Chapter 44

The closing ceremony reaches the awards. Katsuki Bakugo, Shoto Todoroki, and Fumikage Tokoyami occupy the first, second, and third steps of the podium, though Katsuki arrives restrained beyond reason: arms locked, torso lashed to a wooden log, chained down, face masked, all to keep his fury off Shoto. All Might presents the medals. Fumikage accepts third with a modest deflection and gets a hug plus advice that leaning entirely on his Quirk will keep costing him against bad matchups, so his own strength has to grow; he agrees. Shoto takes second, and All Might says he understands there were reasons behind the suppressed fire. Shoto admits he has been treating his problems as solo work and that the approach was wrong, that facing things is the only way through. All Might hugs him too, declines to dig further, and says he trusts Shoto to handle it under his own power.

Katsuki's turn requires removing a face mask that even All Might finds excessive. Freed to speak, he snarls that the number one spot is undeserved because the final was beneath contempt. All Might counters that society will call him first whether he accepts it or not, and gives him the medal anyway. His closing address tells the whole field that every participant had a shot at that podium and that the coming generation of heroes looks bright, then he bellows congratulations, and the festival ends.

Back in the Class 1-A room, Shota Aizawa grants two days off and says he will sort the Pro Hero nominations and distribute them afterward. At Hosu General Hospital, Tenya bursts into his brother's room and is stunned by the state of him. Weak as he is, Tensei calls Tenya a brilliant younger brother and apologizes for falling short of the ideal Tenya has always seen in him, and Tenya breaks down.

The next day, Shoto goes to visit his mother. Fuyumi, surprised he would after so long, asks why, and gets no answer. Standing at the hospital door, he has concluded that the only route past his trauma and toward using his left side is to meet Rei and talk. He breathes out and goes in. Meanwhile Ochaco comes home with groceries to find her door unlocked and her parents inside, arrived to throw her a celebration for how she performed at the festival, and she cries with happiness. Over breakfast, Inko tells Izuku she fainted seven times watching, and he notes she had the harder day. She admits his Quirk frightens her and that the risk gives her no peace, but she will keep cheering regardless. Izuku realizes all he has done is make the people watching him worry, and decides he must find his own approach, one that spares them the fear, because finding it will be his real starting line. Asked whether he wants to rewatch the festival, he says later. At his own house, Katsuki brushes his teeth in a rage he still cannot shake.

All Might awards the Sports Festival winners, with Tenya absent from the ceremony because of a family emergency. Katsuki rejects the top placement as unearned and All Might tells him the public will grant it regardless.

Shoto concludes there is something he must settle before he can use his full Quirk, and goes to see his mother in the hospital, the first such visit in years. Tenya sees the full extent of the injuries Stain inflicted on his brother. Izuku resolves to find a way of fighting that does not force his loved ones to fear for him.

The forty-fourth chapter closes the U.A. Sports Festival arc, printed June 1, 2015 in issue 27 at 19 pages and expanded to 21 for volume 5. Katsuki carries the cover, and episode 25 adapts the material. Fuyumi Todoroki debuts here.

Locations span Musutafu, U.A. and its stadium and Class 1-A room, the Todoroki Abode, the Midoriya Apartment, the Bakugo House, the Uraraka Apartment, Fujitani Hospital, and Hosu General Hospital in its first appearance. Horikoshi's author comment admits the sports festival ran roughly twice as long as he had planned and points readers toward the next arc.