Chapter 7 - New Place, Same Luck

'If I strap these to my body, and swim through a river, I could get a serious cardio workout.'

Naruto's thoughts were solely on training as he looked through the mall, seeing a weighted vest, weighted anklets, and weighted wristbands on sale for a decent price. On their own, each of them were kind of worthless to somebody who had trained their body well, but combined and used in an interesting way could make for a surprisingly good training method. Naruto looked through the window selling them, the mall they were inside of contained dozens and dozens of different stores, and three floors of places to visit. After a short train ride, and 10 minutes of walking, they had arrived at the place where teenagers could be easily found.

"Nope."

Mina grabbed Naruto by the ear and started to pull him away from the store that sold the work out equipment. She saw the look that he had been showing the gear, and since she was trying to pull him away from training, it wouldn't do to let him buy stuff that would just increase his training even more.

"Okay." Naruto muttered as she dragged him to a different store.

Clothing store.

"I do this with my girlfriends all the time, and you're wearing the exact same outfit when we met. I think you need a update." Mina stated to Naruto as she poked his jacket, the same style of jacket that he had been wearing when they met. Naruto looked down at his clothes, not seeing what was wrong with them. By the time that he had looked, she had already dragged him into the men's section. "You're like super well built, so something with short sleeves or no sleeves is perfect. Also, maybe getting something a size too small would look great." Mina grabbed a shirt that wouldn't naturally fit Naruto and held it up to him.

It was pink.

"That... is very feminine." Naruto pointed out as she pushed the shirt into his arms. She pushed black baggy shorts into his arms with them, before she started to really have fun with it as she pulled him across the entire clothing shop. The clothes in his arms piled up higher and higher, until he couldn't even see what was being added anymore. "Anyway, my Quirk usually destroys whatever clothes I wear, so I wear jackets because they are easy to take off, and my pants are made from materials that stretch for those with Quirks that make them bigger." Naruto lifted up the clothes higher up so that he could look at her.

She stopped.

"Yeah, and my Quirk makes acid come from my body. Do you know how many pairs of shoes I've melted? It's a lot. Clothes don't have to be practical." Mina gave him a pat on the head for being so simple minded about this. He, a boy, just wouldn't understand why him wearing good clothes would reflect upon her as his friend. His image was her image, and the opposite was true. "Anyway, look... see, you're on shirts now." Mina held up a shirt that had a stylish image of him in his 1-Tail form on the front, arms crossed in an action pose.

They made T-shirts of him?

When?

"I'm on shirts?" Naruto asked with surprise as he looked at the shirt. He whispered it mostly to himself, since he was honestly surprised. Sure, he had saved a few lives in the past few months, but he didn't think he had gained any real fame for it. He wasn't even being talked about a bunch on the news anymore, since he hadn't done anything heroic in like 5 weeks. The news had already moved on to the popular heroes who were constantly doing hero work, so why would their already be merch for him, when there shouldn't be a demand for it?

Mina nodded and put it on the growing pile.

"Yeah dude, you're like super popular with little kids, and since nobody knows what your normal face looks like, it adds to your charm... and your foxy fox form looks really cool. You're pretty muscular on your own, but your fox form is almost All Might levels of buff. A lot of my friends at school think you're super hot." Mina had seen a ton of her friends put pictures they printed from newspapers and the internet in their lockers at school, and there were a lot of kids she passed on the road that would be playing Hero and Villain. It wasn't surprising to see children getting their parents to buy fox tails and fox masks, and parading around as Fox-Man from TV.

Naruto furrowed his brow.

"I didn't do it to become famous."

Naruto frowned.

"I just want to use my power to help people, but I can't do that without becoming a hero. So I need to be stronger, become a hero, and become well known enough, so that when people see me... they feel safe." Naruto changed into the first outfit she showed him, and opened the door to show her.

She gave him two thumbs up.

Looked good.

"That's like really cool. I mean, I want to help people, but for me being a hero is just something I'm just suited for. Everyone's always told me that because of my looks, my Quirk, and my personality that I was suited for it. Really dorky, right?" Mina had always thought her own reasons for wanting to be a hero were pretty lame. She felt even more lame when compared to those with selfless reasons.

She didn't see it, but Naruto shook his head.

'In this society, that reason is fine too. Honestly, reasons don't matter as long as we're helping people.' Naruto didn't speak his thoughts, but he did smile as he changed into the next outfit. "This one has a jacket." Naruto liked that, he really did. Jackets were sort of his style, especially orange or black jackets. They really fit his color scheme well, considering he turned into an orange fox.

Mina saw him when he opened the door.

"Yep, I'm going to try on some stuff too, anything you don't like, just put back where I got it from."

"So, what was it like... running into a burning building to save people." Mina liked her ice cream as they sat on a bench in the food court. She had been meaning to ask about it for awhile, since Naruto had already done heroic stuff. She had helped him stop a villain, but he had done more stuff in the past that she didn't have experience in. "Was it scary?"

