read this and remember it. read this and remember that she is going to use the profits of her fucking ego-stroking reboot to decimate trans rights. read this and remember that every time you pay into her IP, you are emboldening her to hurt us more.
our lives matter more than your fucking nostalgia.
trans lives matter more than your fucking nostalgia.
I'm about to stab someone (myself) in the heart because Touya really can't see how this is not the end for him and Shouto will never give up on his brother and he is literally building an entire future for them both. Together.
Shouto is telling him you're fucking wrong because I'm here and I'm made an entire new ability just for you and I overcame my greatest trauma to save you and now I know we can change the future, so why would I leave you to die when I know we're the same and I know how you feel, so I know there's still time for you to make it through and become something better.
People who are screaming that Shouto’s character is ruined to save Dabi??? Or that Dabi’s character is ruined if he doesn’t die??? OR THAT SHOUTO SHOULD KILL DABI??
Shouto has always had a genuinely pure heart. Part of his character development was literally that he was able to push aside his hate, his anger for his father, that he was able to rise from a childhood of isolation and abuse and overcome his past and that he can use all his power for good. HE HAS ALWAYS BEEN AIMING TO BE A HERO?? Not the kind of hero his father was only in public, but someone who is an ACTUAL HERO.
There’s no way in hell he was going to kill Dabi? There was no way he was going to turn his back on his OWN brother he never got the chance to know, but so desperately probably wanted to as a kid. Shouto doing everything he can, making his power his own and revolving it around his heart and using it to STOP (SAVE) NOT KILL Dabi is literally SO in character and right along with what it means to be a hero?
And for Dabi, the abused kid who was abandoned and cast aside his whole life, regardless of having turned a villain (no one is excusing that he’s killed innocents btw), if he died a villain with nothing to show for it, no chance to change, no chance to be shown any good in his life after all the hurt and pain he went through, not even from his own family, it would tell absolutely nothing for the story.
Dabi was not born pure evil, he was not always a villain. Dabi getting a chance to change the course of his life even if it’s difficult (aka potentially repenting for his sins, rehabilitating, redemption) the way Shouto is telling him is possible is so much more powerful of a story to tell: that life is not a set track that is unchangeable, life does not have to remain hopeless!!!!
That’s the reason why I love Touya/Shouto line so much. They are brothers and both victims of Enji who failed them as a hero and, what is more important, as a father.
Touya had so much potential, he had deserved a happy life, but reality didn’t give him any chance.
Shouto the only one who can understand Touya’s pain, anger and suffering.
I like that Horikoshi try to show us that there are more than just bad and good people in life. People failed each other constantly and as a result of parents’ ignorance or society’s indifference we get Dabi, Shigaraki, Toga, Twice… The Ligue of Villains.
Touya needs help, and his little brother is the one who can help him. In other words Shouto is able to do for Touya something that Enji couldn’t.
It's beautiful how Shouto can love Dabi unconditionally even though he has all the reasons to hate him. He never knew Touya as a child in the way Natsuo did, they're basically strangers.
And yet Shouto decided to save his older brother. Something their father should've done but would never be able to.
When you think about it Natsuo never knew Touya either, no one in the household ever really saw him and now they still don't because they can't understand why he's choosing to be a villain. Only Shoto truly sees Touya's painful existence and being oppressed by their father's legacy.
it may be my personal perception but i’m a little annoyed that everyone is too happy for shouto when its not a happy victory to him. he had to face the consequences of enji’s abuse and stop his own brother by himself ….. of course he’d win but its not a celebratory win. Tenya is the only one who seems to understand the position Shouto is in.
I feel like the dissonance, the tonal whiplash is absolutely on purpose and it is there to convey a message. Normally when a hero beats up a villain, people cheer because good has triumphed over evil and it gives hope for them. This was the idea behind All Might's Symbol at the very basic level as well. Except, the cost of the victory is invisible to the people who cheer and the villains have families and stories too. In the Todoroki narrative, this has been stripped down - we've seen the cost of Shouto's power, we've seen Touya's spiral and it all comes back to one guy.
