Prologue
Water. Earth. Fire. Air.
Long ago the Four Nations lived together in harmony, then everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked. Only the Avatar, master of all four elements could stop them, but when the world needed him the most, he vanished. One hundred years passed and the new Avatar, an air-bender named Aang, was discovered by two members of the water tribe, Katara and Sokka. Although he was a master of air-bending, he still had a lot to learn before he could save anyone. With the help of many friends, he was able to overcome the many challenges that laid before him, master the four elements, and bring and end to the hundred years conflict. Following the Great War, Avatar Aang made many valiant contributions towards the unification of the Four Nations and made astounding progress, but there is only so much one can do in a single lifetime.
Seventy years later, after the death of Aang, the new Avatar arose from the water tribe right when the world was about to fall into turmoil again. Avatar Korra was incredibly fluent in her control over the four elements once she learned air-bending from the son of Aang, and showed great prowess in elemental combat. However, she lacked good connection to and strength in the Avatar state. This was even further diminished when her connection to the previous Avatars was severed and their memories for the most part were lost forever. Although she was able to stave off the pending chaos, her failures as an Avatar proved too fatal in the future.
Avatar Korra died at the age of twenty-seven years old after many years of faltering peace, hatred, and constant reminders of her failures that seemed to always outweigh her successes and turned her into a despised pariah. Though her closest friends knew that she tried her best to live up to the successes of the previous Avatars, the people saw the position of Avatar as a world arbitrator as useless and counterproductive. War soon ensued following her death with the Earth Kingdom spearheading the conflict with their new advantage of having the Avatar. Thus, began the cycle of war where the Avatar would be used as a weapon, due to the fact that the new Avatars would not have the millennia of shared memories to recount on for judgment, that would last for centuries. Each new cycle of rebirth would see one of the Nations gain advantage over the others for several decades until the Avatar spirit passed on to a new host. The memories of invaluable knowledge, wisdom, and judgment were lost, only to be replaced with memories filled with endless warfare and violence, building each rebirth to be more powerful and devastating.
After six hundred years of war, the world of the Four Nations was a lost cause to the spirit realm, seeing that the power of elemental bending had tainted the souls of humanity and the power of Raava and the Avatar had abused by the people sacrilegiously. It was time for the Spirit realm to retreat from this world and take the Avatar with them.
Avatar Katashi of the Fire Nation sat upon a hill overlooking the ruins of Republic city while he meditated to converse with Raava. He was glad that it was not himself that lead the attack that sacked the city, but he still felt some guilt over the fact it had been his last reincarnation that committed the crime about twenty years ago. And it was not the first time one of his past reincarnations had sacked a capital city, but they all mounted up on his shoulders and weighed him down along with his own crimes in his short seventeen years of life. Although, he had only been recognised as the Avatar at the age of twelve, just as young as the famous Avatar Aang, he quickly mastered all the elements and some of their sub skills under duress to fulfil war needs.
"It's that time, isn't it, Raava? It's time for us to leave this wretched world behind and find a new home to try and find peace?" the black-haired fire-bender asked the presence that had been with him his whole life.
Though she did not make a physical appearance, the spirit of light nevertheless still answered his question, "I have long since forgiven you and your predecessors for all that you have done, you were the subject of brainwashing and torture into compliance. You were lost and without guidance like all your predecessors since Korra, but what has happened must never be forgotten." A warm tear slid down his face as the countless memories of cruelty passed through his mind. He knew that he could never truly find peace, but he wanted at least to help people for once and fulfil his true purpose as an Avatar. "The Harmonic Convergence is upon us, we shall use its power to fuse the Spirit Realm with you and leave for an uncorrupted world. With this fusion, you will be the last Avatar for all time. We cannot let your power fall into the wrong hands again."
Katashi sighed deeply, "So I am to live alone all eternity in the company of spirits? Well it's nothing I don't deserve for everything that I and my past selves have done." He hoped that the convergence was happening soon because it would not be too long before his guards found where he was, even if it was past nightfall.
"Not necessarily, but we can see what is within our power at a later date," the spirit of light commented suspiciously.
"I'll hold you to that," the Avatar scrunched his eyebrows, ruining his meditative pose. "You've told me that you have seen our destination, so tell me, do they have bending abilities or is this a fresh start?"
