Chapter 97

Inko Midoriya tells All Might plainly that she cannot leave her son in U.A. High School's hands, and will not send him to a school so careless with its students. Izuku Midoriya argues that the injuries came from his own failure to handle One For All, and she answers that the duty to look after a child at school belongs to the school regardless. She knows she sounds severe. Her son's safety outranks everything else. She has no objection to the dream itself, only to where he chases it, which is why she wants him somewhere else. Izuku understands her and still wants U.A., because U.A. is where his hero was made.

He rushes out. All Might reads the frustration correctly, knowing how much it stings to be barred from the place your idol walked. Then Izuku comes back holding a letter from Kota Izumi. At the camp, he tells his mother, he pulled a boy who despised Quirks and heroes away from a villain. He has a long climb ahead of him, but for a short while that boy and that letter made him a hero. Even shut out of U.A., he says, the dream stays.

All Might is stunned that the boy will keep going without following him. Impressed by the growth, glad the path is Izuku's own rather than a copy of his, he shifts into his hero form, kneels in front of mother and son, and bows his head while they stare.

He begs Inko's pardon for how badly he has taught her son, and acknowledges what frightens her about the bloody road ahead. What he asks is permission to walk that road beside Izuku so it does not end in blood. The former Symbol of Peace grants her point about the school as it stands today, and tells her its ways are being reformed. He promises to raise the boy and shield him even at the price of his own life.

The resolve knocks Inko to her knees. All she wants, she says, is her son's happiness, and she tells All Might never to trade his life away for anyone. He must go on living. Provided he can protect the boy and bring him up, she will put nothing in Izuku's path. All Might gives his word, Izuku promises not to make her worry, and privately Inko seems to address someone else, admitting the idea still troubles her, though their boy has earned the support of a hero she looks up to, which ought to make them both glad.

Outside, All Might calls her a wonderful parent and tells Izuku she reminds him of his own master. He leaves saying he will see him at school. So a new life opens for Class 1-A as they arrive at U.A.

Citing the danger and her son's injuries, Inko initially refuses to send him back to the school at all.

Izuku's own drive to help people, evidenced by Kota's letter, together with All Might's vow to protect and raise him, is what finally persuades her.

The ninety-seventh chapter of My Hero Academia by Kohei Horikoshi, titled Tell It Like It Is, Mom. It appeared on 4 July 2016 in the thirty-first issue of that year, spans nineteen pages, and is collected in volume eleven. Closing the Hideout Raid arc, it sits between chapters 96 and 98.

The adaptation splits it across two episodes: pages one through fifteen became Episode 50, and the remaining four pages opened Episode 51.

Inko Midoriya, All Might and Izuku Midoriya share the cover.

In his margin note, Horikoshi remarks that browsing the merchandise made him notice how many letter O's pile up when Shoto Todoroki's name is spelled in the Roman alphabet.