Death Battle Predictions: Deku VS Asta

 

"There should be no boundaries to human endeavor. We are all different. However bad life may seem, there is always something you can do, and succeed at. While there’s life, there is hope." – Stephen Hawking

Izuku Midoriya, the aspiring hero known as Deku from My Hero Academia.

Asta, the ambitious aspiring wizard from Black Clover.

Life is not necessarily fair. We can seek to reach the highest highs, climb the tallest peaks, but lack the needed talent to do so; talent that those around us possess in spades. Even if one has the heart to reach that high, they can lack the ground to stand on.

But these two were given the stepping stone they needed, in the form of a unique tool no one else had. With what they needed to begin their climb, they did exactly that, becoming heroic, inspiring those around them, and always having the motivation needed to fight the good fight.

Both these kids undoubtedly stand out within their respective worlds, but how do they fair when placed against their fellow zero-turned-hero? Will U.A. High’s green-clad savior blow Asta away, or will the Clover Kingdom’s anti-magic swordsman push Deku aside? It’s time to find out who will be the winner in a DEATH BATTLE!

Before We Get Started…

It is worth noting that both series are ongoing and still have media coming out, and despite our best efforts to break into Shonen Jump's offices, we can't know what will happen in the future. We will be covering everything that has released as of this blog’s release, even that which is very recent, but it is obviously impossible to account for anything that hasn’t happened yet. It also goes without saying that this blog will have spoilers for both the My Hero Academia and the Black Clover manga. Like, RECENT spoilers. As in, approaching the end of the big story spoilers. You have been warned.

Background

Deku

"I want to be strong enough, so no one will worry about me."

Quirks: Superhuman abilities possessed by most of the population in the world of My Hero Academia. Quirks first manifested when a newborn baby in Qing Qing City, China started glowing, and various superpowers were soon identified in other locations of the world. It wasn’t long before a society of superheroes became the norm and eventually, 80% of Earth’s population had attained a Quirk of their very own. Unfortunately for Izuku Midoriya, he wasn’t born in that lucky 80%. After reaching a certain age without his Quirk manifesting, his mother took him to a doctor, only for the young superhero fanatic to find out he didn’t have any power, with an extra joint in the pinky toe being an indicator.

This led to Izuku’s childhood friend, Katsuki Bakugo, turning into his biggest bully, and giving him the nickname “Deku”, which translates to “one who is useless”. Despite this, Izuku still dreamed of becoming a hero, just like his childhood idol and the proclaimed Symbol of Peace, All Might. One day, Izuku met his idol after a run-in with a supervillain; upon doing so, he asked All Might if it would be possible for someone who is quirkless to become a hero. Initially, All Might told young Midoriya that it was impossible; however, Izuku would prove him wrong by risking his life to save Bakugo from the same villain he encountered. Afterward, All Might admitted his mistake and told Izuku: ”You too can become a hero”.

Of course, that wasn’t the only thing that happened that day. All Might was so inspired by Izuku’s heroism that he chose young Midoriya to be his successor, and inherit his quirk: One For All. It wouldn’t be easy, though. Izuku had to train his body to be compatible with All Might’s quirk. After months of intense training via removing garbage from a beach and eating a strand of All Might’s hair, Izuku Midoriya officially became the 9th user of One For All. And after saving his future classmate Ochaco Uraraka from a giant robot during the entrance exams, he was accepted into U.A. High School. With All Might serving as his mentor, young Midoriya began his hero academia.

Izuku’s time at U.A. contributed to his growth as a hero, especially thanks to his teachers and classmates, though it wasn’t all fun and games. Not only did he have to master his use of One For All, young Midoriya also had to deal with a reignited rivalry with Bakugo, as well as the rising threat of the League of Villains spearheaded by Tomura Shigaraki and All Might’s nemesis, All For One. Nevertheless, Izuku persevered and even accepted Deku, the name constantly used to ridicule him, as his new hero name.

During his hero training, Deku developed new abilities and techniques to efficiently use One For All. This was especially important after All Might officially retired following his final showdown with All For One. In addition, Deku would learn new secrets about One For All, including its origins, being able to communicate with past users of One For All, and new quirks he can now unlock. Even with these new discoveries, the war with the League of Villains darkened as Shigaraki became a more dangerous threat as All For One’s successor. After an intense battle with Shigaraki and the Paranormal Liberation Front, Deku briefly left U.A. as a way to keep his friends from getting hurt and for him to become stronger.

However, his friends and classmates rescued him from this path of isolation, convincing him that he doesn’t have to handle things alone; instead, they’ll all be fighting together. With a newfound resolve and his friends at his side, Deku leads the final war against All For One. From being a quirkless kid to a bright young hero, Izuku Midoriya has worked hard to become the next Symbol of Peace, someone who would save people with a smile on his face. This is the story of how Deku became the world’s greatest hero.

Asta

“I’m going to become the Wizard King! This is something I’ll never give up on!”

Long ago, an army of malevolent demons nearly destroyed humanity as it stood. But in their greatest time of need, one lone mage rose up against them, pushing back against the demons and saving all of humanity. This mage came to be known as the Wizard King, and as he passed, new Wizard Kings would rise to take his place, serving as the ultimate protectors of humanity and symbols of peace across the land.

Given to an orphanage as a baby by his mother in order to keep him safe, Asta grew up surrounded by the only family he knew. With his best friend Yuno as a brother figure, the priest Father Orsi as a foster father, and Sister Lily as a foster sister, he was happy and loved. But despite this, there was something Asta lacked compared to everyone else. In a world with magic as the cornerstone of society itself, he had absolutely no aptitude for it whatsoever. Not that it would keep Asta down. With the dream to become the Wizard King, Asta trained and pushed his body to its physical limits day in and day out, making up for his lack of magical power with hard work and determination.

At the age of 15, he and Yuno were to receive a Grimoire, a book that allows its user to cast magic far beyond their normal capabilities. Yuno’s Grimoire was an exceptionally rare Four Leaf Clover, signifying his massive potential as a mage, but none of the typical Grimoires were right for Asta, except for one. The Grimoire that would bond with Asta was a Five Leaf Clover, which signified one thing: devils. Yuno may have gotten Wind Magic, but Asta got a kickass Anti-Magic sword out of it, so all’s well that ends well.

Six months later, Asta and Yuno traveled to the capital of the Clover Kingdom to attend the Magic Knights Entrance Exam. Though unable to complete the first task, his unwavering determination impressed the Captain of the Black Bulls, Yami Sukehiro, enough that he’d be willing to let him join, even when no other Captain wanted him due to his magic. The Black Bulls were more or less a band of misfits, considered the worst of the worst, but Asta fit right in. Determined to prove himself against the royalty who judged him and others based on their peasant status, Asta’s training would only ramp up with Yami as his mentor, and he made fast friends with the other members of the Black Bulls, finding a new home amongst the oddballs of magic society.

Despite most nobles looking down on him threefold for his membership in the Black Bulls, peasant status and lack of magic, he managed to get many to see and like him for more than what he came from, notably Mimosa, Leopold, Mereoleona, Nozel, and Noelle. Even the current Wizard King Julius came to respect the headstrong mage.

Eventually, Asta would find out that he had an adoptive brother named Liebe, a devil raised by his mother who was unaffected by her uncontrollable magic draining. It was actually Liebe who helped Asta gain his Anti-Magic powers in the first place, as he was sealed in the leader of the Elves, Licht’s, Five Leaf Grimoire by Asta’s mother in order to protect him from the devil Lucifero, who wished to destroy all life on the planet. Liebe’s intense hatred of devils developed into the Anti-Magic power while sealed, and this was given to Asta when Liebe chose him to receive the Grimoire.

Asta and Liebe’s relationship was a bit rocky at first, but through trials and tribulations, they came to use each other’s power to take down the enemies that came their way. Forming a contract, the two brothers became genuine friends and equals, allowing them to share their power and undergo Devil Unification, a power which would prove invaluable when Lucifero began his invasion. With the assistance of the Black Bulls and Royal Magic Knights, the King of Devils was eventually felled, the half of his body in the human world destroyed, and the other half of his body in the Underworld destroyed by Lucius Zogratis. A year and three months later, Asta would be promoted to 1st Class Senior Magic Knight, one step closer to becoming the Wizard King.

Having stopped the elven takeover of the Clover Kingdom, united with Liebe and killed Lucifero, Asta has more than proven his worth thanks to his own magic; the magic of never giving up! So despite his peasant status, don’t underestimate this Black Bull. He’s fighting for everyone, irrespective of status, to prove that anyone can be a true hero. He may not be the Wizard King yet, but there’s no doubt that he one day will be, and until that day, he’ll never give in.

Equipment

Deku

Costume Zeta

Costume Zeta is the latest iteration of Deku’s hero costume. It includes primary features from previous versions of his costumes, along with modified equipment created by schoolmate Mei Hatsume to help support Izuku’s quirk and fighting style. The shoes have a special crushing mechanism that increases damage dealt with kicks, and the gloves can be used to fire air blast projectiles. Once equipped with a hood, Costume Zeta now sports the cape of Izuku’s mentor Gran Torino as a scarf. Izuku still wears a mask with this costume, which also doubles as a gas mask.

Iron Soles

Deku’s iron soles are support items created by Mei Hatsume to act as armored cleats. Designed to compensate for his leg strength, the iron soles allow him to develop his Shoot Style fighting technique, as they maximize the strength of his kicks. By kicking something, the iron soles absorb the impact and redistribute the kinetic energy back out, increasing impact strength. They also look like something Tetsuya Nomura would have a character wear for added fashion points.

Air Force Gloves

Deku’s Air Force Gloves are another support item created by Hatsume in conjunction with his Iron Soles for his Shoot Style. The Air Force Gloves are designed to help Deku focus and aim pressurized air blasts through the flick of his fingers, similar to an air gun. He can also use the gloves to fire multiple, smaller concussive air blasts at once without any repercussions.