Raava chuckled in her motherly way, "They do have powers of some-sort, not bending abilities, but strong powers nonetheless. Some of these people that have quirks, which is what they call their powers, work as heroes for the general welfare of the public."
This brightened his mood tremendously, it was a place where can fit right in and do good for the people, and be looked upon as a hero rather than as a weapon to be used until he was useless. "Would you be okay with me trying to be a hero, Raava?"
She gave another one of her laughs before her answer, "I forget how young you really are sometimes. But yes, you can be a hero. I expected you to become one, otherwise you would be wasting my power. However, you have to go to a school for heroes before you can become one in their world, which means you need to learn how to read and write properly first and foremost." Her voice almost sounded condescending.
"But I know how to read and write," he tried to complain before he was cut off.
"Not in their language, but give me a couple of days of working with your brain and I can resolve the problem," Raava lectured harshly. She could feel the rising power of the Harmonic Convergence, it was almost time for them to leave their world. "On your feet now, it's time and you don't want to end up sitting in the middle of a street. Do not struggle, just let the power flow over you and it will be over momentarily."
"It still doesn't feel right to abandon our home world and leave the people to fend for themselves and eventually destroy themselves," the Avatar sorrowfully gazed over the ruins of one of the many cities his predecessors had razed.
"This world is already dead," the spirit of light reluctantly admitted though the Avatar already knew it was true, "Its people are corrupted, they have become irredeemable, and they have abused the gifts we spirits have blessed them. I am deeply sorry that I could not stop this nor could I protect you from falling into the cycle. I may not be able to guide you that much in this new world, just promise me that you will put my powers to good use and become the hero that world needs."
"I promise, Raava, and thank you for everything you have done for me," Katashi reminisced on his few good memories the spirit provided him. The voices of his guards could be hear calling his name in the distance, it would not be too long before they found him.
Standing up, he stretched his tall, muscular stature from siting down for so long, and adjusted his armoured uniform. He immediately felt the effects of the auspicious occasion overwhelm him. An ethereal white light enveloped him, causing his strength to surge beyond anything he had ever felt before, but he also felt the presence of thousands of celestial life-forces entering his soul and merging with his Avatar State. They were all whispering to him, some praising him for his bravery to stand up for what he was meant to do, darker ones were tempting him to try and commit unspeakable things. All of them were silenced by Raava as she reasserted her control in guiding her young host through the process.
Katashi felt sick briefly, followed by quick cycles of various emotions as though the convergence was forcing him to develop some sort of cognitive issue, and it did not make feel any better. He watched as the night and ruined city faded into blinding whiteness and he lost all sense of direction and gravity, turning his stomach upside down once more. All his instincts told him to fight off the convergence, but Raava's soothing presence kept him in check and guided him towards the end of the tunnel they were travelling.
All of a sudden, the white light disappeared, abandoning him in the diming light of a different cold afternoon. Exhausted and withdrawn from the surge of strength, he collapsed into a heap on the ground of a strange alley. Son of a bitch, Raava never said it was going to be this tiring, he thought with his waning consciousness, it feels like the first day of boot camp. The last thing he saw was a teenaged girl with bob styled brown hair and wearing some sort of sailor uniform running up to him.
"Hey, mister, are you alright?" he heard a concerned voice call out to him as his eyes began to close. "Hey! Don't die on me, okay?" He then passed out into the void of slumber.
~Elemental~
Chapter 1
Katashi woke up to the morning sun shining through a window and into his face. He first noticed that the room was colder than it should be, meaning it either did not have a heater or someone had left it off purposely. Luckily, the futon he was sleeping on had a lot of blankets to make up for the lack of heat, even if they were pink. The rest of the room was pretty basic other than a few cute stuffed animals hidden away in the corner and a desk with a chair next to the door. Outside the window, he could see another building taking up the entire view, meaning he was probably in a big city.
When he sat up, he noticed that he was still wearing his white tank top and black pants, but his uniform top, armour, and boots were missing. They were nowhere to be seen in the room, so he threw off the sheets and stumbled to his feet as he raced out the door and down a hall. He found himself in a living room with an adjoined kitchen. Sitting on the floor at a low-lying table, was the brown-haired girl that he vaguely remembered eating ball shaped snacks.
Her attention was quickly caught by Katashi barrelling into the room, but all she said was "Oh, you're awake! Want some mochi?" as she cheerfully offered one of the snacks.