This title really struck me as odd - here I was expecting a "Shouto rising" chapter, instead I get "Endeavor" and Shouto looking more aggressive and Endeavor-like on the cover than he was in the entire fight. So I've been thinking what this could mean.
My best guess is that the title is meant in a "monkey's paw" way. What we see here is the result of Endeavor's "endeavor". His big plan of creating the perfect masterpiece that would one day surpass All Might.
Now, here is the first real public victory of that masterpiece, on none other than the "holy ground" of All Might's last stance, with an amazing demonstration of his power, to be the first one to defeat his assigned villain, to bring inspiration and hope to the other heroes. Shouto has for sure achieved the kind of goal Endeavor dreamed up when he started this whole thing.
But the reality is devastating. Because Endeavor in this bizarre mini-hero society he set up instead of a family created both the masterpiece and the villain and then left them play out a fight they never should have had to.
Leaving Shouto to carry the family burden, leaving Touya still in the hell he lived in.
This is the end result of all of Endeavor's aspirations - the quirk marriage, the children he threw away, the torture he put Shouto through, the breaking apart of the family. And it's a hollow victory - and not because Shouto didn't try his best, he did - but all this power, all this effort just to stop the villain that was created by the same process.
And even though Shouto stopped Dabi here - the lives that are already taken, the time the siblings spent apart, the relationships fractured... Endeavor's endeavor came at a terrible price - one he inflicted on everyone.
And maybe it's this realization hitting him - that it was not worth it
I was reading this chapter and noticed how Spinner refers to Touya as having everything. It reminds me how couple chapters ago how Ujiko said that maybe he was born with everything.
Yeah that phrase is used a lot with the Todoroki brothers
Implying that Shouto was born with all the power he could want, and status as Endeavor’s son.
Same implications here, except it’s coming from a jealous raging heart-broken Touya, criticizing Shouto for not taking advantage of his incredible circumstances.
The implications are the same.
This is where it changes:
Ujiko is talking about Touya as a defect. “Born with everything” here, following the phrases “full of cracks” and “warped seeds”, implies that being born with everything means to be born cracked and warped.
Obviously we shouldn’t be listening to Ujiko as he narrates the lives of his victims lol.
Spinner saying that:
Well, it’s Spinner misunderstanding Touya.
Yeah Touya has conviction, a purpose in life, and a goal—but that goal is literally Touya’s death. So like…this has always been a major flaw of Spinner’s.
Unrelated to Touya—Spinner sees other people spiraling into misery and thinks “god I wish that were me” LOL. He does do this, I’m sorry but he does. That’s his arc though, that’s the point. Spinner’s role is basically to misunderstand everybody and their feelings, including his own and his own purpose in life.
But for this to be said about the Todorokis shows that everyone just does not understand their personal circumstances (Shouto used to resent his position as Endeavor’s son), and Touya, well *gestures to all of Touya*. Everyone just sees them as having everything, whether it’s good or bad. But the truth is that both brothers have good and bad qualities, as does every human being. But Touya only sees the bad in himself. But then sees the good in Shouto—but his idea of “good” is incredibly warped. Because he didn’t expect Shouto to bust out some true heroism in his face, and cool him off and keep him alive. His idea of “good” was being a “hero” by their legal definition, not by the ideals of a real hero.
So basically I think the point of that phrase is to eventually show us readers that “they aren’t born with everything, and if they want to truly achieve anything then they need each other.” That kinda fits the narrative of a family reunification anyway, imo.
The short version of what I'm about to say is that I am super on the fence on predicting Spinner will die being a hero. I don't want to say "I don't think he will" and jinx it, so I will remain in the middle.
But I want to point out some extremely worrisome things that he is doing right now.
