Chapter 146: 146: An act

Chapter 146: An act 

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"P-papa, uhuhu!"

Kurai's claws were digging into Neji's chest in her attempt to hug him tight.

Neji didn't push her away though, he simply patted and rubbed her small head.

Kurai was crying, which got sympathetic looks from both the ogres, orcs and wolves. The wolves could relate the most to the cat as they also had a parental figure right next to them.

Andrius looked at the scene with strange eyes as she nodded softly before speaking in her new voice. "I think we should give them some time. Follow me, children."

The wolves howled and followed Andrius' steps. Musha nodded to Neji too and did the same with her people.

Kurai's sobs were slowly starting to get quieter, so Neji decided to head back to his room.

The bedroom was releasing a soothing scent because of the special wood used to build the room, and the window showed the outside scenery of the forest where cool breezes blew the leaves.

Neji sat down on the soft bed, Kurai on his arms, and they both stayed like that for a few minutes.

After a while, Kurai raised her head to meet his eyes.

"Papa, what is fusion?"

"You got the notification too?" Neji answered her question with his own question. "It's a state where you and I merge to form a 'being' who is both Kurai and Neji."

"Uh…" Kurai tilted her head, seemingly confused but she grinned soon. "Let's try it then!"

"We will do it soon, don't worry." Neji reached out his hand to wipe her tears. "But first, where is your mommy? And your grandparents and aunty Momo's parents too."

Kurai seemed sad at his refusal but nodded her head nonetheless. "They're all in my inventory. They're fine. Do I take them all out?"

"Uh, no." Neji shook his head. "Just take Kimi out."

Neji didn't want his parents to see all this dungeon and stuff. They're better off sleeping for now.

Kurai nodded to his words and pulled out Kimi from within the empty air, putting her body on the soft bed.

Neji reached out his hand and massaged her neck, causing her body to stir slowly as she soon opened her eyes and sat up.

"Mhm-" her droopy eyes landed on Neji as they sprung up. She jumped and hugged his neck. "Young master! You're fine!"

Her arms were trembling around him and her breathing was almost shaky. But her body calmed down the moment Neji's arms wrapped around her.

"I am fine, yes. Good to see you're doing okay too." Neji whispered in her ears. "Didn't expect things to go ballistic like this."

Kimi didn't say anything, only made an agreeing sound. She was planning to hug him for a while more but… something squeaky yelled from the side.

"Hey! Give me my spot back! Grr!"

Kimi drew her head back and looked at Kurai with a playful frown. She reached out her hand and flicked a finger on the cat's skull.

"Ouch!"

"Hmph, you nearly gave me a heart attack. 'Papa is dead!' My ass!"

"Uhuuhuu!" Kurai covered her head with her hands and looked at Neji with teary eyes. "Papa, mommy is bullying Kurai."

"Yes, yes, indeed." Neji raised his hand in the air and descended it above her ass, gaining a muffled moan from her. "Is this punishment enough? Or do you want me to punish her more?"

Kurai wiped her tears and shook her head. "It's fine. She was worried too."

Both Neji and Kimi laughed at that and Kimi brought the cat to a hug too.

Things were indeed wholesome, but this wasn't the time for that. Soon, Neji cleared his throat and sat up straight.

"That's enough. Kimi, did anything big happen at the party?" Neji asked Kimi who scratched the back of her head.

"Well… I guess… Can it be considered big though? Nobody from our side was hurt, except for a few rich people who got hit by lasers."

"Laser?"

Kimi seemed a bit embarrassed about it since it would sound like bragging, but she opened her mouth soon and explained the situation to Neji.

.

.

.

Soon Kimi finished telling the story, 

"Wait, so, Nine is the dude who killed your sidekick back in the day?" Neji asked in a feigned surprise.

He actually knew it already. Kimi shared her story a lot of times with him, and from the description of the villain and his Quirk [Weather Manipulation], it wasn't exactly impossible to guess who it was for Neji. He just didn't tell Kimi about him because he didn't see any need to before actually confronting him.

"Yup, I was shocked too." Kimi nodded slowly.

Kimi's sister was killed after she captured her first villain and that villain's comrades wanted revenge. She was depressed for a while after that, but she didn't quit her job because of the support she received from the other senior heroes. But when her sidekick also died, more so in such a gory way that it was enough to scar her mind, she didn't have the mindset to continue her job.