"Wait, where am I and who are you and do I want what?" he shot off the questions in rapid fire, causing the girl to frown when he ignored her offer. The whole scene was confusing the soldier Avatar, seeing as what felt like minutes ago he had just abandoned his old world and appeared in an alleyway of a strange city before passing out, but woke up in the home of a cute girl in his underclothes. He needed a full grasp of the situation before he could try fulfilling his to Raava.
"Mochi, it's a rice cake snack," the girl's mood changed to be more cheerful as she elected to ignore the order of his questions and offered the snack again. He quickly accepted the pink coloured ball and ravenously ate the sweet and gel-like snack. "As for where you are, it's quite obviously my family's apartment, and my name is Uraraka Ochako. And who might you be, mister foreigner-cosplaying-as-a-samurai-that-randomly-appeared-in-an-alley-and-passed-out-with-no-papers-to-identify-himself?"
Katashi staggered at how blunt and straight-forward the girl could be with such a cheerful attitude, but he had to admit that his situation may be quite strange. However, he had a feeling that he could trust her, except with the fact that he was the Avatar from another world, he may end up being locked up for sounding crazy. "My name is Katou Katashi and I've come to this great city in order to attend a school to become a hero. It's been my dream for my whole life to help people for a change and inspire others to do the same. As for why I collapsed in an alley randomly, I have a quirk that allows me to manipulate the wind and essentially fly and I was really exhausted when I landed there after my long journey."
He was not lying to her, just not telling her the whole truth, while he did have a mastery in air-bending, he was better at the other three elements with lightning, metal, and sand bending tucked under his belt as well. Ochako seemed to accept his answer with a jolly smile, not even questioning his air-bending. What is up with her unnaturally cheerful nature, he analysed. She gestured for him to sit next to her at the table, which he gladly accepted.
"So, you're planning to attend U.A. just like me then! A quirk like yours could be very helpful and pretty amazing," she clapped her hands that had mysterious pink pads on her finger tips together. "Are you registered for the entrance exam next week? If not, there is still some time left and I can show you what you need to get that done."
"Thank you very much, I'd really appreciate the help even if it puts me further in your debt," he conceded his unfortunate position. It felt so unnatural to have a stranger try to help him rather than pick his pocket and kick him to the curb; how could expect any better than that when it was the destitute nature of his old home. "To be honest, I'm really glad I met someone else trying to get into the school, I would not know where to start without you. I can already tell that you have the calling of a hero as well with all the help you have been giving to me."
"Oh, it was just a natural response to help someone that collapsed in an alleyway, I wasn't trying to be heroic or anything," She blushed furiously while she bit into another piece of mochi, embarrassed by the unexpected return of compliments. He had to admit, Ochako was very cute and he found himself attracted to her despite barely knowing her.
Katashi's mind returned to the issue of getting into the school. If this school needed him to register in order to attend the entrance exam, then it would not be too farfetched for his powers and citizenship to be certified as well, which meant he would need to dig up his foraging skills to create false certificates. "And could you also show me to the public library or somewhere that I can access the ethernet, please, I need to get my files and certificates to complete the registration," he requested politely with another half-truth.
With a puzzled look, "You mean the internet? Sure, I can get you to the library, but you really should have had those papers on you when you travel," Ochako complied with a back-handed reprimand.
Katashi reeled at his acquittance's personality; just a few minutes of being around her told him more than enough about who she was. She was definitely kind, cheerful, and caring, but it was not in a blind manner, seeing as she did not pull her punches when she let on that she knew something was wrong. However, that did not stop her from also giving appropriate compliments and assistance when needed. Judging on how basic her room was and that her heater was turned off, he could discern that she was also very frugal. All in all, he was glad that it was Ochako that found him when he first arrived and he was going to find a way to repay her in some way. Seeing as they have computers in this world, maybe I can earn money to pay her back by fixing computers or by writing codes, he contemplated, I was always really good with them in my youth before I was named the Avatar.
"By the way, where do you come from, Katou-san?" the rosy cheeked girl suddenly inquired, breaking the silence. "You don't look like you come from Japan, let alone anywhere in Asia. Are you American? Or British? Either way, your accent sounds very natural and you speak Japanese very well."
He was much paler, he had blue eyes, and he had a different facial structure, so he always felt foreign in his old world with the exception of his black hair. Ochako, however, looked like she could fit right into his old world albeit with a few differences besides the brown hair. "Yeah, my parents were American, but I was born and raised here in Japan, they were part of the reason why I really want to help people and be a hero." He despised lying to her but he also did not want her to think he was crazy for telling the truth.
