"School, another day of hell..." Izuku said to himself as he made his way to his classroom.

Izuku Midoriya was a 15 year old boy who had fluffy dark green hair that always appeared to be in a mess. He has a round face with large eyes and green irises that matched his hair, giving him an innocent and energised appearance.

When he was young, like other children, he dreamt of becoming a hero.

However, when it was time for his quirk to appear... he received nothing.

Upon being diagnosed as quirkless by many doctors, he fell into disbelief. Yet, he never gave up and still strived to be a hero.

After his fellow students caught wind of this, they looked down on Izuku. At first, there was no harm, they only teased him and laughed at him behind his back.

Then, it escalated when his former childhood friend and playmate, Katsuki Bakugo, began to target him as well.

Katsuki Bakugo was a boy with short, spiky, sandy blonde hair with choppy bangs that hang over his eyebrows. His eyes are sharp and bright red in color. It was an appearance that spelled 'I am a troublemaker.'

When Bakugou got his quirk, he began to change. He became arrogant and started looking down on everyone around him, but with such a versatile quirk, everyone respected and admired him.

So when he targetted Izuku, it gave everyone a reason to target him as well.

After a few years of being bullied, Izuku's confidence had been destroyed. But he still had hope, his idol and the Number 1 pro hero, All Might.

He desperately wished that he could meet his idol... and ask if he could really be a hero.

Opening the classroom door, Izuku avoided making eye contact with his classmates, swiftly making his way to his seat at the back of the class.

As he made his way over, he could hear the whispers and snickers of his classmates.

When he made it to his seat, he sat down and tried to make himself seem as inconspicuous as he could, in hopes that his classmates will ignore him.

His hopes were answered as he felt the gazes that lingered on him disappear. Sighing in relief, he sneakily took out his hero analysis notebook and started writing his observations on heroes that he saw on television.

He was too focused that he did not hear his teacher opening the door and entering the class.

Lucky for him, the teacher did not care about him enough to scold him and went on to talk about their future.

When he finally snapped out of it, he heard a discussion the teacher had about the next step of their lives.

The moment he heard it, a bad feeling rose in his heart. He hid the notebook in his pocket, having an inkling of what was to come.

The teacher went on to say,

"Of course, all of you will become her-" But before he could finish, the teacher was rudely interrupted by Bakugo, "Oi, teacher! Don't group me up with these bunch of extras!"

He stood up and put his foot on the table and declared, "I will be the first person in this crappy school to go to U.A!"

Instead of the extra's feeling offended, they felt endless admiration and applauded Bakugou for his ambition. However, it was cut short as the teacher said,

"Eh? If I'm not mistaken, Midoriya, you also want to go to U.A, correct?"

Upon hearing that, the applause ceased and Bakugo's large smile froze on his face. Everyone slowly turned their heads to face the culprit.

Looking at the person he looked down upon the most, Bakugou shouted with anger visible on his face, "DEKU?!"

"Don't make me laugh! You? Of all the people here, you think you have a chance!? A quirkless DEKU like you will never be able to take a step past the gates of U.A!"

With every word he said, he took a step to Izuku. When he finished ranting, he was right beside Izuku. He extended his hand closer to use his quirk and burn of that eyesore's face. But both he and Izuku knew that they could not take it too far.

Not satisfied with how calm the eyesore was, Bakugou leaned into the ear of Izuku and whispered, "if you ever want to ever become a hero, take a swan dive off the roof and hope that you aren't quirkless in your next life."

After saying that, without even glancing at Izuku, he walked back to his seat, a scowl on his face.
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When school ended, Izuku ran back home, hoping to avoid being alone in school with Bakugou.

Recalling what Bakugou had whispered into his ear in class, he shuddered. How could his childhood friend say such a thing?

Shaking his head to clear his mind, he thought about his mother to distract himself. She was the person who single-handedly raised him, provided for him and was the only one who believed he could achieve his dream.

On the path home, he had to go into a dark tunnel under a highway. However, when he was halfway through the tunnel, he heard a grating voice booming in the tunnel.

"What a surprise! A perfect vassal giving himself up to me? Don't worry, I will gladly accept your present!"

After hearing the voice, Izuku looked behind him to see green slime squeezing through the gaps of a drain cover.

The green slime quickly converged to form a disgusting monster and without giving Izuku time to react, shot slimy tentacles at him.

Izuku, knowing that turning his back to the monster would lead to his capture, focused on avoiding the tentacles while slowly retreating.

Not expecting its prey to avoid it, it bacame enraged and sped up, making it much more difficult for Izuku to completely avoid.