The long version is this:
There's a lottttt of speculation going around right now that Spinner is gonna meet his end doing something heroic for Shigaraki. And while I'm not sure I'm fully convinced he's not gonna make it to the end of the manga, I will say that I do think what he's doing right now is going to make things worse, before it paves the way to make things better.
Because what he's doing right now is so incredibly selfless. Out of everyone remaining in the LOV, he's THE most selfless, the only one who has stopped putting all personal ambitions above someone else's (which, once selflessness goes beyond a certain point, it can so easily turn into a fatal flaw--per BNHA lol).
He's not even fully devoted to the movement he (unintentionally) became the face of. Not that he doesn't care about it, he obviously does (hence his commentary in MVA), but it wasn't why he joined the LOV in the first place, and it's not why he stuck around.
Right now, he's most worried about Shigaraki's wellbeing, but also at the same time fulfilling those dreams of his. The problem is that...there's a very big misunderstanding between what Spinner is wanting to do, and what Spinner is actually doing.
What Spinner wants to do is help Shigaraki fulfill his dream of bringing that blank, new horizon. And in Spinner's mind that more than likely includes Shigaraki being himself, not possessed by AFO.
But unfortunately, what he's actually doing is making it much easier for AFO to keep manipulating Shigaraki and take hold of his conscience (he is obviously not doing this intentionally).
This actually goes back to the war arc, where the first big "uh-oh" happened--
I know that this hand is what ultimately saved the LOV from death by heroes, but this hand was showing the gap of understanding between Shigaraki and everyone around him. The hand suppresses him, not liberates. So putting this hand that symbolizes all of the hatred in Shigaraki's extremely unstable heart kickstarted AFO's plans for fully taking over his body. And, again, please don't take this as me saying Spinner is trying to make things worse, but I'm showing that there is just....a very big misunderstanding between what Spinner is trying to do for Shigaraki, and what Shigaraki actually needs. These panels from the war arc do not quite make a good match for Spinner's true intentions:
He remembered Shigaraki talking about how miserable he is, how angry he is all the time, never happy, and never to feel good again. And he's.....encouraging him to remember those feelings. That's...very similar to what AFO has been telling Shigaraki to do as well:
This is worrisome because that rage is exactly why AFO was able to take over Shigaraki's body, consciousness, and the LOV as a whole. And Spinner, for lack of a better term, enabled it.
Now look, Spinner didn't have much choice. He needed Shigaraki to wake up, otherwise they would have been captured and likely killed tbh. So he did what he could. But the issue is that, even now, in the state Shigaraki is in, Spinner is still holding onto that hand.
Which we readers know is a huge trigger of Shigaraki's trauma and hatred--WHICH only makes it that much easier for AFO to maintain a hold on Shigaraki's consciousness.
Spinner doesn't know. How could he know? Shigaraki held those hands close to him the entire story, and it wasn't hard for the LOV to see that they were important to him, and I mean they eventually found out they were his family so...yeah. It's no wonder Spinner is thinking that keeping that leftover hand on hand (lol) is something that would help Shigaraki. The problem is, that hand really only makes things worse, and worse, and worse.
And, while Spinner is having major doubts about the state Shigaraki is in, he's still going along with Shigaraki's "bring it all down". He wants to help him out of the situation he's in, but he also wants to help get him what he wants, which as far as he knows, is destruction. So, reluctantly, he goes along with what AFO set out for him. It's not even something he's all that passionate about, but because he thinks it's for Shigaraki's sake, he's doing it anyway (with doubts).
So, it looks like Spinner is getting to a point where he may turn on AFO and, as some others have predicted, die that way trying to help Shigaraki. Personally....I'm not sure. I don't know that he'll die. Or at least at the moment, I’m not convinced.
Spinner is kind of a wild card in that his baby arc can go a bunch of different ways, but fortunately? it does seem possible that he will be faced with and become more involved with the heteromorph issue than he ever intended, or wanted to be. It seems like he's at a point where he's willing to just, go along with whatever he has to if it means doing "right" by his boss, so to me personally it looks like he's gonna continue down this "face of the movement" path---and hopefully that leads him to the same type of ending as the LOV trio. Alive, change of heart, and reconciliation between the two sides. Which, in my opinion, would be more ideal than him dying, regardless of the reason.