She accepted his answer but did not push it any further. Unbeknownst to him, Ochako felt that his wording implied that his parents were no longer alive and did not want estrange someone she hoped to befriend and go to school with in the future. A glance at the clock on the wall informed Katashi that it was almost seven in the morning, meaning he still had a whole day to figure out his living situation and how to get into the school.
"If you're new to town and need a place to stay while you get work on getting into U.A., my family would be more than happy to let you stay here until you can arrange living quarters with the school," she offered with a blush, expecting a flustered response. She had probably known the guy for fifteen minutes and she could tell he was a good person to be around. He was mysterious, but resolute in his ambitions; He was respectful, yet portrayed a warm and friendly attitude; and he was noble in his dreams, but also empathetic towards her.
As expected, his face reddened profusely as he began to answer, "I… Er…You don't need…"
"You don't need to come up with an answer yet," she interrupted his babbling mess. "I have things to attend to at school today so I will be gone for a few hours. Feel free to use the TV and have breakfast, we can get you to the library in the afternoon and decide where to go from there."
She quickly moved to get a jacket and a school bag that were sitting against the wall before retreating to the front hallway. Katashi barely caught up to the front hall just in time to see Ochako open the front door, "Hey, I just want to thank you for everything you have done for me, it means a lot to me, more than I can explain," Katashi called out before she could leave.
She smiled in cheerful manner, her rosy cheeks redder than ever, obviously his statement had struck a chord in her, "I'm just happy to be of help and to make a new friend. I'll see you soon, Katou-kun," she suddenly changed his honorific. With a bright smile, she closed as she left, leaving the young Avatar alone in the apartment.
~Elemental~
The next week was a whirlwind of activity, both enjoyment and hard work. After Ochako left that first morning, Katashi spent the whole time meditating to reconnect with Raava so she could teach him how to read and write in Japanese as well as English to make his cover seem a little more believable. When he asked for guidance, he got warm laughter in response as she told him that he should be able to figure things out on his own.
The trip to the library taught him that Earth's computers were practically the same as his old world's, making it easier to put his old hacking and coding skills to use. Two hours later, he had hacked the Japanese government with immense difficulty and found all the documents that he needed to counterfeit. By the end, he created and planted all the documents that would ensure that any government enquiry into who he was would find Katou Katashi to be a seventeen-year-old American-Japanese citizen born in Hirosaki, Aomori Prefecture that went to school locally until halfway through secondary school when he decided to apply to U.A. The search would also find him to have a quirk called 'Avatar.' Putting an end to his devious activity, he finally put in his application to the hero school, to which he was almost immediately notified of his acceptance to take the entrance exam via a new email account.
Meeting Ochako's parents that evening was quite the blessing, they were just as kind and warm-hearted as their daughter, and they welcomed him to stay with them until he could get lodging with the school, stating: "We're just so happy our little Ochako found such a good friend, just make sure to treat her properly or I will hunt you down for your crimes!" However, he would be sleeping in the living room rather than borrowing the rosy-cheeked girl's bedroom.
Katashi spent the rest of the week out of the apartment, setting himself up for the future by opening a bank account then spending several days at the library creating dozens of codes to sell off to companies anonymously. By the day before the entrance exam, he had earned enough money to purchase a smartphone and a laptop to bring the work home. It was not that surprising that in a world dominated by quirks and heroes, advancements in computers would stagnate. The same happened in his home world where computers had been invented nearly three hundred years ago in a brief interim of the continuous wars, but took that entire time just to surpass what had been invented on Earth in a hundred years.
When the day of the exam finally came, the young Avatar realised that he had not been exercising as much that week as he used too, so he went on an early run to warm up. But when he reached the Municipal Beach, he caught sight of a green haired, plain-looking boy training in some manner that involved removing heavy loads of trash from the beach and depositing it in a loading area to be taken away. Judging on how much effort he was putting into it and how exhausted the athletic-looking kid appeared, he must have working on the project for a very long time. Based on his age, he must be training last-minute for the exam, Katashi thought as he paused to watch the kid struggle, he's going to wear himself out like that rather than actually do himself any good for the exam. Even if it's still dark out, I should probably help him out.
