Chapter 52: Hero Killer Stain vs. U.A. Students

The punch lands and Izuku Midoriya says out loud why he came. Tenya, asked whether he can move at all, cannot. Stain compliments the effort, then names his terms: interfere and Tenya dies first. Izuku runs the arithmetic instead of answering. Two wounded people need cover, which means the only workable outcome is driving the Hero Killer off. Tenya orders him to stay out of a fight that belongs to nobody else, and Izuku throws the logic back at him, pointing out that heroes who followed that rule would never save anyone, because shoving into other people's business is exactly what the work is. Stain, listening, smiles.

Full Cowl floods Izuku's body and the two collide. He closes distance and slips through the gap under Stain's legs, ducking katana and dagger both, then springs over the return swing and drops a five percent Detroit Smash onto the man's skull. Tenya, watching from the ground, thinks of Katsuki's speed. Stain simply licks his blade, and Izuku locks up mid-motion, baffled: nothing ever cut him. The realization lands anyway. Blood is the trigger.

Impressed enough to change his verdict, Stain decides the boy is worth keeping alive and turns instead to the two he considers worthless, Tenya and the injured professional. Izuku's shouting does nothing. Then fire arrives in one pillar and ice in another, tearing across the alley, and Stain barely twists clear of both. Shoto Todoroki steps out as the source, and his first remark is a complaint: the text message was too vague, and it nearly made him too late.

Tenya insists that Izuku stay out of his fight with the Hero Killer, and Izuku refuses on principle.

Izuku works out that Bloodcurdle needs Stain to ingest his target's blood.

Stain judges Izuku worth sparing and sentences Tenya and Native to die.

Izuku's text to his classmates pays off when Shoto arrives seconds before the killing blow.

The chapter ran in issue 35 of 2015, dated July 27, 2015, spanning twenty pages, and was gathered into volume 6.

All Might, Class 1-A and Eraser Head appear on the cover, which also exists in color page and sketch versions. Episode 29 of the anime covers the material.

Kohei Horikoshi marked the series' first full year in his author comment and thanked readers for the support.