Mid-Gauntlets

The Mid-Gauntlets are a set of support items that All Might commissioned for Deku from the United States. Not only do these gauntlets provide extra support and protection for Deku’s arms and legs like bracers, but they also allow him to safely use One For All at higher percentages by reinforcing his entire body, though the gauntlets will shatter if he goes 100%. Even though his Mid-Gauntlets were destroyed in his fight with Lady Nagant, Deku received a replica set from Mei Hatsume.

Asta

Grimoire

All Mages in the Black Clover universe carry a Grimoire. These books made of Mana allow mages to use their magic in more complex ways by recording different spells. In Asta’s case, his Grimoire grants him access to his various anti-magic swords. It should be noted that Grimoires aren’t books that mages carry around at any given moment. Instead, they pop in and out of existence wherever a spell is needed and generally aren’t targeted by opponents, likely because of that fact. 

Demon Slayer Sword

The first of the Anti-Magic swords Asta received. A massive greatsword with the ability to neutralize magic. After a while, Asta gained the ability to control the Anti-Magic within the sword, allowing him to call it to him, as well as ride on top of it and take flight. Asta is also capable of increasing the sword’s size at will by enhancing it with Anti-Magic. By tapping people with the hilt of the blade, he can undo mental enchantments. This sword can notably only cut magic though, as otherwise it is a blunt weapon. The sword can also repel magic.

Something else worth noting for his swords in general is that they cannot be replicated to their fullest potential, as made evident by the fact a mage whose ability is to replicate magic was unable to fully neutralize magic attacks.

Demon-Dweller Sword

The second Anti-Magic sword Asta has in his arsenal. This sword was obtained from a treasury within a dungeon. This sword grants Asta Anti-Magic projectiles, allowing him to cut through magic from a distance. The sword also has the ability to absorb others’ magic, and release attacks with the properties of that magic attribute. It’s also the lightest of his swords, meaning he can swing it faster than the other ones.

Demon-Destroyer Sword

Asta’s third Anti-Magic sword, with a unique wide-edged tip design. This sword has the ability called Causality Break, which summons black tendrils of Anti-Magic that absorb and completely remove effects of curses and magic, by severing the cause-and-effect relationship between them. This can even undo the biological changes caused by magic and the effects of reincarnation magic, which regular Anti-Magic cannot remove. The blade also allowed Asta to view Patri’s memories when reaching into his “soul” to remove corruption from his body.

Demon-Slasher Katana

Asta’s fourth and currently latest Anti-Magic sword was obtained from the Black Bulls’ captain Yami, after he was taken by Dante Zelgratis. This sword not only has strong cutting power, but it also has selective cutting. This allows Asta to cut whatever he wishes without cutting that which he doesn’t want to. Asta coats this sword in Anti-Magic to improve its power and nullify magic.

Abilities

Deku

One For All

Gifted to Deku by the number one hero All Might, One For All is what gives Deku all his power, his strength, various Quirks, etc. However, One For All itself does not actually consist of said Quirks. It is what was used to pass them along, making them stronger every time they were gifted to a new user, with Deku being the current and most powerful wielder of the Quirk. Deku can pass on One For All by giving his DNA to another person, like having them ingest a hair or consuming his blood (However, it is possible for the Quirk to not fully transfer due to One For All choosing to stay with Deku, as seen in Heroes Rising).

However, it cannot be copied by power-copying techniques due to its nature as a power stockpiling Quirk (Since the copier likely won't have Quirk powers stockpiled already), nor can it be taken via consumption unless Deku has the intention to pass it on. For example, if one tries to lick Deku's blood off their blade after cutting him in-battle, the Quirk won't be transferred. Though if someone tries to use a technique (such as All For One) to steal it, they need the will and malicious intent powerful enough to overpower both the wills of Deku and the consciousnesses within One For All.

All Might explained One For All to be like a crystalline network of power. Each user cultivates the strength and then passes it on. However, due to the Quirk becoming more powerful over time as well as the increasing scarcity of Quirkless people, it can no longer be inherited after Izuku, meaning he's set to be the final bearer of One For All.

Fighting Skill

Despite being a “damned nerd” most of his life, Deku is actually very adept in combat. Putting aside his general combat training at U.A., he’s also incredibly intelligent strategy-wise, being able to predict the movements of very capable fighters, deduce weaknesses on the fly, and capitalize on exploitable openings.

Air Force

One For All users (and comparable characters like Shigaraki) can produce shockwaves with their movements. These shockwaves/bursts of air pressure can be used for accelerated movement, as long range projectiles, and even for “flight” by constantly using them for acceleration while in the sky.

Detroit Smash

A single punch that focuses the power of One For All into a devastating strike. Initially used by All Might, Deku figured out how to replicate it. Detroit Smash is powerful enough to create massive gusts of wind and even change the weather at full power. Deku is capable of utilizing Detroit Smash at both 5% & 100% power, and by combining it with his Gearshift Quirk, he can chain multiple Detroit Smashes into Detroit Smash: Quintuple.

Delaware Smash

By flicking his fingers, Deku can create massive shockwaves with Delaware Smash. They're powerful enough to instantly shatter massive ice pillars created by Shouto Todoroki (as seen above). By utilizing the gloves on his costume made by Hatsume, Deku can perform Delaware Smash: Airforce, an attack that launches a blast of compressed air at his opponent. By using all of his fingers, Deku can perform four of these in a row.

Manchester Smash

A powerful axe kick that is strong enough to destroy the ground around Deku and Overhaul (as seen above). Fun fact, the fact that it's a kick could reference the Manchester United football club (not very American if you ask me). Deku can also combine it with Fa Jin to create a Faux 100% Smash.

St. Louis Smash

An aerial attack that starts with Deku launching himself into the air. He then focuses power into his leg and delivers a powerful roundhouse kick. By utilizing 45% of One For All, he can create a massive gust of compressed air with St. Louis Smash: Airforce.

Wyoming Smash

Deku draws 100% of his power into his arms, and spikes his opponent with enough force to create a powerful shockwave (but there’s no such place as Wyoming).

Texas Smash

An attack mainly used by All Might, which Deku has been shown to use as well. By focusing power into his fist, Deku can deliver an incredibly powerful right punch.

1,000,000% Delaware Detroit Smash

One of Deku's strongest attacks. A combination of both Detroit Smash and Delaware Smash at 100% power, magnified by Deku's raw emotion and adrenaline. The immense power of this attack allowed Deku to break through the defenses of, and ultimately defeat, the villain Muscular (It should be noted that the 1,000,000% in the name isn't literal, it’s just very hype).

United States of World Smash

Deku's ultimate move. A variation of All Might's signature United States of Smash that Deku uses with 100% Full Cowl. He starts with a volley of punches and then circles his opponent, building up momentum to deliver a final devastating kick.

Vestiges

Unlike his predecessor before him, Deku eventually achieved an ability that no previous user of One For All was able to accomplish. His intrinsic connection with OFA allows him to communicate with the Vestiges or more specifically, the past users of OFA. The Vestiges are capable of giving Deku guidance, allowed him to break out of Shinsou’s mind control, and grant him access to the quirks of all previous OFA users.

Black Whip

The first of Deku’s secret Quirks that he unlocked, Black Whip lets Deku shoot out darkish green energy-like tendrils with a variety of uses. He can use it as a method of ranged attack, to block attacks, grapple onto surfaces to gain momentum, or even grapple his opponents to lead into stronger blows. Blackwhip has also been shown to be able to extend large distances with enough focus. He can also summon this Quirk out of anywhere from his body, even his tongue. It also has a variant when combined with Fa Jin known as Black-Chain, which creates a powerful chain to ensnare his target.

Float

The second secret Quirk hidden in One For All, Float allows Deku to do exactly what it says. With Float, he can suspend himself in the air, and use One For All and Black Whip to propel himself around the battlefield, enhancing his overall mobility.

Danger Sense

Danger Sense gives Deku a precognition of sorts, making him aware immediately when presented with a threat to himself or his allies. However it does not make him automatically move, as he needs to do that himself. Think of it kind of like a legally distinct version of Spider-Man’s Spider-Sense. Sadly, it isn't perfect, as if someone attacks Deku with no malicious intent towards him (such as a psychotic yandere madly in love with him for example), Danger Sense will not activate.

Smokescreen

Deku can create a gust of smoke around the battlefield, effective for both hiding his location and creating an opportunity to gain distance between him and his opponent. Smokescreen can cover entire city blocks even while it is raining.

Fa Jin

Fa Jin allows Deku to replicate the strength and speed he has at 100% Full Cowling by storing the kinetic energy he accumulates while in motion. When he releases the stored energy, he can move and attack at up to the level of 100% Full Cowling without actually expending the effort required to maintain 100%. He can activate Fa Jin any time he is moving, and he can move at faster speeds and hit harder the longer he activates it.

Gearshift 

Gearshift allows Deku to change the speed and trajectory of any object upon contact. He is also able to use this on himself, though due to its power, he becomes very tired after only five minutes of use. He can boost the speed of all of his Ultimate Moves to the point where they can break the sound barrier, and change directions mid-move in order to dodge an opponent's attacks.

Flight

By combining Air Force, Fa Jin, and Float, Izuku is able to fly and accelerate across the skies. He used this combination to cross the ocean to reach his friends across 200 kilometers.

Resistances

• Mind Manipulation: With his willpower, as well as the help of the Vestiges, was able to use OFA to break his fingers, shocking himself out of Shinsou’s brainwashing, as seen above.

• Power Stealing: The Vestiges protected Deku from having OFA be taken from him by Nine as well as Shigaraki, as linked in the OFA section.

• Extreme Temperatures: Can withstand fire and ice from Shoto Todoroki, and scales to All Might who can touch superheated plasma without injury.

• Toxins/Gasses: Deku’s mouthguard on his uniform can act as a gas mask, protecting him from toxic substances and other gasses.

Asta

Anti-Magic

Asta has the unique ability to nullify any and all magic through his Grimoire. Asta, who completely lacks magic himself, can safely utilize the swords provided by this ability without having to worry about it draining his own magic. Other mages would otherwise lose magic incredibly fast, which if exposed to long enough, could hinder their stamina completely.

Anti-Magic works similarly to magic/mana aura, helping him deal better with the temperatures of the interior of a volcano.

