Crossing Lines is the sixth episode of the My Hero Academia: Vigilantes anime.
Summary#
One night at a bar, a Yakuza group called the Abegawa Tenchu Kai is discussing their official labeling as a Villain group over sake. One member, Tetsu, is enraged at the classification and the fact that another member, Rojiya Yonenaga, doesn't seem to be bothered by it. Rojiya is mellow because he believes that the way a man lives doesn't change with the passage of time and the progression of time, even in a super-powered society with Heroes like All Might running around to keep people like them in check. Tetsu drunkenly agrees with Rojiya's views and orders another round of drinks in celebration.
Later, Rojiya, Tetsu, and two other members, Soji and Haruhisa, are resting in the lounge of their headquarters stationed in Tokyo's Danto Ward, before Stendhal suddenly crashes through their window. Believing its some kind of enemy attack, all the present members go on the offensive with their Quirks.
Stendhal effortlessly dodges their attacks and plants himself on a wall, before licking four blood-stained bandages plastered to his arm guard. Using his Quirk, Bloodcurdle, all four yakuza members are paralyzed and unable to move, leaving them wide open for Stendhal to swoop down and cut them down in a few sword strokes. Three more members of the group then flood in to try and take on Stendhal, but they too quickly fall to the Vigilante's cruel judgement.
After his work's finished, Stendhal begins changing out of his uniform in an alley as Kuin approaches and tries to strike up a conversation with him. The man shuts down and corrects the high schooler's playful referral to him as "Mr. Judgement" and later his actual codename, as he's not wearing his mask at the moment, which relegates him to a simple human being. Stendhal believes his alias is something more: an embodiment of judgment who occupies and widens the space between life and death.
An exasperated Kuin then asks Stendhal for the blood samples of the yakuza members she loaned him for his job and suggests that next time he let her pick his next target. Stendhal tells Kuin not to push her luck before leaving, warning her that she is just as eligible for his judgment as they were and he doesn't care if the stronger "vermin" prey on the weaker until then. Kuin is still in high spirits despite Stendhal keeping his distance from her, since the man picked the crime and "vermin"-ridden Naruhata to do his Vigilante work, and gives him images of the following people he must kill.
Several days later, Moyuru and Soga go to visit Rapt in the hospital, who was admitted after he was smacked into a building during Mario's rampage. As the three share a smoke outside, Rapt tells his crew that he'll be discharged later that weekend, which Moyuru attributes to the regenerative properties of his Lizard Quirk, and the boost in power granted by the Trigger he injected into himself. Rapt doesn't want to give the drug too much credit, as while it toughened it up, it also put him in the situation that sent him to the hospital in the first place. Soga asks Rapt if he's up to try using his new flying abilities once he feels better, which the lizard man passes on since he now thinks flying is for the birds.
Later that night, Kuin meets up with Soga to discuss another Trigger deal, though she is surprised that the man didn't bring Moyuru and Rapt along. Soga says his friends have nothing to do with this deal, which Kuin retorts by framing Stendhal's actions as the sudden, random crime of a mysterious serial killer that the crew need to fight against.
Soga rejects her cutesy persuasion to do more tests with Trigger and begins to walk away, before being stopped by Stendhal himself. The Vigilante just wants to cut to the chase and kill his target and Kuin offers Soga one last chance to take her supply of Trigger in order to fight the Vigilante on the spot, otherwise Stendhal would just move on to kill Moyuru and Rapt after he finishes his business here.
Soga swats the vials of Trigger out of her hands and brandishes his Spikes at Stendhal, telling the Vigilante that he doesn't need Kuin's help to fight him. The girl is disappointed in Soga's rejection but has a backup in the form of her bees. The insects swarm out of her eyepatch and surround Soga, stinging him multiple times with their Trigger-filled abdomens.
Soga starts getting enraged, not at the stinging, but more at the cheerful face Kuin makes as she leaves the men to fight it out in the alley. Soga believes it's the same smug face and demeanor most people always mask and use to look down on him, whether it's his childhood friends or people growing scared him because of his Quirk and appearance, his teachers admonishing his behavior in school, or even when he forced Koichi to grovel in the alley when they first met.
