linkspooky:

There’s an interesting bit of foiling going on in the past few chapters, especially playing around with the idea that using quirks puts a strain on the body, and pushing quirks past their limits requires physical undertaking that can take it’s toll. This was also introduced to us at the beginning of the training camp arc before the villains invaded, pushing a quirk past it’s limit required things like Bakugo setting off explosions constantly, Todoroki freezing and boiling at the same time, etc. etc. It’s a painful process, but one that can cause a quirk to evolve, like how weight lifting makes micro tears in muscle fibers that eventually heal into stronger muscles. 

It all starts with Todoroki remembering that his father showed a special technique in the recent battle, and this is also a technique that he tried to pass onto Todoroki into the past. 

I’m guessing from the flashback it’s this technique in particular, prominence burn, and with the appearance of Dabi, it’s also not a stretch to assume that Endeavor’s flames turned blue when he pushed them to their absolute limit like this. If this scene were colored, or when it gets adapted into the anime eventually it won’t surprise me if the flames turn blue when he uses this attack. The secret technique, the ultra hot flames that Enji is referring to is probably the blue fire he uses to carbonize and finish off the Nomu in the anime. 

Similiar to the sudden and overpowering burst of flames that Dabi uses when he attacks endeavor. 

Anyway, considering that Dabi’s burn scars are exactly where his flames emerge from, the same as Endeavor, on his arms, on his neck, around his eyes, and then Endeavor implies pretty heavily that he tried to teach this same technique to Touya before giving up because his body was too frail. 

I think it’s safe to say where Dabi’s scars came from at this point. Most likely trying to learn this dangerous technique, or pushing himself past his limits at Endeavor’s urging, only to burn himself due to his frail constitution. Especially considering the way Endeavor treated a five year old Shoto, forcing him into training that was far past what his limits could handle, and then getting angry and insisting Shoto simply wasn’t trying hard enough, or that he was pretending to be frail to get out of the training. Endeavor’s number one concern was producing a pwoerful quirk wielder, to the point of not caring about forcing a small child into training their body could not withstand, when Rei does burn Shoto his bigger concern is the damage it will do to Shoto and throw off his training schedule, rather than the fact that Rei mentally snapped and Shoto lost his mother.

That, and considering that Natsuo specifically accuses Endeavor of being at fault for something that happened to Touya. It’s reasonable to say the implication right now is Endeavor either forced Touya to train until he burned himself through the effort and then gave up on him, or that he put the idea in Shoto’s head he needed to push himself to that extent in order to live up to his father’s legacy, and then abandoned him as a defective product and stopped paying attention to him entirely when his weak constitution made his flame quirk hard to use and cut off all attention and raising which would likely leave Touya with the idea he needs to push himself past his limits to an unhealthy extent to overcome the fact that he was born defective. 

Either way, it’s interesting because we’re told that developing quirks is a painful process, and there is a lot of fighting that happens between school age children that can blur the lines, but that comes to the old x men dlilemna of is it really okay for these kids going to school to also moonlight in dangerous situations as superheroes which never really has a solid answer. But there’s also a really neat bit of foiling in the most recent chapter. 

So, like Todoroki Tenya also comes from a family line of heroes. Unlike Todoroki, Tenya was given a choice, shown to admire his brother’s kidnness from a young age and never really had the expectation that because he was the son of a legacy super hero and was born with a good quirk he needed to become a hero forced on him. (Also if you read Vigilantes, the elder Iida brother is an amazingly good dude). So, Tensya comes from a family line of heroes, and mainly wants to become a hero to continue his family’s legacy but he was never forced into it, and you can see the difference in their family dynamic in their foiling.

Tenya’s mother warns that it might be a bit early, but his brother also waited until Tenya had proven hismelf capable of handling it and passed the liscense exam before telling him of a way to enhance their quirk passed down the family line. A secret technique just like Endeavor wants to pass onto Shoto, and tried to force him to learn it in the past. 