Combat Skill

While he isn’t a super combat analyst by any means, Asta has shown a high level of combat intelligence. He’s picked up many fighting styles from people he’s fought with and against, and has consistently used each fight to surpass his limits and better himself for the next challenge. This becomes extremely apparent during his fight with Liebe, where he shows off some combat techniques he picked up from Kiato, Fanzell Kruger, and Yami Sukehiro, while having learned enough from fighting Patry and Mars to be able to avoid multiple manners of attacks.

Bull Thrust

When Asta points his Demon Slayer sword and Demon Dweller in front of him, he can dispell anything that comes in contact with his blade. Without help from an ally such as a spatial magic user, Asta cannot change direction while doing so.

Black Meteorite

Asta coats his entire body in Anti-Magic and charges at his opponent, slashing them once they are in range.

Black Hurricane

Asta spins around rapidly, engulfing anything in his surroundings with Anti-Magic that cancels out any magical property.

Black Slash

Asta fills the Demon-Dweller Sword with Anti-Magic and swings it, releasing the Anti-Magic as slash wave projectiles. While this attack only cuts magic, impact with these slashes will deal damage to those hit.

Black Divider

When Asta pushes and condenses Anti-Magic into his Demon Slayer Sword, he can unleash Black Divider. This devastating attack allows the blade to grow way beyond its normal size. At its absolute largest, it was shown to deflect gigantic balls of fire and ice, and Asta can swing it around as if it was normal in size.

Infinite Slash Equinox

A technique Asta gains when fused with Liebe, in which he charges Anti-Magic energy into the Demon-Slasher Katana, unleashing a large slash wave. This technique will not harm allies, even if they are right in the middle of the attack.

Ki Sensing

Asta was taught the ability to sense Ki by his mentor/squad captain Yami. With it he’s able to predict and sense a foe’s upcoming moves, including natural things like trees and rocks. It can also act like a lie detector (to sense intent and emotion) and be used to sense foes even if they are invisible.

Zetten

An advanced application of Ki. Generally, the user would concentrate their magic and release it in vertical slash. Asta applies Zetten however by using Anti-Magic, which can decay constructs grown with magic power, like bamboo in the Land in the Sun.

Liebe 

The Devil that dwells within Asta’s Grimoire is Liebe (which means “Love” in German). He was sealed inside the Grimoire to protect him when Lucifero attacked his adopted mom (Asta’s actual mother). Asta’s usage of Anti-Magic originates from Liebe, as he achieved it during his time in the Grimoire in order to get revenge against devil-kind.

He’s Asta’s adopted brother, so when the time came, the Grimoire came to Asta from Liebe. When they first met outside of the Grimoire though, Liebe tried to kill him, because that’s brotherly love for you. Asta and Liebe then became friends however, allowing them to activate Devil Union, Asta’s most powerful form.

Currently Liebe can manifest himself fully using Asta’s arm (which was sacrificed to Liebe to attain more power), or manifest in a chibi-like state. When Liebe is not summoned or is merged with Asta, Asta has a black demon arm in place of his sacrificed one.

Resistances

• Magic: Asta can negate magic to a significant extent. He can cut through magic spells, attacks, negate the effects produced by them, and lacking mana also means he can hang around with people that passively absorb mana. Later on, he could channel Anti-Magic through his own body to also nullify magic.

Forms

Deku

Full Cowling

Using a specific technique Deku named Full Cowling, Deku is able to use only specific percentages of One For All, for the sake of better preserving his stamina, and preventing him breaking his bones before he could effectively use the quirk’s full power. Even the smallest percentages Full Cowling has used, like 5%, are still very impressive in terms of physical prowess. The more impressive ones such as 45% can even create gigantic wind blasts through sheer strength.

Faux 100%

By combining 45% One For All with the Fa Jin quirk, Deku is able to enhance his power and speed dramatically. His enhancements can emulate the level of power he would have at 100%, without the stamina drain or risk of injury.

One For All 100%

By utilizing all the power stored within One For All, Deku can achieve his full potential. At this level, his power becomes absolutely absurd, being able to create ginormous shockwaves or even cause storms without much effort at all. While the form used to immediately shatter his bones upon landing hits, and has heavy stamina drain, Deku has become more accustomed to using its power after multiple uses, with these issues becoming more minor overtime, even if they are still present.

Enraged 

While in a state of sheer rage, Deku is able to push his 100% even further. Coating himself in Black Whip with One For All exploding all around him, his fury leads to a ridiculous onslaught of attacks, as well as even more devastating blows than 100% normally delivers. But of course, being pushed by rage has its drawbacks, for Deku can overexert himself even faster than normal, and is much less strategic, to a point that All For One Shigaraki was almost able to capitalize on that the second time. If it wasn't for Mirio, Deku would have been a goner.

Gearshift Overdrive

Gearshift Overdrive combines Deku’s ability to increase the speed of anything with his ultimate moves such as Delaware Detroit Smash. This pushes his full power to 120%. He massively boosts his speed in this form and can instantly change his trajectory to maneuver around an opponent, allowing him to deliver far stronger and faster ultimate moves. However, using Gear Shift on himself puts a lot of strain on his body. While this is his strongest form, he can only use it for 5 minutes before tiring out.

Asta

Black Asta

After getting his arms mangled by an elf named Vetto, Asta’s squadmate Vanessa went to her mother in order for her to help heal Asta’s “incurable” curse. Which, of course, meant using her blood in order to remove the limit on Asta’s Anti-Magic. He channels Anti-Magic all throughout his body which boosts his strength, speed, and durability, in addition to giving Asta the power of flight despite only having one wing. 

In order to activate this form, he has to stand still with one of his swords out and concentrate. Were he to be enraged, the form grows stronger but Asta becomes a mindless berserker. Currently the form has taken a more simple appearance, manifesting as four horns on Asta’s head and two wings on his back.

Devil Union

The form Asta attained by completing the Devil-Binding Ritual and the strongest form currently available to him. Anti-Magic forms across his body, increasing his power, durability, speed and mobility. Devil Union also massively amplifies the potency of Anti-Magic, allowing him to negate an Ancient Devil’s blast meant to destroy the entire Clover Kingdom. Asta can remain in this form for up to five minutes. If the form is deactivated before the time limit runs out, they can resume the form with the time remaining. Once time runs out however, Asta will experience intense pain and won’t be able to use his Union or Black form for 30 minutes. 

By focusing Anti-Magic into a specific part of his body, Asta can also achieve a form called Partial Devil Union. With this, the time limit is doubled to 10 minutes, allowing Asta more use of this form's power. If Asta and Liebe are forced out of the form while still having time for it left, they can re-merge with whatever time remains.

True Devil Union

When overwhelmed in battle with Lucifero, Asta reached a new level of understanding with Liebe. Coming to fully understand Liebe’s sadness and pain, Asta embraced and reassured his devil, both united as one as brothers against their foe. As Asta puts it, the feelings both had that overlapped prior had fully merged, and thus their Union became perfected. 

“True” Devil Union is far stronger than the regular iteration, now capable of tanking blows from Lucifero with no issue, and ultimately it defeated the king of devils. Asta gains a fifth horn on his head, and his magic nullification is entirely passive, completely negating magic that touches him. The form shares the same time constraints of the prior union state however, so it is important to end the fight quickly while using it.

Feats

Deku

Overall

• Defeated a giant robot, Bakugou, Shinsou, Stain, Muscular, Overhaul, Nine, Flect Turn, Lady Nagant

• Was deemed worthy of holding One For All by All Might himself, even when he was quirkless

• Passed the U.A. Entrance Exam, U.A. Final Exam, and Hero License Exam

• Managed to fix his friendship with Bakugou, as well as help Todoroki gain confidence in himself, not to mention the inspiration he’s left for the rest of Class 1-A

• Although he isn’t yet, he will one day become the world's greatest hero if his narration is to be believed

• Successfully unlocked and mastered both One For All and all its additional quirks

• His shoes got two votes in a popularity poll

• Has put the shipping community into complete disrepair

Power

• Carried All Might on his back at the start of his training (All Might weighed 255 kilograms or 562 pounds)

• His first time using One For All, he punched apart a gigantic robot as seen above

5%

• Knocked back Todoroki's arm with enough force to "slice the air"

• Kicked through a metal pillar hard enough to destroy it

• Kicked apart this large section of stone

8%

• Can easily kick down walls

20%

• Stopped an incoming spike barrage from Overhaul with a single stomp

• Lifted up a steel girder with both hands and held it up with one hand

• Created a tornado with a kick, sending dozens of trees flying

30%

• Held back a mass of metal pillars before eventually punching through them

• Pulled down a helicopter

45%

• Massively superior to Sports Festival Todoroki, who created a massive ice glacier the size of an entire stadium (10.543 - 49.554 megatons of TNT)

• Todoroki went on to also make a giant wave of ice that froze a huge chunk of a city

• Used Air Force to launch a chunk of sidewalk up to block Shigaraki's wave of destruction

• Broke free from Todoroki’s Heaven Piercing Ice Wall

100%

• Caused a large explosion when clashing with Todoroki.

• Alongside All Might, destroyed a massive cube created by Wolfram (87.17 megatons of TNT each)

• By nature of having One For All, Deku should be superior to its previous owners. He is shown to be superior to AFO Shigaraki (who is equal to Prime All Might), which supports this assertion.

• A severely weakened All Might used the last of his OFA strength to create a huge explosion (59.8 tons of TNT)

• All Might, while far from his prime, punched so hard he changed the weather

• All Might punched a tornado out of existence

• Comparable to Prime All For One, who casually destroyed an island during his fight with the seventh OFA user, Nana Shimura

• Superior to Gigantomachia, who can blast away a giant mountain (18.968 megatons of TNT)

• Punches at 100% are capable of changing the weather via the produced air pressure

• With aid from Bakugou who had temporarily inherited One For All himself, was able to disperse a gigantic storm with just the shockwave of their punches (2.86 teratons of TNT each)

• Sent Fused Overhaul flying into the sky, and completely destroyed his fused state.

