The Emperor's Dragon

So Dad Really Is... A Villain!

Izuku sat at the table. He'd packed away the dinner dishes, and had done his homework. He was sitting in the dark now as he thought. He'd originally begun thinking about the choice his father wanted... no needed him to make but he'd just vacillated between opinions. He had to be sure on that one and Izuku felt that he was best 'thinking' about that decision subconsciously. Once he'd made it he'd have to make conscious choices about how to implement it but until then... he wasn't really ready to think about it yet.

Instead he'd settled on thinking about his father.

A while back he'd thought of his father as a revolutionary and been comfortable with that, but his father was correct, that was a child's thinking. His dad admitted it. He was what the world called a villain. The Heroes had come after him because of that.

But words were just words. Labels were just labels. Action is what made them true, not the act of being labeled.

So was his father really a villain, even if he admitted it?

Izuku took a deep breath as he thought.

Yes.

The answer was clear. And objectively there was no other answer. Yes, his father was a villain. Not just because he broke the law, but because of everything else he did.

He didn't know everything his dad did or had done but the evidence was there. Giran wouldn't call him His Highness if his dad was not someone of importance. Garaki ...

Izuku shook his head as he thought of the Doctor. Later. He'd have to consider the Doctor's experiments later. For now he wanted to focus on his dad.

He was a villain but was he really wrong? Izuku snorted with the thought. On some things probably... no, definitely. No one could be right on everything but that didn't make you a bad person. Did being a villain make you a bad person?

What made you a bad person? The thought immediately followed.

Most would say breaking the law but did that really make you bad? What if it was a bad law? What if you broke it to help someone? Breaking the law was not the sole definition. For some it was but for others, it wouldn't be. What was the definition for him?

Lying? He dismissed that immediately. As far as he could tell, his dad had never lied to him but he was coming to see that Dad had... been selective with the truth at times. But was that the same as lying? He'd sort of seen it before anyway. Ochaco's parents didn't tell her if they were in debt and so wasn't that being selective with the truth? Was what his dad done anything different from other parents? He wasn't sure but from overhead conversations in class, he didn't think so.

So if that didn't make a person bad, then what did. Quirk stealing? Except that was dad just using his quirk and... that could be bad, Izuku realised. People weren't meant to use their quirks unless they were licensed. In practice people looked the other way so long as no one got hurt and there was no property damage. The younger you got, the more they looked away.

But would people see his Dad taking a quirk as simply being him using his quirk?

Izuku's mind answered that immediately. Absolutely no way! They would see his dad's quirk as the worst they'd ever encountered. Worse even than Hitoshi's or Himiko's. Worse than anything... a true villain's quirk.

At that thought Izuku snorted to himself again. If there was one thing he knew about his dad it was that he was good. Not necessarily a good person but whatever he put his mind to, he was good at it. Business was just one example. As a businessman Hisashi Riji, the head of JBQC who unfortunately went missing was considered one of the best.

Gigantomachia told him his dad could fight and... If All Might had come after him, then yeah, there was enough evidence there to suggest his dad was a very good fighter.