"Arrogant brat!" the Butcher roared. "Even Pro Heroes don't dare come after me. What do you think you are? You're nothing but food!"
"I'm telling you—you're dead today! Doesn't matter who you are. You interrupted my meal, so you're not walking out of here. Just stay put and become my lunch!"
He licked his lips grotesquely.
"If you let me eat you quietly, maybe your family will live."
"But if you try to run… I'll find you."
"And when I do, I'll eat your father and mother alive—right in front of you."
Shigaraki lowered his head.
His face was hidden.
The Butcher mistook it for fear.
Encouraged, he grew even more animated.
"Do you know why I became a criminal?" he sneered. "Some idiot once called me a 'two-mouthed freak.' So I found his house."
"I ate his wife and son in front of him."
"And then I ate him too."
"If you don't want your parents to die like that, you'd better behave."
The air in the room seemed to drop ten degrees.
"So… you don't regret any of it?" Shigaraki asked quietly.
The Butcher didn't notice the shift in tone.
"Regret?" He laughed, grotesque and proud. "The only thing I regret is eating too fast. Watching that man's face as he slid into my stomach… that fear? Unforgettable."
"…I see."
Shigaraki's voice turned glacial.
"I shouldn't have expected anything from people like you."
For a brief moment, he had entertained a possibility—that maybe the Butcher's cannibalism was a twisted necessity tied to his Quirk.
He'd been wrong.
There was no justification here.
No tragic compulsion.
Just indulgence.
Cruelty for pleasure.
He had been foolish to expect even a trace of restraint.
The Butcher blinked—then exploded in rage.
"Expectation? From me? You're food! Who the hell do you think you are?!"
"Die!"
With a violent swing, he hurled the meat-hook straight at Shigaraki's chest.
The hook whistled through the air, sharp and deadly. Anyone caught by it would be dragged helplessly back—just another meal.
Because of his massive frame and poor mobility, the Butcher had commissioned specialized gear: a transformable, controllable hook-and-chain weapon designed to compensate for his weaknesses.
That weapon had carried him through countless fights.
It gave him range.
Control.
Dominance.
And in his mind, this arrogant boy would fall just like all the others.
Except—
He didn't.
Shigaraki sidestepped cleanly.
The hook tore past him.
And before the Butcher could react—
Shigaraki caught it.
Then—
Crack.
The metal disintegrated in his hand.
Not bent.
Not broken.
Erased.
The chain went slack.
Only a useless fragment remained in the Butcher's grip.
Shigaraki casually let the ruined remains fall to the ground.
He shrugged.
"Well… it seems you don't actually have what it takes to make me your lunch, Mr. Butcher."
He tilted his head slightly, tone almost polite.
"You know, humility is important. Talking big without the strength to back it up? That's how you lose your teeth."
"Don't you agree?"
The Butcher's veins bulged.
"You little bastard… I want to taste your flesh more than ever now!"
With a furious roar, his massive body surged forward—
A charging wall of meat and rage—
Crashing toward Shigaraki like a human battering ram.
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