Chapter 20: Lake of Fire
Tomura Shigaraki scratched his neck with frantic, erratic violently tearing at his own pale skin. Flakes of dry epidermis fell to the concrete as his single visible eye twitched in pure, unfiltered rage.
"You ruined it," Shigaraki hissed, glaring at the tall teenager standing between him and the broken form of Eraser Head. "You are not a hero. You are a bug. A glitch in my perfectly designed game. Nomu! Ignore the burns! Smash him until there is nothing left to melt!"
The monstrous creature did not hesitate. It did not register the sizzling, charred flesh on its right hand. Propelled by blind obedience and unnatural bio-engineering, the Nomu kicked off the ground with a force that cratered the plaza tiles.
It moved faster than the human eye could track.
Sakazuki barely had time to cross his magma-coated arms over his chest before the beast collided with him. The impact was akin to being struck by a runaway freight train. Sakazuki's boots dug fiercely into the ground, but the raw kinetic power of the monster was simply too vast. He was pushed backward violently, the soles of his shoes carving two deep, smoking trenches through the solid concrete as he skidded across the plaza.
He came to a halt twenty yards away, his muscles screaming in protest. A sharp throb echoed through his forearms.
My lethal output is superior, Sakazuki analyzed, his mind operating with cold, calculating clarity despite the physical pain. But I am severely outmatched in raw speed and blunt force. Engaging in a continuous, open-handed brawl against an entity designed to absorb shock is a tactical error.
He needed to strip the beast of its mobility. He needed to change the rules of the board.
Sakazuki dropped to one knee. He slammed both of his bare, molten hands flat against the plaza floor.
He did not aim a punch. He simply let the internal furnace of his quirk run wild, pouring a staggering volume of superheated liquid rock directly into the earth beneath him. The results were instantaneous and catastrophic. The thick concrete tiles rapidly blackened, bubbled, and liquefied. Within seconds, a massive, fifty-foot radius of the plaza melted into a deep, churning pool of thick, glowing magma. The air above the newly formed lake of fire warped and distorted violently, sucking the oxygen out of the immediate vicinity.
From the sidelines, Kurogiri's yellow eyes narrowed. The misty villain recognized the profound danger of altering the terrain.
"I will not let you establish a stronghold," Kurogiri stated politely, his dark fog surging forward. He attempted to open a warp gate directly behind Sakazuki to cut the boy in half.
Relying on pure instinct, Sakazuki did not turn around. He violently expelled a massive, omnidirectional burst of searing hot air from his pores. It was not magma, but the sheer, blistering wave of thermal discharge acted like a solid wall.
Kurogiri recoiled sharply, the dark mist fraying and hissing as the extreme heat disrupted his spatial coordinates and seared the hidden physical body within his fog. The warp gate collapsed before it could fully form.
"Nomu! Walk through it!" Shigaraki screamed, pointing a decaying finger at the molten pool. "Crush him!"
The mindless beast obeyed. It stepped heavily into the glowing, viscous lake of liquid rock.
The sound of flash-boiling fluids and searing flesh filled the plaza. The Nomu's thick, dark legs sank into the magma, the intense heat instantly eating away at its skin and muscle. Yet, the monster did not stop. It waded forward with a terrifying, unrelenting stride, its regenerative cells fighting a losing battle against the continuous, incinerating heat. It raised its massive fists, ready to deliver a sweeping, lethal blow.
Sakazuki stood up in the center of the molten pool. The heat did not bother him; it was his domain. He watched the agonizingly slow, relentless approach of the monster.
He knew the creature would reach him before its legs fully melted. He could not dodge. He could not block a two-handed strike of that magnitude without breaking his arms.
Then I will not block, Sakazuki resolved, his dark eyes narrowing into sharp, unyielding slits.
He pulled his right arm back, focusing every single ounce of his quirk into his fist. The magma churned, glowing with an intense, blinding white-hot core. He locked his gaze entirely onto the horrific, pulsing brain exposed at the top of the monster's head.
The Nomu swung. Sakazuki lunged.
They collided in the center of the burning lake.
The beast's massive, hardened fist slammed directly into the side of Sakazuki's face and ribs. The sickening CRACK of fracturing bone echoed through the suffocating air. The blunt force was astronomical.
But in that exact same fraction of a second, Sakazuki's molten right fist drove forward with explosive propulsion, sinking deep into the exposed, fleshy mass of the Nomu's brain.
The exchange was instantaneous.
Like a fly swatted by a giant hand, Sakazuki was launched out of the magma pool. He flew backward through the air with devastating speed, skipping once across the hard concrete before crashing violently into the thick outer wall of the plaza.
The impact cracked the wall. Sakazuki slumped to the ground in a heap of dust and rubble.
His vision blurred into a sea of red and black. Blood dripped steadily from his chin, his jaw throbbing with blinding agony. But worse than the broken ribs was the fire inside him. He had pushed his thermal output too far, vaporizing the remaining fluids in his body. He was burning from the inside out, his throat dry as ash, hovering dangerously on the very edge of total unconsciousness.
On the other side of the plaza, Shigaraki watched the boy hit the wall. A wide, manic grin split the villain's chapped lips.
"Yosha!" Shigaraki cheered, throwing his arms up in gleeful triumph. "The weird glitch has been eliminated! We win! Nomu, come back here!"
Shigaraki turned his single visible eye back toward the magma pool, fully expecting his invincible, engineered masterpiece to step out of the flames and stand at his side.
Instead, a strange, wet sound pierced the quiet plaza.
It sounded like the pathetic, broken wheeze of a dying stray cat.
Shigaraki's smile froze.
Standing in the center of the bubbling, glowing rock, the towering Nomu swayed. Thick, black smoke poured continuously from the top of its head. The exposed brain, the vital command center of the biological weapon, had been completely melted and cauterized by the point-blank volcanic strike. There was no regeneration left. The cells were dead.
The massive beast let out one final, garbled gasp. Its knees buckled.
With a heavy, splashing thud, the supposedly invincible monster collapsed backward into the lake of fire. Half of its broad, charred back remained exposed above the glowing magma, completely motionless.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Shigaraki's arms slowly dropped to his sides. His eye widened to the point of tearing, staring at the lifeless, sinking body of his ultimate weapon. The symbol of his guaranteed victory had been permanently shut down.
Across the plaza, slumped against the cracked wall and struggling for a single, agonizing breath, the boy in the white suit had not won the fight cleanly. But he had refused to fall until he dragged the enemy's greatest monster down to hell with him.