Chapter 4: Back to Square One

Silence dominated the room, nary even a single word uttered between detective and hero. Worry mottling his mien, Tsukauchi remained silently seated next to All Might, his hands clasped together. He winced upon briefly glancing at All Might's casted arm for a brief moment.

Most of the damage concentrated into All Might's right-wing, of which twisted almost past the point of permanent monoplegia along with the multitudes of lacerations bedecking its tendons. Whatever Garou did to All Might's arm, All Might was lucky that his arm could even recover despite the severity of the damage.

"...I still cannot believe you've lost, and it isn't to your archnemesis." Tsukauchi spoke his thoughts once more with an octave of disbelief.

Toshinori Yagi sighed in his white bed. After Garou thoroughly 'handed his ass to him,' the ambulance recovered his injured body and stationed him, as Toshinori Yagi, in a reserved private hospital room within Dagoba. Looking down on his right arm, seeing the bandages wrapped around the incisions inflicted by Garou's strange Quirk, All Might ground his teeth with frustration. The image of Garou overwhelming him in combat was still fresh in his mind.

Sitting beside All Might's bed, the detective pinched the bridge of his nose, worry and stress stockpiled within his heart and mind. All Might's defeat was the worst-case scenario, one that even Tsukauchi never bothered to consider as a viable possibility.

"This is not good. If word of your loss spreads…"

Toshinori raised his working hand, "I know."

The Hero Community would crumble towards a downward spiral if the public knew. The Hero Hunter, barely after a week, already became Japan's Number One priority, an S-Class villain that must be imprisoned within Tartarus at all costs.

"Tsukauchi, how goes your indagation of Garou? Have you uncovered any relevant information appertaining his background?" All Might asked, very curious about Garou's background.

"Unfortunately, no. In our investigation, we encountered a problem," Tsukauchi pursed his lips. "Garou has absolutely no background in Japan."

The answer caused All Might to shoot his head towards his long-time friend. "What?"

Tsukauchi sighed as he rubbed the back of his head, "We cross-examined his picture and his name, yet the others found absolutely no record of his birth, his social security number, nor anything close to uncovering his identity. In summary, Garou does not exist."

All Might's jaw slacked in response, trying to parse Tsukauchi's dilemma until he remembered his conversation with Garou before the battle.

"Wait," Toshinori recalled a key point of their chat. "He said he came from somewhere far away. Maybe he's a foreigner," he cupped his chin with his uninjured left in deep thought. If Japan held no record of his birth, maybe his provenance originated overseas.

"You spoke with him?" Tsukauchi asked, his tone radiating with hope.

"Yes; when I was still Toshinori Yagi, we spoke. He was surprisingly civil and, well, amiable. He spoke of his need to find a quiet place to train, if I recall," Yagi recounted.

"Did he mention the reason?"

All Might shook his head in rejection. Unfortunately, Garou didn't explain his need for reclusive training. Tsukauchi rubbed his chin in thought, trying to conjecture any locations that might serve the Hero Hunter's needs.

"I see. Hmmm, considering the expansive land of Japan, there are many locations Garou could settle in. Damn it, I fear for the civilians and others that live near his newfound 'territory.'" The detective grimaced, praying that the Hero Hunter won't drag civilians in his penchant for violence.

---------

After his intense engagement at Dagoba Beach, Garou set off to cleanse himself of blood and grime using a fire hydrant of which he broke without any regard for property consequence. Once clean, Garou set off to retrieve his backpack left in the alleyway where he encountered All Might. Strong or not, he refused to attract attention by committing small-time theft, thus relying on the value of his essentials to financially sustain his livelihood.

Now fully packed, Garou cleansed himself even further by entering Dagoba's public bathhouse, needing to also clean himself of the sand left on his body while waiting for his clothes to dry. Once finished, he set off to Hosu once again, to the land where he first set foot into this world.

Upon returning to the streets, however, he was immediately greeted by utter chaos. Villains seemed to run rampant here on the streets, several robberies taking place while heroes struggled to apprehend the runaways. The area changed too much in the following days. He did not expect this nor did he desire such anarchy to occur after the end of his first hunt.