"Of course it was scary, it was a burning building, and it could collapse or explode at any moment. I was scared the entire time I was inside of there." Naruto admitted with a grin.

Somehow, she didn't believe him.

"Bullcrap." Mina pointed her fingers at him like guns. She didn't buy that for a second, she had seen the news, and he didn't look afraid when he ran into the building, or when he had jumped out of it. He had seemed like the definition of bravery to her. "You were totally fearless, admit it." Mina teased him, and he shook his head.

He wasn't.

"I wasn't fearless, I was scared that I wouldn't be able to save everyone. If people see the person saving them is scared, then they're going to be even more scared. My body just moved on it's own, and I refused to show them I was afraid. Because this-" Naruto pushed his fingers up against his cheeks, and spread his lips into a smile. "Is the most heroic thing you can do as a hero. Sure, with my body I can save their lives... but with my smile, I'll save their hearts." Naruto slapped his heart a few times to show her what he meant.

Mina thought on it.

'... Sounds to me like he wasn't afraid... he wasn't afraid of getting hurt, he was afraid of others getting hurt. That is-' Mina stopped and smiled at Naruto, before she pointed to him. "-really cool. Yeah, All Might is always smiling to. You kind of remind me of him, you could be his son or nephew or something. Man, this gets me really pumped up for U.A.!" Mina leaned back in her chair and shouted out her last sentence. She smiled widely, pushing her fingers against her cheeks, copying Naruto. "I'm stealing that, I'm going to be a hero who smiles too." Mina stuck her tongue out at Naruto.

He nodded and grinned back.

"That-"

"Oh, lets go go singing! I bet you'll be really good at it!" Mina finished off her snack and grabbed onto him, pulling him to his feet as he carried their clothes in one arm, bags dangling from it. She held onto his sleeve as she pulled him, not giving him much of a chance to object to her. "This is going to be fun!"

Naruto just smiled and nodded.

Yeah, this was kind of fun.

-Later-

"Oh my god, that was awesome, I didn't know my voice could go that high... really enjoying your drink, huh?" Mina used a towel to wipe the sweat from her forehead. She had been break dancing while she had been singing, seeing as she loved both of them. "You know, I kind of expected a villain to show up today. Glad to see I was-"

*BOOM*

Naruto looked at her with narrowed eyes for her comment seeming to summon forth a villain from somewhere. Naruto palmed his face, before he stood up and zipped down his jacket. He tossed it on her, before he transformed into his 1-Tailed form.

"Wear that, and use the hoodie to cover up your hair and horns. Since this is a mall, I'm sure there are some heroes here. We need to help evacuate people." Naruto told he as he left the small room they were in. She pulled his jacket on over her clothes, and flipped the hoodie so that her features were mostly covered. Well, the pink skin on her arms and legs were hard to hide, but with her head hidden, she wouldn't be recognized at a single glance. She followed after him quickly as they ran to the edge of the second floor, looking down on the first floor.

"That's the baddy, looks like he's got a hostage!" Mina shouted, and Naruto looked at the situation she pointed at. There was a guy wearing a cliche ski mask, most likely to hid his face, and his right arm was a cannon. It would seem his Quirk was related to his arm being a cannon, because there was smoke coming out of the end of his cannon arm. He had it pointed up at the ceiling, before he pointed it at a man next to him.

"Nobody stop me, or he gets it!"

"Mina... You a good shot?" Naruto asked as he looked at a trashcan. He took the trash bag out of the can, before he tied it up and placed it to the side. Gesturing to the can, she nodded and hopped so that she was inside of it. Naruto lifted up the can itself, her inside of it, before he looked down at the first floor and aimed carefully. "Ready?" Naruto asked as he closed an eye.

Mina grinned.

"Ready!"

He threw her, at a high speed, right towards the villain. The villain saw the trash can coming, since it was a straight shot, and moved his aim to fire at the can. Naruto started to run towards the end of the balcony, while Mina jumped out of the trashcan just as the villain fired his arm. The bin was destroyed by the shot completely, and as Mina rolled across the ground she lobbed a shot of acid at his pants. His belt and the hem of his pants melted in a second, and like magic his pants dropped to his knees. Out of instinct, the villain pulled his pants up.

Mina stuck her tongue out at him, smiling widely.

"You little bit-"

Naruto came flying in while he was distracted, and kicked him in the ċhėst, knocking him through a shop window and into a wall inside of the store. The man let out a harsh breath as he was knocked out cold. He didn't see what hit him, but everyone around him did as the villain was taken down rather quickly. Naruto looked at the bags that were hanging off of his tail, before Mina jumped onto his shoulder.

Naruto snorted.

"... That was before I saw a hostage... All things considered, I wouldn't mind hanging with you again." Naruto had fun today, and really wouldn't mind a repeat.

Though, next time without a villain ruining things.