• Destroyed parts of a city while clashing with AFO Shigaraki

• Stronger than the Todoroki family, including Dabi

• Endeavor, Shoto, and Dabi affected the weather in three different sections of Japan (595.472 megatons of TNT each)

• The three do not scale to the larger cloud feat regarding North America, as this was caused by a chain reaction with a typhoon

• Grievously wounded AFO Shigaraki. Shigaraki has shown to be able tank the following, of which Izuku exceeded in power:

• Survived Star and Stripe’s “Fist Bump to the Earth” M̶a̶d̶a̶r̶a̶ ̶r̶i̶p̶o̶f̶f̶ (4.393 gigatons of TNT)

• Shown to be comparable to his flying Nomu, which survived point-blank exposure to an explosion from several intercontinental missiles (8.76 gigatons of TNT at most)

• Star used ten missiles on Shigaraki, meaning either the U.S. or Star were convinced it would take at least more than one to kill him. (At least 876 megatons)

• Survived Tamaki’s Vast Hybrid: Plasma Cannon

• Survived Bakugou’s Howitzer Impact: Cluster relatively unharmed

Speed

• Completely outsped Lady Nagant’s bullet (Mach 100)

• Reacted to and blocked a bullet at close range

• Moved in tandem with semi-automatic fire

• Launched a ball over 700 meters with a finger flick. Due to air resistance, Deku must have flung it at supersonic speeds, if not greater.

• While exhausted, dodged Jirou’s sound blast

• At 8%, crossed over a hundred meters in a second

• Faster than Mirko, who was noted to be faster than a large military aircraft

• Narrowly avoided a few lasers, though was eventually tagged by them

• Superior to Stars and Stripes, as her speed comes from copying a limited version of All Might’s statistics, whereas Deku is faster

• Star could react to lasers reflected back at her (2% the speed of light)

• Feat is not an “aim grab”, as Star’s reality warp only kicks in after speaking, and the laser fires back at her before she speaks. Otherwise she would have burned alive from the heat.

• Could evade AFO Shigaraki’s Radio Waves, though that may simply be aim dodging

• Has dodged Bakugou’s explosions.

• Is comparable to Tokoyami & Dark Shadow, who can block Kaminari’s electricity.

• Caught up to a moving train just by running.

• His movements at 20% produce shockwaves. Likewise, AFO Shigaraki produces shockwaves from casual movement.

• At 100%, his shockwaves can travel several kilometers in less than a second (Mach 127)

• As fast as AFO Shigaraki, who is as fast as All Might was in his prime. All Might has:

• While weakened, crossed 5 km in 30 seconds, including time taken to fight Noumus

• Rushed down stairs and defeated numerous villains before they could even react

• Traveled from Hokkaido to Roppongi rather quickly (Mach 43.2)

• Crossed the distance between the Might Tower and the Tokyo Sky Egg in seconds

• Jumped from Tokyo all the way to Osaka in a few seconds and defeated the villains running out in 3 seconds 

• Dive bombed from above the clouds to help stop the villain known as Number Six

• Was known to be faster than a speeding bullet

• Far faster than Mina, who reacted to Aoyama’s lasers

• Faster than Iida, who outsped a swing of Stain’s sword with his Recipro Burst (Mach 8.99-39.82)

Durability

• Has constantly survived having broken bones. A lot of broken bones.

• Survived being crushed between massive steel beams

• Has taken hits from Bakugou’s explosions, who can destroy massive steel cubes (500 kilotons of TNT)

• Crushed by a giant rock and was fine afterward

• Survived Todoroki using his ice and fire Quirks at the same time.

• Been stabbed by Stain’s blades

• Got singed by Dabi’s fire

• Blasted into a cliffside before being pierced by two lasers

• Took a hit from Nine’s lightning, which can destroy multiple buildings (1 kiloton of TNT)

• Withstood numerous attacks from AFO Shigaraki

• Took hits from Muscular, who can destroy a cliffside and buildings with ease

• Got blasted with fire from Endeavor

• Tackled through the side of a building by Tokoyami & Dark Shadow

• Alongside Bakugou, endured a lot of attacks from All Might during training

• Held onto Lady Nagant as she exploded

• With several bones broken, survived a massive shockwave (46.98 tons of TNT)

• Survived several of his blows being reflected at him in an extended fight

• Narrowly survived a nut shot from Kota, a 5-year old child at the time, as seen above

Asta

Overall

• Defeated Lucifero, Zagred, Luck (when he was possessed by an Elf so he was even stronger then normal), Fana, Sally, Valtos, Vetto, and Landros

• Claimed he’d find a way to swing his sword even if he couldn’t use his arms anymore, and did

• Stopped a group of reincarnated elves from taking over the Clover Kingdom

• Fought and defeated Liebe with only a single arm while having to fight against 3 of his own swords

• Passed the exams to become both a Magic and Royal Knight

• Helped save the Clover Kingdom on numerous occasions

• Reignited confidence in his fellow Black Bulls’ abilities via sheer bullheaded stubbornness

• Unintentionally created a harem

• Took being Sibling Zoned by Sister Lily like a goddamn champ

Power

• Displaced a large amount of water from a lake

• Superior to Vanica, who detonated six of her followers, creating several large explosions (358.869 gigatons of TNT)

• Stronger than Gauche, who was directly compared to a snowstorm in power

• Said snowstorm encompassed an entire town, and the small mountains near the town (117 kilotons of TNT)

• Can scale to Magic Knight Captains, two of whom supposedly destroyed a mountain while being very casual about it

• Knocked Revchi high into a stone wall with only one attack

• Fought and matched Dark Elf Patri, who was stronger than his regular state

• When unleashing his full power, Patri could cover the entire Clover Kingdom in a massive light spell

• Comparable to Lumierre, who killed Devil Licht, who could destroy the entire Clover Kingdom (1.3 - 33.199 teratons of TNT)

• Asta also killed the exact same type of Devil on his own later on, that was capable of and threatening to do the exact same thing

• The attack that killed Licht created a giant explosion (64 kilotons of TNT)

• Superior to Dante, who destroyed an entire cliffside, and a mountain

• Asta and Yami break a massive stone sword made by Dante

• Destroyed several large boulders while enraged

• Defeated Lucifero at 50% power when in Devil Union

• Reflected fire blasts from Salamander and defeated Ladros while he had all of its power

• One swing of Salamander’s talon could dry up an ocean (11.514 - 197.798 petatons of TNT)

• Salamander can light a whole forest on fire and cause large explosions

• Salamander is stronger than the water spirit, which keeps a country sized mana zone active at all times and created a massive sphere of water over the capital of the Heart Kingdom

• Comparable to Yuno, whose beam clash with Rill destroyed a mountain top

• Comparable to Magic Captains like Dorothy, who can maintain a dimension with her mana, which has been described as being vast and seemingly endless

• Also comparable to Yami Sukehiro, who was able to destroy said dimension

• Destroyed a small ice moon, which was larger than the entire Spade palace

• Destroyed Lucifero’s massive incarnation, which was made of the Spade palace and hundreds of devils

• Superior to Leopold Vermillion, whose Crimson Eruption was big enough to cover a large section of the Heart Kingdom (538.047 gigatons of TNT)

Speed

• Early in the series, Asta was able to react to and counter Gauche’s Mirror Magic lasers (said Mirror Magic works by reflecting light)

• Moved so fast that experienced magicians believed him to be using an acceleration spell

• Black Asta reacted to amped Ladros blasts, whereas Base Asta was incapable of doing so

• Can scale to characters who’ve dodged and blocked Light magic before, which is stated to move at light speed a lot

• Yami tagged Rhya while he was moving at light speed

• Mereoleona reacted to copied light magic (1.4c)

• Scales to Luck, who uses lightning magic

• Luck can move at the speed of lightning with True Lightning (Which is natural lightning from clouds)

• Kept up with Patri, who dodged an accelerated light speed spell point blank

• Reacted to and dodged attacks from Zagred

• Zagred has reacted to light magic

• Shown to be comparable to Lemiel while fighting Zagred

• Lemiel traveled hundreds of kilometers to reach the capital in an instant

• Could keep up with and block Patri’s Light Magic

• Scales to multiple characters who do the same thing

• Nozel managed to deflect several lightspeed spells at close range (2.59-5.18c)

• Dodged Lucifero with ease when in True Devil Union

Durability

• Survived being thrashed by Sister Lily’s and Noelle’s Water magic daily (even more impressive is that Asta survived Sister Lily’s magic when he was still a kid)

• Smashed through a wall by Mars' diamond blades

• Blocked a blast from Vetto that carved through an underwater sea temple

• Survived a blast from Ladros who had the power of Salamander

• Survived training with Mereoleona, which made him run throughout an active volcano

• Unharmed by Mereoleona's flames

• Survived being stabbed through the stomach by Mars

• Tanked multiple attacks from Dark Patri

• Willing to keep fighting even after losing flesh to spatial magic

• Fell out of the sky onto the ground when Zagred launched him from the Elves’ base

• Survived a heavy beating from Dante

• Willing to beat his own arms with his blade

• Barely survived impalement by Lucius

• Was still capable of fighting after taking hits from Lucifero

• At full power, no sold Lucifero’s attacks

• Lucifero can casually destroy large amounts of land

• Lucifero is strong enough to end all of humanity

Weaknesses

Deku

Although his eagerness and courage to tackle any situation is a great strength, it also serves as a major issue for Deku. He is very prone to jumping into situations where he has a clear disadvantage, which can severely cost him in a serious battle. Not to mention him commonly taking gambits with just how much of One For All he is willing to use in a situation, which can lead to him enduring severe injuries and worsening his strength in a long drawn out conflict, as seen after his fight with Muscular. 

Also, as stated by Bakugou, he can get very predictable at times and can even become very suicidal. This was showcased when after the first war, he took no regard for his own health and went on to find All For One with little to no sleep and rest. This gave him such an appearance that made civilians think that he might not even be a hero, requiring his friends to bring him back to U.A.