The man believes all this made him feel and turn to act like a monster, and thanks to the rapid injection of Trigger, he becomes the thing he hates the most and morphs into a bulky, porcupine-like beast. Stendhal writes this sudden transformation as Soga showing his true colors and brandishes his katana in preparation to kill the Instant Villain.
Koichi then rushes in after hearing Soga's screams while on patrol and freaks out upon recognizing both men instantly. Stendhal tells his fellow Vigilante to step back so he can slay the Villain, which Koichi writes off as the man being overdramatic before suggesting settling the scuffle through more peaceful means.
The fight kicks off shortly after, with Soga firing a hailstorm of spikes from his wrist at Stendhal, which the Vigilante easily parries before repeatedly slashing the thug across the chest. This shocks Koichi, as he realizes that Stendhal wasn't exaggerating his earlier statement and that he truly wants to kill Soga.
Before Stendhal can give Soga the coup de grace, Koichi slides between the two and knocks Stendhal backward before turning his attention to Soga. He doesn't get far in fleeing the Vigilante with the Instant Villain on his back, before Stendhal tosses and sticks him in the calf with a throwing knife. He tells Koichi to not interrupt his work and tells him that Soga is a worthless man that deserves to be killed.
Koichi ignores his words and tries to flee with Soga towards a crowded street using Slide and Glide. Stendhal admires Koichi's good intentions in trying to save the Instant Villain but dislikes the fact that he uses his goodwill to "side with evil". Stendhal then dabs a drop of Koichi's spilt blood on his tongue and paralyzes the college student, sending the two men tumbling to the ground.
Stendhal walks up to finish the job with Soga, telling the man that no one will come to save some like him from his judgement. Just he is about to kill Koichi and Soga, Knuckleduster jumps off from the rooftops, landing between the crazed Vigilante himself and Koichi while proclaiming that he is here, ready to protect his protégé and Soga.
Stendhal tells Knuckleduster he has no problems with him, believing they are one in the same in walking the brutal, righteous path. Knuckleduster, however, spits in the face of Stendhal likening his work to his, calling himself a hero of justice, while labeling the other man as a lunatic slasher. Stendhal is disappointed that the man doesn't share his values, and Knuckleduster is the same with how the Vigilante missed his best shot of hitting him with a surprise attack in favor of scouting out his opponent.
Knuckleduster tells Stendhal that he has no options of safely engaging with him, as he can easily dodge and counter his spacious sword swings, and getting in close will leave him wide open for some nasty punches. The older man "kindly" gives Stendhal a handicap in their fight and places the wire of his grappling hook on the ground, saying Stendhal will be attacked the moment he steps over this wire. After weighing his options and rejecting the idea of faltering to Knuckleduster, Stendhal takes some steps back before taking a swift lunge forward in order to overwhelm the Vigilante with raw speed.
He closes in so he can throw off Knuckleduster's timing to counter and proclaims himself to be pushing himself to cross the line to victory, much like a Hero would. Instead, Knuckleduster steps over the line himself and smacks Stendhal in the head with a punch, breaking his nose and cracking his mask. Koichi asks Knuckleduster about the criteria he gave to Stendhal about the wire, to which his master replies that he never said he couldn't step over it.
Knuckleduster picks up Stendhal's mask and states he's met plenty of people who use masks to take on a different persona, adding that this conditional application of a new self can cause people to grow cocky. He advises his student to watch out for people like them since they are the first to throw away self-preservation and morals, though breaking the mask would easily shatter that and send him back down to Earth.
Stendhal, lying on the pavement and choking on his own blood, hoarsely states that he now understands something after listening to Knuckleduster's words. In a sudden burst of energy, Stendhal hops up and trades a few blows with the other Vigilante using his knives. Knuckleduster blocks Stendhal's attacks but is cut in the process. The battered Vigilante then leaps up to the side of a building.
The bloody man says there are people more wicked than Villains that lack resolve yet pretend they've always had it to begin with: phony Heroes. Stendhal then licks the blood he accumulated on his knife and paralyzes Knuckleduster, then thanks the man for enlightening him and putting him on the proper path towards justice, before jumping towards a building and disappearing into the night.
Later, Pop☆Step Leaps down with some first aid kits to Knuckleduster and Koichi, who is currently treating the latter's injured leg. The older man tells him not to worry about the young man and tells him to focus on Soga. While disgusted at seeing him again, Pop begrudgingly treats his gashes at her teammate's request.
