Chapter 28: The Last Bastion

Lida, Tsuyu, and the others came running, their faces a mixture of relief and astonishment.

"You're okay!" Iida panted, his armor dented but intact.

"We are," Izuku confirmed, his gaze fixed on the central plaza, where the nightmare continued.

The Nomu had just smashed Aizawa into the ground one last time. Hope was fading at a dizzying speed.

"We can't win a direct fight," Izuku said, his voice tense as he took command. "But we can buy time. EVERYONE, TO YOUR POSITIONS! YAOYOROZU IS OUR ONLY CHANCE TO CALL FOR HELP! FORM A DEFENSIVE PERIMETER AROUND HER!"

The class representative's voice cut through the panic. The scattered students who had arrived, including a grim-faced Todoroki and a weary-looking Sero, obeyed without hesitation. They formed a desperate circle around Momo, a last bastion against the tide of villains.

Before kneeling to begin her most complex creation, Momo's skin glowed as she became a walking armory.

"Sato, Iida!" she said, her voice fast and precise. "You need more than just your strength! Titanium alloy shields, tower design!"

Two enormous shields sprouted from her back, and she tossed them. They both caught them mid-air, planting them in the ground like a makeshift wall.

"Todoroki!" she continued, and a pair of spiked gauntlets appeared in her hands. "Your ice is our best barrier, but take these in case they get too close!"

She threw them to him. Todoroki caught them, his expression impassive, but he nodded in acknowledgment.

"Jiro, Kaminari, non-lethal sonic dispersal equipment! Aim for their ears! The rest of you, containment weapons! Staffs, nets, whatever you need!"

The objects poured from her, an instant arsenal born from the energy Izuku had transferred to her. It was a stunning testament to the power of his "Booster."

Finally, she knelt in the center of her human fortress. The skin on her arms and torso began to glow intensely.

"I need a minute. Sixty seconds," she said, her voice now strained with concentration. "Protect me. Don't let anything or anyone get close."

She closed her eyes, and complex pieces of metal and wiring began to emerge from her skin. The countdown had begun.

Izuku watched the scene, his heart in his throat. He saw his team, armed and ready. He saw Momo, vulnerable in the center. And he saw the Nomu, which had left Aizawa's unconscious body and was now watching them, its head cocked like a curious bird. And behind it, he saw Shigaraki's grin.

It won't be enough, he thought, an icy certainty washing over him. The shields are strong. Todoroki's ice is powerful. But that thing… that thing broke Aizawa-sensei like a twig. It's not a villain. It's a walking natural disaster.

He knew what he had to do. It was a risk. It was insane. But there was no other choice.

He moved closer to Ochako, who was on the front line next to Iida.

"Uraraka," he whispered, his voice so low it was barely audible over the snarls of the approaching horde. "Listen to me. It won't be enough. I need to boost you, too."

Ochako turned, her eyes wide with surprise.

"What? But… how? Right now? Can you handle two at once?"

"I don't know," he admitted with brutal honesty. "I've never tried. But I have to. You're our best active defense."

As he spoke, he shouted orders to keep up appearances, his body moving with calculated purpose.

"SATO, CLOSE THAT GAP ON THE LEFT FLANK! KIRISHIMA, GET READY TO REINFORCE IIDA!"

In the chaos of his own shouts, he positioned himself directly behind Ochako. His movement was a blur, an "accidental" action amid the coordination of their defense. His hand landed with deliberate firmness on her rear.

Ochako let out a choked gasp, her entire body tensing in shock. A blush so intense you could almost feel the heat flooded her face. It was a mix of absolute embarrassment and an unexpected wave of pleasure that made her tremble.

But she didn't pull away. She didn't scream. Her face, after the initial shock, hardened with steel-like determination. She felt the energy: a new, familiar warmth spreading through her body, even more potent than the last time. She nodded at Izuku without looking at him, her gaze fixed on the enemy. The boost had worked. Their secret was safe in the heart of the battle.

Shigaraki's patience ran out.

"They stopped running…" he hissed, scratching his neck furiously. "They're grouping up. They think they can win. Such arrogance! They're planning something! Forget the teacher! Attack the ponytail girl! SHE'S THE ONLY ONE THAT MATTERS! NOW!"

The horde of lesser villains, emboldened by their leader's command, charged. It was a torrent of bodies and strange Quirks, a wave of violence that crashed against their small fortress.

"HOLD THE LINE!" Izuku roared, his voice that of a true commander. "IIDA, SATO, FRONT LINE, ABSORB THE IMPACT! TODOROKI, NOW!"

Todoroki stomped his foot. A gigantic, jagged wall of ice erupted from the ground, soaring toward the dome's ceiling. It wasn't a complete barrier; he had built it at a clever angle, creating a funnel that channeled the horde into a single chokepoint.

"URARAKA!" Izuku yelled.