This does go hard though, ngl

Asta

Asta has been diagnosed with “terminal anime protagonist syndrome”, meaning like everyone else, he’s headstrong to a fault, being reckless and whatnot. It's also been acknowledged that Asta's reliability on negating magic means he has a difficult time against projectiles that lack any magic, and the same would apply for any non-magic attack in general.

Also despite getting a lot of women smitten over him, he constantly thinks he has a shot with a nun who’s way older than him, and while he has respectable taste, is also impossible as nuns are forbidden from relationships like that.

Before We Get to Verdicts…

Wait, where’s the Summary section?

Just a note; although this change was announced a couple months ago, we have yet to implement it and so as a reminder: we are overhauling the manner in which the summary section is being implemented. Previously, both teams needed to compromise on advantages and disadvantages in order to create one singular breakdown, even when there were points that they did not agree on. Going forward, this section will be rolled into the verdicts; each team will have their OWN summary breakdown for just their OWN character, in order to accommodate differences of opinion between the teams. These summaries do not need to line up with each other, and reflect only the stance of the verdict that they are attached to.

Why are the MHA movies considered canon?

There have been statements made by Hoshikori that the movies are canon to the story of My Hero Academia, and on top of that, several tie-in chapters to the manga have been released. Also, there have been brief mentions of movie events in the manga as well.

You can read here for a full list.

Shigaraki was nearly killed by minor exposure to the missile explosion. Why is Izuku being scaled to the missiles then?

Shigaraki does indeed acknowledge full exposure might be fatal, which is why he uses surface area to his advantage to survive the blast. However, his Nomu survives full exposure, its body remaining sufficiently intact for Shigaraki to order it to detonate. The Nomu in question was a “Near High-End” and thus inferior to High-Ends that have been beaten by characters like Endeavor and Mirko.

As for actual damage done to Shigaraki, this is most likely due to heat. Shigaraki and the High-Ends are more susceptible to heat damage than blunt force damage. Shig was being exposed to a high-end heat laser moments prior to the detonation and it was continuously beating out his regeneration since he couldn't fully regenerate his face. The chapter establishes that too much damage at one time can affect his durability for a while and previously he's shown a weakness to high temperatures.

Regarding examples below, both Shigaraki and AFO are depicted as being physically superior to Endeavor, with Shigaraki humiliating him in bout of strength and AFO tearing off Endeavor’s arm.

• Hosu Nomu - Endeavor had to basically carbonize its brain cells with fire to counter its regen.

• Hood - Pierced and damaged by most of Endeavor's FlashFire attacks, especially Hell Spider and Prominence Burn.

• Woman - Had her brain fried by Endeavor's fire.

• Shigaraki - Had his skin taken off by the Hell Curtain move. Scorched by Prominence Burn even after dodging it (though he still got tagged). Burned a bit by Vanishing Fist. And basically turned to charcoal by full contact Prominence Burn.

• AFOaraki - Had his stomach damaged by a laser. Also had his body and face burned by the laser spear. Took partial damage from the heat of these bombs even after using a decoy.

• Winged High-End Nomu - Same as Shigaraki. Both were hit by the vacuum attack. Both were punched around by Star. But in the end it was heat that did the most damage.

• AFO - Charred to nearly nothing by Endeavor, only surviving due to Eri’s quirk.

While a lot of these biologically-modified characters have high resistance to blunt force, their resistance to heat is not at the same level. It's obviously still high but not as high as their blunt force durability.

As for consistency, Shigaraki tanks a punch from Star’s Air Susanoo calced at 4 gigatons. All Might and Deku have also performed feats on a similar level of power, such as the storm punch in the second film.

There’s also a statement recently in the My Hero manga as well that states that humanity lacks the means to currently kill Shigaraki. This would account for the United States’ missile supply, meaning at peak power Shigaraki could more then likely survive the full force of the combined missile strike anyways. 

Why is light magic in Black Clover counted as lightspeed, and why isn’t the same being as definitively done for My Hero Academia’s instances of lasers?

When looking at Asta’s speed, you’ll notice that we counted evading light magic as being lightspeed. Why is this? After all, there have been cases of light magic having contradictory examples of being light-like, with there being plenty of instances of it being used as an attack with force, being shattered with blades, etc. However, there are also examples of it indeed having light based properties, such as moving in straight lines, reflecting off of mirrors, etc. With these contradictory factors in mind, should it be counted or not counted as lightspeed? Simple answer, it should.

Light magic is referred to as being lightspeed on more than once occasion by users of it, which aligns with other characters having lightspeed statements. For example, Yami states Patri can evade his attacks at lightspeed. Thus light magic being lightspeed actually makes a lot of sense.

My Hero Academia falls into a similar boat at first in comparison to Black Clover. Aoyama’s Naval Laser for instance only moves in straight lines in the manga, has reflective properties, and is called light numerous times. In fact you could argue there’s more boxes checked for it having light properties than Black Clover’s light magic. However it still has the downside that it has shown force before, with there being cases of Aoyama using it to propel himself through the air. It’s also been shown to bend and take shape when building up or fizzling out, as well as bouncing off surfaces that would not logically reflect it.

The disadvantage it has in comparison to Black Clover is that My Hero lacks the same lightspeed statements that Black Clover has. Thus the issue of Aoyama’s laser having force is a huge detriment here. The same issue applies in the third My Hero movie, where the main villain uses lasers that align with a lot of laser properties, but pick up dust whenever they hit the ground. The lasers are argued to be legitimate anyways since they reflect off mirrors though. The issue is the following:

Quirk Reflect: "It allows the user to reflect all types of energy. He usually wears an exoskeletal device called Arachne that controls reflection, changes the direction of energy, and maintains his balance in the air." 

"Arachne, reflection-control exoskeleton", quoted from the film booklet. The exoskeleton and mirrors are literally tied to Flect’s reflect Quirk, which reflects all kinds of energy. It also points out to the "mirror" that floats underneath his foot when he starts flying, stating that it makes him float by reversing the impact. The reflection for the lasers isn't a property for them, rather for Flect himself. Therefore the lasers cannot be proven as real/lightspeed.

In conclusion Black Clover has simply much more solid arguments for lightspeed reactions. Granted if you want to be lenient with things you can probably say Aoyama’s lasers are fine, but it is definitive that Asta’s lightspeed arguments are much more concrete.

Don’t Black Clover characters have to rely on aim dodging to deal with lightspeed attacks?

In the earlier portions of the series, Yami uses his Ki Sensing to evade light magic attacks. Ki Sensing essentially is like a precognition of sorts, and Yami states it is the main reason he is able to evade lightspeed attacks. This is consistent with Julius requiring precognition to deal with Patri. With this in mind, aim dodging may at first seem like a logical explanation for supposedly light level reaction speed.

However, characters later in the series like Mereoleona and Nozel go on to react to light magic attacks without having Ki Sensing in the first place. Asta and Yuno also react to several lightspeed attacks from Dark Patri, and Zagred reacts to Light magic as well. Of these characters only Asta uses Ki Sensing, and it is established in the story that reading Ki will not allow you to dodge attacks if they are too fast for you. In regards to Yami, he was still able to tag Rhya slightly while he was moving at lightspeed.

Lastly it is argued Patri cannot be lightspeed as he was tagged by his own reflected beam. However Patri makes it clear to gauche he was holding back as not to kill him (revealed to be due to Gauche being an elf reincarnation). Patri would later go to evade a light spell that had its speed doubled in his fight with Julius. Julius himself is also noted to have held back in the fight, which might explain the reliance on precognition.

Thus the aim dodging argument is basically moot, as characters show consistent lightspeed reactions in Black Clover’s second half and onward without the need of any precognition.

In regards to Asta’s AP, aren’t all of his showings purely due to Anti Magic?

A common argument is that Asta’s showings are all purely due to Anti Magic. This simply is not true, as Asta still needs comparable strength to magic he fights against to repel them, and has shown considerable physical power (like destroying the debris tossed by Dante or his gravity amped punches). This is shown in full detail when Asta matches Zagred’s word magic, which is purely physical and not magical (thus immune to Anti-Magic).

What about cosmic-level Black Clover?

The feat in question (Dorothy’s Glamour World containing stars and galaxies) is anime-only, and is not present within the manga. It is shown within a single fight, and the realm created and sustained by Dorothy is overpowered by Yami, who specifically directly counters it with his space time cutting magic.

It is unlikely the "stars and galaxy" are even real, as the stars are just twinkles in the background and the supposed galaxy is only shown in the mouth of a beast in the realm. Likewise, the "endless" statement is just because Luck can't see the border, he has no way of knowing and Magna immediately disagrees with him.

Objects created in the Dream world are made by thought, not magic, so classifying this as a quantifiable feat is incorrect. Likewise, this level of power is not congruent with similar feats of strength displayed within the series at the time, and while it could be argued, it could just as easily be argued to be an outlier. For the sake of this blog, we feel it is ultimately safer to not use it as the basis for our arguments.

Can Anti-Magic negate One For All?

In short, no. Quirks aren't magical in nature, and even though One For All was inherited by Deku and has some very non-scientific properties, it is still a Quirk and still operates on the same rules. That being that Quirks are genetic alterations that grant a person their powers, while Anti-Magic is a form of magical energy that nullifies a person's Mana. Since Quirks are genetic and do not rely on mana or any similar form of energy, Anti-Magic would have no effect on One For All.

Likewise, even the Demon-Destroyer Sword would not be able to affect One For All. The blade is capable of even undoing reincarnation magic (which involves removing souls and cannot be done by Anti-Magic) and biological changes done by magic, but OFA is not comparable. OFA is not magical in nature and to assume the sword can remove it from Izuku is purely assumption.

Why aren’t multipliers being used for either side?

You can argue that Asta’s various forms provide various multiplicative increases that can increase or compensate for gaps in certain stats in comparison to Deku. You can also argue Deku gets massively stronger with exponential One For All percentages.

You can argue All Might’s 300 punch statement means you can add a 60 times multiplier to all of Deku’s feats earlier in the series. You can also argue statements in Black Clover about characters being twice as strong or fast as others can stack.