So what I'm getting at is....things don't look good right now. There are several ways Spinner's story could go. The three main ways from what I can see are:
Going all the way along with being the "face" of the movement, and having a similar set up as the trio where he faces some kids and starts really REALLY questioning what he's doing, and if he really wants to continue down the path he's on.
OR, going all the way along with going against AFO and trying to help his friend. Logistically....idk that he would make that type of decision. The other two LOV members have an understanding that AFO could easily just, dispose of them if they started misbehaving. And Spinner is far from dumb, so he is aware of this fact as well (hence, reluctantly going along with whatever is happening). But it's possible he'd take the risk to be a hero to his friend, and as some are predicting, die doing so. If this happens, I would imagine it would lay down some ground work for Deku to go in for the final save later and not be a pointless death. Though...I'd rather him not die at all.
There is also the possibility that incorporates both of these options, except when he tries to be heroic, it ultimately fails because of all the reasons I listed above. He doesn't understand or get it--the kind of help Shigaraki needs. This would also be ideal because again, it would lay groundwork for the final save later. And with this, him LIVING, the whole racism analogy can avoid being ignored and glossed over in the story (which would also be ideal to not ignore something like that)
I'm really hoping that instead of going a route where he d-words, he goes the route where he comes to some sort of realization that the path he and the rest of the LOV are on is not going to bring anything positive to their lives. And along with this, he'll realize that Shigaraki needs help that doesn't include enabling his destructive plan. I'm really hoping that instead of d-wording, he's gonna bridge the communication gap between the heroes and villains (LITERALLY LIKE STAIN DID WITH ALL MIGHT) and give Midoriya that kick in the pants to go in for the save. My hope for this lies in the fact that Spinner acknowledged Deku as a true hero way long ago--
Like yeah, it was long time ago, and Spinner isn't all that driven by Stain anymore at this point. But if he encounters Deku during this big battle that's about to happen, and maybe remembers Shigaraki's weird little fixation on the kid, it may spark him to try to connect with him and light the fire under him to go save Shigaraki. Since heroes save.
I think my main point is---I really don't want Spinner to die. And I think there are a lot of ways his story could go that DON'T result in heroic death. My hopes are high--because Horikoshi honestly seems reluctant to kill off any characters in general. But there's always that end-game drama to fear, so I can only sit here and hope that Hori chooses one of those more optimistic routes for Spinner.
Anyway, I'm so torn on what to expect for the Spinner living vs Spinner dying debate, so I thought I'd put all my concerns into one post lol.
"...he comes to some sort of realization that the path he and the rest of the LOV are on is not going to bring anything positive to their lives. And along with this, he’ll realize that Shigaraki needs help that doesn’t include enabling his destructive plan... he’s gonna bridge the communication gap between the heroes and villains (LITERALLY LIKE STAIN DID WITH ALL MIGHT) and give Midoriya that kick in the pants to go in for the save. My hope for this lies in the fact that Spinner acknowledged Deku as a true hero way long ago–
Like yeah, it was long time ago, and Spinner isn’t all that driven by Stain anymore at this point. But if he encounters Deku during this big battle that’s about to happen, and maybe remembers Shigaraki’s weird little fixation on the kid, it may spark him to try to connect with him and light the fire under him to go save Shigaraki. Since heroes save."
^^^ this whole post, but especially this part, just convinces me more that Spinner will survive, actually. I'm not sure what narrative impact or message Spinner dying would have. We've seen that each League member's death only reinforces the idea that society refuses to make room for them, and thus makes them less likely to accept help, especially from heroes. Losing Spinner would just solidify that the world is unfair and that everything is hopeless for people like them.
