100 Percent Hero

Chapter 1: The Final Battle

"Listen very closely, Mob. You and I are different: we were born with special and unique powers that other people don't have. But even so, we mustn't let it get to our heads that we're special or above them."

Almost half a decade ago, these were the words that a deceitful yet wise man said to a young esper who lived in constant fear of his powers and had no one to guide him. While it was rather ironic that these words came from someone with no psychic powers at all, the message they carried was still powerful. He had no way of knowing that thanks to his words, this esper would never use this amazing psychic power for himself. Thanks to the words of Arataka Reigen, Mob managed to prevent himself from falling under the delusion of superiority with his psychic powers. But it wasn't just Reigen who made Shigeo realize the limits of his psychic powers in several areas.

As a child, Shigeo Kageyama once thought his powers made him cool. Why he thought this? Simple: it was his powers that made his crush, Tsubomi Takane, laugh and smile.

"Look! I can make the bar wiggle like a snake!" The young girl's eyes sparkled with fascination, and her heart reached out for the amazing things Mob could do.

"That's amazing! You're so cool, Mob!"

But for Tsubomi, Shigeo's psychic powers soon came to be old news. "Look!" the young child exclaimed while lifting a cat in the air, "You're the only person I've shown these things to!" The young Tsubomi did not look at these feats with the same awe she did before, and pursed her lips in a small line.

"Eh, it's kinda boring now."

Shigeo's sparkling eyes dimmed, and his proud posture now sunk as he looked to the ground with disappointment. His psychic powers weren't enough to make Tsubomi smile anymore.

Later that day, Shigeo participated in track and field events, and was carrying the baton for his team as he tried to pass it on to the next person. But his endurance was failing him: several boys passed him with confident smiles and strong bodies, while Shigeo was barely able to keep a running pace and had sweat pouring from all parts of his body.

Once the race finished, Mob laid defeated on his hands and knees, trying to catch his breath and feeling his shirt drenched in sweat. Standing a few feet away from him though, Tsubomi was admiring the winner of the race with the same sparkle in her eyes she had once given him before.

"I can't believe how fast you are, Akira!" exclaimed Tsubomi. As Mob heard Tsubomi's words of amazement towards Akira, Shigeo came to a strong realization: his psychic powers weren't enough to gain her affection or true interest. To some, they would view this as something trivial: sure, the girl Mob liked may have gotten bored after seeing him using psychic powers all the time, but there were still probably plenty of other girls that would fall for Mob and his psychic powers, right?

But that wasn't what Shigeo Kageyama wanted. He didn't want just any girl: he wanted to be with Tsubomi, his first crush. And to win her over, he realized he would need more than psychic powers.

Tsubomi never had any idea what kind of impact she had on Mob, nor would she ever have any real understanding of how much she meant to him or just how significant her very existence was in making Mob the person he was. But that didn't matter: once Mob came to this realization, and once he came across his master, Reigen, that was the last piece he needed to make Mob understand that his psychic powers didn't make him better than other people. For such a powerful being who could have the world in the palm of his hand if he so desired, it was exactly the thing he needed and the thing that would make him the pure-hearted soul he was today.

"Ha ha ha ha! Fear not, citizens! Hope has arrived, because I am here!"

In another world, another young boy was watching a video of his ultimate hero. He was watching the video he had watched since he was a child hundreds and hundreds of times. He was watching the Symbol of Peace of his world, All Might, debuting himself to the world on a video captured several years ago.