Simply put there are several multiplier arguments for both which result in a lot of shenanigans and arguments for both sides that can and will result in a lot of unrealistic numbers for Deku and Asta’s stats. Thus, both sides have agreed not to argue multipliers for trying to gain an advantage over the other.

Verdicts

Team Deku

Stats

AP

In regards to Deku’s stats, his power and durability cannot be understated. Even while not at full power, Deku could take both an elbow shot and a shockwave from War Arc Shigaraki, who at the time was on par with All Might out of his prime. Deku was at 45% at this point, and that version of Shigaraki should be on par with Deku’s own showings from months prior (Heroes Rising). Shigaraki was “built” to be superior to any prior and even Nine, who survived several 100% strikes from Deku and Bakugou (right after they performed the storm punch). This puts 45% at 2.86 teratons durability and powerwise (One For All’s power generally exceeds Deku’s durability, but this gap is at its peak at 100%).

At 100%, Deku’s power is exponentially stronger, beating out War Arc Shigaraki to the point his regeneration was slowing down. While Deku cannot keep this state active long due to the damage recoil (though this can be balanced by using Blackwhip as a brace to the affected body part, see abilities), the shear power provided by the form exceeds Asta’s lower end calc for the destruction of the Clover Kingdom (1.3 teratons of TNT, more on this below). Deku is shown to get stronger overtime from training, actual combat experience, and further unlocking of OFA’s abilities, supporting the notion his output at 100% goes beyond his initial 2.86 gigatons. Deku is eventually meant to surpass Prime All Might (who is stronger than the storm punch to quite a degree) narratively and has done so as of the final arc.

With Fa Jin, Deku has managed to work around the limits of 100%. He is able to enter a faux state by stacking it with 100%, and can refill Fa Jin by striking blows on Asta or using Gearshift in conjunction to it. With Gearshift, he gains enough power to oneshot Shigaraki at his peak (who is equal to Prime All Might in stats). This essentially leaves his scaling chain as such:

Overdrive Deku >> Peak Shiggy >> War Arc Shiggy ≈ 100% Deku punches > 2.86 teratons

Check Upscaling below for a further note on Deku’s max AP.

Speed

In regards to speed, Deku is far slower in reactions then Asta, as his best scaling is being far faster than Star and Stripes, who can barely react to a legitimate laser (sadly the only one in MHA) at 0.02c. Deku does, however, have comparable if not faster travel speed than Asta.

Stamina

As for stamina, Deku during the Vigilante arc spent an entire month going to war with the prisoners and assassins AFO sent him, with barely any rest. Shigaraki even before getting the AFO quirk performed similarly fighting against Gigantomachia for over a month, also with minimal rest. Deku should also be able to fight for 72 hours like All Might in his prime was capable of. 

In comparison Asta was able to fight for two days straight and afterwards spent hours fighting in the Spade Kingdom.

Both also have plenty of showings of being able to continue to fight despite being in severe pain, having broken bones and losing a large amount of blood.

Asta’s Stats

As for Asta, his best scaling while remaining consistent with the narrative is upscaling from the Ancient Demon and Demon Licht, both of whom could destroy the Clover Kingdom entirely. The higher end of the kingdom size is dubious, given it comes from the first two minutes of episode 131 of the anime, where Noelle is being stuck-up to Asta and not speaking objectively. Asta upscales from the 1.3 teraton value to quite a degree, being stronger than he was when he beat 50% Lucifero. His scaling chain is as follows:

Current Asta (Second Timeskip) > True Devil Union > 50% Lucifero >> Devil Union (Pre Second Timeskip >> Ancient Demon = 1.3 teratons

Upscaling

Both Deku and Asta have a decent amount of upscaling, though Deku ends up with at bare minimum a 4.4 times difference: 5.72 teratons to 1.3 teratons (scaling fully the storm punch most likely even by the war arc, and at worst a bit after given his power growth, justifiable given at 100% he powered through Rivet Stab in the war arc when Endeavor could not even recently). In the end, both have equal upscaling, though there will always be an advantage in strength for Deku.

In regard to Salamander

Salamander is a statement, by far the highest value for any feat in the verse, at 11 petatons at minimum. Salamander’s own best direct showing while with Fana is setting a large forest on fire. The next best feat is Demon Licht/Ancient Demon being able to destroy the Clover Kingdom, calced at low end teratons (with the current calc, Salamander is 11,000 times stronger than this).

Asta scales to Salamander very early on, downscaling in base and fully scaling as Black Asta. Meanwhile stronger characters like Lemiel needed to siphon off power from the 1 teraton blast to deal with it, and it's a narrative moment as well.

Asta would only scale to Demon Licht (1 teraton character) far later in the story as Devil Union, which is far stronger than Black Asta. An argument for consistency is that Salamander is stronger than a spirit that has country level range for its abilities, though range alone can't really be quantified. Another argument is that Salamander is shown to be able to fight stronger characters later alongside Fuegoleon. The issue with this is that spirits can be stronger with different human wielders (shown with the water spirit Undine, who was stronger against Vanica while in conjunction with Noelle than she was with her regular wielder, Lolopechka). 

Ladros absorbed Salamander (as a result being stated to be stronger than all spirits) and was defeated by Black Asta’s first appearance. Narratively it makes no sense for it to be stronger than Demon Licht while wielded by Fana (the original wielder whom the petaton statement applies to).

Conclusion

As such, while Asta is faster than Deku, he is four times weaker at their peak of power, and twice as weak while Izuku uses 45%. Deku can also travel faster than Asta. He would be able to tank any of Asta’s blows and only needs a few hits to beat Asta entirely, which would be done via his AoE (which can cover entire cities). Given this, Asta would eventually lose the clash. 

To close out, AP as a concept is actually present in verse in MHA, shown most recently by Bakugou’s Cluster ability:

Arsenal & Abilities

Both combatants have a large variety of abilities, but the main difference is that Deku’s abilities are able to counter all types of opponents while Asta’s Anti-Magic is mainly effective against magic users. Seeing as quirks are not magic, all of Asta’s abilities that are specifically meant to counter magic users are not going to be as effective against Deku. This means that Deku has the edge in versatility. 

Deku has a large variety of quirks that can cancel out or counter Asta’s advantages. His Smokescreen and Danger Sense allow him to figure out and match Asta’s ability to sense where he is via ki sensing, and he is smart enough to recognize that Asta must have an ability that can find him, if Asta is able to use precise attacks while Smokescreen is active. After all, even with the speed disadvantage making Danger Sense less useful, it will still be useful for predicting attacks. Once he finds out about Asta’s ki sensing, he can change his own velocity with Gearshift while using his ultimate moves to make his next movements less predictable.

While Asta is a lot faster, Deku has a lot more control over the overall environment. Even though it could be argued that Asta is too fast for Deku’s higher versatility and control over the environment to matter, Deku has numerous ways to increase his own movement and combat speed such as Gearshift and Fa Jin, and has enough experience fighting stronger and faster foes for his versatility to likely come into play in combat. A good example of this is his battle with Muscular, where he bided his time until he could grab onto the brute and land a devastating 100% punch.  

Even though Smokescreen won’t hide him for long due to ki sensing, it can provide a momentary distraction that would let Deku use his myriad of ranged options such as pressurized air blasts with his Air Force gloves, Blackwhip, and Black-Chain. Control over the environment is a huge factor to this debate given the speed gap between the two, and Deku’s superior control over the environment makes it a lot more likely to get in the one hit he needs to nullify the speed gap. 

Deku’s stronger punches can create large AoE shockwaves that will hit Asta even if Asta dodges the actual punch. Once these AoE shockwaves throw Asta off balance, Deku can use Blackwhip to restrain Asta to make getting a hit on him even easier, and the upgraded version Black-Chain would be even more effective in restraining him. Deku can also use the aforementioned pressurized air blasts to attack Asta from the air via his use of Float, then predict where Asta is going to be after dodging these blasts. He can then set up a trap with Blackwhip and the environment around him while Asta is distracted in order to restrain him enough to make contact.

The reason Deku only needs one hit to nullify the speed gap is due to his last quirk, Gearshift. Gearshift allows Deku to change the speed and trajectory of a target upon contact, so he just needs to land a hit on Asta in order to both slow him down and manipulate his trajectory so that Deku can use a Gearshift-amplified ultimate move that would do massive damage. 

His amplified ultimate moves are far stronger and faster than his regular ultimate moves and use 120% of his total power, which means that landing even once of these moves would be very deadly to Asta. While it is true that he can only use Gearshift on himself for 5 minutes, he is smart enough to save it for the best possible moment and leave himself more than enough time to use the ultimate move he needs to end the fight.

In terms of equipment, Asta’s swords aren’t as useful as you’d think. Sure, they serve as an extra option for damage and their size provides more range, but most of them are not able to actually pierce Deku. Most of Asta’s swords have only been shown to be able to cut through magic and not people. While there have been times Asta has been able to damage people with said swords, those times have been when he has coated his sword in Anti-Magic and stabbed people coated in mana. Deku does not have any mana, so most of his swords likely will not do any piercing or slashing.

 While Asta does have a sword from Yami that actually is able to pierce and slash, Deku in the latter half of the series has good showings of durability against piercing attacks such as AFO Shigaraki’s tendrils (they are shown to be potent enough to cut off Endeavor’s arm). Because Deku takes the advantage in power and durability and has resistance to piercing attacks, Asta’s one effective blade will not do much to him.

Deku also has the endurance/power edge in spades throughout most of the fight due to Fa Jin.  While some of Asta’s and Deku’s higher forms have a time limit, Deku can consistently fight at 100% OFA power levels via Fa Jin’s ability to store kinetic energy and boost his power to pseudo 100% OFA levels. He can even use Fa Jin to amp the effectiveness of his other Quirks, which will also result in more energy that can be used to fuel Fa Jin. Essentially, Fa Jin is resulting in a constant supply of energy that will never deplete as the battle goes on.

