The whole case was bizarre. Naomasa had been skeptical since his induction into the whole case - the thought of a quirk that could steal quirks permanently was absurd even by the standards of their increasingly evolving society. And the idea that the user of such a quirk had remained elusive for hundreds of years, directing Japan's criminal underground? Naomasa had felt he was being inducted into a conspiracy group more so than a formal criminal investigation.

There had been years of investigations on the whereabouts of the mysterious villain dubbed "All for One" leading up to this: a raid on a seemingly ordinary household in the heart of suburban Musutafu.

It sickened Naomasa to think that such a villain or his associates were anywhere near an area full of innocent civilians. That the villain could have been the cause of the suspicious increase in the local phenomena known as "quirk regression" in which kids, who had just newly discovered their quirks, found themselves unable to harness those same quirks weeks later.

Scientists had theorized it was the children's own quirk factors shutting themselves to protect the strain on their body, but their investigations suspected otherwise. The strings of coincidences had just piled too high. The children could all be linked to quirk counselors stemming from the same practicing group, whose finances were bizarre.

They had impeccable reviews as a privately funded group that provided low cost care to anyone who needed it, which in itself seemed like a noble effort...until one stopped to wonder how such a group had multiple offices in every prefecture of Japan. The operation put the government's own efforts on handling the increasing needs of a quirk-heavy society to shame. It was hailed as a glowing example of the private sector doing what the government could not dream to achieve. And yet it was notoriously hard to track down where funding for the group even came from despite the vast amount of wealth required.

They had traced shell company after shell company, suffered through surprisingly dodgy statements from the more legitimate sources of money, and had been desperate enough to even tail a few of the more prominent members of the group. All this had led them to here: a humble two story household belonging to a newly wed couple that drew wild speculation from the neighborhood on account of how private the occupants tended to keep their lives.

Well...that wasn't exactly true. Midoriya Inko was the talk of the neighborhood.

A kind, vibrant, round-faced woman from humble, local origins who had taken a break from her corporate life to nurse her even rounder belly. She always had her door open to anyone who would want to talk, much to the chagrin of her more elusive, private husband. It was local consensus that Inko would be a great mother and excitement was building on the block for the arrival.

Midoriya Hisashi was the true mystery: a figure in the corporate world who played on the sidelines but was speculated to be as wealthy as any of the more prominent financial players of their economy. He was a lesser known backer of the Quirk Counseling Initiative, and the government had hoped by obtaining and tracing his communications, they could be a step closer in tracking down the quirk user known as All for One.

They had tried to be as discreet in planning this raid as possible. Midoriya Hisashi had been described as a mild mannered man by the few who knew him, but his quirk - "Hot Breath," could easily be used to cause destruction to both the agents in the operation and the very evidence they were after. So they had kept a watch on Inko's pregnancy and used the hour of the couple's departure to the hospital for contractions as the perfect time to strike.

The operation had gone smoothly at first. The front door went down easily with an enhanced punch, but when they had gone upstairs to Hisashi's study to seize his records, they had found more pictures of the newly wed couple than actual financial records. And when they had tried to secure his computer - it had self destructed .

Never let it be said Hisashi Midoriya was not a paranoid motherfucker.

The operation went downhill from there. The agents who had been assigned to secure Hisashi at the hospital for questioning had gone off the grid. When a second team was dispatched to check what the hell was going on, they had received grim news.

Midoriya Inko had died in childbirth while pro heroes were scrambling trying to evacuate the hospital on account of a massive, unexplained power outage. The silver lining in the whole scenario should have been that Midorya Hisashi had, surprisingly, not fled the scene when surrounded by government agents calling for his detention. They were able to secure him on the premise with a crying newborn in his arms, but the ice cold look on his face made the team uneasy for understandable reasons. He was threatening the legal destruction of everyone involved in this fiasco.

This case had been a veritable disaster, and, the worst part was, Naomasa had a hunch that the real disaster was just beginning.

Hisashi's reserve that day surprised himself. Quite frankly, he had been sorely tempted to just let the hospital burn in flames so he could mourn in peace without the annoying buzz of Japan's government trying to chase his trail.

But 200 years and a baby in his arms had done wonders for his patience to make the longer, the better, play

And really, it was his mistake. Something he hated to admit, but he couldn't deny his part in it. He had been careless. The pregnancy had been going so smooth and he had found himself distracted by his wife's infectious excitement.

"Hmm...how about Izuku? It could be a nod to your name, with the Kanji," she giggled, because she was alway one to love tiny details like that.

Him. A father.

How had he never considered it before in his 200 some years of existence?