A group of three villains, one with the head of a tongue, one with a nose for a chest, and the last having eyes aleatory dotted around his head, ran down the sidewalk with bags of cash, each sack dripping ten thousand yen bills in their escape from a duo of heroes chasing them. Another was driving down the road in a hijacked truck of which its driver was a man with tusks protruding out his eyes with looted goods stored in the back like jewelry as the police cars blared their sirens in their chase. There were even fights taking place between villains and heroes with the victors still undetermined - the sounds of battle reaching even Garou's distance.

'Well…' Garou hoped the kid was unharmed in the uproar while he was away. While he did meet the kid a week ago, he liked the kid, mostly because the boy wasn't afraid of him despite seeing him slaughtering people he mistook for monsters. That and he gave him food and money.

While he was busy ruminating, a few of the villains - a group of people with no distinguishable traits - ran up to him before one of them pointed a gun, an M-7 Glock, at The Hero Hunter's head while the other two gazed at the heroes that pursued them.

Ignoring the villains and the gun, upon looking at the two heroes, Garou noted their costumes share a similar theme with those he saw back home, yet they were different in the long run. A sun-themed skintight suit for one man and leather jacket on the other.

As for the villains, the three shared a theme, all wearing a monochromatic clown mask bearing the predominant red as dark as the color of blood, while garbed in a hybrid of a clown's attire and that of the ordinary mafia's - wearing the shoes of clowns and the suits of high-class gang members.

"Give up pursuit, heroes! Unless you want to see this guy's brains blown up!" The villain smirked, slowly circling Garou with a mocking grin of confidence, while the two costumed heroes grit their teeth at the unexpected hostage situation.

However, neither were aware of the man's identity or the danger they placed themselves in, oblivious to Garou's shadowed eyes nor his growing irritation to the situation around him.

"Let him go, you villain! Wait, holy crap he looks scary," one of the two heroes uttered upon taking a closer look at the scarlet-haired man.

"Ahahaha, words can't save you-wait, wow, he is scary." The villain holding the pistol blinked thrice upon attempting to parse the palpably sharp irritation emanating from the man's countenance, one so tangibly keen it could punch holes in their hearts. The guy looked as if he was crossbred with a demon from hell judging by the demonic right eye.

Both heroes and villains descended into an awkward silence for a brief moment, unsure of their next course of action. On the one hand, they could continue their routine activities, but they couldn't. The man was just that damn scary, and somehow emanated a dark presence that spelled death and misfortune if provoked.

"...You."

The villain flinched upon receiving his 'hostage's' piercing gaze.

"I'll only say this once. Get that gun out of my face, or I'll paint the streets red and pink with your innards."

"""""Eh?""""" All three villains and two heroes uttered in simultaneous confusion; the heroes shocked to hear such baleful threats from the 'hostage' while the villains were even more shocked that he didn't fear the gun aimed at his head.

Despite being held hostage, the verisimilitude of Garou's threat carried far more authenticity than that of the man carrying the gun himself. A dark, foreboding emanated from their 'hostage,' an inexplicable feeling that cannot translate into words.

However, it was a feeling that failed to correspond with the villains that were used to violence and abusing others. Thus, they quelled their unease to reclaim the vestiges of their dignity and confidence.

"S-Shut up, hostage! Unless you want to die, I suggest you-"

Before he could even finish, his 'hostage' rested his hand on his gun and crushed his weapon in a vice-grip, reducing it to mangled scrap without a single warning so casually it almost seemed surreal - especially when the man tore the defunctionalized weapon off of the villain's hand with no effort.

""..."" The two heroes gawked at the scarlet-haired man in disbelief, slacked jaws almost hitting the floor. The man just crumbled the weapon as if it was paper and turned it into useless trash.

"Come again?" The 'hostage' asked, letting the mauled pistol fall to the concrete before tensing his fingers to the point of veins protruding from his skin.

