Chapter 357 of My Hero Academia picks up right where 356 left us, Endeavor applying pressure onto All For One and attacking with fire attacks. The last chapter ended with a long dialogue from Endeavor talking to himself and spurring him to keep fighting not in spite of his weaknesses but because of them.
Now that Endeavor has accepted his weakness, he seems to be stronger than ever and All For One is on the defensive trying to protect himself. He survived his latest attack by creating a barrier around himself using some sort of quirk, but that was not the end of it.
Finally And Truly #1
All For One starts to remark how he senses himself feeling like he is in danger and compares the presence of Endeavor now to All Might. Its interesting how this parallel is made the chapter immediately after Endeavor says he will never be a superhuman like Deku or All Might, but then the next panel explains why that is the case. All For One remarks that heroes are the scariest when they are wounded. This can also be interpreted as when they are at their weakest. This means the presence Endeavor has now is more than likely being compared to when All Might fought him at Kamino and also had his arm broken. Endeavor then makes a giant flaming fist and, with the help of hawks wings acting as fuel, propels himself forward towards All For One at a speed which he cannot react, to then hit with his Vanishing Jet Burn attack. The visuals of these fire based attacks are incredible and well drawn too capturing the intensity and power behind the blows.
All For one crashes into the ground, and in a very comical series of panels, we see all the other villains and heroes fighting on the ground scrambling to get out of the way of Endeavor’s attack. Friendly fire at its finest. The point was to keep All For One in the air, so the others would not be put in danger, but Endeavor is furious and not holding back. Hawk wonders why he didn’t just use Prominence Burn and Endeavor explains how it takes too much energy out of him and since AFO is blocking his attacks he needs to use it only when he’s certain his guard is down. Hawks compliments him on finally having a cool head and Endeavor, in a very cool fashion responds in one of the coolest lines he can. “No- I can’t Hold back this rage”
Endeavor rushes down and Kamui woods tells everyone to get out of the way as the man is coming through. He grabs All For One by his collar and literally drags the man through the woods, propelling himself forward with the biggest burst of flames we have even seen him move with. All For One’s body is being dragged through trees and dirt and tries to break free by stealing Endeavor’s quirk, but then Endeavor turns into Superman and uses heat vision by shooting fire from his eyes to incinerate the man’s hand. These scenes are brutal, visceral and drawn just the right way to convey that violence.
The Children Are The Future
After Barbecuing the man’s hand, along with the rest of him at this point, Endeavor states that those hands ruin people's lives. All For One effectively responds with “Takes one to know one” and Endeavor cannot even deny it. Endeavor has messed up Toya’s life, crippled his son Shouto mentally, put his wife in a mental institution and his son Natsu is still dealing with that trauma. Still, even though Endeavor says the past never dies, that the rage, pain and penance of those things will live on, he must carve a path for the future of these children and not let the mistakes he made affect them. We see what appears to be a much older Shouto stepping into the light of his other, and also older, classmates. He says that him and him alone with win this battle and pay his penance by watching over Toya, his first son who he ruined, and then as All For One screams, begging him to stop, Endeavor uses Prominence Burn, an attack Stars & Stripes compared to the strength of several laser beams that pierced the heavens, to kill All For One.
Were this any other opponent, this might be the end of the manga. The biggest and most dangerous villain was scorched by one of the strongest heroes on the planet's most powerful moves, and he was defenseless to stop it. He has no way to heal the damage and should be crumbling to ash. However, this is All For One, A villain we have seen with prep time on the same level as Batman. He has claimed to scheme and plot things with several roads all the time and says now that of course he would not show up to the finale of the battle empty handed. We then see his face, now with eyes forming and fully flesh ear as he seems to be reforming himself and states “Villains do not have a monopoly on sacrificial moments you know.”
This My Hero Academia chapter ends with Deku talking to the first holder of One For All as they begin to notice something is in the sky headed there way and impeding their path.
The Review
This is another 10/10 chapter by Horikoshi. The violent action and visceral combat is very nice to see in a battle with so much at stake and the art definitely conveys the dramatics. In addition, probably the highlight of the battle, is the way it ends. We see Eri and the quirk erasing bullets and remember when Shigiraki collected the remains of them after he awoke. Readers saw him use two in his battle against the heroes, but one was destroyed and Aizawa had to amputate his leg, so he would not lose his quirk.
It was assumed that was the last of them but in the panel we actually see Shigiaraki grabbed more than two, and since the bullets had Eri’s DNA in it, perhaps All For One stole the quirk from that? It's tough to say but the Quirk erasing bullets have been ineffective in permanently removing anyone from the stories quirk so seeing Eri and the bullets make a comeback in such an interesting way is a delight.