Chapter 168

(A/N: This chapter is brought to you by BurglarOfTurds, the fastest draw in the West.)

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"Now, I still have two questions and one more request to make of you..." said Wilnas, rising to his feet, rubbing his right shoulder with his left hand, and rolling it as if he were warming up.

"Question five..." said Wilnas, staring down at Izuku with an amused smile as he asked, "Did you come here to fight and potentially kill me?"

Instead of denying it, Izuku nodded and replied, "I was prepared for a fight, but my main objective was to gather information."

"Ha!" bellowed Wilnas, hands on his hips as he burst out laughing. Then, with a smile that seemed to stretch at the muscles of his face, he looked down at Izuku and asked, "And you really believed you stood a chance...?"

Before Izuku could respond, Wilnas made what appeared to be a casual slapping motion with his left hand, but the former felt a physical wall of air pressure press against him before he was sent flying back like a projectile from a railgun, crashing into and through the coliseum's structure despite the stone comprising it being more resilient than reinforced steel.

"Ugh..."

Recovering from his momentary black while sailing through the air, Izuku, the crushed bones in his nose rapidly resetting, arrested his momentum by spreading and smacking the air with his open palms. At the same time, his heart and mind raced as he thought, 'What was that? I activated One-for-All and increased my physical parameters to more than 10,000 but still couldn't react...'

As if he could read Izuku's mind, not simply link with it to facilitate easy communication, Wilnas appeared over him with his foot raised, declaring, "Without Divine Power or Authority, you can't do shit with that borrowed power of yours! In this place, I make the rules...!"

Despite the length of his explanation and the seemingly casual speed at which he dropped his foot, Izuku barely had time to cross his arms before Wilnas sent him crashing into the pool of lava below. His armor and Black Whip protected him, but the intense heat and pressure made it difficult to move, almost like his stats weren't boosted.

Plucking Izuku from the magma, Wilnas, holding his wrist, casually spun him as he said, "Alley-oop~!" before throwing him into the side of a nearby rock face. The explosive impact sent pain radiating through Izuku's body, but because he had redistributed his attributes to grant himself a base of 1,000 Vitality, his Regeneration Perk was working in overdrive to repair the damage he sustained.

Flying toward Izuku, Wilnas grinned as he intended to continue the hard but necessary lesson but was slightly caught off guard when Black Whip erupted from the former like an explosion. All Quirks possessed a fraction of Telania's Divinity, further empowered by the will of their users, so when one of the shadowy, lightning-like tendrils grazed Wilnas's face, a shallow cut appeared before promptly closing back up with a hiss.

Bursting forth from the rock face with Strength, Agility, and Dexterity in the tens of thousands, Izuku, looking slightly demonic with Black Whip covering his body and taking the form of a tattered, ever-shifting cape and lightning-eyed cowl, ensnared Wilnas before yoinking the laughing dragon toward him with all his strength. He then tried to punch the man in his face with a full-force smash attack, but Wilnas met the attack with his forehead, grinning as he shouted, "There it is! That's the desperation of a true Champion!"

Scattering Izuku's Black Whip by flexing his body, Wilnas attempted to reach out and grab him, but the former abruptly disappeared. The very next moment, a powerful shockwave rippled through the area as Izuku's fist impacted his side, using [Breathrough] and [Qigong Strike] in concert to try and damage his organs.

Barely moving despite the meteoric blow, Wilnas made another casual sweep toward Izuku, but he was no longer able to hit him. As Telania's Champion, Izuku had a natural resistance to unfriendly demesnes, but it only showed its true effects when he felt threatened or a powerful desire to overcome. Willpower was the 'guarantor' of power, so if your opponent possessed a greater will and you couldn't overcome or break free from its influence, things like stats didn't matter.

"Let's end things here," said Wilnas, catching the reappeared Izuku's hand and closing his around it like a vice as he stated, "If I get too excited, one of us will wind up dead. And I'd rather not decrease our odds by killing off one of the only people who can enter enemy demesnes and take the fight directly to the enemy Champions."

Releasing his hold on Izuku's hand, Wilnas raised both his own in mock surrender, grinning as he said, "You can consider that my sixth request. Survive, Izuku Midoriya. Survive and grow strong enough to protect this world from all who would imperil it and its people..."

Shaking his partially crushed hand, Izuku retracted the veil of Black Whip from his face to reveal a grimace as he breathed laboriously. When he spoke, however, his tone was calm as he replied, "I have too many things to protect not to..."

"Then use that," said Wilnas, thumping his chest as he added, "Every time you enter a breach or face a powerful opponent, imagine what they might do to your family, friends, or loved ones if they were in your place, forced to fight. Because our adversaries 'will' target them. Make no mistake. The only thing that can prevent that is the understanding that if they dared to, the consequences would be far greater than their gains."

Nodding in response, Izuku resisted the urge to state he didn't need to be told something so obvious. Instead, as the incredibly high-pitched whir of his Sky Regalia died down, he bowed his head as a gesture of respect and said, "I'll remember this lesson..." before turning to leave.

