Ryota scratched the back of his head thoughtfully and left the academy grounds without looking back.
Well, the minimum plan was accomplished.
He had scored points, noted the canon characters, made an impression, and tested his abilities in a relatively combat-oriented environment.
After all, in all eight years since his arrival, Ryota had never had a real fight with anyone.
Not that he had been looking for one, of course.
But he had traveled to so many countries in that time and never once gotten into trouble.
Luck?
External influence?
It wasn’t clear.
And the possibility of external influence shouldn’t be dismissed.
Ryota wasn’t all-powerful, after all.
That sounded funny within the context of this universe, but as you can understand, he wasn’t talking about the “number one hero.” Just think of Kalli, who had transported him to another world and somehow granted him superpowers.
Of course, it might seem a bit arrogant to compare himself to gods.
But who else was there?
Objectively, to find someone capable of posing any threat to Ryota, you would have to try very hard.
And if you take the totality of his powers and imagine that he was serious from the very beginning, the probability approaches zero.
Among humans, that is.
But there are gods.
And as one case had already shown, they exist, and suddenly.
And it’s normal for them to walk among people.
The last conclusion was somewhat shaky, since there was a good chance that Kalli was “special” in that regard.
However, the probability of the opposite was still higher than the probability of meeting a person with a Quirk capable of threatening Ryota.
Hence a new question.
Did gods exist in THIS world?
If the answer was yes, did they know about his existence?
Or had Kalli managed to pull it off without informing them?
Did that mean he couldn’t act too conspicuously, otherwise he would immediately catch the gods’ attention?
Could gods from other worlds interfere?
Kalli had managed it, after all.
It might seem that Ryota was too afraid of the gods, given all his power.
And that was true.
The limits of their abilities were unknown.
You could theorize endlessly and try to guess, but never hit the mark.
In this case, being wrong was dangerous.
So he had to be careful.
For eight years, Ryota had been extremely cautious in exploring the boundaries of what was permitted.
Today, they had become a little wider.
The canon had cracked.
Was it the cumulative effect of all those tiny, insignificant influences that could have echoed through the canon during Ryota’s life in the new world?
Or was that supersonic dash at the start “off script” enough?
But events had shifted.
Midoriya Izuku had been saved from a fall by another person.
It was such a tiny change, and it shouldn’t have affected the canon.
But still, it was a change.
And most importantly, Ryota didn’t get anything for it.
A meteor didn’t fall on his head.
His powers didn’t suddenly disappear or weaken (he checked).
The earth didn’t open up beneath him.
Lightning didn’t even flash past and hit him on the head.
Nothing.
That was encouraging.
There were four options.
First: there were no gods in this world.
Thinking that way was somewhat dangerous, but in a way it was logical.
It was only logical until you started digging deeper.
On the one hand, over the history of human civilization, a huge number of books and stories had been written.
Even if not all of them had become full-fledged worlds, there should still be a ton of them.
And in each world, people also wrote stories.
For example, in the world of MHA, over two hundred years of Quirks existing, a lot of literature had been written that clearly didn’t exist on Earth.
Had all those written worlds also been realized?
Did they also have gods?
If so, and they were capable of interfering in other worlds like Kalli… it smacked of a multiversal catastrophe of epic proportions.
On the other hand, there was a possibility that a god could only interfere in a world they could observe.
In other words, the world of MHA was written on Earth, and the Earthly gods could influence it.
But the local gods, if they existed, had no idea that there was a world above them and were therefore at a disadvantage.
If that was the case, the existence of gods was quite possible.
And given the fact that even in the anime, there were many worlds where gods were part of the plot… This chapter was taken from g.com without permission. it was all very confusing.
Second option: the gods didn’t care.
Perhaps Kalli was unusual in herself, and such behavior was extremely strange for a god.
They saw no point in interfering in human affairs.
It would be like a wise, experienced adult playing with an anthill.
That was also a dangerous option, as it downplayed the potential danger.
Keep it in mind, but don’t rely on it too much.
Third option: the gods didn’t know the canon of this world.
Here, the brain immediately began to stall, as a serious temporal paradox emerged.
What was created first?
The anime “My Hero Academia,” or the world into which Samuel had fallen?
Why had he fallen into the world of the anime long before the canon?
What would happen when the story reached its logical conclusion?
A real nightmare.
Fourth option: Kalli had somehow made a deal with the local gods and settled everything.
Perhaps there really had been some kind of agreement that outlined the boundaries the isekai’d guy shouldn’t cross.
But he, of course, hadn’t been told the details.
Another experiment?
Or an exacerbated paranoia?
Of course, a mixture of the above options in various proportions was also possible.
For example, the gods might not know the canon, and at the same time, they might not care at all, because a couple of years of canon meant nothing.
Or Kalli might have made a deal with the gods who were so indifferent to what was happening that they didn’t even ask for any conditions or payment.
Use your imagination.
“Ha-haaa…” Ryota exhaled slowly, pushing a whole heap of conspiracy theories out of his head.
There was zero point, and a whole lot of anxiety.
A much more important question was: should he fly abroad to celebrate his admission, or not?
Arizona was currently having autumn festivals, and they made amazing crabs there.
Ryota was pondering this undoubtedly important question when he was unexpectedly interrupted by a voice from behind.
“Um… thank you so much!”
At first, Ryota didn’t even realize the voice was addressing him.
But a couple of people walking nearby glanced specifically at him.
Plus, the direction of the voice.
And it was vaguely familiar.
After a second of hesitation, the guy looked over his shoulder and saw a slightly out-of-breath girl.
Bright chestnut hair with a couple of long strands falling in front, while the rest of her hairstyle was quite short.
The ends of her hair barely reached her shoulders.
She wasn’t tall.
