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“ My Lord! I have news! ”
Izuku is walking through a shady neighborhood, searching for criminals and people who are on the brink of death, when wing-flapping noises are suddenly all he can hear.
Even though his black hood is covering most of his face and ‘body’, he smiles slightly and extends a bony hand out, an obvious invitation for the crow to land on.
It does so effortlessly, it seems, and he can feel its claws and its weight settle on his hand; everytime it’s always comforting - dare he say satisfying.
Like he usually does, he moves his other arm and pets its black head, careful to not poke the eyes.
Birds are beautiful creatures.
Anyway.
“ Oh? What are they? ” He asks. The crow almost looks excited, if that was possible. It lightly squeezes its claws, a sign that it heard the question.
“ The mortals with the blue uniforms and costumes are confused! They do not know how the tainted souls are dying! They are searching for you! ” All throughout the explanation it kept moving its head around, you know, like birds do. At least the bird finds some entertainment in this.
So it looks like the police and heroes have finally noticed that villains are… ending up dead. He wouldn't be surprised if they called him a villain too. He is killing them. Whatever.
It's not like they can ‘catch him and arrest him’. Just the mere thought of the poor mortals thinking that they can catch him makes him chuckle.
It’s not that he’s arrogant, or cocky, he really isn’t. There's just no way to detain him. Physically. At all. Or any other way. He could just - waltz out of there through the walls. Funny.
“ Anything else? ” he asks. Perhaps there’s a new major supervillain somewhere that should be put out of their misery.
“ Yes, there is a tainted soul the others have told me about... ” as the crow begins to explain details once more, Izuku finishes his exploring and listens.
The place is big. Kind of. He thinks. Doesn’t really matter. What matters is saving the girl and killing the big bad guy.
As he walks in he sees a bunch of villains, and he wants to slaughter them all. But he can’t. Because doing that will alert the boss and he might escape. Unacceptable. He’ll just do it later on the way out.
It is laughingly easy how he finds the boss, sitting at his desk, which is very clean, doing paperwork. It's a weird sight for a villain. It's usually heroes and police officers and workers who do such things.
Izuku summons his scythe, pushes away his anger and disgust at this guy away; he can’t be distracted by feelings right now. Get the job done, put him to rest first , repeats in his head.
“ Overhaul, ” Said Overhaul flinches like a little girl. He was obviously absorbed so much in his work he didn’t even notice when Izuku became corporeal. Even so, he quickly regulates his expression to be one of boredom.
He definitely thinks he’s in no threat right now. Adorable. Ew.
“What are you doing here?” One eyebrow raised, casual lean backwards into the chair. Izuku has to stifle a sigh at the display. Obviously it’s to intimidate him, but to be honest Izuku feels embarrassed for the guy. Idiot.
“ Time for you to go, ” The disbelief on Overhaul’s face is funny, so Izuku lets out the sigh he was holding, the one really bored right now is himself. How ironic. Kind of.
“Who are you?” He tries to question, already standing up and preparing himself to fight. But you cannot kill something that isn’t meant to be killed, as stated many times before in other stories and books.
So, Izuku does the thing he always does. He smirks -
“I am Death.”
- and kills him. No sound, no scream, nothing. Just a clean, easy swipe right at the neck, and his head falls off.
Izuku walks through the halls, noticing they’re very clean. Perhaps Overhaul had a clean fetish, given he was wearing the gloves and that absolutely ridiculous mask.
He’d sent his tainted soul away after he was done, and now he must find the little girl. His dear friend, the crow, told him she was being used for some type of quirk drug. Now it’s just a matter of finding her room, even though these halls are like some type of maze, seriously. Annoying.
He could just phase through all of them, but then he wouldn’t know his way out. Ugh. and plus, when they come back he’ll have to blindfold the child so she won’t see him slaughtering every last one of these dirty pigs. Gah, using a child for crimes, how low. It makes him feel rage and sadness as well.
The door he stops in front of is white, like the other ones he’s passed so far, but you can tell this one has been used more frequently. The most obvious sign is the boot shaped dents in the door. Hm, seems like the door was even kicked open. Poor child, she must've been terrified each time that happened.
He knocks softly, alerting her he’s about to come in. There's a small shuffle, continued by silence. She’s probably not used to people knocking.
When the door is opened, it squeaks. More like screeches. Jesus Christ above, fucking replace this creepy door, or at least oil the hinges.
The little girl is sitting on the bed, knees up to her chest, and - god she looks barely six years old - she’s trying to make herself as small as possible. It hurts that he can relate so much.