"Hey, kid, do you need help there?" he called out to the strange kid. In reality, Katashi was probably only two or three years older than him, but his experience and his connection to the past Avatars made him feel much older than everyone else.
The kid stumbled with a giant tire at the sudden interruption to his training, "W-what? N-No, you don't need to help. I-I need to do this myself, it's part of my training regime that I have to finish before the entrance exam today." The kid was a babbling mess of anxiety, and it did not match the expected personality his physique displayed.
"Don't worry, it looks like you have very little left to do, so it won't damage your training and it will help me warm up for the exam too," he reassured the younger hero-in-training. He took off his shirt and placed it on the seawall to avoid dirtying it despite the cold air immediately seeping into his skin.
"Y-you're taking the entrance exam as well?" the stammering kid questioned.
"Yeah, my name is Katou Katashi," he answered as he started trash for his first load.
"Midoriya Izuku," the boy added before continuing with the giant tire.
The two aspiring heroes worked together efficiently to clean up the remaining trash dump, never missing a step or getting in each other's way. Surprisingly Izuku was just about as strong as Katashi, even in his tired state, but he was also putting his all into the training as if his entire future depended on it. Half an hour later found them finished, all the trash was loaded into a massive pile behind the seawall, while Katashi slumped on the clean beach exhausted. He never meant to get this into it and stay out until sunrise, but here he was, tired and struggling to put on his shirt to stave off the cold.
Suddenly, a ragged roar cried out into the morning, overshadowing the peaceful crashing of waves. Looking up the seawall towards where he could see the summit of the trash pile, he could see Izuku roaring like a feral beast that conquered its prey. What kind of training regime could drive a kid that hard?
The guttural roar ended after a few seconds, then the boy began to tumble from his perch. Katashi had to act fast, so a wave of his arms and the ocean reacted immediately to reach out at his command and catch the falling boy. His actions also stopped an extremely buff man that was rushing to catch Izuku as well. Slowly, he placed the green-haired boy on his feet, then released the water as he rushed over to join the man in checking on the boy.
"Thank you, young man!" the older man acknowledged Katashi in a proud and confidant tone. "Young Midoriya, you must have been here all night to finish this and – OH MY GOODNESS – You did more than I asked of you! You truly are an overachiever!"
Izuku was silent briefly as he collected his consciousness, "It was thanks to Katou-san that I was able to finish on time," he groaned in exhaustion.
"Thank you again, Young Katou, I will have to find a way to thank you in the future, but we must really be going now, his entrance exam starts soon."
That information struck Katashi like a thunderbolt. He checked his phone, it was six o'clock and he had several messages from Ochako. "Shit, Uraraka-chan is going to kill me. I will see you at the exam, Midoriya-san," he promised quickly. Before the buff man could say anything, the young Avatar used air-bending to propel himself high up into the air and proceed to fly towards Ochako's apartment.
At around eight thirty, He and Ochako were walking together from the train station to U.A. She still occasionally scolded her friend for getting home late, but for the most part she was overly excited for the exam. The only part he was nervous about was the written portion, even though he knew how to write in Japanese now, he was never that good with written tests despite how smart he was. They ran into Izuku again at the entrance to the school when Ochako had to save him from tripping over with her gravity quirk. The green-haired boy quickly became a silent mess as soon as he saw the gravity girl; Katashi would have become defensive of her if it were not for the fact the younger boy was too frightened to say anything properly.
They all soon found their seats in a giant testing with hundreds of other applicants, some of whom had quirks that were obvious or changed them from looking like normal humans. Among them he spotted a guy with powerful looking engines on his calves, a cute girl with pink skin and horns, and a floating sailor uniform which was being worn by an invisible girl. Even though she was invisible, Katashi could still see her outline defined by her chakra. The testing proctor gave brief directions before signalling for them to dive into the thick test booklet.
If he though the tests in his childhood were Hell, then these monstrosities must have come out of the deepest pits. The only things that probably kept him from failing were the vague study guide that he had vigorously studied last few nights and his meditative skills to keep him calm. Question after question, he could feel the tension and negative feelings piling up in the atmosphere, looking up from his test he could tell which students were being affected the most by stress and anxiety. It astounded him that students so young would be put through such vigorous tests just to get into a school, but he also understood that such a prestigious institute could not take every candidate. He barely finished when the time was called and joined in several others as they sighed in relief while many groaned at their shortcomings.
