Fading into the background

Chapter two: A masterpiece is born

Trigger warning: Explicit child abuse

Having learnt from his previous three failures, Enji was determined to transform this fourth child into his one true heir. The babe was still too young to endure any kind of training so while it grew, eight year old Touya continued being on the wrong end of his fathers flaming fists. As the baby grew his eyes shined with an intelligence and curiosity unseen on his three elder siblings. At six months old he was already talking in simple sentences and not even a month later he could already walk perfectly. Endeavor was beyond happy with these developments and hired the best tutors money could buy. Shoto kept his genius status and before his turning one he could already read, write and perform simple math.

It was on his first birthday when things began going awry. It was nothing dramatic as his eldest brother was still the object of his fathers wrath. But little Shoto was tasked with performing some daily exercises. These exercises were extremely taxing on the little boy but he kept it up not wanting to disappoint his father and not knowing the wrongness of it, as despite being a genius the youngest Todoroki was still barely a toddler.

This routine was maintained throughout his first year of life: study, train, sleep and repeat. His timetable was fully packed but everyday he would manage to sneak a little time to snuggle on his mother's loving arms. This time, however, was not enough to get to know the three other children that inhabited that house. This fact would change on his second birthday when his martial arts training began. For the first time in his short life Shoto truly loathed something, as his tiny body hurted when he was pitted against his teachers and his bigger, more experienced brother. Nevertheless, no matter what happened he couldn't bring himself to hate the older boy as he could see the pain on his eyes and the bandages and burns peeking from under his shirt. And just like that a bond was born between the brothers, where they would exchange small comforting smiles when the monster posing as their father looked away.

On his third birthday Shoto finished elementary school and began junior high education. His martial arts training was going equally fast having already earned the purple band in Muay Thai (purple is the 6th rank, black is the 9th and the equivalent of a black belt) and a black belt in aikido. A week after his birthday his quirk showed, it was not a grandiose manifestation, he just sneezed and his surroundings were filled with ice and fire. The quirk was perfect, just like Enji predicted and Touya was immediately tossed aside, becoming just as invisible as his other siblings in front of his fathers eyes.

This action meant that the "training" would stop and the burns and bruises would finally heal. Nonetheless, Touya didn't see it that way as he had already suffered so much and he wanted to be a hero, he refused to be seen as another failure. On top of this, Rei's concern and attention was turned to his youngest brother who would now be on receiving end of their father's training sessions. In order to regain his position as the prodigal son he began training himself, gaining injuries even worse than those he got by his father.

While Touya trained himself, Shoto entered his own personal hell. His "training" was far more brutal than anything his older sibling had ever received, as the expectations were higher for him. The beatings got to the point where he required medical attention. When he was asked what happend at the hospital he gave the answers his father told him, repeated exactly word by word "I was playing with my quirk and got careless", "I tripped and fell downstairs" or the most common one "I fell off my bike". Shoto had never seen a bike, but he had read about them and didn't seem to be able to figure out how you could break an arm, fracture three ribs, gain minor internal bleeding and get second degree burns from falling out of one. However, it was what his father said so he never questioned it and the one doctor that did question it never treated him again so it didn't really matter.