But the good mood he'd been in all day vanished the moment he returned to the bar.
Because the place was empty.
No Kurogiri.
No Sludge.
No one.
Which meant—
No one had made dinner.
Shigaraki stood in the middle of the silent bar, then slowly looked toward the counter.
There, sitting in plain view, was a note.
Tomura,
Kurogiri and Sludge have a job tonight, so we'll be out and won't be back until tomorrow.
You'll have to sort out dinner yourself.
—Kurogiri
The corner of Shigaraki's mouth twitched.
He had spent the whole day running around, fighting, scheming, leveling up, testing Apocalypse, dealing with Midoriya, dealing with Shinso—
And after all that, he had come home expecting at least a hot meal.
Instead, not only was there no food—
He now had to deal with dinner himself.
He let out a long, weary sigh.
Then he reached over the counter, pulled out a few ten-thousand-yen notes, and shoved them into his pocket.
Forget cooking.
He'd just go eat somewhere outside and make do.
It wasn't like he could cook, anyway.
…
Following the map markers he knew from the area, Shigaraki soon arrived at a nearby shopping street.
The road was lively, brightly lit, full of restaurants, convenience stores, and late-night foot traffic. Looking at the bustling street in front of him, his expression turned a little distant.
Come to think of it…
Since arriving in this world, this was actually his first time going out to eat alone.
He wondered whether the food outside would even come close to what Kurogiri made.
That guy might look like a walking supernatural event, but his homemaking skills were absurdly solid.
"Bijin-chan—!?"
Suddenly, several young girls screamed in unison from a nearby side street, their voices sharp with fear.
At the same time, a second voice rang out—
Mad.
Wild.
Filled with manic delight.
"Hahahaha! Die!"
Shigaraki's eyes narrowed instantly.
"A Villain?"
All he had wanted was dinner, and somehow he'd still run into trouble.
This world really was too chaotic.
Couldn't he just eat one peaceful meal?
Clicking his tongue internally, he quietly changed direction and headed toward the street where the screams had come from.
He wasn't starving yet.
So he might as well go have a look.
And if luck was on his side—
Maybe he'd even earn a few more Evolution Points while he was at it.
Besides…
He was a little curious about that name the girls had shouted.
"Bijin-chan," huh?
He wondered whether it was the person he was thinking of.
…
"Hahahahaha! Die!"
The crazed laughter came from a towering man with a face like a shark.
No—
"man" was underselling it.
He stood over three meters tall, huge enough to make ordinary adults look tiny by comparison. His frame was massive, and one of his fists had transformed into a heavy metallic mass. The steel-colored knuckles had just smashed a crater into the ground.
Now he stood there admiring it, mouth split wide in a grotesque grin.
But what made the scene truly unsettling wasn't the size, or the iron fist—
It was his eyes.
They were bloodshot.
Red with madness.
His name was Steel Boy, a wanted murderer currently on the run.
A few days ago, while working at a construction site, he had snapped in a moment of anger and killed his foreman.
Then, realizing he had already crossed the line, he simply stopped caring.
In a fit of reckless abandon, he killed four other workers on site as well—men he had long held grudges against.
After that, in order to evade capture, he had hidden in the sewer system, using it as cover to shake off the police and the Pro Heroes sent after him.
And strangely enough—
That had actually worked.
The Heroes who came after him failed to find him on the spot.
But his good luck ended there.
When they couldn't catch him immediately, they issued a nationwide wanted notice, turning him into a hunted animal overnight.
After spending two miserable days scraping by, dodging pursuit, and barely staying ahead of the authorities, Steel Boy finally came to understand a brutal truth:
A man like him—
Someone with no real combat training, no escape plan, no survival skills—
Could not outrun Pro Heroes forever.
Maybe he had gotten lucky once.
Maybe twice.
But luck ran out.
Sooner or later, he would be caught.
And since that was inevitable—
He had decided to indulge in one final burst of madness before the end.
Because he refused to spend the rest of his life rotting in prison.
And he refused to live every day in fear, skittering from one hiding place to the next like a rat.
So he chose his own form of "final rebellion."
He would kill people who were better-looking than him.
That was his answer.
That was his revenge.
After all, ever since childhood, he had suffered because of the side effects of his Quirk.
That shark-like face.
That inhuman appearance.
The stares.
The mockery.
The disgust.
The rejection.
He had endured it all.
So now, at the end of his road, he intended to vent all that resentment and jealousy on the beautiful boys and girls of the world.
Because why should people born with pretty faces get to live peacefully—
When he had never been granted even basic dignity?
In his twisted mind, that logic was flawless.
If they were prettier than him—
Then they deserved to die.
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