Episode 29

Thrown off the train by the sudden attack, Izuku Midoriya moves through Hosu City on his newly steadied power, hunting for Sorahiko Torino and wondering how this creature relates to the one from before. His mentor, meanwhile, is dancing around the Nomu and finding its movements unimpressive. The thing turns on the civilians instead, and as Gran Torino moves to intercept, a wall of fire swallows it. Endeavor has arrived and claims the fight for himself; asked by the crowd why he is there, he answers that he is a hero.

Izuku stumbles onto a running battle between professionals and more Nomu after hearing Manual shout Tenya Ida's name. Tenya is nowhere in sight, which tells Izuku everything: his friend has gone after the Hero Killer. Waved away from the fighting, he leaves to search. From a rooftop, Tomura Shigaraki admires the wreckage his borrowed monsters have made, creatures his master lent him purely to kill a man he dislikes, and declines Kurogiri's suggestion that he join in, citing his injury.

In the alley, Tenya's high-speed counter is dodged and answered with a kick that puts him down. Stain explains he spared Ingenium deliberately so word of his work would spread, then pins the younger brother and drives a blade into his shoulder, calling him as false a hero as his sibling. Tenya defends Tensei's honor and swears to kill the man in his name, only to be told that the wounded Native comes first. A taste of blood off the knife, and Tenya's body stops answering him. The lecture that follows is simple: a hero acts for others, never for himself, and vengeance dressed up as heroism is the furthest thing from the real article, which is why he intends to kill the boy and offer that death toward a more just world. Tenya rejects every word of it.

Reasoning that Stain and the League must be connected, and noting that the killings cluster in empty places, Izuku sweeps the alleys near Manual's office and arrives just as the blade is about to fall. He drops Stain with a Smash, then learns Tenya cannot move at all. Deducing that the cuts are what trigger the Quirk, and realizing Native has been wounded the same way, Izuku cannot carry both men clear. He plants himself between them and the killer instead.

Stain tells him plainly that Tenya's death is a duty, and that interference will simply mean the weaker power is culled. Izuku understands he is facing something entirely unlike the villains at the U.S.J., broadcasts his location, and refuses Tenya's plea to walk away, repeating what All Might once taught him: heroism is meddling where nobody asked you to. Stain takes note of the words and recognizes the boy from a photograph Tomura once showed him. Full Cowl lets Izuku collapse the distance and strip away the reach advantage, and after sliding between the killer's legs and vaulting a katana swing, he lands a five percent Detroit Smash on his head. Tenya sees Katsuki Bakugo in the way he moves. Stain, unbothered, licks a knife blade and freezes him in place; the graze was all it took, and blood is the key. Impressed by the boy's conviction, he decides Izuku is worth keeping alive, then turns back toward his other two victims and is driven off by a wave of fire.

Shoto Todoroki arrives annoyed that a bare location was all he had to decode, sheets Stain in ice, and secures the wounded. Warned not to let the man taste his blood, he fights at range, but a thrown knife opens his cheek anyway. Stain hurls his katana as a distraction and nearly gets close enough to use it before flames force him back. When Tenya insists that Ingenium's successor must be the one to end this, Shoto replies that Ingenium never wore a face like his. A wall of ice buys nothing, and Stain punishes the blocked sightline by stabbing two throwing knives into Shoto and dropping toward him from above, only for Izuku to tackle him away. Native rules out a time limit on the Quirk, and Izuku arrives at the truth: its duration depends on blood type. Stain confirms it.

The students settle into a plan, Izuku drawing attention while Shoto covers from behind, and Shoto admits he has worried about Tenya since Tensei's attack because he recognizes bottled resentment when he sees it. He remembers visiting his mother, telling her everything, receiving her apology, and being urged to live unburdened, which is why he chose his father's agency, not out of forgiveness but to learn from the number two hero. Everything, he realizes, could have been simpler, and it took a handful of Izuku's words to show him. Stain escalates, opens Izuku's leg, and paralyzes him again. When Tenya begs them both to stop, Shoto rejects it, telling him to get on his feet and take a hard look at who he means to become, then meets the killer's charge with fire. Watching Shoto protect him the way Izuku once protected Shoto, Tenya feels his shame turn into movement, and his hand begins to respond.

The sixteenth entry of the second season adapts chapters 51 through 53, continuing both the Hosu Incident and the students' fight with the Hero Killer under Singin' to the Sky and 'Cause You're My Hero. It also gives Shoto his second costume and his first willing use of both sides of his Quirk in the field.

The broadcast lengthens the professionals' battle against the Nomu in Hosu. Stain now notices Izuku bouncing along the walls as he closes in, rather than only in the instant before the punch connects. Shoto's reflection on his growth since the Sports Festival gains a scene of him discussing with Endeavor why he chose Hosu for the internship, and the covering fire he and Izuku lay down for Tenya and Native runs longer. As Shoto orders him to choose the sort of hero he means to grow into, the broadcast has him building his flames for Stain's next charge.