"Uh…"

---------

"[Today, another body pile appeared in Hosu, stacked by none other than the Hero Hunter himself! B-But this time, there villains included in the pile!]"

Switching channel.

"[The scene is just as brutal as his debut, but only for the villain side! I thought the Hero Hunter hunts only villains, yet-]

Switching.

"[Look at their state! The Hero Hunter seemed especially cruel to these villains for some reason!]"

On the screen, every citizen could see the mangled human pretzels that were the villains terrorizing Hosu, their states painful to the eyes and spirits of all ages, alongside the heroes as well, but especially the state of the villains.

Izuku and his mother gawked at the screen, this time, less horrified than the first time they've seen the Hero Hunter's debut. Izuku didn't expect to see Villains added to the body pile, using the Hero Hunter's track record as his basis.

Today was the first The Hero Hunter added Villains in his crosshairs, though the state of the villains was perhaps more brutal than what he did to the heroes. Garou reduced many of the villains into literal human pretzels, limbs forcibly entangled together in a cruel pose designed to maximize their torment.

In the hospital, the emaciated hero gaped at the screen, surprised to see Garou striking again so soon, although he was even more surprised at the sight of villains added to the pile.

"What are you fighting for, Garou?" All Might mumbled to himself as he cupped his chin in musing.

A man antagonistic to heroes just as much as villains, his violence almost seemed indiscriminate, but he could sense an invisible theme behind it, something All Might could not decipher behind the curtain of his actions.

But one fact was certain, Garou was not a genuine villain. Upon further rumination, Toshinori realized that Garou had never killed any of the heroes he hunted unlike a sure Hero Killer roaming loose in Japan. Not only that, Garou possessed one aspect almost all villains lack:

Honour.

It was the first time in his entire life to encounter someone he was determined to arrest who actually spared him, and that same man stacked another bloody body pile of villains mixed in with the heroes.

Still, All Might can't help but wonder if Garou habitually enjoyed piling the bodies of his victims in such a grandiose fashion.

In another home, Tenya Iida and his family, all of whom sat at their family living room staring at their plasma screen television, paled at the sight of another body pile behind the screen in Hosu. Iida especially dreaded the return of the Hero Hunter, his worry for his big brother, Tensei Iida, began to stockpile.

"[One of the villains is waking up! Look! He's crawling out of the pile!]"

The female news reporter with brown bob hair shouted, aiming her microphone at the villain, the one with a crimson clown mask, as the villain painfully undid the pretzel hold Garou forced upon his being. The sharp sounds of cracking bone reached the reporter's ears as well as the audio receptors of the camera, allowing the rest of Japan to know the agony of the villain. The listeners can almost feel his suffering, wincing at the sound with great sympathy.

"[Yeeeaaaaaaaauuuuuuuugh! My arms! Agggggh!]" The villain wailed in misery as his bones agonizingly cracked back into position, and then attempted to crawl away from the body pile. Tears could be seen streaming down past the outer rims of his mask in his attempts to flee from a phantom horror; an unseeable terror embossed into his psyche.

"[...oh god, this is even worse than the last time.]" The reporter reported slightly unprofessionally, the memory of the first hero crying out for mercy from a body pile still fresh in her mind.

The viewers could testament her claims as well, sympathizing with her feelings. Although this time it was a villain instead of a hero crawling and wailing. No one cared for the villains in the end, however.

"[H-Help me… Somebody help.]" Another crawled away from the pile, wearing the same blood-red mask as the first.

"[My legs… I can't feel my legs.]" A third followed suit as the first two, only this one's legs bent in the wrong angle, in a direction opposite that of the usual.

The reporter and cameraman simultaneously grimaced at the brutal sight.

"[F-From what we've seen so far, the Hero Hunter showed even less mercy with the villains than with the heroes. His updated spectrum of targets has shone a new light of perspective on the mysterious man. Which begs the question, is his hate for villains greater than that for the heroes? Only time will tell until then.]"

"Seriously? Now he's adding villains to the pile?" In the home of Katsuki Bakugou, the self-proclaimed future Number One Hero ruggedly sat cross-legged on the couch, watching the news with a sense of intrigue and belittlement.