"GOT IT!" she yelled back.

Boosted now, her power was on another level. The villains trying to scale the ice wall or push through the funnel suddenly lost all their weight. Ochako made them float with a simple mental touch, her control so absolute she could handle five, six, seven at a time. She left them suspended in the air, spinning helplessly like fish on a hook.

"NOW!" she would shout.

And the rest of the class, using the weapons Momo had given them, would neutralize them. Sero's nets enveloped them. Aoyama's laser blasts dazzled them. Jiro's sound waves disoriented them. It was working. Their coordinated defense was repelling the horde. A spark of hope ignited in the midst of the chaos.

Shigaraki watched the scene with growing irritation. His minions, his army of thugs, were being humiliated by a group of kids.

"Useless…" he hissed. "All of you. You're all useless NPCs."

He turned to his ultimate weapon.

"USELESS! NOMU, FORGET THE OTHERS! CRUSH THAT GIRL! THE ONE WITH THE PONYTAIL! RIGHT NOW!"

The Nomu, which had been observing the battle with a vacant intelligence, obeyed. It ignored everyone else and charged. It didn't run; it moved like a force of nature.

It tore through Todoroki's ice wall as if it were glass, sending a shower of frozen shards everywhere. The other students' attacks bounced off its dark skin without the slightest effect. Nets tore. Lasers dissipated. It was an unstoppable force on a collision course with the heart of their defense: Momo.

The Nomu reached the defensive circle. Everything seemed to happen in agonizing slow motion. It raised its devastating fist, a battering ram of muscle and bone, and brought it down directly toward Momo, who was still kneeling, eyes closed, completely absorbed in her creation.

But Class 1-A didn't break. They reacted as one.

Ochako, with a cry of effort, thrust her hands out. Using all the power Izuku had given her, she created a gravitational distortion in the air right in front of the Nomu's fist. The air visibly warped, and the punch's velocity slowed noticeably, as if it were moving through molasses.

At the same time, Todoroki unleashed a second, massive wave of ice. Not a wall, but a torrent that engulfed the Nomu's arm, freezing it, trying to halt its advance. The ice further dampened the blow, but it shattered from the monster's pure, brute force.

The fist, though weakened, though slowed, continued its deadly trajectory.

Izuku saw it. He saw the fist. He saw Momo, oblivious to the danger. He saw that no one else could get there in time.

A rapid succession of images flashed through his mind: Momo in the hallway, asking for his advice; Momo on the beach, her face focused during training; Momo in the Shipwreck Zone, her cold lips against his in a desperate kiss; her smile in the cafeteria; her promise to build him a cage if he stared too much.

He ran.

With the titanium alloy shield Momo had made for him on his arm, he threw himself between the fist and her. There was no cry of defiance. There was no final thought. Just the pure instinct of a class representative protecting his class. The instinct of a boy protecting a girl he cared about.

He raised the shield.

The impact was a sound none of them would ever forget: a thunderous noise of twisting metal and shattering bone.

The titanium alloy shield crumpled like aluminum foil and then split in two. The sickening crack of his leg bones fracturing under the sheer pressure of the impact rang out. And finally, the fist, already extremely weakened by the layered defenses, struck his abdomen.

It didn't send him flying. It simply crushed him.

Izuku's vision turned black at the edges. He tasted a hot, metallic flavor filling his mouth. Blood. It poured from his mouth, his nose, his ears. His body trembled uncontrollably, but somehow, miraculously, he remained standing for one more second.

Through his blurry vision, he saw Momo's eyes open, the last piece of her creation forming in her hands.

He smiled at her.

And then he passed out, collapsing to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.

The Nomu, its task incomplete, ripped the shattered shield from Izuku's arm and tossed his unconscious body aside like a sack of trash. It prepared to strike Momo again.

Momo, her back to the scene, hadn't noticed the sacrifice. She was still focused on her device.

But Ochako saw it.

For her, the world stopped. The sound of the battle, the cries of her classmates—it all faded away. Her vision tunneled, focusing on a single point: the broken figure of Izuku, motionless on the ground in a rapidly spreading pool of his own blood.

Her brain didn't process sadness. It didn't process grief. It skipped straight to a pure, white-hot, incandescent fury. Her objective changed. She no longer saw an enemy that needed to be defeated. She saw a being that had hurt Deku. A being that didn't deserve to exist.

The heat in her chest, the power Izuku had given her, became an inferno.

She let out a scream.

It wasn't a scream of pain. It wasn't a scream of fear. It was a roar of pure, absolute rage.

And she unleashed her Quirk. Not with control, not with finesse. She unleashed all of it, with no reservations, no restraint.

A massive gravitational shockwave, visible as a distortion in the air, exploded from her body. It didn't lift the Nomu. It tore it from the ground and hurled it violently through the air, away from Izuku's body, as if it were a mere pebble.