UA Students Needed a Massive Group Hug in ‘My Hero Academia’ Chapter 426

My Hero Academia’s manga is in its countdown toward the ending. All our heroes have risked everything near and dear to them, but were these sacrifices worth it?

After a decade of publishing, Kohei Horikoshi will be ending My Hero Academia in Chapter 430. In the span of all these chapters, we’ve seen Izuku gain powers that he never had but lose them subsequently after saving Japan. It’s a great story that required painful sacrifices from its heroes. The dust has settled, but the work of the heroes is far from over.

Chapter 426 became available on June 30, 2024, and going into it, everything felt gloomier than it should be. We hadn’t seen Izuku smile since defeating Shigaraki, and it’s been painful to see his expression look so blank.

Izuku protected everyone’s smiles

By protecting everyone’s smiles, Izuku seems to have lost his own. He always wanted to be a hero, but now it seems like a distant dream once more. He no longer has One For All and may have to drop out of the Hero Course for good. Our normally cheery protagonist isn’t the only one who has taken a hit after the war.

Katsuki has also been severely injured after the Final War arc. Overexerting himself with his quirk might result in his own death. To make everything worse, Aoyama has also left UA to atone. He was part of All For One’s scheme and does not feel worthy to graduate with his classmates. No hard battles are won without massive sacrifices, but that doesn’t make reality less heartbreaking.

Izuku, Katsuki, and the rest of Class 1-A are just children with hopes and dreams. They were thrust into a war waged by All For One, and they lost friends, family, mentors, and so much more. Despite the odds, these children won at the cost of everything.