"You hunt heroes, but now you also hunt villains? What's the logic behind this, huh?" He scoffed but grinned from entertaining a thought. If he managed to defeat this Garou, assuming that All Might wouldn't, the authenticity of his destiny to become the Number One Hero will solidify, and ensure his road to success. He grinned at his delusional vision, the sight of him rising to the number one spot and receiving the praise and fame he deserved.

In another abode, one of traditional Japanese architecture, Japan's Number Two Hero, Endeavour, watched with a vicious smile stretching his lips, flames bursting from his brows and mustache upon seeing the pile of bodies appear in Hosu.

A challenge presented itself before him, one that could bring him glory if he succeeded in this endeavor - an endeavor that could bring him closer to reaching the Number One Hero's level.

Watching from the open doorway, his son, Todoroki Shouto, attended with a mix of interest and spite, the first at the mention of another body pile appearing in Hosu again while the later was directed towards his abusive father - abhorring his obsessive nature.

While despising him, Todoroki can't help but worry for the future. With someone like the Hero Hunter capable of defeating so many heroes on his own set free upon Japan, he wondered if he could handle this Villain with his Quirk. He asked himself what he should do if Garou ever set his sights on Endeavour, and then him next? He cannot imagine himself capable of fighting someone of the Hero Hunter's caliber just yet until he acquired the full scope of his abilities.

Among the villains, however, Garou's actions drastically altered Evil's collective viewpoint on his alignment. Every one of them believed Garou to be a villain, someone fighting for their side. They were wrong, however, now comparing him to a certain Hero Killer that despised villains as much as Heroes but more defined in his occupation.

Unlike Stain, something about Garou sets him apart from the other villains that came before him. His case was the first of its kind; he openly hunted groups of Heroes without a second thought on the consequences. The way he took down his prey en masse and piled monuments of his victory with the bodies of his victims as his brick painted his image to that of a Hunter's from the way he constructed trophies of his prey. Amongst the Villains was a hunter, A Hunter Amongst Villains, a title that the Villains gave to the first outcast that can stand against the oppression of modern society unchallenged.

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Exploring Hosu on foot again, a map spread wide in his hand, Garou continued walking through the streets undeterred, the roads evacuated by the heroes during his 'education' of the villains. He did not plan to hunt the heroes that were present, but they, for some reason, decided to interfere as if they could stop him. They now joined the body pile as their penance, in the end, caked in trash and filth Garou collected to add salt to their wounded pride along with their actual wounds - he didn't care if some of the filth landed on the villains' injuries or if it infected them in the end. That was how worthless the villains were in his eyes.

In any case, looking up from his map, Garou saw a playground accompanied by a nearby school building: a swing set, a polychromatic mini-slide palace, horizontal ladder, etc.

Garou mused at the sight of the playground; this one bore more equipment than that of which he and Tatsurou usually meet back in his world. Garou typically talked with the kid and sometimes gather information on the heroes from his Hero glossary. Thinking about the boy, Garou wondered how he was doing back there. He hoped he was doing well without him.

As his eyes perused the playground as the evening sun slowly hiding under the blanket of the horizon, orange land slowly losing its light, Garou caught sight of a familiar face, one he didn't expect to see again ever since he left that person's home, especially at such late hours.

The Shrimp called Ghin was sitting on one of the swings, looking down sullen and sad. The silver-haired boy surrounded himself with gloom, a sadness that matched the theme of the waning sun.

Curious to know Ghin's being here, Garou walked over to him across the unembossed stone floor, seating himself on the empty swingset beside him.

"Yo."

Hearing a sudden, familiar voice, the boy perked his head up and turned towards the source, and widened his eyes upon seeing a familiar face.

"G-G-Garou?!" Ghin almost shouted, jumping from his seat only to fall on his buttocks in his frantic scurrying away.

"Saw me on the news?" Garou joked, lightening the atmosphere with a slight chuckle, dimming the boy's caution as the kid picked himself up to his feet.

