U.A. Beginnings Saga

This is the first saga of My Hero Academia, gathering Volumes 1 through 11, Chapters 1 to 97, and Episodes 1 to 50. The manga ran it from July 2014 to July 2016 and the anime adapted it between April 2016 and June 2018. The Rise of Villains Saga follows.

Three threads define it: One For All passing from Toshinori Yagi into Izuku Midoriya's hands, a villain organization stepping onto the board under Tomura Shigaraki, and the retirement that closes out All Might's era.

Izuku is born without a Quirk and wants to be a hero anyway. Katsuki Bakugo makes his childhood miserable, and then the top hero in Japan chooses him as an heir. Training gets him through the U.A. entrance exam and into a class of students he quickly comes to care about, though One For All wrecks his body every time he draws on it.

Class 1-A is ambushed by the League of Villains, whose leader Tomura Shigaraki wants All Might dead so that the country loses its Symbol of Peace and tips into chaos. The attempt fails and he withdraws. The U.A. Sports Festival follows, a showcase in front of the whole country, where Izuku learns what Shoto Todoroki has survived and helps him accept himself, while Katsuki takes the championship by beating Shoto in the final.

Internships send the students out to work beside professionals. Izuku trains under Gran Torino, All Might's own teacher, and gets caught in a League attack on Hosu City involving their Nomu. He also reaches Tenya Ida before the Hero Killer Stain can finish what Tenya's revenge started, and with Shoto's help the three take Stain down, an outcome that ironically converts more villains to the man's ideology and to the League.

As the term closes, All Might tells Izuku the truth about where One For All came from and about All For One, the villain he believes is behind everything. Final exams pit the class against their own teachers, and Izuku and Katsuki barely survive All Might by working together. Summer camp with Class 1-B is meant to sharpen their Quirks; instead the League attacks and carries Katsuki off, intending to turn him.

Professionals assemble a raid on the League's hideout to recover Katsuki, while Izuku and a handful of friends go in unsanctioned to do it themselves. All For One appears in person, and the brutal fight that follows ends with All Might victorious and spent, the last embers of One For All burned out of him.

He retires from heroics. The country has its peace and no longer has its symbol, and the saga closes with the next generation left to carry what he set down.