That's when Gara–an old friend of her deceased older sister–proposed to her the job to become an undercover bodyguard for two children. Without any choice, as she needed money to survive in this day and age, Kimi accepted it. That's the part where her life changed…for the better.

Reading her expression, Neji patted Kimi's head as if she was a little girl but she simply gave him a blank stare. "You know, I am 18 years older than you. Yet you treat me like a little girl."

"Isn't age just a number? You said it yourself back in the day, remember?"

"..."

Kurai was on the side, tilting her head in confusion as Neji laughed.

"Whatever, it doesn't matter." Kimi sighed, shaking her head and deciding to enjoy his touch instead.

Neji didn't stop patting her for a long time… while smiling like a maniac

"But why are you smiling like that?" Kimi couldn't help but ask.

"You bought me a big gift, you know."

"Gift?"

"Yup."

Kimi looked confused, but Neji didn't clarify anything.

This…this was perfect. Now he just needed to implement his plan on Nine.

'First I will have to take him somewhere isolated… and then… hehe…'

Neji laughed and pulled out a round bowl from inside his inventory before placing it above Kurai, confining her sight as he pushed the surprised Kimi on the bed and kissed her lovingly.

Kurai, after a terrible minute of struggle, managed to push the bowl from above her just as her golden eyes widened at the sight. With a loud screech, she ran out of the room.

"Hmm, she's of that age." Neji raised his head towards the door while licking his lips.

"Then stop doing it in front of her- nghhn~"

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Kimi tried to speak, but Neji didn't let her. She deserved his undivided attention for the gift she bought.

—★—

~An unknown time later~

Nine's eyes sprung up in a jolt as he almost fell to the ground.

'Where is this…?'

He was already standing when he woke up, and he was in the middle of a huge white arena, empty for the most part except for the glowing white ball floating in the middle of the arena, a bit far from him. 

He was still wearing his suit and mask, which confused him.

'What happened… and how did I end up here? Where is that maid woman?'

"You… huff."

Nine's ears twitched at a sound that came from behind him and he swiftly turned around.

'Was he always here?' Nine questioned himself, looking at the charred and bloody injured boy in front of him.

'Wait…isn't that the kid that both Izuku and Shigaraki wanted dead?'

He had white hair and blue eyes, his whole body was injured and he was gradually standing up from the ground where a pool of blood lied.

"Don't think you have won yet!" 

The boy cried, clenching his jaws as he wiped blood from his nose, finally standing up straight.

'Was I fighting with him?' Nine asked himself. 'I am missing something in memory… is this because of a quirk? This boy's quirk maybe?'

Nine narrowed his eyes, activating his <Scan> as he tried to see what Quirks the kid in front of him had.

Nine's <Scan> gave him a rough estimation of a person's overall strength, but he could only guess the quirks the individual possessed. There wasn't any detailed information.

First, Nine could see Neji was pretty strong, very strong even. But because of the injuries, he's currently very weak. Second, Nine could see Neji had a power related to Shockwaves, a power related to his eyes, and a power related to gravity.

'Three quirks?'

Was that why Izuku and Shigaraki wanted this kid? Because he somehow managed to get three quirks? Maybe he's someone who received All for One's help, thus the multiple quirks, and then he decided to betray the big villain? That'd explain everything.

'I guess the ability that is related to his eye is the one that made a gap in my memories. Whatever it is, it seems to be a good quirk. But the most special is his Shockwave quirk…' Nine evaluated in his mind. 'I have two more slots left of my 9 quirks limit… I don't think his Gravity Quirk is that powerful, and I don't know much about his eye quirk, so I will just take the Shockwave one.'

Nine didn't care about the bloody and charred-bodied Neji. He simply wanted to get out of this place, and from what he remembered from the UA Sports Festival, Neji's shockwave quirk was not only powerful but also versatile. It even allowed flight, which would make Nine a lot more versatile than his current self.

"Are you even listening to me?!"

Neji's loud yell brought Nine back from his mind as he proceeded to look at Neji with narrowed eyes.

"You," Nine spoke, rolling his shoulders. "I don't know what you did to me, but it doesn't matter anymore.  I have no grudge against you, but this is the end for you. I also don't want to stay at this unknown place any longer. So, goodbye."