However, when he was almost out of the tunnel, a voice boomed from the drain where the villain previously emerged from, "IT'S FINE NOW! WHY? FOR I AM HERE!"

When Izuku heard this voice, his mind went blank. He knew exactly who this voice belonged to. It was his idol, All Might!

The villain, finally remembering who was chasing it, fell into a panic and quickly tried to secure a hostage for itself.

Taking advantage of Izuku loss of focus, it managed to bind Izuku and tried to enter its new vessal. When All Might emerged to see this scene, he angrily readied a punch, before shouting,

"TEXAS SMASH!"

Using one of his signature moves, he punched a hole straight through the monster, causing it to splatter in different directions, including the parts that tried to enter Izuku.

However, Izuku did not manage to see this scene as he lost consciousness due to his close proximity to the attack.

When he awoke, he felt something hard repeatedly hitting his cheek. He opened his eyes to see his idol's chiseled face right in front of him!

Recovering from his shock, Izuku excitedly jumped up and wanted to ask for an autograph, when he noticed that his pocket, which had his notebook, was empty.

Worried, he looked around to see if ge had dropped it, only to find that his notebook was in his idol's hands. Furthermore, All Might had left his signature on the cover and was about to return it to him.

He gladly received his book with two hands, fanboying internally at the new addition to his collection. But from the corner of his eye, he noticed that All Might was preparing to leave.

He realised that this may be his last time seeing his idol and he still had a question only his idol could answer.

Gritting his teeth, he extended his arms and grabbed firmly on All Might's shorts, making it in time for All Might to jump into the sky.

Mid-jump, All Might felt an unusual weight on one of his legs and turned back to see Izuku holding his shorts for dear life.

He started panicking inside and thought, 'this kid's going to give me a heart attack!'

Not wanting the boy to end up as a pile of blood on the streets, he landed on a nearby building.

Upon landing, he gently removed the green haired boy from his leg, wanting to scold the boy. However, his transformation was about to end, so he could only let the boy of the hook and leave.

But before he could, Izuku fired his question, hoping for the best.

"Even if I do not have a quirk... can I still be a hero like you?"

At that question, All Might paused, memories flooding his mind. Thinking about the safety of this child, he bit the bullet and answered, "Young man, give up. The path of heroes can only be walked by those who are qualified."

The last strand of hope in Izuku snapped and he felt that the dream he cherished for the past 11 years, shatter into pieces. Despair clouded his mind, causing something to stir within him.

However, as if lacking a certain catalyst, it did not progress further than a slight disturbance, before calming down.

But the effect of this stirring caused All Might to tear up a bit. He rubbed his tears away, thinking that it was just because of that memory.
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After answering the question, All Might tried to leave but did not manage to do so in time as his transformation reached its limit.

Instead of the muscular and mighty person Izuku was familiar with, in front of him was a skinny man with a face that looked similar to a skeleton.

With no other choices, All Might had to explain that this was his true form, which shocked Izuku.

Knowing that this was his last meeting with All Might, he asked him to elaborate. All Might reluctantly continued his explanation.

"A long time ago, I was severely injured during one of my rescue operations. The injury was too serious and I was unable to fully recover. Nowadays, I can only maintain that form for half a day at most.

Before you ask why I need to hide it, it is because of my identity as the Symbol Of Peace. If villains were to know about my injury, they would take advantage of it and cause mayhem, while also resulting in the citizens losing their trust in us.

Without me, this generation of heroes will not be able to keep villains at bay. Now that you know about this, you must not tell another soul."

With the end of his explanation, All Might left, never once looking back. Izuku could no longer control himself and finally broke down.

The person that he looked up to as an idol, had just crushed his dream. He felt as if the world had lost its colors.

Shortly after, however, he recovered. At the back of his mind, he knew that his dream of being a hero was nothing but a pipe dream.

Now with the confirmation of his idol, he could finally give up on his dream with a clear mind. After all, if even All Might said so, there was nothing he could do to become a hero.

'Maybe I should find something else to do...'

Knowing that he had no hope of becoming a hero, he wanted to chase another path. Like a police officer, or an investigator.

He smiled at those choices. He would still be able to work closely with heroes, being quirkless did not mean that he was out of options.

He ran home, wanting to tell his mother about his new goal. Maybe... giving up on his dream wasn't a bad thing after all.
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Hello there! I hoped you enjoyed this chapter!

This was a chapter published in 2019. After two years, I finally came back to it. Instead of rewriting the book, I decided to edit it instead.