aspheraphim
ׂ╰┈➤✎𓂃Kanae Kitou was never supposed to be a hero.
Not with a Quirk like Demonic Boost-a terrifying, cursed-looking power that lets her regenerate faster than logic, grow stronger when she's cornered, and fight like something that crawled out of a nightmare instead of a training gym. She doesn't burn in the sun. She doesn't crave human blood. She isn't a monster-no matter what the whispers say.
But everyone loves a reason to be afraid.
Everyone... except Izuku Midoriya.
They met in their second year of middle school, when Izuku was still the "quirkless nobody" everyone laughed at, and Kanae was the strange girl with too-sharp eyes and too-quiet bruises. She didn't pity him. She didn't flinch away from him. She just... stayed. Like it was the most natural thing in the world. Like he was worth something.
And maybe that's why Kanae made it her personal mission to tease him every chance she got-because watching him panic and sputter was funny, and because making him smile felt dangerously close to warmth.
But Izuku learns Kanae the way he learns everything-too quickly, too deeply.
He notices the way she laughs off injuries that should've hurt.
The way she "accidentally" puts herself between danger and everyone else.
The way she always bleeds first so no one else has to.
He knows her self-sacrificing habits like a bruise he keeps pressing, terrified of the day she won't heal fast enough.
By the time they reach U.A., Izuku isn't just protective-he's fierce about it. Because heroes are supposed to save people... and Kanae has a habit of trying to become the price of everyone's safety.
And no matter how many times she jokes, or grins, or pretends she's unbreakable-
Izuku is determined to prove one thing to her:
She doesn't have to be the one who gets hurt to be worth saving.
Because Kanae Kitou might have a demonic power in her veins...
...but Izuku Midoriya has something even more dangerous.
A promise he refuses to break.