Nine walked towards Neji in slow steps as Neji raised his hands shakily in the air to fire blasts of shockwave. The shockwaves hit Nine because he had no intention of dodging. After all, the shockwaves were too weak. They simply brushed Nine's hair in the air, nothing else.

"Stay away, bastard!" Neji yelled, his eyes bloodshot as he tried to step backwards.

Nine couldn't help but hold back a sigh. This kid was too weak… that was disappointing. Nine expected him to be worth more than this since both Izuku and Shigaraki hated him. But it is what it is. 

'From the looks of the kid's charred body, I seem to have used my weather manipulation quirk to summon lightning on top of this kid. So it's to be expected that he's shaken…' Nine thought as he grabbed Neji by his throat and kneed him on the stomach at the same time.

Neji grunted, spitting out saliva on the floor as Nine roughly clutched his hair. It stung on his hands because the kid's hair was strangely sharp as if it was made of some kind of metal.

But Nine didn't like to waste time, so he channelled his second quirk, All for One, just as a mixture of black and red energy jumped out of his hand and clasped Neji's head tightly, immediately as the kid's eyes went white. 

Nine then slowly used All for One to pick up the quirk he wanted, [Surge].

Nine grunted as he felt a portion of life left from Neji's body, slowly making its way into Nine's own–but something that had never occurred before suddenly happened.

Instead of Neji's lifeforce mixture with his own, like what happened with his other victims… it instead started to devour his lifeforce.

"What's happening?!"

Nine grunted, throwing Neji's body on the floor as he stepped back. The surprise didn't end there as immediately after, a blue hologram floated in front of him, with a message written on it.

[Multiple different minds are trying to invade Master's mind.]

[The Gamer's Mind is preparing the necessary erasure procedures.]

"What's this?" Nine frowned and waved his hand on the hologram.

But right then, his body stopped moving and he started to feel something switching his mind off.

"What the-"

Before he could finish his line…

[Procedure completed, all invading minds have been erased from existence.]

With that, Villain Nine died but… his lips stretched into a grin.

"Good, it worked."

Neji, now inside Nine's body, started to chuckle softly.

The [Gamer's Mind] is a skill that not only managed to repair his memories (before reincarnation) but also managed to negate the Goddess' attempts to erase his memories. Because of that, he had enough faith in it for him to take on such risks.

From what he knew from the canon manga when All for One steals a Quirk from someone, it also steals a portion of the person's 'Consciousness', clearly Neji's Gamer Mind wouldn't allow such a thing to happen to him.

All for One, the quirk, when used is like a fishing hook that forcefully grabs the quirk and pulls it out of the body, usually, the mind would come along too, but because of Gamer's Mind Neji got a System message, in form of an option to choose if he wanted to be hooked or not, and when he chose to be hooked his entire consciousness was pulled out of his body because Gamer's Mind couldn't allow his consciousness to be separated into pieces.

The Gamer Mind's job is to keep his mind safe from any harm, which means any mental attack below a certain rank would be easily neglected against it. And now that Neji was inside Nine's body, it was considered his own body. Now, Nine's mind, along with all the pieces of consciousness stored within Nine's other quirks were a mental threat to Neji's mind, so it acted up and erased all the other minds in a jippy.

Neji didn't waste a second and leaned over to touch his previous body that was lying on the ground. It was breathing, meaning it was alive, except it lacked a mind.

But Neji was very fond of this body, more so since Nine's body was dying because of the illness he had. So, he decided to use the same technique to transfer his own mind back to its original body.

Neji first clutched his hand and released it a few times, trying to see if he could use the quirks present in his body or not. When making sure that he could, as they were engraved in this body's muscle memory, he started to insert his Surge back into his own body.

This time, he also got his ability to choose if he wanted to push his consciousness out or now, as that's how the villain, All for One inserted a part of his consciousness into the people he gave his quirk to, like Lady Nagant.

 Neji declined the option, and then threw Nine's original quirk, Weather Manipulation. He did this because now when Neji returns back to his body, these quirks won't be considered as a part of the "All for One" quirk, which has a limit of 9, and would instead be part of his High-Human body, which Neji was sure could hold a lot more.

At last, Neji pushed the quirk, All for One, along with the quirks it held currently into his original body, and this time he chose for his consciousness to enter the body too.

Immediately after, Nine's body slumped down on the floor as Neji's body twitched before he murmured.

"Ugh… System, turn Regeneration rate back to 100%."

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