I think Spinner will be the first LOV member to switch sides and turn against AFO. Since the raid ended he's been shown to have doubts, but he ignores his gut because he assumes continuing on this path of destruction is what Shigaraki wants. But the thing is, the League members haven't opened up to each other. We - the readers - only know each character's backstory through their internal monologue and we can see how similar they all are. Toga, as the most emotionally observant one in the League, has figured out everyone else, but everyone else is pretty much in their own heads for the most part. They're just people who banded together without delving into each other's backgrounds, like Compress said.
You think Shoto will be involved in any other fight in this arc? I thought after Dabi he’d end up with Deku and Bakugo somehow to have an origin trio attack or maybe with Endeavour, but after seeing him absolutely beat down in this chapter I doubt he has any strength in him left.
Yes, I definitely think so.
I feel like Shouto was "frontloaded" here, because he will come in later (how you remember in the previous war there were Dabi's big scenes with Hawks and Twice only to be topped by a much bigger climax - the reveal. And I remember it was the same - they were in different battlefields and people were wondering how it could happen, but it still did.)
To me, it feels like this brings him now up to par with Bakugou, who had his "Bakugou Rising" and new power unlocking and character defining save and apology scenes with Deku.
Shouto didn't get those during the war because the Dabi-reveal came so late, so a lot of the story still had to be told first. But now, Shouto also got his power-up, a big character defining save-win that's also extremely bittersweet.
But I think Shouto will be involved in more fighting later:
he himself treats this fight as a pre-requisite to become a hero. This to him is not hero business, but family stuff he needs to take care of first
He barely actually fought - he was mostly taking hits and charging up a single huge save move.
He still needs some closure with his father / family
Him choosing to take on this fight should get a narrative reward (e.g. in the form of Dabi going on to help the heroes and do something game-changing together)
Iida is on the battlefield and hasn't done anything yet
We haven't had yet a chapter called "Shouto rising" or "Shouto"
While this little round of applause from some classmates was nice - this didn't feel like the big goodbye to his character.
There was never a Todoroki family combo attack, nor an Origin Trio combo attack.
This “win” is devastating for him, and he’s crying. He deserves a win that feels uplifting and joyous.
I expect him and Touya either to join Endeavor et al vs AFO and/or Shouto to go on to help Deku and Bakugou.
As for being spent - I think he's physically fine. He seems to me to be mostly emotionally and mentally exhausted, but I feel like that's something he can bounce back from.
But for sure, the focus will go elsewhere now (unless HK decides to finish off the Endeavor storyline first) and then Shouto will pop up again later.
I'm really glad he got this solo fight though and this 1-on-1 moment with Dabi and now I fully expect him to be more in group-mode - assisting others / doing his part.
Linked to the anon who mentioned phosphorus etc… Shoto gave a lot of importance about his own feelings while building his new super move and style. Similarly Touya specified that when he cries - so when he feels negative emotions - his flames gets hotter, so he also has a type of power linked to feelings. This whole battle is emotional and a, and finally Touya had someone who went far to just stop him and show compassion and love. What if it’s just this instead ? That finally Touya is feeling something else rather than anger , hate , sadness and despair?
Also, pretty much in the fandom hinted Touya’s hair was turning whither because of the stress he underwent. But that can’t be entirely true , his hair started to change sooner than being discard. It always hit weird to me that he has the most white hair of all of his siblings and Rei’s constitution and yet he showed no inclination , even the minimal towards ice. Like , I’d not expect Shoto’s balance , but none, even a 10% of ice vs fire?
So in wondered if this is it. Hori gave much space to heart in Shoto’s explanation of how phosphorus works and heart seems to be the key, both metaphorically and phisically. So if Touya even have a little ice in him Shoto might have been a kindling of something Touya can do by himself and have a little of cool down (even if not at the same level of Shoto of course).