Deku’s many different physical abilities are not his only helpful tools in this fight though.  Deku’s fighting style heavily relies on mid-fight strategy, and this is helped a lot by the One For All Vestiges.  The Vestiges are previous users of One For All who are pretty experienced at using the quirks Deku obtained from them, and they are adept at giving him the best strategies to use with their specific quirks in a combat situation. They have been shown to give Deku advice on how to use their quirk mid fight and also remind him of the quirk’s limitations, such as when the second Vestige reminded Deku that he only had 5 minutes to use Gearshift on himself. Their advice combined with Deku’s already higher intelligence means that Deku will be fighting with the best possible strategy the entire time.

In conclusion, Deku simply has far more useful abilities for this fight in particular, can get past Asta’s abilities and equipment, and has his various Quirks aiding him in completely controlling the environment to get the one blow he needs to nullify Asta’s main advantage of higher speed.

Tertiary Factors

It's safe to say Deku takes intelligence over Asta, being able to make plenty of strategies throughout the course of the manga/anime, and being acknowledged as a nerd for his detailed notes on people's quirks and patterns. Asta could be argued to have better training and experience, so we’ll give him the advantage in that department.

Experience is a bad case for Asta though due to a single fact: Asta’s experience comes from fighting with magic, which he's used to nullifying. Comparing that to Deku, he's always been fighting people that he doesn't directly counter. To put things into perspective, here are some examples:

• Asta has intercepted Yuno's wind magic with his swords to block air attacks, but this is not an option here if Deku decides to release a massive air attack via swinging his fists, due to the lack of magic for Asta to negate.

• Deku can pick and throw heavy objects at Asta, which he would struggle against, as that has been acknowledged in the manga as a weakness he has.

• Assuming Asta's swords aren't sharp against any non magic stuff, or that Deku is just too strong to be penetrated outright, Deku taking AP means restraining with Black Whip is a possibility.

Basically, Deku is more well-rounded, since Asta's experience is directly linked to him being a direct counter to the vast majority of opponents in his verse, compared to Deku who can use all of his knowledge in this fight. Asta may have seen some of the stuff in Deku's arsenal, such as the smokescreen, but he now can't negate them like he's used to, putting him off his game.

Mobility also is something Deku has more options with. Deku can fly via Airforce and Float, use Black Whip to effectively web-swing like Spider-Man and change his trajectory suddenly via Gearshift. Asta's mobility in base is him riding his sword, and in his upper forms he can fly, so either should be equal at their fullest with Deku having more options technically speaking. (Although Deku has better control of the battlefield as he could push back Asta via generating a gust of air by punching like All Might does).

Lastly, we have what are potentially the most important factors for Deku’s victory: his endurance and area of effect. A key thing to note with the use of 100% One For All is that while it can hurt Deku:

1. He can constantly maintain strength on that level with Fa Jin.

2. He’s only going to exert big chunks of stamina when attacking.

Deku, as stated before, is incredibly smart. It’s not going to take him much time at all to acknowledge the speed difference makes it very difficult to hit Asta through traditional means. He’s not just going to spam 100% punches and tire himself out, he’s going to take his time to deliver a devastating shockwave. This is where his AoE comes in.

Deku’s AoE is gigantic, being able to cover entire islands in the shockwave of his punch. Thus, being as smart as he is, Deku is going to resort to his large range to hit Asta when he quickly concludes his speed isn’t sufficient. With his intelligence when it comes to exerting energy, he’s bound to resort to this. And while Asta is extremely fast, his travel speed is not fast enough to escape an island covering shockwave. Even if the damage isn’t enough to one shot him, it will deal critical damage that will leave him vulnerable to a follow up attack that’ll finish him off. It also doesn’t help that Asta’s strongest forms have definite time limits, while Deku’s simply just need good stamina management.

To summarize, while Asta is certainly an experienced and skilled fighter, Deku’s battlefield control, intelligence, and ability to maintain his power give him the advantage in tertiary factors.

Conclusion

"It's not all black-and-white. Most things in this world are in shades of gray. A blend of fear and anger. Which is exactly why... I've gotta extend a helping hand!"

Advantages:

• Stronger

• Smarter and more strategic

• Could decrease the speed gap by decreasing Asta’s velocity using Gearshift

• More variety in terms of relevant abilities

• Far better control of the battlefield

• Asta’s Anti-Magic abilities are completely useless against him due to quirks being genetic, not magic

• Is used to fighting people faster than him, making the speed disadvantage less of a hurdle than you would think

• Fa Jin will let him stay in the fight longer than Asta’s various transformations

• He’s actually omnipotent, what you’re seeing now is an avatar

• He is a Marvel Herald thanks to All Might beating Thanos

Disadvantages:

• Much slower, with less reliable arguments for light speed reactions

• Not as experienced or well-trained

• One of Asta’s swords is technically deadlier than Deku’s punches

• Ki sensing directly counters Smokescreen when activated

• Becomes too predictable if enraged

• Friends with Mineta

• Never making it to the Black Air Force Round Table

Overall, while this is admittedly a very close battle, our team has given various reasons as to why Izuku Midoriya ultimately takes the win over Asta. Sure, the boy who dreams of becoming the next Wizard King might have some advantages that would help him, but the future Number 1 hero has more than enough of his own to justify the outcome of him winning.

In terms of attack potency, Deku has the edge. At full power (100% OFA), Deku is four times more powerful than Asta. At the current point of his story, Deku should be more powerful than the feat he and Bakugo performed together in the second movie Heroes Rising. It’s also worth noting that feat was done with just the shockwaves of Deku and Bakugo’s punches, not direct contact. This gets above the Clover Kingdom’s destruction, and as stated before, the reason why we’re discounting the Salamander statement is due to lack of consistency and narrative sense. Thus, Deku should be able to deal critical damage with just a single enormous shockwave, leaving Asta vulnerable for a killing blow.

In terms of speed, Asta has a clear cut advantage. However Deku should have better travel speed at the very least. Deku also has the advantage in stamina as he was able to fight off assassins and villains for over a month without any rest. Meanwhile, the longest Asta has ever fought without rest was two and a half days. 

Moving on to their weapons, Deku’s arsenal is more useful in this fight than most of Asta’s. For one thing, most of Asta’s swords can only cut through magic, not people. While his Demon-Slasher Katana is capable of cutting through people, Deku’s advantage in power and his piercing durability shouldn’t make that too much of an issue. In comparison all of Deku’s gear is useful for staying in the fight and solidifying his range advantage.

In regard to abilities, Asta is at a disadvantage considering his Anti-Magic not working on Deku’s genetic quirks. While Asta has a few abilities that aren’t anti-magic, One For All gives Deku access to a variety of other quirks that can counter those abilities. Izuku can match and even figure out Asta’s ability to sense ki by using Smokescreen and Danger Sense. And even though he initially has the disadvantage in reaction speed, Deku can increase both it and his movement in general with Gearshift and Fa-Jin.

But not only does Deku get a variety of quirks, he also has access to the Vestiges. The past users of OFA can give useful advice during the fight that can greatly benefit Izuku. Even on his own, Deku is intelligent enough to control the environment and make strategies based on his observations.

This brings us to the tertiary factors. In a comparison between their intelligence, Deku is notably smarter than Asta. Even before he inherited One For All, Izuku has shown to be taking highly detailed notes about many heroes he’s seen and their quirks. Combined with his own battle experience, there isn’t much Asta can surprise him with. In contrast, while Asta has better training and experience in return, his entire experience has only been against magic users. 

In conclusion, Deku can use his quirks to their full potential and use his intelligence to turn the fight into his favor, whether it’s by creating strategies midfight by observing Asta or with the Vestiges’ assistance, controlling the environment of the battle, or utilizing his endurance and the AoE shockwaves of his punches. Winning this battle will require Izuku to Go Beyond his limits. As quirky as he may be, Deku will definitely Smash the competition. Plus Ultra!

Team Asta

Stats

Let’s get straight to the point, Asta’s undeniably got stats locked down. Deku’s strength and durability is dependent on the amount of power he channels through One For All, and his most impressive feats don’t start to appear until he’s going all out at 100%, whereas Asta has power surpassing Deku’s best while in base form. Izuku’s more than capable of comparing to Stars & Stripes’ 2.78 gigaton fist bump, and though the storm feat from Heroes Rising has been calculated many times, it’s most reasonably in the low teraton range, around 2.86 teratons or so, with current Deku scaling to the full 5.72 teraton feat.

It wasn’t until a couple of days ago that what was thought to be the most powerful feat in the entirety of My Hero Academia appeared, that being the Todoroki family’s storm cloud. However, with time, it’s shown that the feat isn’t what it originally appeared. In truth, the Todoroki family flames were adding to an already present tropical typhoon, and their heat only increased the storm clouds due to convection. This only nets them a single gigaton of TNT, leaving Deku’s best as the 5.72 teraton Heroes Rising storm dispersal.

Conversely, Asta scales above Vanica’s explosions, which are worth over 358.8 gigatons, and the destruction of the Clover Kingdom, which is 1.3 teratons at minimum, but is possibly as high as 33.2 teratons. More importantly, he was able to contend with Salamander early on in the series, who was able to dry up an entire ocean with a single swipe of his talon. A feat worth, at minimum, 11.5 petatons of TNT when using the smallest ocean in the world as a base. Being more realistic and using the Atlantic Ocean as a basis, given that Black Clover’s setting is heavily based on Europe, the feat reaches 197.798 petatons, which blows Deku out of the water. 

All of this while in base form, mind you, and Black Asta, Devil Union, and True Devil Union all give Asta multipliers to his strength and speed which widen this gap massively. Additionally, Salamander has only increased in strength as the series has progressed, and Asta’s base is far stronger now than it was at the time, thus the gap is only furthered, and he’d only need a few good hits to do Deku in.

Though it’d be meaningless if he couldn’t even touch him. Unfortunately for Deku, this is far from the case. The most impressive feat of speed from the series comes from Stars & Stripes reflecting a laser sent back at her, which was calculated to be at 2% the speed of light, or 0.02c, if you prefer. There’s a similar instance of her evading the radio waves of All For One Shigaraki, however it’s more likely that she was aim dodging, given that she was aware of them beforehand. 