Soga asks Pop if Koichi's right in the head since he is trying to cheer everybody up despite everything he had done to him, to which the girl replies with a flush on her face that it's just him being dumb as usual. Soga is taken aback by her demeanor and looks away before sighing, realizing Pop's "game".
In a dingy, poorly lit apartment, Stendhal is keeling over a sink while bleeding out and rambling to himself. He grumbles the things he needs and lacks for the time being, like power, speed, tactics, and weaponry. He then pulls up a knife and says the last thing that he needs most of all: resolve.
Kuin is leaning against a nearby wall and poking fun at Stendhal's ramblings, saying that there's nothing interesting about resolve no matter how much he has. Annoyed, the man tells the girl to shut up and tosses the knife at her, striking the Villain in her obscured eye and sending her falling to the ground, presumably killing her.
After getting his peace and quiet, Stendhal proceeds to slice off his broken nose to prove his newly acquired determination, leaving his nasal cavities completely exposed. After finishing the painful self-mutilation, he looks into the cracked sink mirror in manic satisfaction, saying that he no longer needs a mask as his face truly embody his new persona.
He then slowly lurches down a pitch-black stairway while smearing the blood on his hands against the wall, praising himself for discarding his mask and opening himself to the unopposed, unfiltered reality of the world. As Stendhal continues to march on through a hallway, he then spits out his idea of where to go from here: a figure with no face taking on the color of the blood trail he'll spill for others to follow, so that the "stains of his blood" will guide the world forward.
The seemingly dead Kuin sits up and pulls the weapon out of her eye with ease, revealing that her worker bees had stopped the knife from killing her. The girl is still annoyed at the Vigilante's betrayal and pseudo-intellectual ranting, calling him a narcissist. However, despite this, Kuin admits to herself that she can't complain and decides not to retaliate, as she's still having fun with how events are unfolding.
Characters in Order of Appearance#
Tetsu Rojiya Yonenaga All Might (Pictured, Fantasy) Stendhal Haruhisa Soji Kuin Hachisuka Akira Iwako (Pictured) Moyuru Tochi Soga Kugisaki Rapt Tokage Scarred Man Mario Kugutsu Endeavor (Fantasy) The Crawler Ichimoku Samazu (Voice) Knuckleduster Pop☆Step
Quirks#
- Unnamed Armor Quirk
- Unnamed Lightning Quirk
- Unnamed Transformation Quirk
- Unnamed Strength Enhancing Quirk
- Bloodcurdle
- Lizard
- Ignition
- Playtime
- Spike
- Queen Bee
- Slide and Glide
Locations#
- Naruhata
- Kanrin Tavern
- Abegawa Tenchu Kai's headquarters
- Koichi's Penthouse
- Naruhata Disaster Medical Center
Battles & Events#
Anime & Manga Differences#
- The anime omits Rojiya's backstory, as well as the establishment of his habit in taking manhole covers and using them as weapons against rival organizations.
- The anime cuts the narration present during Stendhal's assault on the Abegawa Tenchu Kai.
- In the manga, the nurse enters the room to admonish Rapt just as he asks Moyuru to light him a cigarette. In the anime, the nurse enters just as Moyuru uses his Quirk, setting off the fire alarms.
- When Moyuru is compared to Endeavor, the anime shows him transition into Endeavor visually.
- When Kuin offers Trigger to Soga to fight Stendhal, in the manga she carries the vials in a briefcase, while in the anime she takes the vials out of her pocket.
- The scene where Kuin sends out her bees and forcefully transforms Soga is extended in the anime.
- During Soga's breakdown, the anime cuts the flashback of him being "laughed" at by his teacher and the entire class and adds some dialogue about him being mocked for his appearance after beating someone up.
- In the anime, Soga's new Instant Villain form allows him to shoot his spikes.
- When Stendhal begins to lunge over Knuckleduster's wire, the anime shows him imagining All Might when he talks about his heroic resolve.
- Knuckleduster's scuffle with Stendhal is extended in the anime.
- Stendhal cutting off his nose is slightly extended in the anime.
- The shot of Stendhal after he slices off his nose is more graphic in the anime, with the mirror being more cracked and the reflection displaying portions of his freshly exposed nasal cavities.