Once again, all the applicants were corralled into the halls before being driven into the seating of a vast auditorium, Katashi managed to get a seat next to Ochako who was happy to see him once more. Inside, a pro hero with stereos built into his costume, named Present Mic according to Izuku's mumbling a few seats away, kicked off a presentation for the practical half of the exam with a blast of his own voice, nearly deafening the front row students. Turned out that it was going to be a basic fighting test, defeat as many of the robots to get as many points as possible. Unfortunately, Ochako was assigned a different test group.
"Hey, you got put in the same testing group as me!" chirped the pink skinned and haired girl as she leaned on his shoulder from behind to check out his testing card. A closer look told him that the girl also had pure black sclera with vibrant yellow irises, something about them gave off an alluring vibe.
"Ah, nice to meet a fellow competitor," he greeted the new girl, putting aside the last thought. "I'll try to keep the competition fair and not hog all the glory out there."
"Ha! I'll keep you to your word, Mr. Confidant, but you will have to catch up to my level first!" she jested, quick to respond with sarcasm. "The name is Ashido Mina, and it looks like everyone else in our testing group will have to scavenge for points with two champions such as ourselves in one place," she smiled assertively.
While Ochako's bubbly cheerfulness was one of kindness and positivity, a glance could tell that Mina's was one of sociability and eagerness. "I'm Katou Katashi and I hope we can become good friends and classmates after this test." His response elicited a glare behind his back from Ochako.
"Same here, and I can't wait to see what sort of quirk you have hiding up your sleeves," she replied deviously.
After the presentation was concluded, in which Izuku was scolded by the engine boy for his muttering, all the applicants split up to attend their different testing centres, which surprised Katashi to be the size of several city-blocks with looming gates blocking their entrance. Stretching at the at the starting line, he felt ready to take on the test thanks to the warm up that morning. He could feel the nervousness still lingering in the air, but now it was mixed with more confidence and he could not help but feel the same sentiments. Mina stood a short distance from him doing her own stretches and preparations, but managed to give him a thumbs-up and a smile.
"Okay, Start!" Present Mic suddenly called out, probably without any effort, from his tall tower looking over the testing centres. Katashi was stunned for less than a second before he propelled himself with a gust of air ahead of the crowd through the now-open gate. "What's wrong? There are no countdowns in real fights! Run, run! The die has been cast, you know!" he heard the hero admonish the ones still stunned at the entrance.
It took only a few seconds of running for the first faux villain to appear around a corner to his right, it was a one pointer but the adrenaline in his blood refused to let him hold back. A loud and sharp snap in the direction of the robot ignited the air and engulfed the target in flames, causing it to explode. It seemed too easy, but then he was confronted by a three pointer that wasted no time in striking at him, giving him little time to air-bend up out of the way. Another snap of his left hand and a spark of lightning struck the villain, rendering it immobile and smoking. While most benders in his old world focused on the art form of their skills, Katashi preferred to aim for practicality and efficiency to reduce the excess energy wasted in elaborate movements that got the same results.
He ran into a mixed gang of the faux villains barely a few blocks down, not even hesitating to go to work on throwing around his bending skills to destroy every single one. A snap of his fingers would fry one with lightning followed by a wave of his arm upwards to mould the earth around another and crush it. For the most part, he primarily used his air-bending to dodge attacks or to trip the robots before they could get too close. He forgot to bring a water bottle so his use of water-bending was limited to using his sweat as distractions, leaving fire-bending to serve as his primary weapon by powering punches or simply incinerating his targets.
The one pointers were nothing more than cannon fodder that could easily be defeated with a wide and undirected spray of fire, while the two pointers were smart enough to use their inferiors as distractions while they struck from other angles, but were nonetheless too slow to make a difference. Three pointers, on the other hand, were both smarter and faster, being able to cause difficulty for him. They were even able to land blows on him on a few occasions, leaving him with several bruises and a laceration on his right shoulder that bled through his track suit.
"You fuckers just don't know when to give up," he bellowed at the villains after propelling himself backwards from getting that last injury. They answered with whirrs and clicks as the resumed their assault. "Come on you bastards! You're nothing compared to Water Nation guerrillas!"