Similarly, her powers allow her to affect reality around her, so it’s less likely that she would’ve been able to do so without their use, as she needed to do so in order to deflect the lasers sent at her. Deku is also able to dodge Jirou’s sound blasts and Kaminari’s electricity, but they only land within supersonic ranges, and other lasers such as Aoyama’s are far too inconsistent to be verified as lightspeed. Both Aoyama and Nine’s lasers generate force and kick up dust upon impact, and do not burn, and Aoyama’s beams have been shown to move in unnatural and moving lines, whereas light only moves in a straight line.

In comparison, Asta has been reacting to genuine light from very early in his series. Gauche’s mirror magic works by reflecting light, and Asta has been able to outpace it, alongside Patri’s light magic, which Nozel was able to block at close range; a feat which would require speeds between 2.59 and 5.18 times faster than light, with the latter being a more reasonable calculation for the feat. Other people on Asta’s level have been able to pull off very similar feats, such as Yami tagging Rhya while they were moving at lightspeed, or Mereoleona reacting to copied light magic, which would require speeds of at least 1.4 times faster than light. 

Among the many, many statements of light magic being lightspeed, Asta more than comparable to his fellow Black Bull, Luck, who moves as fast as natural lightning, which is 33% the speed of light when considering the return stroke. Furthermore, Asta’s multipliers with Black Asta, Devil Union and True Devil Union all boost his physical capabilities, including speed, so it becomes an even wider gap, and much harder for Deku to get a hit on Asta in the first place.

Ultimately, while Deku is extremely impressive within his own world, with strength and speed among the best heroes and villains alive, he simply pales in comparison to Asta. With or without the extremely recent storm feat, Asta holds power in spades, and is simply too fast for Deku to be able to hit him. Comparing the fastest speed feat in MHA (0.02c) to the fastest in Black Clover (5.18c) paints a clear picture. That’s a difference of 259 times in Asta’s favor, which will only increase as Asta taps into his greater forms. 

Likewise, when comparing the strongest feats of both, Asta ends up more than 34580 times stronger, and trying to catch, much less kill an opponent with such a substantial lead in stats will be a battle Deku simply can’t win.

Arsenal & Abilities

When it comes to Asta’s weapons. While ¾ of Asta’s blades would act like just blunt objects, have ya ever been hit in the face with a baseball bat that’s bigger than the guy who's currently wielding said baseball bat moving at over 5x the speed of light? That’s gonna hurt regardless. Not only this, but Asta’s Demon Dweller Sword allows him to attack from a distance, which while yes, Deku can also do, Asta could throw more projectiles out faster thanks to his speed. 

While admittedly his Demon Destroyer Sword is sorta useless here since he can’t affect OFA’s vestiges, he has one more sword that can really screw up Deku, his Demon Slasher Katana. This sword was given to him by Yami as a normal Katana that Asta just imbued with Anti Magic. So since its previous wielder was able to slice a lotta stuff with it, Asta by extension should also be able to. Not only this, but moves such as Black Divider would also do serious damage to Deku. 

When Black Divider was at its very largest it dwarfed buildings below him with sheer size alone. So it’s gonna be hard for Deku to dodge it if it covers the area around him, keep in mind Asta was able to swing this version around like it was his standard sized Demon Slayer Sword. Not to mention his other abilities like Bull Rush (which one shot the spirit who can boil an ocean btw), Black Hurricane which would be hundreds of attacks all at once to Deku if he can’t avoid it, Black Meteorite would be good for closing the distance between the two, and Infinite Slash Equinox would possibly be the easiest to avoid, but since it travels ridiculously fast, it would be one helluva thing to attempt to dodge.

None of this by the way is even going into Asta being able to sense ki. With this Asta shuts down Smokescreen completely, which is one of Deku’s best defenses in terms of dodging attacks. Not only this but it could let Asta avoid Black Whip. Other people who’ve sensed ki have not only dodged magical attacks with it, but also non living objects such as rocks so you could make a good case for Asta using ki sensing on Black Whip and avoiding it. 

It would also let Asta avoid any attack Deku could throw at him before he could even throw it, and whilst it has been confirmed to be able to outspeed the ki sense, Deku simply lacks the speed too. If Yami could sense light magic attacks from it and still dodge, that’s way out of any ballpark we’ve seen in MHA atm. And this was Yami relatively early in the series which Asta should quite handedly scale above in current Black Clover.

And now we must discuss Asta’s three forms. Black Asta, Devil Union, and True Devil Union. With Black Asta, this not only enhances Asta’s better strength, speed and durability. But this also allows Asta to fly. While yes Deku can fly with his Float quirk, Asta would be much faster in the air given his enhanced speed. In terms of Devil Union, Asta would be even stronger than he is as Black Asta, which is already higher than anything Deku could scale to. But then of course with True Devil Union, he would be exponentially more powerful then Deku it becomes sorta silly. In this form he was able to beat Lucifero while he was at 50% of his full power. 

While he was at 50% power, Lucifero defeated every single Magic Knight Captain while they were given a boost in power, including Fuegoleon. Fuegoleon had Salamander, who was also given a power boost, and Lucifero tossed them aside like they were literally nothing in comparison to him, and True Devil Union beat them. So in closing, whilst Asta’s Anti-Magic would have no effect on Deku, Asta’s abilities would still be more than enough to turn the next Symbol of Peace into the new Symbol of Pieces.

Tertiary Factors

When it comes to pure skill, experience and training. Yet again Asta has ‘em beat. 10 months of training with All Might is impressive, but 10 months pales in comparison to 10 years worth of training. Mind you Asta started his training at 5 years old. At the time of when Black Clover started Asta was 15, now he’s 18. Being trained by some of the most powerful wizards around, even spent 6 months in the Heart Kingdom training nonstop along with other members of the Black Bulls like Luck, Noelle and Charmy. 

When MHA started and to where it is now, it’s been about a year and a half giving Asta nearly double the combat experience that Deku has if you ignore Asta’s 10 year training montage. When it comes to overall battle smarts and strategy Deku is superior but Asta is far from a dumbass. He’s outsmarted foes in battle before so it’s clear he’s not stupid by and stretch of the word. 

When it comes to battle tactics, Asta’s normal strategy is “Hit it till it dies!” which works out given Asta’s fighting strategy of not relenting at all to his foe. And given Asta’s overwhelming strength edge against Deku, this would work wonders. Deku in fights normally relies on smarts and strategy by combining his multiple quirks to overwhelm his opponent and scoring the win. But sadly this won’t help Deku due to the fact that most of his foes can’t match him physically… but Asta can, very easily. So while Deku is thinking of strategies mid fight, Asta is gonna be bullrushing him (pun intended) the whole time not letting Deku get a chance to think before being dealt a fatal blow.

But there's one more factor in Asta’s favor; he’s too stubborn to die. He can take a lot of punishment and keep on fighting through with just sheer stubbornness and determination. Asta’s been flung to the ground so hard it created a crater and moments later Asta was flying back up to kick the snot out of Zagred. Asta’s been stabbed through the stomach by a massive diamond shard from Mars, when training with Mereoleona he was forced to run through an active volcano, and as a kid he was tough enough to shrug off blasts of water that got him embedded into walls by Sister Lily. 

Even now he still shrugs off water blasts from Noelle, who is vastly superior to Sister Lily in terms of raw power. Not to mention that multiple chunks of flesh were blown off him while in his fight with a spatial magic user who at the time was given a power boost by an elf who possessed him and he still kept going. In MHA, Deku doesn’t shrug off his arms snapping like twigs, he always needs help from others such as Recovery Girl. To put it bluntly, any attack Deku could potentially throw at Asta, Asta could literally go “Tis but a scratch” and then deal a hit to Deku that could end his life.

Conclusion

“I’ve been facing adversity from the day I was born! No matter how many of you there are, or what happens, I’ll overcome it all!”

Advantages:

• Much stronger

• Much faster, with more reliable arguments for lightspeed reactions 

• Ki sensing counters Smokescreen

• Superior training and experience

• Can take much more pain and punishment

• Anti-Magic from the swords wouldn't work, but they're still powerful weapons physically

• Assuming there’s mana in the area when they fight, Asta would be more versatile in movement

• Look man I’m just saying, a flying skateboard sword is really damn cool

• Is a short king…

Disadvantages:

• Not as smart or strategic

• Less useful abilities

• Potentially less control of the battlefield

• Anti-Magic only works on magic, making it pointless against Deku’s genetic quirks

• All extra forms have a time limit

• Headstrong and reckless

• Assuming there’s no mana in the area when they fight, he cannot fly

• Unaware of his huge harem

• …but still short though lmao

While Deku definitely has some advantages in this fight, and Asta's main gimmick of nullifying magic is pretty much pointless here, he more than makes up for it thanks to his better stats, training, and overall tenacity. The arguments for Asta are much more simple and straightforward than Team Deku too, given the statement for Salamander is clear and it comes from an official source meaning there's no reason to believe it's overhyped. 

Asta is basically going to overpower or cut anything Deku throws at him, predict Deku's movements and react accordingly to him, and his superior strength will allow Asta to cut his competition in no time flat.

While Deku certainly has some useful Quirks, they’re made invalid either due to Asta’s Ki sensing or overwhelming advantage in power and speed. And while Deku is certainly smarter, Asta’s superior experience and training helps match said intelligence.

The wielder of One For All is certainly a powerful combatant, but he simply stands no chance against the strongest Black Bull. It seems like it’s time to bid Deku Hasta la vista, as the winner of this fight will certainly be Asta.

Final Tally

Deku (11) - Blue Igneous, Vr, Dark Behemoth, Pasbros, Mani Bhai, Nobrainer13, Legion of Doom, AgentRedhead, VampyreNVRmore, Cyber, Mal

Asta (11) - RadioactiveCaffeine, TrexGamer, Bee🌸🌸, SoMaShadow, Weniss, GumballViking, Rina Antiqua, Tyrannii, Joshski, Robin, FluffyBlader

Tie vote! In conclusion, oceans and clouds are the bane of math, Goku is higher tier in Jump Force, the winner is Goku… and for some reason Columbo also.

Also, we’re going to be releasing a top secret bonus blog alongside the season finale’s blog, so watch out for that.