"Hey, hold up," said Wilnas, reaching out to grab Izuku's entire shoulder with his massive, forge-hardened hand.

Before Izuku could ask, Wilnas beat him to the punch by inquiring, "The person you plan to bring, are they the one who made your weapons and armor? You've got some pretty neat equipment on you."

Though Wilnas was overstepping the bounds of their forced agreement by asking additional questions, Izuku shook his head and responded, "No. The person I plan to bring is the daughter of her country's No. 1 Hero. She has the aspiration of being a Knight. If you're searching for someone with the capacity to be a Blacksmith, I have a few candidates in mind, but the only one native to this land is more of a Tinkerer. She is the best friend of the actual candidate, however..."

Crossing his arms and grinning, Wilnas asked, "Are all the candidates you have in mind women? If so, you should reconsider. I don't really care who inherits my legacy, so long as they prove themselves, but I am a Dragon. If you bring an exceptional woman before me, and she happens to meet or surpass my expectations, do you seriously believe I'd hand her over for another man to fuck? Use your head, fool."

Punctuating his words, Wilnas attempted to knock Izuku's head, but the latter caught his wrist and squeezed it, his expression and tone exuding frigidity as he responded with a low, "I'll keep that in mind..."

Snorting loudly but grinning, Wilnas jerked his hand free of Izuku's and turned to leave, his laughter echoing as he flew back to the coliseum to resume his nap. Izuku's grip had little effect on him due to black-and-gold vambraces adorning his wrist and forearm, but for a brief moment, Wilnas felt genuine pressure from the green-eyed transmigrator...

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Emerging from the breach, feeling as though he had aged a decade in a matter of hours, Izuku first breathed an exasperated but relieved sigh before ignoring the surrounding soldiers and their predominately pitying gazes to make his way out of their cordon. Once outside, he tried pulling out his cell phone to inform Toshinori he was out and to search for nearby breaches to enter, but the device was unfortunately ruined.

Exhaling another sigh, Izuku pushed over an old, half-dead tree and sat down to await Toshinori's inevitable arrival. Fortunately, he didn't have to wait long as the man was only a few kilometers away, helping to catch a purse snatcher in the nearby town.

Touching down a few meters from Izuku, Toshinori, wearing his All Might smile, raised his right brow and asked, "I take it things didn't go as well as you would have liked...?"

Holding up his broken phone, Izuku smiled wryly and replied, "We should continue this conversation elsewhere. The Principal will want to hear what I learned, and I don't want others 'overhearing' it."

Nodding in affirmation, Toshinori asked, "Will you be able to make it back to London...?" as his gaze shifted to Izuku's damaged but still functioning Sky Regalia, stuck in their transformed state but relatively silent as he had taken the time to let them whir down before exiting the breach.

"Don't worry," said Izuku, rising to his feet and smiling as he explained, "I might look like shit, but I'm not seriously injured or fatigued. Even if my AT came apart mid-flight, I could still make it back."

"That's good to hear," replied Toshinori. "Though, before that, you should consider cleaning yourself up," he added, pointing to his face as he said, "If nothing else, you should wash your face. It looks like someone took a bat to your nose."

"That would explain why some were looking at me with pitying gazes..." remarked Izuku, smiling wryly as he used Black Whip like a rag to clean his face. His [Regeneration] might heal his wounds, but it didn't erase the blood from his injuries. Wilnas had completely shattered his nose with his 'surprise' attack, so the bottom half of Izuku's face, neck, and chest were covered in blood. It also leaked into the front of his costume, but thanks to its multiple layers, it didn't bleed through.

Placing his hand on Izuku's shoulder, Toshinori gestured with his thumb in the direction he arrived from, his expression and tone exuding empathy as he expressed, "It's okay. When I was your age, I lost many more fights than I won. I mean, I still have nightmares to this very day remembering some of the beatings I received from my Master and Gran Torino, so don't let this set you back too much, okay?"

Understanding that Toshinori had experienced far worse beatings than the one he received from his mentors, Izuku's expression softened as he closed his eyes and exhaled faintly through his nose. Just the thought of having someone he cared about be killed right in front of him was enough to make him feel...stifled. He couldn't fathom the pain Toshinori must have had to endure experiencing it directly, so while he was annoyed at having his ass handed to him by Wilnas, Izuku felt more determined than ever to gain the strength he needed to avoid even worse outcomes...

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After apprising Toshinori and Nezu of what he had learned and asking the latter to look into the existence of the Founding Dragons, particularly for information on the locations of Lu Woh and Wamdus, Izuku retired to his room and plopped face-first onto his bed. It wasn't even 2 PM by the time he finished the conference, so he was the only one in the Compound and anticipated that would remain the case for at least a few days as the girls had set out with the intention of returning that Friday.

Fortunately, Izuku was mistaken in his assumption as, shortly after he plopped down, Historia abruptly appeared in his room, having teleported there directly when she sensed that he had returned but couldn't reach him via her phone. Thus, after discussing it with the others, she decided to hop over to ensure everything was okay, a sentiment that earned her a considerable amount of Izuku's appreciation...

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(A/N: Wilnas, aka, Mr. Steal-yo-girl.)