Chapter 373

Present Mic chases Spinner into Central Hospital while Tentacole and Anima keep the crowd from following. One rioter winds up to strike Tentacole and is caught by another heteromorph, and the sight freezes almost everyone. Looking at the people lined up in front of the entrance, the man who intervened says their anger is pointed the wrong way.

Pinned under Anima, Takaie yells at them to keep going and make the world hear what they have suffered. The man admits he still hates having been beaten for nothing, and worries that hesitating makes him a coward. The call to action had thrilled him, since a world that turned on them deserved turning over, and their leader made the moment feel right. Now he wonders whether the whole world really is the enemy, and he does not want to hurt anyone lying in that building.

Takaie is furious that a few sentences from Tentacole can undo the work, boasting that the radicalization was engineered to carry them to supremacy, and shouting at the crowd to keep moving rather than think. Most of the civilians halt anyway, leaving the Liberation soldiers demanding to know why the march has died.

Asked whether he should have stayed home and kept quiet, the man is told by Tentacole that what drew them together was never the mistake, because the people who hurt them have yet to be pulled into daylight. A hero apologizes to the man for never noticing what he endured. Tentacole continues that the crowd itself is the light, and that light is the tool to shame the cruel out of their cruelty. Watching the momentum evaporate, Rock Lock reflects that fighting was the only defense these people ever had, and calls reinforcements toward the hospital.

In the research wing, Mic's Voice slams Spinner down and destroys the recorder holding All For One and Tomura's voices. Mic frets over how to keep Kurogiri contained, noting he has not responded to anything since that day and may simply be broken. Spinner reverts, unable to move, convinced he has failed: no army, no way to wake anyone. The rally, he realizes, was never really the point. He only ever wanted to walk behind Tomura and prop the man upright, and Tomura's severed hand is lying right there.

Mic moves on Kurogiri, thinking of Oboro and refusing to let those memories be spoiled, ready to finish it. Spinner reaches the hand first, presses it against Kurogiri, and begs him to save Tomura. The restraints tear apart, Oboro's features surface through the mist, and the thing that stands up declares itself the protector of Tomura Shigaraki.

The heteromorph assault stops on its own as the crowd's conviction breaks, most of them unwilling to harm the patients inside.

Tentacole tells them their anger was never unjustified and should be turned into light that shames the people who wronged them.

The recorder Spinner carried in is destroyed by Present Mic, who then moves to put Kurogiri down before he can be freed.

Driven by his memories of Tomura, Spinner spends the last of his strength pressing Tomura's severed hand to Kurogiri and asking him to save his friend.

Kurogiri breaks his restraints with Oboro's face partly visible, naming himself Tomura Shigaraki's protector.

Horikoshi numbered this one 373. It fills sixteen pages, debuted in issue 51 of 2022, and sits in Volume 37 as part of the Final War arc. Episode 153 adapts it.

It marks the first time an English chapter title repeats, sharing the name "Friends" with Chapter 258.

Horikoshi's author comment notes that his editor promised to take him to the movies and that he needs to clear some time.