My Hero Academia: A Terrible Fate

They, You, I

The Smiling Man.

That was the latest gossip going around, like an online trend or internet joke that everyone seemed to be talking about. His presence had grown so rapidly in such a short time. First it was a few select conversations on 1 or 2 websites, then the entire website, then real life. Before they knew it, The Smiling Man forcefully infested everyone's conversations, like a tick attaching itself to the skin.

Now anyone who has even an inkling of knowledge about the internet would say that normally, something becomes popular and dies down over time. That was simply just how culture worked. It came and went, gone like a ghost. People would talk about it for maybe 1 or 2 months, then it was forgotten.

The Smiling Man refuses to be forgotten.

He even set up his own little shop on the busiest corner of the busiest city, complete with a massive rendition of his own head on top. No one would forget him now. No one would ignore him, no one COULD ignore him. They'd talk and talk and talk, exactly how he wanted it.

However, words can only get someone so far. Soon enough, people could simply... stop talking. Ceasing any and all mentions of The Smiling Man. They'd grow to hate that name, violently gag at the mere sound of its 4 syllables. Eventually, they may stop talking all together, to stop any possibility, any risk of his name forming on the tongue and being flung into earshot. They would instead communicate through facial gestures. Looking at others' faces would become the new kind of communication. An angry expression, blinking a few times, maybe a click of the teeth, the click being produced through the force of the jaws clamping of course, don't want to risk speaking a word after all.

However, one day, peoples' faces started to change. One woman's face was yellow, having a black nose, and yellow triangle shaped ears that poked out the top. A man over the counter at the local cafe had a face which was a rocky gray, featuring blood red markings all over, which formed some eerie smile, accompanied by a massive yellow eye in the middle. The postman who delivered the morning mail had a woman's face, long pink hair gliding behind him, the hair being longer than his entire body. Soon enough, everyone had a new face, or rather, a new mask.

The days they called him The Smiling Man were over, those seemed like years ago. Now, he was simply known as The Happy Mask Salesman.

During the period when people were much more hesitant about speaking his name, The Happy Mask Salesman suddenly opened his hut to the public, now branding it as the Happy Mask Shop. He began selling strange masks he claimed to have collected during his travels around the world, marketing the masks as having mystical powers.

Wearing these masks meant the buyer contributed to his legend. His business. His opacity.

They were his customer, his property, he owned them. It didn't matter if everyone stopped talking about him, just looking at another person and seeing the mask on their face was enough to remind someone of this inescapable fact:

The Happy Mask Salesman is real, and he will never go away.

Those who tried to do something about the situation, just became another buyer, another click and cha-ching of the cash register. Some would watch as police officers entered his shop, wanting to see if he had a warrant to sell his merchandise. Just a few minutes later, they would all come out, wearing his masks. Those who tried to take an indirect approach through the courts, would watch as the judge dismissed their case, that orange-haired man with the grin standing by his side. As the door closed, they could barely make out the last of the judge's face, a big black sphere with a crudely shaped skull painted on it.

Wait, was the judge wearing a mask too?

It has been so long since the residents had seen someone without a mask, or was it a face? When you looked in the mirror and saw your head covered by the image of a peach-skinned boar with tusks on each end of its mouth, was that just how you looked? This... face you were born with?