And because she had clearly just run to catch up with Ryota, she was slightly hunched from exhaustion, making her seem even shorter.
However, once the guy made eye contact, the girl perked up and stared back at him with her huge brown eyes.
For a moment, Ryota felt a twinge of recognition.
Something like deja vu.
His subconscious somehow superimposed a light brown school uniform and a strange night-vision device on top of the girl’s head.
But the moment passed, and the mirage shattered.
Ryota shook his head slightly, and even the fragments of the image completely disappeared.
At that same moment, he recognized the girl standing before him.
Ochako Uraraka.
Another of the very few MHA characters whose name he still remembered.
“…For what?” escaped Ryota’s lips involuntarily, before he had time to think about his answer.
He had to quickly adjust the slip to fit his image.
His left eyebrow rose slowly, and his forehead furrowed just slightly.
Not for nothing had he practiced in front of a mirror.
That expression looked simply magical on Accelerator’s face.
“Um…” the girl said, slightly embarrassed.
“For saving that boy!”
“…You’re thanking me for him?” The eyebrow didn’t show any signs of lowering.
“Well… I would have felt terrible if he had gotten hurt saving me…”
“He has broken legs, and the bones in his arm are most likely a complicated puzzle of a hundred pieces right now.”
“…Hurt worse than he already is?” Judging by her confused expression and slightly tilted head, Uraraka had managed to confuse herself.
“He could have died if it wasn’t for you!” she finally found the right words.
“And you would have died if it wasn’t for him.” Ryota turned his whole body to face her.
“Thank him.”
“I will!” the girl perked up.
“But you saved my savior, so you’re kind of my savior twice over. So I have to thank you too!”
For a few moments, Ryota short-circuited.
Silence fell.
The pause was slowly becoming awkward when he finally recovered from his interlocutor’s logical twist.
“You’re welcome… Can I go now?”
“Huh? Yes, of course…” Ryota was already about to breathe a sigh of relief when…
“I mean, no!” The breath caught in his lungs, and the guy barely managed to suppress a cough.
Finish.
Ryota had already mentally raised the white flag.
The computational power of a supercomputer?
It was clearly not enough to keep up with this girl’s thought process.
On the periphery of his consciousness, the idea of activating his Personal Reality to keep up with the hyperactive schoolgirl was already flickering.
‘No, stop!
That’s not sporting!
And not cool!’
Only through years of experience playing the part of a pompous, silent jerk was Ryota able to keep a straight face and not react in any way to the lightning-fast shifts in the conversation’s topics.
“… ” His mouth, however, was clearly not on his side and wasn’t in a hurry to say anything intelligent.
Perhaps his social skills, which had dropped below the floorboards over the past eight years, were taking their toll?
No… nonsense.
“… ” Uraraka blinked.
She tilted her head.
She lightly tugged at the left strand of her chestnut hair.
“…And you are?” She blushed.
“…It doesn’t matter,” Ryota said, trying to pull himself together with a mental shake.
It wasn’t working very well.
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
With those words, he turned sharply over his shoulder so as not to be stopped again.
“How?” Uraraka said, clearly surprised by the guy’s words.
She didn’t even react to his rather rude gesture.
But Ryota didn’t bother answering.
With inexpressible pleasure, he sank into the depths of his Personal Reality and fished the equation for high-speed flight out of his memory.
Only this time, he didn’t remove the elements that dampened the shockwave.
“…find out,” he tossed out at the moment when he had already returned to objective reality but hadn’t yet attached the equation’s “controller.”
A moment, and his silhouette vanished from the path almost without any effects, leaving Uraraka in a slightly stunned state.
***
‘Too much unplanned social interaction,’ Ryota lamented as he walked calmly toward the dormitory.
‘In eight years, I never once got caught like that, and I never used my “Quirk” in public places, at least not like that.
And now… oh well.’
Calmly walking past the dorm’s security guard post, the guy hurried to his room.
The unexpected dialogue with Uraraka had clearly thrown the rather taciturn Ryota off balance.
For example, using a Quirk in public places without a license in the world of MHA is punishable.
Yes, there isn’t very strict control over this particular law.
After all, the concept of Quirks is interpreted quite broadly, and there are plenty of people in the world whose Quirks are always active.
So it’s not even really an offense.
But Ryota definitely didn’t need unnecessary attention from the law.
Say what you will, but even an almost invulnerable person can have their life made VERY difficult by law enforcement if they cross the line.
In Ryota’s case, problems with the police could have delayed his attainment of independence for a considerable time.
After all, the state machinery in the modern world (and especially in the world of MHA, where all sorts of super-strong people exist) is more than capable of grinding down a very strong lone wolf.
Reaching his room, Ryota pulled his keys out of his bag and opened the door.
The already removed bag flew into the corner of the hallway without much ceremony.
His hand automatically felt for the light switch.
Half a minute later, having already changed into slippers and taken off his top, the guy moved from the hallway to the bedroom.
Suddenly…
“You’re late.”
Ryota reacted before he even understood the meaning of what was said.
A lunge in the opposite direction from the voice and switching his vector shield to fortress mode.
The uninvited guest who had come to his room couldn’t have good intentions.
A moment for reflection and assessment of the situation.
Ryota scanned the entire room in an instant, looking for anything that differed from what he remembered.
Then he listened to his vector perception.
Everything seemed clean.
Another moment later, he shifted his gaze to the uninvited… uninvited girl.
“Who are you?” he asked, still maintaining extreme wariness.
“Huh?” The girl blinked in confusion and tilted her head slightly to the side.
“Oh, right!” She slapped her fist into her open palm a second later.
“I looked like this back then, didn’t I?”
There were no visual effects.
It was like two frames changing.
Without any transition, the short-haired, dark-haired girl with Asian-shaped eyes transformed into…
“Kalli?!”