"Y-Yeah… you're not going to hunt me, are you?" Ghin asked, his voice almost a whimper, evidently terrified of his presence.

"I don't hunt brats. Just heroes… and sometimes villains." Garou shrugged, watching the boy seating himself back on the swing slowly after grasping the dangling chains - his caution slowly bleeding away by the casual ambiance. After all, Garou did save him from villains, despite his brutal capacity for violence.

"O-Okay… why are you here again?" The boy asked, sideways glancing Garou with confusion.

"Well, I'm looking for a quiet place to train. Got bored with the heroes here, so I decided to invest my time in something more… challenging," Garou shrugged with nonchalance.

"Eh?" Ghin turned his head to the man sitting next to him.

"You got bored with the heroes? What do you mean?"

The boy almost sounded as if curious of Garou's acumen on the heroes he faced.

"They're so damn weak, I feel cheated, to be honest. I mean, all of the heroes I faced back home were Quirkless, but here? It's ironic that those with superpowers are weaker than those without them, you know?" Garou scoffed, almost as if airing his grievances to the boy.

As for Ghin, he looked at Garou with fascination; childish curiosity started to swell within, his silver ahoge began to wag from side to side slowly.

"So… are you planning to face All Might?" Ghin asked, wondering if Garou would hunt even the Number One Hero as well.

"Already faced him."

"Eh?"

That was an answer he did not expect.

"W-Wait, if you faced All Might, then did you?!"

If Garou spoke the truth, and he was here talking about it, then that would mean…

"I wouldn't count his defeat as a win. I hunt heroes, not patients," Garou shook his head.

"P-Patients?" Ghin tilted his head.

"Turns out he was injured before I faced him. It looked serious, yet he still chose to fight with that handicap. I don't know whether he's fanatically dedicated or just virtuously stupid. No idea how severe his wound is, but if he kept this up, his wound would permanently depart him from heroism."

Silence dominated the air, the boy dropping his jaw at the words spouted from the man's mouth, not sure whether to take heed or dismiss his words as truth or false boasts.

"...so you beat All Might?" Ghin timidly asked, wanting verification on his victory.

"Yeah, I beat him. I only regretted not facing All Might at full strength though. He better heal or else I will retire him from heroism forever myself." Garou glowered at the empty air before him, still livid at All Might for handicapping himself.

"HAH?! You beat All Might?! Seriously?! HIM?!" Ghin's jaw dropped, eyes wider than dinner plates as all color left his being from abject surprise.

"B-But he's the Number One Hero! The undefeatable champion of justice!"

"Nothing's undefeatable. It just means his enemies are just too weak for him," Garou scoffed at the kid's biased views.

"B-but… wow."

Color slowly returned to the boy, his complexion a healthy beige as stars started to fill his eyes.

"...are you sure you're Quirkless?" Ghin asked.

"There's no such thing as Quirks where I'm from, Shrimp. I thought I told you that already."

'Shrimp?' Ghin tilted his head at his new nickname for a moment.

"Okay… but, how'd you beat him?" Ghin asked, his silver ahoge wagging faster and faster in synch with his growing excitement, like a child listening to an exciting bedtime story.

"I fought him in one-on-one, and I beat him."

Ghin's eyes widen with respect and wonder.

"S-So you're stronger than All Might now?" Ghin asked to elucidate.

"Tsk, a weakened All Might, yes. I want to fight him at full strength." Garou rolled his eyes, still bitter about the state of the Number One Hero.

"O-Ohhhhh… without any Quirk?" Ghin asked.

"Yes, without a Quirk." Garou sighed, not sure how many times he had to repeat himself for the boy to fully receive the message. The common sense of 'power equals Quirks' was too strong here.

"Um… what did you do to All Might when you beat him? Did you add him to a body pile? Did you turn him into a human pretzel as you did with Crimson Riot?" Ghin asked, smiling even wider when he mentioned the state of Crimson Riot.

"I left him be."

"...huh?" The boy blinked, picking his ear with his pinky to clean out the metaphorical earwax.