He walks over to her, softly, no stomping, but loud enough she can hear him. And she did, by the way she peeks up at him and freezes. Combine the clothes he’s wearing and his bloodied scythe… yeah.
“Hello,” He waves his hand. More like a flap, he’s so awkward, but she’s got bandages on her arms and legs - her long white hair is a bit messed up, a sign she’d been sleeping. Her horn is small where it rests on her forehead, small and golden.
He needs to get her out of here.
She’s looking at him confused, as if he's doing something wrong. With how she’s been treated here, she expects him to snap at her, he guesses.
“What’s your name?” he asks, his voice soft, barely a whisper as he kneels next to the bed and wills his scythe away.
“Eri,” her voice is just as soft. Possibly afraid of others hearing.
“Hello, Eri, I’ll get you out of here, would you like that?”
Eri searches his face, even though there’s nothing but a black void, except two green lights which are his eyes, but whatever she finds must be good enough because she nods and gets off the bed.
They don’t talk after that, she’s smart enough to know they must be quiet. The hallways are still like a maze, but at least the other villains aren’t alerted. He wants to get her outside first, then come back and kill them all, but that won't happen, he knows; which is the reason he stops her and crouches down to talk, because he may have ended his own life, but he still knows his manners dammit.
“Hey Eri, is it okay if I cover your eyes? I don’t want you to see the bad stuff,” he explains. Whispers. To be honest she’s definitely seen bad stuff, but, if he can help it, he can keep it to a minimum while she’s with him.
After she nods her head, he rips a cloth big enough to cover her eyes from his clothes. It’s common knowledge across the other Deaths in Japan that DNA is nonexistent on anything they touch, so he won’t be identified. (He’s met a few)
And yes, there are other Deaths, because god knows not just one of them can’t cover a whole globe. (He’s met a few).
The first villain they come across after covering her eyes is some drunk looking dude who is walking sluggishly through the hallway, bottle of drink in hand and everything. He doesn’t hesitate to decapitate him though.
The whole villain hideout is easy to kill after taking Eri outside. Most of them have their guards down. They don’t even have a single idea he’s here and that a good quarter of them are already dead. Shocked faces are all he sees. It’s hilarious, and he might’ve let out a few laughs too. Only when there are about 15 of them left do they realise the shit they’re in, but by then it’s way too late.
At least now his job is done and Eri is safe - will be - after he brings her to the police, which he’s on his way to doing now. And he most definitely doesn’t need the quirk erasing bullets.
There’s a new vigilante/villain in town. And Naomasa knows his hair will turn white before he reaches 40.
After the little girl, Eri, came in and was questioned, the police started calling this new person the Reaper.
Apparently he wears a hood and dark clothes - what a ‘Reaper’ would typically wear - and has a scythe. A motherfucking scythe. He was the one to rescue Eri from the yakuza and stop their quirk deleting drug production then also kill everyone who was there including motherfucking Overhaul how did he do that --
He lets out a long defeated sigh. Reaper has only killed criminals. Dangerous criminals. Him and Toshinori suspect he also killed All for One, after inspecting the way he kills his victims. A clean cut at the neck or abdomen. Usually leaves parts around.
But what he does not understand in the slightest is how. Fucking All Might couldn’t even beat All for One and then this guy appears out of nowhere and- and-
Another sigh is let out. So much damn frustration these past few months. The Bakugou kid also said to have seen this guy (he still doesn’t know whether he’s a villain or a vigilante, but with how safe the streets have been lately, who knows), so now they have descriptions. Adding with how shaken the boy was and looked like he realised a major something it can’t be that friendly.
Nothing else. Naomasa rechecks everything they know one more time. He knows it won't be the last.
Reaper wears black clothes. A hood. His face or anything else is completely unknown. The scythe he carries could be part of his quirk. Most likely.
They’re confident it’s a male, after questioning the two witnesses and some of the league who were captured in Kamino. He only goes after high villains and criminals. Maybe they could make a trap like that. But then they’d have to capture a villain. And also--
Er, that’s how much they know currently. Dammit.
Naomasa tugs at his hair and stares at the paper labeled ‘Reaper’ on his table below. They gotta catch this guy. And do it soon. Or it might become a problem. Fuck, especially after seeing how Sir Nighteye was pissed because he’d been on this case for months . But from what they gathered this guy didn’t plan anything most likely. Just done the job in a single night.
He’s dangerous. Everyone is tense and, well, they can’t do anything about it right now. Just wait.
He’ll speak with the other officers and maybe Nedzu to form a plan so they can make a trap for this guy, hopefully it’ll work.
Naomasa lets out one last sigh before allowing his head to smack on the table.
They have to catch this guy. They have to.