My Hero Academia episode 98 aired last Saturday, giving the fans a chilling surprise with a lot of information to digest. While most episodes have practically gone straight into the action of each match-up, this one starts off a bit more dramatic.
However, there is a lot more learning involved than fighting… For now.
Episode 98 starts off showing All For One tied up where he’s been for a while now. The guards notice that he keeps moving and have been on alert just in case. All For One explains that he’s been having a lot of memories lately, including one where he sees his brother and hears his voice.
It’s no coincidence this is happening around the same time Deku had his first encounter with the One-For-All vestiges.
A phone call between Gran Torino and All Might takes place right after. They discuss if Gran Torino can remember anything Shimura, All Might’s predecessor, might have said about the vestiges that Deku saw himself. Shimura explained to Gran Torino that she once saw a fuzzy, shadow-like figure that told her, “The time has not come yet.”
Could this be One-For-All’s brother that she saw?
While neither Gran Torino nor All Might know what that means, All Might hangs up the phone and begins to worry about Deku before the match really starts taking off.
Monoma singles out Deku on the battlefield while the rest of the Class-B (Yui, Yanagi, Shoda, Shinso) and Class-A teams begin to fight each other.
Uraraka, Mineta, and Mina are swarmed by Class-B’s attacks while Deku is left to either try and save his teammates or take out Monoma.
He chooses the latter.
Monoma starts to get Deku riled up by talking smack about Bakugo. In the heat of the moment, All Might and Bakugo both notice something was off with Deku.
All the noise, talking, and fighting grew completely quiet.
In the heat of the moment, black and green streaks start shooting out from Deku’s right arm. All Might immediately recalls what Shimura said and specifically asks, “What ‘time’ did he mean?”
Deku starts losing control and is completely surprised at what’s happening himself.
He begins to recognize how powerful this new power is and yells at Monoma to run.
Deku’s power basically throws him into the location where Shinso was hiding at.
In obvious pain, Deku tells Shinso to run for it. However, Shinso gives a terrified look as if he’s looking into the face of evil itself and doesn’t move.
Deku starts losing control and the power starts covering almost the entire battfield. It even ends up attacking his own teammates.
While everyone watching thinks Deku has brought out a new move all on his own, All Might runs towards Aizawa and Vlad and asks for them to stop the match.
Urakaka makes a brave decision to jump and hang onto Deku to calm him down. Unforntuantely, it’s not working.
She quickly notices Shinso nearby and, in a loud scream as if she’s in incredible pain, Uraraka tells Shinso to use his brainwashing on Deku.
His brainwashing works and the power recedes back into Deku’s right arm.
While Deku is under Shinso’s brainwashing, he, once again, finds himself in a dream-like state where’s covered in black fuzz.
A past One For All successor appears before Deku and explains to him what just happened. Deku realizes that it’s not a dream and that he’s actually inside One For All with the rest of the successors.
This past successor explains to Deku that he just used his quirk called “Blackwhip”. That each successor has a quirk mixed in with the core of the One For All power.
But he warns Deku that the One For All core is finally growing larger. He shows Deku that Blackwhip was his original quirk. But with One For All, its power grew immensely and it’s the perfect quirk to trap Monoma – Deku’s original goal when he was battling him.
Before disappearing, he goes on to let Deku know that he will be learning six more quirks along the way. Not only that, but, right before fading away, he tells Deku that he is going to be “the one to complete One For All”.
Hmmm…
Seconds after waking up from Shinso’s brainwashing, Deku and Uraraka are immediately attacked by Class-B. Mina and Mineta immediately show up to the scene and it becomes an all-out brawl to end the episode.
Aizawa, Vlad, and All Might all get closer to the battle. While All Might is still in favor of ending the match out of concern for Deku and the other, Aizawa decides to let the match continue.
Despite being shaken with everything he just saw, Shinso joins in on the fight as well. Just as Bakugo saved Jiro in the previous match, Deku snatches Shinso’s scarf before it can capture Uraraka.
This fight is just beginning.
While Shinso played a little role through most of the episode, he came up big when it mattered most.
Despite being terrified in the heat of the moment earlier in the episode, Shinso possibly saved everyone, especially Uraraka, by brainwashing Deku.
Not only that, but it also left Deku and Uraraka defenseless, which Monoma instantly attempted to capitalize on.
So while there we no winners or losers this episode, Shinso showed everyone he can be a true hero and deserves to be there with everyone else.
Episode 99 of My Hero Academia will air next Saturday, June 5, on Crunchyroll.
If you thought episode 98 was the best one this week, you can vote for it on our weekly poll!
All images via Crunchyroll
©「僕のヒーローアカデミア」製作委員会©堀越耕平／集英社