As said many times before, quirk develoment is dangerous and also physically taxing and painful. However, there’s a lot of differences in how these two situations are approached. Number one is they waited until Iida was a young adult, proved he could handle it,a nd left him the option of making the decision for himself. While it is painful, removing a part of his leg and regrowing it, he’s never forced into it, and Iida undergoes that training himself. If he was unable to do so, or he wanted to wait until he was older before pushing hismelf that much both his other and his older brother would have been fine with it. His brother is also really excited about it, like he’s telling a family secret he’s been waiting for years to pass on, and even though he’s excited about Tenya’s development of a hero, he’s also serious and lays out the risks that the process entails before Iida agrees to it. 

In fact if you read into Vigilantes you can go even a bit farther with the foiling. The Iida family are legacy heroes and they’re nowhere near the top, most influential, or most famous but as you can see their operation is incredibly well run, and instead of individual strength Tensei relied on teamwork and keeping everything like a well oiled machine. 

So, his philosophy is pretty much the opposite of Endeavor’s. The reason he values speed above all else is because he believes that it will allow him to save people faster.

Whereas we’re shown Endeavor became a hero wanting to be the strongest singular all purpose hero like All Might, not wanting to team up but rather stand to be the strongest on his own. Not only that but not reaching number one, not being able to be the best sent him into despair rather quickly and made him marry and start producing heirs with the goal of creating someone stronger than all might in mind rather than doing what is best needs to be done to save others. 

So for emphasis you have a family line of heroes who aren’t the strongest heroes in the whole world, but discovered their niche and try to provide as much help as they can from their position and who do not really focus on being the best or the most powerful, and you have one hero who was so focused on being the best that he immediately ran from himself and fell into despair and took it out on his family. So you have a family of heroes that’s lasted for decades at least since their grandfather, peacefully passing the torch from one to the other. 

Especially considering how young he looks in the flashback where he’s sadi to have given into despair, and gave up on the idea of crossing the bridge to All Might himself. Endeavor was 24 when Fuyumi was born so he gave up rather quickly. 

It’s an interesting contrast, because the Iida’s are legacy heroes that developed on their own. Tenya wanted to become a hero out of admiration for his brother, he was never pressured or forced into it. There are expectations of coming froma  family line of heroes of course, but we’re shown a rather heartwarming scene to confirm Tenyai wanted this on his own, and his brother also has his own reasonings for pursuing becoming a hero outside of his family. 

So, you have a legacy line of quirks that came about naturally on its own, and one that was forced into being by Endeavor for the sake of his own desires. It’s an interesting comparison.

Whereas, Todoroki was not a young adult only five years old at the time. He was forced into the training, and given no choice but to endure the pain, and when he failed he wasn’t shown any compassion or concern for his well being at all. Evolving quirks obviously does have an element of risk, it’s painful, it requires one to push themselves and physically transform their body but at the same time we’re shown a clear difference between a situation where Iida consents and wants to undergo this training himself in a supportive environment, and Todoroki undergoing this training at too young an age, in an environment that’s the exact opposite of that.

Todoroki is also being foiled here with Tetsu^4 as well. Likely the kind of training Todoroki would need to undergo to develop his quirk is what Tetsu^4 has specifically been training up until this point. Training his metal body to increase his resistance, so that he’s less affected by either heat or cold. 

However, unlike Tetsu^4 Todoroki has had reasons and mental hangups that hold him back from that kind of training, so while it is the training that’s most likely necessary to develop his quirk, increasing the way he balances the temperatures of his body, and his heat and cold resistance in order to increase his ability to output flames and ice. 

Bakugo hismelf observed this, that currently the way Todoroki’s quirk works there’s a limit to how much ice he can produce, or how much fire he can produce at once, and that limit is generally how much his body temperature drops or raises, and Bakugo compares it to the MP a mage would have in a game, and that his act of freezing Sero is pretty much his upper limit as of now. 

So it’s likely coming up, that as Todoroki clears his mental blocks on his own abilities, (as I’ve mentioned in the past the reason he foils Dabi is Dabi is pretty much able to use his flames freely, and likely burns way too hot to the point of self harm because of his lack of holding back, whereas Todoroki usually does hold back subconsciously out of caution and also a desire not to use his flames as destructively as his father did. 

So likely in Todoroki’s coming development, we’ll see him clearing some more of those mental blocks when it comes to further developing his quirk past it’s limit, and hopefully he’ll make a special technique of his own and not have to learn one from endeavor.