Chapter Text
It ought to have been easy.
Bakugo Katsuki was the best of the best. He had the coolest powers, and unlike those other losers, the determination to use them. Sure, he was saddled with dead weight in the form of an annoying friend with no powers who somehow deluded himself into thinking that he could be a hero. That’s why Bakugo was so quick to put him down, to remind him of his powerlessness: if he didn’t act sensibly, he would get hurt or killed.
So it was terribly ironic, in a sense, that Bakugo was the one suffocating here.
Wave after wave of green slime seemed to pour at him from all sides.
If… if Deku’s hero was here, he would give that cheesy line, “I am here!”
But All Might was not here.
Bakugo squirmed more, and tried to accumulate his sweat to explode. It was no use. The never-ending slime washed it all away.
His vision was going dark.
Bakugo kicked and struggled. None of it was any use against a giant slime monster.
Bakugo’s soul… drifted.
A hallucination? He felt the sensation of separating from his body, of going someplace… else.
BAKUGO KATSUKI. YOU HAVE DIED WITHOUT ACCOMPLISHING ANYTHING AS A HERO.
“Tsk. Don’t rub it in, shithead. Who are you, anyway?”
WE ARE THE NEVERBORN. BEFORE TIME WAS, WE WERE. BEFORE THE HUMAN RACE WAS, WE WERE. YOU ARE ABOUT TO DIE AND ENTER OUR DOMAIN, THE LANDS OF THE DEAD. BEFORE THAT HAPPENS, WE OFFER YOU A CHOICE.
“Wait, so you’re like Enma Dai-Oh?” The King of the Dead was a popular figure in Japanese mythology that had translated into pop culture. Sometimes rendered as a stern, bearded figure in formal robes, and sometimes ironically stylized as a small child, he was instantly recognizable to almost anyone who had seen anime.
WE ARE FAR GREATER THAN THE ONE YOU SPEAK OF.
“Oh yeah, well if you’re so great, why don’t you return me to life?”
THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT WE BROUGHT YOU HERE TO DISCUSS. SERVE US, BAKUGO KATSUKI. GIVE UP YOUR NAME AND PAST LIFE, AND SWEAR FEALTY TO US.
“Serve you? I ain’t got time for that, I’m gonna be a hero!”
YOU WILL BE DEAD IF WE DO NOT INTERVENE.
“What? No! Heroes will come.”
YOUR BODY IS ALREADY DEAD. ONLY OUR POWER SUSTAINS YOU.
“The Heroes didn’t save me? It… it’s a lie then? Our whole society is built on a lie?”
FROM OUR OBSERVATION, HUMAN SOCIETY HAS ALWAYS WORKED THUS.
Rage gathered in Bakugo. Rage at this shitty system, and everyone who talked a big game but let him die as a kid with unfulfilled dreams and wasted potential.
“Fuck them,” he hissed. “So, what’s the job you’re offering? You want me to tear it all down?”
YOU UNDERSTAND QUICKLY. THIS SHOWS PROMISE. NOW, DECIDE. WILL YOU SWEAR FEALTY TO US, UNTIL THE LAST LIFE ON EARTH IS EXTINGUISHED? OR WILL YOU ACCEPT DEATH?
“Accepting death is for suckers. I choose to live! I’ll help you tear down this corrupt society.”
OUR PACT IS MADE. WE TAKE YOUR NAME AND RETURN YOU TO A SEMBLANCE OF LIFE. AND YET, YOU HAVE BEEN MARKED BY OUR POWER, AND OUR HATRED FOR THE LIVING. TOUCHED BY DEATH, NEVER AGAIN WILL YOU FIND COMFORT AMONG THE LIVING, FOR YOU BELONG TO THE UNDERWORLD NOW.
RISE, GAUNTLET OF OBLIVION.
Wait, what did that mean? Wasn’t he just gonna go back to life? And what was with the obsession over giving up his name?
He suddenly felt intense pain.