Four minutes into the test and Katashi found himself over a kilometre away from the starting point having left a trail of nearly forty of the faux villains in his path. But he was alone when he finally destroyed the last robot in the gang, no one had joined him or came anywhere within sight. I wonder how Mina-san is doing, he pondered, I better get up high if I want to find her. With a simple jump, he got himself of the ground, then propelled his body high above the building tops with a strong gust.
The result of his search shocked him. The rest of his testing group probably did not make it far before being ambushed by a horde of the villains, and they were all driven together to the centre of the mock city. As he approached from above to help the stranded group, he could tell that several students had been wounded and were down for the fight, while the rest were fighting for their lives. Four students in particular were maintaining a defensive perimeter around the gathered wounded and weaker fighters, netting the higher tier robots to keep them away.
Katashi immediately recognised Mina as one of the four; her pink skin was secreting some sort of acidic sludge that she was using both to speed up her footwork and to disintegrate her foes. The other three students had pretty interesting quirks as well, a girl with brunette hair could enlarge her fists to crush a single villain in one swipe, an angry-looking boy could turn his entire body to steel so he could easily punch through metal, and a blond-haired boy that could emit and manipulate electricity to fry the robots though he looked overworked.
With little hesitation, the young Avatar crashed down and smashed a three pointer approaching Mina with a fiery punch. "Glad I got here before things got worse," he assessed the dire situation.
"Yeah, nice of you to join us. We saved a few for your speedy ass," the pink heroine sarcastically mocked Katashi. She dodged a two pointer and smacked it with a layer of acid. "This can't be right, mobbing us with so many at one time. We're just students and some of us are seriously injured," she nodded back towards the gathered casualties.
He snapped a bolt of lightning that fried another three pointer while Mina watched in awe of such casual power. "This is supposed to be the best school, they have to weed out the crowd in order to cultivate the best. This must be testing us on protecting the innocent."
"I guess that is an optimistic approach to our situation," she contemplated aloud between destroying one pointers.
"Hey! Quit fucking around or these guys are going to overrun us!" the steel boy bellowed his fowl mouth over the chaos, ending their brief conversation.
His arrival definitely bolstered morale, not to mention that he helped thin out the horde by filling the gaps where the villains could slip through. Something also changed in Mina's style of fighting. She became more aggressive and taking the offensive, obviously competing with him and trying to catch his attention at every possible moment. However, he could not help but notice the skills she did have in defeating the robots, even if it was being done in a flashy manner, showing years of practice to master her quirk.
With just a minute on the clock, the last faux villain melted into a puddle of molten metal at the hands of his fire-bending. At last they were victorious, and most of them collapsed onto the floor with heavy breathing and aching muscles and wounds. Katashi sat upon one of the lifeless robots for a rest, quickly joined by Mina who sat behind and leaned back onto him. Just the simply contact let him feel her heavy breathing and racing pulse.
"Dude, you have one wicked quirk, Katou-san," the pink girl huffed in admiration. "Fire, lightning, earth, air, and metal. Can you control water too?"
"Yeah, but I really don't have water to bend, I usually carry around a water bottle for that," he replied bluntly. "Your quirk is pretty badass too. Never knew acid could be used like that for combat."
"Heh, when it transforms your appearance and sticks with you everywhere you go, you tend to learn a few tricks about it," she reasoned his compliments. "Tell my, friend, where did you learn your way around a battlefield?"
He never got to answer as the ground beneath them began to shudder, catching the attention of all the testing applicants. In the distance, a giant robot taller than any of the buildings began lurching down the street towards where all the students were recovering. It had a zero painted onto its body, signifying that it was the obstacle worth nothing, but it looked like a boss that wanted to kill them more than get in the way. Sure, he could defeat it by himself or even destroy it by swatting it once while in the Avatar state, but there were too many civilians there that were defenceless and at the mercy of the monster.
"We need to get to get everyone out of here now!" he bellowed his order as he shot to his feet along with Mina. "Those that can walk need to help the injured, we need to get to the exit as soon as possible!" Leading the way, he threw a girl with vines for hair onto his right shoulder and picked up a smaller boy with purple orbs for hair by the waist before heading down the war-torn avenue.
Just looking at the weary faces running with him towards the exit he could tell that they were barely holding it together. They were dead on their feet, yet they still drove on in flight from death. As they closed in on the gate, another student fainted and collapsed, but Katashi was to far ahead to get to her in time with the two he was already carrying. Without hesitation, Mina handed off the person she was already helping and rushed back towards their fallen comrade.