His brother had died before leaving behind any family. And he...he never cared for such thing. Not after the pain it had caused him before. But he hadn't realized how lonely he had grown over the years, until he met Inko.

"M-me? Y-you're proposing to me?" She startled, sheets of paper darting from her desk by her quirk to further cover her beat red face that was already being covered with her hand. It was endearing really. He could have sworn her quirk was making his heart want to jump out of his chest towards her as well.

She was fierce and honest to a fault, but also a woman of contradictions. She would argue wholeheartedly for increased funding to a program one second and stutter over her own name the next. She was a mix of idealism and pragmatism whose efficiency in the office was second to none, and she had somehow caught his attention before he knew it. She had noticed him despite his efforts to lay low in his own company, luring him in with lunch boxes and debates on anything from the current hero system to the needs for better research on quirk development on the psychology of children.

"-much too skinny," she had chided, pushing a bento to his hands. "Do you even eat? How are you supposed to take over the world on an empty stomach, Mr. company boss?"

Really, at first, he had wondered if she was someone trying to climb the company ladder by nudging shoulders with management, but it was easy to see she didn't have that in mind. He didn't need a mind reading quirk to know that Inko was so much more than that.

And now, she was dead.

He should have realized the risks of passing down his genetics. When her vitals had started to collapse during the contractions, he had pulled every quirk in his capacity to analyze what was going wrong. And he could see what none of the doctors could.

There was a quirk being activated. Not from any of the doctors, but from the baby .

Quirk manifestation at birth had been both common and dangerous in the early years of the quirk era. The first quirk discovered was a glowing baby, after all. But the expression of quirks at birth placed a great strain on the baby and mother.

To his knowledge, his own quirk had not manifested at birth, much like many of the later quirks that mutated to manifest at a later date to avoid any risk to their own propagation. However, as an early generation mutation, his inheritable quirk factor was much more likely to mutate as a birth manifestation than hers.

He should have known.

"I'm feeling a bit more tired lately," she had said, placing a hand on her stomach. "Little Izuku's been quite active."

But he hadn't sensed any notable changes in her vitals until the birth when all of them dropped straight to chaos.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, 200 years of knowledge and experience and even that isn't enough to save the only life he's wanted to help since his brother-

When Izuku was born, Inko's eyes closed.

"Hisashi will take care of him," she had thought to herself, not knowing he could hear everything.

He frantically summons the few non-self healing quirks he has in his arsenal as he shoved away the frantic doctors. Why hadn't he collected more for this scenario? How could he have so many quirks and it still not be enough-

The heart monitor slowly tapered to a flat line.

"HAS THE GOVERNMENT GONE TOO FAR? MIDORIYA HISASHI, PHILANTHROPIC DONOR TO THE POPULAR QUIRK COUNSELING INITIATIVE, UNDER INVESTIGATION FOR UNKNOWN REASONS"

"INVESTIGATED FOR...DOING TOO MUCH GOOD? THE SCOOP ON THE SHADOWY HISTORY OF PHILANTHROPIST HISASHI MIDORIYA."

The media had been on the Midoriya's side.

Hisashi had the sympathy of everyone after losing his wife to an unforeseen complication at birth. It didn't hurt that he also signed the checks for quite a few news organizations. The public was outraged at the government's hunt over a man who, by their knowledge, had only been supporting an organization that helped struggling families understand and develop their quirks.

No one could really pin on him that the organization was a great asset to his true quirk, providing him ample information on any quirk he may potentially want to add to his collection.

A lie detector quirk was no use against someone who had a quick mind and a whole arsenal of quirks to nullify such things. The government had been quick to back off from his affairs from the public backlash alone. He didn't doubt they were still monitoring his identity as Hisashi Midoriya, but he was sure to always keep two steps ahead.

The stakes had grown higher than ever now that he had a child .

Izuku was doing well. Despite the complications Inko had, he was born with a healthy weight and had hit all his developmental milestones on time, if not early.

The one-year-old was happily babbling from his seat in the kitchen as he waved his hands to float Hisahi's pen from his grasp and towards the baby seat. The child's bright green eyes were wide in both concentration and marvel at his ability to change his environment with just a wave of his hand. Izuku waved harder, causing the pen to come flying towards him with double the speed it had before.

Hisashi easily activated one of his own quirks - metallokinesis - to veer the pen from it's original trajectory and do a u-turn back to his hand.

"Careful, Izuku," he reprimanded. Izuku looked at him in betrayal, but it didn't take long for the child's eyes to wander elsewhere. Izuku waved his hands towards the kitchen knife.

Midoriya Hisashi had a feeling nullification quirks were going to be his new favorite area of research.