amid cheers below.
The smile was real.
That mattered.
"I was never meant to replace you," Jetsling thought. "Just to hold the line until you arrived."
His gaze shifted—not to the battlefield, but to a distant school campus.
U.A. High School.
Normal Course.
A place where no one expected monsters or saviors.
Just students.
Just futures.
Jetsling exhaled slowly.
"The hunt ends here," he decided. "This chapter closes."
He turned away from the city, walking toward something quieter.
Something ordinary.
And for the first time since his rebirth, Jetsling Beroba allowed himself to believe—
That maybe, just maybe—
Being human again was the hardest mission of all.