Plus if that would be true that would be devasting and if I were as sadistic as AFO I’d totally use this. This would mean Enji doomed his son just because he wanted to produce some mini endeavours instead of raising children to be heroes considering their needs, personalities and personal abilities.
Yeah, @thyandrawrites wrote up here well how it could all come together thematically for Touya to have some kind of quirk awakening and natural cooling powers.
Just looking at the light on Touya's chest, I'm mostly reminded of Shouto training Phosphor.
For me, it makes most sense if this "mingling" with Shouto awakens in Touya something as well - something that he perhaps possessed too his whole life, but never experienced. This is the first time after all that he experiences the fire they both inherited from Endeavor not just constantly turned up hotter, but controlled and cool. Not trained to burn and destroy, but to cool and save.
And I like the symbol of Shouto leaving a literal piece of his heart / his light that he created for Touya, so he too can find the reason for his existence and to maybe discover that the two of them are not so different after all.
I just think also that there should be a narrative reward for Touya's backbone - the way that he turned down AFO's offers twice. It would be cheap if AFO gave him a power while in coma or something like that.
And yes, it's definitely been implied that Endeavor gave up on Touya too soon. So to find that he's been perfect all along, would be another blow for Endeavor (though I think eventually, the narrative has to somehow square the circle: measuring children's value based on their hero potential is plain wrong / but also a hero can be inside anyone if only they get the encouragement).
I've been rolling this around my head what could Endeavor's resolution be here. I think narratively it's fitting if he's left in a personal hell where AFO's psychological warfare confronts him with all his sins giving voice to his guilt and doubt. It's the final punishment he built for himself by sacrificing everyone to get to No. 1. I also feel like Endeavor will fail here as a hero, but rise as a father. It was never his role to go over that symbolic bridge, so he cannot achieve what All Might couldn't, and he can't defeat AFO.
I used to think that it was only for Shouto to cross that bridge finally, but lately I'm feeling like it would be more fitting for his sons to cross instead together, and for Endeavor to sacrifice the hero / his ego to help them get there.
I don't really do predictions but I want to put this out there in the very off chance that it might turn out to be true
Conspiracy theory: Touya always had the genetics to regulate his internal temperature, though on a smaller scale than Shouto. We know that Phospor works with Shouto's heart as a catalyst
That brings balance to both halves of his quirk.
And the thing is, Dabi doesn't have an ice quirk (and likely won't pull one out of his ass now of all times), but he's a chimera too. He has an ice constitution and a fire quirk. His body is already engineered for the cold. Who's to say he cannot circulate chilled blood to counter his internal heat as well?
I think that's how he survived Sekoto Peak, and how he remained alive even after sustaining expansive burns all over his body a second time. Horikoshi went extra out of the way to point out the oddity that was his survival, so there's definitely something more to it than just... A spite strong enough to best death.
I think that Touya, too, has a trigger to cool himself down, but neither Touya nor Enji consciously realized it yet.
Quirks can evolve, if the right "catalyst" triggers a change in their inner workings.
A catalyst like... Touya's crazy strong will, for example. A will so strong not even AFO could bend it. After burning up at Sekoto Hill, we see Touya chant "I don't want to die. I don't want to die, " thinking of how he's yet to show his dad what he's really worth. I guess what I'm saying is: if quirks can get "liberated" and unlock a next level under the right circumstances, like an extremely stressful situation, then what best stressor than burning yourself alive and finding out in a panic that you cannot turn off the heat? Being on the brink of death has already worked as a catalyst twice now: think of Tomura and Toga in mva and the power ups they unlocked as a result. It wouldn't be too farfetched if Touya, too, got a quirk awakening in such a circumstance.
I can see this fitting into the Todofam narratives for one major reason.
Enji was really quick to discard Touya as a failure. I have a different post dissecting this but it happened over the course of a handful of months. Touya manifested his quirk around 4, and had already been replaced months before his 5th birthday.
Enji's rushed judgement makes sense when you consider that what he was after was a heir that could counter the overwhelming heat that builds up within his body, thus nullifying the flaw that Enji felt was responsible for never being strong enough to beat All Might.
