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Most days, the weight of One For All is a comforting weight.
The quirk’s power hums within his bones, a tangible vibration that anchors him to the present. It’s a grounding presence, one that reminds Izuku he isn’t a worthless nobody anymore.
He has friends, a new life, and a future. He isn’t doomed to be a failure, just another statistic to be included in the ever-rising suicide rate of the quirkless.
This quirk has brought him countless blessings, but every gift comes with strings.
Some days, though, it’s hard not to drown beneath One For All’s legacy.
These are the days Izuku’s arms ache with the weight of two boys’ dreams and hopes. They are the days Izuku uses too high a percentage of One For All’s strength, when his bones creak with the familiar strain of a quirk not quite his own. They are the nights Izuku dreams of memories not his own, and wakes up screaming from horrors he has never experienced.
One For All is a complex quirk, after all. And complex things tend to bring…complications.
Izuku is no stranger to pain. He first met pain when he was four and declared quirkless, then time and again in the form of insults and blows. One For All isn’t always kind to him; it sometimes blows him up from the inside and leaves his bones aching like that of an old man’s. Pain is unpleasant, but familiar. It’s like wading in chest-deep water—frustrating and distracting, slowing him down a little more than his peers, but hardly something that would make him drown.
No, Izuku’s worst days come when the vestiges’ trust belief hope in him become a bit too much.
Growing up, no one has ever believed in him. Kacchan spat at his dreams, the teachers laughed at his aspirations, and even his mum told him sorry sorry sorry.
Izuku has never had someone believe in him. And it’s a little overwhelming when someone—so many people, all at once—does.
At first, Izuku was ecstatic. But then, as the stakes pile up and Izuku has to fight the strongest villain in the world instead of others’ mistrust in him, the water rises, bit by bit, until he is barely staying afloat.
Izuku is the ninth holder, and the last. There won’t be one after him.
He is the cumulation of the legacy of One For All, the sum of the effort the past holders put into developing the quirk.
Right now, One For All has grown until no one but a quirkless person can house the quirk. But even if Izuku were to find a tenth quirkless holder, the quirk grows exponentially in the process of transferring holders. One For All is reaching singularity, and Izuku is barely containing this beautiful amazing deadly quirk within his body. The tenth holder won’t survive past transferral.
Izuku is One For All’s best and last hope to defeating All For One.
And he cannot fail.
The past holders have dedicated their lives—and even their deaths—to defeating All For One. They spent their lives adding to One For All’s power, risking retribution from a deadly villain, giving up their family and friends just to keep them safe. They passed on their quirk to the next holder—a safety precaution—before going to All For One in a final attempt to defeat him. They gave up their afterlife, mind and soul stockpiled into the quirk upon their deaths. And for what? All for a chance to defeat the greatest evil to walk the earth.
None of them had succeeded.
All Might is the one who got the closest—the only one who came the nearest to killing All For One. And he almost paid his life for it.
Izuku isn’t afraid of that. He doesn’t want to die, but he won’t regret it if he has to.
He wouldn’t have lived until high school if not for One For All, anyway. He has been living on borrowed time for the past two years, and borrowed things are meant to be returned.
But if he dies, One For All—the world’s best hope against All For One—will die with him.
And Izuku won’t—can’t—stand that.
For better or for worse, One For All’s legacy will end with him.
And the thought is terrifying.
What chance does Izuku stand against a monster of a human, when eight heroes before Izuku have tried to kill him and failed?
He is only a little boy with delusional dreams, who up to a year ago was quirkless and powerless. He is inexperienced, naïve, and too kind to do what needs to be done.
And yet, the vestiges trust in him. They believe he will succeed where they have failed, will bring an end to All For One’s legacy, will be the ideal ending to the symphony of over two centuries.
They don’t have any other choice.
Izuku, who has been struggling against the flow for his entire life, who is so unused to faith in himself, finds it terrifying.
Some days, he feels like he is drowning beneath the weight of One For All’s legacy, underneath the truth that he’s the vestiges’ last hope.
It feels hard to breath, and he is barely staying afloat, barely staying on top of the vestiges’ expectations and beliefs. Izuku feels like he’s one step away from failure, one breath away from the world collapsing around his ears.
These days, Izuku trains, trains, trains so he won’t die when his time to face All For One comes. He refuses to spend time with his friends, despite how much his heart yearns for their presence by his side. He stays up at night, analysing quirks and tracking All For One’s movements through the dark web. He wakes up before the sun rises, goes on a jog, and returns to his weight training once again.
He can rest when All For One is defeated. Or when he’s dead.
The less he trains, the more likely the latter becomes.
And Izuku can’t fail. He won’t.
All Might and the vestiges and his friends and the world depends on it.