In the world of anime, there are few villains who are as mysterious and powerful as All For One, the Symbol of Evil. He is the final figure that stands at the end of the lead characters’ journey, the monster that appears in their nightmares, and the cause for countless deaths. Before Tomura Shigaraki became acting leader of the League of Villains, All For One spearheaded the charge. This was because he got overpowered and defeated by his arch-nemesis All Might during the battle of Kamino disctrict. He was imprisoned in Tartarus after the defeat, and he remained there for seven months.
But All For One is still the most powerful villain in all of Japan, and part of why he is no menacing is because an entire side of him is kept hidden. Despite his stature, he is more than a hundred years old, and his unique ability of collecting and combining quirks. One of them must have something along the lines of immortality as well. Now, let’s discuss the quirks that we are aware of.
Quirks that we have seen
The first in-detail look of All For One came from his battle with All Might. Let’s start of by talking about the top ten we deciphered from that, and other incidents.
1. Enhanced Senses
All For One is, by all means, blind. His face is disfigured from the mouth up, which gives him an appearance similar to how Voldemort would look like if he had no eyes. It is made entirely of scar tissue after his previous defeat against All Might. However, he is far from helpless. He is said to possess the Infrared quirk, and it helps him sense the surroundings. Things are visible due to vibrations. Since the loss of his eyes, his ears are better than ever, and we never know if he has some super hearing quirk in there. But take that ability away, and he is totally helpless.
2. Super Strength
All Might was believed to be unrivalled in strength, until All For One pulled up. In fact, his strength was teased from the very start after All Might showed the massive damage inflicted on the side of his stomach. He is easily able to trade blows with the former Number 1 Hero. He was believed to be more stronger, and it was thanks to All Might that he received some long overdue nerf in strength. All For One also has a quirk named Strength Enhancer, and it is available in three forms inside him. So he can cause 3 times the damage.
3. Enhanced Durability
All For One has more durability than any character we have seen in the series, and his quirks can be credited for that. He has tanked a massive amount of punches from All Might and did not even flinch. Meanwhile, All Might had broken bones and screamed from pain multiple times. If it weren’t for the Symbol of Peace’s United States of Smash, All For One could’ve taken hits all day. He also has a quirk named Impact Recoil, which reflects the attack he received, back to the attacker.
4. All For One
It will be criminal not to mention his own quirk. After all, this ability led to where he is right now, and became his supervillain name. All For One is able to steal others’ quirks and leave the original users quirkless. He can use them as he pleases, or pass it down to other people. However, he will not receive the same proficiency as the original users and is limited to an extent. Due to that, he steals those that require raw power and not ones that take ages to master.
This helps him in combat, as well as recon and surveillance missions. But there are drawbacks. All For One is not able to properly contain quirks of newer generations, and this became a cause for concern. Hence, he decided to see help from Dr. Garaki’s medical research. Another problem is that he gets nightmares of the people he stole quirks from, and they insult him.
5. Super Speed
He is speed. All For One is extremely fast, as shown in the fight with All Might. There was also the time when he completely destroyed the Nomu factory and defeated 4 Pro Heroes without breaking a sweat. He is able to dodge attacks from All Might and Edgeshot, the latter who is able to transform faster than the speed of sound. Without a doubt, this super speed is thanks to the multiple quirks inside of him.
6. Intelligence
All For One is without a doubt, a genius. Rather than using his rare quirk for committing petty criminal activities, he created an entire empire of evil. He was able to control Japan from the shadows for over a hundred years. People were not even aware of his presence until his quest for locating One For All began. Heroes who had previous owned One For All had died in fights related to All For One, and that made him a target of the Hero Association. He knows about the who’s who of the country, and constantly keeps surveillance on them.
He is also skilled at identifying the flaws of his opponents. And most opponents are privy to emotional attacks. All For One is known to mock his opponents while fighting, and he did that on All Might as well. He is aware that All Might mourns the loss of his mentor Nana Shimura. So he insulted her during the fight, and also revealed Tomura Shigaraki is Nana’s grandson. This caused All Might to have mixed feelings about Tomura. Using this distraction, All For One launches a massive attack and causes All Might to lose his buff form. He then proceeds to mock him for his feeble appearance.
7. Search
This is a valuable quirk he forcibly took out from Ragdoll of the Wild, Wild Pussycats. Search enables the user to observe and monitor up to a hundred people at the same time. It not just reveals their location, but also shows their weaknesses. He was able to combine this with Infrared against his fight with All Might.
8. Forced quirk activation
This is similar to Zeke Yeager’s ability to transform those who drank his spinal fluid into pure titans with just a scream. All For One is able to forcibly awaken a person’s quirk against their will. It doesn’t matter if they are awake or asleep for the process. He was able to combine this with another quirk named Rivet Stab. Rivet Stab causes his fingers to turn into black tendrils that is also believed to emerge from his spine. It can pierce bodies easily and proved to be a much faster way for stealing quirks, and causing Forced Quirk Activation.
9. Life Force
Life Force deserves special mention, as it’s the main reason why All For One is haunting multiple generations. It was a special quirk made by Dr. Garaki, and made All For One a supernatural being with a massive extension of life. Let’s ignore the face, but the rest of his body gives a seemingly youthful appearance, and that could be due to this quirk.
10. Lie Detector
The quirk’s official name has not been given, but it is something that All For One acquired from an ancestor of Naomasa Tsukauchi. It allows him to sense when a person is lying, and also when someone has some ill will inside them. This causes him to hatch plans against those that plan to cross him, and also watch out for attacks.
Former quirks that deserve special mentions
The first quirk in this list is Power Stockpiling. It allows the user to pile huge amounts of power within themselves. All For One forced it on his younger brother Yoichi, who he thought was quirkless. But Yoichi was actually able to transfer quirks to another person. Power Stockpiling combined with this quirk and became One For All, the quirk that is now within Izuku Midoriya.
All For One also had a self-destruct quirk, which causes the user to blow up in a massive explosion. He also had a bunch of unnamed quirks that could conduct electricity; ones that had beast-like traits; ones that give wings; and various strength enhancers. It is believed that most young heroes have powers that once belonged to All For One.
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