In light of that, it's obvious that dissuading Touya from using his quirk was not the real reason Enji kept having children. That was just an excuse. It's Enji himself that admits the real reason: Touya will never be the one to surpass All Might, because Touya not only inherited Enji's overheating, but he also reaches an internal boiling boint much sooner than Enji.
Adding to that, Enji was pigheaded about besting All Might through brute force, and as such, he only ever taught Touya how to turn up the heat:
So it stands to reason that with this type of training, even if Touya did have the genetics to cool down his internal temperature, he simply wouldn't know how to.
I think there's a chance that by the end of the series, Horikoshi will turn the narrative that Touya was a doomed failure on its head, and show us that it was less adverse fate and more arbitrary choices that ruined Touya's bright future. This idea has already been introduced by chapters 351 and 352, with Shouto's stress on choosing your path and Dabi's stubborn belief that you can't change the tracks of your life once they're set for you.
Building off of that, if it turned out that Touya had the "right" potential to become "a masterpiece", then it doubles down on the idea that it's Enji's choice to discard him so easily that doomed his son to this much suffering, and not some inherent "flaw" that Touya has no control over. It's not a predetermined fate but a choice, and choices can be corrected.
This would work in favour of both Dabi and Enji's character arcs: it would prove Dabi wrong about predetermination, it would give him a way to eventual recovery, and it would teach Enji that forcing his kids to do things his way isn't necessarily what works best for them. In fact, it almost certainly never is. Shouto reached peak self actualization when he explored his way of doing things, independently of his father; Touya never had that chance. Enji could've realized that Touya had the ability to cool himself down after all, if only he'd let his eldest train in a way that wasn't an exact replica of his own moves. If only he didn't focus so hard on turning up the heat.
So. I think we might be on the way to discovering the true extent of Dabi's quirk. Chapter 353 shows a glow appear on Dabi's chest where Shouto's Phospor hit. It's not over Dabi's heart, but it's the middle of his chest, just like how it was for Shouto; it could be symbolic to the two halves of his own quirk.
Or maybe I'm reading too much into this and it's just an addendum of Shouto's move, lol. Maybe Shouto's attack has some medical properties like everyone's been speculating lately, and it triggered some tissue regeneration in his brother. That's a possibility! I'm not completely discarding the regen route, but if that's what's happening, I don't think the source is necessarily Shouto. If it was, then that still wouldn't explain how Touya survived Sekoto Peak and the years after. He didn't have his little brother, then. No, I think, and I might be completely off base of course, that Touya always had this dormant side of his quirk inside of him, but he never actually used it intentionally, or was even aware that he did possess it.
It doesn't even have to be the ability to cool himself down; I'm leaning towards that because it's the only thing that explains his survival. But it might just be that his chimera genes give him the chance to make fire that doesn't burn him, just like his little brother. If that's the case, then one way to recovery for him could be Shouto teaching him how to summon it consciously. I would greatly prefer this to the route of Touya never using his quirk again "for his own good." That never sat right with me — it just seems another way to reinforce the abuse he suffered as a kid, and imho it negates the idea that society was wrong to force him into giving up. And while I'm a fan of Dabi receiving treatment for his injuries and the regen route is good, I also think it doesn't provide a long term solution for the problem that his fire burns him. It would only work like a safety net in case he exceeds his body's limits again. He'd still need to either give up on using his quirk, or get support gear and limit its use as much as possible. But Horikoshi never struck me as the type to say "hurting yourself is fine so long as you can get healed afterwards." Look at Deku!
On the other hand, if Dabi learned a way to make fire that doesn't involve self-harm, he could be free to explore his identity the way Shouto was able to, and find worth in himself and his quirk that isn't attached to his father's legacy. That's what I'd like to see, personally, so that's my prediction
That's not to say I think it will 100% happen! I just think it would be really neat if it did
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