In the End, It Still Came Down to Hand-to-Hand Combat

The enemy's five fingers were subtly aimed at five of Uraraka Shige's vital points: his groin, kidneys, heart, throat, and the spot between his eyebrows. Shige could clearly feel a phantom pain, like a prickling sting, at each of those five points. As he drew closer to the enemy, until only a dozen or so paces separated them, it gradually grew into an overwhelming sense of danger that made his hair stand on end and brought with it the feeling of death.

If this had been before Terumi Genga was injured and left lying face down on the ground like a corpse, Shige would certainly have done everything he could to get away and put as much distance between himself and this enemy as possible.

Even if it had been before he experienced the pain of losing an arm, he probably would have done everything he could to escape this dangerous enemy.

He might even have taken advantage of his child's body to do so, bawling and apologizing, acting cute and playing dumb, stopping at nothing.

If he had managed to escape afterward, he might even have felt smug about it, spouting bullshit about how he was the protagonist, how children and women couldn't be trusted, and how stupid this enemy was for not pulling out the weeds by the roots.

But now, his mind was filled with a rage that came from within.

As mentioned before, Uraraka Shige was a selfish person by nature.

The reason he got along well with his family wasn't that they were his family, but because he liked the happiness he felt when he was with them. When he wasn't with them, the emptiness and alienation brought on by the memories of his previous life, which were utterly at odds with this world, made him feel deeply restless and uncomfortable. His decision was the result of weighing those two things against each other.

He was a very self-centered person. Though he appeared to live harmoniously with his family, played and got along well with his sister, and even took care of her in many ways,

the root of all this lay in his deep-seated acceptance and enjoyment of the feelings he himself experienced from doing so. It was because he desired what he could gain from it.

Deep down, he was the kind of selfish, awkward person who thought, "My liking you is my business and has nothing to do with you. My confessing to you is my business and has nothing to do with you. Whether you mind my taking up your time to confess is your business and has nothing to do with me. Whether you accept my confession is also your business and has nothing to do with me."

He could take the kindness others showed him for granted, while also freely returning it to those who showed it to him because he wanted more of it. In more transactional terms, his behavior could even be called an investment.

And now, filled to the brim with rage, he naturally acted in a way that suited his selfish nature.

"Thread! Fall!"

Uraraka Shige quickly activated his Quirk, gathering a large number of fine threads that only he could see. They twisted and tangled together, even appearing around him in a form others could perceive.

Like a crack in space, it coiled and whirled around him, radiating an unusual presence. Yet the "thread" was thinner than a strand of hair and so tiny that others could hardly make out its form. Instead, that unusual presence became a persistent sense that something was wrong, inexplicably drawing their attention to it.

At the same time, he kept the portion of gravity producing "Rise" separate rather than twisting it into the "thread." Instead, he completely reversed its direction, turning it into "Fall" to help him descend.

That was the action Uraraka Shige took on instinct in his anger, faced with an enemy who had already taken aim at five of his vital points and was poised to attack.

And without a doubt, Uraraka Shige's series of actions and responses achieved the desired effect.

With the enemy's attention distracted by the "thread," the five fingers that had been subtly pointed at Shige's vital points became somewhat difficult to aim. On top of that, Shige suddenly switched from rising to falling. As a result, the silent attacks the enemy unleashed with his Quirk in the next instant all missed cleanly.

"Rise! Level!"

As he was about to hit the ground, Uraraka Shige switched his Quirk again, letting himself land safely rather than stumbling, twisting his back, or even injuring himself in the fall because of the acceleration from "Fall." At the same time, he was able to push off and charge forward the instant he landed, reducing the time the enemy had to attack him at leisure from a distance and allowing him to close in faster and launch a series of attacks of his own.

"Brat..."

The enemy was extremely impatient with how troublesome Uraraka Shige was proving to be, and as time passed, he grew increasingly irritated and anxious. He stopped holding back the impact and heat he had previously absorbed with his Quirk and launched two more waves of attacks, but Shige dodged both by using his Quirk to suddenly alter his course.

"Troublesome brat!"

Watching the distance between himself and Uraraka Shige shrink, the enemy grumbled in dissatisfaction, then simply took a deep breath and charged straight at him, choosing to fight him at close quarters.

Uraraka Shige immediately felt just how troublesome this enemy was. Every punch and kick the enemy threw felt extremely dangerous, as though a single glancing hit would take his life. The same sense of danger arose whenever his own punches and kicks were about to hit the enemy's body. He could only struggle to dodge and maintain the stalemate, relying on the enemy's difficulty adapting to his sudden, occasional changes of gravity through his Quirk.

This guy's cheating, right?! He's just like a hedgehog!

Uraraka Shige grumbled inwardly in frustration, unaware that the enemy was just as full of regret: regret that he hadn't guessed Shige's Quirk earlier, and that he had been careless enough to let Shige get close so easily.

"Forget it. In that case..."

Uraraka Shige gritted his teeth and dodged another punch from the enemy. Then he clenched his left hand into a fist and drove it hard at the enemy's lower abdomen, near his heart.