"Did you say you left him alone? I thought you enjoy sending people to hospitals," Ghin accused based on Garou's infamous record, never bothering to finish any heroes he hunted and sent them to the hospitals instead.

"I'll pretend that I didn't hear that. But yes, I didn't send him to the hospital." Garou felt offended by the boy's claim.

"...why?" A valid question Ghin asked.

"Isn't it obvious? I want to hunt heroes at their best, otherwise, hunting them is meaningless."

"Ohhhhhh."

Ghin's respect for Garou escalated even higher upon discovering Garou's code of honor.

"Now that I think about it know any quiet places I can settle in, Shrimp?" Garou asked, returning to his original objective.

"U-Um." The boy paused, eyes veered heavenward in contemplation.

"T-There are many quiet places in Hosu. My neighborhood is amongst the quietest in a sense, hahaha," Ghin chuckled.

"Oh. Know a place I can stay then?" If there were a place that Garou would mark his territory, here could be ideal, a pleasant, quiet land free from distractions.

"Well… do you have a preference?" Ghin asked with childish curiosity.

"Don't know, but somewhere far away and quiet could do. Away from prying eyes."

"Well, my Aunty owns the apartment building, and it is quiet. Though there are no tenants due to the threat of villain attacks there." Ghin hung his head dejectedly.

"Oh…" Garou almost forgot about the villains that tried to abduct him.

"Remind me again, why were there villains trying to abduct you when I… arrived?" Garou asked, curious to the sequence of events that lead up to him accidentally murdering a bunch of inhuman villains.

"...my Aunty's a lawyer, a good one. She is a diligent warrior of the law, or so she says. She's now taking care of me."

"And being a lawyer is credence enough to abduct you?" Garou could not parse the logic behind it.

"Well, right now she is trying to uncover the corruption in the Hero System, trying to sue the guys responsible for assigning heroes to specific locations and stuff. She is charging them with bribery and murder… well, she didn't consider that the opposition might play dirty, it seems." Ghin gave a sarcastic chuckle at the end.

"Oh… Ohhhhhhhhhh." Garou now understood the reason behind his abduction.

Still…

"How many times did villains try to abduct you?" Garou wondered how much trouble even a young kid could endure from villains and criminal scum.

"...three times. The first time I was rescued by a hero. The second, I managed to run away. The third, you." Tears started to stream from his eyes; the boy rubbed them to dry him of said tears, not wanting to break down into sobs.

"Damn." Even Garou felt sympathy for the kid. His childhood was harsher than he expected.

"Does your Aunt know about this?" If she didn't, Garou would personally pay the lawyer a brutal visit for extreme negligence.

"...yes. She apologized many times after you left, but she cannot come back home. Being a lawyer is very tough, always having to stay at work most of the time." The boy sounded as if he was losing faith in society as a whole.

"Huh." Garou had no words to say.

"...you said your place has no tenants?" Garou asked, an idea forming in his head. Though it might be a bit shameless in the end, he admitted, but he needed a guide, a native to assist and advise him on the geography and history of this world. Someone to help his way through the New Earth he stumbled in.

"...yeah. They are afraid that the villain attacks might involve them, even though the rent is cheap," Ghin nodded, still sullen.

"Heh. You sound like you could use a bodyguard or something." Garou joked, brightening up the atmosphere with a chuckle.

"...yeah…" Ghin chuckled as well, swept along with Garou's sense of humor.

A warm silence dawned over them like a shroud, the two enjoying the peaceful ambiance of the quietness.

"...well, I'm not sure if I can hire you as a bodyguard though. I mean, you're the Hero Hunter. The guy who piles bodies for fun." Ghin joked back as well, slowly bonding with the man that loved to hunt heroes and put them in body piles.

"Hah, and this Hero Hunter can pile bodies of villains just as good." Garou joked back.

The boy's frown reversed to a smile, his sullen mood uplifting with the corner of his lips.

"...will you really help me?" The boy turned to the left, looking at Garou with eager, hopeful eyes.

"Give me a place to stay, and I might consider it."