Katashi passed through the gate and gently put down the two students before looking back at the pink heroine. She had just begun towards the gate again, supporting the other student, but the colossus was only metres behind them.
"Ashido-san!" he called out and with great effort he harnessed the wind around the two. Seconds before the obstacle crushed them, the Avatar propelled them past the last few hundred metres to safety. The fallen student was caught mid-air by the metal boy, but Mina flew straight towards Katashi and collided with him, knocking him to the ground in a heap with her on top.
"Times up!" Present Mic announced over the campus of testing centres. "Oh, and can someone tell those two lovebirds to save it for later."
The dust settled and the realisation of the position they were in hit them like a wrecking ball, his entire face blushed to a crimson red while she darkened to a dark pink. They were separated in a flash, both blushing and faltering into blabbering messes.
"I'm so sorry! Please forgive me!" they managed in unison, garnering a tired chorus of laughter from the onlookers.
"Ooooh, love on the battlefield!" someone catcalled from behind.
~Elemental~
After everyone was healed up from their injuries, they made their way back to the school to gather their things before they left. Katashi tried to catch up with Mina, but she did not hear him as she was lost rushing through the crowd of applicants, her face still darkened by blushing. The Avatar then decided to wait by the front gate to meet up with Ochako, only to be met by her less than normal cheerfulness. Something obviously happened during her practical exam.
That something happened to be Izuku, as she told him on their way home. He risked his possibility of getting any points just to rescue her from the colossus and ended up shattering three of his limbs in the process of destroying it. When she went to Present Mic to ask for some of her points to be transferred to him for saving her and possibly losing points on her behalf. But the Pro Hero reassured her that she did not need to worry about the green-haired hero, leading her to question what all else went into the exam's scoring.
Katashi described the events of his testing, focusing on the ambush that snared all the other testers, which shocked the gravity girl that the school would go to such extremes to find the best candidates. He left out the whole incident with Mina falling on him at the end, but he still described how heroic she was in leading the defence against the ambush and risking her life to rescue the fallen student. When they compared their exams, they believed that his test was focused on heroism and defending others, rather than focusing on personal skill and achievement like her exam.
"I hope we get to be classmates at U.A. because I'm already pretty short on friends," he prayed with confidence as they turned onto the street for their home.
"We will see in a week, that's when acceptance letters are supposed to be mailed out," she confirmed. "And I think you will pretty popular with how amazing your quirk is."
Katashi contemplated Ochako's compliment for a few seconds before answering, "Perhaps, but a quirk is a pretty poor excuse to be someone's friend. I hate to sound cheesy, but I just want friends that are truly my friends for who I am."
Ochako immediately burst out laughing, covering her mouth to supress her amusement. "I'm sorry," she managed, "But that really is cheesy." Her laughing fit continued for nearly a minute while the young Avatar glared at her. "But I can definitely relate to you with those sentiments," the gravity girl added as she pulled herself back together.
The two continued on their way home, both hopeful for the future that laid ahead of them. Katashi looked forward to guiding this young world of powers in a better direction than his old home, to see a brighter future come to fruition by his efforts. The girl next to him looked at him with admiration, she thought the older boy to be an amazing person, but she was not ready to any more of her feelings. Already, the powers of the Avatar were changing the world for the better and take root in the flow of events.
A/N: Thanks for reading this chapter to the end and giving my project a shot. I absolutely love Avatar the Last Air-Bender and My Hero Academia, but it wasn't until this last winter that I had the sudden epiphany that these two would make an amazing cross-over. To those of you that wandered over here from my Unexpected Heroes story, this is, sadly, not part of that cross-over universe. Also I am sorry that I have not update that story in a long time, a lot happened recently and by the time I was motivated to write school had started and I really wanted to get this story out. To everyone else, check out my story Unexpected Heroes if you are interested in a Legend of Zelda based cross-over that includes several other gaming/anime franchises.
Well, I had a lot of fun writing this chapter, and I'm so excited about writing the next one. Before you ask. No, this is not going to be a mega harem. I won't say any more than that, but I just wanted to clear that up before I get any angry messages. Please stay tuned for the continuation of Avatar Katashi's journey to become the greatest hero and to redeem himself for his sins and his past reincarnations' sins against humanity! Reviews are very welcome as they tell me how you guys liked it and how I should continue. Follow and favourite in order to receive updates as soon as possible!
~Grandmaster Robin~